Best Christmas Ever!

We had an excellent Christmas this year! It was miss Libby's first and although we miss our families, we are content spending holidays with just the four of us and the Christmas spirit was over-flowing this year.

We had a fabulous dinner at Ruth Chris Steakhouse. (Love it; they have the best food.) We dressed the girls up in their cute Christmas outfits and headed out on Christmas Eve. After dinner, we opened our traditional one gift per person and left the rest for Christmas morning. Then Chloe set out the reindeer food. To our surprise, Chloe fell asleep just about as soon as her head hit the pillow.

On the big day we had to wake-up Chloe! We couldn't believe it. She, however, couldn't sleep that night for fear that the toys would be gone the day after Christmas. On Christmas day we stayed in our PJ's all day, ate leftovers, listened to music, talked to relatives on the phone, and played for 12 hours- basically from 8 to 8. Thanks Santa! We can't wait for next year!

Good Times!

                             (See C's best Renee Zellweger impression below. lol.)

We haven't fully decorated our tree yet but we're working on it. We've already whipped out the Christmas aprons and baked sugar cookies and decorated with various colorful sprinkles- C loves doing this. My little baker!

We're truly looking forward to Christmas as Santa comes every year at our house.....this year is extra special because it's Libby's first. We're going to get back into the kitchen before Christmas day and make some more cookies for Santa and also leave some food out for his reindeer. We may, however, forgo the proverbial milk with the cookies....and serve up some Christmas cheer with eggnog and cookies.......I think Santa deserves a little extra Christmas spirit this year for all of his hard work, don't you? Cheers!

Welcome to the Jungle

A Sister Haiku

Laughing, playing fun

Lib and Chlo like Ebb and Flow

memories return

Skewl Dayz

Well, I guess this is turning into a picture Blog....I just haven't made the time to write lately. Chloe started montessori pre-school today. I wondered if she would have any of the normal anxieties that accompany the first day of school. And she didn't. She was just ready to get there and start "playing" etc... I haven't' been home long and I've already got to leave to go pick her up.

More to come on the subject of school.

Matchy-Matchy

We got out of the house today, finally. I say finally because it's been raining here for three days straight which makes it tough with a three-year-old and, not to mention, the dogs which have to be taken out on a leash to do their business. (No fence = daily bummer) Even tougher when the three-year-old insists on "helping" and holding the leash which inevitably gets "accidentally" dropped in a pile of muddy water which scares the Chihuahua and makes him bolt-off like he's been walking in the desert for days and finally spots a Taco Bell in the horizon. That's how I spell F-U-N! Chasing a tiny chihuahua who's wearing a small but very cute, yellow rain coat in my sweat pants and no bra- (yes I did, however, have on a shirt) in the rain and all the while ducking as if this would somehow make the neighbors not recognize me. Very embarrassing but in hind-sight funny situation - stressing the HIND sight here.

I guess this makes me one of those annoying girls who dresses their dogs in clothes and has to dress my daughters in matching outfits every now and then too. (and I guess this also makes me one of those annoying girls who doesn't wear a bra in public. Nice.) Yeah, you should have seen this spectacle - talk about Girls Gone Wild. I was wild alright- Steaming hot, also! But not with sex-appeal. Let's just say I felt a touch of frustration. Well, I got over it but it did make me second guess that time in South Padre on Spring Break when I turned down the chance to enter a wet tee-shirt contest. Not that I would actually ever enter one but because I know I will never EVER have that offer again in my lifetime it makes me second guess myself. Trust me, I won't go into the gory details but NEVER again will anyone think that I'm a candidate for that.

The rain is suppose to continue through this Friday. So I guess this means I need to head off to Pet-Smart to get a large but very cute yellow rain coat. We have a German Shepherd, Atticus. Gotta keep the pattern. Gotta keep the pattern.

ha. ha. Kidding. Kidding.

From Possible Lead Poisoning to Frankenfood: It's always all about the money

I find myself being quite irritated about this Mattel Recall. These big corporations are regulated to report hazards within 24 hours of finding a problem. Yeah, I'm sure they jump at the chance to take the moral high ground and would do it anyway even without this regulation in place. Right? WRONG. ( I have serious doubts they do it even with the regulation in place) Last week or so I looked over the list of toys and luckily we didn't have any. Then, today I looked at the new list and we have SEVERAL of these toys and have since Chloe's birth in 2004. I just don't trust this whole 'if you bought it before May 2007 it's okay' or whatever they're saying. This is very upsetting. I'm so sick of these big corporations fucking-up so badly and taking their sweet fucking time to recall or whatever it may be to try and save a buck.

Normal view: babies/children + defective toys = Possible DEATH

Corporation's view: babies/children + defective toys = MONEY LOSS

NO telling what they're putting in our food. *chemicals chemicals everywhere* These big corporations have conjured-up ideas to genetically alter crops that don't produce seeds so you have to continually buy that food from them. Thus, giving them the power to patent and ultimately control the market. I am by no means an expert on this subject but I know enough to realize that they're stealing from mother nature and creating a new market to corner. For example, making corn bigger and sweeter with build-in pesticides but that doesn't produce seed. Cha-ching! Imagine when that takes off? They are systemically going to wipe-out mother nature and the local farmers all together with their Frankenfood. *Chemicals chemicals everywhere*

I'm just irritated. Did I mention that it irritates me? The solution? I'm not sure if there is one. Buying your produce from local farmers is a start. And I plan to continually check for toy recalls now. Or stop buying toys from large corporations altogether- not sure the latter would happen -When Chloe sees the latest Dora collection, etc... We're such products of our environment. *chemicals chemicals everywhere*

DC Trip!

Capitol Building

Chloe on the driving tour

Jefferson Memorial

Room Service!

Me and the girls

Daddy and the girls

Just a few pictures from our little trip. We were there Wed through Sat - A lot of room service and movies! We watched 'Night at the Museum'- very cute. We met some friends from law school for dinner. (Wonderful food everywhere!) Chloe's fave thing was the hotel pool, of course. It was nice to get away for awhile. We'll probably go back when the girls are a little older so we can do more tourist-y stuff. I already miss the room service.

Happy 7th Wedding Anniversary to me and hubby! Kiss Kiss.

Which is C? Which is L?

A little Pop quiz for the readers....do you know which is L? What about C? Take a guess.

Answer: Chloe was six months in the top picture with the white dress on and in the picture below that Chloe was around five months. The bottom picture is Libby, taken recently, and she's four months. (I couldn't decide which picture to put up of Chloe so I did both.) They really do favor quite a bit- even more than these pictures show- Our little Twinkies.

I haven't been blogging recently because we've been busy with house guests and enjoying the summer weather. We're headed off to Washington D.C. tomorrow and I haven't packed a thing yet. I plan to get back to blogging regularly after this little trip to D.C. We're going to stay three nights and we'll celebrate our seventh wedding anniversary there. Which means just going out to eat - but I heard they have some stellar restaurants in the city so that's a plus. They also have some great museums and a zoo close to our hotel so maybe I'll try to brave it alone with the girls while hubby is in his conference and go to the zoo and stuff with the girls. Off to pack!

Our Little Line Leader: Shucking and Jiving

Shuck and Jive used to mean eating sea food, having drinks, watching my sister pass out from too many Jagermeister shots and dancing to Trash Disco into the wee hours of the morning.

Now it means watching Chloe shuck the corn, very competently, mind you. And dancing to Blue Grass. That's her favorite type of music these days; she's exposed to various genres, but always enthusiastically requests,

"I want to dance to Blue Grass, Mommy."

She shuffles her feet as fast as she can, but with direction, almost as if she's performing a very precisely choreographed river dance while intermittently throwing in the occasional hand stand and toe touch. Mr. Bojangles has nothing on her.

She's also very recently taken on the responsibility of shucking corn (when we have it), setting the table, and tossing the salad before dinner. Her preferred 'cooking' activity is definitely shucking the corn.

Chloe went to Summer camp last week; just a day camp for three hours a day. She swam, ran, and jumped a lot. And made like car loads of crafts. I've never seen so much construction paper, stickers, and legumes in the short span of just one week.

She was up at 3 o'clock in the morning the night before the first day of camp asking if it was morning yet. The little cutie was so excited she couldn't sleep. It was reminiscent of her first Christmas. She was so incredibly excited (more like over-stimulated) that she didn't' sleep Christmas night because she knew she had a room full of new toys just waiting to be played with.

Chloe seems to be, naturally, very assertive and a leader. The girl just knows what she wants. As an infant, she would call me (by using a rhythmic grunt and it even sounded like 'momma' sometimes) if I were in the other room. And three years later - she still does the same but with very clear, very loud, and very emphatic diction. She's a little jabber box and has been since day one.  Can't wait to see what she'll become and what she chooses as a career/job someday.

For now, she'll continue to bring prideful smiles to Mommy and Daddy's faces when she shows us the imperfect craft she made at School/Summer Camp. She makes us laugh until our eyes tear-up these days with her 'potty humor' and her Mr. Bojangles jigs. Plain and Simple, she's ADORABLE.

Maybe a third isn't out of the question after all.

Who said that?

Slow Southern Drawl

We went over to our neighbor's house for dinner last night. No, not the Jersey nightmares, they're moving this weekend. Barn animals and all.

It took us awhile to figure out if they were moving because they were using a 'borrowed' ice cream truck (How very mall bang-esque of them) and were throwing in open boxes of shiny, chipped porcelain figurines and old stacks of playboy magazines, somewhat scattered and loose at the foot of the truck. I thought they were gathering junk for a bonfire until I saw them moving load after load and lugging out their stained mattresses and dusty trailer park couches. Moving day!

Yes, I'm endlessly nosy but I saw this display as I was walking over to have dinner at the other neighbor's house. I had come home to grab a bottle of white wine as they were serving yummy king crab. And I had to pass by their moving truck-thingy.

I thought I could slip by unseen and stealth-like. After all, I'd always imagined that I could easily be a Clandestine Agent. If not a sahm (stay at home mom), surely a CIA Agent. A covert op? Cake. I was ready to kick some ass if need be -And I don't mean your standard hair-pulling cat-fight kind of kick ass. I mean, La Femme Nikita round house kick to the side of the head, have enough time to re-apply my lip-gloss and look down at my chipped nail ( my brow dropping in anger because my nails were freshly painted and perfect) and because you don't mess with a girl's nails, lay a non-merciful, deadly karate-chop to the nose kind of kick ass. Yeah, the kind that elicits proud applause from Valerie Plame. And all of this with a full-face of make-up on, lip-gloss still in place, bottle of wine in hand and high heel sandals in tact and unscathed.

And afterwards muttering [from the movie- The Point of No Return] nonchalantly and very ladylike in my best Dolly Parton voice,

"I never did mind about the little things."

After all, I've seen my fair share of Alias episodes and taught my fair share of Kick-boxing classes. But as I was just adjacent to the rear of the truck - (Pamela Anderson's breasts -circa 1988- were screaming out from the once shiny but now 'water-damaged' front cover as if her implants had leaked again and onto the front cover. Yeah, that was probably it.) Mall bangs lady's husband hops out of the truck and says hi very friendly, overly so. This was a shocker because he's rarely made eye-contact, much less uttered a word or sentence to me. And certainly never displayed enthusiasm. I actually thought he was born without a tongue. It was like he had visited Oz and had finally received his brain.

Then I thought to myself - 'he must be excited about moving.' But, no. Who'd be excited about down-sizing to a teeny-tiny apartment? And with all of that junk? Was he being flirty? Ewe.

Just as I was almost past the truck-thingy, I felt the ground vibrate and noticed a humongous presence in the open doorway of their townhouse. It was mall bangs lady and I, being polite and southern and all, said

"hi, ya'll," matching the enthusiasm of her husband but with a slow southern drawl.

[And instantly, wondering why I hadn't noticed how southern I sounded before? Must be the contrast effect. And I use way more terms of endearment in public and 'ya'lls' than I had previously realized. How very southern-esque of me.]

I don't know if it was me or Pammy. But at once, after reluctantly saying hi, her nostrils flared and she looked like a mix of Roseanne from She Devil, a Sasquatch and a Woolly Mammoth that was about to charge. Let's put it this way, if they had hot dogs to move, I know where they would've packed them.... in her nostrils! (1)

I strutted off, unaffected, and heard 'staying alive' playing in my head; one of my staple power songs. (that and 'what a fool believes' by Michael McDonald. I know, nerd-ville!)

Don't get me wrong, I wish mall bangs lady and her family well and I hope they're happy in their ice cream truck-thingy down by the Jersey river. To them I say, Buh-bye now.

As I skipped happily into the other neighbor's house after getting the wine, my power song quickly stopped [the sound of a record scratching] as I heard a burst of laughter while walking in the front door. Then a pause.

"What's going on?", I thought.

Then, I heard my husband, the intellect, joking using a popular catch-phrase.

Referring to grilling the salmon, "Get 'er done!"

Laughter.

Let me tell you, what a crowd pleaser because these people were cracking-up.

I'm thinking 'Can we say, easily amused?'

Whatever works, I guess.

Yet, more laughter.

[Albeit, mono-toned and lacking the familiar southern charisma I'm accustomed to, there were long bouts of guttural- laughter coming from the small crowd gathered around the grill.]

Ears open and waiting.

My husband, in his best Texas trailer park voice and even louder this time,

"Get 'er done!!!"

nice.

[my eyes rolling as I start to uncork the wine]

His slow southern drawl filling the air.



1.) Too mean? No. These people are not nice and purposely disruptive. Besides, she does look this way and it's my duty, as a blogger, to keep it real. And even if she looked exactly like Claudia Shiffer or Angelina Jolie her ugly side would still shine through b/c she's a miserable person, I guess, and in turn mean to others. And loud. And yes, I do feel sorry for her. And yes, I've been very nice to her since we've lived here. I didn't ever turn in the log thing - I did the log for myself to see just how disruptive they are and it was pretty bad. I did talk to her about it again, nicely. Remember, I'm southern. They apparently were already planning to move - so we lucked out. Maybe that's why they were being so loud in spite of everyone b/c they knew they were moving and wouldn't see us again. Mean. Remember, we have a newborn. Anyway, we now have nice, normal noised neighbors. From Jersey, mind you. So it's all good and I'll stop complaining now.

Return of the Kitty-Kat Princess

She's baaaack. She's a cat. She's a princess. She's THE Kitty-Kat Princess! (With side-kicks Mouse Princess and Cinderella) Saving the world, milk in tow, with one wave of the wand and able to leap piles of toys in a single bound!


Chloe had her friends, Arianna and Arden, over to play today. They ate pizza and watermelon and had a blast, in general. A lot of dressing-up and pretend play. Luckily, no pushing, biting, kicking, pinching, jabbing, punching, puncturing, eye-gouging, stabbing, elbowing, kneeing, karate-chopping, or spitting took place...... just a lot of Munchkin laughter and, of course, purring.

Cutie Patooties!

We went to the mall today and got these pics taken.  It's close to the fourth of July but I opted out of the gaudy firework background; just would have led the eye away from their beauty.  :)

My Dad

It's Father's Day
And we're so far away

I wish I could be there
To drink coffee, laugh, and share

Not only are you my dad
You were my coach and a friend
And you're still my personal comedian

Yes, you're the funniest person I know
When you want to, you can even make Robin Williams seem slow
And your charisma could easily sell snow to an Eskimo

You gave me a deep love of music; Folk and Bluegrass
And you're such a hard worker; you inspire me to just get off of my ass!

You are a writer and a poet at heart
And you gave me a love of nature right from the start

Camping and boating
Laughing and racing

Your spirit is free
And that's such a valuable lesson in me

You even built us a real tree house
And my very own regulation balance beam

You even made yard work seem fun
Like we were all a part of a team

You taught me how to drive and, to this day, I don't even have to think-
I can easily parallel park in just a blink

I still brag that I knew how to drive a standard before I was fifteen
And thank you for the fast-twitch muscles and the jogging gene

You're a mover and a shaker
And, back in the day, you even taught me how to prime a carburetor

At seventeen, when I got my tattoo
Mom freaked-out, but not you

When we would practice soccer, you'd make me spit out my gum
And even now, I hear "Another one bites the dust" when I run

Even when I ditched soccer and went for cheerleading
Although disappointed, you were supportive and it wasn't fleeting

Although you rarely give yourself credit
There are few books that you can say you haven't read it

You have a big heart and the jack-pot always seems to be yours for the taking
You're up and running when the rest of us are just waking

Your creativity mixed with tenacity has brought you far from your humble beginnings
As an added bonus, you're always gathering the winnings

You pulled yourself up by your own boot straps
And, although, not free from hard times
Your special character has guided your path

You always extend an available ear
And when I was little, you held my hand when I couldn't shake my nighttime fear

We still talk often and never run out of things to say
When I'm feeling down you give me support and tell me to pray

Maybe it's all part of the master plan
But thanks to you, I knew how to spot a good man

My girls have a wonderful Daddy just like you
And he wants to give them the world too

Thank you for being my friend and My Dad

I'll Love You Forever

Happy Father's Day

Pimp My Slide

Chloe's been in full-on play mode since yesterday's play date at the park. Afterwards, we went to the grocery store where they have an awesome play center called the "Tree House" where she played some more while Libby and I shopped. Then we had a play-a-thon in the basement yesterday afternoon for like three hours.

As not to mess with her mojo, we started the playing again this morning. She delved into her dress-up box and ended up sporting a pink pimp hat.

As you can see, she's quite the poser- I gave her minimal direction. I just told her not to slide down so I could take her picture as she's always willing to ham-it-up.

All that's missing from this picture are some phat pimp platform shoes and a bong. She had a blast modeling her boa and bling while saying "kewl" over and over. She's been saying "Kewl" a lot lately. Kinda kewl, huh?

Sex, Cries, and Video Tapes

What I meant to say is no sex and very loud, frequent cries due to our inconsiderate neighbors. And video taping may be necessary.

Why no sex? Well, we're too tired from our neighbors waking us up at 7 am on Saturday mornings! (sometimes they let us sleep in until 8 am and if we're lucky - 8:30am) Which to some people this may seem late, but my kids have always been very good sleepers and used to sleep until 9 or 9:30am. Also, my newborn can't nap peacefully during the day. I'm constantly trying to calm her after she's woken up by the loudness.

Sadly, we don't have the luxury of sleeping when WE want to sleep anymore because of our loud neighbors. We have had to adjust our schedule and go to bed much earlier than we used to. I go to bed at 9:00pm now. I used to stay up as late as 12:00am. But, no longer b/c our schedule is now dictated by our neighbors.

We've contacted the front office of the problem after we talked directly to the neighbors, nicely, about it and still no change. So I've started a log in Microsoft word. I don't know what else to do except to log the happenings. It is so bad that if I were hearing impaired, I would still be woken-up because it vibrates our bedroom as well. (and let me tell you, that's the only vibrating going on in the bedroom lately due to sleep deprivation.)

Documenting these events by way of video tapes may be necessary because it is SOOO loud. Did I mention how loud it is? Am I a hard ass for thinking of video taping? I don't think so. Simply b/c I don't think the neighbors or the front office understand how disruptive they really are.

I'm just not used to sharing walls with people much less people who think they live in a freaking barn or something. I haven't done this since college but at least we understand to be considerate simply b/c we know we live in close contact with others. (by the way, I never had this problem in college.)

Our neighbors seem to just live their lives in spite of us and everyone else. They also know that we have a new baby and they were especially loud the day the front office contacted them in reference to their loudness. My husband and I were shocked at their reaction. Very immature behavior.

But what can you expect from a lady from Jersey who still wears mall bangs and has the look of someone that has just been punched in the face. Harsh? No, not after she's deliberately been loud and refuses to control her loud kids. Besides, I can't help it if she looks exactly like a troll doll. As my sister always says, she's been chasing parked cars. These are the facts, people. I'm just speaking the truth. Nothing against people from Jersey, she's just from some remote place in Jersey that produces rude, troll-like inconsiderate folk. Maybe I shouldn't blame this on place of origin. Maybe this should be blamed on her rearing. WHATEVER! I don't want to spend my time psycho-analyzing mall bangs lady.

This is probably the most boring weblog entry I've done yet. See, every aspect of my life is being affected!

It's so bad that I fantasize about waiting until they're asleep and going out on our upper deck that's right by their deck and next to their master bedroom and slamming loud cymbals together.

Or letting our German Shepherd out there and command him to 'speak' over and over.

Better yet, I should plan a bounding up/down the stairs party and have all of my friends come over in their heaviest shoes, drink a few, then organize a race up and down the stairs. Bounders Unite!

Even more sinister, rent a large animal, like a donkey or something, to trot up and down the stairs when I know they're sleeping. Because, frankly, I wouldn't be surprised if they have a bunch of angry swine and more assorted farm animals running up and down their stairs desperately in search of their next meal or something. Yes, it's that loud.

Crazy people. Inconsiderate people. I guess they're just stupid.

Hershey Park

We made it to the famous Hershey Park this past weekend. It went something like the following:

1. Load mini van frantically to the hilt with so much extra stuff that our neighbors probably didn't guess we were going on a weekend excursion but moving house. But where? In our van down by the river? They know we're from Texas but, come on, some benefit of the doubt would be nice.

2. Stop by the store and buy so much water that you'd think we were expecting the second coming any moment.

3. Also, fill grocery cart with so many greasy, sugary snacks that you'd think I was an advocate for or starting a campaign in favor of childhood obesity. (And adult obesity, for that matter)

4. Rub Chloe down with like SPF 1 million. This sunscreen was very close to the consistency of tar. White tar. She likened Casper the friendly ghost after I was finished with her.

5. Libby gave us a solo performance the whole hour ride.

6. Chloe scarfed down her beloved gold fish.

7. Parked far far away. Kind of like on the movie Vacation only the parking lot was FULL and we didn't run, although I did hear Chariots of Fire playing; was that in my head?

8. We didn't see a Moose at the front either - We did, however see a giant M&M creature/thingy -And I channeled Mr. Griswold for a moment and thought about punching the chocolate drop in its center nutty area after Chloe saw it and kept asking for candy.

9. Sweat our asses off.

10. Drank like a gallon of overpriced lemonade in an effort to quench my primal thirst (in spite of all of the water weighing down the stroller) only to be even thirstier and also sporting the bitter beer face.

11. Watched a bear shit in the woods.

12. Feel very sorry for all of these captured animals. People were staring and pointing at them and banging on the glass. I was hoping that the glass wall would fall and free the gator on the other side. And maybe the gator would've eaten that lady that was tapping on the glass so loudly. (Jeez, I never thought that I would turn into such an animal advocate and be such a tree hugger, in general- maybe I should volunteer for PETA or something.)

13. Last, but certainly not least, watched Chloe have the time of her life!

Ah, the fresh smell of Ozone

As you can see from the pictures, the children started out very civilized in their Sunday best, only it was Saturday and we were headed out to go shopping - a sacred family event, of course. Chloe was pondering on, oh, I don't know, things like string theory, wormholes, and just who/what this ultimate observer is anyway. Ya know, your everyday basic ponderings on the theoretical sciences.

Chloe says to herself,

"Hmmm, I wonder if Steven Hawking got that email about my breakthrough on time machines."

Just the night before she said,

"No, I don't want to read Good Night Moon! Gosh mommy, brush up on your conceptual foundations of quantum physics, already!"

Me with eyes open widely and nothing else to say, "Okaaay."

And in the picture below that, Libby is wondering when I'm going to take that damn foo-foo bow off of her head.

Well, we headed off to shop at the all-mighty Sam's Club. (No, there's not a Cosco nearby, darn-it.) Alan and I, in the spirit of Memorial Day weekend, purchased two huge maroon (Gig Em Aggies! whoop!) beach- chair loungers with the ever so crucial drink holders, that are not on one, but on both arms!

We idealized laying side by side, the wind in our hair, the lush trees at our feet and gazing up high in the sky at the exotic birds that fly by our deck. Wow, what a view! Wow, what a margarita! Another? Of course, I'll have another. Got any tiny umbrellas too?

Crack! Here came the dark rolling clouds and we instantly scattered like teenagers at a busted house party.

Well, it did take a little vocal prompting (okay, nagging) to convince Chloe to get off of daddy's lounger that she had stolen earlier after he went to make us more drinks. But Daddy was happy to stand on the deck and let Chloe relax excitedly on the lounger. That is, until this fast-moving, water-producing storm showed up. (Libby was inside napping at this point) (Chloe nap? Never.)

Somewhat giddy at this point, we hurriedly swooped everything up and rushed inside. Thundering loudly. Big heavy rain drops. Ah, the smell.

We went to the lower level and before we knew it, somewhere between the x and y margarita, we had let Chloe get virtually naked and start rain dancing out on the deck. Instantly, her civilized ways went feral . Oh, what a feral exhibit. Little feral one. Our little feral child. Queen to all the docile, cultured domestics turned beastly, savage bruts.

Again, I say feral.