Rich & Lana move to Texas

In December, Trevor and I flew out to Maryland to help Rich & Lana pack up and move to the great state of Texas!  We had to cover 3 different locations on 3 different days.  First, we had to pack up some of my grandparent's stuff that was in their house in Baltimore.  My grandfather bought their house in 1953 and they lived there until last October when they moved in with my mom & dad down in Dallas.  So we went by their house (which my aunt & uncle now live in) to get their bedroom furniture, clothing and some other personal stuff.  So, Day 1...Baltimore:

Injury on Day 1.

Location number 1 complete!

Next onto Rich & Lana's apartment in Harrisburg, PA.

Boxes…

Paintings…

Pizza.

Lana's brother Max and his girlfriend Shannon were a huge help.

And they are so cute.

Rich is trying to be cute, too.

Finally empty!

Time to celebrate!

Next stop: Westminster, MD.

School Christmas Program

Told you I was catching up!

Every year Noah’s school has a Christmas program for each class – from little babies all the way up through Kindergarten and the after-school program.  Although this was Noah’s 3rd program, it was the first time he actually participated.  In previous years he would practice his songs at school so diligently and then stand up on the stage and look around like WTF and OMG.  Not this year!

His class on stage…

SINGING!  He knew the words and everything!

Hand motions…

and even playing the air flute!

At the end of the night they try to get ALL of the kids up on stage together.  That goes as well as you would expect.

My mother tried to get video, but she wasn’t paying attention and was pushing the stop button every time she wanted to record, and the record button when she wanted to stop.  So we have some good video of the floor and assorted audience members.  I won’t post it here, as much as I know you want to see it.

Nonagenarian

Not a word I use often, but appropriate since this blog is about my grandparents, who are now both in their 90s!  Pretty amazing.  We gathered at my parents house in late November and again in early December (yes, I’m trying to catch up) to celebrate with dinner and cake. 

Singing Happy Birthday to Mee-Maw

Noah is trying to get her to blow out the candles, but unfortunately, she has no clue what’s going on (damn Alzheimer’s)…

So he finally elects to do it himself.  She’s okay with that. 

Mmmm…cake.

Poppie’s birthday was next

He loves coconut…and so do I, so this cake was sooo yummy

I think he’s now the official candle extinguisher

 Happy 90th Birthday to Anne Wallace

Happy 93rd Birthday to Roy Wallace

Conversations with Noah

Noah (looking at something on the bathroom counter): Mommy, what's that?
Me: It's a tampon.
Noah: What does it do?
Me: It's a girl thing.
Noah: But what is it for?
Me: I'll tell you when you're older.
Noah: Oh....like when I'm 4?

---

Me: Who are your friends in class?
Noah: Umm...Austin. And Mackenzie!
Me: Mackenzie is a cutie.
Noah: Yeah, she's GORGEOUS!

My Sickness

If you know me at all, you know I really like to be organized. Some (*cough* Trevor *cough*) might call me anal. Or Monica.

But the fact is that I really, really, really like things to be clean and organized. I can't help it. I make the bed every morning, I clean up every night and I want to curl up in the fetal position if there are too many toys on the floor.

So you might call The Container Store my mother ship. I could spend HOURS wandering every aisle. The possibilities for organization are ENDLESS and they come in all sorts of colors and shapes and materials!

Needless to say, when Rich & Lana bought me a gift card to my favorite store, it was gone in less than a week. (And I've been known to save gift cards for YEARS.)

Today's project was the bathroom cabinets.

Before

That white shelf only covered the front half of the cabinet (due to the ass load of plumbing back there) so there were things just thrown behind it.

After

The purple bin holds all of our extra soap, toothpaste, razors, etc. (right up front where Trevor can find it). The rest of the crap is all mine.

Before

Trevor's cabinet. We started out putting medicine in that plastic shoebox, but that quickly spilled over the side and just kept growing. He had crap thrown behind those bins, too.

After

Oops, it's 2010.

And I forgot to update my blog at all in December. I do have some pictures to post, which I will probably get to sometime in March (okay, seriously shooting for this weekend).

Now you're expecting me to write that in 2010 I resolve to update my blog more often, right? I would, but who are we fooling? Although I must say that the primary reason I don't update more often is simply because that it's a pain in the ass to download pictures off the camera. Coupled with the fact that I'm lazy, and you can see why December 2009 is a gaping blog-hole.

So maybe I need to update more often WITHOUT pictures! Which would be a viable option if I had any writing skills whatsoever. Which I don't. I read some blogs and I'm so envious of their use of words and imagery and I think 'I could NEVER write like that!'. But then I think of the other 99% of blogs I read and realize that those people have writing skillz similar to mine. And yet I read.

Oh, and speaking of the internets, this morning I was driving to work in the left lane with a group of other like-minded speeders. And you know how when you join a new message board people say that you should just kind of lay low for a while - kind of lurk around until you're familiar with the style and flow of the board? So this jerk in a minivan (of course) enters the Tollway and immediately crosses 3 lanes of traffic and deposits himself RIGHT in the middle of our little caravan. Just like that! Totally messing up our carefully coordinated flow. And I immediately thought 'I'll bet that guy doesn't even lurk before he posts!' And then I thought 'I can't believe I just thought that.' Maybe I need to cut back on the internets for a bit.

Halloween Part III - Trick or Treating!

Halloween pictures! Finally!

So, Noah wanted to be Spiderman AGAIN, but I gently coerced him into being a pirate. And isn't he a handsome one?

Argh, matey!

Handing out candy with Dad.

Mmmm. What Halloween is all about.

Heading out!

Max stayed at home. The streets are no place for a black cat on Halloween.

First we stopped at Pat & Don's house next door.

Then we hit the rest of the street where there were some awesome displays!

Our neighbors seriously love Halloween.

Checking out a big ol' jack-o-lantern.

Once again, the guy across the street outdid himself.

Here is Noah waiting in line.

Talking it up with Buzz Lightyear.

Look at that freaking line!

Candy's starting to get heavy.

I can't begin to describe the scene on our street. There were so many people. It definitely makes Halloween fun, but we ran out of candy AGAIN.

It's not a party until an inmate on a motorcycle with neon lights arrives.

Noah was deathly afraid of the Grim Reaper (ha! get it?), but no issues at all with this scary witch. Then again, she had candy, and Grim didn't.

More pictures here.

Hope you all had a fantastic Halloween!

Halloween Part II - Pumpkin Carving!

So this was our first year to make a jack-o-lantern. I can't even tell you how many years it's been since I've made one, but when you have a 3 year old, it's mandatory.

Noah was a little worried about that big knife.

And grossed out by the nastiness inside.

But the pumpkin seeds were kind of cool.

Max watched from a safe distance. He was worried about the knife, too.

Starting the masterpiece...

with some help from a little artiste.

So cool!

The finished product.

Test run!

Awesome job!

More pictures here. :)

Halloween Part III coming tomorrow!