Seriously??

OK, either my husband is determined to have my kids in a Cirque show, be Romanian gymnasts or simply enjoys getting me upset (I personally think it is option #3).

Cooking dinner this weekend while the kids were in the bedroom with Daddy and look what I walk into when I announce dinner is on the table....

Anybody got an Ark??

6 1/2 inches of rain yesterday - more to come today (the news just said we got 10 inches and the worst for us hasn't hit yet). In some parts of Nashville they have gotten 15 inches in the past 48 hours. Yep - we are pretty much in a giant lake around here. The roads around our house are pretty much impassable. I-40 and I-24 are flooded as is a large part of downtown Nashville. Except for a couple of soggy patches in our basement we have been spared, luckily - for once I am thankful to live on a hill. The only major flooding we got was to my vegetable garden.

Here is Raif out in it yesterday trying to save my plants. He managed to make a trough and divert it around the garden so hopefully we managed to save most of the veggies.

Not the best picture as it was taken from inside the house but you can sort of see the river of water streaming out of the bottom of the garden.


The gutter at the front of the house. Most of the flowers were submerged at some point yesterday. A couple of my smaller flowers have been completely covered by mulch so I am going to have to try to dig them out if and when the rain ever stops.

The rains lifted and moved a lot of the mulch out of the gardens and onto our walk and front yard.

But at least the kids are having fun - watching the storm from the safety of the front porch.

Slugger

Another video showing the hand eye coordination of my son. I tried to think of professional slugger to title this blog but everyone I thought of seemed to be linked to some steroid scandal (sigh).

The Noble Savage

Leslie and I were friends in high school having met, I think, my junior year. We spent many a Friday and Saturday night down in the pit that was Paul's basement doing all the ridiculous and juvenile things that high schoolers do.

When we went off to college (me to Wake and she to KU) I dropped in on her any time I visited KU doing the school year (she made a sangria that would kick your ass) and during the summers we spent an inordinate amount of time drinking margaritas and eating far too many chips at our local Mexican restaurant.

After college she landed outside of DC and I saw her frequently anytime I went to see Cindy. She was the first one of my friends to get married and with her husband went off to see the world. And though after that we saw less of each other I still kept in touch (though infrequently) and learned of her escapades through our various mutual high school friends.

She had a wicked sense of humor and a bit of a dark and brooding side I admired. She always made me laugh and was always, ALWAYS up for an adventure.

Three years ago today, on a beautiful sunny day in Kansas, she went to Target to do some shopping where some psychopath with an axe to grind with no one in particular shot her dead in her car in the parking lot. Senseless just isn't a good enough word to describe the end to her life. I think about her often and mourn the laughter that was silenced that day. If there was anyone that I knew that epitomized living life to its fullest it was Leslie Noble. So today I think I am going to live a little on the wild side and relish in the moment. I think that is what Leslie would have wanted us all to do a little more.....

Bouncy, Bouncy

I got an irate call from my father last night letting me know that it has been over a week since I last posted any pictures or any stories about his grand kids. I figured since he never commented he never read my blog. :) I have a couple posts in me but have been quite busy with the other set of grandparents that just left on Sunday (though my father did kindly mention that they did leave 3 days ago). So I will try to post some over the next couple of days Dad so you can get your fix. In the meantime I thought I would start with this video Raif took from a little while back. This is what my husband teaches the kids when I go into the house to do something.....

Ultimate Punishment

This afternoon the kids and I were playing outside when the kids decided to play a little make believe with Quinn as Mama, Greyson as Papa and me as the belligerent sister. After a couple of missteps, my 'parents' sent me to time-out. After several minutes of 'crying' in time-out I was barraged with additional punishments. When none of those seemed to work Greyson pulled out the big guns.

"If you don't behave you will lose your wine for the rest of the night."

I was a perfect angel from that moment on.

The things we do...

Michael's is a cornucopia of surprises, in my opinion. Wandering the aisles you never know what you are going to find in terms of little projects for the little ones. Last week, I found, in the bargain bin, (clearly leftover from Halloween) a face painting kit. Every time we go anywhere there is a face painter my kids are all over him/her so I thought this would be a great afternoon activity. Yesterday I pulled the kit out since they were dressed up in their polka dot best, figuring they couldn't ruin a shirt we had already ruined and was prepared to spend the afternoon painting faces. Painting faces is what they wanted to do unfortunately it wasn't their faces they wanted painted - it was mine. So in the spirit of "The Things We Do for Our Children" I let them paint me - Greyson one side of my face and Quinn the other. After I was completed they were more than happy to let me do theirs. I don't know what I enjoyed more - their giggles as they painted me or the look on my husbands face when he walked in the door.....