My baby!!!

And by baby I mean Bella. As many of you know Bella has always been a fool for my boys things. Every morning we wake up and she is sleeping with something of theirs. Y'all remember the sippy cup morning?

But it ranges anywhere from diapers out of the trash, to stuffed animals, to toys, to clothes of theirs. She does not chew them up, she just cuddles with them at night! It is truley the sweetest thing. But last Thursday topped the cake. we came inside and she was laying on her bed with one of their pacies in her mouth...can you believe this!!! I couldn't!

Drake and I both tried to get it out of her mouth but were not successful.

It quickly became a game to her and she loved being chased by the boys with the pacie in her mouth. This is Bella running by...see the pacie ring coming out of her mouth?

We finally got it out of her mouth and who knows what will be next?!!!???

While we are on the subject of dogs, I have to show you their portraits that I got done. Don't worry, all the money went to the Humane Association that I paid for them which is why I did it. Not that Divot and Bella are not portrait worthy, because they are beyond portrait worthy being the sweetest doggies in the world, but we would not normally just go out and do this, especially in this economy right now. Anyways, I am so glad we have them now!!!

They are 20x20 in size so they are bigger than life size and are they not the CUTEST PICTURES YOU HAVE EVER SEEN!!!!! She captured my babies so perfectly and I will treasure these forever!

One last thing...Bella is having eye surgery this morning so please pray for her and the Dr.'s steady hands!!! We love our vet so much and I know he will do a great job, but just be thinking about her today and this week because she will have to have a cone on her head for a week! We get to pick her up at the end of the day so I will update soon!

Baby's first haircut...

...Or should it be toddlers first haricut. I have to begin with this: If we ever have a girl, poor thing. She may not need a haircut until she is 5. If Hunter had been a girl I would not have touched it because it really was not that long. He was just looking a bit "straggly"...and he is 2 1/2!!!! If he had been a girl I could have easily put it back with a bow, but since that is definitely not happening, it needed a little trim. I mean, Why could we not get my nephew Christopher's hair. I think he has had like 15 haircuts so far and he was 3 in March.

And Drake's hair was not long either, he just looked like Kramer in the morning.

So we needed to take some of the fuzz out on top. And also Kyle could not handle his "curly mullet" any longer. I did love the curls, but I could put it in a ponytail...so I guess it was time for a littel trim there too.

My poor children are not blessed with abundances of hair. But don't worry for all you sweet friends who stood by me in my fight to not cut off their curls, they just got a trim but there are still curls!!!!

Okay, so finally on to how it went down. We went to Snip-Its, a hair cutting place catered towards children with dumdums galore, a prize at the end, crazy animated characters (which were a little creepy to me), chairs for mommies right by the stools where they get their haircut, seat belts in the chairs so the kiddos do not fall out, and even children's music. However, don't be fooled...when I say childrens music you are probobly thinking Itsy Bitsy Spider, Twinkle Twinkle, etc. But NO...try turning on 102.5 or 107.5 and hearing those songs, but just being sung by children. For those of you who do not live in Nashville and have these stations, they are your typical pop stations. For example, when we walked in the song that was being sung in the sweetest of childrens voices was none other than "Distrurbia" I immediately thought to myself, please tell me that they computer generated these voices and these poor children did not have to actually read and sing these lyrics.
Okay, off my Snip-Its soap box and on to the haircuts. The first picture is of my children "waiting" thier turn for a haircut.

We only waited about 30 seconds and then Hunty went first.
He did surprisingly well! He got up in the chair, sat down, initially resisted the cape so that hair would not go down his back, but was soon easily bribed with a dumdum. He just sat there and was so good!
This is pre-cut, getting hair wet and brushed and inspecting dumdum #1

working hard on dumdum #1 before the haircut even begins

Last picture before fist haricut

Here we go! and dumdum almost finished!

Hunty is watching some creepy video of animated combs and scissors dancing but doing a great job staying still (waiting for dumdum #2!)

Haircut complete and Hunty giving me a fake smile...


Now Drakey on the other hand did not do so well. He immediately went balistic when we put him in the chair and kept screaming and crying saying he was stuck. It was one of those moments that was so sad and I wanted to hold him, but was really funny at the same time. If he had not been screaming "stuck" it probobly would not have been as funny. I did ask if I could hold him while she cut it and she looked at me as if I were a 3 headed lady in a sideshow circus.
But she also was so incredibly sweet and told me that they have a ton of children that scream. She even said that he was not near as bad as some as she has had (i am sure she was just trying to make me feel better) But she was so kind and patient to him. I think cutting childrens hair is a true calling because the moment they started screaming I would say "Next!". Quite frankly I have no idea how she cut any hair at all between the body rocking back and forth trying to get out of the chair, head bobbing and arms flailing, but she did it, and she did a great job at that! Needless to say I was not able to take any pics during the cut, but this is a before

And after

See, still a little curl in the back! And even more when it is dry


Halleluiah Hair cuts are over!!! Now on to obtaining the prize. They were given a little plastic card when we walked in that they stuck in a machine and a prize came out. Hunty went first again

And then proceeded to take Drakes card out of his hand and do his too (poor Drake...he's gonna get Hunty back one of these days!) But this is Drakey holding his prize. How nice, a duck for Drake!

I also stupidly agreed to pay $5 to get a ridiculous certificate saying Hunter and Drake got their first haircut with the date and place on it. They wanted me to do $5 per child but I conviced them to just do 1 with both their names on it. But wait there is more. Also included in the $5 deal is a picture on another certificate of them after their first haircut. Since they both refused to sit still one more second I had to sit with them and hold them. I would have gladly bypassed the picture, but since I already paid for it, bygolly we were going to get it!
Here is our lovely picure we got with their hair stapled to it...(please notice Hunter's face. Every time the lady would say cheese he would close his eyes...on purpose. Believe me we tried 5 times but he was being too silly to behave.)

And to top it all off both my children went back to the machine to try and get more prizes out...


after a few dirty looks we finally made it out with 2 haircuts and no more tears! YAY!

Oh Happy Day!

#1Yesterday was one of those days that despite how difficult Hunter can be right now, and how hard the days can seem, this was one of those days filled with moments that everything seemed perfect. I found myself several times wanting to pinch myself that this was really my life...in a good way. It all began when we decided that after 2 straight days of mid 80s, sunny weather that the plants needed to be watered...but instead Hunty just wanted to play in the sprinkler. Which was totally fine!
He would run through it, stick his face in it, follow it trying to drink out of it like a water fountain as it moved back and forth, hit his T-ball in it (which by the way he is a LEFTY hitter and can KILL IT!!!!!), dance in it, you name it he wanted to do it in the sprinkler which was hysterical. But even though it was HOT outside, the water was freezing and he would get cold so he would run to Kyle holding the towel, Kyle would wrap him up like a burrito and hold him for several minutes until he warmed up a bit and then back down he went to play again in the water. The water playing then into warm towel in daddy's lap was repeated over and over again and it was so blasted cute! Sadly I could not find our camera at the moment so do not have any pics of them, but it was so sweet.
I did however finally find it in the bottomless pit (AKA my diaper bag) after looking in there for the 10th time. SO i got a quick shot of Hunty in the sprinkler hitting the T-ball which he strategically placed in the sprinkler.
(Look to the right of the picture and the white blurr is the ball coming towards us!

#2 Our "Sleeping Terrorist"

So after a few hours in the water Hunter finally started to get so cold that i realized it had been enough. I brought him inside, put on his warmest sweatsuit and within minutes he fell asleep...right when Drakey was waking up. By this time it was about 3:30 and we had to hit sonic Happy Hour to get out half price cherry lime-aids, and since I really didn;t want Hunty napping that late in the day anyways, we decided to go ahead and go. Hunter was still asleep after buckling him in his car seat and taking off his sweatshirt, well most of the ways anyway. It got stuck at the top of his head and there was born our "Sleeping Terrorist" Don't worry, we eventually got it off:)

#3 As we were listening to our Jack Johnson Curious George CD in the car, we like to play the "Sharing Song" (that is what the song is called) since Hunter has gotten to where he does not like to share as much anymore. He has loved this CD since he was just a few months old and can actually sing along with it now but what was so ironic was after the song was over he said "This is MY sharing song!" Need I say more...

#4 At dinner tonight this is what I found myself telling my children:
"You need to eat pizza if you want more fruit." Does that sound weird to anyone else??? I never thought that sentence would come out of my mouth.

By the way, this is the last picture of my boys before they are about to get their FIRST HAIRCUT EVER!!! Neither one has ever had one but that is about to end...I might cry!

The Terrible 2 1/2s

To say the past few weeks have been difficult in our house-hold would be an INCREDIBLE UNDERSTATEMENT!!!! Hunter turned 2 in September and we had our share of struggles, but the whole "terrible twos" thing did not seem so bad. Aside from not being a great sleeper (Drake on the other hand has become a PHENOMENAL sleeper and I did nothing different for each boy...blows the whole "training to sleep" thing doesn't it? HA!!!) But overall Hunty could communicate GREAT, no tantrums, minded pretty well, loving, still funny but also a bit shy, pretty much a good road we were going down. And then he turned 2 1/2 and the walls came a tumblin' down!
Doesn't want to eat anything he should, doesn't want to go to bed at night or nap EVER, completely ignores anything I am asking him to do, refuses to get dressed EVERY SINGLE MORNING, hits, tackles, head-butts, boxes out and sits on Drake all the time (fortunately he does not do it to any other child...so far...). Slaps things out of Drake's hands and throws them in the opposite direction. Screams because he does not want me to get Drake out of his crib, or give Drake a sippy cup, or hold Drake, or read to Drake, or give Drake a snack, or let Drake play with anything! It is all just maddening. He has also become so independent so I really try and let him make more decisions on his own so he feels more in control (which was hysterical the way he went dressed to MDO this past Friday. I wish I had a picture, but he was wearing a Lighting McQueen PJ shirt, plaid shorts that are too big, ankle socks and his McQueen shoes). I honestly could care less what he is wearing at this point, but it is just funny! Anyways, as any other phase, it is extremely painstaking, but just have to remember that it will pass. I also still get weekly updates from Baby Center and for this week's tip this is what it said:

"You think your life is hard? Imagine being plunked down in a foreign land where you're not fluent in the language, you have to figure out how everything from a doorknob to a toilet works, and you're one-third the height of everyone else. Being a preschooler has its stresses. When your child seems overwhelmed, it's a good idea to look at what's going on in his world, slow the pace, and provide extra TLC — the same things you like when you're overwhelmed!"

So for all you moms with toddlers, expecting moms, or even if you think you might have children in the future, just remember you are not alone and your toddler isn't either!! It all makes prefect sense, and helps me step back, take a deep breath and realize he is going through just as much turmoil as I am right now. Just in a completely different way. But regardless, I have to remember he feels stresses too.
I have to end on a brighter note, Hunty tee tees in the potty all the time now and loves his big boy undies!

Feed the ducks, tuppence a bag

Hunty got a little duck (okay several) for Easter but this particular one was a rubber duckie from Elaine Youngblood (Auntie E) who spoils my boys rotten. Have no idea why Hunter is so attached to this rubber duck, but he is, and even feeds him dinner...
Hunty started out feeding him with the fork (and mind you he has no idea I am taking these pictures)

He then decided that ducky should get his own plate (which was the lid to a pot from his kitchen)

Lastly, a quick picture of duckie next to his plate

I guess he has taken my love for animals!!!

No Response

So yesterday while driving in the car I yell out "Look, Fire Truck! How cool!" What happened then? Absolutely nothing, no response. Oh yeah, the boys are at Mothers Day Out. I immediately and instantly felt alone and sad (and a little silly). But I am used to pointing out every skid steer, digger, forklift, tractor, big rig, fire engine, police car, crane, helicopter, plane, or any other non-car transportation you can possibly see because that is what my boys love! A lot of times they will point them out to me even. It is what makes riding in the car fun for them. It is what makes getting to run errands in the car last a little longer. It is another thing I have realized that I am going to miss when they are older and don't want to even hear my voice. My eyes well with tears when I think about all the things that I do now out of sheer habit that I never did before...and I do them because I have 2 precious boys. Yesterday afternoon was a hard one. Just normal mom stuff that makes you want to ring their neck and making my afternoon insufferable, but then I think about the moment I had when I wanted to share the excitement of seeing a fire engine. Fire engines were NEVER exciting before, but now they always are...

Happy Easter!

FRIDAY
Well, all in all it was a GREAT weekend! Kyle got Good Friday off which was just amazing for me to have him home! I cannot tell you how much I miss having him around! He is such a good daddy and so much fun for the boys.
Friday we spent the morning at home and then about 11 decided we would make our first trip ever to Chucky Cheese(I almost shiver in horror writing the name.) I can asure you I will be fullfilled if I NEVER go back again! We pulled up right when it started to rain, and then the storms got worse. We were on lockdown in Chucky Cheese for over 2 hours...I am pretty sure I was paying for some horrible sin I had commited at some point in my life at that moment becuase it was so torturous. There was incredibly rude and obnoxious worker (he had to have been a teenager to make it worse) there that told me he could care less about the game that ate 2 coins and would not come on.

This was our conversation:
Me: "Excuse me, my 2 yr old tried 2 coins in the horse and it never came on."
Obnoxious worker: "Yeaa, we're not really concerned about fixing a game right now, we're more concerned about tornados."
Me: "Oh, I didn't want y'all to have to fix it, I just wanted to see if my 2 yr old could get his coins back to play something else."
O.W. "Yyyeeaaa, we're really not concerned about that right now."

That was the icing on the cake that made Chucky Cheese the pit of you know where. Mind you this was an hour after we wanted to leave which was also an hour past their nap time and there was no way either child would be able to fall asleep in there with constant games ringing, Mouse talking, drinks slurping, and an occasional shreak of horror worried a tornado was about to hit us and we were all stuck inside the back half of CH.CH. because the front half had a lot of windows which we could not go near. THANK GOODNESS MY HUSBAND WAS THERE WITH ME!!!!

Anyways, after we did leave, the boys did took a nap and all was well.

SATURDAY
Saturday morning we woke up to go to the Nashville Zoo for the "Easter Eggstravaganzoo" It really entailed several different events throughout the day that will be much more fun when the boys are older, but the only one we really took part of was one of the egg hunts that they did accoding to age. Here are some pics of my sweet boys...neither one quite getting what in the world was going on, but none the less enjoying it!

I have to note that it was FREEEEEZING!!!!!

The zoo workers laying the 30,000 empty eggs in the field. Their goal: doesn't matter if you get 1 egg or 50 eggs, you turn them all in and get a prize. It was actually a smart idea since they were having to cater to thousands of people. There were 6 different hunts and they reused the eggs each time.

Hunter putting grass, not eggs in his basket...nice

My cuties now putting all their eggs in one basket. HA!


Mayhem at the 2 and under egg hunt

Hunter's eggs...so proud!

Hunty then decides to dump them out...

Proud daddy and boys in front of dumped eggs

Walking to turn in our eggs and redeem our prize!


Afterwards we did walk around a bit but only made it to 3 different animal stops (we knew the boys limits and we didn't want to overdo it after the egg hunt).
First stop, the River hogs
At the river Hogs Hunter says
"Hi hogs! Hunter is here hogs! I'm here hogs!" It was so sweet

Next stop, the farm animals but the only ones Hunty was really excited to see were
the chickens. At the chickens Hunter says
"Hi Chickens...I just love chickens" "Don't want to touch the chickens. I love chickens" I was laughing so hard at that sweet boy

Last stop, the elephants and giraffes.

Boys were very tired by this point and almost didn't care anymore
We took our cue to go home after we saw them.


Later that day we went to an Easter Egg hunt at a boys house from Mothers Day Out. This is how Hunter hunts
1. Finds the egg
2. Stops to open the egg
3. Eats the entire contents
4. Throws it down in search of another which by that point the rest are usually gone
Maybe we will figure out how to really do it next year
Drake on the other hand was picking up pine cones and throwing them in Hunter's basket, not his own. I mean, forget eggs when you can find pinecones!!! Oh my sweet Drake.
Sadly I have no pictures of this hunt becasue Kyle was playing golf and I couldn't manage the broken camera and the boys.

SUNDAY
Easter Morning was started off at church (we could not get our act together for enough time to do the Easter bunny before hand) but here were their Easter baskets
Hunty: Lightning McQueen gear
Drake: Elmo!

On the way to church Hunter was making Drake laugh so hard which was hysterical and I would give anything to have had it on tape, but we were doing good to hold our camera together just to take some pics.


After church we went to Mimi and Da's for Easter brunch and a little egg hunt.
This was the best picture of the 2 of them, but of course it was blurry...blasted camera!


Bops playing with the hammer

Hunty saying "Just one more chocolate"(he decided to delve right into the candy before lunch)

Bops running around

Now he's riding the "4-wheeler"

Hunty kissing a chick he found in an egg

The 2 guys playing with their Easter finds

Da helping Bops find some eggs too!

Hunty found an egg in the tree

My poor mom brought some eggs home from Germany and Drakey saw it and was kicking it around thinking it was a ball...whoopseee...

But when he finally kicked it open he found a fire engine in the egg and he loved it!

I just coudln't believe I caught Hunty mid-air while playing. This may be my favorite picture ever!

Hunter found a car in one of his eggs too...

And then he found another egg...

With a chickadee in it!

Back to a little more off roading!

Happy Easter!!!