This and that

I know, I'm a horrible blogger. Between homework, dance, karate, CCD, playing with Caleb, PTA and planning a baby shower, I don't have a whole lot of time (or energy) left. Haha. Believe it or not, I haven't really been taking many pictures. Shocking, I know, but true. ;)
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Jacob and Jonah started karate and they seem to like it. Jonah had some trouble last week and had to do 25 push ups, suffice it to say that I think he'll remember to say "yes sir" instead of "yeah" next time he's asked a question. That and he's learning to pay attention even though "sometimes his eyes just need to look out the window" when people are talking. Jacob liked it from the start, Jonah is taking some convincing. They got their belts at the last lesson and will be able to start earning stripes now. They hate school, they told me the other day that it's ruining their lives. I'm so mean for making them go. @@ <------ That's me rolling my eyes. Sheesh. They're coming home and getting homework done right away though, so that's nice.

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Emmy is still positive about school which makes things easy. She's always been a very agreeable child, I hope that lasts a while longer. She started regular dance this week and she started Whimsical practice about a month ago. She's so excited to be a part of the cast this year. She was told the other day that she'll have to learn 5 dances to be a Who and her teacher said that she replied "oh my goodness." She'll get it though. The cast list was posted this past weekend and even though we mostly knew what she'd be doing she still wanted to go look. She's in a tap number too, we didn't know she'd be doing that. Here she is looking for her name on the list:

Found it!

Caleb doesn't seem to be missing the other three at all while they're in school. He did tell me yesterday that it was "time to go get the chuldrin at school" but mostly he seems content having the house to himself. He talks nonstop, and tells complete strangers what trains he wants for his birthday. He talks about his birthday every day. The big news in CalebLand is that he's mostly potty trained!! He even tells me when he needs to go when we're out and about. He still needs a diaper at night, but I'll take that over the daytime ones any day!! Now we need to work on this:

I know, he's almost three, blah blah blah. He only has one when he goes to sleep and they're only little once. He won't go to school still drinking it. Probably. His "ba ba" and "blue-bay" go hand in hand. It'd be traumatic to split them up! ;)

So that's it in a nutshell! Hopefully it won't be so long till the next blog post, but I can't promise anything. I need to get a picture of Jacob and Jonah in their karate stuff and post that .

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Till next time!

Back to school

Miss Excited, who was up at 5:15 yesterday morning. I made her go back to bed and at 6:30 she said "can I get up now Mom?!" I hope she always loves school like this. I'm not holding my breath, but it'll be nice while it lasts.

Mr. Bright Ray of Sunshine himself:

How he really felt about going back to school:

Mr. Groovy. Like, far out, man.

She let me in her classroom to take pictures. She's sweet and agreeable. She's not embarrassed by Mom........yet.

OMG! What is she doing?! Just keep walking and maybe she'll go away!

This is as close to the inside of my classroom that you get. As in you can't come in at all. As in hurry up and take the picture before somebody sees me.

MOOOOOM! GOSH!

They all had a really good day and had very positive things to say when I picked them up. I would say that I have high hopes that it'll continue on that way but I know better. ;)

Oh for crying out loud!

I still can't find my pictures. I'll have to start Tweeting more pictures until I can get things together.

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Emmy has started Whimsical practice already, she's so excited about being a "Who" this year. We had to watch last years show one morning this week. The boys were thrilled. She's ready to go back to school, Jacob and Jonah, on the other hand, are NOT. They won't even let me say the word. We've got all backpacks, lunch kits and school supplies ready. Em and I had a nice mother/daughter day this past weekend and we got all of her back to school clothes shopping done then we went to lunch. Caleb is Caleb. He has no interest in pooping on the potty, and I'm losing interest in changing his diapers. I think once the kids are back in school and we're home more, we'll give potty training a good try.

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Alrighty, hopefully I'll run across my pictures soon. I've looked in all of the folders on this computer and I KNOW that Basil transferred them...somewhere. Should it be so hard?!

Kemah

At the Aquarium restaurant:

Waiting for the Kemah train to round the corner:

Getting bored riding the train:

Getting really bored riding the train:

Finally! He gets on a different ride!

It was fun, but super hot and super expensive. Guess that's what vacation is all about though!

Monsters on the beach

Yay for new computers! We took G & G's trailer and went back to the beach last week. We went to Kemah Monday and then spent most of the next 3 days at the beach. We had a blast...again. I'll spread the pictures out over a few posts, it's easier that way.

I thought this series of pictures was hilarious.

What happens when a "monster" chases you down the beach?

You run so fast that you trip over your own feet, but at least you manage to take the monster down with you....AND get up laughing.

Blog break

I'm taking a blog break, not because I want to but because our computer has officially wigged out and I think it's time for a new one. The monitor blinks on and off and you can only run windows on "safe mode" - whatever that means. We're also leaving tommorrow for the beach and we'll be gone most of next week. I do have some pictures of the boys and their new critters to share, so hopefully I can do that when we get back. Speaking of critters, Jacob's white bird that he got Wednesday, as in 3 days ago, died today. WTF?! He was horribly upset because the bird was so friendly, it would hop up into your hand as soon as you'd open the cage door. The lady at the pet store said that that wasn't normal and it meant something was wrong with it. That might have been nice to know Wednesday. Anyway, I called and asked if they had some sort of pet replacement policy (as tacky as that is) and she said to come in and they'd replace the bird. So we did, he now has a blue one and the original green spaz that he got on his birthday. Jeez.

"See" ya in a week!

The Smith Family

This is our picture that was taken for the church directory. I thought it came out alright!

How to throw a fit on the beach...

...and look good doing it.

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This post brought to you by Cawub. An expert in the art of 2 year old tantrums.

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1) Make sure you cry enough to have tears rolling down your cheeks. Even if you're not really all that upset, put everything into it. Tears make things much more dramatic and you're more likely to get your way when you cry.

2) Don't hold back. Being out in public is no excuse to "tone it down." Make sure everybody around can hear you too.

3) When you see the adults start to look around to make sure nobody is watching, really turn it up. This means that it's working.

4) Really get hacked off when people start laughing at you. Scream at them so that they know that the situation is not the least bit funny and that you are still very much in control.

5) Make sure that everybody knows that you're the boss.

Follow the above instructions and you're well on your way to getting everything you want. When, for example, somebody takes your sandals off against your will, even though they're rubbing blisters on your feet, you let them know who's boss and that you want the sandals promptly given back to you. Then you proceed to squeal and shout "(insert your name here) DO IT!" even though you have not the foggiest idea how to actually work Velcro. Scream and cry as if your life depends on it. I guarantee you'll have your sandals back pronto. It's up to you how long you want to sit and try to work them before you get bored and ask somebody else for help. It's not because you can't do it, mind, just that you want to move onto other things.

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I hope this was of some help to other 2 year olds out there. Next tutorial: How to take a bath with everybody in the house when they don't want you in there. Follow my instructions and you could be bathing 5 times per night too! I don't know what they fuss about honestly, it's not like you can't wash it right of for crying out loud. Why should I get out and get on the potty? It's cold!

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Until next time,

King of my castle - Cawub

Annie

We'll miss you.

Annie Fannie

1995 - 2010

Jacob and Jonah's 9th birthday

I'm so lame. I didn't even get a "happy birthday" post up this year. To be honest, it just sort of slipped my mind and then Friday was SO busy that I didn't have time. Better late than never, right?!

Opening Wii games that they REALLY wanted:

Basil and I made these notes for our gifts. Jacob's said "this coupon good for a trip to the pet store to pick out the parakeet of your choice." Jonah's said the same except that leopard gecko or bearded dragon was substituted for parakeet. That's right people, I've lost my mind. If you happen to run across it, please put it in the mail asap.

Jonah went for the bearded dragon, thank GOD because those leopard geckos are UH-GLY!

Jacob had a very specific parakeet in mind. I felt sorry for the poor Petco guy who had to chase it around the cage when they all pretty much look the same. Jacob never took his eye off of the one he wanted though.

Note to self: Get the boy a haircut. For real.

Meet Spike the bearded dragon...

...and King Koopa the parakeet. Poor Koopa, he should drop dead of fright any second now.

After we got the new critters all set up, we headed to Chuck E Cheese's.

Everybody loves Chuck E Cheese's.

I don't know who had more fun, Caleb or Basil.

So that's it. It was a really nice and busy day. I thought maybe there might be problems when Thursday night before bed Caleb started talking about birthdays, balloons and cake. The conversation went something like this:

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Caleb: burtday puh-cakes (he calls cupcakes "puh-cakes")

Me: Yes, we'll have birthday cake tomorrow for Jacob and Jonah's birthday.

Caleb: No, Cawub's burtday.

Me: No, it's Jacob and Jonah's birthday. Are you going to sing to them?

Caleb: No it's Cawubs. I wake up I be so happy.

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Then Friday morning he went on about "Cawub's presents" when he saw everything. It ended up being fine though, he sang, ate cake and helped Jacob and Jonah open their things. Whew. There's really no way to explain it to a two year old, I'm glad I didn't have to try!

Weekend beach getaway

Friday we loaded up Granny and Grumpy's trailer, hooked it to our car and headed to the beach for the weekend. It was our first time RV'ing it, and we REALLY liked it. Thanks so much Granny and Grumpy! We appreciate it!

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Here are some nature-y shots that I wanted to be at the bottom of the post, but I didn't feel like fighting with the issues that the blog has so they're at the top.

I took this one of Basil and I really like how it turned out. The kids said that he looks like a sheriff in the wild west. :)

We didn't get to the beach until about 8pm on Friday night and it was SO nice and really pretty.

Jacob showing Caleb a butterfly that he caught and put in a container.

There was lots of seaweed on the beach and they had a blast shaking it out to see what they could find. LOTS of crabs, some shrimp and a few fish!

Damn that ice cream truck and it's tinkling music.

The mud queen of Texas.

Real cowboys wear pink.

"What? I wasn't eating sand."

"I wouldn't do that because it's gross and it would get stuck all on my tongue. Yuck!"

Sweet Jo.

A totally different kind of "say no to crack" public service announcement.

Going off to see what he can catch.

Sweet Jake.

"What?! We get to stay another night?!"

I love what the humid beach air does to his pretty red hair. His pretty red ear is courtesy of the sun and a not so thorough sunscreen spraying mother.

We roasted marshmallows Saturday night. Again with the pink. Sometimes you run out of shirts and have to wear your sisters, that's just the way it is.

After marshmallows we did a few sparklers.

Jacob and Jonah patrolled the area around this seaweed sandbar to see what poor creatures were getting washed up and stranded.

Just because he's so sweet:

Jacob's "big" catch of the day. It didn't have any claws (or eyeballs by the time Caleb was finished but that's a whole 'nother story) so they got to examine him pretty closely.

Jacob putting a little hermit crab in Caleb's hand:

"Look bwuder! It's a cuhwab!"

Jonah throwing crackers to the seagulls:

As we were leaving, I noticed that Emily had written something on the cement with charcoal. "Emily - rock on!"

The best part of the journey home: