Picture Day

Picture day scares me.  When I was little, I remember that the photo people would come to our Wal-Mart every spring and probably fallish.  I grew up in a little Oklahoma town and photographers weren’t really readily available.  There would be a sign up place a few weeks before the pictures were actually scheduled to take place and then it was really big stuff when the photographer would finally arrive.  It really made for an exciting buzz in our little small town Wal-Mart, the photographer would be set up in the children’s clothing section and it always made me feel very self-conscious to be all dressed up in my picture-taking best…….hanging out and waiting my turn in Wal-Mart.  It’s not like I was doing anything weird or silly, but the thought of someone I knew seeing me there, oh it mortified me! But there we would wait, and when it was finally my turn, the photographer had all these fabulous (cheesy) backgrounds and these boxes that they were always putting under brown or black carpets for me to lean or sit on.  Now as I look back on some of my friends childhood pictures, its funny to see them with the same fake fireplace or swampy reeds background in their photos.  I guess the photographers of the ’80’s knew they had something fabulous with those puppies and made sure that they were used across America.  Anyway, I then remember that you would come back a few weeks later and pick out your pictures.  Actually, you probably bought a package at the beginning and then they tried to sell you the really good ones when you came back.  Either way, it was a long drawn out process and there was such a build up to those pictures and then I remember the feeling of disappointment when I actually saw them.  I had some very unfortunate photos taken in my childhood.  Well, not so much my childhood…..except for after I cut my own hair.  Oh those were rough days.  Unfortunate would be putting it generously.

Still cute, still little – sorry about the crazy flash

And here I am after I cut all my own hair off in the middle of the night. Proud moment of mine

Then school pictures came along.  I think this is where picture-taking reaches a whole new level of low.  The year that I was in first grade, my mom forgot that it was picture day.  Now, before we judge her, lets keep in mind that my mom was working nights as a nurse and got home every morning just about in time to kiss Matt and I good-bye.  Also, I had horrible hair at this time in my life so even if she had been able to work on me for an hour, I don’t think it would have been any better.  I know you are probably wishing that I would share that picture with you, but I think really its best that it is buried away somewhere at my mom’s house.  Neither mom nor I feel very proud of that picture.  But the next year, we were ready.  Even looking back now, I really can’t say anything bad about it.  Good job mom and I.

I’m not sure about the tuxedo-ey shirt, but overall, pretty good

But then after that, things again start taking very, very serious, turns for the bad.

Here we have what happens when your brother dares you to put the ancient sideburn clippers you find and your grandmother’s house up against the side of your head.  And then your mom perms your mullet.

Before the perm, but aren’t those sleeves especially nice?

Now let’s perm it!

Oh now, the sides seem to have grown out but wow….its still so bad.

So, so Bad!

And then the sides grew not only out but WAY OUT! Before you judge, lets keep in mind that this was just me following the big hair trend that was the ’80’s.  I did not pick this style and I was not alone in sporting it.  And I think it makes it a little bit better that I wasn’t an actual adult sporting this hairdo.  I can claim that my mind was not mature enough or capable of making my own sound judgements at this time.

How awesome are those wings?

Anyway, all this to say that picture day has been a day of anxiety for me for the better part of my 33 years.  You should see my drivers license……it is absolutely heinous.  Truly, I don’t really even know how I managed to look that bad, and in public when I usually at least attempt to fix my hair and put on my face for the day.  But really, its like a train wreck.

So why am I talking about  pictures and sharing some of my special ones with you?  Because today was Mattie’s own little day of reckoning, her 2nd grade pictures would be coming home in her blue folder today and I was nervous.  Things went pretty good last year, but the year before was something awful.  I’m not sure if they dropped the camera or if Mattie sneezed when the picture was taken or what, but that kindergarten picture looked sort of like she was caught having a small stroke.  I think it goes without saying that we opted for the retakes, which turned out lovely.  But pictures of Mattie can go either very well, or really disturbing.  She has a tendency to try out new and “special” smiles for the first time when having her photos taken.  Often these smiles don’t really look like the facial expressions of one experiencing much happiness or joy at all, more like someone having some very painful gas or who smells someone experiencing some very painful gas.  And now that she has lost her cute little baby teeth and her smile isn’t quite as straight as we eventually hope it will be, well, those grimacing smiles mixed with schnaggle teeth.  I’ll be honest, it’s not always pretty.  And one other little thing that sometimes happens when photographing Mattie is that her eyes kind of check out.  She’s smiling and still technically looking in your direction, but her eyes kind of go “dead”.  Mix it all together and it is a recipe for an absolute disaster…..caught on film.

But today, as I hesitantly pulled out the envelope, I had to send up a little cheer of victory.  She did good and the pictures turned out lovely.  She looks entirely too old, but absolutely darling.  Teeth are good, smile is genuine and her eyes are alive – a perfect portrayal of my little Mattie Belle in 2nd grade.  So far, I feel like I have saved her from having any too terrible photos.  Digital cameras have been a wonderful invention.  Anyway, all of this to show off my girl’s picture and hopefully make any of you out there who also suffer from embarrassing childhood photos aware that you are not alone.  And we cannot be judged by those pictures. Having a permed mullet has nothing to do with the adult I am now.

Kindergarten

This kinda makes me tear up a little

1st Grade

She’s only in 2nd grade, but this looks like it could be the picture on her driver’s license

Listening To My In-Car Radio

Some of you may already be aware of this, but I enjoy NASCAR.  It started with Reese being a fan, but I will admit that on most Sundays, its me that is stationed on the couch watching the race.  He always likes to watch the beginning preliminary pageantry like the singing of the national anthem and the jets that always fly over.  And of course he hates to miss the weekly “Gentleman start your engines”.  But after that, he is usually in and out just checking on his favorite guy.  Its me though that anxiously  watches the whole race.

This last weekend, while watching and waiting for a huge wreck to happen at Talladega, the computer was logged on to race buddy, which allows you to watch from the in-car camera of your favorite driver.  It also allows you to listen in on their radio.  Our friend Jimmie Johnson doesn’t really have a lot to say while driving and crew chief, Chad Knaus is also pretty sparse.  But there is a lot of talking going on and its coming from a man by the name of Big Earl.  Big Earl has a very calming, even voice and its his job to give almost a play-by-play to Jimmie as he is driving.  He lets him know who and how many cars are behind him, beside him and wants ahead.  And the whole time, he is being encouraging.  I mentioned to my mom that I think I might be a lot more productive if I had a Big Earl giving me directions and encouraging me through my whole day.  Just continually giving me little instructions to make things run smoother and giving me a little pep talk when things get a little dicey.  Just going to the grocery store seems like it would be a whole lot easier.

“Okay Kaylee, we’re just going to pull in right here.  Go ahead and get out and careful there, don’t forget your wallet.”

“Here’s your list, we’re going to start with the produce. Reese is making a break for the bakery…..good save.”

“Okay, all finished.  Go ahead into lane 4, it’s going to be fastest”

“Good Job Kaylee!”

How many of us could use a spotter who has the whole view of things.  Someone who can see the beginning to the end and all the in between.  Who has our best interest in mind and seems to sense when we are getting stressed out.  I know I often feel like I can’t see the forest from the trees and if I just had someone to  tell me if there really was anything up in front of me or on either side and to let me know when I was “clear”, even if it is only for the time being.  Someone to help me make those costly decisions.  I joked that Big Earl would have been wonderful to have around during all 3 of my deliveries with the kiddos.

But all joking aside, there during my weekly NASCAR race, I had a little epiphany.  I do have a Big Earl in my life.  Some may call it a conscience, other’s just a gut feeling.  I kinda like thinking of it as that still small voice of the Holy Spirit.  He is the ultimate “spotter”.  Knowing the story of my life, not just today’s race, from the beginning to the end.  He knows how it ends and what it coming up.  The big stuff, the small stuff, the good and the bad.  He also knows when I’m going to need to “pit” and who I need to have on my crew. And thankfully, he’s on the same radio frequency as those people. It’s all probably rather silly, comparing NASCAR to a relationship with God, but it made me think.  And today, starting my week – I have decided that maybe I will try not to tackle things completely by myself.  My lists are great, my goals are good, but I would probably feel way less stressed and overwhelmed and actually enjoy things if I would rely more on my “spotter” and hand things over to Him.

My Date With Two Men, Neither of Which Was My Hubby

This blog entry was actually written on Tuesday night.  I didn’t publish it because I was planning to put pictures on the next morning.  The pictures were downloaded and then I got busy.  What can I say, mama tried. 

Its late right now.  Really, its only 11:02 but in Kaylee time where every hour often seems like 2, this is late.  I am still awake because I am waiting.  I am waiting on Lila.  I know that if I go ahead and go to bed, I will get all good and cozy and completely knocked out.  The kind of sleep where it feels like you have been hibernating.  And then she will cry and I will wake up all sorts of delirious and disoriented, so badly that you can feel it physically.  So I am waiting.  She ate earlier than normal this evening and I know that means she’s going to need to be topped off if she’s going to make it through the night.  Its like this past weeks NASCAR race, when the 3 drivers in the front were just 40 laps or so away from being done and their crew chiefs were telling them that they were coming up short on fuel.  You can go ahead and risk it, but it you run out, then you are out of the race completely.  But if you pit now, someone else is going to get in front of you.  That’s how I feel with Lila and sleep.  I could go ahead and risk it, go ahead and go to bed thinking that maybe she will make it until the morning.  But if she doesn’t, we are going to have a rough go of things.  Or I can stay up and wait.  Neither choice will get me all the sleep I want.  I will not win this race, but getting to sleep a bit later rather than a middle of the night interruption seems like a better choice.  I’m giving her until 11:30, then I will wake her up to top her off.  And she usually then goes directly right back to sleep.  So while I wait, I’ll blog.

I had a date today, with two young men.  And by young, I mean that their ages added together still didn’t reach the double digits.  Its okay though, we had a chaperon.  Lila supervised the whole time.  Reese and I had the privilege of spending the day with our little friend Landon.  Landon is everything that represents “cool” and “admirable” to Reese.  I will be honest, there have been a few times that I have used this particular little boy as an example win I want Reese to do something he might be on the fence about.  For example, this summer he seemed to have some reservations about wearing the same Stride Rite sandals to church that he has been wearing since he could walk.  He questioned my preschool boy fashion knowledge big time.  That is until I told him that Landon wears sandals to church.  Thankfully, I knew Landon wouldn’t be at church this particular week so even if he didn’t actually wear or even own any sandals, I had bought myself some time.  (As a side note, Landon did have sandals so this all worked out just lovely) Landon also eats salad, comes when his mother calls him, doesn’t pick his nose and keeps his shoes on unless told otherwise – at least in the little world that Reese and I share.  At home with his mama, things might be completely different.  But Reese thinks his older, more mature friend hung the moon so we will use that admiration for the power of good.

So like I was saying, our friend Landon came over.  I promised the boys early on that if they would play nicely outside and let Lila get a good nap in, I would take them somewhere fun and exciting.  The Farmer’s Market.  Our little Farmer’s Market has a little nursery attached that has the cutest little miniature “pumpkin patch”.  There are tons of different types of gourds and squash and of course pumpkins of all different shapes and sizes and colors, as well as little areas set up that just beg for you to pose for a picture.  But it’s not a full on pumpkin patch or farm and instead of having to spend all day there or drive way out to get there, its right in town and only requires about 45 minutes.  That is what it requires, but not all that you can spend there.  Reese fell in love with this little pumpkin paradise last fall when Shannie was keeping him for a few days while I was substitute teaching for the kindergarten teacher at Mattie’s school.  He came home with different little items of fall-esque decor for each of us members of his family.  I don’t think they were ours to keep, just special items that reminded him of each of us.  It seems like the unborn Lila was a little tiny pumpkin, Mattie was an odd green gourd, he was another gourd and I was a squash and Brandon, well, he was an ear of Indian corn.  Or as Reese pronounces it, “kon”.  Anyway, I am getting way off topic here……he talks about the wonder of the mini pumpkin patch every time we drive by there so to actually get to go back and the pumpkin patch be all set up again….it was magical.  And Landon was going with us, magic with sprinkles.

We arrived and immediately, the boys just started climbing on the pumpkins.  One area in particular had tons of pumpkins all stacked up on each other in heaps and the boys were all over them.  I’m pretty sure that they weren’t piled up there with the intentions of being climbed and rolled in, but I don’t think it hurt anything either.  Besides, neither Reese nor Landon weighs any more than any of those pumpkins that were stacked on each other, so I don’t think they couldn’t have caused much damage.  And how do you say no and get down to two little dolls having the time of their lives playing amongst a bunch of festive gourds.  I personally think if I was a pumpkin, I would much rather spend my last days being frolicked on by small children then being turned into a jack o’lantern.  Just sayin’.  The boys had the best time, but what I loved the most was that they wanted me to take their picture constantly.  They couldn’t really be bothered to actually look at the camera, but oh yeah, they wanted the moment documented.  Landon also requested that I continue to send his mom all of the pictures I was taking.  Let me say again that to whomever was visiting WolfChase Family Dentistry at around noon, I apologize for the shower of texts that probably captured your dentist’s attention for a bit there.  But she has an awfully cute boy who wanted his picture taken and sent to his mama.  And because I like to receive pictures of my boy, I obeyed.

The boys thought that I was especially generous when I told them they could each get two of the smaller gourds/ squash/ pumpkins.  They didn’t realize that they were almost all 2 for $1.00.  But when you are 4 and 5, I don’t think prices really matter a hill of beans anyway.  But there is something about buying a pumpkin for your child and it bringing as much joy as a new toy that really makes you feel like a good person.  And something else about walking through the stalls at the farmers market and having them shout our their excitement at seeing different fruits and veggies and wanting to touch everything.  Funny, he never really seems to care about the tomatoes at the grocery store, but here they just have a completely different aura to them.  We bought some blackberry jelly to go with our 10 white tiny pumpkins and our 2 tiny orange ones, 2 warty gourds and 1 apple gourd and didn’t break anything.  A successful trip if I do say so myself….and I do….say so myself.

And I also believe that the little mini pumpkin patch hasn’t seen the last of us this season.  We will be back, quite possibly even tomorrow. Its time for bed now.

Batman Doesn’t Live Here Anymore

I fully intend on sharing about the fun that was our camping trip this weekend, but before I get into all that – I have a few funnies to share with you all.

First, due to Reese hitting a little girl at the play ground and hitting another older girl with a stick.  We have decided to take some extreme measures.  When asked why he struck out in violence towards these two, unsuspecting girls, he responded that he was playing Batman.  Batman, we said, what does that have to do with hitting people?  “In Batman, there are bad guys and Batman is the good guy.  I was Batman so that made them the bad guys.” Whether or not the girls knew they were even playing Batman with Reese, we are still curious about that one.  So I am pretty certain that they had no clue that they were the bad guys.  Anyway, this is one in a whole slew of shenanigans that has occurred since Batman has infiltrated our lives.  So because all the naughty behavior seems to have Batman roots, Reese has hunted up all his batman gear put it in his Batman backpack and it is hidden away in a Batcave only mom is aware of for an unknown amount of time.  I have been amazed at his honesty through this whole thing.  You would think he would be stockpiling his batthings when he stumbles upon them.  Hiding his little figurines so that he can play with his hero when he’s alone.  Instead, out of the blue he will shout out to me, “Mommy I found another one and I’m bringing it to you.  Hurry and take it, I can’t have it!” As though the little Joker he just brought me was on fire.  All this makes me very glad that I had put off ordering his Batman Halloween costume until now because it wasn’t exactly going to be cheap.  Instead, he has decided that he will just be a bat.  I know, you are probably thinking isn’t that the same thing?  But no, they are two very different things.  Batman is a man who is seeking justice for the death of his parents and wears a Kevlar suit when he comes out at night with his expensive bat toys.  Bats are just little mammals that often eat fruit and live in caves and have fantastic hearing.  This whole new bat costume idea is actually perfect because Mattie was going to be a strawberry and that will pair nicely with the little fruit bat.

Another little funny has happened as I have been folding laundry.  I came across a pair of little khaki pants that I couldn’t quite place.  They were too small to be Reese’s and way too small to be Mattie’s, that left one more kid.  But I haven’t ever put khaki shorts on Lila.  Odd, but then again, odder things have shown up in my dryer before…..like rocks or an apple core.  So I moved on…..coming across a strange, unfamiliar greenish t-shirt that again was way too small for any of my children and not really the same style of what I dress Lila in.  It was finally when I came upon the hello kitty panties that were probably Lila’s size  and had a hole in the booty of them that I finally figured out what was going on.  I guess it was laundry day for Mattie’s Build-A-Bear friends as well.

And on laundry day, it seemed fitting that I should share this:

Helping with Laundry

This is what happens when you have a very clingy little person who doesn’t want her mommy out of her sight, yet that mommy needs to get some clothes out of the dryer and washer and fold them.  I can do lots of things wearing a baby, but folding laundry with a baby in a sling or Bjorn just doesn’t work very well.  And this worked out lovely.

I had been wondering for several days now, why the shampoo that I use on the kids doesn’t seem to lather up very much anymore?  We just bought a new bottle the other day, as we had all loved it in the past.  But something was seriously up with this stuff.  I know that there are plenty of things that clean just fine and don’t produce a lot of sudsy lather, and really, these things are probably better.  But we are a lather people and don’t feel like we have been fully cleansed if there wasn’t some sort of lather.  Well, I figured it out.  And again, this is where I admit another oops.  Seems that when I thought I was grabbing a shampoo/ conditioner combo bottle, I actually grabbed just the conditioner.  You would think that Mattie’s unclean, yet easy to comb hair would have clued me in.  It did not.  So, upon discovering that, the bottle was returned yesterday and probably for the first time in a week, my children have had clean and soft, manageable hair.

And one last thing that I am super thrilled about, the dishwasher repair man came today.  And he repaired my dishwasher which means I can use it again.  It is super true that if you want to be reminded of how blessed you are, take something away for a little while and see how much you miss it.  Washing dishes is not hard at all, but I will not be complaining about having to unload the clean dishes from the washer for a long time.  I was so glad to have him here doing his repair thing, that while making lunch, I was tempted to ask if he too would enjoy a peanut butter sandwich and maybe a fruit roll up if he finished that and his applesauce.  I decided that might make for an uncomfortable rest of his stay with us and just kept to myself.  I don’t want him to be afraid to come back should we need him again.