Sugar Buzz!

What a day it's been! I picked up a very perky Meg at the sitter's today. She said she'd been like that most of the day and even the teacher commented on what a good day she had. I'm quite relieved that she's feeling all better now! :) She brought home a paper sack full of Valentine's from her classmates today that she was ever so proud of. She carefully opened and examined each one calling out who it was from with so much excitement I thought she might burst! Some even had candy attached that immediately had to be opened and sampled (beginning of the sugar buzz.)

She was also a-buzz with her first official classmate birthday party invitation. It's a party with a clown, magic show and face painting. (WOW! Guess the little girl's parents aren't struggling financially like the rest of us in America....that or maybe they've already got their share of Obama's economic recovery plan ahead of everyone else??? HA!) I feel like such a prudish, over-protective mother, but I kept scanning the invitation over and over to see if it mentioned anything about parents being welcome to stay. I didn't see it. How can I just drop my child off at some stranger's house and be ok with that? This is why she MUST attend elementary school where I teach. I will either know the scoop or being able to find it out very quickly. I suppose I'll call the mom, speak with her, get fingerprints, background checks, then sit on their front doorstep for the entire hour and half the party goes on just to make sure my baby is safe. OK...maybe that's going a little too far.....We'll see! :)

Back to the sugar buzz...tonight was Grammy's (Greg's mom) birthday. We took the entire gang to Ponderosa for a couple of reasons. 1) It's afforable when you are feeding a gaggle of people. 2) The kids can eat whatever the heck they want and will be happy about it. 3) Ice cream machine...need I say more? My grandpa joined us along with Greg's brother, fiance and their two children. In all the chaos of getting everything and everyone organized and situated, Meg ended up convincing Greg to get her a Pepsi, a la caffeine. She also ended up with 3 bowls of ice cream, which she licked (and yes, I do mean LICKED!) totally clean.

By the time we got home she was literally hopping like a rabbit and her mouth was blabbering about 3,000 miles per second. She got in the shower and was acting bizarre noticing every little detail. "Mommy, did you get a new leg shaver?" followed right after by "What's on the other side of this wall?" When I told her it was the pantry, she started yelling hello very loudly to all the food in the pantry. She suddenly stopped that and was suddenly asking when she was going to get to go visit her goat. We read our books like usual, and I even picked out a longer one, hoping the buzz would wear off and she'd crash. No such luck. She's already been up once, and has climbed up and jumped over the back of the couch. With the threat of no television or computer tomorrow she's back in bed and will hopefully stay there. She's relatively quiet though, although I'm hearing a constant whisper. Lord only knows what she's talking about now. Me? I drank water and limited myself to one small bowl of ice cream, so I don't have near the sugar buzz she does, so I'm off to bed after finishing up just a little bit of my homework. All in all.....a fun day! I'd take a day with a wacky, sugar buzzing kid anytime over the sick, puny one I had last week.

Timing of questions

Meg's been sick. We were at the doctor's office again yesterday (trip #2 in just a few days) right about nap time. That combined with not feeling well equated to a Meg that was a little ornery acting. She was kind of kicking at me, then she'd hop off the table and hug me. She kept going back and forth between being catankerous and loving every few seconds. At one point while the doc was examining her she looked over at me and said in her sweet voice (remember Meghan #1????) and said, "Moooomy, I love yooooooouuuuuu." Awwwwww....how sweet right? Sure.

Our visit was a rather long one so towards the end of it, while the doctor was in the room finishing up getting her prescription sent off, she started asking me any random question she could think of. Then finally she asked me who my mommy and daddy were. We've had this conversation many times, so I once again told her Mamaw and Papaw, I figured this was just the only thing left for her to think of to talk about. But no....just wait....here comes the best part!!!!!!! Then she proceeds to ask, "How did you get a mommy and a daddy?" (That was a new one!) Uhhhhhh....I looked up at the dr. at the same time he looked up at me. Me, being the quick thinker I am, said, "it's a good thing we're here with the dr., he can tell you all about that!" and just laughed. He told me that sounded like a good conversation for a the car ride home, then he handed us our paper so we could leave. And he never did really laugh. :/ Thanks Meg for helping us make a very quick exit!

Oh...and in case you haven't heard my confession of what a horrible parent I was this week, I sent her to school on Tuesday because I really did think she was better. Obviously, she wasn't, which is why we were back at the dr.'s office. She was diagnosed with pneumonia. So yes, I'll confess, I sent my child to school with pneumonia! Me, the person who complains about all the horrible parents in the world that send their sniffling, snot-nosed kids to my own classroom, sent my child to school when she had pneumonia. Another life lesson learned......

Mama, Mommy, Mom and now...

Mother. Over the past four years what Meg has called me has evolved. I was thrilled when she first started saying Mama as a baby. For a long time, I was Mommy, then for the past for months I've been Mom some too (which made me cringe some thinking about how she's growing up too fast!) but now I've become Mother. Ugh! I can't say I like this name. I mean, she's only four and it's so formal and I so NOT a formal person! She'll say things like "Yes, mother" and "No, thank you mother." It's freaking me out! She even said to me last night, "Why are you looking at me like that Mother?" She even called out while she and Greg were playing last night, "Mother, come play with us!" Gee whiz...that sounds like fun, Daughter. :/ I keep thinking this title has come from a television show or movie she's seen recently and it will pass, or at least that's what I'm hoping for. Otherwise, I may just start referring to her as Daughter and see how she responds! :)

Hussy Fussy

So Meghan at least recognizes some of her moods. We are currently hanging out waiting on the "bad kid show" (Supernanny) to come on television. She's enthralled with a new princess dress up sticker book I got her yesterday while I was a conference, but had a bit of a problem because one pair of the sticker shoes didn't fit on the princess like they were supposed to. **gasp!** She started to get very upset about this and throw a fit and give me her gritting teeth mean face, but I told her I would help, she just needed to ask nicely. She did and I fixed the problem easily and quickly. Afterwards, she told me, "See Mommy, there was no need for me to get all hussy fussy about it!" HA! She's now back going through the pages very meticulously applying all the shirts and skirts to every doll picture in the book. And I even a get a hug every few minutes telling me that I'm the best mom ever and that she loves me. Now that's worth $8.99! :)

Update Time!

After my spur of the moment three day vacation from school last week I shouldn't have gotten behind updating on here, but I did, so here's my update from the past several days. A research class just started for my Master's and it literally feels like it's sucking all the life out of me!

Thursday night we spent a little time at Grandpa's being pulled around on the sled by the new Gator. That was lots of fun! We definitely feel blessed to have an 81 year old Grandpa who can still go out and play in the snow with us! He rocks!

Anyways, we ended last week kinda rough. Meg and I both were suffering from cabing fever, so we invited Claire and Kate over on Friday afternoon as I thought it would help. We played a little bit of this and a little of that, but Meg was pretty bossy and even said sh*t again during a heated game of Old Maid. **embarrassed mom face** Kate was in awe of Meg getting soap in her mouth, but I just refuse to allow her to have a potty mouth! The afternoon did calm down with a little craft time before the cousins had had enough of Miss Bossy Bessie and left to go back home.

That brings us to this week. I had to pick Meg up from Beth's yesterday early because she was apparently sooooooo sick! Ummmm....not so much! After a two hour nap, she perked right up. I think it was just exhaustion from lack of rest over her weekend with her dad. :/ Grandpa came over for dinner. Afterwards she provided plenty of entertainment. Her new thing now is to "teach" Grandpa all about the internet. He's been learning all about starfall.com, pbskids.org and webkinz.com. Very beneficial to him, if he were ever to actual want to use the internet! She also had Greg hide her in a box that I had around the house so she could be mailed to Florida to visit Mamaw and Papaw. I wish it were big enough for the two of us, because I may be tempted to pack both of us up and go with nasty winter weather we've been having here! We got somewhere between 4-6 more inches of snow today. :( She's already doing her "No school tomorrow" chant, but I'm just hoping for a delay. We'll see!

Greg's out plowing again tonight, so it's just the two of us. We're going to have fish, since he won't eat "cockroaches from the sea," and hibernate then the rest of the night.

Oh....and as I sit here, Meg is "text messaging" away on her pretend Cinderella phone....yet another sign of the times. I certainly don't recall that kind of technology as a child!

Snow and then some!

We've got major snow here! There's about 12 inches in the back yard. School was, of course, cancelled for the day. Meg cracks me up now that she's in school as she will chant "No school, no school!" hoping for a delay or cancellation. A delay for her means no school, so that's just as good for her. It means an extra Lazy Day with Beth that she just loves to have. :)

We headed outside this morning around 10am after getting all bundled up. She was full of squeals and delight the minute she stepped outside. Obviously, this is the most snow she's ever seen. She immediately started running up the piles (then sliding down) that Greg's plow had piled up in my driveway. I had some shoveling to do, but my shovel was in Greg's basement. We started the trek to his house together, but the snow was waaaay too deep for her to continue. She ended up stopping to make snow angels while she waited for me.

I did decide that we could venture out to Blockbuster to get a movie, as I wasn't up for playing "Cheetah" and "House" ALL day long. We rented a classic...Annie and she also got a Barbie movie since she wasn't so sure about my choice. On the way home we stopped at Chicago's, or Pizza Place as she calls it and got lunch to take home. We had a nice lunch and watched the movie as we ate. She seemed to like it and was even attempting to sing along by the end. Not a surprise really! After that, she watched her Barbie movie some and help me some while I tackled the playroom/office in the house for a major reorganzation. I've lived in this house two years and I still continue to try to make room for all the toys and get things just the way I want them. I think we finally have the playroom in good shape. Now...if things will just get put back where they belong. Right?!?!

Last goat post...

Billy, our goat, left yesterdat at 2pm. Meg was heartbroken and I felt like a pretty crappy parent for bringing the thing into our home and letting her get attached. He's going to a great farm, where a little 11 year old girl will be raising him to show in 4-H this upcoming summer. I will admit that I even teared up with him leaving. Meg had a huge meltdown right away and a few since then. I swear that these types of things were NEVER mentioned in parenting books! Where the he** was that chapter that read Caution Saving an Animal's Life....Possible Trauma for Your Child!?!?! Oh well...I'm sure she'll be over it soon enough, plus Grandpa came over for dinner tonight and informed us that another set of triplets were born last night. Apparently two aren't doing so well, but don't look at me! I've been there, done that!

Things you may never have known about a goat....

In case you've been wondering, we still have our goat (Billy is his name now). To summarize our past week with him, I thought it might be fun to make a list of the things we have learned from him....things I never really knew about goats and things YOU may not have know either.

1. Goats play hide-and-go-seek. Meg and I take off from Billy and try to hide during our play time with him. Usually he follows as fast as he can, but if we get away without him seeing where we go, we can mimick a goat noise and he'll come find us wherever we're hiding in the basement. Quite entertaining...if you have a strong desire now to have your own goat for playing this game, feel free to email me, I can hook you up with one! :)

2. Goats have a great sense of hearing. Billy is in the basement, but when someone is walking around upstairs, you can hear it. He's a perfectly good "goat angel" all night long and doesn't make a peep, but as soon as I get out of bed in the morning and start moving around, he hears me and is downstairs bleating away to make sure he gets his breakfast ASAP.

3. Goats have a good sense of smell. Billy's belly is never full. When his bottle is finished he always wants more and will try to continue to nurse from my fingers. Meg would love to have him do this to her, but he won't give it a thought. I think he knows my smell as his "mother" and will only do this from me. How nice that a goat loves me like this, huh?

4. A jumping goat is hilarious to watch. I've always known that goats are playful, but to watch him jump up on his back legs and kick up at Meg or hop up and down like a rabbit is funny. On top of that to listen to Meg cackle while watching him is joy for me.

Those are just a few fun things we've learned. The good/bad news is that we may have found Billy a home. Good news because a goat really can't be raised in my basement and the home for him would be a great one. It's a 10 year old girl who wants a goat to show in 4-H. Bad news because we (yes, WE) are attached to him. Everywhere we've gone this week Meg has announced to random strangers, "We have a goat living in our basement!" She already she some major tears when I told her the possibility that he may be leaving tomorrow. We'll find out in the morning if he's leaving for sure and will cross that bridge together if we get there.

The Honest Truth from a 4 year old

Meg was trying to convince me of something, so she started in on her bargaining. Bargaining, I'm use to however, she had a new technique this time. She proceeded to tell me that if I'd give in to her request she'd let me take a nap. This was after school, and it has been a long week, so I'll admit the offer was tempting. I know, though, that there's no way she'd ever let me nap as this would require her to stop talking to me for longer than five minutes. Anyways, I told her that I didn't need a nap, so I wasn't giving in. She told me that I did need a nap and she could tell because I looked tired. I asked her how she knew I was tired and she told me she could tell it because of the way my eyes looked. HA! Think she's ever heard that before? Now...off to check the bags under my eyes and see if they really are that bad!

Stretching a Dollar (or Five)

Mamaw and Papaw are gone for several weeks. They've officially become snow birds with retirement and have "flown the coop," yet they haven't forgotten completely about those precious grandchildren that are freezing here in Indiana. Meghan and the other girls got a "miss you" card in the mail the other day that had a $5 bill in it. Meghan was insistent tonight that this $5 be spent on a toy. I wasn't really up for an outing since we were having company for dinner, so I tried to avoid it. There was no diverting her, (not even her goat friend in our basement could get her mind off of spending her $5 bill!) I told her that the only place I would take TONIGHT was Wal-Green's since it's about 30 seconds from our house. I also explained that they have a very limited $5 toy selection and that if she'd wait, I'd take her to Wal-Mart tomorrow after school where they "Roll Back Prices" and she could get a much better deal with her 5 bucks. Nope! She wasn't having it! She had to spend that money TONIGHT! So...off we went.

Here's how our trip went:

We walked in. Beauty department is first. Meg spies a decorate your own nail kit. "Mommy, how much is that?"

"$20, Meghan, you only have $5."

We move on, finding the very short toy aisle, where she proceeds to ask, "Is this it?" Uh huh! She points out many more things she's just dying to have. A baby in a stroller. $39.99. A Barbie hairstyle head. $10.99 High School Musical something. $15.99. Princess Tea Party Set. $20 (She just got one of these for Christmas I might add!) The list goes on...you get the picture. At this point, she's pretty discouraged. I told her again, that I'd take her to Wal-Mart or she could save her money (gasp...what a thought!?!?) and she could buy something bigger when she has more. Nope...she WILL buy something TONIGHT for $5 at Wal-Green's. Finally, she sees a pair of Snow White Dress up shoes. They're red and match her Gabriella dress up dress she got for Christmas. How much? $3.99. Sold! She very proudly walks up to the counter, plops her shoes and money down and makes her purchase! Whew...that $5 is gone...but the story isn't over just yet.

We get in the car to come home and she says, "Mommy, I can't wait to go to Wal-Mart tomorrow night. I wonder what I'll pick out there!" I had to explain that the money was gone. She told me that I could go to the bank and get some of her money out for her so she could get some more things. We had a nice little talk that the money Mommy puts away in her bank account isn't going to come back out to buy toys on a random night at Wal-Mart. Was she a little disappointed? Yep, but when she got home and put on her new $5 dress up shoes, she forgot all about it! Is this outfit just perfect now or what?

New "Kid" on the Block

By kid, I mean baby goat....yes that's right, in case you haven't heard the buzz we have a baby goat living in our basement. How, might you ask, did that get started? Well...here goes. Thursday night temps here in good 'ole Indiana dropped well below freezing and my grandpa's goats decided to start having babies that night. Of course! Greg went into the barn to do the work and immediately heard three of them yelling out. The doe had had triplets! Meg and I were still inside getting all bundle up in our 15 layers to prevent frostbite, so he called my cell to let me know. I took out towels to attempt to get them dryed off asap to help, but that wasn't going to be enough. By the time we got to them, their wet little ears and tails were already frozen. :( Then we discovered, after the help of my brother, that the momma goat couldn't provide any milk. :( again. So??? What did we do? We loaded them up in my 4-runner and brought them home. I'm fairly certain that it's against all city ordinances to have a goat as a pet in the city and I won't even go into what kinds of problems there might be with having one living in the basement, but who cares! I couldn't just let the poor things stay in the barn to freeze and die! Greg and I took turns getting up every two hours to feed them and check on them, but, sadly, two died through the first night.

We did manage to save one of them though, a little billy goat. Meg just loves him to pieces. She keeps wanting to name him, but I know how hard it is to keep an orphan animal alive, so we're trying to hold off on that for a while yet. He's just being called "Goat" or "Billy" for now. HA! She's already started planning how to be able to actually keep him for good in our basement, but there is no way that I'm letting a stinky billy goat stay there for too long. He's finally nursing from a bottle well today and getting up and moving around on his own. We've got one more day to be home with him and then we have to decide what to do with him. Grandpa has informed us that he doesn't want a bottle baby to take care of. I can't imagine just getting rid of him, so we'll have to see. Greg has reassured us that it will work out. (I think I may be getting as attached to the thing as Meg is!) HA! Here are a couple of pics of our new kid:

Meghan #1, Meghan #2, Meghan #3....

Just a few thoughts tonight. I seriously wonder if Meghan has multiple personalities. OK...maybe not seriously, but I do wonder. She can go from happy-go-lucky to pi$$ed off at the world (well, not really the world, just me) in a few seconds and vice versa. Case in point, we left Greg's house this afternoon, where she'd spent a great deal of time. She'd been able to go to the bathroom by herself, get her own shoes and coat on, etc... She was playing very happily with the boys. I'll call this Meghan #1, since it's my most preferred Meghan. Then, the car door opened when we got home and the whining Meghan #2 emerged. "Mooooooommy, I can't get my boots off. I can't get my coat off." My arms and hands are overloaded with all of her stuff she'd carted to Greg's so I couldn't really help. I, very nicely, told her she could do it herself. Wham! Switch to Meghan #3, pi$$ed off Meghan. Now she's just ticked that her servant (me) won't help her when she has ordered. I went ahead, walked upstairs and told her that she could not come up until she had her boots off since she'd been in the barn with them on.

Not-so-surprisingly, two seconds later, she was in the kitchen...still Meghan #3. She stomps, snorts at me a little bit, yells something at me, I choose to ignore her for the meantime, because NAPTIME is just around the corner! WOOHOO, quiet time for Mommy! After ignoring her for a couple of minutes, Meghan #3 disappears and Meghan #2 comes back. This time she's hungry. She wants a snack, but not that snack or that one.... She wants leftover noodles. I heat up leftover noodles, but that wasn't quite right. Meghan #3 comes back. At this point, I'm done. I scoop her up, tell her it's nap time. As expected, Meghan #3 is super-mad now, but with a threat of losing tv time for the week, she gets quiet quickly and sleeps soundly for two hours. Fatigue played a part, and I realize that, but it's still trying on my nerves to deal with that! I guess I am glad that she doesn't have these moods with everyone, only me!

Oh, I forget to mention one more Meghan...Meghan #4, the sweet cuddly one that gets up from a nap or out of bed in the mornings. I love, love, love that one. She'll cuddle up next to me under a blanket or in bed for a while and just chill. It brings back the sweet memories of when I used rock my baby girl to sleep every night, long before all these different moods hit.

Can you imagine what will happen with puberty and hormones? I better start stockpiling up on anti-anxiety meds now!

The Bad Kid Show

Meghan has a new interest in shows. She likes to watch "the bad kid show" on television, which is The Supernanny. She sits in awe of the horrible fits these kids throw and the awful things they do. Tonight we were snuggled up on the couch watching a new episode that had twin 4 year old boys on it. At one point on little boy was throwing a major fit about which pair of shoes to wear (Imagine that?!?!) and Meg looks up at me and says, "I don't act like that do I Mommy?" I told her that, of course, she didn't never acted that terrible, but that sometimes when she argues with me about clothing or shoe choices she acts a little silly! Maybe the next morning we're getting ready for school and she's whining about whether her pants are too tight or too loose, I'll remind her that I could always invite The Supernanny to come live with us for a while! HA!

New Year's Fun!

We rang in the new year with quite a bang! We took the kids to the Great Wolf Lodge in Cincinnati. It was
probably the most fun we could have possibly have had on a New Year's with them! They were quite wound up in the days leading up to it, so I wondered how tolerable the two hour trip over there would be, but I will say they were great. We borrowed my parents mini-van (which is soon to be mine!) which is definitely the way to travel with four kids. Meg enjoyed her DVD with headphones, although she commentated most of it to us all still and the boys texted with their new cell phone and listened to music.

When we go to our room, excitement erupted! We had a room called the Kids Kabin. It had a queen size bed for us and a sleeper sofa bed for Meg in the main room, plus a fire place and balcony (yes, they did go out there even though it was freezing!). Then there was a special "cabin" in the room that had bunk beds and another twin bed in it for the boys. It also had their own tv and Game Cube console in it. It was very spacious even for all of us. We hurried and changed into our swimsuits and headed down to the waterpark. Meg was a little leery at first of the waterslides so she and I started out in the kiddie pool with the little slides. When she had done those several times and was feeling good, I suggested we try one of the bigger slides together in a double tube. She was so sure about it, but I convinced her that there was no way she'd get hurt and that if she didn't like it, we'd spend the rest of our time in the kiddie pool on the kiddie slides. We climbed the 800+ steps (maybe I'm exaggerating just a little bit) for the first time and hopped into our tube. As we started heading down, she was quiet at first the, she let out a squeal of delight. By the time we hit the water at the end, she was already asking to head back up and try a different one. Bye, bye kiddie pool.....hello steps! We climbed those steps at least 30 times throughout the rest of that day and the next. She rode every slide they had, except the big water coaster one. We even had her convinced to do that one, but when we go to the top to get on she was just a tad too short and the guy wouldn't let her on. =( She was very proud to say she'd done all the ones that she could though! By the end of the second day, she was even going down some of them by herself!

On New Year's Eve day, we played for a while, then we all decided we were hungry. We headed back up to our "cabin" and dove into the snacks I'd packed and we ahead and preordered out pizza for later that night, since we figured the rest of the hotel guests would be ordering pizza too. The boys then headed back down to the pool to play while Miss Meg and I rested. It was a bit noisy, since the hotel provided noisemakers to all the kids upon arrival, but we did get a good our of sleep in, which kept us going until midnight! We then headed back to the waterpark for a few more turns on the waterslides, before we got ourselves ready for dinner and the lodge's big Snowball event.

The Snowball event was fun filled with clowns doing face painting, balloon artists, party hat decorating, a band with dancing and games, and a really cool magic show. We even saw a show in the lobby where it snowed at the end. Very cool! Meghan, Cody and I spent much of the night dancing away. We were right up front on the dance floor in front of them, so close actually, that the lead singer motioned for me once to come up on stage with him. I just shook my head no, those days are long gone buddy! HA! HA! Greg, Connor and Kyle took some breaks and went back to the room a little bit, but not the three of us....we are the party animals apparently! =) We did all make it to midnight, even the other three joined us for the big countdown and balloon drop. As soon as the countdown was over though, we made a beeline for our room and beds. Meghan was so funny because she's now convinced (and very excited) that she stayed up ALL NIGHT LONG! She wanted to know what she was supposed to do when we got back to the room since it was morning. I then explained that it was just very early morning, and she still had plenty of time to sleep and that she should sleep late.....but in typical Meg fashion, at just a few minutes for 8AM, I heard her visiting with the boys in their "cabin." We had no time to waste anyways, as we had to get back to the waterslides!

The kids all settled in the "grocery getter"

Decorating a New Year's hat (that I had to wear later because it covered up too much of her face painting!)

With our party favors making noise!

Getting ready to swim

Not sure the hat is quite my look

Alien balloons and face painting

As she was looking through the book, she told me she wanted something pink and girly. HA!

One of their favorite rides

Waiting for the balloons to drop

Dancing the night away!

Tanner the Pooping Dog Causes Problems

I couldn't resist a quick post on this....I was fixing Meg's dinner tonight. She came into the kitched with a panic stricken look on her face. Here's our conversation:

Meg: Mommy, I accidentally had a piece of Tanner's poop (remember the pooping dog?) in my mouth, and it accidentally went down my throat! (The dog's "poop" is about the size of a Tic-Tac, so I wasn't concerned)

Me: Accidentally? You mean you put in your mouth and you swallowed it?

Meg: tears and sobbing start....very loud sobbing I might add!

Me: It will be fine, you will just poop out Tanner's poop.

Meg: *With a look of horror on her face* What?

Me: Yes, you will poop it out. (I gave a brieft description of digestion, then)

Meg: Ooooh.

Me: Time to eat dinner.

Meg: *saying nothing, I notice her lips are locked tight*

Me: What are you doing?

Meg: *says nothing, shakes her head*

Me: Meg? What are you doing?

Meg: Mmm! Mmm!

Me: Open your mouth.

Meg: *finally opens mouth* I don't want to though, what if that poop comes back out?

Me: *trying to hold back laughter* It won't, remember, it will come out when you go potty tomorrow?

Meg: Ooooooh.

She goes with her Dad tomorrow. I did give him a heads up that there could be some real drama in the bathroom when she has to go #2! I'm sure she won't forget about this ordeal. HA HA!

Gift Review

As every other year has been since Meg has been alive, the amount of "stuff" she receieved for Christmas was overwhelming. I must admit I even feel somewhat ashamed, as no child needs this much "stuff," nor could they ever play with it all. I will say she is, at least, very appreciative and excited about it all, so for that I'm proud of her. She definitely isn't one of those kids who just expects this "stuff" and I sure don't buy toys other times just because. It doesn't mean that she's not one of those kids at Wal-Mart begging me mercilessly all through the aisles, but I don't give in....I stand my ground!!! :) (That's why you read in the post from last night that I was being soooo nice last night!) Anyways, here's a small recap of some of her Christmas "stuff."

Puppy Knows Your Name (from Grandpa Moore) A puppy that you hook up to the computer so that is says your name and it knows it's own name after being programmed. It sings, tells you when it wants to be fed, brushed, and petted. It even grows, which we witnessed last night. I even think this toy is kinda cool and will admit to playing with it when she's not around! HA!

Meghan and Snowball


Bride Dress Up Clothes (from Mamaw and Papaw) The whole ensemble of bridal wear....dresss with train (or dragger as Meg calls it), veil, wedding ring w/ rock, shoes, garter belt, purse and handkerchief. She also got a Bridal Barbie from Greg's mom (Grammy) that coordinates and she's also pretty excited about. I'm hoping all this bridal stuff doesn't inspire more "my mommy's getting married" stories that she makes up and tells to random people!

Bitty Baby Twins (from Santa...aka Mommy) Why Santa gets credit for all the exciting stuff, I'm still not sure of....doesn't seem fair to me, but I play along as everyone tells me I"m supposed to as a parent! She loves these dolls though. She got matching jammies for herself and a matching dress from Aunt Lisa that she's already had on and worn at least 5 times. Every time I turn around in the house, she's changed clothes into the dress, so she can match and we spend at least an extra 10 minutes before bed now changing TWO dolls into their jammies and getting them ready for bed.



From Christmas Eve she got a Bratz doll, which as soon as she opened it, she yelled out at the top of her lungs, "My mommy doesn't like Bratz dolls!!!!" ***Mommy hides face*** A giant floor puzzle that was lots of fun to put together, and a Fancy Nancy tea party book. It goes along very well with a tea party set that Santa brought her. A tea party set that Santa found clearanced out on disney.com earlier in the summer and got very, very cheap, I might add!! :) She also got the Libby Lu hair piece that you see her wearing in some of the pics. While wearing it around on Christmas Eve night, she get saying "I'm a hot girl!" and "Totally awesome!" Wow.....I'm soooo not ready for that kind of stuff!

Giant Pet Floor Puzzle

Fancy Nancy glasses

The Bratz doll (that Mommy doesn't like!) HA! HA!

She also got the portable DVD player (a pink one, of course) which will be great to take on our camping trips, and Greg got her a gift that could earn him a good percentage of her royalties someday if she becomes famous.....a radio that has a microphone attached to it! She's obsessed with this gift. We bought CD's for it last night, as I already posted about, and she's spent a great deal of time in there already singing and dancing away. The videos I took capture just a little bit of her performances!

There are a few other things, jewelry box from Grammy, Leapster game, Jasmine princess dolly, some clothes, Gabriella dress up outfit, necklace and new blanket from Grandpa, new pink Carhartt barn coat, a couple of new books, and I'm sure some other things that have slipped my mind.

There's a hole in her pocket!

Meg got some money for Christmas from Grandpa. Last night after we dropped the boys off and had dinner we went by Wal-Mart so she could spend a little of it. We had talked and decided that she was going to purchase a CD for her new radio with microphone to sing along with, a carrying case for her portable DVD player and maybe a new DVD if she had enough money left. Fortunately for her, the economy isn't so great, so Wal-Mart had some good mark-downs. CD's that were normally $14 a piece were marked down to $9, so she got a Hannah Montana one and the new High School Musical 3 CD. We also found a DVD carrying case for $20, when I was expecting it to be around $40, so she was able to purchase a Bratz DVD. As we were walking out of Wal-Mart I soon realized, she didn't quite understand the whole I'm spending my own money concept when she said, "Wow Mommy, you're being reeeeeeeallly nice tonight! Thank you!!!" Greg and I both got a good laugh out of that one!

Merry Christmas

Wow! What a day it's been! Miss Thing was totally zonked out by the time she got home tonight. She crashed in bed shortly after we changed her new Bitty Twins into their jammies and she got her matching nightgown on. She did make the cutest comment when she said, "Geez, now I have two babies and kitty to have in my bed!" That ratty old kitty she insists on sleeping with every night is not going anywhere!!! She got quite a load of stuff today which means we have a very busy day tomorrow getting every put away and sorting through some old things that can be given away to Goodwill. We're definitely looking forward to some relaxing time at home now that the holiday rush is over. I'll post some pics too as soon as the madness settles down. I'm sure there will be a nice long nap tomorrow for Meg in which I could get pics uploaded, that is if I don't choose to nap with her!! Ha!

Time off!

We are loving our time off of school! We've had a busy two days so far and Meg is anxiously awaiting Santa's arrival. We spent yesterday running errands and helping out Greg's mom who's not been feeling too weel. Today Meghan got a little play time in with Claire and Kate while I cleaned at Grandpa's, then we came home for some Mommy and Meg play time. We spent the afternoon playing "barn" as Meg called it. This consists of setting up all of her farm equipment (me putting together the hundreds of pieces of fences to create a separate pasture for all the different animals), then moving the animals to and from the vet for various ailments. Today we had a sick horse, a lamb that wouldn't nurse and a cow with a broken leg. Her imagination cracks me up. I do get in trouble when we play though because the Yoder's (the little Amish people that came with it) get a little wild sometimes. ***You know those crazy Amish!** LOL

We've also managed to make some Christmas cookies and decorate them to take for family Christmas Eve festivities tomorrow night. She loves decorating, but I'm not sure which has more decoration, my kitchen floor or the cookies? :) Oh well...she's having fun!

I do have sad news to report. One of our bunnies has died. I went to switch the water container this morning as I've been doing since it's been so cold and only one came out of the little bunny bathroom area to greet me. I had a terrible feeling and knew something had to be wrong as they have become very friendly when I go to feed and water them each day. When I opened up the little door to check on him, he was all stretched out and gone. :( I haven't had the heart to break the news to Meg yet. I know she'll be crushed, as it's Belle, the white one with red eyes that was her favorite that died. Boo hoo hoo.

That's what family's for!

A little late, but I had to share. I got a call at school on Tuesday around 10:45AM from the babysitter. Her first words were, "Meghan's fine." She's already figured me out, the mom who freaks out when she gets called at work! HA! Her daughter had pink eye. No problem, I said, I'll call my mom. I'm so thankful to have retired parents now who can help out in emergencies like this, right? Not always.... I called Mom, Dad answers they are taking care of my sick niece that day. Ooops! Strike that idea. Ok...no problem, it's almost lunch time, have building substitute cover my room after lunch. Strike that idea. No subs available. Aaaack. Now panic. I thought for a moment and remembered my family just a few seconds away from school. The Parker's! Diana was first to answer. Fortunately she wasn't working, so she went and picked up Meghan. It turned out to be Meg's lucky day. Here's why:

Meg hadn't had lunch yet. Where'd they go? Chicago's of course, since Diana owns it! Meg had her own personal cheese pizza and was even able to help herself to the buffet for chocolate pizza and cinnamon rounds. I should mention this is one of Meg's favorite places to eat too! After a few errands to run, they also had to go to Wal-Mart. Meg came home with a new My Little Pony Baby Doll. This toy has not left her side. We took it shoe shopping with us yesterday, we make a special bed for it every night, she really thought it should go into the mall with her today to see Santa too but I did talk her out of that one, and she carries it around on her back in it's backpack practically every second we are home. She loves this thing! I guess you could say Meghan wasn't too disappointed that the babysitter's daughter had pink-eye.