vanderbilt :(

Just to update eveyone... Granny Sue is in Vanderbilt with a blood clot on her brain in her temple area. She is not a candidate to dissolve it so we are just waiting on a miracle basically. If anyone can pull through though it would be granny. We love you granny!!! We are headed to Vanderbilt now to see how things are going and my precious mother has taken off work to keep Anna and Ezra...thanks mom!

let's try something new

This is hilarious to me. Tonight I needed to cook some ground beef that we had. I was so sick of the same things I always cook with the ground beef. Meatballs is one of the kids' favorite meals I cook so I planned on cooking some. Well, Justin said "I am going to go pick out something out of the cookbook, something new". I said "OK, I am always up for something new". So, he procedes to tell me he would LOVE meatloaf and that I haven't cooked it in awhile. So, I went and cooked up the meatloaf and some rice and peas. As anyone knows, meatloaf takes awhile to cook.. so we waited and waited. The meatloaf was finally done and we had a tasty meal. Well, as I was cleaning up from dinner tonight I just busted out laughing. My meatloaf recipe and meatball recipe is EXACTLY the same except meatballs are much much faster to cook!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So, basically we didn't venture out and it took me 3 times as long. wow. I was so busy handling the kids and cooking my brain wasn't functioning woo well I don't guess.

Eli Bear and I

This is a picture of Eli Bear and I last night before he went to bed. He has almost got his first tooth! I can feel it trying to break through. Eli is also learning how to scoot around! He is growing up too fast. I am already starting to get things together for his first birthday party also! I call Anna Claire a lot of times "Claire Bear"..I have done that since she was a baby. I call Eli, "Eli Bear" and have called him that since about 4 months ago or so.. I don't know why I do that with the "Bear" but it just fits them I guess. So one night I told Anna Claire that we needed to come up with an animal name for Ezra and she said "How about Ezra puppy?" and I said "Why puppy?" and she said "because he always smells like one" LOL She is too funny!

Gatlinburg 2009

Well, we could not wait for this much needed vacation and it is already over :( The car ride was nearly perfect. We stopped at The cracker barrel and ate some lunch. We arrived at Pigeon Forge at about 5:30 and treated everyone to dinner that night. Justin and Josh attempted the 1 lb burger! (not recommended) anyway, we settled down pretty easy that night. The kids just crawled in bed like they had lived there their whole lives. We got going Friday morning pretty early and hit the Five Oaks Mall where we usually stock up on clothes and shoes for the year. We also HAD to go to the Disney Store to get Anna a new princess dress and Eli a cute little Dumbo outfit since his favorite book is Dumbo. Gotta have the matching outfit.. right? We met Dan and the girls and granny and pa ,along with everyone else for lunch at the brewery. Great place I might add. We took the kids swimming Friday night and a quick dip of the toes in the hot tub. We ate dinner that night at the Old Mill. Delicious food. We also fed the ducks while there. The kids liked swimming ,more than anything! We bought Anna and Ezra some swimmies and Anna Claire did very well on her swimming. She could practically do it by herself. Ezra on the other hand was scared to death. He loved the swimming but had to be clung tightly to me or Justin. We woke up Saturday morning with the intention of me, Shelly, Anna Claire and Cole going to Color Me Mine to paint a piece like we do every year. That is something Shelly and I wait on ALLLLLLL YEEEAAAARRR LLLOOONNG. You know where this story is going... the place was closed down!The darned economy got the store. Hey, i can handle paying 4.00 a gallon for gas but don't take my painting store away! We were so disappointed!So we just ate breakfast in the lobby and headed out to make the best of the day. We did a few activities and ate dinner at No way Jose`'s that night. we went back to the hotel after dinner to just let the kids swim as long as they wanted. they enjoyed swimming until about an hour in and a little girl threw up in the pool, then got out and threw up two more times on the concrete and then jumped back in. ugh so needless to say we left. Sunday we woke up and headed to Elkmont campground to enjoy the views and to take pictures of the kids. We took a long scenic drive and met everyone for lunch at Bubba Gump's Shrimp Co. not a very good meal for the price but we had fun. We then walked the strip a little and went into a few small shops that 3 kids and 2 parents could barely fit in so we met everyone at a small theme park. After Danielle, Katy, Emily, Joyce and Brian bungee jumping, Justin and i decided we would try... WOW...the hardest thing i have ever done was step over that ledge! It was an adrenaline rush to say the least. We ate dinner that night at the Brewery for our Valentine's celebration. Joyce and Daniel kept the kids and we had a very nice meal. Anna got a stomach virus that night so when we picked the kids up we headed home. ROUGH DRIVE HOME! We arrived at home at about 2am. We had a great trip! We had so much fun with our family. Looking back on this blog it seems like the only thing I wrote about was us eatinG! LOL

OK...you all probably get tired of hearing me talk about my children but hey, they are on my hip about 18 hours a day so you must get over it..
Anna and I were having a sweet moment today on the couch just cuddling. I told her with a bit of pity on myself that she would start Kindergarten in 6 months...I was so sad. I said "Anna, I do not want you to grow up" then Anna replied "Mommy, No matter how big I get I will always be your baby". I said "Thank you Anna that means a lot to mommy...will you live with me forever?" and she said 'Yes, mommy, don't worry you know I will" and I said "OK, Annie..thanks" and she said " I will live here with you when I am big then you will die and I will get all your jewelery and you and daddy will give me your house so I won't have to buy one"...
wow, what a sweet moment stopped so suddenly... I will sleep with one eye open tonight...I am scared for my life. O' what Anna Claire would do for my jewelery and make-up. You just don't understand.

Eli's First Girlfriend...

Well, the time has come...Eli has his first girlfriend. They are inseparable. She talks and giggles all the time and wins him over. He just stares at her with this stare that has love written all over his face. She sometimes cries and he pouts too because he cannot stand to hear her cry. They are quite cute together though, aren't they?

25 RANDOM THINGS ABOUT ME...

1. Since being married in 2003 we have been through 3 irons.. the first decided to go out at 10:30 at night when I was going to iron Justin's clothes for work the next morning... and he had to leave the house at 3am..we lived in McKenzie..that meant driving to Huntingdon to get an iron... the next iron went out because a curious 2 year old decided his chewed up sweetarts would look quite nice in the water compartment...which made the iron stink like burnt sugar for a week until it puttered out...and you guessed it.. at 10:30 at night when I was ironing. Thank goodness we lived at our current address, 3 minutes away fromWally World. The current iron had the same problem...mysteriously, little nerd candies got stuck in the water department.. how ironic.. (notice iron and ironic are almost the same word).. it finally works nicely now that I had to flush black burnt sugar from the pores of the iron.. wow..that was a long number one.

2. I broke my toe 3 days before getting married and had to walk down the isle in high heels.

3. I had a pet bird as a child and stepped on him accidentally and killed him.

4. During a quail hunt with my dad around 3rd grade I noticed someone shot a quail and it was only shot in the wing.. I could not let it suffer so I asked my wonderful dad if we could take it back home and nurse it to health.. her name was Mary and she happily flew away about 3 weeks later.

5. The only day of my life that I had a lump in my throat that wouldn't go away was the day Madelyn was put to rest. She made such an impact on my life. Seeing her that day hurt me so bad but I am a better person now than ever.

6. I became an aunt at 5 years old and now have 12 nieces and nephews.

7. I love music... I am always listening to music...

8. A part of my heart is in Germany...

9. I had rather pull teeth than file bills, etc. I get so ill when the time comes to file! LOL

10. I ABSOLUTELY hate ground beef!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

11. I had rather go fishing and camping than anything in the world!

12. Facing the giants is a great movie... , the notebook, planes, trains and automobiles, Christmas vacation, pearl harbor, just like heaven, and the bucket list are my favorote movies. Flywheel was also a favorite!

13. My favorote food is fried green tomatoes... if I always had fried green tomatoes on hand I would weigh a good 700 lbs and it would be worth every ounce.

14. I keep up with about 9 kids that are currently at St. Jude ...just cannot quit reading about their progress. I pray for them everyday and their families...

15. My favorite teacher was Ms. Seltzer and Ms. Gena Maddox.

16. I once rubbed poison ivy allllllll over my arms and legs to prove I wasn't allergic. I thought I was going to die that next day. I scratched more that week than a dog with fleas.

17. I wanted to be a professional gymnast when I grew up. Dominique Moceanu was my hero.

18. I just finished reading "Multiple Blessings" by Jon and Kate Gosselin and it was awesome. They are such great Christian people.

19. I have a new love........... Lifeway Christian Book Store. Amazing store..I could spend a million dollars in there!

20. I have searched for a rainbow for a year to show my chidren. I taught Anna the story of Noah and about once a month she will say "mama, we STILL haven't seen a rainbow...are they REAL?" Its funny how when you look for something you can never find it.

21. I used to say I could do anything medical except deal with a needle.. (I passed out during my tb skin test! lol) In high school I entered a program at the technical school where you learn for a semester about the medical field and then volunteer a semester in a department in the hospital... I wanted x ray and..... you guessed it...got stuck in lab. They pulled out the needle and I had to sit down... one day at the end of the semester they asked me to try it... I stuck my co worker (what a woman!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) and I hit the vein! My boss gave me a job offer where I worked on weekends while I went to Jackson state. Then, when Justin and I married I continued to work in a lab in McKenzie... I loved it!

22. I am a night owl AND early to rise..a DEADLY combination.

23. I wish I could take ONE nap where no one touched me or woke me up until I was ready.

24. An hour after my kids go to sleep I miss them and want to wake them and play with them.

25. I have had 2 natural births and 1 c-section.