just like his daddy...

Yesterday at work, I was paged to go to the office. When I got there, I saw the nurse holding little Andrew's hand. She was worried about him because he said he was HOT but when she took his temp it wasn't even 94 degrees. He was as white as a ghost. I noticed he had a bandaid on his elbow and asked him about it and soon discovered it was the problem. He fell at recess and was bleeding. He said that after he touched his elbow he saw the blood and then everything got bright and he couldn't see. He was just about to pass out.... yep, he's just like his daddy. I won't mention any names..cough.. Cameron.. cough.. but someone passed out in the hallway of the eye doctor's office after getting their eyes dilated. Looks like little JuJu is gonna be just like daddy. 

He also had a pretty bad cough for the last few days, no fever, but a bad cough so I decided to take him to the doc yesterday and she said he probably had croup. He started running fever last night and has had a fever almost all day today. I took off today to take care of him. He's just been pitiful all day. His fever would've probably gone away if he hadn't hid the two Ibuprofen pills I gave him behind the couch cushion:0/. I told him he better be glad his fever was 102 or he'd be getting it!!

Parker and I went out this morning to play in the cool morning air. He kept running in to check on Andrew:) he loves his big brother. Tonight, after Andrew's fever broke, they went running around the back yard. It was pitch black, they both had on their super hero capes and were on a mission:). I took some video but am too lazy to upload, I'm actually too lazy to upload pics, too.. these were all taken with my iPhone.

For those of you curious about the spider situation at our house... look what we found on baby Piper's head...OMGoodness! No, really she was just getting a feel for different costume ideas for Halloween:). I personally think she should go as Mr. Potato Head's Sweet-thang:).

Also, Happy 5 MONTH Piper!! Yesterday was her 5 month b-day. I took her to the doc last week and they were teasing me that she's probably going to tower over me because she's currently in the 85% percentile for height. She also weighed 15 lbs. She's a healthy girl. She's not crawling but she's a highly mobile rolly polly.

It's been a little busy around here...

This week has been a blur. Parker was sick with fever at the beginning of the week, Sissy had a diaper rash and now Andrew has a horrible cough:(. I need to douse our house with some good ole' Lysol. We've also not had a lot of sleep around here:/.
I've been busy selling things on Ebay. I've sold most of my Fall maternity clothes. I decided to sell them all because I'm in desperate need of some GOOD shoes, which I'm bidding currently bidding on:). My feet are killing me at work. Seriously, teachers hardly ever sit down in an elementary school!
My poor dad had to have emergency surgery Friday night to remove his gallbladder. The boys were so sad when I told them Papa was in the hospital. Parker said, "is it a different Papa?". It was sweet. As far as the boys are concerned, you could substitute Papa's name for every Chuck Norris fact. They think he's tough as nails:). I've attached a pic of a note Andrew wrote to Papa and some words he was practicing spelling.
Yesterday we went to a John Rosemond parenting conference. We love John Rosemond. We were fortunate enough to hear him speak a few years ago and it was so wonderful to go back. He's also the one we got the excellent potty training advise from that helped us potty train the boys in a little over a day... good stuff!!

Oh yes we did...

take all of our family of 5 to the county fair. Hopefully poor little Piper didn't get lung cancer. As soon as we pull up, Parker fell asleep so I had to pick him up out of his car seat and put him in the stroller. If any of you have ever driven a stroller through dirt and HUGE power cords, let me just say I don't recommend it. Parker's poor head was flopping all over the place. He was SO sleepy, I couldn't wake him up. When he finally woke up he was super pumped about riding the motorcycles. I pulled him out of the stroller and noticed he's soaking wet. He had an accident while he was sleeping. We probably shouldn't have let him ride any rides but we figured surely the workers used lysol wipes between each kiddo;).
I was a little embarrassed that Parker was soaking wet. Little did I know I had reasons of my own to be embarrassed about. Rewind to about an hour before we left.... Parker found some hair clips that he wanted to put in my hair. I said, "okay but we have to take them out because we're about to leave". My hair was in the shortest ponytail possible and I let Parker put them all in my ponytail. Fast forward several hours.... I was rocking Piper that night before putting her to bed and sat back in the chair and realized I never took the clips out. That's right... there were 5 COLORFUL clips in my super tiny ponytail all night. I immediately started getting hot, you know that embarrassed feeling. I began thinking, "who all did I see tonight??" Then anger sat in. I said, "Cameron, COME here". I asked him, "Did you not notice something different about my hair?" He's like, "what, the clips?" He said he thought it was some sort of fashion statement. Oh my goodness!!!

Mr. Potato Head's Girlfriend

Okay, I just had to:)... I saw the glasses sitting on the floor just begging to hop on Piper's face. I couldn't resist snapping a couple of pics with my phone. Cameron came around the corner and said, "WHAT are you doing to her?":)

Ode to Peaches

You could probably say I'm addicted to peaches. I LOVE them so much:)!! My dad went and picked some the other day at the orchard and brought us some. We juiced them up and have been having a late night snack with them the past couple of nights. We cook some biscuits and right as they're finished baking you cut them in half and spread butter on them. You then sprinkle them with cinnamon and sugar and put them back in the oven to get crispy. The best part..... then you SMOTHER them with peaches. It's divine!!!

Family Pictures

We went to my parent's for dinner tonight and I decided to take my camera and tripod to get some family shots. We haven't taken any pictures together since sweet girl was born so we decided to take some simple shots by the lake.

Will I catch up???

I love it that Andrew and Parker are so close in age, only 17 months apart. They are such great friends and playmates. My heart is a little sad because Andrew is growing up and seems to be leaving Park behind. I know Parker is growing up, too, but he's still at home. Andrew is off at school making friends. The other day Andrew said two of his friends wanted him to come over and Parker said, "can I go, too?" Andrew said, "well you don't know them". I told Parker if Andrew went over to their house that mommy and daddy would take him somewhere fun so he wouldn't be sad... he said, "okay, but I'll still be a little sad:(". I took this pic below with my phone. Andrew had brought home a library book from school and they went out on the porch to look at it together. It was so sweet. Today I told Parker that at his birthday he would be 4. He said, "Will I catch up with Andrew?"

Where were you?

I was reading another blog and the blogger asked this question so I thought I would, too.
Where were you on September 11, 2001?
I was co-teaching 10th grade English at Jacksonville High School. I had to take something to the office and remember walking through the library and seeing something on t.v. I went to my room and told my co-teacher about it and we all watched it together. It was so frightening to me. Just a feeling of helplessness. Just days earlier I had arrived home from Rwanda, Africa. I kept thinking how scared I would've been to still be out of the country.

Giggle.. giggle

Tonight Andrew was telling us something at the table and all of the sudden Piper started cracking up:). The boys then proceeded to try to make her laugh....

Recess

Mom.. "what's your favorite thing to do at school, Andrew?"
Andrew... "RECESS"
We usually have that same exchange of words everyday and his answer never changes:). Since Andrew loves recess so much, I thought we'd take Parker to the playground tonight and let him play, too. They both had tons of fun.



Cameron even got in on the playground action:)


What did little Miss Piper do while the boys were playing? Smile and blow bubbles:)... she just had a good time watching her big bubbies play.

At the lake

My parents live right on a small lake about 15 minutes away from us. The boys stayed the night there last night. They LOVE to stay with PapPa and Grandma!! I decided to take some pics of them this morning when I went to pick them up. I can't wait until Piper is big enough to sit with them for pictures:).

At the lake... more pics

Here are some more pictures from the lake today.

Too much time on his hands

So Anita and Anna got the point of my wonderful, reflective post about the sad songs. You know, be nicer to your family, let your mascara run all over your face. Apparently my brother-in-law didn't watch the videos and really let the words touch his heart. After reading the post, he seemed to think I was somehow infatuated with Reba herself and perhaps, deep down inside, wanted to be Reba McEntire. Then with, obviously, too much time on his hands he decided to try to make my dreams of becoming Reba come true. After seeing the pictures, while hysterically laughing, Cameron said, "Maybe that is what Piper will look like with her red hair" ;).

Pics from the iPhone

The boys have really been enjoying hearing sweet Piper Jane talk:). They try to interpret her screams all the time. They'll say, "Mom, she just said boo-ball" or some other made up word. She also loves it when they talk to her in her own language. Sometimes I feel as if I have 3 little babies around here:).
Andrew was drawing on my board at school the other day and drew a picture of PapPa's truck. Isn't it sweet? I guess PapPa doesn't need elbows, or maybe that's John McCain on that picture?:) Just JOKING!

Politics...

Politics.. politics... I've always been into political elections. I've also always been a diehard republican, despite my family's efforts to sway me the other way:). A couple of years ago, I felt very convicted about the divisiveness in politics. It's as if God gave me a disgust for the attacks both parties make. I've felt led to truly try to look at the candidates for who they are and not what party they belong to. I don't want to hate or dislike someone or some leader because what party hat they wear. I believe I can believe in a candidate without destroying another. I honestly like Barack Obama. I know a lot of people don't, but I think he really is a great man. I'm so moved and inspired by his heart for the people of Africa, and yes, I know we live in America. I think he seems to be a great family man. There are many things he believes in that I do not. I honestly wasn't thrilled with McCain but have always had respect for him. I'm hoping that he's an honest, loyal man. I am really excited about Sarah Palin but I'm SO inspired by Cindy McCain. Her intro video was amazing (it played before her speech on AETN). She is an incredible lady. Who knew?? I don't know tons about John McCain's convictions but Cindy seems to live life based on her burdens and convictions and that is so encouraging to me. I'm excited about this political election and pray that God will bless our country with a great leader.

What a good mommy:)

We were watching the RNC last night and couldnt quit laughing at cute Piper Palin mommying her little baby brother. Wish she were around to help me fix my kiddo's hair:)

We're just a bunch of saps...

Tonight Cameron was putting the boys down. Our routine is having our quiet time while they go to sleep. I usually sing a song, read my Bible, pray and sing another song (or two). The boys always request Why? by Nicole Nordeman and Dear Mr. Jesus. Well, believe it or not, Cameron doesn't know those songs;). So he called for back up. I sang those and continued to sing a couple more because they were on the verge of sleeping. Many times I'll just sing hymns but tonight I remembered a sweet song called If I had Only Known by Reba McIntire. When I came out I told Cameron about the song and then remembered another horribly sad song called The Greatest Man I Never Knew. Within minutes, I was boohooing, which isn't too much of a surprise for those who really know me. I've always liked sad songs, sad books, movies, etc. My favorite author growing up was Laurlene McDaniel. She wrote about every type of tragedy imaginable:). Cam always cracks up when he sees some of my old books from when I was a teen. (What's wrong with daddy?, Mother please don't die, Too Young to die, etc.) For those of you who need a good cry, I've added the two sad songs below. If you're already a little depressed and not totally stable you should NOT watch the videos (or look up the lyrics). As I was boohooing about the songs, Cameron started to get sad about Piper growing up and no longer being fascinated with the ceiling fan lights. It was just all depressing over here. Luckily I happened upon the last video I've attached to this post of this SUPER cute baby laughing. Unlike the other two videos, I recommend this one for all of you:).

He's been waiting for so long...

When Andrew woke up this morning I told him, "Happy Birthday". The first thing he said was, "Am I five? Am I five right now??" He was so excited that he was finally FIVE. He's had a great day. I let him choose what we would have for dinner and he chose tacos. Cameron took him and Parker to the sports center to play a little ball tonight. This morning at school, I was peeking in his classroom to see what they were doing and saw him proudly wearing his birthday hat:). He looked so cute with his huge hat on.
Although I'm so sad my little ones are growing so fast, I know that we'll make even more memories the older they get. This weekend we went swimming at a state park and I saw a mom and son spending time together. The son seemed to be around 16 or so. He and his mom were having a great time together. It made Andrew turning five not seem so sad.
Happy Birthday sweet son!! Mommy loves you!!