The Class of 2029

Only continue reading this post if you can finish this sentence:

"Purple, White, Purple, White..."

Otherwise it might be pretty boring and not make too much sense! :)

This morning I decided to take Phoebe's "Born To A Wildcat" picture. You know the one where you dress your child up in her free onesie from ACU and plop her down to take about 34 so you'll have one really, really good one to send to the alumni association in hopes that it will make the ACU Today? If you are an exceptional planner and/or you have a lot of friends with babies the same age as yours, you can get them together in their onesies and take the pictures. That makes you a shoo-in for the ACU Today. Unfortunately, I'm not either of those things so we just had to wing it on our good looks and talents. Fortunately, Phoebe has both in abundance. :) Here are just a sampling of pictures from our backyard this morning.

We were practicing our Wildcat hand sign. Apparently, we need to work on our fine motor skills.

She's quite the little ham when it comes to taking pictures and she just posed and posed and posed. I didn't have to encourage her at all!




This one is my personal favorite, but it wasn't the one I sent.



This is the one I sent to the Alumni Assoc. We were yelling, "Go ACU!" It was very exciting!



About this time, Phoebe lost interest in posing for all my pictures and noticed the bubble machine that Eli had left outside yesterday. Now, she didn't know it was a bubble machine (I haven't been too great about getting out this summer...good intentions, right?) and it was sheer wonder when she pushed the button!






Now the onesie is covered with dirt from rolling around on the floor while Eli was in gymnastics and ketchup from Burger King. It will probably never be the same again. It's good I got so many pictures, huh?

**Update: I heard back from the Alumni Association and the picture that I sent was too fuzzy. (I'm very sad because it was the "cutest" one.) So I sent the first picture on this post...hopefully it's less fuzzy. If not, then I guess I'll proceed to take about 34 more pictures of Phoebe in the backyard when she gets up from nap. Surely the dirt and ketchup won't show up too much, right?!

Before and After

This is what my computer cabinet looked like yesterday morning.



I know, it's a little embarrassing that we let it get to this state, but in our defense, it was the "catch-all" spot while we were trying to get our house in ready-to-sell-mode.

Here is a picture of my computer cabinet yesterday afternoon.



So much better!

Today I'm going to clean out the fridge.

This is a picture of two confused little boys...but, boy, did they have fun!!

Whew!

**Update: Ding, Dong the mouse is dead! I heard the "snap" of the mousetrap sometime early this morning and it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. Brad took the mouse away while I was in the shower and all is right with my world again!

What a weekend!

I think my "weekend" really started on Thursday night. We had Eli's five-year-old pictures taken by a friend from church. I am perfectly aware that Eli turned five in June and this is now August...but at least it's not December. (They turned out spectacular, by the way!) She takes those artsy, architectural pictures and when she suggested that we head out to an old, burned-out homestead, I thought it sounded pretty cool. Then she mentioned that we both needed to wear long pants and tennis shoes with socks. This probably should have tipped me off, but I was oblivious...as usual. When we got there, I had to drive through the MUD! I don't mean the mud like you find on the street after a big rain or even the mud you find in your backyard after a deluge...I mean the kind of mud that cars get stuck in forever! Never fear, Ashley drove first and neither of us got stuck. Then we tracked through weeds as tall as I am to find these burned structures. I say structures because there was a house, a pump shed, a barn, a basement, a garage, and a wooden train car. It made for some very cool pictures, but we did find a dead baby bird in the bricks and a dead "monkey" (I think it was really a squirrel or a rabbit, but I didn't investigate further). I really flipped when we walked right by a rattlesnake! No joke. Ashley was very cool about the whole thing and just picked up her pace a little bit. I, on the other hand, started running, and it was probably a good thing that Eli was way ahead of us or I might have just left him behind. I never claimed to a great mom! We finished up the pictures and, like I said, they turned out great. I'm not sure how I'm going to choose from the 150 that she took because they are all pretty wonderful. When I got home, Brad informed that a main water pipe had busted and he had to turn off the water to the house...before the kitchen had been cleaned up and the children got baths. This is when the big, giant toad jumped out at me as I walked back to the house. I might have overreacted, but in my defense, it was dark and it was a big toad!

Friday morning, we all loaded up and headed to the hospital where Brad works out to steal a shower. It took forever. Then we had to take my car to the dealership because it wasn't running correctly. We enjoyed breakfast at BK because the water was still off and the dishes were still in the sink. Then I got to take Phoebe to her routine chest x-ray where I waited two hours in the hospital waiting room. I understand that we get a huge discount because Brad works there, but seriously, two hours!! We swam after that for the last time because there wasn't anything else I could really do while the water was turned off. They spent the afternoon running an emergency line to the house so we would have water this weekend (thank heavens) and it was finally turned back on around 4pm.

Saturday we spent the day getting ready for the open house Brad wanted to have today. I cleaned like I haven't cleaned in months. I made Brad take us to dinner because we were not going to make a mess in a house I had worked so hard to clean.

My morning started pretty easy. Brad's did not. He woke up at 6:30am with me jumping on him and screaming because I had seen a mouse run across our bedroom floor. I am terrified of mice. I understand that we are bigger than they are. I understand that they are more afraid of us than we are of them. I understand that they are not going to hurt us. My fears are irrational...but that only makes them worse! Brad did go to Wal-Mart right then and get traps, but we have yet to kill the mouse. While Brad was gone, I convinced Eli that he had to protect me by banging a hockey stick on the floor and the wall and make a lot of noise to scare the mouse away. He was very good at it. I tried to get to Home Depot today to buy poison and those outlets that emit the high frequency sound that makes all the mice run for the hills, but it wasn't in the cards. It explains why I am blogging on the couch with Brad's laptop instead of at the computer cabinet...that's where I saw the mouse!

After church we had a "Back To School Picnic and Carnival." Very fun. Very hot. Eli got his face painted with a Batman mask that he proceeded to wear all day long. We were stared at a lot. Brad headed back to the house to do our open house and then the kids and I headed to Sonic, Toys R Us, and Target all before we were supposed to back at church at 4:30 for a meeting. I didn't make it. In all this running around, I lost my phone. Apparently, I have very bad luck with cell phones...especially ones I like alot. I retraced all my steps, talked to countless employees, cried all the way to church because I knew Brad was going to kill me, and then found it stuck between the seats when I got to church. It was all very emotionally draining. And just when I think that Eli could survive very well without me and all he really needs is his dad, he says something that makes me realize that he does love me. I might have inadvertently said, "Your dad is gonna kill me." To which he replied, "No, I won't let him! I'll wrestle him to the floor and tell him that he can't kill you!" Sometimes it doesn't take much to warm the cockles of my heart!:)

I guess now it's time to go to bed. I hope I can sleep because the mouse is in our room and I'm worried that a)I'll see or hear him again or b) I"ll hear the trap go snap! I'm not sure what I am going to do tomorrow, though.

Accessory of the Day

Yeah, those are Brad's tighty-whities.

Family Camp

We spent the weekend in Las Vegas, NM at Family Camp. It's a church camp-out that our church has every August at Camp Bluehaven. I never attended Camp Bluehaven as a camper, so the last four years have been my only experience. Brad and Eli love it. They love being outdoors, getting dirty, hiking, campfires, cool weather, the whole shebang. I like it because they like it so much and the church secretary made sure I had a cabin with a good shower. (Really, it's the small things in life that make me happy.) A bunch of our friends went this year, too, so that was fun. Brad tells me we weren't really camping because we stayed in a cabin with a bathroom and a bed. I told him that anytime you have to take your own bedding and Diet Cokes, it's camping.

This might have been the very last picture of Eli clean the whole weekend. It was very rainy (and cold) this year at camp so there was mud everywhere. I never felt dry or warm the entire weekend. Eli seems to be a mud magnet so it was inevitable. I did remember to bring a garbage sack for his dirty clothes and they are now crusted together waiting for me to attempt to clean them in the washing machine. Every once in a while, I have thoughts of just taking the garbage sack to the dumpster, but that would be a waste so I just lock that thought away in the corner of my mind for anther day and just dump the whole sack in the washer with lots of Biz and hope for the best!


Too cute for camp!


Three sweet girls enjoying the fire. Not one of those cute little chairs belonged to any of those girls. Thanks for sharing!


Eli and Dayton around the fire. I think Eli might be a pyromaniac. The boy could not stay away from the fire! If it was lit, he spent his time throwing rocks or sticks or dirt into it to watch the sparks fly. There were only a few close calls when I thought he was actually going to fall in, but that's Eli for you...living on the edge of danger.


I had an epiphany about Eli this weekend. It was during the devotional around the campfire on Friday night. He spent the entire 30-minute devo throwing rocks into the fire. At first, I was stressing out a little because he was throwing rocks while all the other children (except the littlest ones) were sitting and singing. What would people think? Why is he so unable to sit still? Have I not done enough to show my child the beauty of praising God? Does this mean I have failed as a mom?! (I know I'm a little crazy.) But then I wondered if maybe God created this little boy just like this for a reason. Maybe, just maybe, his "doingness" will find a place in the Kingdom of God. Maybe I should spend less time trying to make him quieter and more still and spend more time just revealing to him who He is. Maybe I should focus more on where I want Eli's heart to be instead of making him a cookie-cutter, compliant child...because let's be honest, I have tried and failed in the compliance department. Now I know, better than anybody, that Eli still has his issues. He challenges everything and is less than willing to do anything anybody tells him to do when he doesn't want to do it or has another idea of how it should be done. We need to work on that. But maybe if I just let some of the other stuff go, if I embrace the fact that his exuberance will always overcome him, then maybe some of the other issues will just fall into place. If nothing else, my epiphany just gave me a little hope.

This is what Phoebe spent most of the weekend doing. I'm not sure if you can tell, but there were a lot of these of steps and Phoebe wanted to walk up and down them by herself. It took forever, but what else is there to do? She even grunted dramatically on every step.


This picture is of the bane of my existence of Family Camp...family craft time! Every year it's painting and every year we knock over paint or get it all over our clothes and I wind up a dithering, exasperated mess while everybody else's family quietly and contentedly paints beautiful flower pots. It's not the kids aren't interested (just look at the concentration!), it's just that this year we were inside because of the rain with instructions to not spill the non-washable paint on the chapel floor or on our clothes. Well, we did both! Really, we are over achievers.



Soon after these pictures were taken, I left our backpack (with the camera inside) up in the dining hall. We did lots more fun things that I did not photo-document. Eli caught a fish, Phoebe played on the slides, I lost a riveting game of Skip-Boo for all my highly competitive girlfriends (Liz, I told you that you didn't really want me to come play...you should have listened), I read a book...all kinds of good stuff!

Now we're home and Phoebe is helping me unpack by taking everything out of the suitcases and trying to put them on. So very, very helpful!

Popcorn Pals

Sometimes I am just struck by how sweet Eli is with his baby sister. He's not the kindest or sweetest or gentlest of boys, so I was always worried about how he would treat her. Most of the time it brings a smile to my face to watch him share and be silly and sweet with her. Even when he's rough, it's because he just wants to play with her and that's how he plays. It's the nature of brothers, I guess. Like yesterday evening as we were having "Olympic races" in our front yard (more like little boys running helter-skelter across the yard and coming to a dead stop at the sidewalk!) and he tackled his sister, who was standing still, and they rolled over and over each other in the grass. She wasn't impressed. It makes me remember how frustrated and exasperated I would get at my own brother growing up...and yet, there is no one who could (and still can) make me laugh harder! I am so grateful that Phoebe and Eli will have that.

Happy Birthday to Sarah! We are so thankful that Ben married her because she's our "missing link!" I hope your day is wonderful and awesome and amazing and happy. God sent us a gift in you. Happy Birthday!

Yeah For Brad!

There are two reasons this week why Brad is a great husband: Las Vegas and cucumbers.

Let me explain.

I went to Las Vegas this weekend with some girlfriends. Brad stayed home and kept the house clean, made sure Phoebe was wearing a bow at most times, took Eli to the driving range, and made the bed. I walked, shopped, and ate the entire weekend. I don't have any pictures yet because I didn't take many on my camera and the ones I do have aren't that great. Maybe one of the other gals will send me better ones. :)

While I was in Vegas, my friend, Dixie, gave us some cucumbers. She's been working on her garden all summer and she keeps telling me about all the wonderful zucchini, squash, tomatoes, onions, and jalapenos she's growing, but all I'm getting is cucumbers. Not that I'm complaining. Homegrown veggies are homegrown veggies, but seriously, ten giant cucumbers? There was only one thing to do: make refrigerator pickles. Mostly, you're making pickles without all the canning involved. It's perfect because I have no idea how to can...I'd like to learn, but that's another post for another time. So to make refrigerator pickles, you have to peel and slice all the cucumbers to soak in a sugar/vinegar mixture overnight. I dutifully peeled all the cucumbers into the sink and turned on the garbage disposal. Did you know that cucumber peelings will not go down the garbage disposal? Neither did I. Brad had to come in and scrape all the little cucumber giblets out of the disposal (the blade did chop them up into inconvenient, tiny, slimy pieces for us). The disposal is up and running again (thank heavens) and it just goes to show that Brad is a really great guy!

I'll be sure to let you know how the pickles turn out!

**So many of you have been wondering about my latest scans. We haven't heard from the doctors in Boston and Dallas, yet (it's time to start being a squeaky wheel!), but my GI doctor here said they look good. That's all we've got for now, but I'll be sure to keep you updated.

One Of Those Weeks

Have you ever had one of those weeks where it seems like you're busy from sun up till sun down and it still feels like you've gotten nothing done? That's what it's been like around here this week. It's due, in part, to Phoebe running fever since Sunday night. It's gotten higher and higher everyday so this morning I took her the doctor. $25 to tell me it was just a virus and she'll be over it in a day or less. Thanks so much. She's been extra clingy and grouchy the last few days and it's very hard to get anything done while holding a 22lb. 17-month-old. My mom's been here so that's helped. She's been the one teaching Eli how to ride his bike without training wheels. Yeah for Nena!

Our house is officially on the market as of yesterday evening. So far, no one has called...which is probably a good thing since I haven't actually finished unpacking from our trip and today I felt the need to wash and dry four loads of laundry. I should be folding them, but I'm blogging instead! :) Luckily, I have some help here. Hee Hee.

As promised, here are some of the pictures from our trip to Canton.

Sarah and Carrie on the way to Canton. They were covered up with my picnic blanket because it was too cold (maybe the only time that day they were cold!) but I had to have the air conditioner on full blast because I was getting carsick. Maybe it had something to do with turning around backwards to take pictures.


This was before we got all hot and sweaty. It was in the parking lot.


This was after we got all hot and sweaty. Sarah told us we could take the picture as long as we didn't touch her. I'm still not sure if she's recovered.


This is my very shabby trunk and old window. The picture was actually taken on Sunday as we were loading the car to drive home.


This picture has absolutely nothing to do with Canton. On Monday night, Brad wanted paninis for dinner...but we don't have a panini press.

Seriously, who needs a panini press?

And, if you're wondering, my paninis had pesto, deli chicken, provolone cheese, roasted red pepper, and arugula on them. They were delish!

Why I Was Late For My Hair Appointment

Be sure to watch it all the way to the end.

As Nena was patching his skinned-up knee, he said, "I want to go out and practice some more when I stop crying." That's my boy!

Canton: Great Deals, Hot Times

The "Jolly Girls" went to Canton yesterday. (Although my last name may be McCall, they still let me call myself a Jolly Girl). I took some great pictures, but I'm not sure how to download them on my parents computer so I'll have to wait until I get home to post those. We left the children with my dad at home because this was a "serious" Canton trip (read: no children and no complaining boys).

I really like to go to Canton First Monday Trade Days. It just might be the biggest flea market in North America. You can find absolutely anything you are looking for! From golf clubs to jalepeno popper cookers to old fans to funky jewelry and everything in between. The deals there on the "junk" (my personal favorite part of Canton) are great. Here is what I scored yesterday:
* a blue, "shabby chic" wood trunk-I think it's my favorite find! I'll post pictures of it later.
* a Blueridge bowl and platter for $5 each
* a pendant with my initial
* an old window for $5
* a dress for Phoebe with a sparkly cupcake on the front
* a pirate puzzle for Eli that has a motorized pirate ship to "float" around the puzzle

Here is what I thought about buying (but didn't):
* a red and white, wooden "office" arrow sign. I'm looking for some old wooden signs for my house, but this just wasn't the right one
* a initial pendant made out of a Yahtzee piece (I'm a little sad today I didn't buy it)
* a child's red rocking chair
* a picture frame made out of old ceiling tiles

Most of the pieces were left behind because of space issues or the fact that it was extremely hot and it was too much to think about while I willed my blood to literally not boil. I do not recommend first-time Canton goers to go in August. I thought my sweet sister-in-law from Minnesota was going to expire in the heat and humidity. My own southern sister implored me not to buy anything else we had to carry to the car. Our saving grace was the new, clean, air-conditioned bathrooms in that we made two trips to from across the park. They might be out of the way, but soooo worth it!

Every time I leave, I'm always thinking about the next time I can go. Hmmm, probably not until January (probably the other worst month to go)!