Introducing Mary Raines & Brooks

Halloween 2009

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 22:01:26 -0600

It feels like we celebrated Halloween the entire month of October. That’s not a complaint...we enjoyed it. All the families from church got together the weekend before Halloween and had a Trunk or Treat. It was so much fun and I was so surprised at how many kids were there. We grilled hot dogs and had a potluck. Then the kids got to trick or treat at the various families’ cars. We got way too much candy!! There were 3 Tinkerbells, including Mary Raines, but only on Peter Pan. Despite Beau’s disdain, Brooks sported brown tights and was content as could be.
As for the actual Halloween night, we went trick or treating for about an hour. It was actually a very cold night so the kids were ready after an hour. Earlier in the day we passed a house with all sorts of Halloween decorations. The kids wanted to stop so we told them after trick or treating we would go by. It was so neat. This family had a mini haunted house and spooky music among other things. There were people everywhere. Their neighbors were grilling out and had a moonbounce! The kids were in heaven. We rang the doorbell to trick or treat and the lady said, “hold on, I’ll be right back”. Then she came out with two Halloween buckets for the kids. She said they won the Cutest Costume awards. They were oblivious but loved their gifts. That pretty much made the evening. Well, that and the fact that it was the end of Daylight Savings and we got an extra hour of sleep.

Halloween 2008

Sat, 1 Nov 2008 15:12:44 -0500

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 14:52:05 -0500

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 14:24:24 -0500

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 20:48:38 -0500

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 21:47:04 -0500

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

Officially Empty Nesters

Mon, 18 Aug 2008 21:32:14 -0500

Well, their youngest has finally left the nest. Kerrie went to Florida College to start off her freshman year. I won’t even get into how different things are for her versus how they were for me when I was there. Nevermind, that my computer had a dot matrix printer, or that I didn’t have a cell phone, or I got no allowance. I guess the one good thing about my pitiful status is that no one ever asked to borrow or use any of my things. Anyway, I’ve had a really hard time with Kerrie going to college. I think it’s because it hit me that my two babies will go off to school in a two year period. My parents shipped me off in 1995 and took their youngest to school in 2008. They had 13 years to get used to the quietness. Then I think about how lonely Brooks will be that one year while Mary Raines is gone. THEN I think about how much trouble they’ll get into when they’re at FC together and all the secrets they’ll keep from Beau and I. (Yes, they don’t have a choice, they will go to Florida College for at least a semester!) It’s hard being a parent!

Curious George Movie

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 20:39:30 -0500

Jennifer & the boys were in DC for a long weekend so they came to our house for a few days afterwards. It is always so much fun when they are here. Mary Raines & Will play surprisingly well together. In just a few more months Brooks & Andrew will be playing together too, which will really liven the visits up. The highlight of their visit with us would have to be going to see “Curious George” at the movie theater. “Curious George” is Mary Raines’ absolute favorite movie. She’s only seen it on DVD, so when it came up on the big screen she was super excited & surprised. Tucker joined us too, so our row was full of kids.

Evening on the Mall

Fri, 18 Jul 2008 20:29:38 -0500

We’ve been saying all summer that we want to go to DC in the evening and see the monuments when they are lit up. After a really hectic day we decided it would be good to get out and enjoy some fresh air. Brooks was sleepy early because he didn’t nap all day, so we put him to bed and our neighbors were gracious enough to come over and hang out at our house. So, Mary Raines, Beau & I went out for pizza then walked around the National Mall and the Capital. The last time I was at the Capital was pre 9-11, so we were able to walk up the stairs and get close. Things are different now. You cannot walk up any of the stairs and there is security everywhere. It was still beautiful and so huge. I had forgotten what a big building it is. Mary Raines enjoyed having us all to ourselves and she ran around explored all sorts of things. Although we didn’t see any of the monuments, it was still a really nice evening and hopefully we can do the monuments in the fall.

New Smyrna Beach 2008

Fri, 4 Jul 2008 22:51:46 -0500

We had a really great time at the beach this year. The kids were so good and of course, it’s always nice being with family because that means EXTRA HANDS!!