Well I have totally neglected my blog lately, I always want to write, but something else stands in the way. Recently it has been due to all the photo assignments I have had. I was contracted for a bunch of business advertising and although I have been doing it for about three months most of the work came in the last month right before deadline! It makes me really not want to be on the computer!
I had to go back and re-read what I had written so I would know where I left off. Looks like I was averaging about one post a month. Not too good. Since I don't use my blog so much, I have thought about switching to word-press which is free. But I either want to make a book of this blog or figure out how to transfer everything, because I would hate to lose everything. Anyway, possible by the end of the year I will have figured out all the details. I am hoping to start working on an actual photography site and I would want to incorporate my blog into that formula. Whatever that may be.
So since I left off with Easter, I guess I could say a little about that. We did not actually die any eggs this year. We had a picnic at the park with the church and the kids did an easter egg hunt there. Unfortunately, I did not really get any photos because it all happened so fast. and the area that the eggs were hidden was not a good backdrop for photos, lol. I still have the dye I bought, so I thought maybe this summer we could do it as an art activity.
The month of May was busy with lots of activities. We saw the first signs of summer.
We dragged out the TACO bowl Eli gave me for Christmas two years ago...
We finished up with Elijah's school tennis team. He has actually gotten really good. Miss Toni said in the last few weeks, it was like it finally clicked in his head and the techniques were just "there." Maybe all the playing he was doing these last few months are what kick started it. He was playing both at Maybank and for the school tennis team. He did really well and would win about half the matches he was in. Plus Andy was able to take him three or four times to the Family Circle Cup. He even was able to see Venus and Serena play!
I had a really nice Mother's Day with lots of fun homemade gifts from the kids and one Barnes and Noble Gift Card from the Ando! In the evening we went walking downtown just to get out for some exercise. Ellie and Eli are really into taking pictures right now, so we had to stop every few minutes for photo ops!
Loved this one. Eli and Ellie taking a picture of a flower and Noah just being the funny man because he is not interested in taking pics.
Whew! two hours and only half way through May. This whole blogging thing is just like laundry...If I just did one load (post) a day, it would be easier and I could stay caught up!
More to come...(but I would not hold my breath...you know how slow I am.)
Growing up we hardly ever went to church on Easter. Maybe because until I was about 13 we never actually went to church...but anyway, I missed the whole Easter dress and hat business.
So is it any wonder that I would want to dress my beautiful little girl up for Easter. I mean that is what we do as parents right? Live vicariously through our children?
My daughter, for those of you who do not know...is a little fashionista. She LOVES clothes, and shoes, and jewelry and hairdos (not sure that is really a word). Especially if it is pink. She LOVES pink! So you would think Easter would really be her holiday. She can dress to the nines and really feel like she is going somewhere.
So meet Exhibit A...The Easter Dress.
A perfectly adorable dress bought at Dillard's at Christmas time for a STEAL! $7.50! Of course, I also have cute socks and shoes, hair ribbons to go with the dress.
Now this dress has been hanging in her closet for months and EVERY SUNDAY she asks if she can wear it. I have to say, "No, that is your Easter dress. You can wear it on Easter."
For the last week, it has been, "Is today Easter? Can I wear my dress?"
So this morning she puts it on...and immediately starts SCREAMING her head off! TAKE IT OFF!! I DON'T LIKE IT! Oh fickle children. I guess she did not like that her back was bare because it is a sundress and she wanted a shirt to go with it. So after a little arguing she agreed to wear a turquoise shirt instead of a pink one (because the pink one's were not the right color) and we went off to curl her hair.
Now, this is the first time I have every actually curled her hair. I have always been scared to because I was afraid I would burn her accidentally if she wiggled. So, I painstakingly curled it all nice a pretty, spending at least ten minutes getting it just right.
I go back to finishing my makeup and a few minutes later she comes in the bathroom and says, "does this look okay?" I look down at her and what has she done...she has completely WET her hair with the spray bottle and slicked it all back! She took the curl out completely!
I think I might be having a nervous breakdown....
I am so mad I just send her away and tell her to finish getting dressed and I didn't care what she wore.
Which leads to Exhibit B...
Notice the fur vest and the fur BOA. Not sure what the dead animal wrapped around her forhead is...
Andy says if I was trying to prove I would show her by not caring what she wore, I lost the battle.
Next year, we might be going camping on Easter...
HAPPY EASTER from the LYONS!
Monday was career day at school and of course Noah had to go dressed like his daddy. He debated on going as a SWAT team guy, but his love for his daddy won the day. Of course, his dad drug out an old mini tape recorder for him to use and I think that is what really clinched it...
On this one he was all like, "Mom, get me with my hat off and scratching my head like I am thinking!"
(Notice his press pass...)
When it looked like there was no way to access my old computer even in Safe Mode, I knew that my love hate relationship with my old Gateway was over. Most of my picture files were on an external hard drive, so I was not that worried about what I was going to lose on my computer hard drive if we had to do a full system recovery.
Through some chicaneries told to us by one of mom's friends (who is a computer geek, thank goodness), we were able to take my hard drive and hook it up to her DVD drive and drag and drop any remaining data files, BUT, we were unable to save my LIGHTROOM CATALOG!
So, although I have all my photos, since they are no longer sorted in Lightroom, I have to go back and re-import them and then sort through them for the ones that I like. This is going to be quite a job. So my hopes of finishing my Christmas Blog will have to wait just a bit.
I did not need a monitor, so I just went shopping for a CPU. I lucked into a great deal on a DELL. Since I have not had a DELL before, I thought I would give it a shot. I did look briefly at a Mac, but for the money you don't get much, and right now I am all about the money!
It takes awhile to get everything working correctly and get all your old programs re-loaded. It is a lot of work setting up a new computer. Luckily this computer is much faster, and hopefully it is not as buggy a the old one. I never knew if it was even going to turn on everyday.
We went to eat at Charleston Place for our anniversary. We had friends of ours from Florida stay with us a couple of days, so we were able to get out and about a little. They took us out to one of the fanciest 5 star restaurants in Charleston. It was a lot of fun and the food was delicious. Dad took a couple photos of us. I definitely need to learn how to use the liquefy tool in Photoshop! That will be much easier than going on a diet, lol.
Okay, let's see if I can give you the rundown. Mom and Dad were here for Thanksgiving. We had a pretty quiet meal in the evening (it was delicious) because Dad and Andy when down to Hampton Park to help with a Thanksgiving Outreach. It turned out really great--they had tons of volunteers.
The only bad thing was Noah got sick on Thanksgiving with a bad stomach flu, fever and the works. The worst was over by the next day, but he really did nothing but lay around and sleep for about four days. Andy had to work the night after Thanksgiving, so Mom and I were able to get a little Black Friday shopping done while he was at home with the kids. It was a good thing we took the opportunity because by the weekend, Eli, Mom and Andy were all down with the same flu. It took quite a while to recover from and Andy even used four sick days. He has never been as sick as he was that week in all our married life. I felt really sorry for him. His temperature was up to 102.6. Pretty high for an adult. I don't know what Mom's was, but she took even longer to recover.
Ellie had one little bout of something and then was fine and me and my Dad hung in there taking care of everyone. PTL we were never sick.
Since then our time has been spent with Christmas Pageants, Christmas parties, shopping and decorating the house.
Ellie played Mary in the Christmas Pageant at her school. She was so cute. She held the baby Jesus and when it came time she "tossed" him in the manger. Then I learned something I did not know. Joseph gave Mary some PINK slippers! I guess her feet hurt from all that walking to Bethlehem. After giving birth "Mary" put her slippers on and then stood up and danced like a chicken...and other animals that would have been in the stable.
The kids also had their Gymnastics Finale mid-December. They all love gymnastics. They all got "gold" medals just like the Olympic team. They are quite little stars.
Since Grant and family were coming for Christmas this year, Mom and I worked really hard on getting all the our shopping done before hand. Buying for five kids (plus all the adults) is not easy. Not only did we have to shop for ourselves, we also do all of Grandad's shopping for him. It was hard to keep straight who bought what and with what. I ended up having to do a spreadsheet! (Pilfered from Mom, of course.)
Grandad was set to fly in on Sunday afternoon and Grant's family were to drive in late Sunday night. I guess they were so excited to see us they decided to drive straight through and they got here on Saturday night instead! We all stayed up until 2:00 in the morning talking, even the kids!
Luckily Rachelle had done most of her Christmas shopping already, so except for a few little things and the food shopping we were really free to have some fun!
The first day we took the older kids and Grant and Rachelle downtown to walk around a bit. It is always fun to walk and look at the old houses. I think the kids enjoyed it too. That is until Noah leaned against the railing at the park and got bird crap all over him! He was a little bent after that, lol. Before heading home we drove across the bridge so that Grant could get a close up view of the Yorktown. I think he would have like to do the tour, but they were not going to be here long enough--maybe next time.
On Tuesday we took the kids to Ready Set Jump. We knew they would really enjoy it and it is a great way to burn off energy. We lucked out and about half of the time we were the only ones there. That is always fun because you don't have to worry (as much) about anyone getting hurt. The kids had a blast. You can really tell how alike Noah and Lauren are...they both have no fear and will just try anything. Sometimes I would see Noah catch about three feet of air coming down the big slide.
After lunch and a rest, Rachelle and I decided to tackle Christmas Cookies. I am very much afraid that my kids are going to grow up and say, "hey Mom, remember that ONE time we made Christmas cookies?" It turned out to be much more involved and a lot longer of a process than I ever anticipated. And we did not even make our own dough!
First of all, I blame my Mom and Grant. They bought the cookie cutters. They were all about the size of my thumbnail. It takes a long time to make cookie's when they are all only an inch or two in size! Then, I did not have a rolling pin. I had to resort to using one from Ellie's play cookware. At Teen Missions I always used a great plastic cup for rolling dough, but I must have lost it somewhere because it was nowhere to be seen, so Ellie drug out what she had from her play kitchen set. That was fun.
Next imagine, if you will, five super excited kids (all with pretty squeaky voices) and ten grubby hands all reaching for the same thing at once. There was plenty of yelling, screaming, and hysteria going on. (Not just by the kids. Mommy did a little yelling herself...lol.)
Was it frustrating? Just a little. Especially when I baked the darn things and they all ran together to form big blobs! Next time I will use bigger cutters, more dough and leave twice as much room. (Did I say next time?) Luckily, I burned the last (fiftieth) batch. I was happy to throw those blobs away.
Then came the icing part. I did make it homemade and I thought it was pretty good. The kids did too. Unfortunately, they would use a knife to ice their cookie and then lick the knife clean and stick it back into the icing!
Ellie was the only one who did not get the concept of icing the cookies and setting them aside. I think she ate all the ones that she iced!
It took longer than I expected and was a huge mess, but the kids loved it! That is what it is all about, I guess.
Gotta love that one. Look at Lauren...(top right corner).
Well, that was Christmas Part One. I still have to work on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day etc. Hopefully, I can get to it soon.
If you made it this far, then I have a little "Noah Nugget" for you.
On the first day back to school he was really upset and crying. Andy decided to console him by giving him a clicky pen just like he uses at work. He told Noah if he was sad all he had to do was look at it and know that Daddy was using the same pen.
Well, his teacher took it away from him. When asked why it was taken we got the response, "I was just trying to find someplace to put it when she told me to take it to her desk."
Andy wrote a note to the teacher asking why it was taken from Noah (we realize that he was not the innocent party he claims he was) and could she send it home and we would keep it here.
His teacher wrote back that Noah had been playing with it all day and had been told repeatedly to leave it alone, before she finally took it from him.
When I asked him why he told me he was just putting it away, when in fact he had gotten in trouble for playing with it, this is what he said,
"But Mom, that was just one of the things I was doing with it (the pen). I wanted to give you a quick example."
Photographer Tara Whitney started OPAM (one project around the house a month). I thought it sounded like a nice idea, but I decided on my own version OPWICCATHMGTI (one project when I can convince Andy to help me get to it.)
We have long wondered what we were going to do to fill up the space of the 30 foot brick wall downstairs. We painted it--which took SIX coats of paint--but that still was not enough.
A few months ago, I scavenged some old windows in the neighborhood. I thought maybe we could paint them and I could use them to hang up as frames.
So one week Andy sanded them all.
The next week he primered.
The next week he painted them all black.
The next week he painted them again.
The next week he painted them another time.
The next week...well you get the idea.
Finally they were done. Now we had to add the hardware and figure out how to hang them on the wall. Brick is not that easy to go through. Even when you have the right tools.
We were worried that they would not look very good, because they are still just old window frames that have been repainted, but once we got them on the wall, you don't see the flaws so much.
These were all full size windows from a house, just to give you an idea on how big the wall is.
WHAT NOAH SAID...
We worked on this on a Monday before the kids came home from school. They were all excited when they came in and Eli and Ellie immediately begin pointing to each picture and saying, "I like this one." "I like that one" I like this one of us."
Noah pointed to the one empty window and said, "I like that one. It is a great picture of the bricks!"
Andy went deep sea fishing a few days ago and came home with some fresh fish. He loves to clean the fish and freak the kids out with the guts and eyeballs. They all get so grossed out and start screaming.
Matt took this one on the boat. Ain't he handsome? (NO, I am not talking about the FISH!)
When I posted about Ellie turning FIVE, I listed a whole bunch of things she is...you know...funny, artistic, girly, etc. What I did not list is what she isn't.
SHE AIN'T NO CAKE DECORATOR!
SHHHHHH, we will not be telling HER that!
Just wanted to include a few snaps from her birthday party. She was supposed to have a little friend come over, but the little girl was sick, so it ended up being just us after all. I don't think Ellie really noticed. The kids are used to having the "just us" birthdays. It is kind of a tradition.
I guess I don't really have a "baby" anymore, do I? Hard to believe that she was not even three when we first moved here. She was still in diapers and using a pacifier. It is hard to remember that she was actually born when we were living in the house on Carriage.
In the last year I think she has changed dramatically. I always thought she was a girly girl, but she has really developed her own uniqueness that is so much fun to watch. She of course, loves all things PINK! She absolutely LOVES jewelry. She refuses to leave the house without some on. I think that is funny in a four year old. She also always have to have a purse! I would say this was like mommy, but I am not as definite about eveything that she is. She has her own sense of style and it is very hard to get her to wear anything she does not want to.
She loves bright colors. And has been known to wear a yellow dress, purple socks and black shoes. She has a funny habit of wearing what she calls a "jacket" (some type of button shirt; sleevless, long sleeves, any color) over her other clothes. It doesn't necessarily have to match and she LOVES rubber boots. (actually, she loves all shoes) She has a funny sense of humor and loves to tell jokes (or what she thinks is a joke anyway...) and she is definitly a mommy's girl although she has her daddy wrapped around her little finger!
She has a great imagination and loves to play games where she is pretending she is someone else. She is quite the little artist, and I will sometimes find her in her room coloring with a fierce need to finish her "art" before anything else can be done. She has an artists temperment too. She can throw a fit like no other. Always has been able to. She is tough and will run roughshod over the boys with no problems. She knows she is a Princess.
We think she is AMAZING!
On a scale of 1-10, last night's trick or treating ranked a 12! Although there are quite a few kids in our neighborhood, for some reason it is pretty dead (no pun intended, lol) on Halloween night. Last year we started our here and ended up trick or treating in our old neighborhood of Windermere. Windermere is great because there are lots of of older houses and a lot of trick or treaters. It is the neighborhood the boys school is in and where we first lived, so we were comfortable going there.
But this year, we decided to try something different. A friend from Andy's work lives downtown so he invited us to come trick or treating with his family. We actually had a little group of trick or treaters with several kids all about Eli and Noah's age.
I have to say there are probably only one or two other places in the entire US that could compete with Charleston as far as trick or treating ATMOSPHERE. Lots of creepy 200 year old houses (filled with ghosts everyday, NOT just on Halloween) mostly owned by creepy eccentric southerners who like to dress up just to scare the kiddies themselves! There were tons and tons of kids, adults and pets out and about. There were even a couple of "haunted houses" set up in yards or under the house in the crawl space. Lots of Halloween decorations, lights, pumpkins, skeletons, spiders and pumpkins. It was fabulous.
And boy did the kids score. I always wondered who bought and handed out those full size candy bars. You would not believe the booty they came home with.
The group of people we went with were really nice and one of the girls took the older faster kids on ahead so they could zig-zag across the street and hit multiple houses at once. The boys had a blast. Ellie petered out for awhile and needed to be carried, but then she got a little second wind and was able to make it to the finish line. She ended up with almost as much candy as they had. (She looked so cute that a couple of trick or treaters and homeowners gave her extra...)
Just CLICK for other Trick or Treat Photos.
This morning I get a phone call from the boys school. It is the school nurse. Not to worry she says. Everyone is okay, but apparently a little boy in Noah's class accidentally PEED on him!
While I stood there in silence trying to absorb this information, the nurse continues to explain that it was an accident and that Noah was alright and not even really upset about it. Evidently, they had been standing at the urinals and as little boys do...just lost their focus. The other little boy turned to Noah to speak to him in MID STREAM.
Now I understand about losing focus. I do have two boys. They seem to lose focus A LOT. At least if my bathroom is an example. But, I was really worried that Noah was going to be upset AND be scarred for life. I mean the idea of being PEED on at school seems sufficient to screw you up somehow.
But, we all know Noah...he is nothing if not unusual and he handled it with his customary aplomb when he got on the phone to tell me about it. The nurse explained that she had already given him a change of clothes, but that he still wanted to talk with me. I was a little nervous because I felt so bad for him.
"Noah."
"Hi, mommy." (very tiny little squeaky voice)
"Noah, honey are you okay?"
"Yeah, Mommy, but I gotta ask you something."
"What is it Noah?" (Thinking, my baby is going to want me to come get him. I mean who wants to stay at school after THAT.)
"Mommy, I really NEED a new trick or treat bag. I just don't want to carry that purple and orange one anymore."
"Noah, now is not the time to talk about trick or treat bags. Someone just PEED on you!"
"Okay, mommy. But, he (pee-er) said he was sorry and I just need to tell you I don't want that bag anymore I want a new one!"
"Noah, just go on back to class and I will see you this afternoon."
Evidently the idea of FREE CANDY trumps any and all other thoughts going on in their little pea picking heads!
Good to know he won't be scarred for life.
We bought the kids Halloween costumes today. I always like to buy them a little early. I want them to wear them as much as possible. No sense spending the money if they are only going to get one night's use out of them. Ellie already knew that she wanted to be Sleeping Beauty this year. So her costume was easy, but the boys were not really sure what they wanted to be. They are funny little guys and very peculiar. Neither one wants to be something scary. They have never seen any superhero movies, so they are not really interested in the regulars. They know nothing about Star Wars, so that was really out and they did not want to be NINJA's, because as Noah said, "Then everyone will call us NINJA POOPS!"
So after a little deliberation, the boys settled on the SWAT team costumes. These are really great costumes with lots of attachments.
Fast forward a few hours to home and trying on the costumes for the first time.
Eli: "You all ready, Noah?"
Noah: "Yeah."
Eli: "Got your helmet on?"
Noah: "Yeah."
Eli: "Handcuffs ready?"
Noah: "Check."
Eli: "Get your gun out." (First guns we have every bought the kids...)
Noah: "Okay."
Eli: "Okay our shift is starting, ready to go on duty."
Noah: "Okay, let's go eat doughnuts!"
Kid you not folks, that is what was said. I mean you can't make this stuff up.
