A Minor Crisis

I didn't post a blog last night because I found myself in the middle of a minor crisis. Let me start the story by saying that I let the babies eat some blackberries at dinner last night...Now fast forward to bedtime. Jason had a work dinner, so he wasn't home. JR was showered and ready for bed and I was reading to him in the playroom (I normally read to him in his room, but when Jason's not home it has to be the playroom so I can also keep an eye on the babies). The babies are into everybody's business, and about 3 pages into our second book, Reed had already been in my lap, JR's lap, tried to take the book away from me, and tried to rip the pages from another book. I knew Kyle was laying on the floor at my feet, but found it strange that he too hadn't been pulling the same antics as Reed. I bent down to check on him and saw that he had spit up. As I pulled him into my lap to clean him I noticed he had something in his mouth and that his bald head was now glittery. Somehow a broken Christmas tree ornament had gotten underneath the couch and Kyle was eating it. I stuck my fingers in his mouth and pulled out a huge chunk of the ornament. Putting my fingers that far down his throat caused him to throw up and then throw up again. At this point Kyle is doing his broken hearted cry (I cry the same way when I throw up), while Reed is crawling around in the mess. Remember I told you I had given them blackberries at dinner, so my carpet looked like the Glitter Fairy came over and had one too many glasses of red wine. JR was now squealing, jumping and jiving while I was still trying to calm Kyle down (and yes, I'm covered in "Glitter Fairy wine" too). It was then that I thought to myself, "I could really use some help right about now." I'm happy to say that everything turned out fine. Everybody got cleaned up, and the carpet looks better than I thought it would. After all that commotion, I really wasn't into blogging, or emailing, or even turning on the computer. So I just sat on the couch for awhile. (And then worked on Reed's stocking, that thing is a killer...but that's another blog.)

So Late I'm Embarrassed

I'm ashamed to say that only today did I finish getting our Christmas trees up. I'm also embarrassed to say that we are only having 2 Christmas trees this year. I know! I'm always fully decorated by this time of the year, in fact, I've been known to have up ALL the trees before Halloween. But not this year. I'm giving myself a pass this year. And, for those of you that are still in shock over my lack of decorating, I just so happen to have my excuse list handy:

1. The babies are crawling and in to everything. They could have a Christmas tree in the floor in 10 seconds flat.

2. With the impending move on the horizon, we're still not sure when the packers will be scheduled. If it happens to be a few days before Christmas, that would be an awful lot of undecorating right at Christmas time.

3. I just don't have the time this year. I really hate this excuse, nothing aggravates Jason and me more than people being "too busy". But, with the move, the babies, Jason's traveling, and JR with all his extracurriculars, I'm going to play the busy card.

4. Since we're moving, we aren't going to have a Christmas party, so I'd really just be decorating for JR and me to ooh and ahh over. (Can you believe Jason isn't really into oohhing and ahhing over Christmas decorations?)

Is that enough? I think so.

AND, I also did something I really never thought I would do. I let JR decorate the tree today, and I didn't re-do it. One of my favorite Friends episodes is the one where everybody's decorating the tree, and their commenting on how they can't believe Monica's letting them decorate. When they stand back to admire their work, Monica swings the tree around to her perfectly decorated side so theirs is hidden in the back. I couldn't stop thinking about that today. But, I'm letting the tree stay the way it is, and since I'm not having a party. Who's going to see it? JR must have inherited the Reynolds' love of Christmas decorating. He was so proud of his work today. I told him, "Put every ornament on a different branch so that each ornament feels special." (to avoid all the ornaments winding up on one branch) He really liked that, and every time Jason would walk through the room he'd tell him, "Daddy! Every ornament has to be on a different branch so it knows it's special!" As you can see from the picture, JR was very serious about his work, but you'll also notice that he's still very much an Ingersoll since, true to form, he decorated the tree shirtless! The only other tree I have up this year is JR's tree. He wanted a tree in his room and informed me, "Mommy! I want a big tree this year. Not a little tree." JR and I put up his tree last week and I did move the ornaments as he was hanging them. I took some of his old school projects and made ornaments out of them, which I think came out really cute. He stands and looks at the tree in his room and says, "It's just too beautiful. I want Santa to put the presents right here. You know, Santa loves Christmas because he loves God." Oh, that JR. He can be a sweetie when he wants to be...and it's amazing how sweet he can be as Christmas time approaches, especially since Jason and I have Santa's phone number on speed dial! So, here's JR with his tree. And as you can see, I still couldn't convince him to put on a shirt...

HSM3

I went to the movies with JR tonight. There were a couple age appropriate movies showing and much to my delight he picked out: High School Musical 3. He really likes the "High School Music Kids" and points out all their "products" whenever we see them in the stores. His Ayi sent him HSM and HSM2 from China, so it was an extra treat that he got to see tonight's feature in English! We went to the 5:00 showing, so thankfully there was only one other family in the movie theater since JR likes to give me a play-by-play of what's happening on the screen.
"Mommy! Sharpay has two lockers and they're pink!"
"Mommy! Ryan has on pink pants...ha!ha!ha! He's so silly! Pink pants!"
"Mommy! The boy with the crazy hair (Corbin Bleu) is so good at basketball."
It went on like this for almost half the movie. But at that point, JR started loosing his attention span since The High School Musical Kids are neither cartoons nor superheros. So, for the last half of the movie he asked me:
"Are they about to graduate?"
"Have they graduated yet?"
"When are they going to graduate?"
It was a cute movie although I would have cut one or two more of the sappy, slow songs, added more Ryan and Sharpy (they really are funny), And a few more scenes of Zac Efron without his shirt would have been fine too. Wow! How old my I? and How old is he?

Ike's Still Messin' With Me!

We had a big storm last night and when I woke up this morning I was greeted by yet another tree down in our yard. Thanks, Ike! This tree started leaning during Hurricane Ike and the little storm we had last night finished it off. Poor JR is starting to think that every time it rains a tree falls down in our yard. Here are some pictures...

AAANNND...If you remember I thought I had accidentally deleted all my Ike pictures off my camera. Well, I didn't. While suffering from Post Ike Stress Syndrome I had put the pictures under September 06, so when I went to look for them under September 08 they weren't there, and I thought I had deleted them. I wouldn't have posted them since we all seem to be over Ike, but since I'm having to talk about it again, here are the before and after pictures I didn't get to show you the first time around. And yes, the before pictures were taken the day of the storm. That's another spooky thing about hurricanes, look how gorgeous it was just 12 hours before it hit!

And this is what it looked like when we were trying to get down our street.

Tagged By Angie

My friend Angie "blog tagged" me about a month ago, and I've been trying to think of something to write ever since. Angie and I taught together at McMeans Jr. High and she's one of the sweetest people I have ever met. She taught reading; I taught English and we were the pep squad and cheerleader sponsors. Needless to say all the girls we taught were precious angels since they thought there might be a smidgen of a chance that we actually had a say in who the cheerleaders were. If you know anything about Texas cheerleading then you know it is ultra, super, intense competitive. We had to have judges come from over a hundred miles away (so there was no chance they would know any of the girls), then Angie and I would leave through a backdoor before the results were given out...Our principal wanted us safely in our own homes so the moms couldn't accost us in the parking lot. At the school I taught at before McMeans, I would be escorted to my car by a police officer after tryouts "for my own safety". Yes, it's that serious. Cheerleading tryouts aside, we had so much together. She is now in Anna, Texas with her 3 kids and husband, Andrew, who is the pastor at the First Baptist Church. This picture of us was taken at Angie's going away party (she was moving to Waco) right before we moved to China.

Okay, so now onto my tagging. I'm supposed to tell you 6 interesting things about me...that's been the hard part, I tend to over share, so I think y'all already know everything. I'm not sure if these count as 6 interesting things or not...but I did my best to go for things you may not know.

1. I'm right handed, but the left side of my body is the strongest. In high school drill team I could always kick my left leg higher than my right. And if you asked me to do the splits right now, I couldn't do either of them, but my left split would be better. Kyle is heaver so I always carry him in my left arm and Reed in my right.

2. Little kids really like me. If there's a little kid around, they always seem to be drawn to me. I've decided that it must be my voice. I'm like Elmo. Sesame Street can be on all day and none of my kids will look at it. They hear Elmo's voice and they stop everything to turn around and look. There's only been one kid that has an aversion to me. JR's friend, Travis, is terrified of me. Jason thinks it's hilarious because he's seen how most kids are attracted to me (Travis actually really likes Jason.) Every time Travis sees me he starts saying "Bye-Bye! Bye-Bye! Bye-Bye!"

3. I'd love to have a gaggle of kids. I guess it's my "only-childness" in me that makes me want to have a herd myself. Jason says "we're done". But I still plan on having a little girl. I've just got a few minor details to work out: Convincing Jason, AND getting back to China (or anywhere else in Asia) to adopt her....we'll have an Ingersoll girl yet....just stay tuned!

4. I love sleeping. Sleeping late, taking naps...nuff-said.

5. Jason and I think we should have our own reality show. Jason and I started watching a lot of reality TV when we moved home from China since we had missed the start-ups of so many popular scripted shows. Seems like everybody has their own reality show these days, you don't even have to be famous...or that interesting. Jason and I are convinced we'd make great TV. If any TV producers are reading this, we'd be happy to open our home to your cameras....and enjoy all the freebies that come with it. I'll be happy to pour my kids Juicy Juice every morning if they send a crate over for free!

6. I'm not a picky eater. I really will eat most anything. In China I wasn't too interested in eating the fish that was still looking at me, but I would eat it. The only food I really don't like are pickles. Which means I really don't like potato salad either. Every once in awhile I think that I should like potato salad, so I'll try it again...And I still don't like it (it's the pickles). I don't like slaw either. Is that pickle based too?

Now I'm supposed to tag 6 others and have them tell 6 interesting things about themselves. Kristi has already done it, so that leaves Allison, Robin, and Beth. I'm bad at math, but I do know that that's not 6...but that's all the bloggers I know!

Christmas Crafting Day 27

Hallelujah! After 27 days, I've finished Kyle's stocking. I'm pretty proud of myself, (not for my quality of work, but just that it's finished). Sweet JR is really proud of me too. He was telling his Grandpa Gary today, "Look, we finished Kyle's stocking." I'll definitely give JR the "we" credit because he gave me tons of moral support. Every morning he would check to see what I had done the night before. He'd tell me: "The stocking looks great, Mommy." "Look, You only have 3 more steps to go!" "I love the eye patch, Mommy." He was almost like having my mom around. Now if he'd told me to 'go lay down and take a little nap' then I would have known it was her telling him what to say. But since he never mentioned letting me get a nap, he gets all the "stocking helper" credit. So, one down...one to go. Reed's stocking (Santa riding a motorcycle) gets started tomorrow, so I get to start a whole new Christmas Crafting Countdown. Oh goody.

A New Fave

The part of Houston we live in is really an older part of town. It's the suburbs that get all the really great new stores and restaurants. I'm so excited, because finally, we've now got something brand, spankin' new. And let me tell you, it is brand, spankin' new fabulous! The new H.E.B (big grocery store chain in Texas) opened up on Thursday and we made our first trip there today. Unfortunately for us, we'll only be able to enjoy it for a few more weeks before the move, but I'm thinking I can find a reason to visit everyday. The excitement started in the parking lot when we discovered they have the "duly carts" (as Jason calls them). Since the babies have been born I haven't been able to go to the grocery store without Jason because if you have two car seats in the cart, there's no room for the food. I wish I'd had my camera because Kyle and Reed looked so cute sitting next to each other in the cart. They looked as happy to be there as everybody else. I'm telling you, this H.E.B is so great, it's almost up there with Super Target. The "beauty" aisle looks like a Sephora and the book and magazine section looks like a Barnes and Noble. Not that I would ever buy anything at Barnes and Noble, I'm much too conservative for that...I get all my books from a great little place called the Public Library. They had a section of Christmas decorations to rival Hobby Lobby, two rows of pinatas, and a RediClinic! They had a wine tasting going on...which totally took the edge off the big crowd, a huge meat department, and seafood department that could double as a trip to the aquarium. When we were finished shopping there were 25 checkout lanes to choose from. 25! I love my new H.E.B.! I love it so much I just might start cooking...well, maybe I don't love it that much!