Introducing Mary Raines & Brooks

Someone likes Mommy’s Cinnamon Rolls

Mon, 15 Dec 2008 16:00:32 -0500

I made some of Pioneer Woman’s Cinnamon Rolls for our neighbors and friends. They turned out really well. We all ate one as soon as I took them out of the oven, totally spoiling our supper. Mary Raines didn’t finish hers but asked that I not throw it away. About an hour later I went back into the kitchen and look who climbed up in Mary Raines’ chair and polished her cinnamon roll off. Way to go Buddy! I call moments like this R-E-V-E-N-G-E. Poor little Brooks puts up with a lot from his sometimes, not so sweet, big sister.

Christmas Card ‘08

Sun, 14 Dec 2008 15:41:03 -0500

One thing Beau and I have learned since having children is that everything takes twice as long as you think. I’m not sure what I was thinking when I thought I could snap a quick Christmas card picture before going to church tonight. Last year Mary Raines was very uncooperative so I expected Brooks to be the problem this year. Nope, he had this same look in every picture and barely made a move. My angel of a daughter wouldn’t be still. Finally I got this one. I sent it to some people and I sent the other one below to others.

Friends

Fri, 12 Dec 2008 15:37:38 -0500

This Friday we had an extra friend come over. Abby is our neighbor next door. She’s two years old so she’s right in between Mary Raines and Brooks as far as age goes. The girls played for a while, but then requested to watch “Tinkerbell”. They sat on the couch like this until their Mom’s came to get them. So cute!

Introducing Olivia!

Fri, 5 Dec 2008 15:12:32 -0500

I know I have mentioned Mary Raines’ friend, Olivia, before. She comes over on Fridays and plays at our house. Today I made some sugar cookies and let the girls paint them with different colors of icing. They were mostly concerned with making enough to share with their whole family. Olivia made enough to give to her family and Mary Raines did the same. Then all the ones that were left over they ate. I don’t think anyone ate lunch that day.

You can take the baby out of Alabama...

Sun, 30 Nov 2008 15:17:36 -0500

but you can’t take the Bama out of the baby. What a season for the Crimson Tide! Finally we are having a good season. The kids proudly wore their Alabama outfits to church this Sunday. Although we have several Alabama & Auburn fans at our church, here in Virginia, it probably doesn’t receive the attention it would in Alabama. So we’ll be obnoxious on our blog and say “Roll Tide Roll!!!”
They were not in the mood to cooperate for this picture at all. I love how Brooks is flashing the camera.

Mary Raines is our cheerleader. I’m pretty impressed with how diligently she watches the game. She knows when a touch down is scored and she’ll say “first down”. Brooks runs around and claps during the whole game and raises his
arms and says “touch down”. Surprisingly Beau doesn’t get annoyed with
all the noise during the game.

Celebratory Hug

Halloween 2008

Sat, 1 Nov 2008 16:12:44 -0400

When we got home from Cox Farm it was time for dinner and baths in preparation for trick-or-treating. It was a toss-up if Mary Raines was going to get to go. She wouldn’t eat any of her supper. She’s stubborn that way you know. So I went on and on about how much fun Brooks was going to have getting candy. I thought for sure she would break...we had been talking about this for weeks. She has tried her costume on daily for at least a month! Brooks got bathed and dressed. Still not one bite was eaten. Our door bell was ringing every few minutes, kids were dressed and getting candy. Finally her friend Abby from next door came over. When we closed the door and Abby walked away Mary Raines said, “Mama I think I want to eat a little”. Hallelujah! She managed to eat about three bites. We got her dressed and off we went.
Mary Raines had it down pat from the get-go. Brooks tried to barter with folks at the beginning. He would pull out candy from his pillowcase and offer it for a piece of their candy. Mary Raines would fuss at him and say “that’s wrong Buddy”. After a few tries he got the hang of it and we trick-or treated for about an hour. When we got home they dumped their loot out and each got to eat one thing (or three, who’s counting?).

Cox Farm 2008

Sat, 1 Nov 2008 15:52:05 -0400

Our Halloween Day started off with a visit from our friend Olivia. After Olivia went home we had our next activity of the day. Cox Farm! As the kids get older things are so much more fun. We had a blast at the Farm. The weather was perfect. It was sunny and in the high 60’s. We took a picnic and enjoyed some fresh kettle corn. But the real fun was all the big slides and the corn maze. I think Brooks’ favorite thing was the goats. He loved them. Well, that and all the tractors. There wasn’t hardly anyone there I guess because it was Halloween day so we played hard. We petted cows, pigs, goats and chickens. We went on the hayride and we watched a pumpkin launch. We did everything they had to offer. When we left the kids fell asleep in the car. I started to doze a little too.

Back-blogging

Sat, 1 Nov 2008 15:24:24 -0400

My goal this weekend is to catch up my blog aka back-blog. As you can see from the picture above I live in a crazy household where there is always a mess to clean or a fight to break up. Many of my readers share the same daily experiences as I do and somehow manage to keep up their blogs so I’m going to try harder to do a better job. Plus Beau has offered me some pretty good incentive gifts if I’ll do better. So here goes. Below are some random pictures over the past few months.
The biggest milestone that was reached was Brooks walking. He finally decided to give it a try. Brooks had gone all summer without wearing shoes. One day Beau decided to put some tennis shoes on him and lo & behold the boy walked! Really, it was as if he had been waiting for shoes to walk. He didn’t really teeter or fall down, he just started walking and hasn’t stopped. Check my movie section for a short clip of him walking at the park.
We’ve got a pretty full schedule here this fall. I’m doing MOPs again and am part of the steering committee this year. My job is to line up guest speakers once a month. The girl who did it last year acted as if it was no big deal. It’s not a huge deal, but it is more time consuming than I anticipated. We have Mops every Wednesday. They have childcare so it’s a nice 2 hour break where the kids get to play with other children their age. On Thursdays we are doing Mom’s Morning Out. Me and six other moms take turns watching each other’s children at a church nearby. So twice every seven weeks me and another mom watch all the kids. The other five weeks I get two hours to myself. I usually come home and clean house because it’s so much easier when the house is empty. The kids love it because they get to play with lots of other kids and they have snack. That is always the highlight of MMO. Lastly a friend of mine, Rachel has a little girl named Olivia who is a few months older than Mary Raines. We take turns watching each others kids once a week. Olivia comes here on Friday mornings and my kids (usually just Mary Raines) go to her house on Mondays. Mary Raines and Olivia are pretty tight. It’s especially fun to go to Olivia’s house because she has another sister so they have lots of girly toys. They usually play dress-up and Mary Raines gets pretty upset when she has to give the outfits back. I usually run errands and take Brooks with me. Nobody wants a little brother around to disrupt dress-up! So as you can see, we have lots going on and we’re making lots of good friends.

Congratulations Kelli & Kyle

Tue, 26 Aug 2008 21:48:38 -0400

They’re getting married!! Woohoo!! We are so excited. My kids won’t know life without Kyle because he’s been around since they were born. Kelli & Kyle are the perfect couple and we couldn’t be more happy. Beau’s glad to have another guy around for my Mom to put to work. So mark your calendars for June 27, 2009 for their BIG DAY. Yours Truly will be a bridesmaid but more importantly Mary Raines & Brooks will make their wedding party debut. Debba already has their outfits. No pressure huh? Come spring we will be in full wedding planning mode. Congrats Kelli & Kyle. We love you guys!

Florida College Freshman

Tue, 19 Aug 2008 22:47:04 -0400

I can’t believe my baby sister is in college. Beau remembers the first time he met her. My parent’s drove to Tampa to visit me my freshman year and Beau and I were dating. Something happened with their flight so they packed up my Mom’s enormous black Cadillac and drove. When they finally got to FC my relatively young family pulled up in this old woman Cadillac and out pops Kerrie with her crazy hair. It was a match made in heaven...for she and Beau that is. They have this neat relationship. Maybe it’s because they are the youngest in their family, or maybe it’s because they’re more of the free-spirit type, I don’t know but they’re pretty close as far as brother and sister-in-laws go. Beau thinks of her as a little sister because when they first met she had just turned six. She pestered the stew out of us but Beau put up with it. (Kelli just invited all her giggly girlfriends over to talk about how cute he was.) Over the years Beau’s enjoyed harassing her boyfriends or embarrassing her at school functions. I’ve been lucky enough to be around her quite a bit in the past few years and I’m so glad she’s been able to spend so much time with my children. Mary Raines & Brooks love their Ree. So, Ree, good luck this year. We’ll be sending you lots of goodies in the mail.

**Kerrie has a blog so she can share the fun stories of her college experience. Check it out:
Kerrie’s Blog