Tonight before bath, mama decided to trim up the mullet on the back of my head. This is what I looked like before.
She was having such a good time trimming that she decided to continue to the rest of my head. Maybe it was because she always wanted to try to cut hair and a three-year-old isn't going to care how bad it looks afterward. Maybe it was payback for when I peed on the floor this afternoon.
Here's the finished result....
Hey, who's that charming guy?
Granted, it's no Grandma cut, but I don't think it's too bad for a first time stylist.
We don't want to jump to conclusions, but June might be a genius- despite the fact she's the only kid in the family who still isn't talking.
Mama noticed this last week (ask Aunt Jenni). June likes to play with the 3 different alphabet puzzles we own and especially likes to carry the pieces around. We've begun to notice that she especially likes the F's. We first thought it was a coincidence, but not after she brought two F's to supper last night. Start setting up her scholarship fund, Harvard.
Despite her vast cerebral abilities, June still enjoys the simple things in life- like sweet corn. We're very glad she figured out how to eat it correctly instead of just sucking on the end of it like a popsicle.
And check out that cute hair barrette. Mama scored a 6 pack of animal barrettes at the dollar store.
We found a better solution to June's indoor shoe problem. She didn't like the red slippers, so mama pulled out a pair of ballet flats that Mister Andy and Miss Christina got her last April. Good news! She's finally a size 4! (For those of you who don't know baby shoe sizes, most kids are in size 4s well before their first birthday. Our friend Audrey wears a size 6 extra wide. Sadie's probably in a size 8 by now- which is also my shoe size.) And yes, that is a cape that June is wearing. It's my Batman/Superman cape that I've never worn willingly but she now loves.
This morning, I had the best idea- a book party. It involves piling books in June's crib and reading quietly. The perk? I got to go in June's crib too. Mama was going to veto the idea but then she asked what she did during a book party. I told her she had to sit on the bed and check her email on the computer. Sold.
We looked at books for a half hour before we started jumping and got kicked out of the crib.
Mama took the opportunity of quiet kids to finish taking pictures of our house. Here's our room.
We share because it's pretty big and we're best friends.
I like my room because it has a desk in it. Right now it's piled up with stuff because we're waiting to move some new dressers in the room and don't want to hang anything up until we know how everything is going to fit.
Here's mama and papa's room. They got that headboard at the Sauder's outlet and it was advertised as full/queen. It's waaaay to big for their bed, so mama put it up on Craigslist this afternoon.
They have two closets.
The hallway between our rooms. You'll recall from the last set of pictures that the upstairs is only on the back side of the house. What mama likes best about it is that the whole front of the house is a walk in attic accessed by a door in the hallway and a door in our room. Already it is so much more convenient than the pull down ladder at our old house.
Henry's really come into his own lately, and thanks largely to workbooks, he's been calming down and able to concentrate quietly for long periods of time. Last night he found a box of vehicle stencils and was busy tracing them for an hour this morning.
Of course, there are times when he can't entertain himself- namely when I'm changing June's diaper, putting her to bed, trying to fix supper, or trying to take my 20 minute afternoon nap (he always wakes up just after I lie down).
He's becoming very self-sufficient and can use the potty on his own- though he doesn't like to. He'd rather we pull up his pants for him. He remains the one kid I know who has no desire to undress and dress himself, but he will do it if he has to.
He's very loyal to his little sister, but that doesn't stop him from and occasional push or toy-grabbing. But overall, they get along surprisingly well. June is finally getting to an age where she doesn't demolish everything (namely his train tracks) immediately upon entering a room, but does get in his way sometimes which results in lots of yelling.
He's a delightful id to have around with a few exceptions. He NEVER stops talking, which really wears you out. He's starting to compare mama and papa. For example, mama won't switch albums on her Zune when we're driving in the car. Once we've picked an album (in the driveway), that's what we're staying with (especially since we only drive about 7 minutes at a time). So no flipping from the Beach Boys to Johnny Cash to the Kinks. But papa will change songs on the MP3 player to any song Henry wants to listen to. "Why don't you change it mama? Papa always changes it to my song. I want to ride with Papa next time."
And perhaps Henry's worst vice right now is the already huge amount of guilt that he inherited from his father and the Parsons side of the family. Henry will apologize for just about anything. "Pick up the spoon you dropped" "Okay, sorry for dropping my spoon." He really amped it up one day when we were coming in from outside and he pushed June down the step in the garage. I yelled at him and told him to go park cars in the spare bedroom- which is where he was racing June. I found him five minutes later crying in the bedroom and he sobbed to me and said "It really hurt my ears when you yelled at me." I felt pretty bad, so I apologized for yelling. He picked up on this as a pretty good way to get out of being in trouble, so now everytime he gets sent to time out, the tears flow and his ears hurt from my yelling. His main fault is that his ears hurt even when I don't yell. If I ask him to carry his dishes to the counter he responds "It really hurt my ears when you yell like that, mama." Sorry kid, you just lost all sympathy.
We had a great weekend, but neglected to take many pictures. Henry's feeling better and went back to school on Friday, though he continues to insist that he's sick and demands medicine every time he coughs. (Nice try, buster.)
On Friday morning, the exterminator came and sprayed the inside and outside of our house with a cocktail of chemicals that he insisted were harmless, but "don't let the kids touch them while they're still wet." We are glad to report that there's only been one Palmetto sighting since, and it was a slow moving roach that showed up on Friday afternoon and had pretty obviously already been affected by the spray. Mama sprayed it with Raid (which is not a pretty sight to watch) and vacuumed it up. Henry then insisted on setting up his train track on the spot of the chemical holocaust (who is Raid kidding with their "Country Fresh" scent?) and we've probably all lost enough brain cells to set us back a few months in our development. But at least we don't have any more bugs.
Mama is getting tired of me carrying shoes around the house (I refuse to observe the strict "No Shoes on the Carpet" policy), so she got out a pair of Henry's old slippers. I don't know what she's thinking. Who would give up pretty sparkly slippers and fun flowered rain boots in favor of fuzzy red boy slippers? Whatever, mom.
On Friday night, we went to bed with the promise that we'd have visitors on Saturday morning. And we did! We woke up to find our favorite Miss Susan and Mister Paul asleep in the guest room and mumbling something about having only given up playing Beatles Rock Band 4 hours earlier. When are these grown-ups going to learn to stop playing video games all night because we're not going to sleep in for them? Despite the rainy weather (that's been going for a week), papa and Mister Paul headed on to campus to try and get tickets for the Clemson-Boston College football game. They had a great time, but the game was delayed due to lightening in the 3rd quarter and the stadium was cleared as a safety precaution.
The rest of us set out to find something fun to do. We succeeded in getting lost and found one of the few remaining gas stations in the country with old dial pumps (where does the credit card go?) and an old chain-smoking lady working the cash register inside. She told us we should go check out some big flea market east of Anderson. Mama decided no one was going to take a nap and we headed over to find the flea market. It was massive and boasted only one rule "Pay us $8 and you can sell anything you want." There was a farmers market, a whole section of puppies being sold out of laundry baskets, many Michael Jackson Tribute shirts, tons of "As Seen on TV" products, and even a mini donut booth. I really wanted to stay and look at the table with obscure Pixar Cars' cars, but mama made the mistake of coming to the flea market without any cash. We did scrape together enough change to buy snow cones before we left. I got banana, mama got strawberry, and Miss Susan got blue raspberry. June was asleep in the stroller and we didn't tell her that we stopped for treats.
On Sunday, mama took the opportunity to dress June up, since it was still raining, so there wasn't a chance to go outside and get dirty. We found a restaurant in Anderson that was playing the Benglas game (most of South Carolina is dry on Sunday, but Anderson is one of the few towns that allows bars to open). Henry and I were very good at the restaurant for the whole first half of the game. I played with toys in my high chair and Henry colored a special project for PawPaw. We got to eat lunch there too. (Mama loves bar food.) We didn't get home until after 3, so we took really late naps. This worked out well, because mama and papa let us stay up late because PawPaw was going to talk to us on the webcam at 9. I spent most of the time trying to type on the computer, but Henry had a nice conversation with PawPaw that quickly evolved into Henry running across the room, so PawPaw could see him saumersault on to the couch wearing nothing but his underpants. I think PawPaw thought it was funny.
Mama's still trying to get a decent picture of Henry. She's worried he might run away from home, and we'll only be able to give the police pictures of him in his underpants. And the way he and mama are getting along today, he might run away from home sooner than we think.
Since we got to stay up until 9:30, and didn't really fall asleep until after 10, we've been quite a handful for mama. Henry got sent to nap early for hitting me with a car. Then he really tested mama's patience by calling for her, so he could discuss a matchbox car he found in bed. This has become increasingly common lately, so mama said it was bedtime and he lost all of his books because bedtime does not meaning calling mama upstairs 10 times to talk. Henry cried and asked for Papa to come home because Papa would let him read books. Mama responded that papa is at work, so he was stuck with her. This just made Henry cry more. We sure have the meanest mom ever.
Finally, here's a video of me dancing. Papa and Bubba were on campus last night getting some work done, so I took the opportunity to dance without the threat of getting tackled. (By the way, here's proof that we do pick up the 97,000 puzzle pieces every night.)
I couldn't handle looking at that gross spider every time I opened the blog, so here's a quick update and a much nicer picture.
Henry's feeling much better now. He still has a bit of cough and a runny nose, but we proclaimed him healthy enough to go back to school today. He must have felt better because his teacher said he ran around the whole time. He did get a sticker today- for being quiet during circle time! Rumor has it that not many kids got the sticker today. This is really quite an accomplishment for Sir Talks-A-Lot.
Henry's been surprising us at night and during nap time by coming out of his room. But he never comes down stairs. After the first night, we asked what he was doing and he said he was going into the bathroom to blow his nose. Poor kid. We also think there's some illegal book trading going on after hours because June's books keep ending up in Henry's bed. He told me that June gives them to him.
It looks like June is coming down with the cold now. I never understood what Grandma Cooper meant when she said a kid gets sick in the eyes until June came along. She's had seeping, crusty eyes all day. Hopefully, her flu is over as quick as Henry's.
Yesterday, we just hung out at home, because Henry came down with the flu and couldn't go to school. He had a nasty cough that kept everyone up most of the night and a fever. We don't think it was the big one because he's already feeling better today thanks to some powerful cough medicine. Mama is hoping for H1N1 to hit soon, because it's inevitable that we'll get it thanks to the fact that we are going to be regularly exposed to the germs of a preschool and a college campus (that already has over 150 confirmed cases). She figures we should just get in now while we still have our summer strength instead of this winter when we're compromised by harsh 50 degree temperatures.
Mama walked into the living room to big this doozy of a spider last night. We tried to find a ruler, but had to use this pencil for reference. That is terrifying huge.
`Here's papa ready to pounce on the kill. This spider was fast and ran under the mama was standing on before mama could catch it. The exterminators come tomorrow morning.
Mama needed a picture of Henry to send to his school. She was looking through our archives when she realized that we only have pictures of Henry looking down at his workbooks or toys or acting goofy with someone else. We had to go back to early August to find a picture of Henry in a truck that worked, even though Henry wasn't looking at the camera.
' This one is nice, if you don't count that Henry is standing with his hands down the back of his underpants. Why are they on inside out, you ask? Because this morning, mama was upstairs getting me dressed (I slept in until 9). She could here me downstairs yelling, but was choosing to ignore the old fashioned Seibert intercom system. When we got downstairs, we were surprised that Henry was in the bathroom washing his hands. He went to the potty all by himself! We were impressed because Henry suffered from "I can't pull up my my pants by myself" syndrome. He got his pants and underpants back on, but mama had to take this picture when they were getting dressed and she saw his underpants were on inside out. All that matters is that they're on, right?
We hung out at home today. Bubba is coming down sick with a cold and that means just about anything will make him cry. Including me touching him or looking at his toys.
Luckily, after I drove cars on his train track, I left him alone so I could play with my dolls and look cool in my glasses.
I love my glasses. I put them on first thing in the morning and only take them off when I go to bed. I even wear them when I eat.
Mama thinks I'm really starting to act like a little girl. Today, I was rooting though all the toys (and throwing them all over the floor) and picked one up, brought it to mama and said clear as day "Fish!"
Here's a video of us tonight. After we dumped every toy out, we played a game Henry called "chase tag." All I know is that it's super fun. We played for over 25 minutes.
My biggest fear about the south (maybe just below the whole family lapsing into southern accents) has been the threat of enormous bugs. Thanks to our overactive condo association in North Carolina, our house was always well sprayed and only had to worry about some ants and an occasional spider. I can handle that.
What I can't handle is the Palmetto bug. Basically, Palmetto is the southern, gentile way of saying "There are cockroaches EVERYWHERE." I shouldn't get too out of hand, because we've come across 5 in the past week. I called our real estate agent for advice and when I told her we had Palmetto bugs, she was worried we'd opened a cabinet and hundreds came spilling out. (God help me if that ever happens.) I called the exterminator and they said it's normal this time of year. The weather is cooling down and it's very dry due to the drought, so the cockroaches are trying to get inside. Yippee.
(I'm not putting up a picture of them, because it gets me too worked up to look at them, even in picture form, so if you want to see one, google it.) We (I) have been lucky enough that each sighting has been when Brandon was home. Henry did find one on Sunday when Brandon was gone, but it was flipped over on its back and wouldn't move with any lights on, so we kept it stunned in the bathroom until Brandon got back.
But today when I took Henry upstairs for his nap, we found one sitting on the ceiling of the kids' bedroom (our first sighting upstairs- I probably won't sleep tonight). I tried to keep my cool when we saw it. I don't want the kids growing up to be scared of seemingly harmless things, so I try to downplay my complete abhorrence of bugs. (First, it's not that I'm scared of them, I just don't like squishing them. Second, this is also the philosophy I take when I have to touch dogs. I think dogs are dirty. I don't want them to lick me, but I'll let it happen so my kids don't grow up with weird phobias. One exception- butterflies. I will never let one touch me if I have anything to do about it.)
So we went downstairs, got the vacuum, lugged it back upstairs and tried to suck the little devil off the ceiling. Now, if anyone has ever dealt with the American cockroach, you'll know these suckers are fast. I believe Brandon read somewhere that if they were the size of humans (cripes!), they would be able to run at 220 miles/hours. That's fast. So I knocked down the bug instead of getting it on the first shot, then chased it around the room until it ran- of all places- under Henry's bed. Henry's meanwhile was standing on a chair yelling "Suck it up! It's getting away!"
So we proceed to pull Henry's entire bed apart. We pull the mattress off, followed by the box springs. Of course, there are about 50 books under Henry's bed. We carefully lift each book up- and never find the stinking Palmetto bug. We stripped all 4 layers of sheets and mattress pads off his bed and nothing. We moved the bookshelf by his bed and cleaned all the books off it of- still no bug. I have no idea where this thing could have gone.
Finally we had to give up and put everything back together. Henry concluded it must have run out the window (which was closed). I heard they can squeeze through anything, so who knows where it is. I do feel bad putting Henry to bed up there, but he doesn't seem to mind. Hopefully he doesn't wake up with it running across his face.
Oh, and the exterminators are coming on Friday. We've already scheduled our next 4 quarterly appointments.
She was having such a good time trimming that she decided to continue to the rest of my head. Maybe it was because she always wanted to try to cut hair and a three-year-old isn't going to care how bad it looks afterward. Maybe it was payback for when I peed on the floor this afternoon.
Hey, who's that charming guy?
