Writing to Remember

Remember how this last week school was canceled before a snowflake or freezing rain drop fell?  And then it turned all to rain and it was a little bit of a disappointment?  Well. Last night we received yet another Winter Storm Watch/Warning warning us that we *might* get 1 to 2 inches of snow.  Well, after our Tuesday disappointment, I really didn't think we would see much.  And they were projecting that his "snow" was going to hit central Arkansas which when that happens, it misses us. 

Imagine our surprise when after going out to eat, we came outside and it was snowing teeny tiny flakes.  Again, no biggie.  We went over to Justin's parent's house and hung out for a while.  During that short amount of time, the snow came down.  All the kids were excited and immediately went out to play in it.  Our so called 1-2 inches was already over 3 inches and still falling like crazy.  We were all shocked.

Of course, we had to let the kids play in it before we came home. I tried to get a picture but as you can see, it's pretty dark out.  But look how pretty the snow is!

Poor Julie.  I tried to get her picture and little did I know that a snowflake totally photobombed her!

When the kids woke up this morning, they immediately headed outside.  It was so cold, but oh so pretty!

Julie tried to clean off the swing set...

And it was hard work for Julie to trample through the snow!

And I leave you with Jax who clearly was enjoying the snow. 

One more month and this little cutie will be three!

Seriously.  How did that happen?!

Julie is our goofy girl.  She loves Disney princesses and playing Skylanders (with help!).  She loves to wear big bows in her hair and pulling her hair into a pony tails so she can play in the mud out in back.  In other words, she keeps us on our toes.

She loves to shop and is actually really helpful.  When we went shopping at Target and Kohls, she was helping me pick out shirts and telling me the pink and purple sparkly ones are pretty.  Not my style, but it sure was her style!

And look how cute she is with her tiny shopping cart.  All the grocery stores around here have these little carts.  At first I thought it was really neat, HOWEVER, after 50 million times of my ankles being ran into with that cart, I changed my mind.  Don't let that cute little cart fool you-it hurts!  I may have been guilty of telling her that the little shopping carts were all gone the next time we shopped....

Julie loves to help me in the kitchen.  She did not get this from me.  But I'm glad she enjoys it.  We've been making cookies, breads, soups, etc.  She gets really frustrated when I won't let her crack the eggs.  She tries to tell me that she is a big girl and not a baby.  She has yet to convince me. 

Julie still loves to sing.  Every time I would try to get a video of her singing, she would stop.  One day I'll capture it!

Happy 35 Months Julie!

When we moved into our new house, it took Julie all of 15 minutes to lock herself in her room.  All the bedrooms have locks on their doors and it's the kind you can't stick a pin in it and pop it back out.  You have to turn the lock in order for it to unlock.

So that was fun to do when I was knee deep into cleaning the house and Julie goes and locks herself in her room.  I had to sit on the other side of the door and explain to my two year old that she needs to turn the little lock in order for her to be free.  It took a while and she figured it out.

Well, I've been meaning to change out her door knob so she can't do that again.  Yesterday morning, I went to get her out of bed and the door was locked again.  Which means that before she went to bed last night, she turned the lock and I had no idea.  Luckily, since we are moved in now, I could just get a screw driver and undo the door knob.  (I didn't have that luxury when we were first moving in!  I had no idea where the tools were.)  I set her free and then made a note to get that door knob switched pronto!

And wouldn't you know that she managed to lock her self in one. more. time.  At that point I told her she had to wait for her daddy to get home and he could rescue her.  It was only about 5 minutes later Justin walked in the door and he saved her.  But in the meantime, I told her to just hang out and play with toys while she was stuck.

And she did have fun in there while waiting-I would peek in on her through the door knob hole.  She didn't seem to traumatized.....

On Wednesday, our temperature was 78 degrees!  It was glorious.

I was a little warm running errands!

And now it's Friday and we are currently 32 degrees but really feels like 21 (according to my weather app!).  Brrrr!  

School was canceled yesterday even before a drop of rain fell!  I was looking forward to sleeping in but wouldn't you know that both Jax and Julianne didn't sleep in one bit!  Seriously.

So now we are kicking back, enjoying a cup of tea, and watching the Winter Weather Coverage. 

Since we are having winter weather, it's only fitting that I share this photo of Julie and the "Santa" she likes to visit when we run errands.  She loves to touch his beard and loves that he's basically the same size as her!

Thanksgiving was fun.  Since we had so many people coming, we had it at a local church.  Which has an indoor play area with a ball pit!

We had some great food and had a good time.  We brought clam dip which most people told us that they never had it before.  And asked if it was a Pacific Northwest thing.  I dunno.  I guess I never thought about it like that.  We just always had clam dip at Thanksgiving and Christmas.  It was a must-have food!

We came home and I finished up painting Julie's room.  I was bold and decided to go with pink.  And let me tell you, that room is PINK!

When she first saw it on the walls, she said, "oh my gosh.  It is cool!"  Where in the world did she learn "Oh my gosh?" And to say it dramatically?  I'm a little worried for her teen years...

Meanwhile, Jax asked me when I was going to paint his room.  His room is such a nice gray color that fits perfectly with his Star Wars theme.  So I asked him again what color he would like to paint it and he told me black.  Nope.  Not going to happen.

Justin and did some yard work today.  These stupid vines are taking over our yard and need to be tamed.  It took a while, but we finally had a spot free. 

I think I'm going to go ahead and give up on the leaf battle.  I work so hard to clean them up and more appear each day.  Why does it take so long for the leaves to fall?!?

After all the hard yard work, I came inside and put up our Christmas trees.

Our family tree is on the left.  Jax's tabletop tree is blue and Julie chose pink.  Of course.  I had fun decorating them.  A girl can never have too much Deco Mesh!

I've sure enjoyed having this time off to get some stuff done around the house!

Julianne can say Jaxson now instead of "boy."  It sounds like Jaggun.  She also calls Jaxson "Jaxson Ross" I think she must have gotten this from when Jaxson would get mad at her and call her Julianne Ross.  And I bet he got that from me when I get mad at him and call him Jaxson Isaiah Ross.  Hmmm.... kids sure do learn quickly!

She knows how to get her way.  She will clasp her hands together in front of her chest and give you the puppy dog eyes and say "peeeeeeeze?"  How can I resist?

Speaking of getting what she wants, she roped Justin into a tea party one day.  I'm impressed! 

Julie is now telling whoopers.  Once she had a bug bite and she told me that a mean "woof" (aka dog) had done that to her.  One day she had a dirty diaper and I told her we needed to change her.  She look at me in all seriousness and told me that her dirty diaper was all gone.  She worked so hard to convince me that was true.

Julie got her a princess cell phone the other day while we were shopping at Walmart.  She has talked a lot to Belle and Ariel.  And I have to admit-so have I.  You can't turn away a two year old when they hand you the phone and tell you to talk!

Julianne was a hard little worker on moving day.  She would go up and down the ramp carrying her toys into the truck.  She sure didn't want to leave anything behind!  Of course, she also liked running up and down the ramp-many, many times!

Since we moved she loves our new house.  She calls it "new house".  When I tell her we are going home she will correct me and say, "No, new house."  She associates "home" with our old house in Raleigh.  I wonder how long we will be calling this our new house?

One day I sneezed and Julianne responded, "You're welcome!"  I had a good laugh over that one.

Oh, Julianne.  You sure are a character.  Happy 32 months!

(Notice how we are both wearing scarves.  She is such a fashionista!)

You know what's a nice surprise?  Going to the supermarket and when looking for cucumbers you notice that right next to the collard greens is a weird looking item.  Upon further inspection,I realized that they were smoked necks.  In the vegetable area?  When I asked Justin about this when he got home from work, he told me that you make collared greens with the smoked necks.  His exact words were, "just like putting a ham bone in beans."  Now, I'm a girl from the Pacific Northwest and I'm pretty sure that is not the same thing.

Julie and I ventured to Walmart by our selves today.  I got a little over confident and decided not to use my GPS on my phone.  I ended up passing the Walmart exit and taking a nice scenic route to get back around.  Poor Julie thought it was taking forever to get there.  Note to self: It's ok to use GPS if you aren't sure exactly where a place is located.

Living in a tiny town has it's benefits.  I didn't realize that it's pretty much ingrained in me to look out around my surroundings at all times when I am out and about.  And always made sure my purse was close to me at all times.  Living in a big city, people (especially at some Walmarts) would steal wallets out of purses and I don't feel like I have to worry about that here.  It's very friendly town and a lot of people talked to me today while I was shopping at Walmart.  The cashier was even telling me all about her grandchildren while I was checking out. 

Jaxson is loving school.  After his first day I asked him what his favorite part is.  He said everything.  Then I asked him what his not so favorite part is and he said, "Mom, I said EVERYTHING was my favorite."  Oh sorry!  His teacher is so sweet and has helped his transition to a new school go smoothly.  He loves PE the best.  He also told me yesterday that his PE teacher told the class that they need to go to a church Harvest Festival for Halloween and then go trick or treating.  So he came home telling me that we had to go to church first.  Which was our plan to begin with, but funny how a teacher saying that makes it so much more important. (But a teacher could have never told a class that in a big city school...)

The house is coming along.  Most of the boxes are out of here now and I can find most things.  I still have some more work to do and work on it daily.  And of course, I'm already thinking of house projects...painting Julie's room is top priority now!

Julie has loved to help me out.  She thought sweeping with the broom was the BEST thing ever.

Julie has helped me decorate.  Which really means that she has undecorated what I have already worked on.  And I think her wearing the cleaning gloves is a nice touch.  I'm not sure why she thought she needed cleaning gloves to move my picture frames!

In all each day we get a bit more settled into everyday life.  Who knows?  I may be purchasing some smoked necks to go in my collard greens-you know-just like a ham bone!

Tuesday October 8

Today Jaxson's class went to the fire station.  He loved every minute of it.  He learned that you call 911 in an emergency and to stop, drop, and roll!

Wednesday October 9

Julie had a minor problem.  Her Princess Sofia necklace's batteries died.  So we had to replace them.  She was so happy that her necklace finally worked again!

Thursday October 10

I hate packing.

Friday October 11

Julie saw I was wearing a scarf and needed one too!  I found a smaller one for her to wear.  She is such a fashionista!

Saturday October 12

Technically, this isn't a picture.  But Jaxson decided to set up his Angry Bird Star Wars Death Star and then yell, "Millennium Falcon!" really loud and run crash into it.  Never a dull moment....

Sunday October 13

No picture.

Monday October 14

This caught my eye as I was walking past Julie's room.  A quaint little tea party was going on...and I wasn't invited!

Julianne loves to wear dresses.  She gets very upset when I pull out an outfit that is shorts or pants.  She is such a girly girl.

But even though she loves dresses, she hates hair bows.  Go figure. 

She is a chatter box.  We went to Target one morning and she talked the whole entire time we were shopping.  That wore me out a bit.  But she sure is a good shopping partner.  I can ask her what she likes better and she will give me her opinion.  If I ask Justin or Jaxson, they just shrug and ask if we are done yet. 

Her favorite colors are pink and purple.  Princess Ariel is her favorite Disney princess.  We watched The Little Mermaid together and she loved it.  She recently started watching "A Goofy Movie."  (My sister loved that when she was little!)  She will watched that movie 3 times in one day. 

She LOVES her sweet tea.  I don't give it to her very often because you know, caffeine and sugar rush!  But she sure enjoys it when I make it for her.

Now that Alma has treated her to nail polish and make up, I went ahead and painted her nails one night.  Pink nail polish with purple sparkles...Julie was so happy!

She loves the big iPod (iPad) and now that Jaxson is at school, she gets to play with it some.  I saw this in our photo stream the other day:

I'm guessing she was painting nails in this art app.  Too funny!

Julianne is a determined little girl and pretty much gets what she wants.  (within reason!)  One day, Julie somehow roped Justin into playing some sort of beauty shop.  He would comb her hair.  And then she would comb his hair.  It went on for a while.  The whole time Julianne was just having so much fun!

Poor Justin!  I just had to laugh!

Happy 31 Months Julianne!

Now that Jaxson is at school, Julie just assumes that I want to play with her all day long.  Today, we played Minnie Mouse. 

For an hour.

It was a mixture of a tea party with momentary lapses of "Bad Doggies" messing up Minnie's House.  I guess a two year old can imagine so much.

These doggies (Woof-Woofs) were bad.  They were put in time out a lot.  They liked to tease the kitty.  Justin and I have figured that Julie has quite the affection for cats-not so much for dogs.

At one point, Julie had me playing Mickey and when "Mickey" asked for Minnie, Julie brought out her pretend phone (aka hand) so Mickey could talk to her.

Julie talked to Minnie too.  Which I was glad to see that Julie doesn't require an iPhone...yet.

It was fun playing with her.  Often times, I get so focused on my to-do list that I can miss these little moments.  There's nothing like playing Minnie Mouse with Julie!