On My Nightstand

I LOVE to read. It's one of my favorite things to do dating back to being a child and hearing my mom read chapter books to me at night. One of the greatest days ever was when the book fair came to my school........Who am I kidding? It was the greatest day ever when the book fair came to CADE'S school! I still sat at the table with the little flimsy paper flyer they send home with my sharpie in hand marking the books I thought Cade would enjoy. Here's the problem. I've collected WAY too many half reads over the last few months. All of these are seriously on my nightstand. I just CAN'T find a book I cannot put down. I started with an army novel. I love me some military book...........not so much Ollie North. Too much military jargon and abbreviations and I could not follow. I've read it twice to the fifth chapter.

2) Then, The Gift of Fear. Gavin DeBecker. Great information. I learned so much about fear that I'm now scared of the book.

3) The Invisible War............real life demon stuff. The book by Gavin told me I should be scared of it too. So I am.

4)Two Wars. True story of military heroism. Not the greatest writer. But really, he never claimed to be a good writer just a good fighter. It was taking too long to get to the point where he crashed his helicopter in the enemy territory and had to fight the Afghans.

5) 3/4 of the way thorough World Without End. Good book. 1300's. SOOOO LONG.

6) Black. The people at Lifeway said it was a must read series. Too sci-fi for me. I don't get into sci-fi.

7) I tried to be smart and literary. Read six chapters of Little Women. Got tired of Mr. Darcy and Marmie. I'll try that one again later.

8) Now, just four days ago, I started taking a stab at Twilight. The ONLY reason I'm reading it is because there is so much hype about the movie and I feel left out. I can't stand not knowing what all the squealing is about. I'm two chapters in. Maybe this will be THE ONE. It's about vampires. I hope all my knowledge from The Gift of Fear doesn't force me to put this one down too.

My question is: What are you reading?? Surely someone has the perfect page turning recommendation for me. And, please, don't make it about Amish. I read so much Beverly Lewis I started pricing horse drawn carriages and almost started making my own butter. Don't take that as a stab if you're Amish. And, hey, if you are, don't tell your dad you've been on the computer.

It's That Time Again

Me: "Cade, if you could have just ONE thing for Christmas, you're most favorite thing, what would you ask for?"








Cade: "Well, since I KNOW that Santa is bringing me the Star Wars Millennium Falcon,

I just figured you could get me the Republic Gunship."
Me: "Do you have any idea how much that Millennium Falcon costs?" (try one hundred fifty dollars)

Cade: Insert shoulder shrug " No. What does Santa care? He just has to build it."








I had no comment after that. Seriously, I know all of you non-Santa-ers are saying "I told you so" right now but truth be known, I really like the Santa charade. It brings me joy. And them joy. And I loved it as a child and have no deep scars from finding out it was a hoax. In fact, I think Annie Brickler told me about it in the bathroom at church one morning...........well, it was that or the truth about where babies come from. Either way I don't remember crying about it or anything I just remember wondering how Annie knew so much stuff.





So, Santa has a tough road to go in this economy. I think Bobby is going to look into delivering pizzas so we can get the boy the Falcon. The 30 minutes of pure elation that it brings him will be all the reward we'll need.

Look Closely

Apparently we have "Droids" in the yard. After scouring the area looking for my children I made one last pass down the sidewalk yelling their names. That's when I heard lots of "shhhshes" coming from the bushes. (Hey, that was quite poetic. Read it again if you must.) I went back inside and grabbed the camera because, folks, that's just what I do. Look closely. You can see all three but I must admit they did a great job camouflaging themselves.

Rhett emerged and I questioned him as to what was going on. His reply? Hiding from Battle Droids. Of course. What else could it have been?
Cade was poised and ready with the most powerful weapon known to mankind....... The Buzz Lightyear AK47.

And when Grant ran out in his best army man fashion using hand signals and the whole nine yards, I was able to photograph him with his fighting face.

They apparently did a great job fighting off the droids because I neither saw one nor was attacked by one while spending time outside in the unseasonably warm weather. Just one more day in the life of three star wars lovin', active imaginationing, high energy using b-o-y-s.

Party! Party!

We had the big birthday bash at the Gymboree play place over the weekend. Rhett had a great time playing with his buds. Bobby, on the other hand, was wishing we had had the party at Pump it Up or something. He thought the party was too babyish. I did remind him that the child had just turned 3 even though Rhett would swear to you that it was his fifth birthday. No kidding.My cake lady did a great job on the Diego cake. Rhett was so excited to see baby Jaguar on there. He is slightly obsessed with this nino and his gato. I think one of Rhett's favorite parts was the parachute. It seems parachutes are always a bit hit with kiddos. I'm considering buying one for the Morgan home. I believe it would be a good investment........kind of like our jumphouse. We could bring it out at all the Morgan Family Extravaganzas that we have.

I was lucky enough to catch Rhett for one pic with the birthday boy. He was not into photo ops or kisses from anyone on his party day. Too busy running I guess.
Several of the kids were too excited about the play area to even eat the cake. I was practically forcing them to eat it. Even after that we came home with an entire Diego head that needed to be eaten. To keep from completely torturing myself I sent it with Bobby to work (along with a very large bag of Halloween candy). I tell you what, those work people will eat anything.

Here's to another birthday come and gone. I'll try not to be sad. These are just some of the most precious times and I've come to realize that they pass in the blink of an eye. Next up for birthdays: Bobby. Here he comes 3-2. Yikes!

May the Force Be With You.

Halloween this year rolled out with a Star Wars theme. Star Wars has been a huge hit here for the past 6 months at least even though the boys had never even seen any of it until about 2 weeks ago. I had to kiss sweet costumes goodbye and just bite my tounge as they picked out their own get ups. I must say though, Rhett as Yoda totally cracked me up. Especially when he put the "force" on you as he is doing in this photo. We briefly did our church's fall festival and then came back to the neighborhood to trick or treat door to door. I had proposed three rules to be followed 1) Take only one piece of candy 2) Say thank you 3) Don't run three miles ahead of me because I cannot tell you apart from all the other Storm Troopers and Boba Fett's. None of the rules were followed. Excitement trumped them. Bottom line: No one was lost. No one was injured. Everyone came back with loot.I will admit that at least part of the time the "one piece" rule was working. We probably had half of the candy this year that we did last year. Good for me. Less that I have to sneak and throw away.Aunt Tracie came up to share in the festivites. I think she had a good time just watching Rhett run around in his cuteness. She had him screaming Trick or Treat at the top of his lungs from the sidewalk before he even got to the front door of houses. He could hardly contain himself. She also let him have his birthday present before his party. Big hit.

We were happy to have her here along with her furry friends. She was even a sport and dressed up like a Kentucky cheerleader.....much to Bobby's chagrin. He should know by now that Baker blood runs blue!

Hope everyone had a great Halloween!

We've Hit the Big Zero-Three!

Today is Little Buddy's third birthday! Time has gone by so quickly that I'm shocked we are celebrating this already. At about 6:15 this morning I decided to fashion him a birthday crown out of some cardboard. It really turned out to be a hit. He stood statue-like on the kitchen chair while we sang happy birthday to him. He didn't move an inch while we were singing. My voice must have scared him stiff... Even after the song he still seemed a bit shocked. I'll have to admit that I, myself, was shocked as well. Shocked that I had it in me to be singing when it clearly was NOT daylight outside. If you've ever lived with me you know that I DO NOT talk or interact with others in the morning.....especially if the sun is not yet awake.

I didn't spend a lot of time on a special birthday breakfast. I know. Boo on me. He was ecstatic when his toaster strudel showed up bearing three candles.

And, what is a mini-party without your best canine friend? Chicky Bear was lucky enough to make it down stairs for the festivities. He hasn't missed much in the small time he and Rhett have been friends.

Happy Birthday, Little Buddy! Stay tuned for birthday blowout party pics!

Look What the Attic Drug In

My mom, who is a saver of all things good and bad, made a trip into her attic a while back. She took all the things that she has collected from my 30 years of life and gave them to me in a rubbermaid container. It was full of first grade writing samples, spelling tests, elementary school report cards. A great find: a diary from my tortuous elementary school love life (another story for another day if you're lucky). There was a lot of fun memrobilia to peruse. Then I came across these:





I thought to myself, "Well, how unfortunate that she has placed these incredibly huge glasses in a baggie along with all of these other semi-normal ones I wore in elementary school. These must have been my grandma's or from Goodwill or something. Surely. Surely to goodness." Then, wouldn't you know? I found this:


AAAAUUUUGGGGGHHHH!!!!!! I totally DID wear them!
For TWO years worth of school pictures! I just can't imagine the eyeglass woman looking at my mother with a straight face and telling her these were a good fit. Where was my sister when this was going on?? Did she not know the proper face to eyeglass ratio either?? Maybe she tried and I ignored her advice just like the time she tried to tell me I was using the curling iron upside down and that's why I was ending up with a crink instead of a nice curl under (which, if you look closely enough can be noted in the second picture). In any case, I'm thankful Bobby has already taken an oath to love me forever. I'm afraid that if these pictures had surfaced 9 years ago he may have thought twice.

The good news is, however, my glasses are on the comeback. Just ask Nicole Richie.