Cleaning, Schmeaning

I cleaned my living room at 4:00 PM today and at this time (9:00 PM), it's officially a WRECK again. What gives? Is it just me or is this ridiculous?
Cleaning is worthless. I know I was born to have a maid. Where are you???

Sympathy Pains

Ben said that his stomach hurt today (too much Christmas candy??) and curled up in the recliner. After seeing this, Mary Claire got all sickly and said that her stomach hurt too and climbed on top of Ben. Thought it was sweet. Of course after about 5 seconds she was up saying "All better!"

Wonderful Christmastime

We had a wonderful Christmastime this year. Here's hoping all my friends and family did too. Merry CHRISTmas!

Season of parties

Jason and I successfully made it through three nights in a row of different parties. It definitely took a village to watch our kids. Thanks to the Kennebecks, the Jobes, the Ezells, the Petersons, and Emily Strate for watching after our kids. Yes, it took five families to watch our 2 kids for 3 nights. Whew. :)

Christmas break is finally here!

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Now that's what I call clean

My sister sent me the following note about my old nephew (soon-to-be 3 yrs old):

We were cleaning up tonight and Jake said he was gonna clean his room.  When I came in, this is what it looked like. He was so proud.  He smiled so sweet for the picture.  
Thought I'd share the love!

What I Love About Wednesdays...

McDonald's FREE premium roast coffee, and a Fruit 'n' Yogurt Parfait (low-fat - not that it matters, I'd eat a Big Mac just as well).  Breakfast for $1.10.

I discovered free coffee Wednesdays not long ago when they gave me my $1 total (normally $2 for coffee and yogurt).  I'm not really sure what the deal is, because I placed my order this morning and they quoted $2-something and I said "Isn't this "free coffee Wednesday?"  Then they knocked that extra dollar off the price.  Hmmm.  

My mouse hand is cold

Is it just me or does anyone else sit at the computer long enough for your "mouse" hand to get ice cold?  What can you do about that anyway?

Don't look if you don't want to see a dead deer...

Ben killed his first deer over the Thanksgiving holiday. He was with Pops, but Ben killed it by himself. This is a right of passage in our family - he's officially a man now. :)

El Dorado's Premier Photographer

What's the best kept secret in El Dorado? Melissa Laird! She takes neat journalistic style photos at - get this - affordable prices. (Melissa, don't be one of those photographers that figures out how good she is then shoots up her prices!) :)

Anyway, I called her and asked if we could come over in like 30 minutes and get you to take a couple pics for our Christmas cards? She said yes (thanks!) and I'm telling you, we got like 20 good pictures in 5 minutes (we were in a hurry, as usual). Here's just a glimpse..

Check her out at www.lairdphotography.smugmug.com

Christmas Parade

Check out our fun Christmasy Day!

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

Christmas in El Dorado

I'm excited about tomorrow...
Ben's singing on the square with the 2nd grader's at Yocum, then we'll get the kids picture with Santa, then we'll watch the biggest Christmas parade in Arkansas that afternoon at 4!
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A Good Laugh

A smile starts on the lips,
A grin spreads to the eyes,
A chuckle comes from the belly;
But a good laugh bursts forth from the soul,
Overflows, and bubbles all around.

Woooo Pig Sooie!

Arkansas 31 / LSU 30

http://www.shreveporttimes.com/article/20081129/SPORTS0202/811290350/1026/SPORTS02

Thanksgiving: 2 Things

1) My contribution to our family's Thanksgiving dinner this year: Deviled eggs, chicken and dressing (I confess, Jason's wonderful Aunt Wanda made it, froze it, and gave it to us!), and cokes.

2) What I'm most thankful for this Thanksgiving: I'm thankful for a lot of things (good job, healthy family), but the one thing I can pinpoint this year that I'm particularly thankful for is that Jason is doing something that makes him happy.  Have any of you ever lived with a man that didn't like his job?  It's not fun.  But now that he's a police officer, he seems really fulfilled.  I'm thankful!

Here's my challenge to you - post your contribution to your Thanksgiving dinner this year, and what you're really thankful for on your blog!  If you don't have a blog, post it as a comment to this entry!

Ahh, El Dorado

Home sweet home. I got back Friday night. I enjoyed the opportunity to be in Houston to learn all I ever wanted to know about petroleum economics, but I'm glad to be back to El Dorado "traffic." Much less stressful. :)

Beth Moore's Church

Since I'm in Houston, I was looking online for a church to visit and realized the Beth Moore (you know Beth Moore!) lives in Houston and goes to Houston First Baptist Church. So I went there tonight (Wednesday).

Well, turns out she wasn't there (yes, I asked - apparently she travels a lot during the week, but is there most Sundays), BUT I did get to listen to her son-in-law, Curtis Jones teach Bible class! He taught about the transfer of leadership between Elijah and Elisha - it was good.

Flat Tire in Houston

Well some good samaritan guys from Missouri are changing my flat tire as we speak. Texans weren't much help, and neither was the rental company. Go Missouri!

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Mary Claire on AFV Website!!!!!!

Thanks to everyone who suggested that I put Mary Claire's "A, B, Sneeze" video on America's Funniest Videos. I did and they have added it to their website! Yea!!!

Go watch it at the link below and vote 5 smiles for her!

http://abc.go.com/primetime/afv/index?pn=player&itemId=6274237

They said that if they decide to actually put it on the show, too, they will give me a call. She's famous!

Deep Thoughts...

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” -Mark Twain

What would you do differently today if you chose to take this advice?

Susy Tagged Me...

I've been tagged by Susy to do the following:

1. Choose the 4th picture folder on my computer

2. Choose the 4th picture

3. Explain the picture

4. Tag 4 people to do the same.

No fair! It's not a random, crazy picture! It's one we were actually posing for - and ironically it's my header picture right now. This Thanksgiving 2007 and we were at the Deer Camp.

I am tagging...
1. Mandy (get a blog!)
2. Tina
3. Rhonda
4. Anyone else that wants to - do it, it's fun!

The Blink of an Eye

Hey my mom friends - how many times have you had wise friends, acquaintances and random strangers in the grocery store say when they see your kids:
"It goes by in the blink of an eye, you're gonna miss this."

Sometimes its hard for us to really put it in perspective with young kids, but this song by Trace Adkins really brings it home (click YouTube below to see the video).

With that in mind, I really truly enjoyed my kids this weekend. Started out Friday night with Pizza, Peppermint Ice Cream, and both kids in our bed watching Kung Fu Panda (Jack Black - LOL!). Saturday morning, led Ben's Cub Scout meeting, and then took a "Five Hour Energy" drink and cleaned all afternoon (against my better judgement). It was fun though because we turned on the music and danced, too - Mary Claire knows how to boogie!

I'm headed to Houston today for work and will be gone all week - say a prayer for me (and Jason, and Jason's Mom, and Wanda (Mary Claire's babysitter/God's gift to me)!

Cheesy, I know

Little Miss Muffet sat on a tuffet,

eating her curds and whey...

Then along came a spider,

who sat down beside her...

And frightened Miss Muffet away!

Missed you, Talyn!

We stayed at Mandy's house after our Winnie the Pooh adventure. The cousins are having cinnamon rolls for breakfast on the back patio. We missed our Tay Tay!

Bible Class

Mary Claire's Bible class got to talk about what they had been learning in church recently in worship service. Mary Claire said her name, but got some stage fright with the question/answer part. It was cute!

Black Friday - It's On

Does anyone else do Black Friday shopping? It's become a sort-of tradition for my sister and me. Thanksgiving at the Vacation home (a.k.a. Deer Camp - so the men will join us for dinner), then we head to Conway to devour the Black Friday ads. We strategically select everything we want to purchase, then prioritize our list. We get up at around 4:30 (okay, she drags me out of bed), we brush our teeth and head out the door.

I haven't found much that I'm interested in the last couple years, but I have to say, for some reason I'm really looking forward to it this year.

As reserved as I TRY to be with shopping (last weekend not included!), I love getting to just get this need to splurge out of my system all in one day. It's so much fun!!!

Keep track of ads that some sneaky people get their hands on here (it will be updated frequently)...

http://www.blackfriday.info/

Spontaneous Weekend (next best thing to Vegas)

Thanks to Kelli (and Laney!) for giving us tickets to see Winnie the Pooh Live at Alltel Arena Friday. We got them at 4 p.m. on Friday and jumped in the car and flew to LR to make the show by 6:30 (didn't even stop home to get diapers!). I called my sister on the way, and she and Jake met us there (she lives closer and did get to make a diaper stop - thanks!).

We were on the 4th row - really close seats!

Ben admitted that is was more fun than he expected. :)

Even Mickey and Minnie made an appearance!

Cub Scout Campout: AWESOME!

This is Ben's 2nd year in Cub Scouts, but this was our first campout at Camp Desoto. Can't believe all the FUN we missed out on last year! Okay, Jason was working, so it was just me and Ben. Thanks to my Mom and Dad for keeping Mary Claire at the Deer Camp! I couldn't stop with the pictures.

We stayed in a tent and it was FORTY-TWO DEGREES outside! We had hand warmers strategically placed in our sleeping bags...

Pledge of Allegiance...
Hiking...
Logoly brought a snake...
Building a wall like the Indians did at the Archeology exhibit...

Rock Wall Climbing...

Remote-control boat races...

Craft making...

Canoing...

Raingutter Regatta...

Dutch Oven Cooking...

We had an awesome time!

Living in El Dorado - Need your help

I am developing a list of the top ten best things about El Dorado.  If you live here, have lived here in the past, or have visited El Dorado, please COMMENT some of the unique things you enjoy about El Dorado.

Some things I thought about...

Shopping/Eating on the Downtown Square
LaBella's Fudge
Southern Hospitality
Great churches
Spudnuts
Quality Schools
Free College! (El Dorado Promise)


www.goeldorado.com

Raggedy Ann and...

The first night of Halloween (Cub Scout Carnival) Ben was the Headless Horseman. And Mary Claire was a little variation of a Raggedy Ann thanks to a cute outfit my mom bought her...

The second night of Halloween, Ben's mask disappeared, so we just painted his face. He goes with the flow - such a good kid. We went trick-or-treating at the businesses on the downtown square. It was lovely.

This guy looked so cool, I just had to get him in a picture...

We also did a little trick-or-treating at people's homes, then went to cheer the Wildcats on to victory at the football game!

Ben's 8th Birthday - Movie Party

Well, for the last two years, we haven't had an "official-invite-all-your-friends" birthday party for Ben, it's been just the family. So, Ben was aching for a party this year. We went with a movie theme (because, he was sick of the Halloween theme).

So, this was the Ticket, a.k.a. invitation...

And we printed Ben money and Mandy asked the kids Ben-related trivia questions. By answering correctly, they earned their money to by nachos, popcorn, and movie candy with. We projected the movie Speed Racer on the wall for our "theater."

Ben chose a big chocolate chip cookie, because he doesn't like birthday cake...

Cousin Jake (2 and 1/2 yrs. old) insisted on wearing his Wolverine halloween costume to the party and kept tackling all Ben's friends. Cracked us up...

What would we do without Dads and their pocket knives? Of course that's about the only thing they remember. Moms take care of ALL the other details...

Overall, Ben had a great time!!