Pictures

Man I've been falling behind on the sharing on SHutterfly and I have a feeling I won't be catching up soon, since I was just given a big assignment at work that they want quickly, and the Christmas break! Just wanted to share a few recent cute ones!

Our little mini-man playing at the surgeon's office:


CHEESE!!!


My beauty-full wittle babygirl:


Here's Daddy, so proud of his black & tan:


And is this Grandpa, or Santa?!?! Must be Grandpa because Santa wouldn't have a beer in his hand, would he???

I just had 11 little HoneyBee visitors!

Shelby's class came to my office to see me. They are so cute! They're all holding onto their rope lined up on the wall. When they were leaving, they all started saying, "Bye Shelby Mommy!!!" Ms. Yolanda said, "That's Miss Megan, can you say Miss Megan?" and Shelby said, "My mommy's not Miss Megan, she's Mommy!!"
Their visits brighten my day! :)

Black bobby grew up.

Last night was the most horrible bedtime ever! Shelby did not want to go to sleep and didn't want to lay in her bed, and Jeff and I had such a hard time with it.
Shelby ended up giving up, after we took her back into her bed without speaking to her a la SuperNanny about a gajillion bazillion times, and slept on her floor. Amidst all that mess, I kept thinking about how we'd lost her precious bobby and that she would probably be going to bed readily if she had her best friend in the world there to comfort her. After all Bobby had been through....being left at the Pumpkin Patch only to be picked up by us hours later, being dropped in the toilet, left at school all alone at night, resulting in tears from Shelby... he ended up going missing one day and never seen again. We think it might have been at Albertson's that he was last seen, but we're not sure. We only knew that we couldn't mention him being gone because of the heartbreak it would bring to Shelby. We had to just let him fade from her memory, and let other little stuffed animals like Penny, Missy, Val, and Lammie try to fill the void. But Bobby was the only ever TRUE lovie that Shelby had, and he always seemed to bring her comfort that no other thing could. I had been thinking of him more and more lately, and had been so sad knowing that he was gone and we wouldn't have him to keep in the top of a closet for years and years, and to pull him down when Shelby had a baby of her own, like my Grandpa Rabbit and Jeff's train conductor dog named Joe. Last night I was thinking of Bobby even more as Shelby's bedtime fit ensued, and I remembered the other bobby we have. He was dubbed "Shoo wee bobby" or "Eyes bobby" by Shelby because I bought him as a backup after the other Bobby had been thoroughly broken in with love, and he was new and plump and didn't have the whites of his eyes scratched off from when she was a teething baby like the Real Bobby did. Poor ShooWee Bobby, Shelby wanted nothing to do with him. So last night during the bedtime debacle, I found this Shoo Wee/Eyes Bobby, all new with the pretty white eyes, and I scratched those damn eyes off. I scratched as hard and fast as I could, motivated by my sad screaming little girl who needed her Bobby. No, she wasn't crying for him but I knew he would have been able to make everything ok if he were in her arms. But, I couldn't give him to her last night. I had to be very careful in making sure she didn't know that this was the shoo wee bobby in disguise. Instead, after his eyes were nice and Black, I put him in the washer. I put him through 3 heavy cycles to try to wear him out. I dried him, and got him out this morning. He still wasn't worn out like the other Bobby was from 2 years of ShelbyLove, but he was a little less puffy and looked not quite so brand new. I grabbed him from the dryer and headed into Shelby's room this morning. She was laying there with her eyes open, and they sure did brighten when she saw "black bobby" in my arms. She grabbed him and started giggling, but she was still a little hesitant. She really studied him, turning him over and smelling him and holding his eyes right up to her eyes, as I stood there in suspense. Is she going to love him or throw him off, knowing he's really the "Shoo wee Bobby?" Finally, a huge smile broke on her face and she giggled some more. She said, "Is this black bobby mommy?" and I told her it was. It wasn't a lie, since he was technically now Black Bobby, with black eyes, no whites left on them. She smiled and said, "Bobby grew up mommy!" Haha, she noticed that he was bigger and puffier than the last time she had seen him, but she concluded that he must have grown up, since it was in fact the same Bobby- it had to be--- just look at his eyes!!! The eyes that were furiously scratched away with mommy's love only 12 hours before!!

Long live Black Bobby!!!

In the beginning:


Near the end:

Shelby Shelby bo belby

This is funny. (Yes I was filming while driving but I was being safe!)

Life Lessons from the HoneyBees

Another thing to be thankful for: Our AWESOME perfect couldn't-ask-for-a-better-place school where Shelby spends her days! Her teachers are so loving and really care about their little HoneyBees. After being out of school since Wednesday for the holidays, Shelby was crying, "I want to go to school!!" by Saturday night. Now that's something to be thankful for! A place where she is loved and happy! Ms Yolanda just sent us this email document:

Throughout our busy grown-up lives, we ignore the small things that occur daily that fill us with love and changes us. All of us know at least one person whose influence has greatly inspired us to change our perspective on life for the better. I’m blessed that I have eleven little friends who do just that everyday.

Shelby reminds me that it’s great to have a friend to call on when you need them. “I need you Linnea,” she says.

Gabriel and Mark remind me that two friends are stronger together than apart. Gabe asks, “Where’s Mark,” and Mark asks “Where’s Gabe.”

Linnea reminds me that it’s ok to be silly and to laugh often.

Ryan King reminds to play hard, eat much and sleep well.

Isabella and Madelyn help me remember that family is what matters the most and that a family member is always close by when you need them.

Ryan Carr reminds me to always stop and listen to the music and to dance as if no one is watching.

Ryann Ward helps me remember that you don’t have to be a grown up to shout joyously anytime of the day.

Lucas helps me remember that a smiling face often warms the hearts of others.

Natalia reminds me that it’s always good to help others.

We are never too old to learn from the very young.

Ms. Yolanda Anna-Marie Jones

Give thanks!

Well I didn't have my camera out much. I'm falling behind on the picture taking! But I wanted to share a few things about Thanksgiving. It SNOWED on Thanksgiving day! Beautiful HUGE snowflakes fell for several hours. It wasn't cold enough to stick but it sure was pretty to look at coming down!
Here is our pretty table all set up for the meal:


And people at the table chowing down:


Jeff and I posing with our first turkey. It was a 23-pounder, YUMMY, and gone in 2 days!!


Coleman enjoying his first Thanksgiving AFTER Poppy burnt his mouth with the mashed potatoes :) :


Nana and Garland came in from Powderly, Texas. Nana makes the amazing dressing that we LOVE, tasty gravy, and some pretty great pies too!:


Here are my wonderful siblings and me:


Coleman spent lots of the weekend on his favorite toy, his horsey! He can get on and off by himself and rocks along to the music with a huge grin on his face.


Then my dad's family came into town, and I didn't have my camera for the entire time they were there. It was lost, hanging out in Shelby's play kitchen for a few days. But Mimi, Jack, Jana, Bruce, Hayley, Ben, Scott, and Karen all came in from Arkansas to see us. We had a great time. Jana, I promise I'll get some pics of you at Christmas to put on the blog! I know you want to be on here, haha!

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone! Jeff and I are so thankful for our family. Our children bring unmeasurable joy to our lives, and we are so blessed to have such a wonderful extended family surrounding us. Our children might not ever know exactly how blessed they are to have so many grandparents, aunts, uncles, great-aunts, great-uncles, cousins, and great-grandparents who know them and love them so much, but we will always try to make them understand just how special it is!!! We love you all.

Feliz Navidad

This morning Jeff and I were both telling Shelby to leave something alone (who knows what, she's into everything!) and she said, "Leave me alone FAMILY!!!" We put up the Christmas decorations this morning, and the ornaments on the tree. She grabbed a handful of icicle ornaments and said she was going to count them. She sat down..."Uno, dos, tres, quatro, cinco, seis..." She counted them in Spanish all the way to ten! haha. It's Christmas time! Feliz Navidad!
We had a great time with family this weekend, for Thanksgiving. I will write more about that later, and have some pictures too!

Amidst bedtime

We're in the middle of "bedtime" so far and this is how it's gone:
Mommy: "Shelby it's bedtime now. Let's go."
Shelby: "No mommy it's not bedtime, it's time for a tea party with Mommy and Daddy."
(((She starts walking into her bedroom with her picnic basket full of plastic food, plates, cups, and spoons.)))
Shelby: "I'm not going asleep Mommy, I'm having a party with all my friends! They are hungry and I better feed 'em."
(((I walk into her dark bedroom and turn the light on. She's on her top bunk with all her stuffed animals and dolls.)))
Shelby: "You leave the light on mommy and I gonna have the tea party with all my friends and all my friends gonna like it."

So of course I got the camera and videoed it:

Daddy is wude.

Last night we let Shelby sleep with us. At 4am when Cole woke up, I asked Jeff to take her to her bed so I could feed Cole in our bed. Well, Shelby wasn't happy with that. She woke up as he was carrying her and started screaming, "No daddy!!!" Then she whimpered, "Mommy wants to cuddle me!!!" haha, how could I send her away like that? So I told Jeff it was fine, let her back in our bed, and he said, "OK Shelby let's get back in mommy and daddy's bed." She said, "ok. That's WUDE Daddy!" She told him he was rude. haha.

Weenies and bodies

This morning Shelby was playing in the kitchen and she kept saying, "Oh my God. Oh my God." I truly don't know where she learned that because, as common as it is, I know it is something that Jeff and I (and my family) do not say.
This evening we were sitting on the couch, and she was being so sweet. She was saying, "Mommy. Mommy. I want to cuddle you mommy." So when we were laying there, she said, "Daddy. Look at me." When he looked she said, "Coleman has a weenie and Daddy has a weenie." J said, "That's right. What do you and mommy have?" And she said, "We have bodies."
I have a theory about how she (and probably many other toddlers) do JUST ENOUGH cute stuff for us to keep them. Today she was a holy terror about 75% of the day but that other 25% is just so great. Last night she bit Cole on the back, broke the skin and left marks. Today she bit me on the leg. She also peed in her panties FOUR times today. She hasn't had an accident in a month but today she decided that she wasn't potty trained anymore, I guess. Talk about frustrating!
Well, that's my short little before bedtime Saturday night update!

Yucky carrots

I am pretty sure it is just a quality that is there when you are born. Veggies are yuck. It doesn't matter if mommy and daddy only give you veggies for the first year. It doesn't matter if they give you veggies before fruit, or after meat. It doesn't matter if they're green or orange or yellow or what order of colored veggies you are given. It doesn't even matter if you have no sugar for your entire first year of life. Veggies are yucky, no matter how you do it! Coleman thinks so.

Fevers and wedgies

Cole is sick today. He didn't want to sleep last night. He went down around 7:30 but was up at 10, 12:30, 2:45, and 5:45. Fun (not.) I am also not feeling tip-top but I'm surviving. I don't think I really slept much at all because between Coleman waking up, I was coughing. Which was keeping Jeff awake. Oh and Shelby got up sometime between midnight and 3 also, to peepee. Then I had to lay in her bed w/ her but I couldn't stop coughing so Jeff went in to lay with her. Isn't there someone who doesn't WANT or LIKE to sleep at night who could come stay with us for a while?? :) Anyway, Cole must have not been feeling well b/c when I picked him up this morning, he felt really hot and he had a 101.1 temp. So I stayed home with him this morning, and Jeff came home at lunch to stay with him the rest of the day. After napping in his crib for about 30 min this morning, he slept on top of me on my bed for another hour. After that his temp was over 102. Poor sweetie. He doesn't act like he feels that bad, just kind of lethargic but he's still lots of smiles.
This morning out of the blue Shelby exclaimed, "Oh no! I have a wedgie!" Haha- I guess I taught her that. The last panties I bought her are "low-cut bikinis" or something. They're way cute but she walks around with a wedgie in them all the time so I'm always telling her to pull out her wedgie. She still hasn't figured out how to do that without pulling her whole panties off. :)
Well that's all for now. My head feels like it might explode from the sinus pressure. Please let us feel better! This no sleep thing is definitely not helping my immunity.

Weekend pics

Coleman is such a happy boy! Here he is this morning, dressed all up like a big boy with a BIG smile on his face to go with it!


Here's Shelby making a mess with her ice cream sandwich on Saturday:


Friday night Jeff and I got to go out on a "date." We went to Brio. Jeff was feelin all young and cool rollin' without the munchkins:


and I was just really excited:


It was a great weekend!! :)

Cole's new favorite thing

Crawling out the doggy door! He's fast too! We caught him several times this weekend, halfway out the door.

It's finally Friday!

I've been trying to get up the desire to update on here- I've just been worn out this week! Shelby has been a BEAR. She doesn't want to go to bed, she doesn't want to go to school, she doesn't want to do whatever it is that we ask so it's fits all the time. What a beating!
We went to Gram & Grandpa's house on Wednesday and we just hung out at their house all day. It was fun and relaxing. Shelby really enjoys seeing them. She fell asleep on Gram's lap right after I had given up on the idea of her taking a nap. The rest of the week has just been basic routine life.
This morning, Coleman crawled all the way out of the doggy door! Jeff was ironing his pants and Shelby and I were in the pantry (she was trying to decide what she wanted for breakfast) and when we all walked back into the kitchen, little man's booty was the last thing sticking out the door. It was quite funny.
Tonight Jeff and I have a date night! We are finally going to use the gift certificate the Mill Anna & Ty gave us to Brio last Christmas. It is "Parent's Night Out" at Shelby's school, and they are keeping her from 6-10 like a little mini slumber party. It's a fundraiser for the school, pretty neat I think. Nonnie & Poppy are going to keep Coleman.
Ok let's see, what else has gone on this week? Coleman pooped 5 times yesterday. He blew out 2 outfits, and Shelby pooped in her pants at school too. So I had some laundry to do last night! I cannot believe it's so close to Thanksgiving, yet it's 80 degrees today. I am excited about having everyone at my house for Thanksgiving dinner- I even went and bought plates, napkins, etc yesterday. I hope it's a cool day, 80 degrees on Thanksgiving would just be wrong. Mimi, I wish you could come!!!! Any chance of working that out?
Cole has another tooth popping through, it's one of the side middle ones on the bottom. So that's his 7th tooth after the top 4 came through last/this week. I dunno- maybe that's what's making him so poopy and runny!
That's all for now. I have a headache and don't feel very creative this morning! Byeeee.

I need music to dance!

I wish I had a camera or at least a microphone following Shelby around. She's so cute and funny to me! Last night when I was cleaning out the garage, I found a little tutu that she had gotten at a birthday party. I took it in and she was so excited, and put it on immediately. Then she headed into the living room saying, "Mommy, I can dance in it!" I said, "Yes you sure can" and just watched her walk in there. She turned around as if to scold me and said, "MOMMY, I have to have music to dance to!" "Oh, sorry baby." haha Then we turned on the music and twirled and danced for what seemed like an hour. It was fun and I got some exercise! Then this morning she was walking by my desk and my pump and everything fell into the floor. She turned around and looked at it and then looked at me and said, "I'm sorry Mommy." Pause. "It was an accident." Aww I just want to eat her up!

Shelby-isms and Cole's 9 month dr appt

Jeff is sitting in the living room icing his arm since he pitched today, and Shelby just came running to me, and I could hear her saying the she had just hurt herself, so of course I expected her to ask me for a band-aid like she always does. Instead, she look at me so seriously and said, "Mommy, I just hurt myself, so I need some ice." hahaha. Update: Jeff just came in and told me that he touched Shelby's cheek with ice, and told her she could ice her foot, so she put her foot on the ice for half a second and that was good enough for her. Then she just came in and said, "Mommy, Daddy put ice right here, and he put ice right here, to make it feel better." So I asked if it felt better and she said, "Yeah!" in her cute cheery expression.
Another thing she said today (when she was mad at me) that wasn't so cute was "I'm gonna punch you in the face."
I just told Shelby that she needs to wipe her face, so get me a kleenex. She runs off to daddy, "Hey! Hey Daddy! Where are the kleenexes so I can wipe my nose?!" She is so proper in her speech and it's so cute.
Today we went to Natalia's birthday party. Natalia is one of Shelby's favorite friends in her class and she was turning 3. They had the party at a gymnastics place and it was so much fun for the kids. I'm afraid we may have to have a party at a place like that, too.
I was sick on Friday and I don't think it's totally gone. I woke up Friday morning and had some apple juice, which caused me to get so nauseous that I threw up. Then for the rest of the day, I couldn't get out of bed without getting sick. Since Jeff was running late from getting both kids ready, I had to get up and take Shelby to school. After I buckled her in, I had to go to the back of the car and puke for a few minutes. Nice. Then Shelby walks in to school and proudly starts telling her teacher that mommy threw up. And of course the 2 people I told about being sick (My mom and her teacher) both asked if I was pregnant. Ummm, no. But anyway, my tummy is still yucky and not very happy when I eat, but I am much better than Friday, when I stayed in that bed for almost 8 hours. I must admit, it was NICE, even if I was sick. :)
Cole's 9 month appt was Friday, too. I did drag myself out of bed to go to that, since someone also had to pick Shelby up from school at the same time. He weighed in at 22 lb 4 oz (between 50 & 75th percentile) and 30.5 inches (95th percentile.) He's nice and healthy, except the doctor found one thing of concern. Cole has lots of fluid in/around his left testicle. It should not still be like this; even when babies have this fluid at birth and early on, it is supposed to be gone by 1 year, and the doctor said since it's still there then we need to have a surgeon look at it and probably have it fixed. SURGERY!?!? For my baby??? So scary! But the doctor said that it's a day surgery and not that bad as far as surgeries go. He gave me numbers of the 2 children's surgery groups in the area and said they are all great, so now I have to contact them. The thought of them putting my baby boy to sleep and cutting into him is scary, but I know that he will be fine, and we have been so blessed to have 2 children with perfect health and development. By the way, the fluid in testicle thing is called hydrocele, in case I ever forget. :) haha
More about Cole: He has been pretty clingy but I think that's because he's teething like a badboy and he needs his mama and dada to make him feel better. He has all 4 top teeth now (the middle ones came in this past week) and now I think he's really working on the eye teeth. Those ones take a long time and a lot of pain! :( He has been holding his hand high up in the air and making the "Guns Up" sign- of course he doesn't know "Guns Up" but he will soon since we say it every time he does it! He's been giving "5" and waving hi and bye. He also gives wet slobbery kisses to his mommy and his nonnie all the time. They are messy but we love them!

Watch Shelby grow