Independence day

Happy 4th!.

First I must say that I Loathe living in the desert. Second I must say that I loath summer. Third I loathe my body in a bathing suit. Fourth I loathe public swimming area's.

So I sit here independently appreciating my freedom indoors with air condition and a cold soda. If the 4th was the 4th of October, I would be parading around the beach wearing stripes and setting off things that go Boom in the Night.

I can not be patriotic in the dead of summer. I can not.

It is not my fault. I do love our country, this is not meant to sound like I don't appreciate what today stands for....I just can not do summer holidays. I would not be happy about Christmas if it was in July. It's nothing against the holiday, I am against the month. I am against how hot it is where I live in the month of July. So really, this is just me saying I don't like where I live.

Sorry.


Now for the actual point of blogging today, My little Man is 8 whole months. And he is sporting his first tooth. His lower right central, (I looked it up ) :) And that thing is sharp, keeps him up all night (one of about 7 other issues), feels really pleasant on my boob, and warranted a trip to Babies R Us to pick up his first tooth brush. A milestone. Eeeeek.

He is doing so much around here, he maneuvers himself around and always ends stuck underneath the coffee table or the bed or with his hands in the dog bowls. He crawls like a madman. Only backwards though. It drives me crazy and breaks my heart. He will look at something in front of him and you can see that he wants to get to it, so he starts crawling but backwards and the whole time he is crawling further from the object he just wails in devastation. He has been crawling backwards for a month now, and if you were a fly on my wall you would see Liam's mommy and daddy on all four's trying to show him what to do. I think that is why he does not do it, he knows that once he does, mom and dad won't look as stupid. I think he looks so much like his daddy in this picture.

Irene Dorothy

Today marks the one year anniversary that my Grandma has been in Heaven. I still miss her so much, I have a bazillion memories of her but as I was thinking of what to write nothing felt as real and heartfelt as what I wrote in her program at her funeral.'


"My Grandma was a collection of Angel decorations, she was spaghetti dinner at the Old Spaghetti Factory, she was Christmas mornings, she was a baseball game on T.V., She was country line dancing at the Moose Lodge, she was the "Henry Wave", she was fresh tomatoes, she was house slippers, she was dentures that didn't fit quite right, she was smooth legs, she was in love with my daddy, she was making silly faces, she was coca-cola, she was a yellow VW bug, she was gardening in the spring, she was turkey gravy, she was a hot pot of tea, she was Grandma Got ran over by a Reindeer, she was ticklish knees, she was a comfy reclining chair, she was a crochet pattern and needle, she was twirling thumbs, and she was the sharpest set of ears. I am blessed to be a part of who my Grandma was. She will be missed every day this side of Heaven"


My Grandmother had Alzheimer's, I was her Granddaughter and at times I was also her Daughter, her Friend, her other Granddaughter and a stranger.

I am so happy to know that my Grandma is in Heaven and not confused anymore with who I am, and when we meet again I will always just be her Granddaughter.

Joyfully Remembering
Irene Dorothy Henry
September 16, 1918 - June 23, 2009

Aloha!

At the beginning of this month we took our first family vacation to Maui. We were so looking forward to it. Sam and I had been there together 4 years ago and had a wonderful time, we went parasailing and scuba diving and went to a luau. This time we stayed up all night, went for long scenic drives, and avoided the sun.

Our nights were not out and about enjoying the night life, they were in our little condo with a baby who could not sleep in his strange crib, in the room with the weird air condition unit humming a different sound than normal, and his mommy and daddy in the room with him. The kid is a light sleeper and so every time we turned he would hear the sheets rustling and would wake up screaming. The first morning we woke up and were so angry we flew to hawaii on vacation with a 6 month old. He promptly woke up every 45 minutes on the dot that first night. It did get better after that well anything is better than 45 minute naps all night long.

Our long scenic drives were not necessarily by choice we would head off to the beach or lunch or shopping and Liam would fall asleep in the back seat, now Sam and I have this rule that we never wake a sleeping baby, and most definitely not our sleeping baby. When Liam sleeps we take each moment as a gift from God and then sigh in exasperation that we are in a car and not able to go to sleep ourselves. So we would head out and Liam would fall asleep and we would drive and drive and drive. And drive and drive and drive. Seriously. 2 1/2 hours almost every day. At least the kid got some good naps in. And we saw almost every inch of that island. Yes even the roads that the rental car place forbids you to go on. SCARY roads. They are forbidden for a reason. I thought the road was going to kill me. And Sam thought I was going to kill him with all of my terrorizing gasps of fear. We lived. And we kept on driving.

We really had a wonderful time, and I am pretty sure that my husband is going to buy me a house there one day. As soon as they build a Target. ;)Liam hated the beach. Screamed and shook all over. Convulsed. Hated the sand. So we went in the pool. Hawaiian pools are much more tropical than ones in California so we did not mind. And I myself loathe sand so I am quite tickled that my son has one of my traits. The only one to date. I will take what I can get. Now when People say "oh he looks just like his father" I can respond with "yes but he hates the sand like his mother".

April Showers part 3

So my little niece Reese is just the most precious thing ever. She was born nearly two months early and weighing under 3 pounds, and she has been impressing all of us with how much of a strong little girl she is. She now weighs a whopping 10 pounds at 7 months. I am so excited for Liam to grow up with her. One being that he will have a cousin his age to play with and pick on ;) and the other because Reese has down syndrome. I firmly believe that God gave Reese to our family on purpose and that each one of us has something that we are to learn from her. I am thrilled to death that my son will have a bond with her and that he will get to grow up side by side with someone as special as Reese.
As a teenager I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to go bowling once a week with a group of Down Syndrome Teenagers. They were so wonderful to be around, their attitudes were so encouraging nothing made them sad, life was simply about love. Loving each other, loving me. They would not even know me but they would greet me with a huge hug, and they would hug on me all through their game, and then they would hug me goodbye. The amount of Love that I felt from being around them has stuck with me ever since. And they were not my family. Reese is. And I am looking forward to the years ahead that will be filled with the Love that this little girl will give us and teach us about. A love so pure and nonjudgmental. A love that is unconditional.

Easter was the first time that the two really has an "interaction" of sorts. I can't wait for the years to come, but this first experience was hysterical. These photos were not posed, all movements were naturally done by the babies themselves. Absolutely no babies were harmed during the making of these photos.

April Showers par deux

We had my family over for Easter Sunday. Or Resurrection Sunday :)
I attempted to make some new recipes (bad idea) for everyone to try. First I made a strawberry and creme pie. Chilled it over night like Paula Deen said and then when I put it on the table for dessert and it was cut into, low and behold a fluid of sorts that was underneath all of the whipped cream and strawberries. I was certain I followed the recipe correctly and even brought out the cook book to prove it,
Sugar -I did that, Flour- I did that, 2 eggs beaten- I did that too.
Jen my sis in law says "2 eggs beaten"?
me-"yes"
her- "you beat them before you added them"?
me- "was I supposed to"?
her- "it says 2 eggs beaten, you were supposed to beat them together before you mixed them together"
me- "oh," (ashamed at myself)
who knew that cook book's actually need to come with direction's for the direction's?

Now if it was just the pie I would say no big deal but when it was also my sweet potato balls. The precious balls that I worked so hard on. Please find humor in my balls. So balls go something like this make sweet potato mixture add orange juice, cinnamon, yadda yadda, then take large marshmallows and wrap the potato mixture around said marshmallow, then roll in coconut. I do all of this, but once again Paula Deen led me astray. Yes I will blame everything on her. It makes me feel better about myself, ok?
Put in over 350 degrees for 20 min. BUT be careful because the last few minutes they might explode so watch carefully.
Jerk. Those Marshmallows exploded with in 5 minutes. FIVE. 5. aaarrrgh. So I have to take them out because now they are no longer pretty round delectable balls for everyone to enjoy they are a mass of potato blob on a cookie sheet that looks like a flock of birds flew over it and pooped. And not just exploded balls but still cold.
So I served them cold. Chilled sweet potato balls.

And Paula Deen makes a lot of money to screw up my Easter dinner. She really does.

April Showers

I am going to do a little shower of posts today to get you all caught up on our little lives out here in California.

First shower ~ So as I have mentioned before I would like to dabble in a little photography here and there. So since Liam is now more expressive and has a better temperament for sitting still without crying, we set him up in a new red bucket out in our front yard and attempted to take some photos. He was much easier this time and we are happy with what we got for the time being since we don't have the money right now to have professional photos taken. Here is just a handful of some of our favorites. Hope you enjoy them.

April Fools

So today I am 5 months old.I like Screaching as loud as I can until everyone's ears hurt.
I love kicking and splashing in the bath tub.I love my thumb, it tastes delicious.I like spitting up on clean clothes, it is real funny.I love eating peas. I really do.I love to play in my Jumperoo.I like to giggle, especially at my puppies. They are SO funny.I love to stick my tongue out at my parents.I love to pout my bottom lip when I am unhappy.
I like to be barefoot.
I love going outside for walks, the air smells so good.I love to wake up all through the night. Especially when mommy and daddy just get comfy.
I like to scream during my nap time, until it is time to play again.I love to be held, it is so comfy.

These are my three most favorite bath toys. Mr. Hippopotamus and my whales.
I love this baby, he hangs out here in the hallway. I always smile at him though, just to be nice.
I love these rings, mommy says every baby since 1972 has these, they are real old.
I love this little guy, he is fun to chewI love to be read to, mommy and daddy read to me everyday.I love this oily stuff, mommy massages me every night with it.This chair is cool, it makes me sit up like a big boy. I am a big boy now.
This is Sophie the Giraffe, I love her.This is my sun, he has a light show that I watch in my crib. It makes me stop crying. Sometimes.

And lastly these two toys, bark, and lick my fingers, and they chase each other, and they like to lay their heads on me, and I like to grab their fur and pull. That makes them jump so high. It is real funny.Knightley and Kingsley