Sneaky Camera

Reed hates having his picture taken. He is such a punk but when I noticed them sitting like this a few weeks ago, I couldn't resist sneaking a photo.

Then Reed saw me.

Get used to it Bud. The camera and I aren't going away anytime soon.

Christmas Came Early

I've had my eye on a new bed for Millie for several months now. We finally decided to spend the money and call it an early Christmas gift.

Reed was excited as well because he got Millie's old bed. We were worried he wouldn't be ready to part with his fire truck bed but we talked about it with him and he wanted Millie's bed. He was a big help putting it together in his room.

Millie's new bed finally came together in her room after an extra trip to the furniture store when we realized the bottom bed was missing. Can I just say that I LOVE this bed. I would have loved this bed when I was little so I was very excited to see her getting excited about it as well.

I am glad we agreed that she had to sleep on the bottom bunk unless she has a guest (Mammy) spending the night. I want her on the bottom for 2 reasons 1)I don't want to have to try to change the sheets on the top bunk any more than is necessary and 2) I don't want her going up and down the ladder at night to turn her radio on which she does several times a night sometimes..
She finally decided the bottom was pretty cool when we got all her books on the shelf and put a lamp where she could reach it. It is super cozy under there and she was loving it tonight when we put her to bed.

Reed was excited to go to bed tonight as well. We still have some accessorizing to do in his room but he does have one little blue tractor getting the theme started off right.

Reed's a Riot

Reed is cracking me up lately with the silly things he says and the random times he says them. I will never remember half of them so I will be adding to this post if I think of more.

- When it is dark, he will say "It's like Boo Boo Choo Choo in here." Boo Boo Choo Choo is a short Thomas the Train song where it is dark and spooky and the trains are all scared of the dark.

- When he is on the potty pooping..."Mommy it stinks in here, get outta here!"

- When he is running through the house coming at me or toward the couch..."Incoming!"

- "I do bike race Mommy?" when he wants to go ride his bike.

- "Oh no, milk all gone? Go to grocery Mommy and get more milk? Let's go!"

- "I zoom my milk all gone fast" means he drank his milk real fast. This can also apply to bananas.

- "Let's play board games Mommy!" He loves board games right now. Sequence, Memory and Hi Ho Cherry-O are his favorites.

- "Ohhhh, these pants are comfy cozy.  I like these pants Mommy."

- Leaving the zoo on Tuesday, he was naming the animals he saw. He calls the elephants "Helephants". Then he kept asking "Else Mommy?" as in "What else did we see?". He also kept going on about how the Zebras were crazy and running around. They were pretty crazy that day.

- "No-ah Mommaaaa" He stared calling me Momma last week and it has really been bugging me. I finally figured out why it bothers me and it seems he only says Momma when he is whining about something. I think that is why it annoys me so much.

- "Pay Attention Meme(Millie)!" He would yell this at her during baseball games when she was outfield.

- "I watch Meme jump in swimming pool." He always says this when I get on the blog because there is a video of her jumping in the pool he likes to watch. Here

- "Oh, turn volcano off Mommy?" or "Oh, comes volcano on?" He calls the candle in the kitchen a volcano.

- All during mass "I can't see God Mommy!" He used to claim that he could see Him but now he claims that he can't. Interesting.

- "What you have Mommy? Have KitKat?" When he sees me raiding the Halloween candy.

- Every morning after Millie gets on the bus..."Where Meme go? Go school? I go school? I ride bus? {no Reed, not yet} I ride bus when I'm 5 Mommy? {yes} Oh, okay Mommy. {insert 3 second pause here} Where Meme go? School? I go school when I 5 Mommy." Sometimes I am convinced he is Ten Second Tom from 50 First Dates. Be warned, the video link is PG13.

- While driving..."Red light Mommy, haffy (rhymes with taffy - short for 'have to') stop. Oh, green light, haffy go!" At least we know now he isn't color blind.

Carving Pumpkins

We have never carved a pumpkin before but on Halloween morning, we decided we wanted to try it. Millie picked out a pattern and then her and I took push pins and transferred the image to the pumpkin with LOTS of tiny holes.

Then it was Rick's turn to get out the power tools and go to work. He kept praising Millie on what a wonderful and intricate pattern she picked out. He only had 3 small mistakes where he slipped and cut through something he wasn't supposed to. I took the push pins and made a few props to help it keep it's shape.

I think it turned out great but I knew what it was to start with so I think that makes it easy. Can you tell what it is?

Halloween

Probably my least favorite "Holiday" but I put on a happy face for the kids. This was Reed's first year to trick-or-treat. He went last year as a football player but we just carried him around and he didn't get candy nor did he really know what was going on. He still didn't really know what was going on this year but he did figure out that if he yelled out Happy Halloween and opened his bag, someone put something in it. I guess that's really all you have to know anyway.

We started off by going to our Church's Halloween Party which I love! They have few game booths where the kids do a little game and get a prize. They have a cookout with hot dogs, chips, cookies and hot chocolate. After that they have a costume parade and have little stops where they get to get more treats.

The kazoo was by far Millie's favorite thing. Today she was walking around the house singing/playing Iron Man by Black Sabbath on it. I would take bets that may be the first time Iron Man has been played on a Kazoo but I may be wrong.

After church we went to just a few neighbor's houses but Millie wanted to hurry back to pass out our own candy. Her and Reed both had a blast and handing out the candy was by far the highlight of their evening.

Boys and Girls...Come Get a Treat...They're Free!!!

Millie was more excited about handing out candy than she was about trick-or-treating. That suited me just fine because I don't let the kids have many sweets anyway. She did this for about an hour. She kept asking me why she didn't have much business at her house. Once she had to take a break and run inside and she told me to make sure I watched her business and to keep track of all of her customers.

Thankful for Amelia

Thankful for Amelia

Our oldest child, what can we say?

We love you more each and every day.

We love your smile and bright blue eyes

But it breaks our heart when we see you cry.

We are all amazed at every turn

To see how well and fast you learn.

Reading, writing, arithmetic

Just like glue it simply seems to stick.

Your athletic skills we always witness

You dominate the court at tennis.

Gymnastics, soccer, basketball,

Baseball, dance you’ve done it all.

But most of all we have to agree

Our favorite thing about Millie

Is your precious heart and loving ways

And the way you remind us all to pray.

God chose us to take care of you

And that is something we plan to do.

You, us and your little brother Reed

Complete our caring, faithful and loving family.

Love, Mom and Dad

Ijams Nature Center

Rick and I wanted to take the kids for a little hike this weekend since the trees are beautiful right now. I didn't feel like driving all the way to the Smokies so I suggested we go to Ijams Nature Center. Neither of us had been there but I knew it a had a few trials so we agreed that that sounded like a good idea.

It turned out to be a great idea because we only had to drive about 15 minutes instead of over an hour, there were plenty of trails to make Rick happy, lots of pretty trees to make me happy and plenty of sticks to make Millie and Reed happy.

Reed found his favorite stick and kept saying things like "Here, hold my stick", "Oh no, I lost my stick", "Oh, my stick broke", and "Oh, now I have 2 sticks". But, his 'st' sound is more of a 'd' sound so needless to say Rick and I were cracking up listing to Reed go on and on about his 'st'ick for several hours. We are childish, I know.

Pumpkin Festival

Last weekend we were all in Indiana for Millie's fall break and it worked out that we were able to attend the first annual Pumpkin Festival at a local Catholic Church in the Knobs after we watched Jacob's soccer game that morning. Millie, Reed and Jacob all enjoyed riding the horses, having their faces painted, decorating pumpkins for the contest (which my mom won) and bouncing in the bounce house.

Reed's ABC's

Here is Reed's rendition of the ABC song.  He was just a little wild and as you can tell by my appearance I was settled in and ready to lounge while watching the UT game.  Millie was already in bed because she was a brat all day so she went to be early.  The past few days she has developed a bad attitude and has not been obeying us very well.  We intended to snap this back into shape before it gets out of control.