Jacob the (almost) Wonder Dad

I'm currently coaching 6th grade volleyball. It consists of me yelling at the girls "ARE YOU KIDDING ME RIGHT NOW? RETURN THE BALL!!!" Or another favorite, "WE CAN"T SCORE POINTS IF WE CAN'T SERVE THE BALL!" I actually really do enjoy it, and I love the girls I work with, they try hard. That being said though, I come home from games a bit frazzled. Apparently all the LACK of competitiveness I have in my personal life is channeled into coaching. I tell you ALL that to tell you this.

My loving husband decided he was going to have everything settled for me when I got home last night around eight. He did it all. He did the dishes. He made dinner. Took out the trash. Cleaned the dinner mess up and DID THE DINNER DISHES (unheard of behavior for him normally). Got the kids ready for bed and all tucked in. The man even did some laundry. I got home and all I had to do was heat up some leftovers and sit down to relax. I was impressed and relieved to not have to drag my tired butt through all the motions of the evening. He and I are just talking when I very innocently asked him about the kids soccer practice that night.

......

......

(Realization slowly dawning on us both that Jacob totally forgot to take the kids to soccer practice.)

........

"Crap. This ruins my Super Dad night doesn't it?"

And really. I was just too happy to be sitting there on my butt to care. So thanks, babe. You almost did it all.

Sick Kids, or the Week Mom Got No Sleep

The last week has been filled with fever filled fun, thanks to a bug Sophie picked up from school. When I get sick I can usually get up and function. Sophie gets that same take on illness from me. She didn't feel well, and you could tell, but in general she did her own thing and rested when she was feeling really bad. Keegan, however, takes after his father. When the boys get sick it's like they may as well be on their actual death beds. It was so bad with Keegan that he literally crawled across the room as opposed to walk over to change his clothes. It does make for some serious snuggle time though. However, between the two of them getting up so frequently in the night, this is one tired momma. Today we all seem to be fever free, and hopefully onto a good weekend. The kids first soccer game is Saturday, I think if Keegan were any more excited then his head would explode.

Soccer 2012

Coach Lois. We love her.

What a difference ten years makes...

Thirteen Years Ago

Ten Years Ago

June 2012

 Happy anniversary, baby. I love you.

At least I know she is paying attention

Yesterday at the doctor's office Sophie and I were looking at paintings of dinosaurs that kids had painted. She very matter of factly explained to me that I was most likely looking at a picture of a _______. (Fill in the blank with the name of some long necked dinosaur that she knows the exact name of and I don't. ) She was busy explain all the details of the ________, even down the fact that the ______ has nostrils on top of its head to breath while mostly under water to escape from meat eaters, until she hit something that apparently didn't fit in. "The ________ doesn't have those ridges on its back though. Perhaps this is a free form dinosaur." Sophie: the artistic paleontologist.

This may be awkward later...

Keegan is stubborn. Once he makes his mind up about something it is almost impossible to convince him otherwise. For example, when Sophie had her birthday Keegan was convinced that he got older as well. To this day if you ask him how old he is he will reply "three" and there is no telling him that he is still two. He will fight you to the death about it. If you persist in telling him that he is only two he lowers his voice to a raspy growl and says "No I NOT, I THREE." It's just how is he. Stubborn.

I tell you that to tell you this. A friend asked Sophie the other day if she had a boyfriend. She said no, but then Keegan piped up "Yes, I am Sophia's boyfriend." And there is no telling him he isn't.

To Pee or Not to Pee

Well, I called it. Keegan was definitely fibbing when he said he was going to start going potty like a big boy. I'm stumped. Sophie was so easy to potty train. She woke up one day, I asked her if she wanted to try to go potty, she said yes, and then she did. I told her we were going to try to do this all the time and she was all about it. With very few accidents she was potty trained in about three days.

Keegan, once again proving that he is an independent kid who was not made to follow in Sophie's footsteps, has gone to the potty once. And I honestly think that was an accident. But I'm unswerving and steadfast in my goal. I'm armed with Diego and Elmo underwear, candy and enough people who have offered him surprises if he goes that he will eventually have a Nerf gun arsenal. And just to show him I mean business I may start only letting him have chocolate milk if he goes potty. Chocolate milk is pretty much what this kid lives for. He's addicted to it like a hooker on crack. I'm playing hard ball. The diapers have to go.

Back At It

After a summer long hiatus it's time to return to writing down the event of our lives. It was either this or finish the kids baby books, and this is way less work than that would be. Since catching up would be almost impossible, I'll just throw out a quick list of what is currently going on.

1. The kids have been sleeping in a tent in Keegan's room all week. Sophie got the tent for her fourth birthday. Holy crap, my Sophie is four. Let's move on before I think about that too much.


2. Sophie, at her tender age of four, has already mastered the guilt trip. I finally broke down and told her that Jacob and I were going on vacation without them in a few weeks and Sophie said, with tears in her eyes, "Mommy, don't you love us?" Yeah. Nice. She got over it once I told her she got to spend the night with Mamaw all week. That kid would do anything to keep from sleeping at home. She doesn't even spare my feelings about the matter. "Mom", she says quite matter of factly, "I do not want to stay with you at home. I want to stay somewhere else. I want to go to _______ house and stay." EVERY NIGHT we have this conversation. I don't think being independent will ever be a problem for little miss.


3. I am slowly.... ever so slowly.... plodding along to my weight loss goal. Actually, I already hit the one I set at New Years. (How often do you see that? An accomplished resolution.) So I set a new one, and I've lost 27 out of 30. In fact, I just gave away a ton of clothes. That feels good. Now I don't have many clothes though. That's not so good. But at least I look better while I am wearing the same clothes over and over again.

4. Keegan told me this morning that he was going to start going potty in the big boy potty. I am skeptical to say the least. The idea of life without diapers seems like too much to dream for. Besides, he also told me that his motorcycle could fly so that shows how much you can trust what he says.
5. Life is good.

Pictures

I've been getting griped at for not blogging, and it's true it's been a while. I still don't feel like it, but I'll post some pictures I've been meaning to get to.

The kids and I went to Momma Sherie and Pops house the other day. Sherie made the kids a little slip and slide to play on. She's cool like that.




I get one pedicure a year. It's my Mother's Day present. This year Sophie went with me and got her first real pedicure. She loved it!





It was also her first year for Vacation Bible School. She went to my momma's church to go. She really loved it, came home talking about her lessons and singing songs. We went to her program on Sunday and watched as she did EVERY motion and sang louder than anyone. We were so proud of her!

An Upside

The upside of Jacob working four on and two off is that he gets more one on one time with the kids. While I am at work he gets to stay home and play with them. They go everywhere together, and he often has great stories to tell me about the kids when I get home.

Sophie asked Jacob if the guys that drive the airplanes are very small because the airplanes are so tiny. Jacob about snorted his ice cream up his nose.

Keegan and Sophie both got new tackle boxes, filled with an assortment of brightly colored worms that they will no doubt lose in about a week. In the meantime they are so stinking excited about having their very own tackle box and we get asked to go fishing about every four minutes. On the way home from picking them up with Jacob Keegan was struggling to get his open. After trying and grunting and pulling, he finally resorted to singing the Open Up song from Little Einstein. "Open up, I want to get in, open, open, open, open, open open upppppppp." It didn't work, but if Jacob had ice cream with him he would have snorted it up his nose.

The kids went to spend the day with Aunt Ruth the other day. While we were getting ready to leave Sophie eyeballed a magnet on the refrigerate that was silver and said "Princess" in big pink letters. Ruth kindly gave it to Sophie who was. of course, thrilled. On the way home the kids were very quiet. Keegan was asleep, and we thought Sophie was as well until she piped up with the following question: "Mom, Dad.... will you buy me a frigerater?" It turns out she didn't want to share her magnet, thus requiring her own refrigerater for her to put her magnet on. We assured her that she could put it on ours, and she was okay with that as long as we promised that it would only hold her own stuff.