You Know Your Baby is Sick When...

Okay, so a good friend Kim recently posted a "you know when your 3 1/2 year old is sick when... and she gave her version. Here's mine.

Camdynism

I made hot cocoa for the kids today when they came in from the snow. Cam was particularly excited and exclaimed,

"Mom! When I drink this hot cocoa really fast it feels like my throat is going to droop!!"

After a nice run down the hill at the church. I tried so hard to get him to wear a jacket.
Funky kids. They love having fun!!
Okay, so these pics are from "retro/tacky day" at school. I really don't know what Reilly was aiming at, but I think he hit it head on. And that's a pink, polka dot towel over his shoulder.
I thought she was good with just going 80's, but then she threw in a little "tacky" with it. She loved her hair. She asked me to do it again the next day.
Being our little "fashionista", McKinley really didn't want to wear this outfit. I'm sure you can tell that I MADE her pose and smile for the picture. However, I think she's the cutest 80's girl that school has ever seen! Reminds me of Napoleon (whatever the girls name was), only way cuter! And when she got home, she didn't want to take off her new outfit!

Christmastime

Shea's homework. Remember contractions? I guess she thought they forgot one. The "southernizing" of our sweet Shea...
Grandpa with the Christmas kitties "Buddy" and "Jovie". My dad is a cat magnet.
One of the kids wanted to take some pics of mom and dad, so there's about 10 shots like this one.
Oh, so cute. Looks a little uncomfortable to me. You know, I pushed for kittens, and to be honest, these little cuties have proven to be a pain in the neck. They wont stay off my kitchen counters or the dining room table. And they have plenty of their own food and water!! Tomorrow they're getting the squirt bottle approach.
Buddy certainly had a particular affinity toward my dad. But he is a licker. He licks my toes while I do dishes. He's always licking. In fact, both of them are. They lick feet, faces, arms, cupboards, tables, etc. A little strange if you ask me.

Finally, a Picture Update!

Well, I can never seem to get these in the proper order, so we're going from most recent backwards...first are some pictures from our little post Christmas getaway with some of our favorite people, the Bells. Jackson is the tallest, Lizzie is next to him, and Anna Kate in front of Lizzie. We love them! This was the indoor swimming pool. It was 20 degrees outside. Lots of snow on the ground. The kids thought it was great to get a swim in!

This is Mr. Mike Bell holding baby Dax. We stayed in a beautiful condo in Blowing Rock. It was amazing! Thank you Bell family! We loved our time with you!

The boys had their own room and enjoyed being together. True buds.

Lizzie and Kinley. Dax is obviously not wanting his picture taken.

Into town we hauled them all for some really expensive ice cream. It was frigid (outside) but we all had a great time.

This was our family on Christmas Eve at our sweet little theater in town. It only costs $2.00 per person. Our whole family can go for a mere $12.00 since Macy and Dax are free!! We love it, and frequent this place. Isn't it cute??

Christmas dinner all by little lonesome selves...as if that isn't enough for a par-tay!! We had a great time and I made lots of food-even cooked a ham. Mom, aren't you proud?

My first attempt at bagels for our Christmas Eve morning. The kids actually loved them! It really wasn't too difficult, and I only plan on making them once a year.

So this was a few days before Christmas. I let the kids make "gingerbread houses". Stale graham crackers, lots of cheap icing, and leftover halloween candy!! They loved it. I even made my own house. I think it's the one in front of Macy. The roof was all M&M's. I ate it.

McKinley and her good buddy Rachel. She is the youngest of 6 kids. There are lots of big families around here! These girls are so much fun together. Rachel is a sweet little ball of energy and she and McKinley get along fabulously. Many more pictures to come in the near future. I have lots of catching up to do!

Mrs. Bell

I've been cracking up at Macy-Boo recently. She is quite the story-teller and is full of it. We were leaving church on Sunday and as we were getting into the car I was saying good-bye to a good friend Dave Duncan. Macy loves the Duncans. She shouted out, "Good-bye Mrs. Bell!!" (Hmmm...) Then we drove over and parked the car for a few seconds and were saying good-bye to another family and Macy looked at the driver (John McGrath) and said, "Good-bye Mrs. Bell!" (?????) So I think either Mrs. Bell has made a very strong impression on Macy, or she is really confused. She didn't bat an eye, nor was she being a ham. She was genuinely and heartily shouting her good-bye greetings...to all the "Mrs. Bell"s out there.

Driving...or trying to!

Okay, I forgot one more thing. Though I don't really miss the freeways in Los Angeles, I do miss the simplicity of them. To get to our old house from, say, Topanga, you would drive north on the 405, you would then hop on the 5 going north, then you simply took the Hasley Canyon Road exit. Turn right on the Old Road, left on Hillcrest, and right on Beryl. Simple.
I entered "Charlotte-Douglas Airport" into my iPhone map search and thought I had a short in the phone. From my housing development, here's what the map search came up with.
1. Head NW on 24th Ave. Ln. NE toward 14th St. Ln. NE
2. Drive 151 ft then take first left onto 33rd St. Ln. NE
3. Drive .3 miles then take the 2nd right onto 24th St. Ave. NE (yes, thats a different 24th than the first direction)
4. Drive 194 feet then take the 1st left onto 18th St NE/State Rd 1401
5. Drive .9 miles then continue onto 10th St. Dr. NE (wait, continue? Yes, it changes from 18th St to 10th St. Dr.)
6. Drive 1.8 miles then turn left at 10th St. NE (WHAT? Turn from 10th onto 10th?? Ludicrous.)
7. Drive 46 feet then turn right to stay on 10th St. NE. (Turn right again to stay on 10th St. NE????? City planners must be playing a mean joke on the citizens of Hickory or they were drunk while planning, or they are a very conflicted bunch.)
8. Drive 512 feet then continue onto Lenoir Rhyne Blve SE/State road 1534. (CONTINUE ON? So you have to follow all of these turns to do your best to stay on 10th St. Dr. NE, and then they just pull the rug out from under you and change it to Lenoir Rhyne Blvd.??? All for naught. Unbelievable. I give up.)
9. Drive 1.7 miles then merge onto I-40 via the ramp to Asheville. Ah. The first simple driving instruction. However, it's about to get insanely crazy.
10. Drive 1.8 miles then take exit 123-123A-123B for US-321 toward N Carolina (you mean the state that I'm in??)127/Hickory/Lenoir/Lincolnton/US-70 Say it isn't so. If I hadn't seen it on my very own iPhone, I'd be tempted to disbelieve. I really thought there must be some mistake when I saw the directions on my phone, but was convinced that my phone was only trying to confuse me. What topped the shock charts was that the iPhone had the exact wording of the freeway sign. Verbatim. I know, because I nearly caused an accident while comparing the two- which took around 10 minutes with my mom's help ("driving time"- kinda like cat years). No way. Invitation to car crashes. I just checked the internet for accidents around this interchange, but obviously the city planners have been removing them from public access. :)
So, I wonder to myself, why on earth is driving somewhere made to be so complicated? Most people search their directions on mapquest before they leave their house, right? So once you're on the road, wouldn't it be easier if the sign just said, "321-South"? Maybe I'm just too simple. Maybe I'm missing something. Actually, if we stay in Hickory, and my kids learn to drive here, maybe this will help them to gain some trouble-shooting and problem-solving skills, and serve to improve their SAT scores. They'll learn how to read faster, that's for sure. Hey, combined with the DMV drivers test, they'll be ready for grad school before you know it. Maybe I owe a big thanks to the state of North Carolina for the bettering of the education of my children through hands-on practical life quizzes. That is, if their mother doesn't crash and severely injure them before they turn 16!
Or maybe the bottom line is this: I miss L.A. Freeways!!
By the way, my NC driver's license arrived in the mail yesterday! I'm official!