Ass Up, Nose Down

Emma is obsessed with the smell of the floors. Let me back up. Emma loves to clean. While I know this is a great trait for my daughter to have, it does get annoying when she always wants to help, and really, she is going back behind me with the cleaner and streaking the windows. She does a great job of spraying the cleaner, a little too good. She doesn't do such a great job of wiping it.

Anyway, the new house has hardwood floors in the bedrooms. When we moved in, Danny brought us a professional buffer, some buffing pads and some floor cleaner and wax. Emma was in Heaven with all this good-smelling cleaning stuff. She takes after me. I am obsessed with smell. Every day now, or whenever she discovers the floor cleaner she wants to know if we can clean the carpets/floors. I will of course tell her no, that we don't need to. She is still little and quite flexible and she will immediately bend her body in half, ass in the air, nose to the floor and proclaim, "We NEED to clean them! The floors smell bad!" She is my little floor police. Don't worry ladies, I will warn you before we come to your house, so you can whip out your Febreeze.

Malia

There is Hair on My Ice

Our icemaker is broken, so we have had to go back to the old fashioned ice trays.

Today, Emma had her first glass of juice with ice in it. Do any of you remember how the ice has these little formations on the inside? Well, Emma was telling me, "There is hair on my ice. There is hair on my ice."

"What?!", I say.

"See mom, there is hair on my ice."

I held it up to the light and sure enough there were little "hairs" all over here ice.

Funny.

Malia

Pancakes

I am having pancakes for breakfast. Pancakes are my absolute favorite breakfast food. They are being prepared by my husband. Those are the very best kind of pancakes.

Malia

He is Wonderful!

I want to go to church. I want my children to be brought up in the church. I struggle with learning the Bible to do this day, which I attribute to not being there every Sunday of my life. I was NOT brought up in the church. I was always a believer and was talked to about God, Heaven, Hell, The Holy Spirit, Jesus Christ...all of them.

I can't go every Sunday to my church because I have to work Sundays, not every Sunday, but a lot of them. Wade WILL NOT go to church without me, or at least that is what I thought. He is not social, as a matter of fact he has social anxiety disorder.

I have struggled with my children not being there very many Sundays for a while. I feel like a failure, like I am not bringing them up correctly or the way God intends for me to and would like me to.

The other day, at the Warehouse of Hope, I was talking to my journey group leader and asking her about ways my children could be more involved, not on Sundays. She pretty much didn't have any other options other than being a regular attender. I asked if anyone ever dropped thier children off at Sunday School and then came back and picked them up later. She looked at me as though I were crazy......My parents used to drop me off at Sunday school!

So, the only solution I could see, was to ask Wade to please, please, please, take them to church when I was at work.

Ya'll, with 0 resistance he replied, "Okay...if it is that important to you, I will take them, .......but only 3 out of 4 Sundays a month!"

Hey, I'll take it.

Thank you God!

malia

$6.90

Tonight we are having coleslaw with our supper. Being that I am off of work today, I do NOT want to go to work and pick up the cabbage needed to make it. Burger's Market is right next door to me. It is family owned and Christian based. They are closed on Sundays. They also have all of their plants 50% off right now. I have a new sunroom. I need plants.

For $6.90 I bought a green cabbage, a red cabbage, that he went into the back to find for me while I shopped around some more. I didn't even know it. I also bought a Wandering Jew...it's a plant....it is huge!

I like Burger's Market. I like suppporting small town businesses. I'll be back.

Malia

A Weekend

Ahhhh...a weekend off....just enough time to re.s...t......do laundry, unpack my room, unpack the boys' room, do the dishes, unpack the dining room, clean the bathroom..........

Malia

Hope

Dylan and I went and did something today that we had never done or even thought of doing before. We volunteered at Warehouse of Hope. Honestly, I had not known the place existed until last year. It is off a little side road and I guess it is not heavily advertised.

The place was packed! It was all kinds of noise and "excuse me's" walking down the hallway. Dylan and I were assigned to the clothes area. We went through two racks, marking down the old and highlighting the new.

Then we packaged beans...a type none of us could identify. We had fellowship while packaging beans...talking about the volunteer work we would be doing on Tuesday for a Home Makeover.

I didn't think Dylan enoyed it very much...he was complaining that his feet were hurting from working for so long....remember, most of us do eight hours per day on our feet.

We were talking on the way home and I asked him what he thought about it. I don't think that he is too sure what he thought about it. He said it was kind of fun, but he was tired from ALL the work he did. Please someone tell me that this is just how children react to these kinds of things that they can't understand. I plan to keep him in the good works and see how he feels in a couple of months.

Almost, home, he calls from the back, "Mom, I love you." Even he got nothing out of it...we at least got to spend quality time together.

Malia

Home Sweet Home

Finally...we are in...I am sitting at my computer, at my desk, in my den. We will sleep here for our first night. Our first home-cooked meal was...pizza...sad, I know, but I still don't know where my pots and pans are. I will let you know how the first night's rest goes....

Malia

Connected

I am finally going to have satellite hooked up today! Yeah!

I still won't have gas until Tuesday, which heats my water, so I will finally be able to shower after going three week without.....just kidding...I have showered, but I still won't have the heat until Tuesday.

I want to give a special praise out to my friend Kelli with an I, who has the diagnosis about the lump in her breast being benign and the pain under her arm, which she thought was connected, being nerve damage from the "McDonald's kid's meal reach", you know the one, "Here kids in the backseat, here is your drink,.... here is your toy,.... here is a napkin...." Love you Kelli. Thank you God for answered prayers.

Malia

One for the Underdog...er...Buffalo

I am not savvy, so I don't know how to paste the actual Utube movie here, but...I can give you the link, great, now the hyperlink thing isn't working and that makes me look dubm...anyway...here is the link...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LU8DDYz68kM. It is eight minutes long, but it has you hooked on every second. Feel good story of the day.

Malia

Potter Pooper

I haven't jumped on the bandwagon, I can't even see the dirt trail the bandwagon is leaving behind I am so far from the bandwagon.

It's not that I don't believe in Harry Potter or that I don't even like him...I am just not that into him. More power to the ones that love Harry, but I. just. don't.

They had a release party at work tonight. People came in pajamas, they stood in line to buy the books, they played trivia. I would have gotten every question wrong.

I kept hearing the question, "Are you coming to the party? Wha?! Why?!

Apparently....I'm weird.

Malia

Give a Little Bit...

I get E-mail daily from a website called Dailycandy.com. They send E-mails regarding cool stuff that you can buy, attend, or places to eat in your area of choice. It amazes me some of the places they tell you about and the prices of some of the items they feature, but nevertheless, they are always unique.

Today I got an E-mail that featured a t-shirt, which looked very thin, but it promoted saving the earth. The slogan on the shirt was "The earth has a fever, be the cure." I thought, "How cute and catchy, I might actually want one of those." It is made from organic material, ships in organic boxes and $ 2. 00 of the proceeds goes to a foundation for children growing up on a safe earth. I will check it out. I got to the link it gives to check out the price on the t-shirt, maybe $20 at the most.

The price pops up and all I can do is laugh out loud! $82.00! What amazes me is that they only give $2.00 to the charity! Sad! No, you won't be seeing this shirt on my back :(

malia

Sleeping in

All three of my children are out of the house....rare...but wonderful. I miss them...I do!, but I slept today until 12:00 p.m. It was great! I feel fully rested.

Now I have to go make up for the four hours I have missed in the day.

Malia

Nickparents

How sad is it when I walk into a room and see the t.v. and Nickelodeon is on, I turn my head and the only person in the room is my husband. He is tuned into Drake and Josh.

How sad is it that Drake and Josh is now on Tivo. Dylan and Jackson didn't add it to the Season pass...Wade did.

How sad is it when Dylan says to me this morning when he catches me watching Drake and Josh by myself, "Mom, that's pretty cool that you and dad like Drake and Josh."

How cool does it make Wade and I? Pretty darn cool!

Check these kids out, they are hilarious.

Malia

It's Raining!

I just had to shout it! That is two times in one day! Woo hoo!

Malia

A New Beginning

Just like the blog says, we have a new, new beginning...a house. Rachael has Chez Farmhouse, I have a house built in 1946. What should I call it? It has such character. It has curves and arched doorways, a sunroom, a den...and....a living room. There is enough room for all of us. We really like it. I would love to post pictures, but Blogger takes sooo long. I guess I need a lesson in patience. I will take some photos and get em posted. Meanwhile, you think of a name for my "Chez Farmhouse".

malia

Pictures....Through the Eyes of Children

I gave my children a small project...they get one shot, to take a picture of anything they wanted. They each decided in a matter of seconds, well, Dylan took a little longer, wanting to copy his brother, but mean 'ol me, I made him be creative and choose for himself. Here are the results....

Dylan: This is a Star Wars Trooper, I think that is the name of it, that he got last Christmas and just discovered while cleaning out his toy box. They, that would be the men of the family, Nathan, Ben, Pappy and Wade and then just Pappy and the boys, put this together a couple of weekends ago. When he took the shot, he declared, "Perfect!"

Jackson: He has always been the keeper of many things, almost always animals. He has tons of them, mostly very, very small. The small kind you saw the dad on t.v. stepping all over, doing the one foot hop in the middle of the night kind of small. Tons. of. them. It is appropriate that he chose to photograph his animals.

Emma: At first, she wanted to copy Jackson also, but I was mean to her too. I made her choose something else. She chose our new toads (I haven't told you about them yet). You can see this one in the middle there, it looks like a brown tard in the water. If I knew how, I would draw an arrow or circle it or something, but I am not that savvy. Hey, you are getting a post aren't you?

I thought they did rather well, don't you?

Malia

Ahhh....Summertime

....Is hot as Hell in Georgia!

Dylan receive an ant farm for Easter and we sent off for the ants that day. In May, I called because there were still no ants in our mailbox and the boy had been patiently waiting for more than the alloted three to six weeks.

I called Uncle Milton, but we couldn't seem to connect due to the different time zone. I believe that they are in California. Finally I got to talk to some one live and they assured us that the ants would arrive in two weeks.

Bless his heart, he waited...for another two weeks before asking if we could call Uncle Milton again. We were told that the ants had indeed shipped, but alas when the lady came back with the ship date, she informed us that a hold had been placed on our ants due to the weather in Georgia.

I inquired about what weather she was referring to since there had been no rain and certainly no snow in Georgia. We have only had pleasant weather for months now.

Uncle Milton's secretary said that there would be no ants shipped to Georgia until there was a 10-day forcast with 85 degree weather in it for Georgia.

"Son", I said, "it looks like your ants will arrive just in time for Thanksgiving dinner."

Malia

You're So Pretty

On the day of my sister's wedding Jackson was not the perfect, outgoing ring bearer that I had hoped he would be. As a matter of fact, right before walking down that aisle, the groom's sister comes to me and says, "Malia, can you talk to Jackson to reassure him that you are still here?" I go out of our little hiding spot and sure enough Jackson's little chin is just quivering. I talked to him a bit and promised him all kinds of things if he did really good.

After all was said and done, we had to walk out the front door and around the church to the fellowship hall. Well, Jackson just starts balling and saying something that I can't even understand. I ask him to repeat himself, but I still can't understand him. Finally I get down to his level in my orange dress and gold sparkling shoes and I said, "Jackson, what in the world is wrong with you?" Jackson says, "Isje thelwo youneco sooelle praeujwe!" I thought he was saying something about the prayer.

"What?! Jackson, stop crying, I can't understand you. I need to figure out what is wrong so I can help you."

Frustrated, he tells me a little bit louder, "I'm crying because you just look so PRETTY!"

Lord, you know how much I needed to hear that. As one of the biggest of the girls there it is hard to think you look pretty, but to my precious baby, I am always the prettiest.

I love you Jackson!

Malia

Elvis' Killer Burned

As Jackson and I were on our way to Carrollton for my sister's wedding, at least an hours drive, I asked him what he would like to listen to, the radio, Elvis or the MP3 player. Jackson asked if we were going to head to Tennessee to Elvis' house to hear him sing. I explained to him that this would be just an impossible feat because Elivs was indeed dead. Jackson, being a Scooby Doo fan and having seen the Scooby Doo movie about the Tennessee Bell Witch over 100 times for sure, announced that he knew exactly how Elvis had died since he lived in Tennessee.....The Bell Witch had killed him!!!

Malia