One Christmas pic

Here are John and cousin Katie working on her awesome workbench from Santa. We found out that Katie is going to be a cardiologist-LPGA champion, as well as a carpenter. Christopher privately asked me why we haven't started his college applications yet... I had no answer.

Boys in the Tub

And finally, one with the lighting the way I wanted it!

Big Night Out!

Hey everyone. This is Kerri from The Naptime Blog. I am guest posting here on Screamin John because I was the only one who took pictures of The Big Night Out. What was The Big Night Out? Well, as many of your know, SOMEONE had a birthday. I am not going to say who or how old that person was, but because there was a birthday there had to be a party. Now, this someone planned and hosted this whole event, so the least I could do is take pictures and blog about it.

The evening started around 6pm. We met at our host's house for a pre-Big Night Out drink and snacks:


And here were our lovely hosts! Great dress!


Now, I shipped my kids off to Grandma and Papa's for the evening. But everyone else's kids also gathered until their respectively babysitters were available. It was loud. Here are Brandon and George:


If you are new to this blog, try to guess which one is Brandon and which one is George! A quick snap of John. Again, note to self, next time we gather for a pre-Big Night Out cocktail, do it at the house with the fewest kids!


After we gathered, the adults loaded up into The Swaggerwagon for our trip to Greenville.

The activity that brought this evening to Big Night Out, instead of just a Night Out was the dance lessons. Again, this was the idea of our host and most of us were really excited about trying it. I got a few pictures of the dance lessons before I was reminded that they will sell us pictures of our evening as well.



We learned the rumba and salsa dancing. At this time I can't remember how to do either dance, but I do remember the lessons were fun!


After the dancing, we literally walked through a breezway to The Melting Pot, where again, our hosts had planned everything. We enjoyed A Night In France which was delicious!


Our host were extremely sneaky. Becky called earlier that afternoon about doing an extra birthday thing and found out that the whole dinner was already paid for. No arguing about the bill! Juilet knows I hate that, ;) but we did get her some chocolate strawberries...


Just thought this was a funny picture of Brandon:


After dinner, we got back into the swaggerwagon to go home. It was a great time and we look forward to our next round of birthdays in May.

Surprise!

[I'll blog this even though the majority of my audience lived it with me!]

Yesterday was my 40th birthday and it was not nearly as painful as it could have been because my family surprised me by coming for a visit!

First, on Monday morning, I drove home from the gym to see a strange car in the driveway and my mom and dad came out to greet me. Totally unexpected! Then, as we are walking into the other room talking and laughing, our big recliner spins around and my sister Jessica from England is there!! I screamed a very scary scream I was so surprised!

Then, the next day, Tuesday, my actual birthday, Jessica and I met my parents at the Olive Garden and my middle sister Jenny and my 1-year-old niece Danielle were at the table! This was also a surprise, but less so, because of some accidental slips that came up previously involving a baby car seat.

Anyway, we four girls spent the afternoon shopping for a "birthday outfit," an old family custom. Then after getting the kids to bed, friend-neighbor Becky came down and all the adults got to go to the Blue Heron for a nice child-free dinner. It was really cool to be able to go out with my folks, since usually they are sitting for us so we can go out.

Jessica, Jenny, and Danielle stayed at our house and we all reunited here this morning, before they all headed back to Dallas via Atlanta. Jessica flies back to England on Monday.
It's been the best birthday ever!

Christopher is one year old

Halloween decor

This year we decorated our house for Halloween. First, we carved a jack-o-lantern and lit it with a color changing LED night light...

Then we colored our porch lights with some gel that Tony had rolling around in the trunk of his car...

And we put a red gel on the light in our entry way. It had Christopher pretty freaked out...

The Berenstain Bears Visit Greenville

The boys and I drove up to Greenville on Sunday to have dinner with Tony on his break from tech. This weekend was Fall for Greenville, in which local restaurants sell samples of their food in tents along the downtown street. There are also kids' rides and live bands.
This time there was a special appearance by Mama and Sister Bear! Made my day!
I was so excited, I didn't even think about getting Christopher in the picture.


Here's the first attempt, where you can't even see John!

Phone

Evidently the cell phone gods are having a practical joke party with my phone number. A couple months ago, I got about 20 calls in a week from various staffpeople from a Nissan dealer in Vienna, Virginia, who were hot to sell "Alex" a new car.

This week, I am getting calls from "Grandma." I have traced the number to a rest home in Walhalla. The couple times I have answered, she immediately demands "Who is this?" I say "It's Juliet, you have the wrong number." I've stopped answering the number, now that I recognize it.

Am I a terrible person for not cultivating a beautiful and rewarding phone relationship with this lonely woman who stumbled on my number? I can live with that.

Maybe it's actually myself calling from 40 years in the future. I am coming up on the big 4-0.

Christopher Bobistopher

[These pictures are from our trip to the Happy Berry Farm in August.]





Christopher is doing well as usual. He seems to be starting to get over his separation/stranger anxiety a little. He has gone back to smiling at people who smile at him instead of just looking at me with a stricken look on his face. However, he does still assume that the default is for me to carry him around whenever he sees me. I'll be ready for that phase to be over. It is waning, possibly, maybe a little, because it's normally when he's tired. He definitely pushes me away sometimes to get to a toy or to investigate what John is doing...

He is enjoying communicating "Bye" with a wave and a "b-b-bye." He sometimes reciprocates when you tell him goodbye. The other day when John's Leap Frog computer said goodbye upon idle shutdown, Christopher said "Bye" back. He also shakes his head no when he feels strongly, either good or bad, about something, and often to let us know that he is done eating.

He is definitely getting more and more proficient with scooting and seems to be proud and happy with mobility. He often scoots around from the kitchen to the den to keep up with the rest of us going back and forth. Instead of dirty knees like John had when he was crawling, Christopher shows the dirt from my dirty floors on the outside of his ankles. After having read several authoritative sounding articles online about scooting vs crawling, I have made my peace with his alternative method of locomotion.

He knows me so well

Yesterday, John was finishing up playing with Play-doh when Christopher woke up from his nap. I told him that we would clean up and then there was just one more thing he needed to do before we could have a snack. John said "Unload the dishwasher!"
Of course, he was right!

"That's Why We Get Along So Well"

Just now, Tony said he was going to heat up some leftover frittata from last night's dinner for breakfast and asked me if I wanted any of it. I said "No, I'll stick with Cheerios." He said: "That's why we get along so well: we stay out of each other's food."

DENTAL ALERT

Christopher is sprouting tooth #5. I saw it this morning. Upper left canine.

Running him ragged

What was I thinking?
John has gymnastics on Thursdays from 2:30 to 3:30pm. He now also has soccer on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 5:30 to 6:30pm. So far, keeping him busy is working. We'll see how long we can burn the candle at both ends...
I went upstairs to check on him just now (7 minutes after I left) and to see if he was still awake, I said very quietly. "Are you OK?" He said "I'm asleep."

Nothin' much

Life has kicked into normal high gear, now that Tony and John are back in school.
Tony is halfway through his annual Dracula trip to Louisville. Today he told me he was actually happy with the show, which is amazing at this point in technical rehearsals.
John is enjoying school very much. I am enjoying our new car pool. John isn't clingy when it isn't me or Tony driving him, and Miss Becky just drops them off in the car pool lane. It's a win-win-win situation! Loud in the afternoons, when I pick up the two kindergartners, but I can deal with that. I would rather have loud fun than any volume of whining!

John has also started gymnastics on Thursdays. I think he is still enjoying it, but ready to be challenged a little more.

He starts soccer on Tuesdays and Thursdays next week. Pa took him to buy shin guards and socks.

Christopher is continuing to perfect the "bottom scoot" to move from place to place since he hates being on his tummy.

Here are some pictures from our trip to Hilton Head Island this summer. Tony went down to SCRC (South Carolina Repertory Company) to do some maintenance and help with audience riser installation. The boys and I tagged along.

Nothing keeps him down

Evidently John picked up a 6-hour stomach bug last night. Yup, SIX hour. He started feeling bad around 4pm, complaining about his tummy hurting, fell asleep on the futon, didn't want to eat any dinner, started feeling really bad around 6:30, throwing up at 6:35, going to bed around 7pm, diarrhea at 8pm, back in bed, up at 8:30pm wanting to be up, read books with daddy, requested and received apple juice at 9:00, back to normal bedtime stalling tactics by 9:30. Slept all night (once he decided to stay in his bed), and was fine/normal this morning. Jumping on the little indoor trampoline by 4:30pm.
Whew! I count us very lucky, especially since this was the first time he has ever had a stomach bug. Pretty amazing for four-years-old.

John to the extreme

Lately John has been learning to communicate the concepts of more or less. But he communicates it in terms of distance. If he wants to indicate very "something," he says "all the way to Seneca." If something is very extreme or intense, it's "all the way to Texas" or "all the way to Mimi and Pa's house." When we were driving out here, Christopher spit up after we got a couple miles down the road from lunch. I asked if it was a lot or a little, and he said "all the way to Mimi and Pa's house." I asked him if it was just "all the way to Seneca." He said "No way. All the way to Texas." Unfortunately, John was right...


Here are some pictures of John and Christopher sharing toast while waiting for Tony to come home from work.

Quick Christopher Update

Christopher is doing well and is just such a joy to have around!
He's sprouting three teeth these days. In this order: One down, one up, one down. Strange, but everything is different this time around, naturally. Thankfully.
He is a champion sitter and REALLY wants to crawl, but hasn't yet. He's starting to lean forward a lot more, and is getting braver and not as afraid of falling. He also works at reaching things by sort of oonching on his bottom. And he spins himself around to see or reach whatever he needs.
He babbles a lot, and makes lots of mouth noises with his tongue and cheeks. He also likes to hold things in his hands and turn them over and back using his wrists. I am holding a tiny bit of hope in my heart that he could be left-handed, because he does sometimes reach with that hand, which John never seemed to do.

He eats lots of baby food (2-3 tubs 3-5 times a day), as well as bits of whatever allowable solid foods the rest of us are having. I usually nurse him right when he gets up in the morning and right when he goes to bed. He can entertain himself in 20-30 minutes spurts (like when I'm doing my morning yoga) as long as he has toys and is near us. His favorite activity these days are building blocks.
He loves watching all the "big boys" whenever we get together with Henry and/or James.
We're including him in the bedtime routine now. Bath with John, then reading 2-3 books, then nurse, then bed with his monkey nightlight (thanks a million, Miss Kerri), pacifier (which he chews rather than sucks), his afghan, and Ikea stuffed puppy. He is still mostly sleeping through the night, although the past couple nights, he has woken up between 3 and 4am and needed some TLC from Daddy and some tylenol from Mommy to get through the night. I think his teeth might be troubling him...
We're all enjoying him very much!

At Juliet's request

I articulated my stance on marriage and expectations to Juliet a while back. Apparently it made some sense to her because she asked me to post it here.

This came up around the time of father’s day this year. These days we’re pretty busy with the kids, so things like getting cakes and cards in advance tend to slip through the cracks. I don’t get as upset about it as Juliet does. When she asked me why, I gave her this analysis…

When it comes to birthdays, father’s day, etc., one of two things will happen…
A) My family will get me a card/cake, or
B) They will not

Now, if I hope that they will get me a card/cake, I will be setting myself up to either be (respective to A and B above)…
A) Pleased, or
B) Disappointed

On the other hand, if I do NOT hope that they will get me a card/cake I will instead be setting myself up to either be…
A) Overjoyed, or
B) Pleased (because what I expected to happen indeed did happen, or I guess I should say it didn't happen)

So I can either set myself up to be pleased/disappointed or overjoyed/pleased . Which would you choose?

Just so that my posting date isn't "one week ago" on everyone else's bloglist

Everyone at their respective work stations.







For the record, Christopher is sitting down in the bassinet, not standing up. I was reminded by Mimi tonight that he doesn't need to crawl or pull up, he's got his royal bearers (me and Tony) to move him from place to place!

Bathing