I am officially the worst mother!

I was changing Callee's clothes last night into her jammies and she started to scoot off my lap. I put up my hand to catch her (I didn't want her falling) and she lunged forward at the same time. My thumb nail scratched her bottom eyelid pretty bad and she has a little bruise (aka - black eye!) What kind of mother gives their baby their very first black eye? I am terrible.

On a whole different note, the girls and I had a great evening last night, until Taylor had to go to bed and didn't want to. We were done with dinner early, because I made scrambled eggs and sausage, it didn't take too long. This is what happens when you forget to thaw anything! We colored, watched some TV, played and ran around like crazy. Callee went to bed at 8:00. Not only is she teething, but she is hitting a growth spurt too and that makes for one sleepy little baby! I tried putting Taylor to bed at 9:00, but she actually didn't get up again after 10:30 so she went to bed really late! I tried telling her last night she wasn't going to want to get up for school today, and what happened? She was a bear to wake up! I did make her go though, even though I felt bad, like I should keep her home.

I got to watch my friend Jenn's baby girl. She is the chubbiest 5 month old ever! I absolutely love chubby babies, however, I've never really had one. I told Jenn to leave her at my house because she had some running around to do and Addison was being fussy. She left her and I think she was lying about her. She was not fussy unless Callee was in her face. She just sat there so content and looking around. She is such a good baby!

That was my Monday evening followed by not getting to bed until late! Hopefully it will be an earlier night tonight. I hope everyone has a great day!

Taylor's new haircut and the weekend

before

Taylor got her haircut on Saturday morning. She couldn't wait to get it done. She's been asking me to get her haircut like mine for about 6 months now and I kept telling her no. Well, her hair doesn't look like mine, but there is about 4 inches missing from it and she hates it! She cried starting about half way through and didn't stop until we got home. It is a cute little bob with layers and I think it is the layers that bothers her so much. She said, "I like it, but I don't like the sides and the top." That would be where the layers are, so I think we'll be letting those grow out. I'm not sure I like the layers either so I can completely understand where she is coming from.
after

Friday night after work, we went to my friend Angie's house. She has 2 adorable boys who are 6 and 19 months and she is pregnant with her third boy! Taylor and Christopher (6) play really well together, you wouldn't know there was a three year gap between them and they both ask for each other if we haven't seen them recently, it is too cute. Maurice (19 months) and Callee are a different story. They are cute together, but when they were just crawling, Reese didn't realize he was a lot bigger than Callee and when he would hug her, he would knock her over, unintentionally. Now, Reese is afraid of her because he kept asking her for five and after the thirtieth time of giving him five, she must have wanted him to stop asking so she slapped him across the face. Of course I told her she couldn't do that because it wasn't nice, etc while Angie laughed and as soon as I was done telling her, I excused myself to the bathroom so I could also laugh hysterically too! Here are a couple of pictures of all the kids.

Callee made herself a seat!

What a goofy face!

Saturday night, Mike, my friend Trisha, and I went to meet a couple of Mike's friends that were in town. We had a great time and still got home early which was wonderful. Mike really does have some great friends who have just kind of accepted me whether they wanted to or not, which I am grateful for. While we were out, I had a really good grilled chicken sandwich. Trisha and I were the only ones that ate though. We watched the OSU game (they won) and then we headed home. It was nice to get out.

On Sunday, we went to church as usual, but this time it was just me and Taylor because as we were getting ready to walk out the door, Callee decided to have a meltdown because she got up way too early so Mike decided to stay home with her and give her a nap. After church, we took the girls to a parade and I forgot to take my camera...I hate that! We had a lot of fun even though it was pretty chilly out and the wind blowing made it so cold. The parade lasted an hour and a half! The girls had a ton of fun and everyone was dressed in their costumes so it got the girls all psyched for trick or treating.

I hope everyone had a nice weekend too and Wednesday is the big day! I know my girls are getting so excited.

Can you tell she is mean?

The weekend...finally

Callee is ready to go.

Okay so I finally get to blog about my weekend. My friend Ashley who was in the accident with me came into town to visit. I love when Ashley comes to town and so do my kids, especially Taylor. One thing you need to know is Ashley didn't always live in Pittsburgh. We met our Freshman year of college and have been friends ever since. I spent a lot of time with Ashley even after having Taylor because the girl loves kids. It was never an inconvenience that I had Taylor. She majored in early childhood education and now works as a nanny for a wonderful family, so Taylor was and still is always included in our outings. Very rarely do I leave my kids with Mike when Ashley is around because it isn't an issue with her. I love that about her. I never feel like I have to sacrifice my time with them to hang out with a friend. Also, Ashley is content hanging around my house so I never feel as if I am ignoring Mike either. She really is a great friend.

Taylor just chillin'!!!

Taylor became extremely close to Ashley in the months following the accident. As I have said before, Callee screamed for 9 1/2 months. Well, the first 4 or so months, Mike was on midnights and the child didn't care that nobody was there to walk with her, she still screamed at 12, 2, 4, and 6 a.m. It was really rough to know that she would quiet down if you would walk with her, but I could hardly walk myself and wouldn't walk with her because I fell all the time. That is where Ashley came in. I don't know if it was out of guilt (she was driving) or that she was just that good of a friend, I like to think the latter because she didn't do anything wrong and did everything to avoid the accident, but if she wasn't at school or work, she was at our house helping out. I had people who helped out beside her, but most of them were family. She is the only friend who would spend hours on end at my house helping with the baby or helping with dishes, baths, stories, playing, anything I needed. I appreciated all of that and mostly the company that she kept me. It is really hard after having a baby to feel like yourself again and when your husband is doing everything he can to support his family, he can't always be there. She helped me to not fall in too big of a funk. She would tell me to go to bed about 10 and she would either be there all night or at least until 3 or so. I would sleep that entire time. It was the greatest 5 hours of sleep ever! I knew my baby would be taken care of and yes I felt guilty letting her stay up all night with her, but I knew if I didn't get those few hours of sleep Taylor and Callee would have an irritated, crabby mother all the time and Callee would sense that and cry that much more.

She loves cookies!!!

Okay, that is not where this post was supposed to go, but apparently I needed to get it out or something. Anyways, Ashley picked up dinner on her way into town and we all had great food. My sister-in-law, who has also became friends with Ashley was there too. My sister came later. If you can't tell, Ashley is like having another sister. My mother even invited her to all our family things when she lived an hour and a half from her family. Ashley has just kinda been adopted and her mother has kinda adopted me too. Okay I digressed again. We had a great night sitting around talking and laughing. We got up Saturday morning and took Taylor to dance class. When we got home from there, it was time for Callee to take a nap. Ashley and I sat outside and watched Taylor ride her bike for a couple hours while Callee slept.

Ashley and Taylor at dinner. Gotta love the beer sign right over their heads in the background.

After Callee got up it was time to go get something to eat and say goodbye to Ashley. She had to go watch the kids she used to watch when she lived around here so her visit was short lived. We had dinner, talked, laughed, and took pictures. It was a really good visit with her, but as usual, it didn't last long enough. When you are used to having somebody around at least 5 days a week, 16 hours just seems to fly by.

Callee being rotten and getting everything out from under the sink:After Ashley left, Mike, me, Josh, CJ, Casia, Taylor, Callee, and Emma decided to go for a walk. First of all, it was like 105 degrees. We decided to take a two mile walk with 4 kids and a dog, and along the way, we picked up Kara and Makayla. Can you even imagine how much fun this walk was not? Everybody made it back alive, but only after much bickering and complaining. I was in bed by 10:00 p.m. on Saturday night and it felt great. I have been so exhausted lately, so the early bedtime was welcomed with open arms.

We went to church Sunday, as always, and I went to my Grandma's for dinner. My aunt had brought her new puppy with her. He is so cute. His name is Gizmo and here he is:

I hope everyone elses weekend and now week have been good. This post is a lot longer than I expected it to be. Sorry about that.

I almost forgot....Go Tribe....they eliminated the Yankees in game 4 last night. I hope this is their year! Maybe I'll post about my love for the Indians tomorrow, complete with pics from the game I went to last year about a month before I had Callee. Let me tell you how comfortable I was, but I still loved every minute of it.

Blogger Award and the weekend

I have been awarded the You make me smile blogger award from Shana at My 3 Wisemans. Thank you for this award. You have made me smile today. This is what the person who made the award up had to say about it...

"The thing that I love most about blogging is that I learn so much about a person just by reading their blog. I have met MANY wonderful people with wonderful stories to tell, and I am grateful every day for each person that I have the pleasure of crossing paths in life with. I wanted to create something special for the top ten people who have inspired me through their blogging; the stories they tell, and the lives that they lead with grace and dignity. I visit their blogs for inspiration and encouragement..." And here is what Shana had to say about me..."I am so glad that I have gotten to know her through our blogs. She is such a sweet person and she makes me smile." Shana is such a sweet person. I really enjoy checking out her blog daily to see what is going on in her crazy world...she has 3 boys!

Now, I am going to pass this award along to Rachael at Life with Hannah and Lily. She is truly an inspiration and makes me smile as well as cry. She has suffered a tremendous loss and her strength is insurmountable. Please accept this award and know I read every day.

It was overall a good weekend, it just went by way too fast. Friday night, we went to my grandparents after dinner to spend some time with them. Taylor wore her "everyone loves a blue eyed girl" shirt for Hannah and it has glitter all around the lettering, but you can't tell in the pictures. The best part of her outfit was the bandanna she wore around her neck and her sunglasses that made her look like a "rockstar."

There are more pictures of the rock star glitter girl if you want them Rach just let me know.

Saturday we took the girls to the park so they could play and Mike could play basketball. They had a blast. I was standing with Callee making sure she didn't eat dirt (which she ended up doing) and I could hear Taylor calling me. I went to look for her and she was half way up the rock wall by herself. The child amazes me with her adventurous spirit. After we left the park, we went home and got showers (Mike and I, the girls went to my mom's) and then we went out to dinner with Randy and Mai. It was another good weekend and I hope everyone else had a good one too. Here are some pics from this weekend:

Taylor climbing the rock wall.
Taylor and Callee after they got done sliding down the double slide. Do you see the dirty legs?

The child has no fear sometimes.

Mike doing pull ups with Taylor on his back.

I almost forgot, Taylor started dance Saturday, this her as we were getting ready to leave.
Don't worry Callee, I can't tell you were eating dirt! GROSS!!!

O-H...........I-O

It was a busy weekend again, but it actually felt like I had a weekend, which was nice. Friday night the girls and I hung out at Kara and Jason's house so Taylor and Makayla could play. We ended up going to the mall to get a few things and we actually found a new Mr. Bunny (which is now a green bear!) For any of you who didn't know, Taylor has had the softest stuffed bunny since she was a baby. She has had to take it everywhere with her and it started to look pretty gross over the years. She lost it about 3 weeks ago and has been devastated. We have looked for a replacement one, but nothing seems as soft or as good as Mr. Bunny. We were at JC Penney Friday night and there was a big rack of stuffed animals. I happened to see a green one (Taylor's favorite color) and went over to touch it, low and behold it felt just like Mr. Bunny used to feel before he was drug through the mud and dirt! She was so happy to have her new playmate. Here is a picture of Taylor with her new bear.She drives Mike crazy with it because even though he is a bear, she still calls him Mr. Bunny. I don't see what this is hurting, but it drives Mike absolutely insane.

Saturday was a good day. Mike slept in because he stayed up too late cleaning the toy room and kitchen counter. I got the girls up, breakfast, bathed and we headed out the door to pick up a few things from the store. On our way to the store, we picked up my brother because the girl that works at the grocery store, he has a crush on. He agreed to come home with me afterwards to keep an eye on the girls while I got the food together. I, like other bloggers I have been reading, love fall. I made two pans of lasagna (we were having company) and a crock pot full of chili. I don't like lasagna, because I don't like spaghetti sauce and wouldn't you know, it's my husbands favorite food. So the chili was for me; my brother and dad love it too so my brother took some of it home with him.

Mike's friend is in the air force and stationed in England so we don't get to see him too often. He was home when I had Taylor, he came home right before and spent about a month and a half here, and he came home with his wife in toe on 9/12. We knew we'd see them this weekend we just weren't sure which day. They ended up coming over on Saturday to watch the Ohio State game and my food I made wasn't eaten. We ended up going to eat at Cracker Barrel, they have such good food, I love it. On a whole different note, do not take a one year old when her bed time is in an hour and expect her to be happy. Callee screamed from the second I put her in the chair until I got her out. It was so embarassing because everyone kept staring at us. So if anyone was at the Cracker Barrel we were at on Saturday night, I aplolgize for my child's behavior.

I felt bad for Randy's wife Mai because Taylor kept getting in her face over dinner. She was sitting between Randy and Taylor and Randy kept asking her questions so Taylor would lean over Mai, in her face leaning, and answer his question. That was definately a challenge to try and explain to her that it was rude and you shouldn't do that. In her 3 year old mind, she was being polite by making sure Randy could hear her answer. It was overall not too bad considering the restaurant was crowded and we took three kids ages 5, 3, and 1 with us.

We went back to our house for a little more visiting and then wrapped up the evening. Saturday we are supposed to be going to the football hall of fame, but I think Mike is just going to go with them. They want to leave at 10 and Taylor starts her dance class this week which is from 10:30 - 11:10. I don't think I'll be going, but maybe we can go to the park or something afterwards. It should be another good weekend. Here are some pictures of Saturday. We took the girls to a parade on Sunday, but that will be my blog for tomorrow because it has taken me about 4 hours to do this post because there is a lot going on at work today.

This is Callee when she stole Randy's hat.

Mike, Randy, Mai, and Emma (in her OSU collar.)Callee talking on the phone.

Randy and Callee playing keep away with Callee's jacket!

I have 37,000 (an exaggeration) more pictures of this weekend, but I think I've bored you enough with the pictures.

A Scrappers Game

Last night I took the girls to their first baseball game. Mike wasn't overly excited because he wasn't able to go with work and all. We had fun, we didn't get to stay the whole time because it didn't start until 7 and Callee is usually in bed by 8:30, but we did have fun. Amazingly, Callee lasted until a little after 9 which is great for her. Taylor seemed to enjoy the game, but was more interested in the socializing instead. Her friends Riley, Abbey and Alyssa were there so she bounced around from row to row. I should tell you we went with a bunch of people from our church so we had 4 rows of seats! I don't normally just let her roam around. I was really impressed with her socializing because usually she wants to just sit right next to me the whole time and gets very shy and quiet. This was a huge step!

I wanted to share the pictures Judy sent me from our church picnic the other day. She did not send me the one of Callee with cake all over her face, but she did send me 3 cute ones. Here they are: This is Taylor trying to be as messy as Callee was. It didn't quite work, but what a face she

is making.

This is Shelley blowing Alyssa's bubbles and Taylor enjoying them. The bubbles were Alyssa's auction "prize." There is the crazy puffed out lips face on Taylor again. I don't know where she got this or what she is doing!

This is Callee with her monkey "prize" from the auction. She would not look at the camera for anything! Look at how much she resembles her prize. Maybe it is just me but she looks so much like a monkey! I think she is beautiful, so no one take that as I'm being mean to her. I have always thought monkey's were cute, I just never thought I'd give birth to one! Have a great weekend, more on Monday!

Church Picnic

Last night our church had our annual Women's ministry Friends and Family Picnic. Of course it rained so the picnic was moved from the park to the church. Every year this turns out to be a great time for fellowship and we also have an auction to raise money for Women's ministry. This year, they auctioned off kids toys too. Every child there was given a dollar by the adults and sat right up front when it was their turn. The little ones weren't sure how to do it so they just kept waiving their dollar and it was so cute. Taylor obviously can't take the suspense because when they got to 50 cents, she stood up took the prize and handed him her dollar, it was hilarious. Every prize was wrapped so you didn't know what you were getting so the thrill of opening it, I believe, is why Taylor just grabbed it.

Taylor got a finger shooter, which is kind of like shooting a rubber band across the room without hurting yourself. She also got a nice new coloring book and crayons. Callee (the monkey) got a nice blue and green stuffed monkey. It was kind of funny that she got that cuz she looks and acts just like a monkey. Shelley gave her a cupcake and she was in her glory. Of course I forgot my camera so I am going to see if Judy will e-mail me the pictures she took so I can post them to my blog. Hopefully you'll have those soon. Until next time, have a great day!

Oh where is my hairbrush?

We took the girls to Kidzfest this weekend. It is a big festival with rides, games, and food that is put on by the area churches and the best part is....it's all free. We invited Kara and Jason to come along with Makayla. We all met up to only be disappointed because you can't ride any of the rides unless you are 4. Of course, this did not make Taylor or Makayla happy. They adjusted pretty quickly and we began scoping out fun things for them to do. There was face painting, balloon animals, food, and all kinds of characters including, Oh where is my hairbrush himself, Larry the cucumber. We decided to eat first and then we noticed the line for face painting wasn't very bad so we headed there. Makayla got a beautiful butterfly and Taylor just wanted anything green, so we went with a heart. My brother later suggested a four leaf clover. Where was that suggestion a few hours before? After that, we began chasing the characters down. Larry must not have been feeling well, but we managed to get a quick picture with him. He had people guiding him and he didn't seem to be walking too well, so I don't know what was going on there, but I hope he is okay. Then, Taylor spotted Pooh and took off running so Mike went to catch up with her. She would not stop hugging Pooh, I think she might have fallen in love. Overall, we had a really nice day and the weather was beautiful. However, now it is really chilly with lots of rain which is never too much fun, but at least it held off on Saturday.

After we left Kidzfest, we headed over to McDonald's to play in the play area, which is extremely nasty and I try not to think of all the gross stuff in there when they are playing. But, the girls had a really good time and then we headed home for a much needed nap! OY! what a day!

Sunday it rained all day and so we had a very lazy day. Around 4:00 Michele called to see if we wanted to go over there to play games and the kids could play so we headed over there around 5. We didn't stay too long and were out of there by 7:30, but we did play one interesting game of Mad Gab and had some fun. I am now completely exhausted from no sleep and another jam packed weekend, but the only time we can be an actual family is on the weekend, so we do have some great ones.