Princess update

This picture was taken with Miss Jessica's camera this past Sunday at church. Princess is on the right in the pink dress. Her friend Emily is on the left. Emily was born 8 days before Princess. They both have that beautiful red hair! Princess can now sit up by herself...well, until she decides she'd rather try to crawl. Then she falls over and is stuck laying on her belly. She can scoot backwards and around in a circle, but she really doesn't go very far. It won't be long now. She is really interested in eating actual food with her hands. I give her little Zwieback biscuits and she just goes to town. She'd love to eat more but there really isn't much finger food she can eat without teeth. She loves her baby food, too. I just can't believe she's getting so big. She is such a joy...our little blessing from above.

Jill

Yummy!

Princess has discovered the joy of eating...and she tackles it with all her might. Though she can't really eat solid foods yet she loves the biter biscuits that Gerber makes. As you see, though they make quite a mess. But it's great to sit her in her seat and give her one while I'm trying to wash dishes or cook.

Other pics show Tink making her homemade Valentine's Day cards to take to our Valentine party later today with the homeschool group. We will have 50 kids there so we had quite a lot of cards to make. I'll write more about the party later. I know it'll be lots of fun. There are also some pics of Man-Man at a Pump it Up birthday party we all went to. He had a ball. You can see pure joy on his face. We're off to do school and then go to the gym. Have a great day!

Jill

Life changes!

I just checked my email and this was sent to me....it kinda explains some of the rambling of the previous post. Enjoy!


The Spoiled Under 30 Crowd

If you are 30 or older you will think this is hilarious!!!!

When I was a kid, adults used to bore me to tears with their tedious diatribes about how hard things were when they were growing up; what with walking twenty-five miles to school every morning...uphill BOTH ways...yadda, yadda, yadda!

And I remember promising myself that when I grew up, there was no way I was going to lay a bunch of crap like that on kids about how hard I had it and how easy they've got it!

But now that...

I'm over the ripe old age of thirty, I can't help but look around and notice the youth of today. You've got it so easy! I mean, compared to my childhood, you live in a Utopia! And I hate to say it but you kids today you don't know how good you've got it!

1. When I was a kid we didn't have The Internet. If we wanted to know something, we had to go to the library and look it up ourselves, in the card catalog!!

2. There was no email!! We had to actually write somebody a letter ... with a pen! Then you had to walk all the way across the street and put it in the mailbox and it would take like a week to get there!

3. There were no MP3's or Napsters! You wanted to steal music, you had to hitchhike to the record store and shoplift it yourself! Or you had to wait around all day to tape it off the radio and the DJ would usually talk over the beginning and mess it all up!

4. We didn't have fancy crap like Call Waiting! If you were on the phone and somebody else called, they got a busy signal. That's it!

5. And we didn't have fancy Caller ID Boxes either! When the phone rang, you had no idea who it was! It could be your school, your mom, your boss, your bookie, your drug dealer, a collections agent, you just didn't know!!! You had to pick it up and take your chances, mister!

6. We didn't have any fancy Sony Playstation video games with high-resolution 3-D graphics! We had the Atari 2600! With games like "Space Invaders" and "Asteroids" and the graphics were horrible! Your guy was a little square! You actually had to use your imagination! And there were no multiple levels or screens; it was just one screen forever! And you could never win. The game just kept getting harder and harder and faster and faster until you died! Just like LIFE!

7. When you went to the movie theater there no such thing as stadium seating! All the seats were the same height! If a tall guy or some old broad with a hat sat in front of you and you couldn't see, you were just screwed!

8. Sure, we had cable television, but back then that was only like 15 channels and there was no onscreen menu! You had to use a little book called a TV Guide to find out what was on! And there was no Cartoon Network either! You could only get cartoons on Saturday Morning. Do you hear what I'm saying!?! We had to wait ALL WEEK for cartoons!

9. And we didn't have microwaves, if we wanted to heat something up, we had to use the stove or go build a fire...imagine that! If we wanted popcorn, we had to use that stupid JiffyPop thing or a pan with HOT oil and real popcorn kernels and shake it all over the stove forever like an idiot.

10. When we were on the phone with our friends and our parents walked-in, we were stuck to the wall with a cord, a 7 foot cord that ran to the phone - not the phone base, the actual phone. We barely had enough length to sit on the floor and still be able to twirl the phone cord in our fingers. If you suddenly had to go to the bathroom - guess what we had to do.....hang up and talk to them later.

That's exactly what I'm talking about! You kids today have got it too easy.
You're spoiled.

You guys wouldn't have lasted five minutes back in 1980!

Regards,
The Over 30 Crowd

Return from the Stone Age

O.K. I know I haven't posted in a while...and there's a reason. We have a very nice, yet very old computer that sometimes can't keep up with the new, fast-paced, high-tech world. We have a dinosaur from 1998. DH is great with computers and has basically rebuilt this one with all of the new high-tech stuff in it. But it has a problem connecting to the cable modem when the computer is turned off. (At least that's what I think is happening). All I know is that we had some terrible wind up here last Tues. (10 days ago) and the power went out for about 1 second. It was enough to shut down our computer and it took until today for it to decide to reconnect to the internet world.

This really made me realize how much we rely on computers and email to communicate. I mean, I had to watch the local and national news to know what was going on. I'm so glad I don't have to do that on a regular basis. We're so spoiled. I used the internet the first time while I was in college and now I can't remember how I got along without it. This invention has totally changed our world. I mean think about it. We don't have to have the latest editions of the Encyclopedia Britanica sitting on our bookshelves for our children to write reports out of. In one click they know more about Abe Lincoln than any encyclopedia or library could ever tell you. I remember that to write a book report or essay in the sixth grade I had to write my essay on unlined computer paper. In order to keep the lines nice and level I had to use a lined sheet of paper that had the lines marked in black and paper clip that paper to the back of my unlined paper. Does anyone else remember having to do this? These are things our kids will never understand...or do. Oh, I'm just reminiscing here....I'll post some pics later since that's what y'all want to see anyway! Love you guys!

Jill

Snow in Mississippi!!

It wasn't supposed to happen. All of the weather forecasters said that it wouldn't snow here because it wasn't going to be cold enough. Our cold weather was coming today and the rain was coming last night. Well, we all know who is actually in charge of this weather!! The cold and the rain just did come together this morning for a couple of hours of beautiful snow. Since it had rained all night last night the snow didn't stick much. There was a nice slushy mixture of ice and rain in our front yard. The back yard held a little more snow but we had so much rain water on the ground that it melted quickly. But it snowed a good bit. (And that's not just the opinion of a Mississippi girl...it's the opinion of a Mississippi girl who spent a year in north Utah!) If the ground would have been dry we would have had a nice winter wonderland. But we still had fun. The kids couldn't believe that it actually snowed here at their home. Tink asks all the time when we can go vacation somewhere where it snows. Well God brought the snow to her. Christian wasn't quite sure what to think of it. It was cold and wet. He played a little...but he liked watching the snow fall from inside the house better. Tink played for a long time in it. She liked making snow balls. We even have a snow ball in the freezer to show Daddy when he gets home. What a wonderful surprise on a cold dreary day in MS.

Jill

Yummy Food!

On Christmas Day my little baby started eating real food. Her first food was squash and let me tell you...she loved it. She took to eating like a champ. She gobbled it up right away. None of the others have eaten so well on their first try...I was so impressed. Each night we sit her in the center of our kitchen table in her Bumbo seat and she eats while we eat. I know she feels like such a big girl. She loves the fact that she's literally the center of attention.

Now a word on the Bumbo seat...

This Bumbo seat is such a great invention. We didn't have it with Tink and Man-Man (wasn't invented yet) but it helps Princess sit up by herself before she can do it alone. It's wonderful and I would advise any new mom to invest in one. I sit her in the middle of my kitchen floor while I cook supper and sit her in my bathroom floor while I'm getting dressed. She can see me and it makes her happy. It's a lot easier than pulling the exersaucer everywhere we go.

I hope you all have a great week. Oh, please go to the previous post and read Miss Jessica's comment about Man-Man. He is such a wonderful little boy. He just takes your heart!! Mom can brag all she wants but this came from a college student who keeps him at church. He's loved Miss Jessica since he was a little toddler. We have been blessed to have her.

Love,
Jill

Christmas Fun!

What a wonderful Christmas we had! It seems like it all happened so fast but we loved every minute of it. The weekend before Christmas we traveled to Montgomery to have Christmas with DH's family. We were able to Christmas with his parents and brothers and their families on Sat. and then with the extended Kyser family on Sunday night. That was the first time we had been to Montgomery for Christmas since 2002. It was hectic, but wonderful. The only bad part was the 5 hour trip there and back. Since Princess does not like the car or the car seat we had quite a fussy and loud ride. She does seem to be getting a little better though.
Monday, Christmas Eve, we came back to Clinton. Our church held Christmas Eve services that night and we all went. Then we came home and got our p.j.'s on so we could jump in the bed for Santa. Earlier that afternoon we had baked some cookies for Santa and made up some reindeer food. The kids were more concerned about feeding the reindeer than Santa. After all...everyone gives him cookies.

Christmas Day was awesome. We woke up early and played with the toys Santa brought then opened the rest of the gifts. After that we laid around all day and went outside to play. We didn't have to go anywhere and I didn't have to hurry and get the house straight. We loved it. Man-Man got his big boy Spiderman bike with training wheels and Tink got her Razor scooter. I couldn't believe how fast Man-Man took off on that bike. He's riding it like a pro now.
Hope you enjoy the pics above. They're just a few of the exciting events of the past couple of weeks. I'll write more later!
Jill