Times are a Changin...

What happened to my sweet baby Kaelah? Kaelah would never hurt a fly and always seemed to be the victim of random attacks by her big sister Haleah, yet never would retaliate. She always gave me kisses and hugs and wanted to snuggle with me. But now she's nearly two and I am seeing a different side come out of her. It's not necessarily bad, but I am kind of surprised that she has developed strong opinions and a will, of sorts.

Now Kaelah will say, "Bad mood, Mommy," when I ask her a question. Or she'll say, "Don't want to Mommy," when I tell her it's time to do something in particular. She is also becoming more assertive with Haleah and says, "My try" (for my turn) or "I do it!" Miss Kaelah doesn't want help anymore and she wants to do things herself. A lot of this is very good, but what a change!

Kaelah has also started to potty train. She is growing up. Before I know it, she has her pants and diaper off and wants to sit on the potty herself. She barrels into the bathroom saying, "Myself! Myself"! She goes pee pee about 1-2 times a day. It's the start of something good.

Kaelah says funny things too. She came into the room the other day where Haleah and I were sitting, and she said, out of the blue, "Whatcha doin guys?" It was so cute to come out of the mouth of a mere 23 month old. Kaelah also told me that she wanted a bagel for breakfast the other day. She said to me, "Bagel. Big bite. Cut it up." Well, okay there, little lady!

Life is precious with growing children who surprise me every day with their cuteness and spunk. Haleah is now 3 and is seeing the world from a new perspective all the time. She said to me the other day, "Aren't I clever, Mommy?" I thought, "Well, if you are asking that, then I guess you are!" Haleah is learning to write her letters and is always asking "Why?" She wants to figure everything out. She is also doing wonderfully with the potty. She doesn't really have accidents anymore and wakes up dry (most days) from nap. And she is able to tell me when she has to go while we're out. Today we went potty in Walmart. I was proud of her.

And finally, but not least, Bekah is a roly poly. She is practically on all fours now at just six months. That child wantS to crawl! She scoots backwards and can also sit up well. She eats a lot of food, all kinds, and just loves to eat. She is even taking some liquid from a sippy cup now. Bekah is always smiling at us. I love her fluffy hair and big eyes and her exuberance. She is such a happy baby, and that makes me overjoyed!

Below are some more videos, to make my Mom happy...

Fall Fun

Today we got little accomplished in the morning, but had some fun this afternoon. David delivered two of our family's broken down riding mowers to a shop to be fixed (or trashed). Later the kids went outside to play in the leaves. It was the first real day that felt like autumn. It was cool and crisp.

After the kids' naptime, we ventured to our friends, the Davis', for football, food and fun. They rented a bouncy castle outside for the kids to jump on, and they had a blast.

There was also a huge spider (actually quite pretty too) on the stairway of their deck. We had lots of good food to eat and I brought along a shoo fly pie. It turned out to be very rich, but at least I gave it a go on baking it.

Bekah had a nice time rolling on the floor with her friend, John Michael. The babies are 10 days apart and were so cute together!

Here's to Joe

I've been spending the past couple of days looking for his photo. The one where Joe is laying on top of his bed in his one room apartment. He had an English looking hat on, as I recall, and he was smiling his big old Joe smile that would make you just want to laugh too. In the photo, his smelly cat, Ramey, who was as equally old as Joe, was sitting by his side. I couldn't find this photo, but I'm remembering Joe tonight.

Joe was born in the 1920's to a relatively loving Italian family in Quincy, MA. But during his toddlerhood, he fell down a set of stairs and broke his back. He wasn't given much hope for recovery, much less survival, so his mother sent him away to live in a tuberculosis hospital. Joe lived in the hospital for years and was told he'd never walk again. His growth was somewhat stinted (he only ended up to be about 5 feet tall). Joe also had a pacemaker and only one kidney, but Joe stunned the doctors over time and became fully healed. Joe took a job as a laborer in the water department in the City of Quincy, the only job he ever had, where he worked for over 35 years until he retired. It was at that time that I met Joe.

I worked for the City in the Personnel Dept. My focus was retirees and coordinating their health benefits. Joe came in and needed help in finding doctors and general direction. I loved his sense of humor and his bluntness right away, and over time, a friendship was formed between us.

Joe never married or had children. He only had Ramey his cat. He didn't have much, but he used his savings to buy himself a Lexus, his lifelong dream. Joe wanted people to envy him for something, I suppose. I did various things to help Joe out. I shovelled his driveway in the winter, made doctor's appointments for him and checked up on him frequently. I helped him organize his paperwork and buy turkey for his cat. One time, I recalled he had the gout in his foot and was laid up. I went to see him and, in examining his foot, I accidentally banged it with my arm, causing him severe pain, as he shouted out to let me know it! It was one of those things where you didn't know whether to laugh or cry. But I'll never forget it...

Joe worried a lot and had a way of getting me "on the bandwagon" with him. He kind of felt like the world was out to get him. He had caller ID and jumped to conclusions, always thinking someone was out to swindle him, including his doctors and his family. But he trusted me, which was nice. Joe and I enjoyed going to his favorite Italian restaurant a few towns over, where they had smooth spaghetti sauce, just like his mama made, so he said. He had to have it that way...

Then I moved to Colorado and then to Alabama, and slowly I lost touch with Joe. My Mom took over "care" of him when I left, checking up on him and having him over to her house now and then. But I just found out that Joe passed away in April. Joe was in his 80's. His cat had died a year or two before that... I was sad when I found out. Joe was a good man, who made the most of the life given to him. He always managed to use his charm to get other people to help him. It worked on me! So tonight I'm remembering an old friend, a person who holds a piece of history in my life. Here's to you, Joe!

I'm a Slacker!

I'm sure that everyone is not waiting with bated breath for me to blog again. It's been a couple three weeks since I've blogged, after I had been so faithful, daily, for so long. But I have been busy with getting my financial house in order and dealing with some family issues, so I have been a slacker!



I have felt guilty about not writing. I do love to type words out on this blog to form a story, share a memory or to make myself laugh. It's therapeutic.



So, here I go again...



Last weekend was a whirlwind of events as my friend Laura and I worked feverishly to put forth a huge yard sale. Each year on the first weekend of the month, our entire neighborhood holds garage sales during our town's annual Fiddler's Convention, so swarms of strumming bargainers come through. It's always a fun day, but it takes a lot of preparation and dedication. Laura always makes more money than I do, but it's fun for the social aspect of it as well. Each of us has a little baby this time around, so it was extra difficult to get things done; but we made it through. I didn't get to browse around at many other yard sales, but I was able to score a Brighton handbag that my neighbor had for sale when I got to preview her stuff before the barrage of crowds. I was psyched!

The kids kept getting into Laura's house that she was trying to sell at the yard sale!


On the weekend prior to last, our family ventured off to a place called Lyon Family Farms. I wanted to do something "fall-esque," that didn't cost too much. So we drove about an hour away and ended up at this quaint little farm full of fun! It had a corn maze, big slides, an animal petting area, a cow train ride, a corn box to play in, hayrides and more! We had a great time. Haleah was scared to death as a donkey brayed at her. It was hard not to laugh. We had a nice picnic lunch on the farm grounds and got to pick out mini pumpkins for the kids before we departed. See the pics below!



Look at Haleah's face! This was when the donkey was braying at her. Hilarious!

Other than our past weekend festivities, my days have been filled with cleaning out and sorting clothes, having various play dates with different friends so that Haleah and Kaelah can adapt to other kids, worrying about financial issues and working on some family relations. Life does have it's ups and downs and sometimes we need to face the challenges head on. I have been concentrating on staying positive and listening to the Wisdom that is higher than mine (mainly God's and my mother's--ha).


This was a play date with friends Jenna and Kate. Jenna has her arms around Kate and Haleah. Precious.

On a lighter note, Haleah came up to me the other day while I was nursing and said, "Mom, can I try your boob?" My response? "Ah... no." My kids make me laugh every day and lighten almost any situation. They are the truest blessings in my life.

Bekah's getting so big. She is my sweet baby, almost 6 months!

Three Days in a Haze...

Friday:

The morning began with a nice play date with my friend Laura, and kids, over at my house. I have been wanting for Haleah to get to know and play with kids more her own age, so that she can learn to progress, rather than regress. I was so happy that she and four-year-old Morgan actually played so well together and enjoyed each other's company. Laura and I will aim to do this more often.




I prepared a nice lasagna dinner for the family, but it turned out to be somewhat of a disaster. None of us ate together due to scheduling conflicts, and for those who did, it was chaos. Haleah smeared sauce on the window. In reaction, David flopped his plate down, which caused the sauce on his plate to spatter up into my face and into my eye. The acid from the sauce stung my eye, ridiculously, and it was painful.


After dinner, Kaelah decided to drag her outdoor fold-up chair into the kitchen while I was feeding Bekah her rice cereal. Kaelah tripped on the rug and fell onto her chair, collapsing it and crushing at least 8 fingers. As I was turning to get her, her Aunt Missy ran across the kitchen and swooped her up. In the process, baby food was knocked out of my hand and all over my legs, feet and the rug. Poor Kaelah was is terrible pain, and it took us basically the rest of the night to determine if her fingers were broken or not. Luckily, they were not.


When the older girls were down for bed, Grandmama came over and spent some time with Bekah. We got this cute, adorable video of Bekah laughing. There is no joy like it!

Saturday:


We ventured out to Cora's volleyball tournament. It was at a really, upscale high school a few towns over, but I was not thrilled with the spectator options. We had to watch the game from balcony bleachers, high above the court. It was ridiculous. I had never watched a game like that before and found it difficult to follow. But Cora did well and has begun to realize that tourneys are hard, because you have to pace yourself both mentally and physically, and you are usually exhausted by the end.


We took a little break with the kids between matches in the high school courtyard. We took these cute videos of them.

On the way home from the tourney, we "ran into" the Trail of Tears motorcycle ride. It's an annual ride with thousands upon thousands of riders. They travel through our town each year in remembrance of the Trail of Tears and for the suffering of the Native Americans. You can't break this line of motorcycles as they travel through, and each year since I've lived in Alabama, I seem to get myself stuck and unable to manuever until they pass. This year was no exception. We had to drive the LONG, LONG way home. And luckily David was driving and knew where we were going among the corn fields, etc.


We got home for nap time and I discovered that I pulled a muscle pretty badly in my chest and under my left arm. It was so severe, that I could hardly lift the baby. That evening, we ordered pizza and ate it at my mother-in-laws. And the final highlight of the day was when Haleah decided to quietly cut her own hair. She chopped her bangs, and now her hairdo is hacked! I don't know how I can rectify it. I did this too, to myself, as a kid. Live and learn! The funny part was when we took a picture of the clump of hair she cut off. It looks like it's in the shape of a heart. How apropo.
Sunday:


After our Sunday morning church service and nap obligations, we headed out to our cousin's ten year Birthday celebration. It was a cookout for a LARGE crowd, and it was a stereotypical Alabama party all the way! There were so many kids and people in one house, that even I was afraid to mingle... or nurse Bekah! I saw things I've never seen or done at a party before. It wasn't wild or anything, just funny. Some of the highlights included cousin Lilly showing the girls their hamster, Bear. They were fascinated, for a while.




Then we watched our cousin, David, use a strange tree climbing device to scale a tree in his back yard and hoist up his bow and arrows, and shoot at a target down below. The pics I took of him were pretty cool though. He looked like a silhouette in the sky. It would have been a peaceful scene, except for the arrows being quite dangerous.



Next, the CHILDREN were riding the quads and four wheelers in the front yard and on the street. I took a picture of my nieces "psyched out"to be riding them (of course). But I thought to myself that I wouldn't let my kids ride those in a million years. Maybe it's just me...


Then we played some volleyball in the front yard, which I participated in, while eyeing my kids to make sure they weren't going to get hit by some moving apparatus. And my David tossed a football and almost took out a tree (with his body, not the ball). And a group of 10-year-olds at the party found a lost puppy and wrapped him up in a blanket and put him in a shopping cart and wheeled him around the neighborhood to see if they could find his owners. And finally, someone called the cops on the party for child endangerment for riding the quads in the yard and in the street. But all in all, it was fun, and we had an enjoyable time seeing our family, and we made it out safe, happy and alive!

Good Things Come to Those Who Wait

Today was quite mundane, except a few high points beamed in to make this day blog worthy. It was a beautiful, perfectly sunny fall-ish day. I went on two enjoyable neighborhoods walks with the kids. And there was more potty success in this household too.

After picking up Gracyn from 3rd grade, we went to the post office together and then headed out to see Cora's volleyball game. We sat in the hot gym for an hour, watched the 8th graders play, then had to leave. Apparently Cora's 7th grade team wasn't going to be playing for another hour after we left. I was not happy that we didn't have the correct time of her game and had to miss it.

But on the way home, Haleah told me she had to pee, and I asked her if she could hold it until we got home. She said she couldn't, but I encouraged her. I got sandwiched between a couple of cars thanks to some moron who spilled golf balls all over the street and was trying to retrieve them, stopping traffic in the process. Well, in the waiting, Haleah surprised me. She toughed it out and waited until we got home to race into the bathroom to pee. I was so proud of her.

Kaelah decided to surprise me tonight too. When I was changing her diaper before bed, I noticed it wasn't that full. So I asked her if she wanted to use the potty. She said, "yes." So off we went to the bathroom. She tried out her little potty first, then the big potty, and then finally settled back on the little potty. And she peed! I was super shocked and super proud of her! Perhaps we are well on the way to training two toddlers at once. I won't get my hopes up, but I am so thrilled with the possibilities.

Good things seems to come to those who wait... and wait.

Milestones and Tidbits

1) Well, after much prodding, Haleah finally used the potty today to doo doo number 2! I was disgusted the other day when poo fell out of her Pull Up and into my carpet. I told her it was time to change, because I was tired of changing her! We were really proud that she used the potty, and lots of little gifts were given to her for it. Grandmama brought her over her own can of Sprite and a hat. And Daddy brought her home a princess puzzle, a book and a princess stamping set. I gave her M&M's. And her cousin Gracyn helped her make her Poopy Potty chart to which we added two stickers. Now she can continue forward earning stickers for the chart. Let's hope this continues!

2) David and I have decided that Kaelah looks like Tinkerbelle. She has a big, round head, scruffy hair and big pretty eyes just like Tink. She's blond and little and cute too. Kaelah has been so funny lately. She walks around saying, "Self. Self," for wanting to do things herself.

3) This morning I told Haleah not to roll the big exercise ball towards Kaelah because it wasn't nice to try and bull her over with it. Haleah just looked at me and said, "Yeah, but it's funny though."

4) It's been a long week so far, and I'm trying to figure out why I am feeling so unmotivated. I have so much to do, yet I feel frozen to kick start myself to get anything done. I need to shake this feeling, somehow. I am trying to get things ready for my big yard sale in a couple weeks, and I keep procrastinating.

5) Poor Bekah still keeps rolling in her crib at night and gets her arm stuck behind her. This keeps her (and me) from sleeping through the night. And I felt terrible when I went to check on her during nap today. She had spit up and couldn't move her head out of it. She had spit up in her eyes and up her nose and in her ear and on her head. I felt horrible for this poor, sweet baby. She is my scrumptous baby, and I could just eat her up!

6) The kids have had fun this week outside riding their bikes and playing on the swing. It still feels like summer here, which is nice. I have been picking up my niece, Gracyn from school, so she has fun playing with the kids too.

7) Auntie Missy rode the kids on her lap doing different "horsey gallops," and the kids just loved it!