A Whole Year!

I have entered the love/hate relationship that is Facebook, so I've really been neglecting the blog. I've been thinking about the blog recently and realized that it has been my output of the early years of the girls. I hope to print these out one day for the girls to enjoy!

So, not much in our lives has chaged...just our lives as Babygirl has TURNED FOUR!! And, Jellybean is a walking, talking, headstrong, happy, beautiful toddler. This summer has really been a turning point...the girls now do most everything together. Dress-up is a big one. They have a nice collection of pink princess and fairy dresses, complete with purses, jewels, shoes, and other accessories. It's especially fun to see Jellybean prissing around calling everyone "Highness! Highness!" (Hope we got that on film!) The other big strides in our lives is that both girls have learned to swim somehow! Babygirl started off the summer not wanting to put her head underwater. Now, she is diving to the bottom of 3-4 feet of water to get the diving rings. At the beginning of the summer, Jellybean was still not able to get her feet under her if she tripped in a couple feet of water. Now, she is pushing off, getting horizontal, and kicking! At 2-1/2! It's unbelievable. I'm glad I didn't pay for swimming lessons. Seems like they learned more just by being in the water.

I've been working on the DeKalb mapping job since spring of 2007. That project has been on hold since last December. Sooooo, I've been working primarily on projects in the Virginia tidewater area and DC. Same SSES work, mapping, condition assessments, database management. Love it!! Haven't seen a client in over 2 years! Can't beat that! Just kidding... :)

Sales have been slow for Mapgeek since the housing market and construction markets tanked. In the meantime, we now have our first African-American president who is so over the top outrageous in his spending to get us out of the recession and kill capitalism, that markets have started picking up. I just wonder what the monetary difference between how much our taxes are going to go up and the potential money for sales will be. Anyhoooo...

I've forgotten how much I like blogging, especially when I can soapbox and nobody posts a bunch of opinions and then get in a fight on MY pages.

Still haven't done a sprint tri. Still half training for it, though it's hard to find the time to train for three different sports and work and deal with the kids. This is why there are so few women triathletes.

And that is the general goings-on at the moment. I really need some new books to read if anyone has any suggestions. Otherwise, I guess I'll go watch Tivo. Night!

Where does the time go?

And the months come and go. We’ve been busy this summer as always! Jelly Bean is growing like a weed. She’s absolutely beautiful, just like her sister. How I ended up with two girls with straight blond hair and blue and green eyes…I’ll never know!

Babygirl is now 3! Completely potty trained now and hasn’t had one, single accident at night (knock on wood). Her latest obsession is dinosaurs. She saw a Land Before Time movie earlier this spring and it’s been dinosaurs ever since! She got a big Fisher-Price dollhouse for her birthday, and the dinosaurs moved in and took over. Clever girl. She also has discovered jigsaw puzzles. Partly because I found one with dinosaurs on it that was in the clearance bin at the grocery store. Babygirl’s collection has expanded, and she spends hours doing the 100 piece puzzles and can pretty much do them by herself. It’s fascinating watching her mind go!

Jelly Bean started preschool last week. After a summer of Mother’s Morning Out and also the childcare at the gym, she has taken right to getting dropped off for a few hours. The teachers keep them busy doing all kinds of fun things – coloring, eating, playground, etc. She also got a dollhouse this summer and she loves to play with her “house”. Lots of fun to watch the pretend in action.

We joined the local Lifetime Fitness a few months ago. It’s been incredibly motivating to me! After coming to the realization that in order to be in shape, you have to exercise 5 times a week. So, now I’m there almost every day. It’s been wonderful because the staff knows us, which is nice because I don’t really feel like one of the masses. I’ve been doing Peak Pilates, complete with torture devices, as well as running A LOT. At this point, I’m hoping to do a triathlon sometime next year. With their indoor and outdoor pools, I hope to get back in the water soon to start reacclimating.

Mapgeek is working like a dog, doing his quarry sales as well as multiple GIS contracts on the side. I think he loves keeping up with GIS and making all the extra money! But, I’ll have to let him tell you all about that…

Enough with my catch up. I will try to do better at keeping up!

Stop global warming (eat mor chiken)!

This is really funny to me. The politicizing of global warming has gotten so absurd that I don't know how anyone can take it seriously. And I'm so sick and tired of being preached to about "being green" from people that aren't really living the lifestyle anyways. How can you lecture about the public's carbon footprint when you're flying around in a private jet to do so??

And I can't believe that Hillary is allowing the Olympics to go on! She really needs to go over there (or send Jimmy) and negotiate Tibet's freedom from China. And how come all those protesters aren't screaming about worse human rights violations (Sudan, North Korea, etc)?

Friday rant...don't get me really going.

1, 2, 3...PEEEEE!!!

As was bound to happen, you *knew* I was gonna have to blog about it at some point. After months of knock-down drag-outs...Babygirl is finally potty trained (well mostly). I never was getting why she was so against potty training. Screaming, fighting, etc. And that little bugger can HOLD it...like 6 hours. So the whole sitting her down on the potty every half hour didn't work and was flatly miserable.

So, for the last couple weeks, I've been counting down to spring break, when she's at home all week. We've been shopping for new panties, though I never did find ones with bugs on them (her request). This past Saturday, I removed all diapers, pullups, the changing pad, the diaper genie, and the wipes from her room. And she hasn't had an accident all week (knock on wood), though I am still putting her in a "night-time diaper" for bedtime.

The next big hurdles are: using a public restroom; sleeping through the night without using "Mommy I have to pee" as a stalling tactic for staying up; and, the big road trip to Columbia this weekend.

I'll let you know...

Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster

Not to far from the lake house in Kingston, TN. I'm duly impressed with the Crossville people. Wonder what the housing market looks like there in case I get a wild haa're to move!

The Party Goes On…

Wow! Where did the summer go?? After a brief hiatus in July (post-Granddaddy P’s birthday and pre-Mapgeek’s birthday), we decided to head to Panama City Beach for a long weekend. We haven’t been down there in 3 years. One of my college roommates got married and lives down there. KR (or KO) and her husband own a couple of condo’s RIGHT ON THE BEACH! Lucky for us, one of them was available. And now for my shameless plug of her condos...

The condo was absolutely beautiful! And did I mention RIGHT ON THE BEACH? It was a very large 2-bedroom unit with a huge balcony, washer and dryer, huge kitchen, and TVs in every room. It was even setup for high speed internet (though not wifi at the moment). Both sleep 8 (two bedrooms, sofa bed, and bunk beds in a closet off the eating area – hilarious for kids). They recently decided to rent the units themselves, so I’ll post some contact info when I find out.

I love the gulf coast! It’s white, the water is clear, and the strong gulf stream currents are missing. Plus, we ate some fabulous seafood. I strongly recommend eating at Capt. Anderson’s (PCB standard) and a new place called the Boatyard, which was outstanding. We also ate at our old standby – Shuck-ums. Love those oysters! Mapgeek and I even got a couple of dives in one morning. Not quite Cozumel, but it was great to get wet. I’m really looking forward to going back this fall sometime.

Now we're into football season with the Thursday-Monday of nonstop action. *sigh* Fantasy football, college football, blah blah blah. I used to really like football season, but now it just gets on my nerves. It just gets old after 5 straight days. Hopefully, I’ll feel more involved when it starts getting colder, if it ever does. However, living in Georgia is always a treat when I get to proudly say GO COCKS!!

FYBirthday07

Wow! Busy busy BUSY summer! As you may well remember. This year was even more so because we now have our Jelly Bean (Miss 3.0). BTW – I’ve thus rescinded my previous order (did I aleady mention this? I hate to go back and reread) and will now refer to Miss 2.0 in her original context of Babygirl and Miss 3.0 will henceforth be referred to as Jelly Bean (as we lovingly call her). It’s just cuter and we are all about cute.

I decided in my infinite wisdom to have Jelly Bean christened on Mother’s Day. I knew that I’d be hosting, but I wanted it to be extra special because it’s the first Mother’s Day that I had with both my girls. It was beautiful and Jelly Bean is the best. Happy, happy girl. We had the family in (except for brand new parents, Markyjoe and Niknik) and had a great lunch and day in general. Next was birthday overload week, which was a fun week of dining out at great restaurants. Killer Creek for one…my favorite! We ended May with Memorial Day at the lake. Very nice. And I finally got to drive a front end loader (don’t ask and see the pics when I post them). Woohoo!

June started with Babygirl’s second birthday! Amazing how time has flown by. Since we decided to go to Hilton Head Island for a whole week this year, we had Babygirl’s party on Friday. Then we left on Saturday for HHI. Mapgeek and Babygirl have been taking swimming lessons all spring, so it was only natural that we have a pool party. Our neighborhood pool also has a kiddie pool. Perfect! To avoid the weekend crowd at the pool and so we could leave for HHI Saturday morning, we decided to have the party around lunch on Friday. It was great! Guests showed up around 11 and we had cute food (of course). The highlight, in my opinion, was the strawberry cupcakes that I opted for, rather than a boring old cake. They were made from my Great-Aunt Hon’s recipe and were yummy! They were also a huge hit with the crowd.

Our next huge news, which unfortunately coincided with Babygirl’s birthday party, was that Mapgeek got laid off from Pulte. Long story short, we knew that it was most likely going to happen…and it did. Getting laid off was a blessing in disguise. Not many of us have a month off (serverance) to “try out” other things. Mapgeek had an opportunity to work with Papa C and decided that it might be a great opportunity. So, he is now working for Papa C and Markyjoe doing sales for rock crushing/mining/conveyors/etc. Lots more potential for growth than in consulting. However, he will continue to do some contract work in GIS on the side. For homebuilders. At quite a bit more than they were paying him as an employee. Bummer for them.

Next up was the annual Hilton Head trip. Mapgeek and I have decided to start going for the full week every other year. Unfortunately, due to Babygirl deciding to hang out in utero for an extra week, her birthday falls smack in the middle of that week. Every year. Forever and ever Amen. This year was actually our first full week at HHI. It was fabulous! Though, two months later, I can’t remember a single thing that we did. Beach, ate, pool, ate, shopped, ate, etc.

The big deal of the year was that BOTH my parents turned the big SIX-OH this year. My brothers and I decided back in March that we were going to try for a surprise party for them. After much scheduling drama, the first weekend that really made sense was the end of June…a month after Grandmommy P’s birthday and a week before Granddaddy P’s. We all plotted and schemed until my mother started telling me about a surprise party she was thinking of planning for my dad. THE NEXT WEEK!! So, no more surprise for Grandmommy. Which turned out great, because I needed help. From Mom. As usual, of course. The party was great! My dad had no idea. We had it at our neighborhood clubhouse, complete with Dusty’s Barbeque catering (great eastern NC style), and tunes supplied by my Aunt Wufpakgrl. It was especially memorable for me because as long as I can remember, I’ve never attempted to “get” my dad (that I can recall). I think Dads in general are much overlooked by society. I think there should be a whole day dedicated especially to the much loved male members of our family circle. Oh….wait…..

Since the decline of our social and party life, I’ve been sitting around, twiddling my fingers just waiting for the next thing. I don’t know how I survive without pressure. I just LIVE for planning!

Stay tuned….