Spring Break Zoo Trip

Although it was a cold Spring Break, the kids still had lots of fun! We played and ate at Chik-fa-la on Monday and enjoyed the indoor bounce house. On Tuesday, Melissa and Aaron Cook came over for a while to join in on the bounce house fun. Wednesday- Reese and Raygan-Elise visited with Hammie for a bit, while Poppa and I ran errands. Then, they were pretty good while we went to two home stores. Thursday-Reese went to play at Titus's house for the day, while Stacey and I took the girls to the Collierville Antique Mall (yes, we are very brave!). Friday- Zoo! Saturday and Sunday we rested and played around the house!

Friday was our Zoo day. We met Mary Ann, her parents, and her children, Enoch and Sarah. The zoo was packed! The weather had been so cold all week and then with weather.com calling for thunderstorms Saturday, everyone had the same idea! It was a beautiful day and the animals were enjoying it. The bears were play fighting, and one of the Polar Bears was jumping off the rocks into the water! Reese's favorite spot is the new bear and wolves area- Teton Trek- because he loves the wolves. By the time we made it to the wolves, they were asleep. :( Reese got camera happy this trip and wanted to grab the camera and take pictures of all the animals. He also kept saying, "Take a picture of me here." "Oh, Mom, you always want to take a picture of me in the _____." Raygan-Elise was wonderful!!!!!! At the moment, our whole family is loving her on a dairy free diet...but again we will have to wait and see if it continues. She even walked with Mary Ann's parents and let Enoch and Sarah touch her! She still loves ducks! She found 2 sleeping in a corner by the fence and chased them until they flew away! She enjoyed the animals and especially lunch (pizza with cheese removed) and her strawberry Popsicle! Reese of course needed a wolf stuffed animals. I'm amazed with how much he still loves his stuffed animals-both collecting and honestly he really plays with them often. Although sometimes, he makes up games where he's throwing them. But we'll walk in and he's decorated the room with them or made a scavenger hunt with them. She was asleep before we even left the parking lot, while Reese went straight into playing his DS, with his new wolf in arm (he named him Teton). And when Brian got home from work, we went to eat Mexican! Sad our fun week must come to an end!!!

How are the kids?

Reese is growing up and starting to use a larger vocabulary each day! I keep thinking I need to write a list of the words he uses during regular conversation. I am going to do that this next month! It is hilarious! He is playing soccer games now and has started baseball practice. He made 2 goals at a soccer game (the only game ever that Brian and I both weren't in attendance! UGH)! He is on the Cardinals through Snowden for Baseball this year. He is very excited. He has a great stance when at bat and when he makes contact he hit great. But sometimes get too nervous I think. I so remember that feeling of everyone watching you! And I pulled his other front tooth so he got $2 from the tooth fairy. He has told many people that his mom likes to pull teeth!! I do, I do!! He really is enjoying reading the Diary of a Wimpy Kid books. I haven't read them and think maybe I should! But he's very excited that the movie is coming out this weekend. I would say his good friend at school is Titus, and he got to go to his house over spring break which thrilled him. He said they ate, watched TV, and played games! Poppa and him caught a turtle a few weeks ago and he saved it for many days. Then was so sad to let it go. He wanted to make a "home" for it outside so he could go back and visit. A friend wasn't very nice and tossed it too deep into the water while they were outside playing! It broke his heart (and mine and Brian's seeing him so upset). He has a sweet heart! He is very scattered like me sometimes and can walk right by something but then ask where it is!! He is still making all A's in school and soon I will be having to choose his 3rd grade teacher! YIKES! 3rd Grade!!!

Raygan-Elise is starting to talk more and more each day! She has learned so many new words! She is still getting speech once a week but I think soon we will probably go onto just maintenance and/or where they check in on her from time to time. I feel they will wait until she turns 2 to decide to see if she is "where she should be". She has had 2 more ear infections in the last post (one with yeast in culture). The practitioner put her back on daily zyrtec and singular but she still had another infection and nose running the week after that (we are still taking it though). We saw the real ENT (not just nurse practitioner) and he was leaning toward more surgery but wanted to see if it possibly was dairy allergy. She has had what I think is eczema for a while. So we are on dairy and egg free diet till March 30th! and it may be coincidence but her nose has quit running and in general her irritability is better!!! She still has such a strong personality with what we call- a little bit of evil. Last night she decided it would be fun to tease dogs with food from the highchair and then eat it! How does a 22 month old come up with this? I must say I didn't stop her immediately b/c I recorded some of it on my phone. She likes to be so independent! She loves spoons, balls, her soothie (pacifier), Mimmie(minnie) and of course bows and shoes! She loves water (even showers!) and will take a large cup and dump it all over her face in the bathtub! She still eats more than I've ever seen a little person eat! She also likes to sit on her potty even though she doesn't like potty-ing on it. When she feels she must go, she either stands and goes on floor (even #2'd on floor once) or goes and gets a diaper! She isn't afraid of anything and is rough and tough! We got the bounce house out this week and she loved it! She would throw herself all over it! She loves her Reese and has started copying everything we do! If he does it, she tries to do it! And it happened- she wrote all over the wall and the door this week with a green coloring pencil! Newest words- eeth (teeth), loves saying uh uh (no), eese (Reese)

Facebook Status comments!

Everyone on facebook comes up with such cute and witty ways to word their status comments...usually mine are pretty blah! But I do find it a fun and quick way to share with friends what's going on in our little world. But sometimes I do have a moment. And I must say this was my best one which I can tell by all the comments I had about it and it is based on a TRUE STORY!!

Top Facebook Status Award Winner of the Month by April:
Attention all Target shoppers: I apologize for your shopping experience today. The lady in the green shirt is April and the adorable girl laying down in the basket kicking and screaming is Raygan-Elise. They have now left the store and you may continue on with your Friday afternoon shopping. **Target is not responsible for any distractions or headaches received during shopping.

Honorable Mentions:
pizza hut again!! Reese is upstairs eating. Brian is eating watching basketball. I'm eating mine in living room with Raygan-Elise who isn't eating yet because she's throwing a fit because she can't eat her pizza with a spoon.

is so proud of Reese and his scrabble team member, Jacob, for placing 5th in the Spotlight Scrabble Tournament today! He was so excited!

just learned Raygan-Elise may not need speech any more because apparently Brian asked her if she was ready for a bath and she responded, "Yes and I want my mommy to give me the bath!" Wow! However, Brian was the only person to witness this breakthrough! ; )
on!

guess I should be happy Raygan-Elise loves Maples & threw a huge fit bc she didn't want to leave today but it makes me sad! Now onto Reese's 1st soccer practice.

just left a store where Reese announced, "this stuff is like so 1996!" so I asked what that means. He responded, "you know. like so 14 yrs ago!"

January/Early February Update on kids!

I guess I've broken my Resolution already! But I'm going to hopefully do better!

Reese is such a good child. He still gets hyper, especially around Raygan-Elise, but in most of the time he is so helpful. His teachers say he's great. He's only pulled 2-3 cards this year. Once last week for playing at lunchtime. He enjoys Spotlight Gifted class so much! They had a scrabble tournament last week. It was a partner team tournament. He and his partner got 5th place. He had the biggest grin after school! I didn't know how many teams played so didn't know if 5th was good or if there were only 5 teams. : ). But I found out from his teacher that there were over 50 teams! So wow!! He still enjoys playing on the computer! And he is excited about Spring soccer! He still is close friends with Titus in his class and Caleb (a 3rd grader in Spotlight too) comes to play with him each day at the prek building. He recently also went to his friends Lake's bday party where he drove a go cart for the first time and he loved it! It has snowed up a storm and he's been sledding in our backyard!! He still cracks me up with the things he says: Mom, on your q we will start. Can you do it because I'm having to attend to Raygan-Elise? and so many more! He also made his Dad proud by watching the whole super bowl with brian (reese wanted saints to win! Yay, they did!) And even coming up with scenarios towards the end of game (such as saints need to make a td but miss extra point and the other team needs a safety!) bc he wanted us to win the super bowl squares!

Raygan-Elise is almost 21 months old! Her personality is definitely shining through more each day! The ear tube surgery has not stopped her infections. She has had 5 ear infections since the surgery which makes 11 since the last week of September. But on a very positive note, the tubes help her infections so much- she can hear even with the drainage and she doesn't run fever or feel bad! She just gets irritated and pulls on her ears but I would too if fluid was draining from them! She loves baby dolls and baby is one of her words she can say! After calling everyone mama and working with the speech teacher for a while, she now says dada!!! She said it for first time about 3 weeks ago! She now has about 10 words (some we understand only- like gu for duck and some clear like baby and bye!) She still loves being grumpy and throwing some major fits in public or private! Like her recent falling on the ground and screaming at target because I wouldn't keep the puppy pads! Seriously, we don't need puppy pads! Or at the house because she is mad at her jacket or because the dogs won't do what she wants them to do.
She had a check-up mid jan and weighed right over 23 lbs! And after a dentist trip that showed deterioration of teeth and a talk with dentist we cut out her bottle before bed immediately which slowly turned into a bottle-less day! She loves her soothie (pacifier), minnie mouse, saying mine, and shaking her head yes (mostly shakes yes no matter what you ask her- such as do you want daddy to change your diaper or do you want to kiss a monkey or jump off a table) and no. She still loves for Hammie to sing Itsy bitsy spider! And she loves peek-a-boo, this little piggie(but you can't use one foot, I have to do one piggy on one foot then next piggy on other foot and so on), and starting this past week- Baby Beluga, as I hold her like an infant or as she dances around the room! She is such a girly-girl. She loves wearing shoes and would wear the in bed if I would let her. She loves bracelets, and even took an onion out of my salad at Brian's bday dinner & put it on her wrist! She hates to have her hands dirty and wipes her feet if they get dirty and hates hates a wet or dirty diaper. So, we bought her a potty about 2 weeks ago and she's been just sitting on it. Often she will go to it after she pottys in her diaper. This morning she was grunting and pointing to tummy so I took her to potty. She sat on it but stood up immediately. Then she sat back down but got up, walked to get diaper, brought me diaper, then pp'd all over floor as she stood beside potty holding her diaper!

I'm hoping the video works. This is Reese and Raygan-Elise's new game. They love it! I'm calling it our winter olympics!
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone

Christmas/New Years Card

I can't wait to have time to type more about our Disney Trip, but until then...

I didn't do a Christmas Card before Christmas in the hopes to do one with our Disney Pics. Well, I've spent the last week creating it with some digital paper and software! And now I CANNOT get it to print. So here is a preview. It is very clear on my computer but for some reason it is blurring when I upload it. I am not a professional yet...Hopefully, it will work soon!

Disney World Slide Show

My New Year's Resolution is to blog more often (instead of 4 in one day)!!

Disney was wonderful! So much to do, so many stories! The kids had a blast!

I took almost 900 pictures and lots of video! I made a slide show of my fav pics (narrowed it down to 160 so I think that's pretty good)! There is still so much more to tell you about our Disney Adventures but this is a start. I'll share some stories and favorite events from each park in the upcoming days!

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Christmas, 09

Christmas with little ones is so much fun! Leading up, we went to see Santa as he traveled through downtown Olive Branch. Reese had his list and read the entire letter to Santa. Santa kept it so he could remember it. Raygan-Elise wasn't as thrilled with Santa. She screamed! Santa tried real hard to win her over. He walked around and talked to her and whispered secrets in her ear. She warmed up a little...and by that I mean she didn't scream when he stood beside us but she didn't crack a smile either. Then, we went to the Hernando Christmas parade. Reese was more thrilled with trying to catch candy than the bands and floats passing by him. He just kept saying do you think they'll throw candy. Raygan-Elise smiled and clapped some. None of the very loud tractors, 18 wheeler (the front part), banks, or even firetrucks scared her. She just walked around my chair and stared at all of it!!

We started off this week in Clarksdale on Sunday. We opened presents at Ruru's first then SL that night. Raygan-Elise loved tearing the paper. And Reese was just super excited! I think Raygan-Elise's favorite gifts were her Magna-Doodle from Anna and her baby doll, from Hammie. Reese loves his Barakagun DS game from Anna. He said he can't eat anymore because the game changed his life!! Raygan-Elise got a rocking horse from Ruru and a grocery basket from Mamaw. Reese got a Spongebob game from Ruru and a hot wheels track from Mamaw. All the kids (except RE) got a marshmallow gun from Aunt Billie. That was a big hit with the cousins!! Reese loves his! That night we went to SL where they got a lot more gifts. The children had so much fun. We usually do Christmas in Clarksdale on Christmas Eve night and although I complained I feel blessed we did it early, as Ruru passed away Christmas Eve morning. She will be missed so much but as she said, "I'm ready to go home!"

Today, Santa came and of course tons more gifts!! Reese was SO excited yesterday! He set many traps to catch Santa but then changed them all. He took a nap to try and stay up late last night, but he still fell asleep. We called Norad Santa tracking all day and tracked Santa around the World on the computer. Brian said he has never seen him so excited! This morning he was thrilled with all his video games, guitar, and microscope plus everything else. Raygan-Elise was excited to see all the presents. She walked straight to her balls and then to her corn popper walker toy. She smiled each time her furreal pet cat made noises! She has been very very happy today! I think the tubes and meds from earlier in the week are definitely helping!

Then, we opened our presents. Reese's school had a fundraiser where the kids got to shop for their family. Reese got Raygan-Elise a book, me a heart necklace and earring set, and Brian a lighted key chain! Then they opened our presents to them. After the 3rd Mickey gift, Reese said hmmm, I'm getting a lot of these this year. Then, the big finale came! He opened the box and stared. When it finally sunk in, he grinned from ear to ear. Brian and I both got teary eyed!! Then, the big news-- Reese, I wonder when we can go....what about tomorrow! "YES!!!," he yelled, "MERRY CHRISTMAS!" and his arms flew up in the air. We are so excited and have been packing the car all day! It will be a fun-filled Mickey Week!! We leave tomorrow around lunch! Reese says his Favorite part of Christmas is all the toys and I think Raygan-Elise's is the food (she's gotten so good at using baby sign for more, all done and eat.) She even says ma sometimes when she signs more.

MERRY CHRISTMAS to everyone!!! From our family!!!

My Funny Children!

Personalities!! I tell you. Sometimes they are like night and day. Reese-the ever talkative, happy, smiling, question asking, curious boy and Raygan-Elise- the vocal (yet with no words), strong-willed, demanding, although yes curious girl!

I think the older a child gets in school, maybe the less time during the day they have to talk and be social...too many worksheets and tests that must be accomplished. Now, I'm not saying this is the teacher's fault; its just school now. We love Reese's teacher, Mrs. Samsel. We've known her since we moved to OB. Her daughter, Jorja, was in my class with Reese for 2 yrs. and they've been in the same class until this year! Now, back to my point...talking. So, sometimes Reese comes home and he just has so much built up that he wants to talk about to me...So, we got in the car and without stopping to breathe or pause here is his story from last week on our drive to get Raygan-Elise from her school:

"Mom, I can't wait till I'm like 16 and can drive a car and I will say-mom I'm driving to a friends house and if u let me u will say ok but be home by midnight and I will say ok but I'll come home at 1 and then get grounded so that's not good (and without taking a breath) who are the people on the side of the road that pick up stuff. Are they just environmentally friendly or what? And if u r a passenger looking outside the more restaurants you see you get hungry then if its not a restaurant just a store with windows then u can see the food and get even hungrier. I'm a really good drummer. I remember that day when we had that party and we were trying to figure out who was coming at the right time and then u said Zoe coming at 1 and Clayton coming at 2 and Olivia coming at 3 and really our Christmas tradition should really be breaking something. Wanna know what made me think of that. It was that bent tree right there."
And there was actually another story bt the driving and people on side of road but I was typing yet at that time. We love his funny off the wall stories. Brian says he's just like his Poppa!


Now, Raygan-Elise is 18 months old. She is saying bye, mama, and sometimes baba. She was assessed through Simple Strokes and First Steps and does have an expressive and receptive language delay, which we've discovered (after a failed hearing test and a visit to an ent)is probably due to fluid buildup in ear. We've had 3 speech sessions and it does seem to help. Mrs. Angela gave us a little game of saying specific sounds to "name" specific objects. Some nights Raygan-Elise tries, sometimes not. But she is only 18 months! Her personality is really starting to show! She loves dancing and shaking head to any music. She even started blowing kisses last week! She has also gotten better at shaking her head yes and no but often gives us the wrong answer that she is trying to give. She had ear tube surgery last Tuesday (weighed 22 lbs 0 oz the morning of surgery) and the ENT said her ears were awful and bled a lot due to fluid build up damage. We are hoping this helps her a lot with both her frustrations and language. Early this week her ears were still looking bad (with the tubes you can see the infection, which is gross but helpful in knowing to go to doc) so back to the ent we went. More antibiotics and antibiotic drops and they cultured it! Hopefully this will be it for a while!

As they grow, I will miss-

* All the funny things Reese says. Recent quotes from Reese:
--After he was relaying messages for a while b/t Brian and I, he grabbed my cell phone, pushed some buttons, and said, "I'm done and clocking out for the day." Then he walked upstairs without saying another word.
--While trying to feed the very big catfish at Lake Tiak-O'Khata, he said, "the ducks are getting into our territory!"
--"I ate so much Thanksgiving food, I think I put on a few pounds." (yes, that was from Reese not me!)
* Reese's baby teeth! He has also lost 2 more teeth- another on bottom and his first on the top. I pulled the bottom one, and he pulled his top one while at school. First time for him to pull one!
* Reese rushing to say, "Good night, sweet dreams, don't let the beg bugs bite, love you more! I beat you!!"

I will miss Raygan-Elise:
* Grabbing and holding the collars of shirts or sleeves with her little hands and even her own collar if needed
* Her running to me and falling into my lap
* Her dancing and wiggling from side to side(which she loves to do now, especially to Chicken Elmo and Country Elmo that are hand-me downs from John Aedon!)
* Her calling me and Brian- mama!!
* Her signing more and eat.
* waving bye upside down. (more like we would use our hands to say come here).
* her soothie/pacifier- everyone says she reminds them of the baby on the Simpsons b/c she smacks on her soothie and really makes that same sound as on the show!

Halloween, 2009

We did many activities leading up to Halloween night.

To start, we went to the annual Zoo Boo! This is our 4th year to go and we had a blast. We went with several friends this year- Bethany, Shane and Jack and Melissa and Aaron. Reese and Aaron both got picked to go on stage to help with a trick. That was so exciting for them! Reese decided to go through each line 2 times in a row by going through the line, then going to the end of the long line and going through again...He called it his sneak attack! Baby Jack and Raygan-Elise both decided to need a big time diaper change while having at least 3 layers of clothes on their little bodies! We had both talked to them about this prior to the event, but of course they didn't listen. The Hay Ride was a hit! Reese rode the spinning ride with a complete stranger! He's such a big boy! Raygan-Elise and Jack (and us mommies) had a fun time on the fast carousel! and I think Reese and Raygan-Elise's favorite was the dracula disco! They danced and danced! Although I think the cutest part of the evening was when we tried to take pics of Jack and Raygan-Elise together. I got some cute pics of Raygan-Elise while they situated Jack. By the time Jack was ready, Raygan-Elise decided to get up and walk around. But then she walked over to him and they just looked at each other, tapped each other, smiled and eventually shook hands (see pic!!).







We also enjoyed the OBHS Halloween Carnival! Reese played all the games and even went down a haunted hall (although he only made it half-way...brian went to and said it was scary!!). We got to see lots of friends--Vince, Valerie, JT, Abby, Jorja, Jack and many more!Raygan-Elise played the pick a duck game! Her first game!! and won 2 pieces of candy!




Raygan-Elise had her first class party and pajama day! I was able to go thanks to a good friend, Stacey, for watching my class! Raygan-Elise loves to eat, so of course this was right up her ally!! We signed up for treat bags so I made clear bags of cheetos look like pumpkins. She quickly ate her cupcake and use her baby sign to sign she wanted more. Mrs. Deborah gave her another cupcake! They had juice boxes which was hilarious to watch them try and figure them out. She enjoyed playing with her straw, although she did drink about half of it. She tried her strawberry, grapes, cookie, and cheetos too! I enjoyed just sitting back and watching her and her friends! We took Reese's teachers and her teachers cakes! yum, yum. Reese's class couldn't have a party, but they did each take a treat for their friends. He took Halloween shaped marshmallows with a pencil attached to the bag.






Then we went to downtown OB the afternoon of Halloween! We trick-or-treated in each store! I think Raygan-Elise liked the Ballroom Dancing Studio the best. She has really gotten into "dancing" lately and I must say it is SO funny to watch. She makes her hips/waist go front and back! Too cute!







Halloween night-- We went on a Trick or Treating Hay ride with our neighbors! Reese was so excited (since he missed it last year being sick). Reese was his blue phantom and Raygan-Elise was a pink poodle (she loves her pink poodle webkinz! It is the first thing she ever became attached to). Many of the houses had great decorations! One even had a haunted maze. Brian went through it with the kids first then I did. Reese kept telling look mom there is someone behind that tree about to scare you! Mark (our neighbor) finally said Reese stop telling her. :) Raygan-Elise loved the ride. She loves it outside!!! When we stopped, the kids and dads would go to first of 4 or 5 houses and Raygan-Elise and I would walk to the 3rd one. In our neighborhood, the driveways are long and in some parts of it-very long. Raygan-Elise and I would walk and walk and about half way to the house she'd turn around and walk back. She was very cute and excited to be out and about! I think maybe we made it all the way up to 3 houses! After we got home, I wanted to get a picture of Raygan-Elis smiling. So Reese jumped around and acted silly! She loves laughing at him! Then, she truly got tickled with me pulling her paci out of her mouth using my teeth (because I was holding her and the camera.) She was laughing so hard which made Reese and I both crack up! It was a great time!