Sara's first cheering

Sara is cheering this year for the first time in the area youth football league. She is LOVEING it. There first game was Saturday, they didn't wear their uniforms, so I'll have to take some more photos next Saturday.

A get away!!

Last Sunday Kory and I left for a get away just us. No kids for 4 days. It was the first time in 8 years that we have left the kids for a "just us" vacation.

I guess it was a late anniversary trip,

we celabrated our 8th anniversary on Aug. 11th.

We went to Gatlinburg, and loved it. I had forgotten what it was like to be just us, we chose where we were going to eat, not wondering if there would be something the kids liked to eat...what we were going to do without wondering if the kids would be able to do it.

We reconnected, I paid attention to him, listened to him and not one of the kids, and he did the same.

It was SO nice, but I was ready to get back to the girls.

First day of school

Man, I can't believe the summer is gone! With the possible move all we could think about for the last two months, school sliped back up on us. It was a crazy summer not knowing where we would be when school started, but it all worked out. We will be in Calera for atleast a few more years!

Alyssa is a "freshman" and Sara is in the first grade.

After we droped them both off at school we went to Wal-Mart to pick up cookies and a few other things. When we were leaving,

Emma said, "ok, NOW can we go pick Sara up?"

She will miss Sara not being home to play with her.

Where has the summer gone...

I can't believe it is only 4 weeks till school starts back up for the girls!

Since we got back from vacation the only thing we have really done is VBS and being bums.

VBS was alot of fun. The girls really enjoyed it.

Alyssa was in the skit they had during opening worship. She loves being a put of VBS every year. She even got to help with the 4 year old class and she has a new outlook on her sister's after that.

This was Emma's first year to really get to participate, and she was in heaven. She would ask me everyday "When are we going?"

She can sing the songs and do the motions, she would even help Sara remember the motions. It happened at a good time. The few weeks before we had started VBS she had started potty training. I would tell her if she wanted to go to school like Sara she would have to be potty trained. Well, then we started VBS and it was like school to her, so she wouldn't want me to bring her diaper bag with us with a change of clothes in it. She would tell me, "I'm a big girl now, no more diapers." I would tell her I didn't have diapers in it, I had a change of clothes in it. She would again tell me she didn't need it! "I'm a big girl now!" She has really done great with potty training, she does better then the other girls at night.

She loves to tell everyone that will listen,

"I'm a big girl now, no more diapers!"

Summer Vacation

So, after my niece's high school graduation we went to Pensacola Beach, FL. It was so nice to get away. We took some family pictures...

The girls....

my niece, Jessica, my oldest sister, Cindy, Emma, Kory, Sara, Me and ALyssa

(my middle sister couldn't come with us on this trip).

Potty Training is never dull!

So, I know that I have other things to blog about, but something happened last night that I just have to try and tell you about. I was laughing so hard I nearly went to the bathroom in the bed myself.

Ok, I hope I can explain it well enough for you to get the picture.

Backround info...we have been potty training Emma and it has been a long process over months of working with her, but the last 3 days she has gotten the hang of it. Yesterday, she didn't have one accident all day.

She went to bed with no problems, about 10:30 she got up and ran to our room proclaiming she needed to go "pee pee in the potty". So, I got up and went with her to the bathroom. Successfull again! We make a big deal out of it. (No wonder my children are drama queens) We sing a "Pee Pee in the Potty" song and she has to tell EVERYONE in the house. l let her wake up Kory and wake up Alyssa. (but not Sara) We all sing and I get her back into her bed. Not five minutes later, she is back in our room proclaiming...you get the picture. After about two hours of this, I tell Kory it's his turn to get up with her.

So, it's like 12:45 at night and she is back PROCLAIMING LOUDly that she needs to go "Pee Pee". I hit Kory and say it's your turn. He reluctantly gets up and I remind him to be postive about this. Emma gets up on the potty and starts talking, Kory is in no mood to talk, but he says "really!". So, I start to listen to their conversation. Emma tells him that she is mad at him because he took all her friends home. (We have no clue what she is talking about) Kory asks her about going to the potty and she tells him she can't cause she is mad at him. Kory says "well, make it come out so we can go back to bed", she says "I'm sqeezing my toes and it's not coming out, I'm still mad!" They continue this for a good ten more minutes. Then I hear Kory say, "Kaylin... KAYlin... KAYLIN, it's your turn!" I get to to find she has done number #2 in the potty, and Kory won't clean that up. I take care of her and get her back in bed. About five minutes later she is back proclaiming she needs to go to the "potty". Kory again gets up with her and we repeat the same routine again. Finally about 1:30 she is back in her bed and doesn't wake us up again till this morning. It was a long night, but what do you when every time she proclaims to have to go to the potty, she is successfull, even if it is at midnight?

This was her at MIDNIGHT in front of her sticker chart.

We left here two weeks ago...

We left home Tuesday, May 26th and headed to my dad's in Alba, TX for a few days. Kory droped me off, and he and the girls went to see his family in Jacksonville, TX. It was nice, I got to get away from being a mom and got to spend some time with my dad and MJ.

Kory and the girls came back on Wednesday. He, my dad and Mr. Louis went fishing nearly every morning or evening. Kory was loving that.

We even mowed the grass.

and the kids played hard outside everyday! Bedtime was never trouble.

Sara's Kindergarten Graduation

Sara had her graduation last week. She got to check out of school after the program go eat lunch out with her friend, then go over to her friend house to play for awhile. She was in heaven.

Extreme Rock Racing

Kory's uncles drive "buggies" and go rock crawling. Well this past weekend they had a race in North Birmingham and we decided to go see them and the race. We had never been to one of these. It was fun, wet and muddy but fun! I was surprised that I would enjoy it, maybe it was because we knew someone raceing.

Emma loved Uncle Buddy's helmet!

Uncle Buddy and Uncle Jody watching other teams.

Rock Hard Racing (Buddy and Jody) on the trail.

Kory and the girls loved it! I was glad we went. Sara and Emma were full of dirt head to toe, and Emma fell asleep about 10 seconds after she got in her carseat, we hadn't even left the park.

Sara's first Field Day!

Sara had her "first field day" today. She loved it! They had jumpers, relay races and potatoe sack races. It was an action packed morning filled with fun and alot of sun!

I'm sure she will sleep good tonight!

It was a very warm April morning...high today is suppose to be 88, what happened to spring?

Sara's career day

This week at school was "Career Day" for Sara. This week she wants

to be a teacher.

After school Kory and I were talking to her about what she had learned. She was telling us about a firemen, and a police man that had come to school to talk to them. Kory said "Oh, so I could have gone to talk to your class?" Sara said "No daddy, you have to be a worker!"

Easter 2009

Kory worked so it was just me and the girls easter weekend. We didn't do much at all. We played outside and enjoyed the beautiful weather.

Emma, Sara and Alyssa with their Easter baskets.

The girls and I headed out to church.

AND LOTS OF HIDING EGGS all day long!

Climbing Trees

Sara wanted to learn how to climb a tree, so with a ton of trees in our back yard but none having branches low enough, so decided to get creative. She has this ladder that we took off her swing set that she moves around the yard. She took the ladder and put in up against the littlest tree in our backyard and started to climb. She got scared and came down. Emma decided she wanted to get up there, so she did!

Sara was not too happy... so off she went!

Never a dull moment

Yesterday afternoon it was rainy and cool, so the girls were cooped up inside the house. Emma has gotten very vocal lately and has started singing all the time now. Well, yesterday I noticed she had gotten up on the "stage" and was getting after it.

I took this with my phone, so it's not the greatest.

Things that make you realize you are right where you are suppose to be!

Today when we came home from church, we all went up stairs to change clothes. Sara and Emma were the first two back downstairs. When I came back downstairs this is what I saw!

Sara was teaching Emma to bow down with the palm leaves to praise Jesus. It was SO cute! It really made we realize we are right where we are suppose to be!

Thanks God for the writing in the sky!

National Junior Honor Society

Yesterday Alyssa inducted into the National Junior Honor Socitey.

I am SO proud of her.

She didn't understand all the ceremony and the fuss, but was excited to get in.

We got a letter about two weeks ago and ask that we keep it a secret from Alyssa. So, I did, and forgot about it really untill yesterday at about 1:30. I was not dressed and doing things around the house, when I thought is that today or tomorrow at 2:00? I ran to find the letter saw it was Wednesday and that I better, get dressed NOW, if I was going to make it.

I got there just as it started.

Spring Break

Last week the girls were on spring break and kept asking "Where are we going?" The first part of the week, we stayed around the house. Cleaning and playing...then on Friday we picked Kory up from work at 8 in the morning and got on the road to New Orleans. Kory slept and I drove. I have been wanting to go to the outlet mall in Foley, AL, so we went there first. Shoped around there found a few good deals on little girl clothes. We left there headed on to New Orleans when we passed another outlet in Gulfport, MS. Kory was asleep and Alyssa and I were talking when we saw it and passed it. ALyssa said can we go? and I said, yes, we will turn around. Kory quickly got up and said WHat?

Alyssa and I went to the coach outlet. They were having a sale...I got a purse. Alyssa talked Kory into buying her one too.

Then Sara found a "dress up" dress she wanted, so she talked Kory into buying that.

We finally made it to Cindy's about 8 o'clock that night.

Saturday we got up and took the girls to the Audubon Zoo. I have always loved going to that zoo. I guess because I grew up going to that zoo. They enjoyed it too! It was hot and there was alot of people there, but it was still fun.

That night Alyssa ate her first oyster at the acme oyster bar. I of course didn't eat oysters. I ate shrimp.

We when to the mall after dinner and the little girls rode the easter train.

Sunday we went to the Irish/Italian parade in Metairie. The girls always love going to the parades. After the parade we had crawfish and even Sara decide she liked them. She won't peal them but she wanted to eat them after I would peal them.

Monday we headed home and back to reality!

Never a dull moment in our house...But a wake up call!

This time it was me.

Monday I had a really bad headache and just wasn't feeling well at all. I was tired and felt very slugest, and short of breath. I felt like my arms and legs weighted a ton just to left them up. Well, I went to bed but couldn't really sleep. I got up Tuesday morning and felt like I had someone standing on my chest on the left side, it felt tight across my chest and up into my left shoulder, and I could hardly breath. I took a shower and got dressed. Nothing helped, it could kept getting worse. I got Sara ready for school and on the bus, Alyssa was home sick and still asleep, Emma was playing in her room and watching her TV. I text Kory is see what time he would be home from work, he called and said it would be a little while. I didn't tell him why, he had a regional manager there to visit, so I didn't want to bother him.

The pain and tightness just keep on and on, not letting up. I saw our neighbors were up and so I walked over to our neighbors house and ask them to bring me to the ER. They called 911, and Kory.

The EMTs hooked me up to all kinds of monitors, gave me nitro spray, and some aspiran. When we got to the ER my BP was 198/98, according to all the monitors my heart looked fine. They gave me some meds for to help get my BP down. They got blood and left me hooked up to this machine that took my BP every 5 mins, it seemed like, and monitored my heart. After a few hours they told me everything looked fine, heart wise, the only thing was my BP. He told me that when your BP is high and stays high over a period of time it will mimic a heart attack.

Well, I have to admit this is all my own doing...see when we moved I never went and got a doctor here, I just kept putting it off. So, I ran out of my blood pressure med back in January. I learned my lesson the hard way! I saw the look on my husband face as they put me in the ambulance, I have never seen that look in the 9 years we have been together. I saw the look on Alyssa's face when I got home, it will be a day I will never forget! Thanks be to God it was just a "wake up" call for me!

Saving money....

I have never been one to cut coupons or bring other ads to Wal-Mart to comp items, but with all these shows talking about how people cut their grocery bill in half, I decided I would try and see what I could do. I've only just started collecting coupons and watching other store ads. We buy groceries every two weeks and that's it except for milk or bread or something I forgot in between. So the first time I did this was two weeks ago. I just comp ads from other stores and saved $7.00. This last Thursday I had gotten some coupons and again comp ads and I saved $14.00. This doesn't include items that where on sale at Wal-Mart. or the 2 for 1 items I got at Publix. (Wal-mart won't comp those) So, really it was more like $20.00 now that I add those too.
So far it has been pretty easy, I get the other store ads look at them and compare prices at Wal-Mart. I get the Sunday paper for the coupons and then I found alot online.
I'll keep ya posted on my new challenge

Snow on Sunday, March 1, 2009

I can't believe it, we got some snow!