HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

A NEW YEAR is upon us...

and I need to get busy. :)

Resolution 1 - get those pics you've all asked me for up on my blog and write a blog at least weekly (baby steps y'all baby steps!).

Resolution 2 - get organized - you laugh. I heard you! You over there! I HEARD YOU!! I meant that one. Really.

Some of you know, it was painful and hard, but I finally let some relationships go. Sometimes you put forth effort repeatedly, and you realize it's not meant to be anymore. I know that's a pretty somber thought. It's a sobering thought. Just because you share a blood line or shared many years together doesn't mean it's healthy for you or those involved around you to pursue it any longer . You remember the good times and cherish those, but you move on.

This all aside, we are well. I'd say we're healthy but we're all overweight except ms. Julia Grace. She's a skinny minnie because she'd rather run than stop to eat! We're going to work on that one too - well, us getting skinny and getting some chub on that precious baby girl.

God has great plans for our New Year - I know He has great plans for yours as well. I have many blessings and many talents. I have not used my gifts wisely - in fact, in the words of my mother, I have wasted my God-given talents by not using them. I feel it is time to step up and find a greater use for me in God's realm. This means in many areas - one being that I've always felt called to volunteer and help those around me. Another is my talents in the arts - I have squandered that talent in the pursuit of other things - I know that it is still there and it is up to me to put it to good use again. I hope you will pray for me in this time.

I leave you with some pictures of Julia we had made at Sears just prior to Christmas. She's getting so big. I feel so overwhelmed some days. I know that I am loved every day that I look into her eyes and that I'm doing just fine. That smile tells me so.

Holidays

With the holidays right around the corner, I'm starting to get prepared. I've never made a huge deal about holidays in our house and I've not really decorated so much (aside from the Christmas tree that was up from, yes, December to July - Julia liked to look at it while in her swing and we just got lazy and left it b/c she liked it so).

So I know it's a little late to decorate for Halloween - probably won't bother - just do fall harvest sorta things - that can last for Thanksgiving. But she's starting to get big enough to remember and notice things. It's been hard to really nail down any "family traditions" with me, Tracy, and Mallory - everything is so unpredictable with when Mallory will actually be around. But I feel like it's time to do that for Julia. Well, like with my mom and dad - we always put the Christmas tree up the day after Thanksgiving. Mallory is almost never here that day - but I'm starting to think we need to make a traditional day to do it. I need to make traditions for Julia. And hopefully, Mallory will be able to participate in these "traditions".

I'm working on some things for Thanksgiving and some things for Christmas. I don't have many ideas yet. I may have Thanksgiving dinner for dinner on Thanksgiving - I'm really not sure how this year will play out for us. Asheville people are supposed to come to my in-laws for Thanksgiving and we changed it to where Mallory alternates Thanksgiving Day with her mom and dad - this will be her first year ALL DAY with us. I think this will work out so much better and make Mallory ultimately more happy for this holiday in the long run.

I missed taking Julia to Christmas parades last year so I'm hoping to make it up this year. There are so many more things for her to do this year - it makes me start feeling like a little kid again.

I will post fall pictures tomorrow from our Apple Farm trip and do a short blog of birthday pictures.

Hopefully I will get some Halloween pictures this week with her Piglet costume on her - but don't hold your breath. She doesn't like the hood with the Piglet ears - she likes the costume if you pull the hood down the back. oh well. We'll work on it!

Catch you later taters!

Remainder of Blue Panthers soccer schedule

For those interested, Mallory's got 5 more games left this season:

Old Canaan Rd Soccer fields - Field C1
Oct 6 - 11:30 a.m.
Oct 13 - 12:45 p.m.
Oct 20 - 11:30 a.m.
Oct 27 - 9:00 a.m.
Nov 3 - time unknown - Tournament game.

Only recent pic of me that I know...

I just look so tired. Wait, that's 'cause I AM tired. I gave birth to a precious blond-headed, big, blue-eyed sweetie pie MONKEY! and she's not EVEN walking yet.

Since we last met...

Soccer season is underway - we're losing and I'm not sure what else to say about that. I think Mallory tries hard most days - except when she assists the other team with their goals. *sheesh* It does get nerve-wracking even for the girls.

Julia and Mallory went to the apple farm with our MOMS group. Julia got her first pumpkin and rode her first hayride - she didn't want to let the pumpkin go (less than a week and it's going bad already though). She also kept trying to pull out the hay and eat it. I was convinced I had birthed a monkey up 'til that point. Now I'm not so sure.

I'm so behind. I still have birthday pics to post. I now have Apple Farm pics to post.

Julia has 5 teeth now, about to be 7. She's gotten 3 of the teeth since her first birthday - and really reaaallly likes what you have on your plate WAY better than hers. Not sure I blame her. Some of the toddler food isn't so bad though.

She finally weighed 20 lbs. on September 6th. Only took 4 months to gain a full 2 lbs. and she eats like a PIG! We went to Hardee's this evening and got 2 pc. chicken strip combos for the kids. Julia ate almost as much as Mallory did. Astounding and by the morning - she'll be back to her tiny 20 lbs as usual.

Mallory lost another tooth. She's proud of being all snaggly! She's doing well in school again this year so far. She's one smart cookie - God has truly blessed her in the smarts section. She's doing 2 dance classes and AYSO. We talked about trying out Upward Basketball this evening - not sure if that will fly by her mom though. We'll see - it falls between soccer seasons so it wouldn't add really anything.

Tracy totaled his truck. All pics of that are on myspace - if you haven't seen it/can't see it there, let me know. I don't want to repost that. It wasn't his fault - a lady pulled out in front of him and he flipped his truck trying to avoid hitting her. He's lucky to be alive is what many have said. It certainly puts a new perspective on life as we know it here.

And me. I really have nothing new to add. Well, I'm membership vice pres. for our moms group. I'm adjusting to that - it's good for me and Julia - lots of interaction with other moms and children. Very different from any organization I've been involved with before. I'm also finding out what true friends are - and finding ones I thought were my friends weren't so much. So I'm putting my focus where things should be. I'm rekindling what needs rekindling and setting aside what is beyond hope - perhaps hope isn't a good word. beyond being what it once was. I have some good friends I've just neglected. I hope they believe me when I say I was a doofus. Wanna get some coffee? :) or perhaps a Dew?

Anyways. I'm excited about this month. Halloween is fast approaching. Julia will be Piglet. Mallory will be something - its a work in progress - it's pretty, but Mallory doesn't want to be a "bad guy". I'm sure her mom will come up with something - it is a pretty costume. To be revealed at a later date when Mallory is happy or Halloween, whichever is first!
More scrapbooking - it's becoming addictive. Halloween shindig at Dan and Angie's - can't wait! Jay Clifford @ Orange Peel? we'll see ! October also starts FEELING like my favorite times of year - fall and winter - I really just like the holidays and cold weather and fall leaves. Pumpkin pies and coffee don't hurt a dang thing either!

You guys have a good night - lots of pics to post later.

later taterz.

I just want calmness. no drama.

Why do people think they don't have to answer questions? Why do they look you in the eye and acknowledge what you say but ignore your original question at the same time? Why can't we just have straight answers? Why not a simple yes or no in the beginning? why some long drawn out unnecessary, answer and drama weeks after the original question was asked? Why does it take asking 6 times to get answers? "I don't know, that sounds familiar, I don't think we have plans, but i'll get back to you, potentially we have plans"... all of that gets OLD! I can just about write the script by now. Maybe I should just start saying the answers out loud and we can have a chorus!

I don't ask many things. Coordinating family events is a job in itself sometimes. A thankless job nonetheless. I have too much going on for drama. Julia has too much going on, Tracy has too much going on, Mallory has too much going on. simple, concise, direct answers would be nice. I don't require much. It seems to some that I do, but in reality I don't. And other people need to grow up and realize just how much they inconvenience people with their indecisiveness and only hurt children in the process.

I've vented and now I'll get back to other stuff.

Julia's birthday party pics to come and more. just can't bring myself to do anything else tonight.

Believe it or not...

Julia is watching "Seinfeld"!

Yes, it's true.

I had sat her down after taking her dirty clothes off of her and went to find pajamas.

I came back and she's watching Jerry, Elaine, George, and Kramer.

Maybe she'll learn to just scratch and not pick?

A George for each hand!

"New" Curious George
"Old" Curious George

And Julia Grace - a George for each hand!

I guess I am a sucker. She already had one Curious George courtesy of Grandma and Grandpa. I took her to Walmart with me to pick up some things and I stopped to look at the toy section - the Curious George section to be exact. She is so fascinated with Curious George and Veggie Tales. I was looking at a few toys and saw the pile of little Georges. They didn't have the one she already had but had 3 others instead - a racing george with helmet and Team George! outfit, a George flying a kite with a scarf around his neck, and the baseball Curious George. She whimpered as soon as she saw Baseball George. I put him away and showed her the other two; she looked for the one I hid. I held all three in front of her - she grabbed Baseball George. She whimpered when I took him back (she had her bottle in her mouth and "old" george in the other hand while doing this).

And because she had not been feeling well, I caved. It was only $5.88 you know. So now... we have a George for each hand!

Soccer seaon is coming soon...

I still have not found the pictures from the championship game of soccer in the spring. I will post them soon. But I did want to let everyone know that Fall Soccer season with AYSO officially starts here this next week. Tracy has a coaches meeting on Tuesday and gets his packet with his new team of girls. We can start practicing as soon as we get our packets. YAY!! I really will post a schedule this time as soon as we get it. We're super excited to see what's in store this season!

http://www.ayso132.org/

I'll let you know our team number as soon as we know. They'll post a schedule about mid-August of games.

Julia eats Mexican!

Julia was quite happy with her San Marcos mexican experience! She had salsa and guacamole and tea on this visit. But today, she had salsa, guacamole, sour cream, nacho tostada beef, shredded cheese, enchilada sauce, refried beans, and water. She loved every bit of it - which is good because the owner of the restaurant informed my parents (who were visiting with us) that our family is their number 1 customer - Yeah, we eat there a LOT!!! Good stuff!

Zoo pictures finally!

Julia arrives at the zoo...

She isn't sure of what to think at the elephant exhibit.


Mallory smiled even though she said it stunk!

Tracy carts Julia off to the next exhibit.

Ah, yes... the "cool spot" - we have a picture of Mallory with Tracy under the same one when she was 2 years old. She cried too when Tracy first made her go through it but then, like Julia, she got over it.

I am not sure there are even words to describe this picture - this is outside the gorilla house.

This is one of the gorillas at the window peeking at us all.

Yeah, we're bad. When we took Mallory to the zoo at age 2, we told her this exhibit was where they kept her "Unky Phil". She later went home and told people she saw Unky Phil at the zoo...

Really, insanely tall Bamboo.

Just before the end of the zoo trip at the petting zoo spot.

And this is 5 minutes later, at the playground OUTSIDE the zoo.

I'm not sure what Mallory liked best - the zoo or the monkey bars outside of the zoo!

My mom and dad are in town and spending some time with Julia this evening, so I thought I'd get caught up on posting some pictures. All in all, we had a fun trip. I think Julia was a little overwhelmed - she did lean forward and take a closer look at the spider monkeys and squirrel monkeys. Kinda passive about the rest... and Mallory, as always, just wants to know when can we come back?!

The ZOO!

We finally got to take both kids to the zoo! We'd been trying to wait for Mallory to be here when we took Julia for the first time. Sooo... we went to the Greenville Zoo on Saturday, July 14. Julia was a little fussy getting out of the stroller at the elephant exhibit, but nothing else seemed to really phase her. And well, Mallory is 7 now so she's used to all of it - unlike the first time we took her there at age 2!

Mallory loved getting to see all the monkey exhibits - she's on a monkey kick right now! And a couple of the monkey exhibits are all Julia really seemed to get excited about that day - she leaned forward in her stroller to look closer at the spider monkey and squirrel monkey exhibits. Otherwise, she was her laidback self as usual - just taking everything in and fussing a little when the stroller stopped.

I think we're going to try and go to another zoo in a few weeks - we have Hollywild less than 10 miles from our house and Riverbanks isn't that far away - in fact, it's on the way to Grandma and Grandpa's!

The Greenville Zoo isn't as big as some zoos. They don't have the lions exhibit right now - it says they're working on a giraffe exhibit and that both should be done Summer 2007. I'm guessing they're a little behind on their work don't ya think? I didn't see tigers either - don't know what happened to them. I know both tigers and lions were there when Mallory was 2, 4, and 5! We didn't go last summer - I was too pregnant for all that!

Well, it's time to get started for Monday. I will post pictures this evening of the zoo and Julia eating Mexican! :) later taters...

The rest of 4th of July pictures!

The end to our July 4th evening - Julia and I went home and straight to bed afterwards!
Julia makes herself comfy on her "Da!" for fireworks! (that's Madison in the background with her dad).

Super cool kiddie pool at the Waynesville Recreation Center - we all went there on July 4th.

Mallory swimming off after making a splash!

Giant water slide at the indoor kiddie pool - Julia wasn't big enough yet, but Mallory, Tracy and Madison and Doug were! Here comes Mallory in this one!

She's trying to figure out how to splash the water through the float thing - it's coming through that orange netting on the float.

Julia loves the pool (and we borrowed Makenzie's float since she was tuckered out first!).

I had some difficulties uploading pics after the first two in my last post. I decided to give it another try this evening.

My parents have Julia with them for the evening - yay, Tracy and I got to go have nice dinner by ourselves! But I do miss my little girl even though it's just one night at the Holiday Inn about 3 miles from my house... I don't know what to think when I don't wake up to her smiling face propped up on the crib jabbering away or her crying to get in bed with us (because she is ROTTEN). But she's still so sweet!

I'm going to go get stuff for breakfast in the morning. Catch ya later taters.

4th of July!

Julia is loving on her baby doll before we head back to Asheville!

Julia did not want to sit still for a 4th of July pic!

We went to visit our family in Asheville for the 4th of July holiday. We actually stayed more than just the holiday but I only have pictures from July 4th.



We went swimming at a recreation center in Waynesville, NC. It was all indoors and had a regular, olympic size pool, but then it also had a huge kiddie pool that went from 1 ft. deep to 4 ft. deep. The kiddie pool also had a huge indoor water slide. Everyone had fun at the pool including Julia and her cousin, Makenzie, who is only 6 months old! Julia isn't scared of anything - she kept trying to drink the pool water and kicked and splashed up a storm! I have pictures of Mallory, Tracy, and our cousins Madison and Doug going down the slide. Tracy and Doug were trying to see who could make the biggest splash at the end - still not sure who won that one!



After this we went to their friend, Ann's new place by Lake Junaluska. We basically had a picnic dinner. Julia was sitting in the floor "talking" to Makenzie, but crawled off as soon as I got the camera out to take a photo. We tried to take some pictures of her before we left Ann's house but that didn't work out too well (she didn't want to be still - she wanted down on the ground again). Mallory stayed at the lake and watched fireworks there with our family, while Tracy and I took Julia back to Asheville and we went with Jimmy and Madison to watch fireworks in Asheville. As usual, Julia wasn't scared of a thing! She laughed and smiled and watched the fireworks. She would jump a little if it was a big BOOM! She never got upset by the noise though! She laid upside down in her daddy's lap watching them.

It was a really long day but it was a fun day. Several of us woke up with summer colds the next morning (Julia included). Most of us slept well after such an eventful day!



Well, I'm out of here. My parents will be here soon today! Later taters.

Beach Hat Baby Photo Contest!

This is the photo we entered into a photo contest. Julia didn't win, but she was #13 out of 1054 babies for the week! It was a 6 week contest, but we didn't find out until the last week of it. She didn't make it to the final 30. We are very happy with where she ended in the contest considering this is the first one she's entered!

I would like to thank everyone who voted! I think we're going to enter the next contest which is 6 weeks long also. It's for red, white, and blue themes through August 7. I will keep you posted as to when we enter a photo and where to vote!

Have a good July 4th!

We'll post more after the 4th!

Happy 30th anniversary to Grandma and Grandpa!

A few pictures from our Memorial Day weekend...

Grandpa blew lots of bubbles for Julia while we took Mallory to the putting green!

Mallory preparing to play "golf" - it was a putting green in my parents neighborhood!

Mallory on Memorial Day in Bluffton!

Julia's first day at the beach - she didn't get in this trip!

Mallory sure looked like she was having fun!

Daddy and his little girls!




Soccer pictures are coming when we get back home from Asheville for the July 4th holiday!

Julia is trying to stand in the sand - no she didn't eat it!

oooooh... water! I'll go get it!


Julia still didn't eat it! She just raked it and squished it in her hands.

This is Julia getting ready for the beach. Yes, that IS a toothbrush in her mouth! They said it was the only thing that would get her to sit still and get ready. I guess she was brushing her about-to-be-here teeth!

Julia went to the beach with my parents last week. We took her in her stroller over Memorial Day weekend, but she actually got to sit down in the ocean this time. This picture was taken afterwards when they were leaving the beach.

Julia liked the beach and my parents said she fussed a little when they put her back in the stroller. Like usual though, she was over that as soon as someone started pushing her. She's good in the stroller as long as someone's pushing - she thinks if it stops, she should get out or you should get going AGAIN!

I'll post more this evening. I'm trying to find my pictures of Mallory from Memorial Day and of the soccer championship!

Later taters

Because I am a goober...

I have not posted because until just now, I had forgotten the sequence of passwords to get me here. I finally took the time today to get the passwords recovered (and now have the passwords logged somewhere).

You know, it does get hard to keep up with 4 email addresses of my own, a myspace, a message board, and then help manage the work email accounts too (it doesn't help that whenever anyone quits, Bob gets gung-ho and changes all the passwords AGAIN!).

Where we are now....
I pretty much am a stay at home mom. I do a little work for a few of Bob's companies but really, it's a once every 2-3 weeks I get a check myself and the work takes me about 1 day a week (if I put the hours together) to complete it. So... Julia and I have thrown ourselves into the stay-at-home-mom and baby pool. It's fun so far. We're all about free activities right now though!

Julia goes to a play class and a music class 2 times a week right now (mondays and tuesdays) and we recently found a new group of babies and mamas to hang out with on a regular basis.

Mallory just completed soccer camp at USC-Upstate last week and is going to Vacation Bible School again this week. I hadn't even gotten to post that our team won the soccer championship. Tracy and Mallory were ecstatic over this as you would expect! Tracy was their coach and is very happy with the great job his "soccer girls" did this season - some of them came so far in their game! Mallory went to camp last week with 3 other girls from last season's team. As of now, she's going to a church soccer camp at the end of the summer in August.

We've been here, there and everywhere it seems. We've been in Hilton Head often visiting my family lately, but we're going to visit some of Tracy's family in Asheville this next weekend and !yay! Mallory is going with us!

I will upload pictures later on this evening and try not to be so slack about putting stuff here. I told all kinds of people about this and then I, the slacker as usual, did not post. But I have my ducks in a row (and passwords!) and will be back!

Later taters!

WE'RE HERE!!!

I have never really done this blogging thing before... I have a few short ones on my myspace recently, but not everyone in the family can access that so - here goes!

We plan on putting up pictures of the kids, updates, upcoming events, and general commentary on life as we see it on here!

Plan on plenty of opinionated stuff, lots of cute pics, and lots of stuff to keep you in the know!

We'll post Mallory's soccer schedule soon (Tracy is her coach for the third season) - we just got started, but only 4 more games to go. First game, our Blue Dragons won 8-1!! We'll post some pics from the first game too.

Julia is just getting to where she scoots around after things that catch her eye. Soo cute! We'll post some of those too!

Gotta go get back to work and little sweetie for now!

tracEy