Finished!

What a satisfying declaration for a chronic procrastinator like myself to make! The. Blankets. Are. Finished.

 

Drue's has been finished for a few weeks now, I just hadn't taken any pictures of her with it until today. I still have mixed feelings at the print she picked out. Maybe because it's small things like this which serve as daily reminders that she is no longer my wide eyed little baby whom I slept with on a mattress on her floor for the first 10 months of her life? She passed up all the pink, little girly fabrics and went straight for this cheetah print. Really? Are we decorating your first apartment? On the other hand, I was kind of thrilled to see she did pick that print. It shows she is starting to have a little mind of her own instead of doing everything the way Reese does it.

 

Tate was so excited to pick out his material. It comes as no surprise that he picked (a) dinosaurs and (b) ORANGE! We bought his material a few weeks ago and it's been sitting in the dining room ever since calling out for some attention. Tate would even mention it every once in awhile and ask if anyone was going to make his blanket. So today I layed it out on the living room floor and snipped and tied. He was all smiles when he saw me working on it.

The girls both literally squealed with delight when I finished their blankets. And since he is even more excitable than they are, I couldn't wait to see his reaction. He and Drue were playing nicely upstairs together when I finished and I most certainly didn't want to interrupt that. So I draped it across the recliner as an element of surprise when he came back down. Of course, I was in the other room when he finally did come down. He went waltzing nonchalantly by me and I asked "Tate, did you see your blanket?", anticipating his gung ho response.

"Yeah," was all I got back. Men!

He did get more excited about it as the day went on. He couldn't wait to show Reese and David when they got home. And it's up on his bed as I type this.

Although it spent much of the afternoon as a napping spot for Mabel.

 

Love the classic look on Molly's face..."Explain to me again why you forever changed our peaceful lives by bringing not one, but three of these things home from the hospital?!".

 

Carts, Kids, & Craziness

As I mentioned recently, I've been letting Tate walk in stores more and more. Realizing that tossing him into a cart was actually just a result of me being lazy and selfish and wanting to get my errand run as quickly and smoothly as possible. (Not that every Mother who puts her child in a cart does so for the above reasons).

But this year, when it's just been the two of us a few days a week, I have been able to slow down and actually been able to spend 1:1 time with him, teaching him the finer ways of walking, not running, and admiring that pretty vase from afar while resisting the urge see just how many pieces it would smash into if pulled off the shelf.

And, as usual, he has really surprised me with his ability to follow directions and be an all around great errand runner. I can already tell, his personality is shaping up to be a lot like the girls in that he wants, more than anything, to please me. Ironically, this is a part of my personality that I've always felt to be a flaw. I'm a people pleaser. I can't stand the thought of someone being upset with me, or worse yet, disappointed in me.

And while it's not necessarily a good thing to get entirely caught up in what people think, having a little bit of this personality trait is ok. Tate is forever asking, "Are you happy at me?" after he's done something he shouldn't have.

Tate, Drue, and I went to Target today. They both walked. They got a little ahead of me a few times, and Tate was talking louder than the other patrons probably preferred. But all in all, it was a success. Let me interject here that I am still pleasantly surprised that Tate no longer runs away at warp speed as I chase after him like a crazy person. I never thought he would outgrow that stage. It was frustrating, maddening, and exhausting. But now he holds my hand through parking lots and across streets and even grabs it out of the blue at other times when there isn't even a crucial safety issue at hand.

We finished at Target and there was one thing I needed (ok wanted) to check on at Hobby Lobby. Tate announced that he was ready to go home. I burst his bubble that we had one more quick stop to make. "Ok Mommy," he relented. "But you can only get one stuff," he bargained.

They know Hobby Lobby as "Mommy's Store" or the "Don't You Dare Touch Anything or Even Look Sideways at Anything Breakable" store. And please explain to me, why this store has hobbit sized carts? It was truly a circus feat for me to glide through the aisles with all 3 kids at once when they were ages 3 1/2 and under. Tate's infant carrier alone, was enough to almost topple the whole cart completely over. Add trying to stuff my 1 1/2 year old's chubby little legs into the tiny leg holes while trying to keep my 3 1/2 year old from eating all the blasted fake grapes they so abundantly use in their display decorations.

Yes, I had to really want something badly to venture in there during that time in my life.

Today, as we pulled into the parking lot, I bravely decided to offer Tate the option of walking or riding. But I phrased it a bit differently this time, "Tate, will you be able to walk nicely through this store without touching anything?".

To which he very honestly answered, "No. I want to ride in a cart...".

Happy Valentine's Day!

 

Roses are red,
You know the lines,
I am in love
With my 3 Valentines!

 

(The girls' shirts say "Happy Valentine's Day" and Tate's says, "The Ladies Love Me".)

 

A WALK DOWN MEMORY LANE : VALENTINE EDITION

2005- It only took about 5-6 tries to get them both looking my direction. Little did I know, in the years to come (and with the addition of another child) how 5-6 tries would turn into 25-26 tries!

 

2006- One of my favorites!! This was around that time that I figured out they don't have to be looking straight into the camera for the shot to turn out cute! (I had to fix Drue's heart on the actual card I sent out so people could tell her heart was supposed to read "B Mine".)

 

2007- This was Tate's 1st professional photo shoot and we used this pose for some Valentine picture cards. Do not rub it in that he was 8 months old before we got his picture taken. Let's just reflect upon the cuteness of the picture.

 

I did take a picture of them myself in 2007 around Valentine's Day. The girls had sweet little Valentine's sweaters and I was going to stick a tin foil hat on Tate to make him look like a Hershey's kiss, but the poor little fella was so sick that day and had a fever so I spared him the misery and just stuck a red shirt on him. You can see it here.

Happy Birthday Daddy!

 

David got to celebrate his birthday today by taking the girls to the Daddy Daughter Ball. This was Drue's first year to go and she (and Reese) were very excited! They even wanted to dress Tate up as a girl and sneak him into the Ball as well.

 

I don't know that I was quite ready for these little grown up dresses this year. The past two years Reese has picked out some adorable Cinderella type gowns. This year, with Drue's "sensitivities", those itchy gowns were not going to cut it. But this style felt fine on Drue, so both girls got it. Notice Drue's footless tights. It did take a few trips to find shoes that she would agree to.

 

Shopping for their dresses was a giggly event, to say the least. They giggled and giggled and giggled all through the store and in the dressing room. As they admired themselves in the mirror, Drue squealed, "We are going to be fancy friends!".

 

I kid you not, the only makeup the girls are wearing is CLEAR lip gloss. I know, I am completely jealous! And their hair took about 5 minutes to throw together...I just let their cascading curls do most of the work.

David was none too thrilled with the tie I picked out for him. However, it was no easy task finding a tie to match both girls' dresses. Apparently, bright yellow and coral are not a popular masculine color combination. Go figure.

 

 

 

Library Day

Library Day. An exciting day. Joyously anticipated each week by my thirsting for knowledge 7 year old. (I am still having a hard time wrapping my mind around that fact that she's 7. I almost typed "6" and had to stop myself).

It falls on the same day at school each week. Reese reminded me last night that today was library day. "You better find your book then sweetie".

"Oh, I know where it is," she assured me. And that was that. I didn't doubt her for a minute. Because 9 times out of 10 she knows exactly where things are, a missing brush, a microscopic pink Barbie shoe, a sewing needle, etc.

This, of course, was one of the 1 out of 10 times she was wrong. And when she realized she didn't know where her library book was, it was 8:12am and we were on our way out the door to drop her off at school.

I pushed away my thought of "I told you so" and replaced it with, "I'm sorry Boo, we will look more for it tonight and you can turn it in tomorrow".

But she was beside herself. Her lip started quivering and the tears began to fall. Because if she didn't return her book, she wouldn't be able to check out a new one. The thought of watching all the other kids excitedly skim each title and carefully select a fresh book to bring home to share with their family was too much for her.

Thus my internal Mommy debate began. Do I go home and look for the book so I can run it back up to the school which will put a big smile on her face? Or is this one of those times I should be teaching her responsibility about preparing for school the night before?

I went with the former. We scoured the house. I think Drue was actually the one to find it. Back up to the school we went. We got buzzed in and went straight to the office and dropped the book off for her.

I felt good the rest of the day, knowing how surprised she had probably been to get her book. And I looked forward to hearing about her successful library day when she got home.

Reese was very happy after school and was excited to show me the new book she was able to pick out from the library. She reached her hand into her little backpack and pulled out a Dr. Seuss book...the same exact one we had just bought at Target a few days earlier!