Moving Along

Here's a short video of Haley walking her baby in the stroller, and building up her balance. Oops, look like she forgot the baby :-O

Are you aware?

I was inspired tonight. A memory I often think about, usually in church, sometimes when comforting my children...shined through with a little more meaning for me tonight. When I'm singing in church, amoung the crowded pews, my voice probably not heard, I keep it down often...not wanting to catch anyone's attention with my cracking or off pitch voice of an..no not the voice of an angel. Then my thoughts turn to my late Grandfather who was quite the accomplished church choir singer...who would be so proud if I sang louder. No matter how I sounded. He was probably listening to me every Sunday and smiling. Next my thoughts shifted to my childhood. Sitting next to my mother in church, clinging to the sound of her voice while she faithfully sang every word with confidence. I smile remembering the comfort her singing brought me. The smell of her hair, the lotion on her soft skin, while I cuddled closer to enjoy her voice. Now, all grown up, I realize that to others, bless you Mom, but she too doesn't carry a pitch all so well. But she was my mother, who sang to me since I was tiny in her arms. To me it was the voice of an angel. That does it. I then sing louder, nothing crazy here...I'm no American Idol...just confident now to stop hiding my voice in the crowd. I always realize halfway through the first song each Sunday (maybe I'm waking up about then)...that my children seem to like my singing. They've always asked for more...leaned in close...looked up at me with a smile. Maybe they would grow up remembering this and they would follow my example and always participate in church. Not be afraid to sing, pass that onto their children, provide their kids with that comfort, that opportunity to discover music (who knows, maybe someone will get Granddad's singing gene). So, I think of this often. Remind myself of this often, when I'm tired on Sunday and not feeling like sticking out. Well tonight at my RCIA class we were talking about song being a form of prayer. I'd always realized that my children liked my voice no matter how painful it was to others. But someone pointed out that God gave us our voice. He won't be disappointed by what he hears. He's the one who picked out whatever voice you ended up with. It will thrill him to have it thrown back at him in song! That hadn't even occured to me. That someone else was listening when I sang...not just my children. Someone else who would appreciate it. So, hope I didn't dive too deep for anyone, but just something simple that I was aware of, but now understand more. So keep singing to those little ones. They may hold it in one of the fondest corners of their hearts forever. It may teach them something for years to come? Thanks Mom, for the never ending gift!

Almost!

Just thought I'd try and post a quick update on our new year so far. So I guess I haven't mentioned much about Haley's road to walking as I'm kind of just holding my breath while mother nature takes it's course. She is making great strides finally. Yes, she's 17 months and a very late walker. Never fear she's been thouroughly checked out head to toe and inside out of that cute little noggin. All is completely well and she was just so busy learning more talking than she needed to learn at her age..she forgot to worry about the motor milestones. She is now up and about cruizing the furniture, dog, her brother...anything she can use to balance by. She will finger walk only using one hand which is great. She briefly stood alone the other day until her germ friek mommy dashed to brace her just in case she was to fall and touch a dirty restaurant floor whenever she realized she was standing alone. It was particularly dirty..some others wouldn't have bothered me that much..ok a little. So yes, she is getting there. And Hunter, he's gearing up for another upcoming birthday. He's quite the party planner! He will have is next birthday planned on the way home from this years party. This is our crazy month full of friends with birthdays. We have 3 parties this weekend alone. So Hunter can get lots of ideas for next years party :-) Hunter's thoughts are also pretty consumed lately with going to kindergarten next year. He asks a lot of questions about riding the bus..and how long until he leaves Ms. Abby's class this year. He acts excited but it's clear he has a little anxiety about the unknown. He's concerned because he knows Haley will start at his preschool next year and he wants her to go to the same school as him. He wants her to go now. I tried to explain to him the money issue of paying for two in preschool, but he wasn't impressed. Well, hope these little tidbits qualify to keep you all up to date.

Better Late Than Never

Ok, so this is our Christmas post and I know I am way behind. I have been so distracted with facebook. Lucky for you readers, I will probably make this short and sweet to get caught up. I did say "probably" right. Anyways, we had a wonderful Christmas. We are so blessed to have such fortunate and generous family and friends. Haley and Hunter were absolutely spoiled! Need to go shopping for a toy? Toys R'Us is in our living room! I know you all probably feel the same right?! Hunter truely enjoyed all the magic of Christmas this year and I think Haley fed off of a lot of Hunter's excitment. I tried Sandy's "bowl of water on the porch for Rudolph" that mysteriously turns red by morning. It worked better than we could've imagined. Hunter's reaction in the morning made it all more exciting for Thomas and I. We had some wonderful time with extended family and made plenty of long lasting memories here, there, and everywhere. Another year has come to an end and all the decorations are down. That was a little traumatic in our house this year. Last year, we took it all down while Hunter was at his Grandparents house and there were no objections when he returned home..like he didn't even notice. This year I lucked out as Thomas and Hunter took a lot of it down while I was working/sleeping...or working on my sleep :-) Hunter was very helpful and into it until the last branch was in the tree box ready to go in the attic. He was very tearful suddenly and wanted "Christmas to be forever." We had a hard time putting a few things in boxes as he didn't want to part with some things (his rudolph toys, nativity scenes, his little tree for his room.) They will be missed until next year! Hope you all enjoyed your Christmas's...which I know you did..since most everyone has posted about Christmas long ago! Pam, I know you've been disappointed that I haven't kept up...so I'll try better. By the way...when are you going to start yalls blog? Now is a perfect time to keep us all updated on Baby MaGoo on the way??? No pressure.

You Will Find the Baby Wrapped in Swaddling Clothes Lying in a Manger...

Is that not the cutest little shepherd you've ever seen! This was Hunter's first year in the Christmas play at church. He was a little apprehensive about dressing up like a shepherd, but once he got there and saw that everyone else was dressed silly too, he jumped right in. He didn't do a whole lot of singing up there. He mostly spent the time pondering sitting down..which he finally did. There was also that time he hollered out "These shoes are making my feet hot Daddy!" He did mouth a few words and do a few hand signals. Mom and Dad enjoyed it no matter what! I threw in a photo of Thomas's birthday and somehow it ended up right in the middle of the others. No, Thomas didn't want a pink cake, but his favorite is strawberry...so he got a pink cake. Hunter and Haley were both soooooooo excited to make Daddy feel special on his birthday. Haley was even saying, "happy, happy, happy" to him over and over again.

It Snowed In Houston!

Ok, so I know the grass is still green here and it doesn't look at all like winter, but this was exciting for us in south Texas! We haven't had snow here since Hunter's first Christmas Eve and it was gone before sunrise Christmas morning. Hunter has been watching all the Christmas shows on TV and notices snow in all of them. He keeps telling me, "Mommy, when Christmas comes, it gets real cold and then the rain turns to snow, and it will snow Mommy when Christmas comes!" We keep trying to prepare him for no snow since there my likely be no snow here for many years to come, but he's not having any of that news. So of course now, he was right and we are just the stupid parents. What do we know?!!! We weren't expecting the snow to come as south as Houston on Wednesday, but low and behold I noticed rain outside that was falling silently and floating down like leaves. After a closer look, it was snow! Hunter was soooo excited! He ran around the yard for a while and was asking "when will it be enough to build a snowman?" I told him it doesn't usually snow enough here to build a snowman. That night all he could talk about was "when I wake up in the morning I am going to go outside and build a big, big snowman and throw lots and lots of snowballs!" Again, doesn't matter what we say, what do we know? However, just like it always goes in the bayou city the snow was gone by morning and 2 days later it was 70 degrees outside today. I'll have to check out my mom's pictures. Apparently the snow stuck on the ground for a while at her house (and she's even closer to the coast). Guess we REALLY need to send Hunter up to visit all his his relatives in Colorado. That's where the real deal is.

Trimming the Tree

So the Wednesday before thanksgiving, Thomas and I are done with work (outside the home that is)...and Hunter is already busting our tails to get the tree and it's entourage down from the attic. He had to wait a while. At least until Haley had gone to bed for the night. Hunter and Thomas put the tree up. It's quite the pain in the ... as you have to spread the branches and assemble one branch at a time from the bottom up. By 10:30pm we told Hunter we would put the lights on Thursday morning. He was pretty upset since he thought we would finish all the tree decorating and outdoor lights that night. So Thanksgiving morning we put the lights on the tree while we watched the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade on TV. We hadn't really thought about it, but Hunter had never seen a parade. He didn't even know what a parade was! Terrible parents...I know! We've always been on the run to someones house or busy cooking and preparing for guest. This year was so nice. Low key, nothing at our house...not much to cook. So we got the lights on just in time to head out for our Thanksgiving feast at Aunt Diane's house. We had fun with our cousins. They may not have enjoyed us too much as Hunter told them (all Aggies) "It's not a good day to be an Aggie!" Never the less we had fun. Each holiday we realize there are more and more babies in the family. Pretty soon the little people will rule the roost! They kind of already do. So Friday we got the tree finished after a day of horses and four wheelers at Grandmommy's house. Finally last night we got all of the outside lights up. For those of you who don't know how obnoxious we are...we have a lit up longhorn pulling Santa's sleigh in our yard with a lit Texas sign. Hunter loves his Christmas Bevo. He now wants to go out and feed Bevo every morning and evening and let him in and out of his (pretend) barn. He looks out the window and checks on him a lot because one year he looked out there and found Bevo upside down (one of those Aggie cousins). The rest of you better get your lights up because Hunter's already asking to go out looking at Christmas lights in the car. He doesn't understand why there are not many up yet. Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving and hope you all are enjoying as many singing Christmas toys (Rudolph's, singing sleighs, jingle bells, talking nativity scenes- thanks Grandmommy, barking singing dogs and lambs- thanks Joanna)as we are!