Part 2 of the Road trip

We had lots of Miller family fun, which is what we came for in the first place!

We played.


We caught minnows in Michele's pond. {Pictures on Michele's camera}

We ate.


We played cars with 16 year old Riley who secretly liked getting to be a kid.


We bounced.



We ate ice cream outside in the rain while it was 45 degrees! The Smiths are really beginning to influence us Millers! {No pictures, imagine that!}

We went to the Zoo.







We came home. That was a trip I'll remember for a long time. Miller did a good bit of complaining. (In his defense, He has another ear infection and was uncomfortable...more on that later.)

I'm tired just blogging about it! Let's take a rest...

2 million miles and 768 pictures later

We traveled approximately 2 million miles and took approximately 768 pictures, and we have nothing to show for it. Well we do have pictures, and Miller does have another ear infection, so I can't say we have nothing to show for it! This post could be called "The pictures I forgot to take" We did so many things that I didn't mange to capture. We (translate I) lost our little point and shoot camera last summer and haven't replaced it yet. As much as I L.O.V.E. my big fancy camera, it isn't really practical to tote around in your purse. I So wish I had been able to capture more of our wonderful times. Not to worry, I manged to get the whole crew out of the house on Black Friday by 7:15 a.m. so I could get one a t a reasonable price! Now back to the story of our trip...

First we went to visit Allen's mom to celebrate her birthday. Boy was she surprised when we rang the doobell at 9:30 at night.




We had a really great day with her. (No picures of our lunch in a fine french resturaunt)Jackson wasn't sure about it, but he worked up the courage, to get on Papa's tractor. Heaven for him would be Papa, a tractor (that doesn't make noise) and an endless sippy cup of milk!




Allen had to head back so he could work (to finance our lifestyle of leisure), and we headed down to Greenville and stayed with my sister. I'm not sure if it was her idea of heaven or not, because we sure do bring excitement, adventure and a lot of headaches into her life when we come. {All of the good pictures are on her camera, so I'll get those later!}

Miller's love for Michele's Great Dane, Sassy, has not diminished in the least. If anything they are more fond of each other than last time.



My mom was busy getting her whole house recarpeted, so we didn't get to see her as much as we would have liked, but she's coming for Christmas, so there will be lots of time for visiting then. {No pictures again}

We spent the week visiting with our friends in the day and making sure Michele knew how much we love her at night! Tuesday Jackson had his first visit to the dentist and we were so pleased at how well he did. It may have been that the dentist is a friend of his Papa's, but we don't care, we are just thrilled that there was no hysteria involved! {Where are you pictures?}

It was so great to have the time to spend with my friends and their children since we don't get to do that too often! I wish I had been better about taking pictures of our visits! Katie's sons were such good sports and so was Katie because Miller pulled out every single item in her house. Twice. {No pictures of that either}
Cathy's daughter Emerson is a hoot (like her mama) and Jackson and she really got along well. Guess what? Cathy took a picture and sent it o me! Hooray for Cathy!


So then on Saturday, about 1 week after we got into town I took my camera out of my car and began taking a million and one pictures of the rest of our trip.


On Friday evening my brother and his family arrived from California. Jackson was beside himself! He is absolutely smitten with his older cousin Miya. She is such a great girl, and really did a super duper job taking care of Jackson and Miller.






Whew, I think this post is getting a little long, so I better break it up and bore you with another post about our trip! Thanks for reading all this drivel already. I know most of you are related to us and all, but thank you anyway!

Hangin' In

Sorry I have been a bad blogger! We went to NC to celebrate Nana's birthday, then down to Greenville to have a big family reunion. Now we are back and Butterbean has ANOTHER ear infection. The bad news is that he got it in the right ear while on antibiotics for the ear infection for his left ear. That means he is resistant to that antibiotic. Boo! Good news is that we are going to an Ear, Nose, Throat doctor next week, who will hopefully offer a solution in the form of tubes. At this point that would be a welcome relief.
I'll try to post again soon and give you some of what you really want. Pictures!!!
A big Happy Birthday to Miya our niece who turns 12 today. Jackson is absolutely smitten with her. I happen to like her a lot too!

Just what I needed

After a tough week, I got just what I needed. Reading these posts really put it all in perspective.
My boys have been a little sick and we have made way too many visits to the Dr. BUT we have total access to world class medicine.
My children make a mess because they pull things out and leave them all over the place. BUT it is because we have so much. A house with roomS and lots of things to fill them up. Most importantly, the boys are curious enough to explore their surroundings.
We have a great support from all the people who love us.
All this is a contrast to what the people on the Compassion trip are seeing now. It was just what I needed exactly when I needed it!

You can skip this post

Feel free to skip this post. This is just me documenting, not complaining, but it is just as much a part of our story as is all the fun stuff we do.
We're trying to take a more deliberate approach to what we feed Jackson. He won't starve himself and at the same time when he throws it on the floor, it is just plain frustrating!
Not much progress has been made on that front, but we will continue because it is the right thing to do.
Jackson and Miller have had colds for a while. Nothing terrible, but the coughing and snot is keeping them from sleeping soundly.
I took J to the Dr. to check his cough since it has been ongoing for a couple of weeks. The Dr. said that it was allergy related and had us "try" a nasal spray. Went to pick it up at the pharmacy and was told that it was $70. Huh? I asked if they had run it through our insurance and she said she had. It seems that this spray only comes in one size of bottle. Since he is little he only uses one spray per day, so the bottle is a two month supply. So with a $35 co-pay for brand name drugs, that comes to $70. We will "try" it!
His behavior has been plain awful at times. He is doing things out of spite. Usually it is related to us not giving in to his demands. For instance he drops food on the floor that he doesn't want to eat. We give him a warning and so he looks at us as he drops a second one on the floor. He gets sent to time out. When he returns to the table he repeats his trick. He gets sent to his room. While in there (this happened on 2 consecutive nights)he has 1) spread Balmex around. 2) Tinkled on his chair. I spanked him after the tinkling on the chair. Didn't seem to work because he then got in the tub and proceeded to take a cup of water and dump it out onto the floor-deliberately. So out he goes, no more bath for him.
He just doesn't get it. We will not allow him to continue this behavior. One day (SOON we hope) he will figure it out.
Meanwhile Miller continues to take our house apart on an hourly basis. He finds something inspects it moves to another spot, drops it and picks up something else. We're happy he is curious, but it is a constant game of keep away. Toys in the closet, shoes in the kitchen, Tupperware in the bathtub, bibs in his bedroom. He had his 15 month checkup yesterday and got 4 shots. (OUCH!) He was pronounced a perfectly typical baby. Thank God for that! He also has an ear infection. Which would explain why he has been waking up in the nights. We thought he was teething and was uncomfortable from his H1N1 shot on Monday. Could be teething, could be the shot, could be the ear infection! It's all good, we visited the pharmacy (again!) and are on the way to getting that fixed. Thank God for good medicine and our insurance. The last 3 days have cost us $170 in Dr. visits, shots and prescriptions. This doesn't count Miller's well visit, or the other things that insurance has covered. We are fortunate in that respect.
We will keep on keeping on, this is just a tough patch. It isn't that bad! We have a home, cars, a good marriage and most importantly 2 happy (relatively), healthy (relatively) boys. Oh and we have a mighty fine dishwasher too!

Eating

Have I told you that the Bug is a picky eater? I have? Well it is getting on my nerves! As of today, he eats PB&J with no crusts, French toast with no crusts, pancakes, bagels with cream cheese, pasta with parmesean, granola bars, all types of crackers and chips, yogurt (but only the white kind), applesauce, some kinds of cheese and dried fruit. Oh, he does it all sorts of sweets. It is just plain ridiculous. Basically give him a simple carb and top it with a fat and he is good.

I know that I am partially to blame because I allow him to be this way, but I honestly don't know what I am supposed to do. I have tried everything (I think). I have bribed. I have negotiated. I have been kind. I have tried to talk it out. I have tried being firm. I have gotten angry. I have gotten frustrated, and I have done the time-out thing! It's really frustrating. Do I sound like I should be on an infomercial before they tell you how to stop picky eating forever? They could so choose him to be their case study!

I think I need to make some changes around here. The Food Revolution was a partial success. It stopped most of the bad behaviors, like throwing food, but it has done nothing to change the fact that his pickiness is just getting obnoxious. I have stopped making a seperate dinner for him, he can have what we're having, or not. His choice. Tonight we had beef stew, corn muffins, I added cut up apples for the boys. He ate a corn muffin.

Suggestions? Let me have them? Even you, the people who read my blog but never comment, I know you are there and I need you! Tell me what to do! Even if you don't tell me what to do tell me something. Please?! I'll give a Reece's Cup if you just type one little word! Oops there I go again!