Royal Disinterest

I'm excited about the Royal Baby.
I was excited about Kate's wedding.
I was excited about Diana's wedding.
I was excited about Diana's babies.
All things Royal.
Love. Love. Love.
So much yuck lately.
National news. Personal family challenges. Life. Stuff.  Ick.
So I'm just going to get excited about something happy. That I love.
The Royal Baby!
I mentioned to the Captain yesterday that I was excited about the arrival of the Royal Baby.
It was met with a "humph."
What?
How can you not be excited about this??
You don't even care? You don't want to know when she has the baby?  And if it's a boy or a girl? And what the baby's name is?
What?
Who are you???
"I only have so much excitement to go around and I'm not wasting it on the Royal Baby. I don't even know these people."
Then we got in a big discussion about royal lineage.
And who would inherit the throne.
He really doesn't care.
Not interested.
At all.
Fine.
"So, Captain, what I hear you saying is that you don't want me to put your name on the gift card?"
Fine.
He just told me he was more excited about the birth of the twin panda cubs in Atlanta thn he is about the Royal Baby.
OK, then.
I will remain on Royal Baby watch.
Alone.
Ta ta.

Wish

If I had a whole buncha' money...

These are a few things I would like to have:

Somebody to change my sheets every day

A massage every day

Books, books, books and more books

My very own beach house

Big backyard with kitchen and a pool and a TV and some couches

A pedicure every week

I think that's about it.

Feel goods

Lately I have been overwhelmed with life.  With disappointment, dysfunction, stupidity, anger, denial, sadness, fear, rudeness, failure, mean people, etc etc etc.  Sometimes it's just too much and things get all jumbled up and just takes over my whole being.

So today, instead of curling up in to the fetal position and sucking my thumb and crying for 23 hours,  I will just share three videos that made me smile, laugh, and cry happy tears.

So, watch this for a funny one about sleeping dogs.  This is laugh out loud funny. 

Or, this one about a dog reunited with his soldier. Cue ugly cry at 1:50.

And, another dog and soldier reunion.  Never gets old.

Commence

My sweet beautiful niece graduates tonight.
What an exciting time.
We celebrated her awesomeness yesterday.
It was a splendid day.
This passage of time is quite difficult to process.
Because one minute there are little people running around and the next minute they are driving and heading off to college.
Seriously how does this happen?
Growing up.
Seasons of life.
Not real sure I like it.
It has left nostalgic and slightly weepy.
But, regardless of all this sniffly stuff, I'm super duper excited for my niece.
And tonight we will have a little pomp and some circumstance
And a big HOORAY!

No words needed

Merry!

How about a little Christmas video?

From my kids' great school.

One hour. One run through.  Two takes. One fun video.

Click here for some merry merry!


PS - Jordan is at 2:17 on the left in a green sweatshirt.

They did it!

 

Saturday.

Team Nick.

80 plus members strong.

Representing 7 states.

Raised over $26,000 for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital.

St. Jude Half Marathon.

13.1 miles.

What. A. Day.

 

 

Here's the team pre-race.

 

Connie, The Boyfriend, and I were at Mile Four and cheered everybody as they ran past.
There they go!
Jordan is on the far left.
At that point she was red-faced, but smiling and still running!

My girl did it!!!!!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Waiting for other team members at the finish line!

 

 

 

Taking a load off.  And shoes.

 

 

 

Such a good day!!

There were some slow movers at church yesterday.  Sore, but proud.

Yay!

This

My Potion

I'm obsessed with this stuff.

Peace of Mind from Origins.

I call it My Potion.

I use it every single night before I go to bed.

It's all pepperminty and soothy and calmy. 

Best. Stuff. Ever.

At Christmas, I gave Connie some, she gave me some, I gave Jordan some, Connie gave Jordan some.  It was all the holiday gift giving rage.

Seriously.  I love this stuff.

Rush out today and get some.

Origins didn't pay me to write this post.  They don't even know me.   I just feel like your life will be better if you know about this stuff.    You're welcome.

Yes, please.

Does it get any better than this?

A feet feat

For an Art 1 project this year, Jordan had to select a photo and then draw it.

She chose this one.

Those are sweet baby Kennedy's feet when she was just a few days old.   And those are the hands of the Captain's sister and BIL and their wedding rings.

Jordan...

Plus the photo...

Plus black pencils...

Plus a big ol' piece of paper...

Plus about two months...

Minus two weeks with her hand in a cast...

Equals this....

She had it framed and then totally surprised the Captain's sister with it when they were in town a few weeks ago. 

I think it turned out pretty good....

And I'm kinda' proud....

The GOOD thing

Went to the baseball game last night. It was a good night at the ballpark.  (Except for the humongous swarm of mosquitos that ate us alive.)

It's always fun to watch some good baseball.  And do some good people watching.  America's pasttimes....

There's a man that sits down in front of us - just a few rows up from the visitor dugout.   He's a little bit older and seems to be a little mentally challenged.  But appears very happy - enjoys the game, claps to the music and eats his popcorn.   He's cute. 

When the visiting team would head off the field to the dugout, the man always stood up at his seat and held out his hand asking for a ball.  He never really walked up there.  Just stood up and held out his hand.

Lots of other people are down there in the front, too, asking for balls.  One teenage boy a few rows over from us ran down there and got one of the balls.  I had been watching him and his group of friends.  Having fun.  Dancing to the music, eating, hollering at the umpires. 

Toward the end of the game, the teenager walked down and gave his ball - and a thumbs up - to the man.  Still makes me a little teary thinking about it.

So I marched my big fat mama bootie over to that boy and told him that was the sweetest thing ever and he had done a good thing and if his mother were at the game I'd tell her what he had done and how proud she would be of him.  That's when another boy in the group said, "I told him to do it."   

"Oh you did not."

"Yes, I did.  We're brothers."

OK, pat on the back for you, too.

Anyway, it just made my heart happy.

It wasn't that the boy did the right thing.  Because it wouldn't have been wrong to have kept the ball either. 

The boy did the GOOD thing.

Double Digits

He's ten today.

Ten.

Double digits.

Seriously, how did that happen?

Because wasn't it just yesterday when he was a tiny wee little thing?

Happy birthday to my sweet Cooper!

baby time

Had a great weekend with the Captain's sisters and little niece.  If you haven't played with a sweet, happy little eight month old lately, then I highly recommend it.   Preh-shusss.

The Captain and I got to keep Baby K yesterday for a few hours.

Cooper was a little worried about my being alone with a baby.

"Have you ever been alone with a little baby, Mom?"

Ummmm, yes.   A few times.

 "What if you have to change her diaper?"

Done that.  A few times.

Actually, the Captain did the diaper changing.

I heard him in there talking to her in a little baby talk voice:

"You've got Elmo on your paaaannnnnnnntieeeeeeees."

Tough guy.

Alrighty, I'm headed to work.

Although I'd rather stay home and watch all the Queen's Diamond Jubilee stuff. 

Cheerio!

I must have blinked....

Tomorrow, this....

.... turns 15.



How did that happen??

Happy Birthday, Jordan!

Monkeying around

It would be a lot easier to go to work today if I could wear these.

Toys

Think he likes the frisbee that Santa brought him?

Texas Bound

By the time you read this, I'll probably be in the car with the Captain, my two kids, the Captain's grandmother, and the Captain's aunt on our 1,000 mile round-trip Great Texas Thanksgiving Adventure.

Other miscellaneous items in the car will be: three bags of M&Ms, a box of CheezIts (Scrabble version for our gaming pleasure), a wheelchair, a walker, two laptops, one DVD player, 467 movies, Christmas presents, and a partridge in a pear tree.

And Jordan may or may not have packed four bags. Four bags. FOUR. I can't confirm, but I think one of them contains only hair products. Apparently beauty has its price.

I'll probably be taking a bloggy break until next Monday. If you want to know what I'm up to, check me out on Twitter for real-time updates of my most exciting life.

So, for your reading pleasure, I present a few things I will and will not do this weekend:

I will not shop on Black Friday.

I will not see Breaking Dawn movie.

I will eat like a pig.

I will talk sports smack with my crazed LSU fan brother-in-law and my converted LSU fan sister-in-law.

I will celebrate a mighty HOG victory.

I will not call the Hogs so loud that it wakes up baby Kennedy.

I will enjoy being with my family.

I will miss my other family (Mom, Connie.... Mom's dressing.... )

I will watch football until I'm comatose.

I will not say I told you so when we are stuck for three hours on the Arkansas interstate due to construction.

I will be thankful.

I am thankful for all of you, my little cupcakes, and am happy that you come here every day and read all this blah blah blah stuff.

Hope you all have a blessing-counting, thanks-giving, food-eating, family-loving, football-watching kind of day.

First, you gotta' love God, then ...

Open house for Cooper last night. A little disappointed there were no handprint turkeys.... but some good work nonetheless.

Including this little gem.

The kids had to write the kind of person they hope to marry one day.

Hey fourth grade gals, wanna' catch Cooper's eye?

It's pretty simple....

"I would like a Christian.

I would like a WWE fan.

I would like a good girl.

I would like an awesome girl to go to church with."

*sniff*

OK, weekend plans?

A little Friday night lights tonight -- Semi-final playoff game! GO LIONS!!

Putting up Christmas stuff tomorrow...

College football. Of course.

Peace and love, my cupcakes.

See you Monday.

Lips and knees and nothing

So, yeah, the beach. Love.

It was a short trip. But a trip to the beach nonetheless.

We left after Jordan's volleyball game on Thursday night. Which scheduled our ETA for 1:30 am. Which is ridiculous. It got a little dicey between 11:45 pm and 1:00 am. That's when the Captain was sitting on the edge of the driver's seat begging for M & M's and searching the abandoned Mississippi highways for a caffeinated beverage. To no avail. Well, I provided the M & M's. But couldn't come up with a drink. *yawn*

The next three days featured a frenzy of nothingness. Which is fine with me.

Six of the folks in our "sort of" group that I knew but didn't know ended up leaving on Thursday afternoon so they weren't even there. And four of the folks in our "real" group left on Saturday. So it ended up being the four of us, the Captain's MIL, and her friend. And NOT Connie. Which made me sad. Because as we discussed, it was the first time in 15 years I've been to the beach without her. And that's just not ok.

We slept and read and ate and watched football (including a big ol' Hog win! Woop woop!) And it doesn't get any better than that.

Jordan has finally seen the beachy light and just wanted to sit on the beach the whole weekend. Cooper isn't quite there yet because he was beyond obsessed with the indoor pool. Really? The INDOOR pool.

And the washer broke so we didn't even have to do laundry. And that was fine too. Although it's a proven fact that vacation laundry isn't nearly as painful as home laundry. But no laundry is best of all.

I got some ridiculous sunburned kneecaps. Which I really have no explanation for other than they were at a direct angle to the sun while I sat in the beach chair doing nothing except sitting and reading and dozing and watching the surf.

I apparently got sunburned lips too. Because on Sunday morning I woke up looking like Angelina Jolie with Botox gone bad. My bottom lip was humongously swollen. I looked like a complete goober. With a big ol' lip. And red kneecaps.

All good things must come to an end, and Monday morning we headed home.

That's when we found the volleyball bag - with a four day old, less than fresh, volleyball uniform. Major stinko.

So now we are home. And laundry is done. And my lip isn't swollen anymore. And my kneecaps are fine.

The end.