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

Christmas 2006

Oh yeah...you knew it was coming...Christmas....it is finally here. We had a lovely Christmas season, complete with a new tree and new ornaments. Enjoy...

To Be Continued......

God Bless,

Malia

Oz

This is something I had to do for work last October. The theme was enchanted fairytale land. I actually had customers come up to me and ask if I professionally painted murals. Not bad, huh?

God bless,

malia

Cola

About two months ago my brother and his finace' got engaged! I tell you, it is wedding central around here! Congratulations to Coleman and Karla, better known as Cola!

God Bless,

Malia

Jackson Journals

In his class, Jackson is apparently required to journal every day. I think they give him a sentence and he is supposed to try and write that sentence and draw a picture to match it. We got his journal thus far at the end of the last nine weeks. We were flipping through it when we noticed a particularly funny sentence that we are sure the teacher's didn't give him. I could not contain my laughter at what the teacher's thought when they read his journal and was quite surprised they didn't put some kind of smiley face or something on the paper. Without further ado....here is Jackson's sentence: "I can see a tent."

Thank God his picture showed that he really did understand the sentence, just not the spelling.

God Bless,

Malia

Thank Heaven for Big Brothers

Not long ago, we were all fixing to eat supper and we were all discussing who was going to say the blessing that particular evening. We all decided it was Jackson's turn to say the blessing, so we all bow our heads and listen. .....he thanks God for the trees, the house, our beds, etc. As we tune into Jackson's voice, we keep hearing this little distracting whisper. Wade and I break the rules and open our eyes and lift our heads and look at each other. We realize it is coming from Dylan's direction and change our focus to his voice, instead of Jackson's. As Jackson is now on "thank you for the animals, thank you for the car, thank you for my toys....Dylan is diligently tring to remind him under his breath....."Thank you for my brother....thank you for my brother....thank you for my brother!"

Thank you God for both of those precious boys.

God Bless,

Malia

Ring Bear

My sister is getting married this weekend and she is going to be the most gorgeous bride EVAH! I mean, just look at her.....

This is us, trying on dresses. She is the one with the great curves (and the bad tanlines) on the right. So, here we are, with our hair not professionally done, actually they are in rubberbands provided to us by the sales girl, she is all natural, she loves her freckles and barely puts on a coat of powder and she is still gorgeous, inside and out. She is a great person and is going to make a wonderful wife and life partner.

Now, this post is actually about Jackson. He was asked to be the ring bearer in their wedding. Well, actually, I told him he was going to be the ring bearer.

Jackson and I were discussing the fact that we had to go get him fitted for his tux one night at supper. He asked what a tux was and I explained that it was the suit he had to wear in order to be the ring bearer in Auntie Erin and Stinky Joseph's wedding.

Well, we went on about our supper business and were on another subject when Jackson looks up at me all sad. I said, "What is it Jackson?"

Jackson says in a very sad and tearful whisper, "Mom, does the ring bearer have to wear a bear costume?"

God love his little heart.....many pictures of this weekend to follow.......some time next year!

God Bless,

Malia

We Are Decent Parents

Although we did have Emma's official party on Thanksgiving Day, we did have a small party at home on her actual birthday too. Complete with a cake made by Dad, (isn't he sweet?) and presents. Oh yea, and lots of love for our Emma!

God Bless,
Malia

Still Catching You Up

This year...scratch that...last year, we had Emma's birthday and Thanksgiving on the same day. See, she was born on the 19th and come on, ya'll know how hard it is to get everyone together. Okay, I have been threatened to NEVER do that to my daughter again...and I won't...okay Melissa, I promise.

Never theless...that is what we did. Well, for Christmas, my aunt and uncle's present to my grandmother was a trip to Hawaii, a place she had never been. So my mother decided to get her a going away present and made sure it fit before she left. So, here are some pictures of the day. Enjoy!

God bless,

Malia