Modesty, it's that thought that counts

So my girl was trying on clothes.

A skirt to be exact.

She came in the room to model it with nothing else on.

I told her it fit just fine but that ladies wear shirts around the house to keep themselves modest.

She smiled at me and said, "Don't worry Mom, I'll keep myself modest on the way back to my room."

And then she took both of her hands and very carefully covered her belly button with them and ran all the way back to her room.


Great. It seems we've got a lot to discuss.

Not. Going. According. To Plan.

My favorite part of the A-Team was when Hannibal used to , "I love it when a plan comes together".

My problem is that mine is not.

The plan: eradicate and relocate the murdering vermin who sabotaged my attempts to have beautiful flowers growing in my yard. They reduced my pansies and various other blooming plants from this......

To This........

Plan A: While my parents were visiting, my dad built a rabbit trap with the help of the kids. Or maybe in spite of the kids.

The day after my parents left, the kids ran in screaming, "WE CAUGHT A RABBIT, WE CAUGHT A RABBIT!!!!!!".

They said they were playing in the backyard when they heard the door slam shut. So I went out to check. I stood the rabbit trap on it's end and with 3 excited children surrounding me, I carefully pulled open the door.

No rabbit.

We tried to use different baits but we never caught one. The kids really wanted to pull up some of my pansies as they felt this would be a sure-fire way to lure the rabbit in. Unfortunately, most of the pansies had been eaten to the ground by this point.

Plan B: The rabbits really aren't that fast. Somehow, natural selection has overlooked our neighborhood because of the apparent lack of predators. There are literally several rabbits per house. They all come out in the evenings. My kids really thought they had a chance to catch one. So they spent all their free time with their butterfly nets trapping rabbits in bushes, only to have them narrowly escape.

The Problem: They ran in last week screaming "WE CAUGHT A RABBIT, WE CAUGHT A RABBIT, GET A BOX, GET A BOX!!!!!" They actually did catch a rabbit. The only problem was it was a baby rabbit. And the problem with that is that where there is one baby rabbit.... there are sure to be more.

I was contemplating my options when the informative neighbor kid said, "Don't give him to the humane society... they'll kill him! And don't take him and turn him loose in the park, the coyotes or a hawk will eat him! He'll be safest right here in your backyard".

Great.

Thankyouverymuch for that.

By that time, my daughter was smitten by the pansy-eater. She asked if she could keep him as a pet and let him live in her room. (and yes, she is sitting in a dump truck)

We let the kids keep him in a box and look at him until after supper. We really wanted to send him on his merry way but decided that he really was too young to be separated from his mother.

Who was apparently still living in our yard.

With her brood.

So we let him go.

They have since caught 3 other baby rabbits which have all been released back into their natural habitat. (which would be our yard)

But I am still in a quandary because I DON'T WANT RABBITS IN MY YARD! The kids have so much fun chasing them that I actually wouldn't mind their presence if they didn't eat all my flowers and kill the grass wherever they left their pellets.

I'm considering ordering some fox urine powder or maybe even trying moth balls. I was also planning on having a garden this year and using fox urine around my vegetables is just not that appealing. There are several products out there to try but I hate to spend money on something that doesn't work.

Anyone have any suggestions?

Or brilliant ideas?

Because this is me, needing some brilliant suggestions.

And no, a dog is not an option at this point. But thanks for asking.

Randomness

I was tagged by Mrs. Troop to tell 7 random things about myself.

So, um, here they are.

1. I adore playing music. I can play several instruments including the piano, oboe (college orchestra), bass drum (high school marching band), tenor sax (college jazz band) and flute if absolutely necessary. I've recently started playing the violin (I use the term "playing" very loosely). I really enjoy it and can play several songs and several hoedowns with my Grandpa and Mom who also play the violin. Although I'm pretty sure my Grandpa would say that he plays the fiddle. I've attempted to play both the guitar and the banjo but I just never really got it.

2. My brother and my husband have the same first name. Which is odd. But not as odd as the time I was dating my husband (obviously before he was my husband) and my brother was dating a girl with my same name. That was really odd. And I must say that I adore the girl he married who does not share my same name.

3. I love to play games. Especially nerts. It's a card game that I learned at college. On my hall we would all be in our rooms studying and then someone would yell down the hall "NERTS BREAK!!!!" and we would all grab our deck of cards and go play a couple hands for a study break. I am always up for a game of nerts.

4. I collect daylilies. The actual plant. I have about 34 varieties and around 300 plants total. Which is really only a problem when it comes time to move.

5. We've moved 3 times in the last 4 years.

6. My brother and sister and I used to all ski slalom together. Those were good times. We would do all sorts of tricks. It was great fun. 7. I know the Order that most insects belong to. It's nerdy and quirky, I know. It's because my college Zoology professor was an Entomologist and we had to do an insect collection and have 12 orders and 100 insects. After that much quality time with all those insects it was just kind of hard not to remember facts about them. I passed this on to my children this last summer when we studied insects. It's rather amusing when my 4 year old tells a neighbor that the butterfly they just found is in the Order Lepidoptera or not to step in the ant pile because ants are in the Order Hymenoptera and we don't like insects in Hymenoptera because they sting. How's THAT for randomness.

Okay, so that's it for all my randomness.

So I'm going to tag my sister Good Life Girl, my friend Laura J. and my best Georgian friend Georgia Mom, to tell us 7 Random things about them.

Good luck with that.

Much Excitement Still Abounds

So that you do not become concerned that a lack of posts equals no excitement, I submit this picture.


These little guys have given us much excitement.

The first day we saw one, I was vacuuming the living room and saw something small and agile scrurry across the floor.

I promptly yelled.

My 5 year old does a fairly good impression of the event.

We tried to capture him and actually had him cornered when he proceeded to crawl up the wall.

That was exciting.

He was finally captured and was in captivity for about 12.5 minutes before his tail was parted from his body.

We felt terrible but could actually see how this tactic could work in the wild as all 3 of our children were absolutely fascinated with the wiggling tail and completely forgot about the creature it formerly belonged to.

We released him to the wild but fear not for the extinction of his kind because since we have moved in, my 4 year old daughter has successfully captured and de-tailed 5 of them. The last one she actually had in a basket for about 2 hours before his tail came off.

I believe we are making progress.

(Only the first one was found in our home, thankfully. The rest have been found in the garage and in the back or front yard.)

**We believe these are Mediterranean Geckos. If you know what they are for sure, please let us know. And I'm sure you will be much relieved to know that one was held in captivity for several hours yesterday and released back into his natural habitat (which is apparently our back porch) with his entire tail intact.

*** And I'm also sure you will find much relief in knowing that their tails do grow back. Which is what they need to keep predators distracted from eating them. But I'm pretty sure that their only local predator is a 4 year old-blue-eyed girl. And she hasn't eaten one yet.

and that's what broke baby bird's balloon.

So, my husband was supposed to be home around midnight on Thursday. He called and said his flight was postponed a couple hours and that he should instead be home around 3:00am. And then he added that I should go ahead and try to rest and also, since this was a late flight and there was bad weather that should he die that I should not close on the house in Texas but instead take the equity and move back near my parents.

I slept like a baby after that.

Oh, I jest.

I actually stayed up and waited for him because that is what I always do. And by the time he got home at 3:20 am I had his funeral completely planned including the minister (T. Elliff), the songs(I was hoping I could get Steven Curtis Chapman to come in person and sing a few) and a couple of his friends who I would ask to say something nice about him.

I'm serious.

So we were pretty exhausted come Friday morning. He had to leave around 7:30 that night for a flight to New Orleans so we tried to spend quality time with him that day. And, of note, my son lost a tooth. This is important later on in the story.

So, about an hour after my husband got to the airport, they announced his flight was delayed. I'm sure he was shocked. Okay, so maybe not so much. But it was really late when he boarded the plane and I'm just sure I asked him to call me when he got in. Since I had taken a benadryl around 8:00, I was able to drift off to sleep in an effort to rest a bit until he got in. I woke up around 1:00am and realized he had not called yet. I called him and it went directly to voice mail which it usually does when he is in flight.

So I went back to sleep.

Around 3:00am my daughter came in because she was having a bad dream. At least she said she was. She seems to only conveniently have these when her daddy is gone and she thinks there is a chance I'll let her sleep on his side.

And it usually works.

So at that point I realized that he had not called. I figured either his plane had crashed and he couldn't call or that he was exhausted when he got in and didn't call. I figured I couldn't change anything by calling him except to wake him up.

So I didn't.

But I lay there and contemplated his death once again to the point that I decided at 4:00 am I must call him.

And so I did.

He was just fine but said didn't call because he didn't want to wake me up. Very sweet, but he didn't know I was anxiously awaiting his call. So all was good and I finally went back to sleep.

5:55am cue son, who had lost his tooth. He was distraught because his tooth was gone and the tooth fairy didn't leave him a gold dollar.

Darn that tooth fairy! She was so tired she forgot all about the tooth under his pillow.

And he wouldn't let it go. He wanted answers right then. Why would the tooth fairy take his tooth and not leave him anything? Why? Why? Why?

All my pleading for him to go back to bed and mama will deal with it in the morning would not work. So I dragged my drug laden body out of bed and went to investigate the Great Tooth Fairy Mystery of North Georgia.

Fortunately I found the tooth on the floor. I explained that the tooth fairy must have not been able to find the tooth. I proposed that we put the tooth in an envelope and try again Saturday night. He was placated and we both agreed we should try to stay in bed until at least 7:00am.

So on Saturday night I had two goals.
1) Get that tooth and exchange it for a gold dollar (that's what we call the dollar coins).
2) Get at least 6 hours of consecutive sleep.

At 10:30 I went to bed (was waiting on my husband's phone call after his conference) with a good 2 hour head start from the benadryl.

I had a good feeling about that night and I went right to sleep.

2:00 am - cue daughter with "bad dreams". I heard her start to cry but was hopeful (in my drug induced state) that she would go on back to sleep. It was no good. I heard the crying get louder which meant it was coming for me. I was so tired that I readily agreed that the best place for her was on daddy's side of the bed. Problem solved, back to sleep.

4:00 am - cue middle son with "bad dreams". I heard him start to cry and he actually cries out, "mommmmy...... mommmmy......". I give it a couple minutes because by this time I'm so tired, I'm just not for sure I'm going to make it. And then I hear it getting louder. Yes, that's right. He was coming for me.

So I hopped out of bed and was greeted by not one, but two boys. I ask the oldest what he is doing and he says "I'm not staying in there if he's not staying in there." I do the mental math and figure out that with 3 children in my bed, I'm likely to end up on the couch. And I like my bed. It has one of those foam toppers on it.

So I made my decision. All the boys back to their room. I wrapped up the middle child and lay down beside him and asked him about his dream. He said he dreamed that his brother locked him up in jail. We had just been reading about Joseph so I could see where this would have come from. But still, not the worst dream I could think of.

He was just starting to settle down and almost asleep when my oldest discovered that the tooth fairy had come. He had to get up right then (4:30am) and put his coin with the other two he was saving.

Are you kidding me? Go to sleep child!!!

After several minutes of searching and not finding his secret stash of coins, I convinced him to go back to sleep and we would find it in the morning.

It took a little longer to get middle child settled down and he had just gone to sleep when I heard from my room..... MOMMY!!!!!!!!!!!!

Good grief!

She's going to wake the other two.

And then she gets louder and suddenly she is standing in the middle of the boys' room. MOMMMMMYY I can't sleep without you!!!!

I finally got her back to my bed and everyone settled in around 4:45 am.

And which point I felt like I was trapped in the B Book by the Berenstains'. You know the one that starts out with ..

Big.

Big Brown.

Big Brown Bear, Blue Bull, Beautiful Baboon, blowing bubbles biking backwards, bump black bug's banana boxes and Billy Bunny's breadbasket and Brother Bob's baseball bus and Buster Beagle's banjo-bagpipe-bugle band.....

....and that's what broke Baby Bird's balloon.


Yep, that's exactly how I felt.


I'm thinking about giving everyone benadryl tonight.


Just kidding. Or maybe not.


So is it just me? Or does anyone else have nights on end where sleep is elusive? If not, what is your trick? Desperate minds want (need) to know.

The Gospel

I'm not for sure what to say about this really except this is the first time anyone of my family members has been featured in a YouTube video.

I'm not for sure this is in line with the demographics of my blog readership but it's fun so I'm puttin it on anyways. (It does kind of make my stomach hurt, though)

My sister and brother in law work with the youth ministry in their church and my B-I-L and another youth worker made some crazy videos featuring the focus of a recent youth retreat which was the GOSPEL.

The man who married my beautiful sister is Eric, the one in the white shirt.
He's a great guy and we love him.

And we still do.

How frugal are YOU?

As I was doing laundry today, I realized we are just about out of laundry soap so I've been skimping a little on each load and it reminded me of a time when we were first married,.... and we were doing laundry with a washer that my husband bought in McAlester, Oklahoma for $35....... it was just this side of being a fossil..... and he was very frugal... and I was washing a load of laundry......


He said (as I was getting ready to pour in the detergent): I only fill the cap about 3/4 full.

I wasn't going to let him win so I replied: Well, I usually only fill the cap about 1/2 full.

He replied: Well, actually, I usually only fill the cap about 1/4 full.

I replied: Well, I actually stop the washer before the rinse cycle and take out a couple soapy towels to throw in the next load instead of using more soap.

He came back with: Well, I don't rinse the soap off my hair in the shower, I just wipe it all off with a towel and throw the soapy towel in with a load.

(at this point I was laughing so hard I was crying,.... and I just couldn't think of anything that would be more frugal than that..)

So He won.

And I just thought I would share.

Where Are My Super Sleuth Skills When I Need Them?

So while I was fixing supper, my 5 y/0 runs down carrying a metal measuring tape with blood all over it and there is blood all over his hands and he is crying, telling me he cut himself. So I clean him up, all the while looking for this gash that has caused all this blood. I ask him where it hurts and he points to a bloody place and I wipe it and nothing... Soon both of his hands are clean, no cuts and no blood anywhere else...

So what do I do? At this point my Nancy Drew skills should have kicked in and I should have called Bess and George and got to the bottom of the Bloody Hand Caper. But no, I have a headache, I am cooking supper, and I am just relieved that he in fact did not have a cut on his hand. What was I thinking? I guess I was thinking that if someone else had gotten cut, they would have been lined up right beside my 5 y/0 so I could fix them too.

Ten minutes later, my 3 y/o comes down stairs crying because she can't find something. That is when I notice both of her hands are covered in blood! For ten minutes she has been running around the house covered in blood and obviously not bothered by the cut or the fact that she is staining everything she touches (you can tell where my concerns are! ha!). Of course, once I mention that we need to clean her up and that she might need a band-aid, well she was completely convinced she was mortally wounded. Because the girl LOVES band-aids. So she ended up with 3 band-aids and I spent the next 20 minutes going around the house cleaning up blood.

Nancy Drew must have been getting enough sleep at night.

And that's all I have to say.

I'm a sucker for praise.... apparently

So for dessert tonight I was dishing up ice cream for the kids when...

6 y/0: That ice cream looks really good. If only it had sprinkles on it, you would be the best mom in the whole wide world.

So I know that is blatant flattery.... obviously... but I'm at the point where being the best at anything would be just great and if being the best mom in the whole wide world just for the next 5 minutes was my only reward.... well.... by golly... I gave that boy and his siblings sprinkles....every color sprinkle and then topped it with cool whip......and for the next several minutes I basked in the glory of being the best mom in the whole wide world.

Funny Things They Said

Well, it snowed here in Georgia on Wednesday and they are saying it will snow again tonight and tomorrow. When I told the kids, my 6 y/0 said...

6 y/0: Mom, when we moved to Georgia, you and daddy told us it wouldn't snow here.
(he is my bringer of truth)
Me: Yep, that's right. It is very atypical for it to snow here.
6 y/0: Well mom, it's just God's plan.
(right you are child)

The other night at AWANA Cubbies our verse was "When they saw the star, they were overjoyed." Well, my 5 y/o just got a turntable to go with his Thomas trains and apparently he has wanted one his whole entire life because he has played with it every minute of the day since he got it. Last night, once I finally wrestled it from him and tucked him in bed he started sobbing.

5 y/o : (sobbing in bed)
Me: Baby, what's wrong?
5 y/o: Mommy, I'm overjoyed.... (more sobbing)
(I'm not for sure he totally understood the meaning)


Tonight at supper.

6 y/0: Mom, I'm going to be a Juicitarian.
Me: A what?
6 y/o: A Juicitarian.... I'm only going to eat juice... get it?
(oh my, it's going to be a loooong weekend!)


5 y/o: I'm SO hungry
Me: Babe, you have your sandwhich, why aren't you eating?
5 y/0: Because I'm waiting for the hostess to sit down.
(my, my, my,.... what a sweet and intelligent boy!)

And my 3 y/0, my dear sweet 3 y/o.... in a 5 minute span of time, she asked me no less than 30 questions! I KID NOT! How is that even possible?

Other random comments....

6 y/0: Mom, why does this flyer for Thomas trains show trains that we have but it says they are new?
Me: Well, they probably printed it a long time ago when they were new but they are still using the flyers.
6 y/o: You mean like when the Old Testament was written?


5 y/o: Mom, are you thinking what I'm thinking?
(this is a frequently asked question and I have not once been thinking what he was thinking)

It's a great life, verbally complicated, but great

Overheard At the Table

We had the girls across the street over to play for the day last week. This was the conversation overheard at the table during lunch.

(3rd grade neighbor): Our next door neighbors are moving.
(mine in 1st): We're moving to Texas.
(K neighbor) : Everybody moves to Texas.
(1st): My daddy says they don't need as much help at his job here anymore but they need more help in Texas.
(My 4 y/o) : It's windy in Texas! (how would he know this?)
(My 3 y/0): Yee Haw Yippee ki yo... Texas here I come.......
(1st): The best part about it is that my mom says that she has always wanted to live in Texas her WHOLE ENTIRE LIFE!!!
(as I am choking on my drink.....)
(1st): Isn't' that right mom?
(still choking.... remembering that I did indeed say something to that fact to try and get everyone excited about the imminent move.......)
Me: Yes, that's right. I am very excited. It will be a great place to live! (yippee ki yo)

Almond Joy

I think

I might

make that

the new title

of my blog because

....... sometimes I feel like a nut.

Venit, Vidit, Absentis

They Came, They Saw, They Left

They Came

at 11:00 am Sunday morning to see the house.

They called at 10:00am Sunday morning to say they were coming.

Who comes to see a house on Sunday morning?!?

Don't they know it's all some people can do to get

their kids fed and dressed, their hair done, their coats on

and out the door on Sunday mornings?

Why, oh why would they call Sunday morning

an hour before they come by?

They Saw

the house in disarray.

Oh yes they did.

We did not know they were coming.

The kids beds were unmade.

The doors to the rooms in the basement were locked.

The house was clean (swept, vacuumed) but not

entirely picked up.

Not "Southern Living could come take pictures

of my house clean".

I'm sure the tinker toy parts in the

front entry way tipped them off

to the fact that they were not expected.

I'm sure they were impressed.

They Left

We did not hear back from them.

Their loss.

Our house cleans up real well.

I promise!

To See If She Could

So, I am fixing lunch. My 3 year old daughter who is somewhere on the other side of the kitchen says, "Mom, look at me!".

My spidey senses kick in as I turn around in slow motion.

She has a glass jar full olives and olive juice......

balancing.........

....on her head!

My 3 YEAR OLD!

After I recovered from passing out on the floor I immediately used every ounce of self control not to yell "WHAT ARE YOU DOING!!!!! PUT THAT DOWN IMMEDIATELY!" because in a moment of clarity and surprising sanity I realized I might scare her and she might actually drop the thing. So instead, I said "wow" in my happy voice and with lightening quick speed I closed the distance between the two of us and snatched the jar from her head. And THEN once all was safe and danger was averted I let her know that she is never again in this life time and under no circumstances ever again allowed to try that stunt again.

Amen.

Things That Make You Go....... Hmmmmmm

Friday, my husband decided to put these cool toilet bowl cleaner things in the tank so they are always smelling nice and fresh.

And blue.

Today, my 4 year old son ran into our room and said "I need to use your bathroom, the water in my toilet is blue".

(sidenote here: ALL the water in ALL the toilets in our house has been blue since FRIDAY)

My husband then replies "All the toilets have blue water. It's supposed to be that way. You can use your own toilet."

My son runs out of our room shouting "Yippeee, we can use the toilets! The water is supposed to be blue! Yippeee!"

So WHAT has he been doing?

Hmmmmmm.