Allie & Sariah

Sariah's class has a pet alligator named Allie.  They each get to take her home one night, and then they use a journal to tell what they did with Allie.  Sariah's turn was last night, and here are the pictures we put into Allie's journal:

Allie liked Lizzi.

 Allie played with Sariah's ponies, Scarlet, Scarlet, & Scarlet.

 Allie tried to eat Caleb for dinner.

 Allie helped Hannah with her homework.

 We went on a car ride to show Allie the new house.

 Sariah showed Allie her new pink room.

 Allie & Sariah played on the stairs.

 Sariah tucked Allie into her baby basket for bedtime.

We Have a House

At long last we have closed on our house.  So exciting.

I thought I would develop an ulcer on Friday while we waited for the bank to figure out what the heck it was doing (reassuring, that).  One of my friends commented that it was like waiting for a baby to arrive and being afraid to be told it would be false labor.

BUT at 6:30 on Friday night, we closed, and are now deeply indebted the proud owners of our new home.

So today we moved a load of junk in.  We don't have utilities hooked up yet (because we didn't close until so late), so we just moved a bunch of stuff into the garage and basement.  We want to get the carpets cleaned and a few other things taken care of before we get too far in.

Worn out, but so looking forward to moving all the way in!!

Happy Birthday, Bob!

We threw a party for Bob's birthday. It was his 40th. I wanted to throw a big exciting bash, but one, since I have no house, I had no reasonable venue, and two, since I was supposed to close on my house like everyday for the last 3 weeks, I've been a little preoccupied.  But it was his 40th, so we had to do something out of the ordinary.  I let the kids decorate.

Note to self: 100 feet of danglies is a lot of little danglies.

My son informed me the fans need dusting.  Yeah, yeah.

Here's the birthday boy.  Isn't he handsome?  His coat was really overkill.  It was like 60 degrees outside, but he's always cold.  Hello?  We live in Georgia now!

Further note to self: Jonah-the-Wonder-Dog is afraid of balloons and shiny streamer doorway hanger thingies.  Haha!

Getting creative with the streamers.

Buying these Bose headphones was a funny experience.  I told the sales guy that my husband likes really nice things, and he asked if I meant it, and I said yes, and he dreamily told me that these were the headphones that were desirable.  He had that same look-in-his-eye-drool-on-his-chin that Bob gets over things he likes.  And boy oh boy, does Bob like them ... he is now more plugged in than Hannah.

Goofing off.

Playing with fire.

Not that this is very extraordinary for Bob.

He sure lights things up, doesn't he?

Look at that smoke!  He's so old.

Yummo!

My little Samster cracks me up.  See that green glob that he's shoveling into his mouth as fast as it will go?  It's guacamole.  I'm still giggling over it.  Of the 6 kids, I would say Sam is the pickiest eater.  Some of them had texture issues, some had taste issues.  But Sam just doesn't eat.  And what he eats is cyclical.  Grapes all one week, then he won't touch them again for a month.  Then it's bananas, or mini-saltines, or goldfish.  Then he goes off all of them, and eats nothing.  But one thing he eats predictably is guacamole?  Seriously?  What kid likes guacamole?  I certainly didn't, though I do now, thanks to my mother-in-law's yummy homemade version.  Some of my kids still make terrible retching noises when I make it.

It's always fun to play with your food.

What a happy boy!  Notice how he has completely ignored all the chips on his tray, and the cheesy enchiladas.  Guacamole or nothin', man!

40 Reasons

My sweetheart turned 40 today. That's some exciting stuff. I had hoped to buy him a house for the big day, but alas, the bank was not cooperative ... yet. Meanwhile, I give you 40 reasons I love Bob.

1. Because. He. Is. Bob. (If you know Bob personally, you know exactly what this means.)
2. He makes me laugh. Everyday. Even when I am flaming mad at him.
3. He buys me knives for Christmas.
4. He cleans up puke unflinchingly. Seriously, this is a talent (and one that I don't have).
5. He likes nice stuff. We like nice stuff. We can go into any store for any item and know that what we have agreed on will be the most expensive of its kind without ever seeing a price tag. Yeah, we're good like that.
6. He calls our dogs stupid, and then tells them that he loves them. I don't tell the dogs I love them. Generally because they are really stupid.
7. He drives the Date Car. In my imagination, it's a Nassau blue Corvette. But really it's an economy car with not enough seats for all of our children. Whatever.
8. He "reads" Sandra Boynton's Barnyard Dance book to our toddlers and preschoolers, acts it out with them, AND makes the older kids participate, too.
9. He buys me flowers every now and again, even though he's pretty sure they are dead, and why would he give dead things to his beloved as a token of his affection?
10. He is a miser. Which balances ME out perfectly.
11. Because of Bob, I get to have a topnotch adventure in Georgia.
12. Hannah.
13. Lizzi.
14. Caleb.
15. Rex.
16. Sariah.
17. Sam.
18. Two words: chocolate provider.
19. Knowing that I am a night owl to his early bird, on cold winter nights, he puts the heating pad on my side of the bed for when I show up. Okay, really this is so I don't use him to warm my feet up, but you just have to tweak the perspective a little bit.
20. He bought me a diamond. And he made me get the nicest option even though I would have picked the lesser.
21. He can do almost anything I can do, and 9 times out of 10, he will do it inifintely better, especially floor mopping, toilet cleaning and laundry.
22. He watches chick flicks with me.
23. He feeds my need for books.
24. He survived a year of me being the PTA president. Isn't this akin to winning the IronMan contest?
25. For my every weakness, he has a strength. And vice versa. That's pretty cool.
26. Blood makes him pass out That's so freakin' cute.
27. Technological things like gigabytes and other things I can't pronounce make his day. But so do a set of dumbbells and a cardio machine. We can always appreciate versatility.
28. He paints the girls' nails. Better than I do, but I already said that.
29. He makes me explain the plot of Pride and Prejudice every time he catches me watching it. HE must do that so I can have the joy of talking about my favorite movie, because surely by now he knows the plot by heart, right?
30. He thinks about other people all of the time, especially the poor and the elderly and the weak and the downtrodden. It may not seem so to many, but he thinks about them frequently, and does more quiet acts of kindness than I ever realized when we were only dating.
31. He prays. On his knees. Everyday.
32. He knows the scriptures. Because he studies them everyday.
33. He hugs his kids.
34. He works hard. Everyday. And in spite of constant pain. That says a lot for character right there.
35. Little children love him. Inexpicably. And yet.
36. He isn't afraid to try new things.
37. I don't know why this makes me love him so, but he has had grey hair since the day we met. Makes me look younger, maybe?
38. We have stuck together through the good, the bad, and the ugly. You really don't know exactly what that means until you've been there, but you always know that it means a lot, and that is true.
39. He likes to figure out what makes me happy, and then he keeps it up.
40. He. Is. Bob.

'Nuff said.

More Callaway

Callaway Gardens is free in February (and January, too, I think), so we hung out there yesterday as a family.  Lots of fun.  I know it's a lot of pictures, but we had so much fun, and I love my little ones so much.  **If you click on a picture, you can see it larger, and depending on your operating system, scroll through all of the picture in larger format.  I will also put on FB later this afternoon, so I can tag some of my kiddos.  :)

Who needs fancy dancy plastic weapons when you can use sticks for sword-fighting?

Caleb wasn't feeling cooperative.  Imagine that.

But Hannah was exceptionally cooperative.  :)

 

Hanging out with Virginia Hand Callaway, one of the founders of the Gardens.

Blurry, but she's so beautiful!!