Three is Company!

I sit here thinking about how I should word this, but I guess I might as well just come out with it.  Brian and I are expecting little #3 in our family.  We're super excited, terrified too, but that's how life goes.  Our new addition is due to arrive on July 24th, 2011. 

So there you have it folks. 

To my little Girl....

....On her Second Birthday!

Can you believe it's already been 2 years since my little angel was born??  I can't!   She's still my little baby to me, but then again, she will probably always be mamma's little girl.  So her is a shout out for the little angel that brought such happiness to my heart and our family over these last two years.

Kenya,

Though the pregnancy was long and the labor not fun, I was thrilled to have gone through it to bring you into my life.  The night you were born was scary, and for a short span of time (10 minutes) we were nervous about how you would come into the world, but God blessed us with your safe entry into this world.  The moment you took your first breath was such a relieving and satisfying moment for me, to know that you were safe and well.  The placed you at the head of my bed so I may see you and tears streamed down both cheeks uncontrolled.  You were perfect and precious and I couldn't have asked for more. 

It was another 30 minutes before I was able to hold you, but when I was all stitched up and ready I took the first chance I could to sit up and just look at you, stare and marvel at the beautiful creation in my arms and how blessed I was to have you in my life.  

The last two years have brought all sorts of new experiences and discovers with a little girl.  You have quite the little attitude Missy, but mostly it's fun to see your little personality develop.  You love to be little miss boss, not something I'm sure is all that great, but we think it's absolutely adorable at the moment.  You love your brother and want nothing more than to be exactly like him, something he's not sure how to handle. 

Little miss Kenya, I'm just not sure what to do with you most days.  You are definitely a mixture of girly girl and tom boy.  Not sure how you ended up with that, but it's quite the interesting combo.  You usually don't want me to do your hair, but if I do it you have to have a bow, at least one.  But you love to run and get dirty, jump in leaves, play with trains and planes, and wrestle with your brother.  You can totally hold your own in nursery and you never let anyone pick on you.  No body messes with you, sometimes not even your own brother.  :)

There are days when I can see the teenage years coming on just too fast.  You point your finger at me and shouting at the top of your lungs in gibberish.  It's a frightening thought, but for now that is years away.  :) 

Not a week goes by that someone doesn't comment on how beautiful, cute, adorable, or amazing you are.  We hear it all the time from passersby at the store, the park, or just around while we are running errands.  You are a special little girl and everyone sees it. 

Happy birthday my little darling Kenya!  May your special day be bright and happy just like you!

Love,

Mom

Long Day

You know, yeserday was just one of those days.... it lasted forever!   The kids were being particularly quarrelsome and pulled every toy and book off the shelves in the play room.  It was so bad that I finally had to move the whole shelf and all the toys out of the room and away from the kids. 

During the middle of a project my sewing machine decided it wasn't going to work.  It gave me a frustrating 2 hours and then I got it working again. 

The dog came to the conclusion that my nice sandals were tasty and I found him chewing them to bits.

While at a friends I had to run home.  Brian had parked his car right in my blind spot so I started backing up with out realizing that his car was there.  CRUNCH!  At this point in time of the day all I could do was roll my eyes.  Thankfully there was only cosmetic damage done, nothing that will change the workings of the vehicles.  Brian just laughed at me. 

When I was getting ready to leave home and head back to my friends after picking stuff up I saw the mailbox tilted at a funny angle  After getting out of the car and checking it I found that someone had HIT our mailbox with their car and knocked it over.  It was pretty hashed with scratches down the side of it and it is now unstable and we'll have to fine someway to make it stable again. 

Like I said,  LONG DAY.  

It's ALL about FALL!

The leaves have begun to fall and so Brian headed out to rake them up.  He didn't get very far before the munchkins realized what he was doing and decided it would be fun to run and jump in the leaves.   That must be an ingrained child feature that every child is born with, because these kids needed NO help jumping and frolicking in that crunchy goodness. :)

Top left of this picture is where Ian ended up with some leaves in his mouth.  He wasn't too happy about that. 

Ian decided it would be fun to through leaves at me while I was playing with Kenya.  In the end it turned into a leaf throwing fight.  I'm not sure who won, but we were both covered in leaves.  :)

Final Contest Video

Well, here it is.  I picked this for my final contest video.  Guess it's just time to wait.  :)

Watch Kenya dancing in the bottom left corner of the video, she cracks me up.  Also, Ian knows the chorus to this song and jumped up to sing with me.  Too funny!  Love that little man!   He makes his departure memorable by acting like he is falling off the bench we were on.  Quite the little actor, that one is.  It took everything in me to not laugh at him when he did that because it was just too funny!

Trains, Planes and ....

.... Okay, maybe just Trains!

Aren't these two just darling??!!  They LOVE their trains.  Until last weekend it was the only toy they actually fought over.   Ian's really good at sharing his trains with Kenya but sometimes it just gets a little too tight in there.  Lucky for them we decided it's time to get Kenya her own set of Trains to play with.  (shh, it's for her birthday in 4 weeks.) 

I'm really excited to give her the set because I'm painting her set pink and then also giving the kids about 50 more pieces each for Christmas.  Imagine what they'll be able to create with that. :)  Ian's will be painted blue and Kenya's pink so that they can play separately or if they want to dream bigger they can combine them.  How fun, right?!

Airshow

Dobbins ARB hosted an Airshow to the residents of Georgia.  It was much fun to attend and best of all, FREE!   The kids love planes, so we figured it would be an exciting occasion for them. 

Here are the kids watching some of the smaller planes do stunts.  They really enjoyed that, but hated the sun in their eyes, so we spent a good portion of time blocking the sun.   

Kenya and I sitting in the C-5 aircraft.  That thing is MASSIVE.

Brian and Ian in the C-5. 

Brian and I really enjoy when the Jets do their stunts and fly-by's.  The kids, not so much.  We bought earplugs for the kids and they worked well, but Ian hates noise, so he buried his head in Brian's chest till the F-18 Rhino was done.  Kenya was fine as long as I was holding her.  I put her down when the jet wasn't near and she went about her business for a few seconds but came running back as soon as the jet came flying back.  It was quite hilarious!

By 1 pm the kids were done and ready to go.  Ian kept telling Brian, "Daddy, it's time to go home".  I think he knew if was nap time and was tired. :)  Brian I were reluctant to go because we really wanted to see the F-16 Blue Angels do their stunts, but knew that Ian wasn't gonna hold up much longer.  That sweet boy is so patient with us.  :)  As we were leaving we got to watch the Canadian Snowbirds (smaller planes but about 9 of them) do formation flying which is always fun to watch.  Maybe when the kids are older they'll enjoy it more.  :)

A Hero's Party

Ian's best friend, GaVen, had his 3rd birthday recently and we were all invited to his party.  His birthday falls in October and evidently that is reason enough to have a costume party.   The theme was heroes and Brian immediately came up with his "perfect" costume.  It cracked me up. 

I don't know if any of you remember the cartoon "Doug" but I do.  I loved it as a kid and this is where Brian pulled his costume from.  We decided that since Brian was going to be Quailman that Ian would have to be Quailboy.  :)  They looked AWESOME!  Kenya went as the cheerleader from the recent show "Heroes" since I already had her cheerleader outfit.  (See the red blood looking paint on the side of her head).  I of course went as Super mom, cause it was easy.  :)  I do have to say though, I'm pretty happy with the way the costumes turned out.  Brian and I came up with the design for the Quailman headbands and I mad them and the capes about 2 hours before we went to the party.  It's fun having a time crunch on a project sometimes. :)

Fall

Don't ya love it when you can look outside and see these beautiful colors?  What about that nice, clear, cool breeze that winds it's way through your open windows and around your house?  I sure LOVE it!  How 'bout you?

Atlanta Zoo

My friend had extra tickets to the Atlanta Zoo, so off to the Zoo we went.  The kids LOVED it!   Ian kept saying, "More animals" everytime we stopped for more than a couple of seconds.  He was too funny.

Look at my big kids looking at those strange birds.  I can't believe they are getting so big already. :(

Ian stuck his cute face in this Lion poster but I couldn't get Kenya to do it.  Ian was absolutely adorable though.  Makes for a really cute cat, don't ya think?

Kenya was in love with the little monkey's.  My friend, Angie, had to pry her away from the window just so I could get a picture.  She just kept watching the little lemurs so intently.  It cracked me up. 

It was a fun day with my little munchkins!



Annual Frogtown Trail Challange

I started October off with not only General Conference (Which sadly I heard very little of due to little ones) but I also ran my second annual Frogtown Challange. It's an awesome race that I enjoyed so much last year that I thought I would do again this year. I guess I just like getting down and dirty when I race. :)

This is 2010's tech shirt that I got after my race.

This is the beginning of the race.  There were three wonderful women ( a mother and two daughters) that I met before the run and hung out with until it was time.  I was on my own, so it was really great to have someone so kind to chat with while we all waited. 

Just some of the fun stuff we ran through.  I actually slipped on a rock right as they took this picture.  Luckily I caught myself and didn't end up soaked to the bone.

Coming in at the finish line I was actually a little disappointed.  While I was running the trail I kept thinking how good I felt and good I thought I was doing.  I kept telling myself that I was gonna come in at a better time than last year but when I crossed the finish line I was 2 minutes later.  Come to find out that they added .35 miles to the trail that we didn't have last year.  So I actually didn't do too bad at all.  :)  Race stats are below.  I came in 120 out of about 350 runners who rane the 4 mile trail.  I felt that wasn't too bad.  :)



Make it a VOTE

Hey Ya'll!  I'm trying to figure out which song is best to submit for a contest this week.   I have to submit by Friday so help me decided which one to polish and send!

#1: Vanilla Twilight by Owl City

n#2:  Fallin For You by Colbie Caillat

 

#3:  Stuck Like Glue by Sugarland

Tell me what ya think!

Six Flags Over Georgia

We got the AWESOME opportunity to go to Six Flags on a Friday night.  The company Brian works for bought the entire park for their employees and friends and we were able to buy tickets at a reduced price.  It was great!!!  Brian was giddy as a school boy and oh so excited that he was rushing me the whole day.  :) 

I on the other hand was completely terrified of the idea of getting on a roller coaster.  It had been so long and I've changed a lot since I last went on one, I just wasn't sure I wanted to be riding roller coasters.

So we arrived at the park at 6:15 pm (the company had booked the park from 6pm - midnight just for the employees, family and friends - so NO LINES!!).  Brian ran right to the maps and was looking for the first coaster he could jump on.  He was pretty unhappy when it took us a good couple of minutes to FIND the first coaster.  When we did find it we jumped right on and I started to freak out.  He was stoked and I was terrified.  He kept asking me if I was okay, if I was gonna make it.  After we got off the ride he was sure I was gonna have a miserable night.  I was so scared.  I actually had tears streaming down my face (those hormones gone wild after having kids).  But I convinced myself to do just one more and then I would stop and just watch him if I didn't like it. 

Well, we headed off to Gotham City to ride "Batman".  It's one of those coasters that you are harnessed into cause you hang from the top.  Again I was sooooo scared.  But after the ride was over, I was hooked.  I LOVED it!   That's when we started running around to every coaster we could find.  The adrenaline rush was just AWESOME!  In fact I went on 8 different roller coasters that day and did 6 of them twice! 

I felt so bad for Brian though, he got a little stomach sick after about 6 rides and had to slow down.  He did make it through every coaster, but only just.  We had a BLAST (or I did and Brian enjoyed it). 

Our friends joined us at the park after about a half hour and we really enjoyed spending the night with them.  They are such fun people and cute too.  Check out their pic below.

Courtney and Brad were a blast to hang out with.  It's always funner with a large group!!!

Some of my favorite rides were Goliath (a 225 foot drop coaster that had my stomach in my throat for most of it - but hey,  I loved this one even though it was the one I was most terrified of.  They had to convince me to ride it), Superman (they harnessed you in to this one so that when you were riding it you were face down looking at the grass and ground.  It felt like I was flying and it was AWESOME!!), Batman (I just love dangling from a harness :)) and Scorcher (we actually harnessed in STANDING UP for this one, so bizarre, but totally awesome). 

I will tell you though, if you are going to go to an amusement park...... avoid the old, rickety, wooden coasters.  They are TERRIBLE!!  I was in soooo much pain from those.  It bounced us around and was so uncomfortable, I was even hollering "OU OU OU" over and over again on one because it hurt so much!  Brian and our friends of course thought that his was hilarious and proceeded to tease me, but hey, I guess I deserved it.  I was the only one on the ride yelling in pain and not having fun.  :)  Let's just say my chiropracter wasn't too happy with those coasters either.  :) 

 

Us on a coaster.

It was terribly muggy and hot till about 10 pm, but it was the best date that Brian and I have had in a long time!   Thanks awesome hubby for making life a fun ride! 

Weight Loss Update

I had what I would call a monumental break through this morning!  I weighed in at 140.8 lbs!!!  Yeah!  I haven't been this weight in years!  Slowly but surly it is coming off.  Now lets see if I can hold onto it! :)

My Goofy Kids!

Ian cracks me up!   Today while eating lunch, Ian dropped a grape on the floor.   All of a sudden it was as if I was watching a scene from a movie where something of great value is falling from the sky and someone is diving for it in slow motion to catch it before it comes crashing to the ground.  Ian screamed "NO" at Comet (our dog) as he dove from his seat at the table to get his grape!  Too funny!  

After the kids took a bath the other night Ian came into Kenya's room while Brian and I were getting her ready for bed and promptly announced (while dressed in nothing but his bath towel, hoody on his head, towel wrapped around his waist) that "Daddy,  I CUTE!"  Brian and I both burst out laughing.  I of course told him "Yes Ian, you are adorable!" and his reply was "I not adroblble, I CUTE!" 

This Kid cracks me up on a daily basis.  What a comedian! 

This little video gives you an idea of what crazy things go on in our home.  The kids are so silly but I just LOVE all of it!

Here are some pics for your enjoyment.  The kids are getting so big!

                Haha!!! I know your secret                  CHEESE!!!

You may wonder why there are so many pictures of Kenya and not as many of Ian, but my little man has become a little camera shy lately.  Most times I try to turn the camera on him I get either his hand covering his face or a hand placed in the camera's way.  But I try and sneak a few in here and there. 

Exhibit A of Ian's hand in face (he really didn't want this pic taken.  He kept telling me "no mommy, no picture!"

The kids love eating out on the porch and when the sun is out and the air is perfect how can you deny these cute little munchkins much of anything? :)



P.S.  Because I never posted the video of the house that Brian made and I just found it on my computer (it truly was lost somewhere in the depths of the cyber world) I'm now posting it.  Hope you enjoy! :)

How To....

.... Spend $150 on Visiting Teaching (Proven Method)

Step 1:  Schedule the Visiting Teaching Appointment

Step 2:  Proceed to pick up Visiting Teaching companion

Step 3:  Car dies while halfway in VT companion's driveway and halfway in the street.  (No power to car at all.

Step 4:  Ask VT companion's hubby to help with it.

Step 5:  VT Companion's hubby jumps it and moves it to halfway in the neighbors driveway and halfway in the street. 

Step 6:  Forget Visiting Teaching all together and have companion take you to Wal Mart to get a new battery for car (8:45 pm).

Step 7:  Buy $56 Battery.

Step 8:  Return home so VT Companion's hubby can replace car battery.

Step 9:  Find out that the car door is locked and won't open without power.

Step 10:  Call a locksmith.

Step 11:  Locksmith costs $94.99 to pop open the car (takes a whoppin' 5 minutes to do).

Step 12:  Roll eyes, pay locksmith, leave car, got home to sleep and deal with it tomorrow (midnight).

Trust me, it's a proven method.  I set out to do my Visiting Teaching and ended up paying $150.  The postive side of the whole ordeal:  I got to spend about 4 hours with my best friend!  :)  Life is crazy, but not to worry, so am I.  :)



Bed BE GONE

I told my son that there was a very easy way to make his bed dissappear, it's called "Bed BE GONE" and it truely does work.  Let me tell you how. 

I had told Ian many times that if he tore his bed apart and made the mattress into a trampoline or a tent that I would make it dissappear.  He didn't believe me and shortly after he and his sister started tearing it apart I came into the room and yelled "Bed BE GONE!"  Withing 5 minutes the bed was apart and down in the basement.  Vwalla!!  The bed dissappeared!  Ian didn't think it was a very great trick, but I thought it was pretty awesome.  :)

Don't worry,  he didn't sleep on it anyways.  The last 2 weeks he has preferred the floor and that is where we have found him sleeping every night.  So it's really not a big deal, it just keeps them from being monkeys on a bead.  :) 

Ribbit!

The kids and I found this cool little guy clinging to our window for dear life one morning.  Ian thought it was the coolest thing that the froggie was 'hangin out with us' at our house.  He cracks me up.  He kept telling me 'bring him inside mom, so we can play' and 'get him down from there!'  

 

The next day we found this little guy perched on the porch rail.  Don't let this picture deceive you, he was really only the size of a quarter. 

A few days later the kids were playing on the porch in the morning when I heard Kenya's squeals of joy escape her lips and turned to find the kids chasing after this little fella.

He was so tiny and cute!  Probably only about the size of a dime.  I was able to catch him and let the kids look at him before we set him back down in the back yard.  Squeals of joy were continuously coming from Kenya's lips as we watched the frog jump around my hand.  She thought it was the coolest. 

World of Color

I decided to finally tackle the job of painting the main color of the house this beautiful brown.  I got this far on the wall in one day (plus a few other areas) and realized that there was no way I was reaching the top of the ceiling without a ladder.  I have a friend I can borrow one from, but for now it looks like this.  Right now I'm not so happy that the room is an awful two-toned color, but I'm excited for what it will look like when all the UGLY cream is replaced by this beautiful brown.  :)

Labor Day Weekend

We had a BLAST together this weekend!  I love that the kids are old enough for ALL of us to really enjoy time together as a family. 

The weekend started off with a fun round of Volleyball with our friends.  We had so many people there and it was such a blast.  Brian and I love getting involved in sports wherever we can and the kids love running around playing in the sand, chasing there friends, and playing on the playground.  After 2 hours of much fun we stripped the kids down, shook off the sand, and headed home. 

After the kids went down, I head on over to my friend's house for a girls night.  There was 5 of us there and we spent the evening laugh until at 2 am we all decided it was far past time for bed.

Saturday morning was CRAZY!  At the last minute we decided we'd try and catch the DragonCon Parade.  DragonCon is Atlanta's big Sci Fi/Fantasy festival and it's pretty BIG from what I'm told.  Since the Parade was free, we went to see who we could catch a glimpse of strolling down the road.

These were some of the fun costumed people we saw while at the parade.  The kids loved it!  Ian got to see Spiderman, Superman, Batman, the Princess from Princess and the Frog and others.  We saw many Star Wars Storm Troopers, Obi-Wan, Jedi knights, Darth Maul, and of course the famed Darth Vader.  We even got to see Klingons, ferengi, and Star Trek officers up close and personal.  Harry Potter characters were also another prominent group.  It was a great, perfectly warm morning to enjoy together as a family.

Since we had run the kids out of the house so fast before the parade that none of us got breakfast, we stopped by McDonald's on the way home at lunch time.  The kids were such troopers waiting all that time to eat and when we got our food they dug in deep.  They also spent a good deal of time playing on the play place and having fun. 

At 2 pm we headed over to a beautiful park for a friends birthday party. It was such a beautiful day and the park was splendid. The kids had more fun than I think they could really handle.  :)

There's a few pictures for your viewing pleasure.  Ian was very timid to hit the pink pony, not sure why, but when Kenya got her chance the was whacking at it with vengeance.  It was quite hilarious to watch her with a bat just as tall as her swinging away with just one hand.  She was a happy little girl.  I think we might be doing a pinata for her birthday. :)

For Labor Day Monday we enjoyed the day at the beach.  Acworth Lake's offical last day open for swim was on Labor Day, so at 1 pm we headed out to play.  The kids LOVE, LOVE, LOVE  the beach!  We were all enjoying it so much it was so sad when we did eventually leave.  Our kids are such water bugs, it's hilarious! 

For dinner we grilled up some hot dogs and pork steaks.  Very yummy!  Brian had the idea to make home made ice cream and it was also very yummy!  All in all and very wonderful Labor Day weekend.

(We had our very own "Joker" in the house at dinner. )

I'm sad to say that we're back to the busy family we've become.  Brian studies (almost non-stop it seems) while Ian, Kenya and I got about our business.  My guess, it's only gonna get busy from here on out.  But I guess that's life.