Hello all! I hope you are having a good weekend. Ours started out with a leaky toilet leading to a hole in the bathroom wall and a toilet now sitting in the shower and has ended up with us hanging out at the lake. We are having a great time too! So much that we haven't even had time to pull out the camera to take any pics. When we arrived Saturday afternoon we immediately put suits on and jumped in the water. Then we headed to my parent's SS party around the corner. It was great to see their friends and their friends kids who have their own kids now too.

Sunday we went to Church in the Pines and then walked over to an art show for Children's Harbor. When we came home suits were back on and everyone jumped in the water. The kids have been dying to practice their swimming so if water is around, they are in it! After a while we headed across the lake to a friends' house that has a slide and a diving board about 10' up and after about an hour of sliding and watching the bigger kids jumping off the board Christopher decided he wanted to try it. Two jumps with Daddy and then he was doing it on his own! I was so very proud of him! Sophie wanted to stick with the slide and jumping off the dock and I don't blame her. When we made it back home the kids wanted to give the double tube a go. Sophie went first with Daddy, but it was too rough due to all the other boats out there, and for once she doesn't weigh enough, so she was out faster than she was in. Christopher loved it though. (Thanks to an exhausted Daddy who was using every ounce of strength he had to keep the tube inside the wake and from bouncing too much!) We had dinner, rode plasma cars in the driveway and then played on the fort. Finished with a movie and then finally off to bed. And that was day one!

Today we took it a little easier and just swam at home and even practiced without any floats. Had lunch on the patio and as I'm typing Sophie and Brandon are passed out on the couch and Christopher isn't too far behind.

I'm about to read on my Kindle while everyone else is resting. I am LOVING The Help right now and can't seem to put it down. If you read The Hunger Games and loved it, we need to talk because I can't seem to get past the first few chapters because it is so depressing and sad. I don't understand why anyone would want to make a movie about this or why everyone loved the book, so if you did you need to tell me that it gets better!

I just finished catching up on some blogs I haven't read in a while and realized that apparently I'm the only person out there who is not pregnant (specifically with child #3) at the moment. Does anyone else feel this way?

Well, I guess that's enough for now. I hope you are all enjoying your weekend and the weather is beautiful wherever you are. We are getting even closer to the end of our time in residency and soon it's going to be crazy with moving, painting, graduation, vacation and then sending Brandon off. So, if I'm not on here very much this summer, you know why. But keep your posts coming because I'm having fun reading them!! Later!

... when your daughter yells, "Mommy! You gotta come see! It's the BIGGEST poop ever!!!"

... when your 3 year old walks by you and says, "Mommy? Can you get me some coffee?"

... when your son runs up to tell you, "I just felt like I was flying!" and then remembers that means he was doing something he's not supposed to do.

... when your daughter tells you she has to put in her contacts when she gets out of the shower, pulls a contacts case out of the drawer, fills it with water, uses one finger to dip into the filled cups, puts her contacts in (exactly like you do) and then tells you, "Now I can see better!"

... when your son says, "Look at me Mommy!" and he is now wearing his sister's earrings.

... when you set up the sprinkler in the yard and your son immediately takes it over to the driveway so it will make a big puddle for them to stomp and ride their bikes in.

... when you are trying to teach your kids a lesson about wasting money and they go and get excited about having to use their allowance to replace the brand new shampoo they dumped out in the bathtub.

... when you ask your kids to help carry their stuff in from the car only to have them say, "My hands are full because I have to carry my cup and a piece of gum."

...when you tell your child that if they don't pick up their toys you are going to throw/give them away and they look at you and say, "Ok, that's fine."

... when you are at Chick-fil-a and your youngest child tells you that she is pretending her big brother is a mean monster in the play area only to have a child more than twice her age run out and tell her mom she heard there was a monster on the playground!

... when your daughter is more into sword fights and guns than your son.

...when you are at a playground and your child tells you they have to go potty, you are nowhere near home, there is nobody around and you help her pee on the ground off to the side only to find out she really had to poop.

Before I had children I said I was scared of having little girls. I really wanted one, I was just scared. I was terrified that she would be this little girl who was always a princess, wanted bright, frilly, fancy, curly, heart-shaped, glittered, pink stuff around her at all times. This scared the mess out of me. I have a great relationship with my mom and wanted to have that with a daughter one day, but everything just seemed so much more pink and shiny and "Cinderella" than it was when I was a kid. (Which is hilarious because I went through a phase where I would only wear dresses!) I was never a tom boy, but I had two brothers and my sister was quite the adorable tom boy so I had two options: I could either play house with my dolls by myself or go play G.I. Joe with everyone else.

Well, fast forward to today and my life now. I may have an adorable little tom boy in my house, but God has quite a sense of humor because He didn't give me the princess I was scared of, He gave me a DIVA instead. Y'all, this girl is crazy! (I'm having to go back to saying y'all because I was told the other day by someone that they never would have guessed I was from the South and it cut. Deep. Guess that's what I get for living around people from the NW for so long, even if it's in FL!) Here are just a few samplings of life with my Diva named Sophie...

I walked in her room the other morning and found her standing on her kitchen, wearing a hat that Christopher made at school back in the fall (they were going through the items we saved) and her sunglasses and she was about to climb up higher so she could put her blanket over her window. I've always called her my little monkey because she was scaling walls long before she could walk. She FREAKS PEOPLE OUT when we are in public because she can climb up things that only kids twice her age should be climbing. Or climbs up moving objects. Her daddy would have a heart attack if he saw half the things I let her climb. But my mom always said, "If they are going to do it, at least teach them the right way!" (She climbed into my brother's crib when he was a baby and showed him the right way to climb out. He'd already figured it out, but she wanted to make sure if he was going to do it, at least it wasn't head first.)





We gave up naps when we turned three. No warning. I really didn't care because it was starting to interfere with things. Her teachers feel otherwise and still try to get the kids to nap. Um, Sophie doesn't. She ripped her nap pad with her bare hands. You know, the kind that fold up and have a vinyl covering? Yup, she ripped it almost in half. Another day I was told that she wouldn't keep her feet off the walls and took the posters with her feet. Needless to say she doesn't get a Tootsie Roll when she leaves at the end of the day. One day she had substitute teachers. I think I saw steam coming out of one of their ears when I went to pick her up. I don't really know how I'm supposed to fix these problems other than just say, she's 3, she doesn't nap anymore and keep her away from the wall. I'm sorry that I'm not more supportive, but is it crazy of me to think that a 3 year old should be expected to lie completely still while still awake for 30-45 minutes? I do apologize for her misbehaving, believe me when I say I understand your frustration, but I'm working on it too, so please stop making me feel guilty. I do have good news, she has decided to nap every now and then, her teachers are beaming on those days and she still sleeps well at night. For the most part.





Most of the time she doesn't like when I take her picture. But she cracks me up so much that I just can't help it. She is OBSSESSED with the movie Tangled and quotes it at least 5 times a day. We have forgotten how to use our manners and are constantly have to remind her who the boss is, but she still says it's her. Here's just a sample of some of the conversations we have had:

*When trying to load up to go grocery shopping.
Sophie - "OPEN MY DOOR!!!!!"
Me - "Excuse me???????"
S - "Oh my gosh! Open my door PLEASE!"
(Me - "That really just happened.")

*When trying to unload at the grocery store.
She has my yard stick and insists that it has to come inside with her and she will keep it in her lap. (Yeah right!) So I'm trying to pry her little hands off of it.
M - "Sophie, we can't take this inside. It's too big."
S - "I HAVE TO HAVE IT!!"
M - "You can have it when we come back."
S - "No! I have to have it for every minute of the rest of my life!!!!"  (quote from Tangled)
M - (laughing) "No you don't and you're coming with me."

*When hitting her brother with her Raggedy Ann doll in the car. (It was playful and not being mean.)
M - "Sophie, please stop hitting your brother. You might hurt him."
S - "No, I won't stop hitting him for every minute of the rest of my life, I will keep hitting him!"

*When talking about school next year and that they will be in classes with our best friends' kids Nicholas and Joshua.
M - "Aren't you excited about being in the same class as your best friends?"
C/S - "Yeah!!! We can't wait!!"
S - "Christopher, I'm going to school with Nicholas' brother."
M - "Sophie, are you and Joshua going to be so good when you are in school together?"
S - (shaking her head with a big grin on her face) "Nooooooooo."
(I'm already praying for their teachers.)





We have had quite the battle on Sunday morning with wearing a dress to church. She is super confused because they go to school at our church so she assumes she can wear shorts on Sunday. We finally have started calling mom's day out "school" and Sundays are called "church" so now we don't have quite the confusion anymore. But just in case you didn't see the above photo I wanted to post it again. On this particular morning I asked her to get dressed and you would have thought I asked her to rip her arms off. So, to pay me back for making such a hideous request, this is what she put on. She even got her brother involved in taking the laces out of her shoes. I almost wet my pants when she tried to walk into the building we had to go to that morning. I finally just pulled out the few items that I hated and now I don't care what she puts on. You can only get away with looking like this for so long so I figure she should enjoy it. Plus it makes running errands much more fun when you have this to laugh at the whole time!

I love this girl to death and my life would be so empty without her in it. She has us laughing all the time and she is seriously the funniest person I know. My aunt tells me all the time that Sophie needs her own reality tv show and I agree 100%. Y'all, you would wet your pants if you witnessed half the stuff I do on a daily basis. And your abs would get a great workout!!

I know, it's Mother's Day and I'm finally posting Easter photos on here. I just haven't had time.They pretty much explain themselves. Forced photo sessions. One child is all for it. The other would rather have his/her hair pulled out. Let's see if you can figure that out for yourself. It's pretty hard to tell.

Thank you so much to Mimi and Papa John who let us crash at your house at the last minute. They didn't know we were coming until Thursday. I'm not sure WE even knew we were coming until then too. I'll try to be better about posting info and photos on here, but we are getting closer to moving and that is sucking up my time right now and is only going to get worse. Thanks for understanding!!!

This month, the customer special for Thirty-One is about the mini zipper pouch. For every $31 you spend you get one for $2.31! (They are $10 regular price!) These would make a really cute end of the year teacher gift, with a gift card slipped inside to their favorite store, coffee shop or restaurant.

You could even plan ahead and order a couple extra for cute little gifts throughout the rest of the year too. (Stocking stuffers, anyone?)

Here's the link to my site and if you have any questions about any of the products, please let me know! : )