Fancy, Indeed!

Whitt, Bruce, and I eased up in the carpool line. I spot Mae waving at us wildly, always a great part of my day. As we get closer, I see Mae's teacher motioning to her mouth, and I notice Mae's lips are the brightest possible shade of hot pink. I think to myself they must have had another lipstick day (A couple of months ago, they sent home a small tube of lipstick with each girl while they were studying "darling dollies." Pops acutally picked Mae up from school that day, and somehow the lipstick ended up out of her bag, all over her face, clothes, and the backseat of Pop's car). Obviously, I wasn't thinking to hard considering they are learning about orca and balleen whales right now, and lipstick and whales just don't seem to mix. So, here is the conversation when the car door opens: J: Oh, Mae. You look so fancy!!! Love your lipstick. Mae's sweet teacher: It's actually marker. She colored her lips today. (Mae beaming) J: Oh! (Trying not to crack up) So, yes, our little Miss Priss painted her lips with her favorite color, and you know what she did a good job. Check it out. She stayed pretty much in the lines, truly some of her best work. Of course, we talked about how markers always stay on paper (which she already knew), but in all honesty, the fact that my girly girl so wanted lipstick that she decided to break the rules and color in her lips with a bright pink marker made my day.

Kindred Spirits

This photo of the little guy and I pretty much sums up our relationship. We can't take our eyes off one another; we are kindred spirits. He makes sure he knows exactly where I am at all times. His sweet little eyes will follow me around the room, and if he is being held by someone else and I am in arms reach, he lunges for me. He is perfectly content to spend the large majority of his day on my hip, and I just so happen to love it. By the third one, you no longer care about all those silly, arbitrary rules like, "if you hold him all the time, you are going to spoil him." Maybe so, but I am perfectly happy soaking up as much of this sweet baby as I can (even if that means he is my human barnacle). Check out the video of our little "barnacle" crawling. He really got going last week.

Thirty-one...

It is Michael's birthday today. He is in Austin, TX for a bachelor party, so we celebrated a little early on Wednesday night. Check out the pictures.

The annoying thing about Michael is he seems to get better looking the older he gets. As my body grew while pregnant with our three little ones, he got thinner (really annoying!). He started getting a little bit of grey a couple of years ago, and it looks good on him, a little more distinguished if you ask me. His face never looks tired; I wake up looking completely exhausted.

But even with this annoyance, I realize with each of his birthdays that I love him even more than I did the year before. The more comfortable he becomes in his own skin, the deeper I fall. Moving to Chicago taught me I could make a home with him anywhere. He is home. I love that he can admit he teared up watching Mae sing at her choir performance last Sunday, I love that he looks at Whitt and tells him he has such a handsome face, I love that he is just as natural with baby Bruce as I am, I love how he is always challenging himself. He brings out the best parts of me, and on most mornings as I wake up looking exhausted, I think to myself I won the lottery when it comes to men.

Happy Birthday!!

ps-Michael, this is going to have to count as your birthday card.

Espionage....

Mae has been going to choir on Wednesday nights at our church this year. She loves it and looks forward to it every week. She does not however like for us (brothers and parents as well as grandparents) to watch her perform. This all came to light in December at her school's Grandparents Day/ Christmas program. Our little Mae climbed up on the very front riser, dead-center in a room full of overzealous family members (us included) with cameras and videos rolling. She started singing the Mandarin song they had learned, then she spotted us out of the corner of her eye as Whitt waved widely at her. She immediately stopped singing, then she started playing with her nails. Not sure what was going on, we all thought she would feel more relaxed if she could see us better. We moved so that we were right in front of her line of sight. Big mistake! She then started to rub her big brown eyes so hard I thought they were going to pop right out the back of her head. That is pretty much how the rest of the program went. Fast forward, to two weeks ago. I pick Mae up from choir. M: Mommy, Miss Julie (choir teacher) said we are going to have a spring program. J: Yes, you are! Aren't you excited? M: I don't want you to come. J: (Heartbroken) Why Mae? I would love to come see you. I love you and am so proud of you! Do you want Daddy to come? M: No J: JJ and Pops? M: No J: Ok, we won't come if you don't want us to. I will just drop you off and pick you up at the party afterwards. As you can imagine, we were not about to miss seeing her, so I dropped her off at the church, came back to the house where everyone loaded up (including JJ and Pops), and went right back up there. We snuck up to the baclony, so there was no possible way for her to see us and quietly watched. It was so sweet. What a blessed moment to watch my baby girl sing praises to our Father! Could there be a more precious form of worship!?! You could tell she was having so much fun up there, and she was so pleased with herself afterwards. We gave her a yellow tulip when the program was over, and she immediately turned around and gave it to Miss Julie. My girl! Check out the singing before bed from tonight:

High Flying Boy....

We should have had some idea of the personality that awaited us by the middle of the night arrival and the crowd that joined us for Whitt's entrance (he was born at a teaching hospital so there were a few residents as well as the doctor and two nurses), but he fooled us. He was an extremely laid-back baby. He slept, he ate, he smiled, he giggled. Then he turned ten months and around that time, he learned to pull-up and walk/ run behind his pushcart. It was literally amazing. He would stand up behind it, throw "blankie" on top of his head, and take off. He could even do 360s behind it. Also around that time he started babbling, then talking pretty much the entire time he was awake. Whitt has the energy level of a tasmanian devil, and these days Mae says, "excuse me" over and over just trying to get a word in. Whitt keeps us on our toes. That being said, I delight in who he is. He is laughter and joy wrapped up into one package. He has so much energy and passion in that little body, and he loves harder than anyone I know. Behind his long, black eyelashes are these pale eyes that are so honest. When you look into them, you see every emotion he is experiencing. He is our high-flying boy! We love you.

Glow worm....

Michael was out of town last night, and after I put the little ones to bed, I started thinking about what we were doing three years ago. We were living in Evanston, IL. About 5:00 pm, I realized that our little man would be coming soon. We took Mae to her last dinner as a only child, came back to our apartment, called a dear friend to come stay with her, and headed to the hospital. We were up all night (well, actually michael took a brief nap), and at 4:14 am, Whitt arrived and he looked just like a glow worm!!! He had these giant cheeks that everyone noticed, several nurses commented, and michael, mae, and my hearts were instantly his. Whitt absolutely loves hearing this story, so this morning when he asked me to tell him for the hundredth time, I happily obliged. Happy Birthday beautiful boy!

Whatever it takes...

okay, I sent this pic out to a few people yesterday, and this morning I was told it needed to be part of the new blog. The morning was actually going pretty smoothly. Michael had taken Mae to school. Whitt finished breakfast, and I played with both boys. Bruce went down for a morning nap (small miracle that he actually got to take a nap in his crib instead of the carseat/ stroller). Whitt and I read some books. Then he went to play with his cars while I cleaned up the morning dishes and did laundry. Suddenly, Whitt came running to the kitchen frantic, W: Brucie is crying! I think you need to feed him. J: I don't think he is hungry, Whitty. W: I'll go check on him. J: Thanks, buddy. The crying stopped, so I started another load of clothes. When I walked in Bruce's room, this is what I found. It had rained stuffed animals. Whitt had thrown every toy into the crib. Bruce was thrilled, and Whitt was zooming his cars right next to him on the floor. Awww, brotherly love! ps-excuse the photo quality. my personal camera man was at work : )

Pomas aka Thomas

I have always been amazed at the connection my two oldest have. I often find them in deep conversation like an old married couple. These little moments usually occur in the backseat of my car. Here is a recent one. A little background, we were listening to a "Music is for Aardvarks" CD. The song started, "Hello, Thomas! It's good to see you." M: Mommy, who is Thomas? W: Mae, Mae. Pomas (Whitt still has a little lisp. I happen to love it) is a small, blue tank engine with a number one painted on his side. He said it with all seriousness and respect. M: Thanks, Whitt. Every time I think about it I smile!

Dashing....

We have had alot of snow in Memphis this year. Let me rephrase that. It has not really been so much snow as it has been slushy, icy stuff, nothing that really sticks or you can play in for too long before it melts. But, there was one morning of great snow. Of course, the weathermen all said there was no chance of snow, but somehow we all woke up to a beautiful blanket of fluffy, white snow. The really good stuff where you can sled and build snowmen. It was magical! God sent us all the most wonderful surprise when we woke up that morning. We had a blast that morning playing, drinking hot chocolate, building a snowman that proudly wore Great-grandaddy Walker's cap, and the big bonus of Daddy coming home early from work. Here is a pic of Mae and Whitt as well of a pic of Ernie. When Mae saw him running/ hopping threw the snow, she said he was "dashing." Love that girl!