Marie-esque: Heard Around the House Lately

Marie: Mooooooommmmmmmmyyyyyyy!!!!!!!!! Mooooooommmmmmmyyyyyy!!!!!
Mommy: Yes, Marie.
Marie: Look, bird. or Look, aypwane (airplane). or Look, baby. Basically, anything that has caught her interest at the moment.

Repeat indefinitely until she gets bored of the game and finds something else to do.
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Any given moment of the day Marie is very likely to get upset and start crying for who knows what. Unless we are around other people,of course, then she is a perfect angel.She's scheming to make a liar out of me.

Mommy: Don't cry, honey. Be happy.
This is usually answered with more crying that increases in volume.
Mommy: Marie, if you are going to cry, you can do it in your room. Be happy.
Marie: Mommy. Mommy. I cwying.*sniff* Wahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

And off to her room she goes.
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Sometimes the things that come out of her mouth aren't terribly funny, but they make me smile because she is 20 months old and hearing her talk at all is just so dang cute! Some examples ...

As I was trying to help her eat lunch today she kept saying, "No want it. No want it."

When she hears another baby/child crying in a store, "Mommy. Mommy. She's sad."

She completes her own conversations: Thank you. Wacka (welcome). or Mommy. What. Look.

And whenever William has to say sorry to her, she always says sorry back. This frustrates William to no end. "No, Marie. I took your toy. I say sorry." *eye roll*

Right Now ...

I am with these chickies, sans Becca. Right now we are missing her.

Tomorrow we will be running a 5K together. I was going to try to beat my 33 minutes from my one and only other 5K, preferably in under 30 minutes. Then I found out that the youngest sister hasn't prepared very much, or at all. So I will be making sure she finishes. I am OK with that. Maybe I should have brought my jogger stroller to push her in.

Sara, you know I love you.

And you will love me tomorrow when I am pushing you across the finish line. I promise.

Ocean Mural

I started an ocean mural with William a couple of weeks before we left for California. I knew we would be going to the ocean (duh) and thought it would be cool to fill him up with ocean knowledge. Just in case you aren't keeping close enough tabs on my life, that would be approximately 10 weeks ago.

It didn't get finished before we left and when we got back, the unfinished mural sat and sat and sat.

Until yesterday, when I finally got back into my kids crafting groove and our little ocean mural is now finished .... ten weeks later.

The crabs are what we finished last night. He giggled with excitement because seeing the crabs on the pier, uh, *clear throat*, eight weeks ago, was one of the highlights of our trip.

I guess I could just say that the mural is reinforcement for what he saw on his real life adventure with the ocean, right? Right.

Another Adventure to Add to My List

Well, I did it. After more hours than I care to admit I managed to put together my piano blog and I learned a lot about HTML code.

No, I haven't mentioned my piano blog on here before.

No, I am not starting up another blog that I will have to update.

Yes, I am starting something that will take up more time than another blog.

Beginning this fall (or summer if any perspective students are just dying to start right away) I will be teaching piano lessons. It is a lifelong dream that time and circumstances will finally allow. Plus, I have felt very strongly lately that I should not be burying my talents.

I can't wait to get started!

I would be flattered if you would go take a look. (click here)

William-ese: As Heard at the Dinner Table Last Night

W: Mommy, when you have regular hair I will feel it.
M: Regular hair? What kind of hair do I have?
W: Black hair.
M: What kind of hair do you have?
W: I have regular hair.
M: What about Daddy?
W: He has regular hair.
M: And Marie?
W: She has regular hair, too.
M: And my hair?
W: Your hair is brown dark. When it is regular I can feel it. And you have nipples, and I have nipples, and Daddy has nipples, and Marie has nipples, and Grandpa has nipples.
M: (In an effort to steer the conversation to more kosher body parts) We all have knees too, don't we?
W: Yes, and we have noses.
M: That's right. We all have noses.
W: Yes, and we all have boogers in our noses.

The conversation ended at this point. I was laughing too hard to continue.

Gone But Not Forgotten

I first met this beauty on my 22nd birthday. My dad brought her to me. Although it was not love at first sight, I was deeply grateful for the convenience she would bring into my life. Time passed, miles were driven, memories were made, and love grew.

Now 7 years later it is time for me to move on. She just can't meet my needs anymore. I will never forget what she brought to my life, though.

Roadtrips, roadtrips, and more roadtrips. Thousands of miles worth of roadtrips.

Our getaway car at our reception, complete with an entire bag of confetti poured into the vents. A random piece of confetti will still shoot out every once in a while when we turn the A/C or heat on, almost five years after the blessed event.

Our honeymoon car. We drove from Monterey to V-town in this baby, a 16-hour drive total. I got pulled over, but didn't get a ticket. Maybe the cop saw the confetti and had pity on us?

We brought William home from the hospital in this sweet Saturn. Brandon and I were so nervous to be in a car with him. I think Brandon drove about 20 MPH the entire way home (good thing the hospital was only about 1 mile away) and I checked every 5 seconds to see if our baby boy was still breathing. Ah, the paranoia of new parents.

Yes, life was sweet with my little blue Saturn. She will be missed.

But you know what they say, "Every new beginning comes from some other beginnings end."

Good-bye, Saturn.

Hello, Sienna!

Disclaimer: This is not actually our Sienna. I haven't taken a picture of our Sienna, yet. I am OK with that. You should be, too.

William-ese

I am not much of a direct bragger. Or at least, I try not to be. I don't ever want this blog to become a look-at-how-smart-my-kid-is blog. If I ever come across that way, please call me on it.

Alright, that being said, I am about to brag. William's Grandmas need to hear this story. I can't take credit for one bit of this, other than the fact that I bought the fridge magnets that will take part in this story and the fact that I am the one to turn on "Between the Lions" about 3 times a week.

On with the story:

Brandon and I were cleaning up from dinner and chatting about who knows what. William was standing at the fridge where we have two or three letter magnets. I could hear him behind me saying "huh" "ohhhhh" "huh" "ohhhh" "Ho, ho, ho!" When I turned around I saw this:

Perhaps the fact that I didn't teach him that is what makes me so proud. Or maybe I should be embarrassed and ashamed that I didn't teach him that, a TV show did.

Whatever.

William read his first word. Be proud, Grandmas, be proud.