Hello from Birmingham!

There are a lot of thoughts and questions running through my head right now..

1. Will heaven really have streets of gold and if it does, won't that be kind of tacky? I mean, haven't you seen pictures of Donald Trump's place? Surely that was a metaphor.

2. Have you ever met the kind of person that is frequently wrong but never in doubt? man that annoys me.

3. Or worse, have you met one of those people that has to out do you on everything? Those kind of people seriously make me want to take up poop scooping as a hobby just to watch them try to do it better than me.

4.What makes mother's feel the need to compete? Why can't we all just say, "hey, this is hard. Some days are better than others" and support and help each other?

5. Why is a parkway called a parkway when you drive on it but a driveway is called a driveway when you park on it?

6. Alabamians really do have a thick accent..

7. Was God just bored and decided to jazz things up a bit when he created women to fall in love with a species that couldn't possibly understand them?

8. Should I really expect my husband to understand me when I don't understand myself?

9. Does having a minivan really make me old and uncool?

10. Why didn't Obama respond to my e-mail where I laid out the most fabulous stimulus plan ever? Doesn't he know how important I am?

11. Why won't they close Walmart and let me shop alone without having to wait thirty minutes to get to the feminine products that I can't do without while the little blue haired lady reads all the ingredients on the package of the hemorrhoid medicine. Don't they know how important I am?

12. Why wasn't I thankful that it was the blue haired lady instead of the little old man that tested out every single one of those cheap Walmart colognes the last time I was brave enough to venture into Walmart. OLD SPICE, JUST GET THE OLD SPICE!

13. Did throwing the starfish back in really make a difference?

And so many more random thoughts and questions.. But, I can't land on anything specific so feel free to answer any of the above questions. It would be fabulous to check some of these of the list of things that keep me awake at night. But tonight, since I've not posted in a while, I thought I'd just give a good old fashion "we're still alive and kickin" update.

I am in Alabama at my parents. Adam went to camp and I just couldn't bring myself to drag two little ones and wasn't up for another week of single parenting. The four of us left on June 4th, and went and had a great visit with Adam's family (Yes, I do sing "The Adam's Family" theme song in my head every time I say that). Then, we went to our college Christian Student Center reunion at Troy where we got to see some of our old college friends. I was also very excited to see Stephanie, one of the girls that was in our youth group in Panama City that married one of the guys that we went to college with (that isn't as weird as it sounds. He is only five years older than her. We were very young when we were PC) My parents came and picked up the girls and me in Troy (no that is not incorrect grammar. It is the girls and me, not the girls and I. My parent's wouldn't come to pick up I). Adam will come over here to get us next week. Anyway, we miss daddy terribly but we're having a nice time living on central time, sleeping late but, realizing that it's still early when we wake. It's been nice to be away from everything. We had gotten so busy there at the end of the school year and I really needed some time away where my cell phone gets no service so that I can focus on them. And, of course, having doting grandparents around that consider it a favor when you let them do something for your kids is awesome! We are so blessed to have both sets of our parents so active in our lives. I've also got the chance to hang out with a friend from high school and I'm hoping to meet up with a few more before I leave. I have of course taken tons of pictures but, I had gotten backed up on some portraits I had taken and needed to upload them and my parents computer is as slow as getting off those last few baby pounds (Christmas comes quickly to me these days) so, hopefully, I will get them uploaded one day. But no promises, because we all know by now that half the time, I never get the pictures uploaded. It's like the modern day version of those thirty rolls of 35mm fill my mom has sitting in her middle dresser drawer still not developed.

And if you are the one person that has realized how important I really am and are just dying to get a hold of me. Even out in the boonies in Argo Alabama where my cell phone gets no service, windstream somehow made their trail up a red clay dirt road somewhere and I do have access to the internet.

Blessings,

Dana

Happy Mother's Day-- A tribute to my mother...

Yeah, I know it's two weeks late. But our job is hard! I think we should be celebrated every day. Besides, better late than pregnant right? Okay, since like 80 percent of my friends are pregnant right now, for most anyone that would read this, that isn't true but for me.. oh yes, better late than pregnant.

I really have trouble writing for a specific date.. It kind of reminds me of my honeymoon. It's like you have an appointment to well... you know... It just takes all the spontaneity away.. Nothing like putting the pressure on like having an appointment to have sex. Yes, I did just say that on my blog. Seriously, like you didn't know what people do on their honeymoons?

But, I did think about what I wanted to write on my blog about Mother's Day on Mother's Day and I'm actually proud of myself for writing it because well, I still haven't written a New Years post.. Anyway, this is how my Mother's Day went..

I woke up with a presentation from Emma and Chloe of a homemade coupon book. Since my love language is not gift giving and is totally, acts of service and because I like to pinch a penny until it screams, this was right up my alley. On the front of the book, it said. "Re-usable and never expires". And inside were the coupons: free hugs and kisses, clean the playroom without complaining, clean my bedroom without complaining, and free foot rub. With no expiration! Man, this is going to bite them in the tail. Don't think I won't be pulling those things out when they are teenagers. And when Emma is thirteen and she gets out of the car at school hoping that her friends don't notice that her mom dropped her off in her pajamas oh yes, then I will be whipping out my free hugs and kisses coupon. And I hate to see what Chloe is going to do to Emma when she figures out the mess her big sister has gotten her into. Wow, the feeling of power is addictive! Then, Adam also gave me some coupons for various helpful things. Now I realize that this would totally tick some women off but I really get irritated when someone spends the money I have carefully budgeted on something that I didn't budget for. Even if it is for me. Adam also made me breakfast and it was just a sweet moment between us all.

Now Adam has to be at church an hour and a half earlier than me because they are having a book discussion before church. Since we don't have classes in the morning, I don't go since there would be no book discussing if my kids were there. So, the moment didn't last incredibly long and soon, the chaos began. On most Sundays the girls play nicely until Adam leaves and the second he does, they are right under me the whole time I'm trying to get ready. I just love the fact that I can find a pair of flip flops with a little bit of a heal on them and some beads on the straps and call them dress shoes. So, I put on my "dressy" flip flops and noticed that my toe nail polish was chipped on the ends. In my normal Sunday single mother rush, I ran into the bathroom and grabbed the nail polish and touched up the ends of my toes. Declaring it a decent job unless someone looks closely, I moved on to the mirror for makeup. About that time, Chloe, stepped on my toe.. My freshly painted toenail!

I started to get irritated, but repressed the irritation, in honor of the day, feeling the need to be a sweet, patient, mother, therefore earning my Mother's Day coupons. And, I began to think about a particular Mother's Day with my mother.... I was about seven years old. I had only a few dollars that I am assuming that I got from her in the first place. So I went to Family Dollar with my dad and I bought my mom the most beautiful I had ever seen- three dollar-pept0 bismal pink- plastic set of beads. Both necklace and bracelet. Nice job of guiding that one dad..

Now I'm pretty crafty at handling this type of situations with my children. My solution would be something of this sort: Oh wow, these are the most beautiful beads that I have ever seen. I don't have a dress to match this color of pink but I have the perfect pajamas! So tomorrow night, we are going to have a candlelit mother daughter pajama dinner! And I am going to make all of our favorite foods and then we are going to talk about all things that we love about each other and I am going to wear these beautiful beads. Now I have no doubt that this would work with Emma and she would think I was the coolest mother in the world for it.

But heres the thing... Twenty four years later (yes I did count on my fingers), I remember the dress that my mother pulled out of the closet saying that it would go perfectly with those beads. That dress was not pink it was more of a rose color and it did not match those horrible beads.. And I remember how she ooohd and ahhd as she had me clasp that necklace around her neck. And when we got to church and I realized that all the other mothers had corsages and I hadn't gotten my mother one. My mother told me not to brag because the other mothers only got a flower and not beautiful beads that they could wear over and over again. And I sat there next to my mother not yet fully understanding why she was truly the best mother in world but feeling confident that I was definitely the best daughter in the world. And you know what? When I called her this year on Sunday morning to wish her a Happy Mother's Day, and mentioned the beads, she told me that she still had them and she still thought they were beautiful. And really, that's probably been the most influential thing in my life. No matter how bad I fumble, my mom is always there, cheering me on, thinking I'm great. And I know that I will always have that security.

So there were all of those thoughts over a simple smudge in toenail polish. And inspired by my mother, I reached down and fluffed Chloe's hair and took a step in the direction of being the kind of mother mine was and wore my smudge to church. And it was a wonderful day!

Kellum Family

I've been following the Kellum family around for a couple of days now. Check out this momma below. Would you believe that she is the mother of five boys? And the wife to a med student which means that she often plays the role of a single mother. I think she is just beautiful and looks way more rested than I know she really is. I somehow managed to miss a picture of one of the kids. Only because at the baseball field, he was out being in social and definitely not because he isn't as equally handsome as the other boys. Baby Evan is four months old now and is growing like a weed. He's such a beautiful baby.

Pictures from the weekend.

Our friend Matt is here for the weekend. I've posted these pictures on facebook but for my mom, who hasn't braved facebook yet. Here are some pictures from the weekend.

Here is Matt having a tea party with Chloe

Sunday after church, they were playing ring around the rosies in the rain. I ran in and grabbed my camera. I didn't have time to change my settings so the color was horrible. The moment was too sweet to discard so I converted to my trusty black and white. I still like black and white best anyway. Especially for memories like these.

On Saturday, we went to eat at one of our favorite local restaurants and then let the girls play at the playground on the river.

I love this picture of Emma. She is flushed in the face and maybe that's what I like so much about it. That it looks so real. She looks like such a big girl these days.

You wanna know what?

As anyone who reads this knows by now, we bought season passes to Six Flags. We have made three trips already and the summer hasn't even began. Atlanta is about half way between here and where my family is so it works out as a great meeting place. I'm sure at some point, we're going to get bored with it but so far, it has proved to be a great investment.


We were on our way down there on Saturday when Emma announced that she had to go to the bathroom. As most mother's have learned the hard way, I have too learned that when nature calls, you are going to answer. You only have a choice in which method you use to answer it. For the sake of any of you that might have a weak stomach, I'll skip the descriptions and just stay that the gas station restroom that we stopped at wasn't the finest of establishments.


But out of desperation, we entered into this tiny restroom with two stalls and about six ladies packed inside. I attempted to quickly push my inquisitive 5 years and 3.75 quarters (that's how she puts it) old child into a stall in hopes of avoiding sight of the machine that is holding certain contraceptives hanging on the wall but quickly realized that I had failed because the stalls were occupied.


We were standing there as I tried to point out the pretty pink color of the hand soap (opposite direction of contraceptives) in anticipation of what was about to happen. As you can guess, Emma turned to the machine and said, "Momma, what is in that machine"? Not wanting to totally lie to my child but also not wanting to have the conversation about the birds and the bees in front of six complete strangers, I replied "that's a machine with medicine in it". She then asked, "why"? to which I replied, "In case someone has an emergency and needs it right away". The whole room erupted into laughter and one woman congratulated me on ability as a mother to field hard questions. It was only later that I realized how fortunate I was that she didn't think to ask me what the medicine helped with.


When we got back in the car, I made a mental note of the exit number to be sure to avoid the stop on the way home and then waited until Emma put her headphones back on to watch her movie before I relayed the experience to Adam.


These kind of questions really aren't that rare for Emma. We tackled the "where do babies come from"? question when she was three and I was pregnant with her baby sister. It's not my fault that she some how deciphered that God took Chloe out of my belly button from my honest yet not complete explanation. Boy is she in for a surprise! It seems like I've should have taken some kind of class on these kind of things. And before you suggest any books for me to read, the stack of books on my nightstand is getting pretty tall. I don't go through them near as fast as I used to. Some kid at school with an older brother or sister might give her the information before I get to it. Book suggestions probably won't do us much good. However, I would love to hear any clever tips or funny stories you might have about these sort of topics.


Anyway, pictures from the trip. Not pictured: the medicine machine..

Sorry guys... maybe next year.

Click HERE to watch this video about me winning mother of the year. I promise I'll nominate you next year. I'm most concerned about the pony tail study.

Thanks Hannah, So cute!

Picture Crazy

I've been trying to catch a picture of this hair clip for months. My friend Ashley designs them and I'm just in love with them. Check her etsy store out on my side bar.

I got a new camera and it is totally worth the organ I traded for it. It has a super fast focus so I have finally been able to catch my toddler that moves like lightening. I've been taking pictures like crazy because it is almost like starting all over trying to figure out where each of my lenses need to be set under certain lighting conditions. Here are a few that I've taken in the last couple of days.

Adam thinks that Emma's new hair do "makes her look 25". I wouldn't go that far but she definitely looks like a first grader.

Happy First Birthday Maggie!

The Ellis Family loves you!

Emma's Donation to Locks of Love

I was waiting to put these pictures up because I was going to do a post on the whole weekend including our little anniversary trip. But, my sister is BUGGING me to put pictures up of Emma's new hairdo. Can someone please tell me how even as a grown adult, my sister can still manipulate me into doing the stuff she wants me to do? I just can't seem to tell her no.

Here you go Denise.. Are you going to let me sleep with you tonight? (That's how she always bribed me when we were kids. There was a neighborhood rumor that the house across the street was haunted. So, I was always scared to sleep by myself. I really should see a therapist).

Taken the day before. I just put this one on here to show how long it had gotten

I think my heart was beating 100 miles a second. I was really scared that she was going to be disappointed.

Sigh of relief, she loves it!

Ten inches to put in the mail. We're so proud of her!

With Nonna and Aunt Nancy! Thank you both for keeping them so we could make our first ever (non work related) overnight trip since we've had children!