I know how to make noise

Hiding in the boxes

Well, I am down to 2 rooms. I have the kitchen and basement left to pack up. The boxes have eaten up the dining room and the girls like to play amongst them. I even got the shed packed up today. The packing, realtor stuff, and everything else seems like there are not enough hours in the day.

The inspection for our house was pretty good. We have to fix 3 things which isn't bad. We got the GFCI outlets put in the kitchen tonight, are giving money for a new exterior door from the kitchen to garage, and the pain of it is the Radon test came back slightly high so we have to pay $1200 for a special vent to be installed in the basement.

J's teacher caught me in the hall yesterday to tell me how impressed she was with him. No one else could think of a word and she showed it in a book and J was the only one who could sound it out. It was the word "kelp"

He's in the parade with his class on Saturday.

Pictures of Tootie's Dance Class

Tootie had a great time at ballet and is learning so much. Here are some pics. She fell in the parking lot on the way in and that is why she has a bandaid on her tights.

September Birthdays!

Happy Happy Birthday, to Uncle Sean (who I am REALLY late on...this house has deteriorated my mind), Uncle Craig, and Eric...aka..Daddy!! We had Eric and Craig's birthday party at Mom and Dad's today. Yumm-o, Lasagne, Chicken Parm, fruit salad, garlic bread, J's fav...Deviled Eggs, and Apple Dumplings and Cheesecake for dessert. Gig and Mamma were able to make it. But again with the distractions on my mind, I forgot my camera. I know, totally, not like me!!!

Tootie was talking to the baby in Aunt Nichole's belly and said "Come out, Baby, Come out!" It was hysterical. She was determined to see that baby. She kept lifting Nichole's shirt up and couldn't understand why she couldn't see them.

Nene and Gig got the kids LOTS of wonderful fall and winter clothes and pjs, which they were sooooo excited to try on and wear to bed, tonight. And they had to take their new flashlights that Mamma got them in their Halloween bags to bed, also. So cute. It was like Christmas for them. Nene also got them new coloring books for Halloween, which kept them very busy on the way home and while the boys opened their birthday.

Well, our pool inspection found lots of problems with the pool and she feels a new pool should be put in after the erosion issue is fixed so now we have to re negotiate with the sellers after they have a pool inspection this week. Yuck! Why can't it just be easy to buy a house anymore! I think I will get a big AMEN from Cara and Ryan on this one. Anyway, we should know more later this week!

Well, Mom and I are predicting a new baby Hendry this week. That baby can't get too much bigger for his LITTLE Mama!

2 Down, 2 to Go

Well, we finished our inspection of the new house today and are awaiting the report. We found a bunch of stuff that was done the cheap way but I think a lot of houses are like that. Easy fix compared to moving walls and remodeling ;) The pool inspector comes at noon tomorrow. Our house was inspected for Radon the other day and the buyers and general inspector come tomorrow. So ready to get all the logistics over with! Eric took tomorrow off, Yay!!! Glad I don't have to deal with this inspection stuff myself, especially since I don't have a clue!!

J had a field trip to the museum and had a blast, today!!! Wish I could have made it but maybe next year.

HAPPY 31ST BIRTHDAY TO MY LITTLE BROTHER WHO IS ABOUT TO BE A DADDY! IT DOESN'T SEEM POSSIBLE!!!

Inspections.inspections,inspections

I know it has been a few since I posted but WOW is this house selling and buying business a big deal! Well, we had one inspector for the bank come and do a Radon test on Tues and he will be back to get his ready and pickup his equipment tomorrow. Then we have the buyer's inspector coming Friday from 3-6 pm. Tomorrow is our inspection on the new house at 3pm and our pool inspection will be done Friday at noon. Then we have appraisers for both next week. Yikes!!!

I had a PTA meeting last night and was nominated to be the chair of the teacher conference dinners on Oct. 27th and 28th (J's birthday). GREAT! (I say that sarcastically). So I will be working on that project. I have Sophi's room, the kids's room, and the office and closet upstairs packed up, except the things we will need the next couple of months. I have a truck load to go to goodwill and I kept the garbage guys busy, today! LOL!

J lost another tooth on the bottom last night. They line up perfectly, it is soooo cute. He told us that he wanted to be a math teacher when he grows up and Eric's response was "Could you find something where you might make a little more money? Because I think you are going to need it!" LOL! They moved on from dinosaurs and are studying "Community Heroes", therefore, teacher. He has a huge field trip to the science museum tomorrow and couldn't be anymore excited!

Tootie was my evil one, today. I was taping some boxes and come in to find that she has taken a new canister of oatmeal and spread it all over my living room floor. Ahhh! Her split lip has healed so fast. I don't think she will have ANY scar at all.

Soph Bug loves all the action. She just toodled and tried to pull things out of boxes.

We have a babysitter, Vickie, who watches our friends's the Jones's kids. J and Brecken are best friends. And Mason and Sophi are close to the same age. She also watches the Bolin family kids, who go to St. Susanna, also. She is one of the nicest ladies I have ever met. She is a clean freak, which I LOVE! The girls are going to start going a couple of times a week in Mid October while we move and then I have a lead on a contract for a law firm to start my Legal Nurse Consulting and plan on working from home twice a week or part time, while the girls are at Vickie's. All 3 will go part time this summer. J is over the moon that he and Brecky get to go to Vickie's together!!!! Alot going on! I contemplated taking Tootie to preschool since Mrs. Hughes...Jackson's teacher from last year REALLY wants her this year. But I decided that Sophi needs her more to make a smooth transition since she has never been left with anyone except my mom.

Eric has been playing catch up at work since he got back and will be taking off Friday to wade thru the inspections.

Tonight's The Night

Chili Supper Night!!!!!

Well, we sold our house last Tuesday!!! Yay!!!!!!!!!!!!! Now we are negotiating on our other house! Keep praying for us; it has been stressful, especially since there is another couple interested in the house.

Eric got home last night around 7pm and the kids were so excited to see him. Even my little Soph Bug ran up to him and gave him a big hug and kiss and hugged his neck and said "Awwwwwwww". It was so sweet. I love their ages right now! So much fun and so sweet!

I took Tootie's stitches out on Friday morning and her lip looks great. I don't think we are going to have a scar! Yay!!

Well I baked a pineapple upside down cake, chocolate chip tiramisu cheesecake, pumpkin cheesecake, and a choco raspberry cheesecake for the chili supper tonight.
I have been working on the school database for our school auction. I had to learn Access in like 10 hours by myself but now I have it and have ran 10 or 15 reports and created my own queries. It's kind of fun. We had a great turnout at the chili supper tonight and made $1900 just on the cake walk and chili supper. It was a lot of fun. Especially now that I have a bunch of "mom" friends from J's class and the 1st grade to hang out with!!

I also stopped at the furniture store to look at furniture for Tootie's room at the new house. I found the most adorable white, Victorian furniture with etching and silver hardware. The mirror is round and the chair has a circle back. I love Victorian. I'm not a contemporary but an antique girl!!! Tootie will be, too!!!

New Semester of Ballet at the Children's Ballet

Well Tootie started a new semester at the Children's Ballet, tonight. I really like the dance instructors who are retired ballerinas and they are very strict as to dress and hair. I love it; of course!! I love structured!!! They all have to wear a plain black leotard, pink tights, their ballet slippers, and their hair must be pulled back tight into a dancer's bun or braid. They all looked so serious and adorable. She LOVED it! She didn't mind giving up her tutu. She said that now she was in big girl class and has to wear a uniform to her school like Jackson does to his big school! So cute! They don't like for you to stay, simply because it is distracting; so the kids and I went and got groceries and let her stay there. She didn't seemed to mind and I asked her if she had to go potty, of course, she did. She said she did it all by herself, which she usually does but with a leotard, over tights, over underwear, with shoes on top, I wasn't sure if she could get it down and then all up again but she sure did!! And she pointed so well tonight. I was wondering what the black bow on one shoe and black triangle on the side of the other was for, but then I realized that 3 1/2 and 4 year olds don't know directions, such as right and left so they are taught to point with either the bow shoe (left) or triangle shoe (right)...BRILLIANT!! LOL! Anyway, we had a great evening together!!

Soph Bug says "Thank You" to everything, now! It is adorable.

And J read a "Lightning McQueen" level 1 reader to us tonight all by himself.

Soph Bug ready for Halloween

Not too much to report. Jackson was so hilarious. On the way home from school he was telling me that he learned about dinosaurs and how they are extinct and I asked him how they died. He said "Well we don't really know". So I say maybe a meteor or the Ice Age. He tells me, just as serious as can be "Mom, not everything in movies are real" and then he says "I hate to tell you but that move Ice Age, is not real". I just about died laughing.

Practicing for Halloween

Tootie is going to be Ariel from "The Little Mermaid" and Sophi Sebastian the Lobster while J and Eric are both going to be Hulk and I'm a pirate!

Supergirl gets stitches

Well, while talking to Eric on the phone in the kitchen at 5 pm tonight. The kids were running thru the kitchen and just as I yell "No running in the house". Batman falls and stubs his toe and then Supergirl flies over him face first into the wall. When I heard J crying and yelling "Are you ok? Oh Tootie" I knew a bloody face was about to emerge around the corner and after cleaning her up. I managed to convince all of them that we were going on a little trip. I couldn't reach Mark and Stac, so I took all of them to St. Vincent's which is forever away but I wanted a plastic surgeon to stitch her up so she wouldn't have a scar. We didn't have to wait in the waiting room very long until we went back. Miss Tootie didn't like it one bit when she figured out that we were in the ER. The numbed her and let her numb up for a good 30 minutes and then 4 of us held her down while the doctor put 4 stitches in the line vertical from her nose to mouth. No teeth or inner mouth were affected. She put up a good fight but wore out and just cried the rest of the time. I think Sophi cried worse than Tootie did. Because of the location it can't be covered and she has a horrible cold so we'll hope she doesn't get it infected. She can't lick at the stitches or they will come out and we have to be careful for the next month that she doesn't pop it back open which would leave a scar and 70 SPF sunscreen everytime she goes outside for the next year to prevent the scar showing more. We stopped at McDonald's at 9:30 since no one had anything to eat since 11am except Sophi who got to eat all the crackers and the cookie that were in packages in my purse. We finally got home about 10:15 and everyone went straight to bed. Now it's my turn :)

Smooth Transition

Well we still don't know anything about our house. Waiting on the buyer's next move. It is such a long and frustrating process.

J got his first report card and I was so proud. He acheived Maximum Success on almost everything! He only still needs improvement in the self control category and neatly coloring (he can do it, he just gets in a hurry because he wants to be the first one done)...Gee I think these things are normal boy things! LOL! Today he was the only one who could count to 200 so he got a brand new Lightning McQueen out of the Treasure Box. He is one smart little cookie. My mom just reminded me tonight that my Pampa Emmett used to tell everyone "she's always thinking while everybody else is sleeping" about me. Mom and I think the same thing about J.

Little Tootie bug is getting better at sharing and has been religiously asking Sophi if she wants to play. It is adorable. She still wishes she were at school but she has to live with us one last school year since I'm not ready to give her up yet. She is so creative. You will notice her 4 wheeler battery died so she talked J into pulling her with monkey backpack and she didn't want Sophi on her 4 wheeler so she tied the sled to the 4 wheeler for Sophi and Ducky to ride on. Sophi evacuated quickly and I didn't get my camera in time. She is a little artist right now and would color all day if I let her.

Sophi is my sweetie pie. She just kisses on everything and loves on everything. She has the most emphatic "Hiiiiiiiii" when I get her up in the morning. She has been doing this little face when I tell her she has to do something or can't have something. She cocks her head to the left (ear to shoulder), closes her eyes, and sticks her pouty lips out, and sayd "Ewwwww".

It hasn't been too bad with Eric gone. The kids went right to sleep last night and tonight, right on schedule. We stopped at McDonalds for supper last night and had frozen pizza tonight. Yessssss! I haven't even had a full load of laundry everyday! LOL! But we are ready for him to come home! I took the girls for a 3.5 mile walk thru Hummel Park yesterday right after school drop off. Then, I let the girls play on the playground. A nice man gave them peanuts to feed the squirrels, which they loved. One squirrel came about a foot from Tootie for that peanut. She loved it! We also got to feed the ducks and saw a Herron, and then a man gave us birdseed to feed the birds. I love that time of morning when all of the older people are out. They are so friendly and love to chat!

Eric is learning a lot and has been offered a job in Vegas. Of course, I said "Heck No" Not any places to raise kids!! His director asked him if he always listened to everything I say, Eric's response "Happy Wife, Happy Life!!!!!" He does live by that motto pretty well.

Well, I have to go finish a few licensing modules on the computer.

Happy Labor Day

I'm getting bad about forgetting my camera but have so much on my little plate.
Eric left for SC for 2 weeks for business, yesterday morning and so the kids and I headed over for a quick visit with Mom and Dad. We got in about noon and had a fabulous lunch and Nene and Pop took the kids on 4 wheeler and mower rides, played games, let J read them books, Mom took them to the store for their favorite, "Frog Spit" (they are like lime push up popsicles...I think they just like to be able to say they are eating frog spit) One of Craig's best buddies was in town from Chicago and had a pair of Craig's shoes so he stopped and visited after the kids had went to bed, which was fun. Then Mom, Dad, and I visited for quite some time. Then Poor Dad had to get up at 5:30 to head over to Steve's farm. They were back at corn picking, today. So Mom and I took all the kids over for their tractor rides. Steve and Dad are always so nice and patient with the kids. They stop and let them ride in the tractor with the ogger cart or then they climb in the truck and take some wagons to the elevator. They are natorious for pushing all kinds of buttons!! They had a great time and always cry when they have to leave the field. But Miss Tootie still has her sinus infection and has been cranky and needed to leave and eat lunch and take a nap, especially since it was 2pm. They did not take a nap, however!!! Well my little angelic Soph Bug did, LOL! I know...just wait until she turns 2!
We are still working on negotiating our house! Say a prayer that we finish this tomorrow! One of the buyers has been out of town. Now Eric is out of town, so Ughh!

J is reading!!!! His favorite book to read to everyone is "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" Tootie doesn't have the patience, yet. He gets upset with her because he tries to read to her and halfway thru she says " That's OK Boogie, I go to bed now" or "We need to say prayers, now"

Well I better get to bed since for the next couple of weeks, I will be loading everybody up at 7:30 to take J to school! Next time, pictures...I promise!!

Happy September

Sorry, everybody! It has been stressful and a very busy week. We are very close to negotiating the sale of our house!! Yippppeeeeeee! The only bad thing is they want to close on Nov 29!!! Which ruins our plans for Thanksgiving. We told them it had to be Nov. 5 but if they come up to our asking price then we will probably have to go with that date! We'll see. We are biting at the bit to make the offer on our other house that we want.
My funny story is that Eric is concerned about the bean field of about 80 acres behind our house down in the valley. He's afraid eventually it may be commercialized. Eric's friend/boss knows a guy on city council and called him and asked about it and found out which farmer owned it and it turns out it is a prominent farmer who also owns a huge gravel pit at the other end of Mooresville. So then Eric was fretting it would be a gravel pit. So "Mama Bear" decided enough worrying was enough and I was not letting my dream house go because of what ifs (My philosophy is that when you live within 30 miles of a major metropolitan area anything can happen. Even if you live in a older neighborhood, Walmart can come by 12 of your neighbors, tear them down, and build a Walmart right next to you!) So anyway, I looked that prominent farmer up and called him up to find out his intentions. Yes I did!!!!! I got a hold of his wife out of the yellow pages and explained the situation and she said to me "Honey, I know what it's like to have your husband tell you that you can't have something. Let me give you his cell phone". So I called him on his cell and laid on my pancake syrup sweetness and found that he doesn't even own that field. He does own the 300 acres of corn down the road from us which he is a country boy and swears he will never sell out to darn (I'm paraprasing) commercialization. Anyway, he gave me the farmer's number who does own it and told me to call him up. It was quite funny and now I know not for sure their won't be a gravel pit back there :)

My sweet J Man read his first book to all of us tonight. Cover to cover, he read "The Hungry Caterpillar". It was one of my proudest moments of motherhood.

Tootie has had 6 weeks of this horrible cough which finally loosened up, she had a fever yesterday, and ended up with LOTS of drainage, today. So hopefully we are on the downslope of this cold that has seemed to last FOREVER.

Soph bugs words are so cute. She is saying "Boog" for Jackson, "Tooie" for Tootie, and pulls on my pantleg and repeats "Mamamamamamamamam" until she gets my attention and I give her what she wants.

Eric leaves to do production training for the new site in Spartanburg, SC for 2 weeks!!! on Sunday! Pray that my head doesn't spin around and fall off by the end of those 2 LONG weeks! He and J are headed to J's first professional baseball game on Sat night. He is super thrilled!

Somehow I signed up for a lot of committees for the PTP and have lots of projects for September. Oops! I'm in charge of keeping the teacher's lounge stocked with goodies, I'm in charge of the Kindergarten bake sale on Sept. 10, I'm co chair of our auction database which we are getting letters punched in for our donor and patron letters (it is our largest fundraiser, our auction raised $75,000 for the school last year), and I'm in charge of the cake walk at our big Chili Cook Off on Sept 18, which is the day Eric gets home...Yikes! Plus I have 4 cheesecakes and 4 dozen cupcakes I have to make for it. Wow! The snowball started rolling down the hill. LOL! I like it busy, though. It keeps the stress of thinking about moving down and keeps me distracted.