It's Stuff Portraits Friday

...and I haven't played in a really long time.
Here's what Kristine wants us to show:
1. Something in your house that isn't where it should be.
2. Something you broke, but kept it.
3. Food that you have in your house that you never eat (or drink)


This contraption is something my husband brought home. He is *borrowing* it for a few weeks to see if he wants one.
No.
N. O. Not in the freaking living room!


This cute doggie was holding a "Welcome" sign. We've tried fixing it several times but it keeps falling back out. He's just too cute to throw out though.


I bought this delightful stuff after Dwayne had his oral surgery and couldn't eat solids. He said he'd rather starve than drink that crap.


Happy Friday!

Things I Must Do While Nursing

by Holden

1. Latch on and get upset if the milk does not come down IMMEDIATELY
2. Bob my head and body like I'm jamming out to 50 Cent
3. Dig my fingernails into Mom's boobie
4. Pop off to look up at Mommy and smile
5. Pop off to look around at Sophie playing
6. Pull my head back to see how far Mommy's nipples will stretch before they break
7. Pop off to smile at Mommy
8. Pop off to watch Sophie
9. Blow raspberries on Mommy's nipples
10. Get mad after Mommy puts her boobie away because I've been goofing off for too long

WBW: Fraternity/Sorority week

The Kept Woman wants to see our sorority or fraternity pictures.
If you know me (and really know me), you know that I am soooooo not a sorority girl.

When I was in high school I used to love fraternity boys. I would sneak off for the weekend to visit my college friends and they taught me all the fraternity names, cute boys in each one, and how to party frat style!
I went to more frat parties in high school than I did in college. Oh I partied in college, but was just not into that scene anymore.

Here's the one and only frat party I can remember going to. My girl, Carrie (on the right) dragged me along no doubt. Hey, at least they're good for free beer!


See those colored chords around my neck?

Those were for being a Kappa Delta Pi member (the other ones for graduating with honors). I joined Kappa Delta Pi my senior year. It's not really a sorority, but an Honor Society in Education. I figured it would look good on my resume.
Does that count??

Side note: That's Dwayne with my nephew on the side. I remember I had tried dying Dwayne's hair blonde at the time. Didn't quite turn out as planned. It actually turned many shades of orange as I tried to dye it again and again to fix it.
But it grew out eventually and that was the last time I was allowed to dye his hair.

The Great Tattoo Artist

Here she is working on her tattoo called "Brown River"...


And here she has created "Brown Mustache"...


The girl even colored the bottom of her feet.

Some of you are wondering if I supervise my child with markers.
I do. Unlike pen, markers are washable.
And just look at her creative talents!

Daddy's Birthday

We have been planning Dwayne/Daddy's birthday for the past week.
It is hard for a 2 year old to keep a secret.

Mommy went to the paint-your-own-pottery place and picked out a nice little plate for Daddy. I painted it, wrote "daddy" in the middle, and planned on returning with the kids to put their little fingerprints all around the edge.
A few days later I was taking them back to the pottery place. I told Sophie we were going to the pottery place to paint a plate for Daddy's birthday.
She heard that we were going to Daddy's birthday party.
I tried explaining again what we were going to do.
And she got very excited that we were going to Daddy's birthday party.
You can imagine Sophie's disappointment when we got to the pottery place. She looks around with a confused look on her face, turns to me and asks "Where's Daddy?"
So I went through the explanation yet again that we were there to paint the plate for Daddy's bithday. After she realized she would get to stick her hands in some paint she was happy again.

But she couldn't quite keep her mouth shut about the plate. Luckily Dwayne was only half listening and didn't clue in when Sophie asked him about his plate a few times.

We also went shopping for items needed to make his birthday cake. Sophie picked out the kind of cake, icing, candles, wrapping paper, and a big bow for his present! Holden didn't really care what we got. I did ask him though so he could be a part of the whole birthday thing. All I got out of him was "bwdah, bwdah, bwdah." I figured he was agreeing with Sophie's choices.
I had wanted everything to be a surprise for Dwayne on Friday. But knowing we still had 2 more days to go and I figured Sophie would surely spill the beans. She did. That night she told Daddy about the cake. Oh well, I tried.
And Sophie was very concerned about this cake. She really wanted the cake to be for her. After I told her again it was a cake for Daddy's birthday she said "For Sophie's birthday too!"
"This time it's Daddy's birthday, but he will share the cake with us."
That seemed to appease her, and then that's all I heard about... "Daddy will share his cake with Sophie."

We baked and decorated his cake, wrapped his present, and signed his cards. Then we anxiously awaited his arrival home.
When he walked in we showered him with hugs, kisses, and "happy birthday"s.
We enjoyed a nice meal at home, sang "Happy Birthday" and brought out the cake afterwards. It took about 5 minutes to light all the candles and I was sure the smoke alarm was going to go off when Dwayne blew them out!

But he sure loved his present and homemade cake!
And Sophie was very relieved when Daddy shared a piece with her.

P.S. This is what Daddy's plate was for.

fun day

Sophie got to take her cousin Bradley out on her boat a weekend ago.
They had a great time playing with each other, splashing in the water, digging in the sand, eating lots and lots of crackers, and they even found a baby turtle to play with that was only as big as a quarter. Mommy thought he was really cute and wanted to take him home for a pet, but Daddy said no.

The two cousins were so excited to ride in the boat!


And then we started going fast. Look at the hair!


Somebody was so tired she fell asleep holding her cup in one hand and her cracker in the other one. I tried to lay her down and take the cracker out of her hand, but apparently it was much more comfortable having her face squished into the life vest while holding on to her cracker for security.

Way Back Wednesday: Damn I was hot!

This week the Kept Woman wants us to show off our hot young selves.

Hottie at 20 with my boyfriend Hendrix on New Year's Eve.

I still have that sparkly shirt in my closet, 8 YEARS LATER. Is that too long to hold on to a piece of clothing you hardly wear anymore??

And at 23. Ahhh, so young, tan, skinny, and had all the time in the world to fix my hair...

Love that dress. Still in my closet too. Will fit into it again. Someday.

Here I'm all dressed up for the Millenium New Year's Eve...

Another good hair night that took like 3 hours of preparation. (all for my sexy boyfriend Dwayne)
This dress got thrown out a few months ago after I made the mistake of trying it on. My new bore-two-childen-body spit it back out at the mirror!

My sweet new ride

This is my new ride, BOB.


BOB rocks!
I have been searching for many months for the perfect jogging stroller. BOB is my man now.
Just look at his huge canopy... a must in sunny Texas.
And his striking complexion... I won't ever lose him in a crowd.
His big solid frame and robust wheels... I can take him anywhere.

I really took BOB for one good ride this morning! Lots of panting, sweating, and moaning... and I can't wait to use him again.
Thank you BOB!

My husband got so plastered last night!

Yep, I was moping around about our cat Archie being gone and told Dwayne I wanted to do something to keep my mind off of him.
He said "Let's make my face mold."
Cool.
I got to plaster his face!

Here's the true hockey player with missing front tooth.


So, first we had to put the stocking cap on, lube his face up with Vaseline, and put makeup pads over his eyes.


Then came the plaster. Very fun! I highly suggest plastering someone's face if you are ever depressed.


At the end...


And we're done!


Dwayne wanted his face mold to send to off to have his goalie mask re-padded.
Whatever.
It was fun for me and I want to do it again!
Next time I want to get plastered while I plaster.

Ode to Sophia

When did you become such a big girl?

You like to pick out your own clothes,

You like to pick your nose.

You can put on your own shoes,

You can sit on the toilet and make big poo-poos.

You like to paint yourself with yogurt,

But girl, sometimes you can be such a little squirt!


I love you Sophia!!

WBW: Bad Fashion

Today I bring you the best of my bad fashion. I have to say I don't think I have any pictures of my absolute worst outfits, so here's the best I could dig up...


This was sixth grade circa 1988, so you can understand the rolled up jeans and ugly geometric patterned sweatshirt.


And then there's this one. What do you say about a picture so ugly?
That's my mom, sister, and me on the end. (1984?)
It's not really a bad outfit, it's just baaaad in so many ways.
But this picture makes me laugh so hard when I look at it!
Go ahead and laugh and tell me that you like my hair, my big buck teeth that took 8 years of orthodontics to fix, my mom's cool humongo glasses, and how my sister looks like a boy.

And he keeps on growing

We've made it to 6 months alive! (and I mean Mommy and Daddy)


I finally feel like we've got a good rhythm to Holden's days.
He's eating and sleeping about the same time each day.
He sleeps all night.
He's stopped crying all the time.
He can sit up by himself.
He loves his toys and and will play alone or with Sophie for a awhile.
Of course his favorite place is still in Mommy's arms.
Mommy is a very popular around here.

So we went for his 6 month check up Friday and everything is well except his weight. He only gained 2 oz in 2 months. He went from his normal growth curve at 50% down to 10%! Of course I am concerned. He had been doing fine up until now, so we're not really sure what happened... he's probably using up more calories now that he moves around so much more and was just not getting enough food to replace them.
But we're going to fatten him up now. I want him to be a little dough boy. The doc wants us to keep nursing and start feeding him 3 meals of solid food a day. We'll go back in a month and see where he is then.

How do you get the kids to stop crying and whining so you can cook breakfast on a Saturday morning?

Put on Dora of course!

Where, Oh Where Can My Archie Be?

Archie has been gone for two and a half weeks now. Usually he comes back home within a few days. We saw him around that first week he was gone, but now there's no sign of him. We have looked and looked and called his name. We have put food and water out a few times and it was gone the next morning. But was it Archie or another cat??
I wouldn't mind him being an outdoor cat except he doesn't have any front claws to climb or protect himself.
I have been worried sick and keep hoping he'll come to our door meowing to come in.
As each day goes by and he doesn't return I wonder if he'll ever come back.
I keep going back and forth between hopefulness and sadness. I feel hopeful going outside and looking for him, putting food out and waiting for him to be there in the morning.
But then I start thinking he's gone for good. It's been almost three weeks and it's time to realize he's probably not coming back. And then I just cry. I really want to be wrong about that, so I go back to being hopeful...

COME HOME NOW ARCHIE!

way back wednesday

This week's theme is "school spirit"...what you did in school (band, cheerleading, sports, etc.).

So first we have me, the track star in high school.

Before practice my friend Cynthia and I would always hide under the bleachers for a quick smoke before our workout.
I also did cross country for awhile but found it got in the way of my pack-a-day Marlboro reds habit, so I had to quit. Cross country that is.

And I also played the alto saxophone for many years. I was pretty good at it too. Was in marching band, but really liked jazz band more.

I had to put the picture with the guy next to me (Mike) because I had the BIGGEST crush on him for a year! He was soooo cute and I got to sit next to him!

And here I found a picture of Dwayne. Now if you know anything about him you know he's the big hockey star, but apparently we don't have any of those pictures here. I did find this one of him playing soccer in his youth.

I don't want to dog my husband too much for this picture, so all I can say is "nice hair dude!" I guess it was cool back in 1982.

booze, trunk, dishes

SPF this week is:
1. your favorite alcoholic beverage
2. inside of your trunk
3. your dishes

I have a couple of favorite drinks, but I am a beer girl at heart. But good beer. Not that Bud LIght, Miller Light crap that pretends to be beer. Let me tell you those Canadians and Europeans really know how to do beer right!
Here's my current fav, STELLLLLLLLAAA!!


Here's the inside of my trunk...

And Dwayne's trunk...

What do you think this says about us??


And our beautiful dishes...

We registerd for these for our wedding and they are nice looking dishes, but apparently not Jackie-proof. I have chipped and broken about half of them now.
We once had a set of 12 wine glasses but I managed to break every single one of those in about 6 months also!

Numbers

9 is for how many days Archie has been gone now.
He's never been gone this long before. His last record was 7 days. Please come home now Archie! I know you're out there because we've seen you twice. Give it up and just come home! I'm sure your girlfriend will still be there when you come back.

60 is for how many crunches I did today. I ROCK!

1 is for the first day of school for Sophie and Holden. They're in a Mom's Day Out program for a few hours a week to give me a little much needed break. Who do you think was crying today? Not Holden, he did pretty well. Not Sophie, she walked right in and started playing with the playdough. It was Mommy! Feeling a little sad and empty, and a tad bit guilty for leaving them. But it sure was nice to have some peace and quiet alone time.

23 is for how many dollars I made selling the rest of my maternity clothes today. Not very much but better than nothing. I don't ever want to wear those clothes again!

1000 is for how much money we've donated so far for Katrina victims. I can't say much more about this because I get really upset and start crying when I think about about those poor people. Just so unimaginable what they're going through.

5 is for how many hours sleep I got last night. And too bad I wasn't doing anything fun either. I just couldn't fall asleep. What the?? Our kid finally starts sleeping through the night and now I can't sleep. Go figure.

253 is for how many days till we're celebrating our anniversary in Mexico! By ourselves. Can you tell I'm excited?!!