Happy Birthday!

She woke up this morning with pretty pink flowers in her ears (yes, last night she had her ears pierced - her gift from mom and dad!) and a huge smile on her face. We have found her several times sitting in the sink in the bathroom staring at her ears in the mirror and giggling.

A lunch trip with mom to McD's provided time for lots of joke telling and laughing. She had the employee's wrapped around her little finger... they gave her cookies and ice cream and sang to her. Anna sure felt very special.

We headed off to pick up some My Little Pony plates for tonight and of course, as Anna said, "Every birthday party needs balloons (and party hats and a birthday tiara and decorations - all of which I was able to talk her out of)"

Back at home Julia came home from school and so it was present time! Julia picked out a couple of outdoor toys and beach toys (a bucket, shovel, playground ball, sidewalk chalk and bubbles) and Anna was very excited.

She was also quite excited to find a bike under a sheet in the kitchen from her Meemaw and Poppa. She has been outside riding around ever since....

Tonight it's dinner with a friend at Chuck E Cheese... complete with chocolate cupcakes with chocolate frosting, a candle with the number 4 and a birthday song.

You are my Sunshine...

Happy Birthday to my sweet girl. You truly are my little sunshine.

Over and over and over

There is this song I keep picking up in the car when I'm by myself (because that's the only time I get to listen to what I want to listen to) and it is super annoying. It is one of those songs that just repeats and repeats and repeats.

The same chorus line over and over and over and over and over.

I have to admit that I love this song. It's annoying and repetitive, but it's beautiful and simple. It stays with me.

Of course it is John Mayer.

Here are the lyrics... but without the repetitive chorus...

"Take out of your wasted honor,
Every little best frustration,
Take out all your so called problems,
Better put them in quotations

Say what you need to say

Walkin like a one man army
Fightin with the shadows in your head
Living out the same old moment
Knowing you’d be better off instead
If you could only

Say what you need to say

Have no fear for giving in
Have no fear for getting older
You better know that in the end
Its better to say too much
Than to never say what you need to say again

Even if your hands are shaking
And your faith is broken
Even as the eyes are closing
Do it with a heart wide open
Why?

Say what you need to say ……………"

So much to say...

I don't know how to share just a little. Perhaps that is my overwhelming personality flaw. It manifests itself in so many ways.

The truth is, I just don't know how to converse in small talk. I love to tell stories and I frequently spill the back story, front story and side stories to tell that one story. Some would say I'm an "oversharer" others would say I'm a talker. Frequently I do this when nervous or anxious, but I'm just as likely to do it with people I'm comfortable with. I love to hear other peoples stories too, in fact, other peoples stories are utterly fascinating to me. I just don't' know how to listen with out empathizing and when I empathize I try to bridge that gap between here and there with yet more stories of my own. Because I get it... you know. I just don't get that sometimes listening doesn't require the level of empathy I work at.

What the???

I know.

The point here is that I have so much to share. So many little and HUGE things are happening to my family right now, but I don't know how to say it in pieces right now. I'm having a hard time separating the little important stories from the big ones. It will come I'm sure, but in the mean time I just might be quiet.

Obviously not for long, because come on, when have I ever really been quiet, right?

Anna, anna, anna

Conversation overheard between Anna and her dad today...

"Anna, you need to stop picking boogers."

"And eating dem"

"Yes, and eating them."

"But Dad, I like to."

"It can give you germs since your little hands are always dirty."

"But Dad, boogers are like fwowers."

"Flowers?? wha??"

"Boogers are like fwowers, the just keep growing in your nose"

Julia is a beautiful fairy

Julia's first play was last night. She was a beautiful fairy in a take on Sleeping B*eauty.

She remembered her lines and delivered them like a pro. Ok, the first two or three were barely a whisper and she looked petrified for the first five minutes, but once she loosened up she did great.

Her sisters were less than entertained and Dan ended up chasing them up and down the hall outside while I repped for our family and dutifully took lots and lots of photos.

After the play (which was a huge success and should probably end up on Broadway very soon) Julia posed for more photos. While she changed and Anna went potty, I took Emma outside to wait.

Local high schools were battling it out on the lacrosse field across the parking lot and Em and I headed over there to watch.

I am endlessly fascinated with Lacrosse. We have sticks and have attempted to play and get the girls into it - but I am hopeless. Lets just say I'm amazed by it, it's the equivalent of running at full speed and trying to catch a ping pong ball in a dixie cup. Difficulty level - 10.

I was a bit entranced and didn't notice my little girl (in floofy little layered tutu type skirt, pretty delicate little sweater and riding boots) run out on to the track and head straight for the field. I am wearing a high wedge shoe for the first time this Spring and lets just say that my chasing after her was at a Difficulty level of 8.

It got even worse because once she knew I was coming after her she ran faster and in an effort to escape my closing grasp, she started going in the typical two year old zig-zap pattern of elusion. This ups the difficulty level to a definite 10. I did finally nab her and haul her screaming off the track (of course there was applause, come on people!!).

It did dawn on me that Emma just might be able to play lacrosse, she has some mad skills.

Commercial Anna, part II

Anna came up to me last night to tell me she was getting me "PWOPOWERS" for Mother's Day.

"They have YOTS of colors and are bee-yoo-tee-ful"

"What honey?"

"PWOPOWERS. Yike what we buyed for Julia"

"Flowers?"

"No, PWOPOWERS"

Lightbulb moment, "Do you mean PRO FLOWERS?"

"Yes, PWOPOWERS. I'm totawy getting dose for you"

The mighty Sprout commercials strikes again.

Everybody is a WEINER!

Ok - When I was a teen, there was a banner, "good sports are winners" at my High School. Someone marked it up and it ended up reading "good sports are weiners" for a couple of days before someone took it down. My mom and I found this endlessly funny and have made many a "good sports are weiners" jokes over the years.

I think the local softball group here has perhaps taken the idea of "good sports" a tad too far. Everyone is a good sport, because EVERYONE is a WINNER. There are no outs. When it's time to bat, they bat the entire line up. When they go out on the field, they ALL go out on the field. There are no strikes - the coach pitches the ball until the batter hits it (sometimes 10-15 pitches).

Julia's "game" the other night was ridiculous. They played three innings and it was over 2 hours long. I thought maybe they were playing that way because it was the first game, and some of the kids hadn't even had a practice yet, but no. Apparently this is how they play ball at 7-8 years old.

I am not one of those ultra competitive parents. Really, I'm not. I'm all for teaching good sportsmanship (being a gracious winner, not being a sore loser, not throwing bats/helmets/gloves in frustration, shaking hands with your opponents, playing by the rules... I'm all for that, you could even say I'm a bit of a stickler for these things). I believe everyone at this age should get a turn to play. I believe in coach's pitch. I might even be persuaded to believe in no strikes for this age. I could even go along with not officially keeping score (although everyone always knows who wins).

I just think playing the game the way they are is a dis-service to our daughters.

How are they supposed to learn the play of the game if there isn't any game play? Why sign your kid up for a competitive sport if you are afraid of letting them compete? Your daughter might not get a hit each time, but she doesn't feel like an idiot having to take 15 pitches to hit a dinker. Your daughter might get called out at first, but imagine how amazing she'll feel the first time she makes it there on her own.

I don't think this set up allows them to understand the various positions, the flow of the game, correct batting technique, the rules of the game.... and so on and on and on. It's good for skills practice, but it's not a game, it's not preparing them for the next league.

I think we are cheating our girls by forcing them to play like this, I think it makes us all look like weiners.

I'll post more on this insanity later... she is so cute!

For a limited time only...

I love me some Sprout. Good old PBS with crazy hosts thrown in. LOVE IT. No matter what time of day it is, my kids can find something on Sprout to entertain them for 15-30 minutes.

The suckfest is that Sprout has commercials. Commercials for adults (apparently we're not supposed to dump them in front of Angelina Ballerina and then make a mad dash to empty the dishwasher, or change the laundry over or go potty (yes, I said Potty, get over it). We are supposed to sit there and be amazed by the goings on of PBS entertainment and exciting commercials.

I think Anna might have seen one two many infomercial style ads (if you call now, we'll not only DOUBLE your order, but we'll triple it!).

Yesterday while I was hanging out working on the computer, Anna says to me, "Mommy, are you happy?"

I said, "Sure, Mommy's happy" thinking to myself I must have looked pretty involved in that spreadsheet if she thought I was sad.

Anna's response, "Well mommy, if you aren't happy, you can get your money back."

Yeah, maybe just a little too much Billy Mays (oxi-clean sales guy).

I have spent the last two weekends ridding myself of things. Trash, paperwork, the kids old toys, my old books... the trash, the recyling and the donation. I'm still amazed as to how much we have and how sentimental I STILL am. It's much, much better - but I think we need to do it again in a couple of weeks once I see how nice it is to live without so many THINGS.

As surprised as I have been about the things I want to hold on to, it has been equally surprising to me the things I have chosen to rid myself of. I feel so much lighter because of it. Tomorrow we are going from a 10x30 storage unit to a 10x15 unit (it was $5 more than the 10x10 and we figured the extra space would make it more usable). THat's a lot of stuff. We would like to be consolidated with all of our things in a 10x10 by the end of Fall (including our stuff from AZ). That would be wonderful!

So, I spent a lot of time reading old notes today. Some from friends (Hey Stephanie!!) and many, many, many to and from Dan. From early on in our relationship (9th grade ya'll), to our tumultuous teen years to when he was away in the Marine Corps. The Dear John letter (that broke his heart), and cards we have exchanged over the years.

There was a batch of notes/letters from the end of my Senior year, and I immediately returned to that time. Dan was dating someone else and I was terrified I had pushed him away for good this time. I read each letter while holding my breath. I wanted to go back and give the 17 year old me a hug. I wanted to reassure her that letting him go was the best thing she could do. That when the pain stopped, she would finally realize how much she loved him and for the right reasons. That she would have 3 beautiful little girls with him.

Ahhh Drama.