Weekend Pics

We had a good weekend. Sophie has been into wearing her summer P.J.s over her winter ones. It started when Mom bought her a princess gown at Disney World. It had spaghetti straps so I made her put warmer P.J.s underneath it. Ever since then she has been layering her pajamas. It will be nice when it gets warm enough for her to just wear one nightgown each night.

Yesterday morning, Sophie sang in church during the worship service (see previous post). After nap time we spent the afternoon playing outside. Sophie (aka Belle) worked on her golf swing with Daddy. Even princesses need to learn to play golf.

I only have one picture of John Curtis to post of him proudly displaying Sophie's necklaces. He loves to play with them. Taylor calls him our little Pimp Daddy.


I also finished my book for the book club I am in this weekend and want to recommend it to everyone. It is called The Year of Living Biblically: One Man's Humble Quest to Follow the Bible as Literally as Possible by A.J. Jacobs. It sounds like a Christian book, but is actually written by an agnostic. It is really funny though and is an interesting perspective on how a nonbeliever sees the Bible and religion in general. I've read two serious nonfiction books and a row and need some fluff, so I'm back to reading some Meg Cabot.

Sophie Singing in Church

They Aren't Readers Yet, But I Think They're Pretty Great!

My mom was kind enough to send me this link yesterday about a 17 month old who can read. http://www.kcbd.com/global/story.asp?s=7937573. Beware all you moms. Seeing other kids excel can make you feel that your kids may not be gifted after all. And let's face it, we all think ours are! While neither of my kids can read yet, I thought this would be a good opportunity to update what they are up to.

Sophie is growing so fast. I was working on her scrapbook last night and can't believe the difference in her from last year. She is definitely a little girl and all girl at that. If she is home you can usually find her in a princess dress up outfit. Today she is Snow White. Daddy is always her prince and if the music is on he must dance with her. She is sensitive and dramatic and her feelings get hurt easily. When she gets upset, even if it is something as silly as me getting John Curtis dressed first, she throws herself on her bed and cries for a while. My parents say what goes around comes around :) However, with that sensitivity comes a very tender heart for others and a kindness I pray she won't lose as she grows up. She loves making her brother laugh and I love seeing them play together. While she isn't reading yet, she does know all of her letters and can identify them. She goes through times when she is obsessed with what words start with, which makes this teacher's heart glad. Although she is growing up, she still says some pretty cute things. My favorite is that she thinks the word forgot is "I forgot". For example, "Mommy, you I forgot my drink". When the sun was in her eyes the other day she told me the sun wouldn't quit looking at her. My mom's favorite is when she was sneaking up on her and she said, "I sneaked you up!" While I never thought we'd have our own princess in our house, we are incredibly thankful for her life and her sweet spirit.

While Sophie is all girl, John Curtis is all boy! If there is something in his hand it will either be thrown or put in his mouth (as my last post explained). He has a pretty good arm, too. He is a bit more stubborn than his sister and likes to pretend that he doesn't understand the word no, and he is in to everything! If I had to come up with one word that sums up John Curtis it would be joyful. He laughs easily and often, and sometimes we aren't even sure what at. His vocabulary consists of Mama, Dada, uh-oh, and thank you. He also signs more, bird (for most animals), drink, thank you, and all done (although his favorite sign for that is throwing his plate across the kitchen). John Curtis loves to be outside throwing rocks and balls or eating dirt. He seems to always be dirty. We are currently trying to wean him of his pacifier. He goes down pretty easily without it. The hard part is when he wakes up early in the morning looking for it. He can't find it and therefore cries and since I value my sleep above all else at that point, I give it to him. I'm so weak early in the morning!

I could go on about my kiddos, but I'll spare you and attach some pictures instead of them in the yard yesterday. Yes, John Curtis did enjoy tasting some of that mud!

My Little Chipmunk Face

As I have tried to explain what happened to John Curtis this weekend, people are having a hard time understanding. I'm having a hard time understanding and I was there! So I'm going to try to explain using pictures. Let me set the stage. Our kids' closets have folding doors on them. At the bottom of the doors is a metal piece that sticks out.


Once when I was sitting by the closet playing with the kids I decided it was dangerous for the piece to stick out like that and so I folded it back so that it looked like this.

Much safer, huh? I thought so. Can you see where this is going? On Saturday John Curtis was playing in Sophie's closet and something possessed him to try to chew on that hook. I like to think he is a very bright child and was using his imagination and pretending he was a fish. Well, he got to see what it feels like to be a fish because somehow he got that hook stuck in his cheek. No, I didn't take a picture of him stuck, we were a little panicked at the time. Taylor just thought he had fallen, but when he tried to pick him up he didn't budge. He realized he was stuck to the door! I stuck my finger in his mouth, but couldn't get him to budge and I was scared to pull too hard. I don't do well in emergency situations. Finally Taylor told me to hold him still (keep in mind he's screaming at the top of his lungs) and he just pulled the cheek back as far as he could and got him free. We were really very lucky. I expected blood everywhere, but it didn't bleed. His cheek immediately swelled like a chipmunk's though and he wouldn't stop screaming. We gave him Tylenol and a Popsicle and called a nurse friend to come over and check him out.



He let her look in his mouth and she found bruising all around his cheek and up and down in his gums, too. We kind of got a picture of one spot, but that is all he would let us get.


He is doing amazingly well. He is eating fine and doesn't seem to be in much pain. He has been waking up some at night crying, but will usually settle back down with Tylenol. Our pediatrician goes to our church so he checked him out yesterday and said there was not permanent damage. The vicious metal hooks have been removed from both closets. This is what my sweet boy looks like this morning. Everyone go check your closet doors!

Rodeo!!!!

On Thursday night we went to the Rodeo and carnival. Sophie had in her mind that she wanted to ride the ferris wheel. I'm not sure where that thought came from, but she had been talking about riding one for a while now. I thought she would change her mind when she saw it, but she didn't. When I see the rides at the carnival, I can still hear my mom's voice saying, "Anything they can put up in an afternoon can't be very safe!" However, I pushed the voice aside (sorry, Mom) and let her get on it with Taylor. She loved it! Evidently, things that are high don't scare her, just dark rides (as we discovered at Disney World). She also rode the little cars that go around in a circle and the carousel. I figured there wasn't much danger in those. The Midway was definitely the highlight for Sophie.











































John Curtis on the other hand loved the petting zoo. He chased after those goats and sheep and didn't mind them surrounding him. While Sophie isn't afraid of heights, she is afraid of a mob of goats surrounding her. It wasn't the highlight for her.






















We also ate some "yummy" fair food. Sophie loved the fried Cajun shrimp on a stick! By the time the rodeo actually started at 7:30, the kids were exhausted. John Curtis saw a little of the bull riding before he conked out. Sophie really enjoyed watching it and said she wanted to stay until the end, but decided around 9:00 that she was ready to go home. Even the sugar from the cotton candy couldn't keep her awake anymore!

Taylor is 30!

Today is Taylor's 30th birthday. He celebrated it in a big way with several parties. On Friday night our Sunday School class surprised him with a dinner at a Japanese Hibachi grill in town. The food was great and afterward everyone went over to our house to play Cranium. We had a really good time.


































On Saturday night our friends, the Peacocks, had us over for a birthday dinner. They have two little boys close to our kids' ages. Caleb is 4 and Connor is 15 months. Sophie and Caleb had fun playing (their favorite game was doctor and we all had to have a talk about appropriate play) and Connor and John Curtis had fun ignoring each other. John Curtis really loved their soft carpet and spent much of the evening laying on it. Maybe he misses our carpet, I don't know. The dads played the Wii and everyone had a great time.

Today Taylor and I got to go out to lunch at Outback while the kids were at Mom's Day Out. When I picked them up, Sophie and I made his traditional blueberry birthday cake. Then the church had a surprise party for him this afternoon. Tonight we are going to have a family dinner with just the four of us. So now I am married to an older man for a few months.

Boots!

I took a picture of John Curtis in Taylor's boots today and I remembered we had a similar one of Sophie. She is about 15 months in her picture and he will be 14 months on Tuesday. I don't think they look very much alike!