Random

To make up for all of the lengthy non-picture posts lately, here a few pictures with few words :-) We went to Hollywild on night before Christmas Eve where a zebra and a buffalo came up to our car. I fed the buffalo; the zebra was too good for Adam's bread. John Dickson rode on my lap through the entire park and loved looking at all of the deer running wild, emu, zebras, bison, and cows. Then we got out and fed more of the above and reindeer, pigs, camels, and more. There were probably a couple million lights. It was actually a LOT of fun, until of course John Dickson's diaper leaked and he peed all over my lap. He rode home in his turtle neck, puffer vest and no pants. I just rode home with wet pants.

Christmas - Attempt #2

This is going to be somewhat of an abbreviated version of what I originally typed... and it only includes one picture, because I, in an effort to continue my Mom of the Year streak, failed not only to not charge up the camera before Christmas, but forgot to pack the charger altogether. I got one shot of John Dickson in his Christmas Cars PJs with matching slippers and some SERIOUS bedhead, Elmo and Bank in tow, and then the camera shut itself off. While I know a few other cameras were around at the Kelley's to hopefully capture a few good shots of John Dickson, and a lot of good video was taken by us, there was not so much as a flash at the Propst Christmas. This makes me sick. Everything just happened so fast... I walked in and Jared threw a big present into my arms... and then things just got so fuzzy...

We headed to Winston Salem on Christmas Eve just in time for some BLTs (I have eaten 4 since then, in case you are counting). John Dickson took a faux nap that included taking off everything from the waist down (no one would listen to my pleas to duct tape that diaper), and then we headed over to Erin and Jason's for some yummy food and drinks. John Dickson dug into some sugary cream cheesey roll up thingamajigs and later packed one for church (he may not take real pacis but he sure takes the food kind). It wasn't needed for a good while though, as John Dickson was captivated by the bat flying about the sanctuary. We could hear him a few seats down (with Granna and Papa) - "Where bir? Where bir? Where bir? I nnnknow! Where bir? BIR!! BIR!!! BIR!!! Bah bye bir..." This went on for quite some time. He was great throughout the whole service until he tried to color in the hymnal and refused to let me put a piece of paper in the hymnal for him to color on. Ahhh the story of every Sunday morning...

On Christmas morning everyone was up and waiting on John Dickson, who, for probably the very last time, slept in on Christmas (bat excitement is exhausting!). When sleepy head finally woke up, he got to see what Santa brought. Now, Santa brought John Dickson some bath crayons. NOT some bathroom cabinet crayons, as John Dickson thought, but some BATH crayons. Santa should be more clear next time ;-) (Kidding, of course, although the cabinets were blue). These were definitely a HUGE hit. You should just see our little Picasso at bath time. I'll be sure to post a picture soon. Really, I will. No, really.

Erin, Jason and sweet Ella came over for more Santa, presents and delicious food. Why is it that you can never not overeat on holidays? Holiday food is just too delicious... mmm I'm thinking about it now... my mind is very food tracked these days... anyhoo, had John Dickson been a little older, we would have been mortified at his complete and utter disregard for manners (which you could argue, he doesn't really have in the first place to disregard... not for lack of trying on our end, I assure you...) but that little man was just tearing through some presents (his and other people's). At one point, he opened a bag of clothes and threw them all over his shoulders, alternating left and right, until he grabbed the empty bag and flung it in Papa's face, I believe to distract him while he tried to open Papa's next gift. He was opening presents out of turn, sneaking some while no one was looking, and he emptied a box of shoes, turned the box upside down, then tried to get more out of the other side, and finally looked up and asked for "mo" (more). Like I said, a little older... mortified... however, this was just stinkin cute. Our little tornado had a Christmas blast.

After we were so stuffed I thought I could pop, we headed to my parents house for Christmas Day Pt II. We had some of my sister's famous some sort of cheesey hamburgery salsaey something dip that John Dickson ate by the spoonful, and mom's famous 7 layer cookies. I know they're popular now, but I'm pretty sure she invented them. John Dickson whirled his way through even more presents (this time half opening an ornament and then flinging it aside... boring! And I can say this because the ornament was from us). Nana and Grumps got little man a tent that connects to a teepee via a tunnel, and John Dickson thought this was absolutely, positively, one of the greatest inventions he has ever seen. The rest of the night and the entire next day were spent squealing and dashing through the tunnel. He then took a bunch of toys in his tent and would hand them back, one by one, only sticking his arm out of the tent. Too. Stinking. Cute.

All in all, a wonderful Christmas.

New Year's Resolutions

This year I have three new year's resolutions:

1. Take more pictures, post more pictures
2. Floss more

And most importantly:

3. Do not break new year's resolutions.

This means I will not resolve to do the following:

1. Lose weight
2. Exercise regularly
3. Stay on top of laundry
4. Keep Ellie
5. Send birthday cards and gifts on time

You can hold me to it!!!

Happy New Year from us :-)

Darn You Mike Fleiss!!!

Every season for the past eh 3 or 4, I have made myself the solemn vow to QUIT THE BACHELOR. That show goes through unbelievable editing, and I can't stand the way the show brain washes me every season. This time, however, they made it easy for me to quit. Jake as the new bachelor? I don't think so. May as well have the girls competing for Jake and his Mama... (John Dickson, if you are miraculously reading, it's ok to be a Mama's boy) I mean, I could barely watch him with Jillian... a whole show, all about Jake? Really?

I will not watch the Bachelor.
I will not watch the Bachelor.
I will not watch the Bachelor.

Screw that. I cant WAIT for Monday!

ARRRGHHHH Mike Fleiss... what have you done to me?????????

(As an aside, the Christmas post is coming... you see, I typed a whole long recap of A Kelley Christmas, but then it got deleted. And I cant bring myself to type it again yet...)

Mom of the Year

It's true. I won this prestigious award, given by myself to myself. Last night I put John Dickson to bed and then left to go to the grocery store. About an hour after I had put John Dickson down, who was at that point screaming his head off, Adam calls me to see if I can guess what I forgot to do when I put him down.

Reading books? Check
Elmo? Check
Blankie? Check
Pajamas he cannot take off of himself? Check
Nothing in reach of the crib? Check
Kisses? Check

I was stumped. Any idea???

Ah yes, that's it. I left the light on.

Mom of the Year.

He's Baaaaaack!!!

I can't believe I forgot to mention last night the best part of all about being HOME SWEET HOME... After his 5 long nights away, John Dickson is BACK! I think I will be eternally grateful for my parents bringing him all the way here rather than meeting them in Clinton, as originally planned. After about 8 hours in the car yesterday, the very very last thing I wanted to do was get back in and add another 2 to the trip.

I was not very hopeful about John Dickson being excited to see us when we got back (he actually beat us home... how is THAT for service??)and I was not let down. John Dickson would not give either of us the time of day. In fact, he took a little tumble or something that made him start to fuss (I cant even remember what... can you say tired??) and he went straight past us to his Nana. My parents stayed about an hour maybe and the entire time they were the only ones he wanted. I wasn't surprised because after my week long trip to Raleigh back in the summer, John Dickson tried to convince me that Dad was the new Mom.

John Dickson went down for some shut eye last night and screamed his head off. I think I finally understand the term "screamed bloody murder". I thought I understood it long ago, but I know now that I did not. After Nana and Grumps left, John Dickson got back up (with some assistance) and with Nana and Grumps gone, Adam and I were allowed to resume our former roles.

John Dickson did not come home empty handed, mind you. Other than his Bob the Builder juice (who he calls Bob and tried to feed Special K to this morning), he was sporting a brand new baby Dyson, complete with miniature attachments. If the thing really cleaned, we would have one squeaky clean house. Except that I vacuumed and mopped all of the floors today, so they are squeaky clean anyway, but that's beside the point. And our guest room is squeaky clean because, well, I'm a sucker...

On Wednesday afternoon I got a knock on the door. It was a sales person who wanted to shampoo one room. After much reassurance that this would take 30 minutes, came with ZERO obligation, and was guaranteed to get out all stains, including the big stain from when our dogs were left inside for 24 hours due to some miscommunication while we were out of town, I let her in to work her magic. I thought she was selling a service, and had she gotten the stain out, she would have most definitely come back to do our other carpeted rooms. So, she starts to vacuum the rug (vacuum? vaccuum? I think it's one C, but Im a terrible speller) and then she lets me sweep with the "electric broom", while trying to convince me that this broom is so much better than the non-electric kind, ignoring me when I told her I just vacuum the hardwoods. (Now Im thinking 2 Cs??) She "deep cleans" the hard wood in one spot, vacuums some furniture, then lets herself into our bedroom and starts to vacuum the mattress. She then tells me that I should be doing this every 3 weeks, and that this vacuum is so much cheaper than buying a new mattress every 3 weeks. You know, because that's what my lazy rear end normally does when I dont feel like cleaning my mattress... I just buy a new one. They even deliver, you should try it...

So... two and a half HOURS later, she finally sets foot in our guest room. Low and behold, the stain IS gone, and the carpet looks great. Unfortunately, she is not selling a service, she is selling this vacuum/shampooer, and she gets down to the bottom line.

$2,499

But wait. She will knock off $100 if I agree to buy before my husband gets home. No really, its called a "spouse alone" discount. AKA, sign up before your husband can tell you no. So Adam FINALLY comes home, right as I was about to ask my neighbor Scott to come be my husband for a minute, and he politely argues with her for 30 minutes, working the price down to a mere $1,500, with $0 down and only $60 something a month for a mere 3 years. (Working the price down, by the way, was just telling her no over and over, while she continued to lower the price).

I have no funny conclusion to this story, I just wanted you to know that I am a sucker who lets vacuum sales people into my home. Oh well, my carpet is clean. The best part though? Her bargaining tactics were trying to convince us to help her win some trip to Virginia. Sorry lady.

So John Dickson is home. Our floors are clean. And soybean is the size of a grape this week. Those are the highlights.

Super Quick Update to a Super Quick Update

We are HOME!!!!!!!!! We left at 3:30 Friday afternoon and made it back just after 7:00 tonight... 22 inches of snow where we stayed in Staunton, VA. I have never seen snow like that in my life, and hope I never do again!! Unless, of course, I'm in my house and the power doesn't go out and I am well stocked up on food. Then I could probably get on board :-) We're just thankful we had a hotel to sleep in instead of the car on the side of the interstate, as many many other people did. It is good to be HOME SWEET HOME!!!!!!!!!

Oh snow...

Super quick update... Adam's surgery went well yesterday, taking less than an hour, and was discharged at 3:30 yesterday afternoon. We started to make our way back before stopping in Virginia due to some crazy weather. We are now officially snowed in (a first for all four of us - Adam's parents came too...) and Virginia is officially in a state of emergency and the National Guard is kicking people off of the streets. Looks like we'll be here a while!

It's Friday!!

And for once, the very first time EVER, that is not a good thing. We dropped off John Dickson yesterday with my parents. He will be bounced around for FIVE NIGHTS (well, only four more) until we get to see that kiss giving chubby cheeked face again. He spent the night with Lauren and Jared last night and is hanging out with Lauren today. Tonight he will stay at my parents' house and will spend the day with mom on Thursday, dad on Friday, and I guess mom and dad on Saturday and Sunday. Adam and I are off tonight to Winston Salem, our stopping point on the way to Maryland. Adam is getting a new pacemaker on Friday morning. This is like surgery number bazillion and one, but if everything goes as planned, it should be his last for at least 7 years. Here's hoping. So, like I said, this Friday (which is really Wednesday) is 100% completely and totally the opposite of exciting. For us. Not for John Dickson.

Does John Dickson miss us? Ha. Hahaha. AAAAAAHAHAHAHA. No. Why would he? It sounds like his days are pretty jam packed. I have already talked to Lauren 3 times today, and it sounds like he has been eating nonstop, drinking Bob the Builder juice (Lauren took John Dickson to the grocery store, and apparently she is the sucker that I am not...again, score 1 for Aunt La La), unpacked his own suitcase, tried to cram a broom into Zoe's cage, and I believe he is destination Edventure today. Saturday he's is all lined for Monkey Joes, and I'm sure there will be other fun adventures (or, edventures... sorry, that was totally lame) in between. In fact, I would almost put money on my dad taking him to Hardee's on Friday. Dad, if you do, please dont tell me. Well, that is if they aren't dove hunting. My dad has been lobbying for this since John Dickson was in my belly and it was determined he was a boy.

Speaking of people in my belly, I completely forgot to post about our first doctor's visit. We were busy sharing the good news and didn't want people finding out via our blog, but we went to the doctor 2 weeks ago, saw the little soybean (who looked absolutely nothing like a baby) and even got to see the little heartbeat. Soybean (yeah, we took the name from The Office) was 7 weeks to the day, measured 1 cm long, and yet you could actually see a heartbeat. That to me is UNREAL. So tomorrow I will officially be 9 weeks. So... we probably started telling people a little early, but quite frankly, we had known for about 4 weeks and I HATE keeping secrets. Plus, I needed people at work to know why I was eating Cheez its at 9:00 in the morning and eating enough lunch to feed a small army. When I was pregnant with John Dickson, I didn't know nearly as early as with this one, so this may have been the case and I just didn't realize, but this time around, weeks 3-7ish were insanely hungry. I think we went broke just trying to feed me. Then came the nausea, which lasted a couple of weeks, but I think I'm all through with that (which would be consistent with last time, and I hope is the case). So if I could just start staying up past 8:00 PM, it would be time for the fun part to start!

Speaking of raging appetites, did I mention that this baby craves bloomin onions?? This could get dangerous... So far I have only indulged once, and it was John Dickson's first trip down under. Adam and I ordered steaks, mine well done, Adam's medium rare. You may recall John Dickson is 99.9% vegetarian, BUT... he has never had steak before. I gave him a few bites of mine, and he liked it, but then he had a bite of Adam's delicious red centered steak and that boy started shoveling it in. To quote Adam: "This is better than any paternity test"

Christmas Tree Shopping

We've been wanting to create some holiday traditions of our own, and we got the idea to start getting our tree from a Christmas tree farm where you cut your own down. We drove about 30 minutes to get there, stopped by to see the 850 lb pig, checked out some turkeys (that John Dickson calls ducks) and peacocks, walked through the farm, sampled strawberry cider (twice for John Dickson), scuppernong cider, moonshine jelly and sweet potato jelly, indulged in an apple dripping with hot caramel, nuts and whipped cream, took a goofy picture, mailed an invisible letter to Santa Claus himself, and left. Left to buy a tree. From the produce stand. What can we say, we're just a frasier fur kind of family, and I'm pretty sure those cant grow here.

Instead, we started the tradition of letting our kids (just one this year) make our wrapping paper. With a big roll of butcher paper and some paint markers (which are very different from paint pens, by the way) and a few stickers, John Dickson has been making masterpieces. And he loves it!

Thanksgiving

I fully acknowledge the next few posts are all out of order, but... oh well. These are some cute shots of John Dickson with his Uncle Jarey, Aunt La La, and Nana on Thanksgiving. Apparently turkey makes Aunt La La REALLY happy (although I like to think it was my crock pot mac & cheese). P.S. That donkey sings and dances to "Sugar Pie Honey Bunch" which may not be the real name of the song... eh

4 Years Ago Today... (and some change...)

Disclaimer: This is long winded, and here mainly as a way for me to remember an important day

I was going to wait until December 23rd to do this post, but I know me, and I know I will absolutely not be thinking about blogging on the day before Christmas Eve :-) 4 years ago today (and some change), Adam and I were at my good friend and old roommate's wedding up in Clemson. I wanted to wait until the bride and groom left, but Adam seemed to be in a hurry to leave. This was irritating, but not quite as irritating as the excuse he gave... he claimed his mom wanted to see Bear. Who could have blamed her, by the way? But when you are at a dear friend's wedding... it hardly seems worth leaving for! So after much back and forth, I gave in, and we called it an early night, trucking it back to Columbia.





We stopped by my parents' house to pick up Bear, and then headed over to the Kelley's. I decided this would be a good time to give them their Christmas gifts, and then I became a chatter box and chatted away about who knows what. Little did I know, everyone else was starting to stress a little bit about the house that was soon to catch on fire from all of the unattended candles upstairs, but I just continued to babble.





Adam had gone to New York the week before and told me he had gotten me 3 presents, A, B, and C. When I asked him what the best present was, he told me B. He also told me that that night he was going to give me present B. As it turns out, there was really a D present as well, and that night I got B and D. Adam took me upstairs to give me B, and while I consider myself a very intuitive person who is nearly impossible to surprise, I was blind as a bat as to what was happening. We walked into the room, filled with roses, candles, champagne and some sort of chocolate truffles (which I refused to eat or throw away... they are probably really disgusting now, but they've still got a long life ahead of them). We walk into the room, and I simply say... "Nuh uh..."





When I see other people get engaged or married (whether in real life or on tv), I ALWAYS cry. No matter how many times Chandler proposes to Monica, I still boo hoo. And don't even get me started on his speech about how Monica is a mother without a baby... just bring me some tissues. HOWEVER, I have decided that when events take place in my own life, there are no tears. I do, however, shake. Adam made me sit down so that I wouldn't fall over. When we got married, I teared up and cried A LOT whenever I would hear a song on the radio that would make me think about marrying Adam. I thought I was going to be a WRECK, but instead, I just shook. Like a leaf. Lauren was on standby to catch me. I did not even know I was shaking... So, on December 23, 2005, I believe I let a few people down by neither screaming nor crying, but man did I shake. When I cant eat caramel apple cheesecake or drink champagne due to severe shakes, that is how you know that this is one of the best moments of my life.





Adam proceeds to tell me that he has loved me since the 8th grade and has always known he wanted to marry me. And some other stuff that I absolutely do remember... mm hmm... He got down on one knee, and in front of me was the most perfect ring. I never spoke a word to him about anything I wanted in a ring, on the off chance that he had a family heirloom. While I really really really didn't want a tear shaped diamond, I would have adored it if it was a ring that was special to him and wouldn't want him to ever think otherwise, so I just kept my mouth shut. I majorly lucked out, or maybe he just knew me as well as I had hoped... brilliant solitaire... perfection. I couldn't have picked a better ring myself. And I am definitely not just saying that. However, I did tell Adam that I wanted white gold. He even got his Clemson ring in white gold so that it would one day go with his wedding band, which would, of course, match mine. So you can imagine my surprise when the setting was yellow gold. I was surprised, but I loved that ring every bit as much. Then Adam turned on the light, and I realized my eyes had deceived me, and this was in fact a white gold ring. Is he the best or what?





He then calls me his fiance, and he says "as of December 22, 2005, we are engaged!"




Umm... babe, its the 23rd.

A little something to get you through your Friday...

This is less than a minute, and totally worth it :-)
In other news, John Dickson saw Elmo on tv yesterday and started saying "Elmo, Elmo, Elmo". To our knowledge, John Dickson has never watched Sesame Street, and Im 99% sure they do not watch anything at daycare. I guess maybe they have Sesame Street books or something like that. All I know is that Adam came home from work that day with a stuffed Elmo for John Dickson. A few minutes later, Adam heard "mwah, mwah" and turned around to see John Dickson giving Elmo kisses. So sweet :-)

20 Month Update

John Dickson turned 20 months on Saturday! He celebrated by going to meet his cousin. We will post pictures just as soon as we can get him to get close enough to her to actually take said pictures... he was terrified of her... all night.

In other news, John Dickson surprised us by telling us what a chicken says (this is not in our usual repertoire of animal sounds). He says "buh buh buh", and he also told us what a cat says "Noooow." Also since our last post on animal sounds, he is making a noise like a bunny. I have no idea how to type it, but its like the sound bunnies make when they eat vegetables. It's so cute.

Other words John Dickson says are "hot" when he sees steam, or gets food that has come out of the microwave, or even when we open the oven door. He knows his hair, his mouth, nose, eyes and ears, his arms, legs and feet. He can say hat, and will point out hats in pictures. He continues to tidy up around the house, and will push his laundry basket around to put his dirty clothes into and puts any toys that have made their way out of the bath back into the bath. He is quite the fan of "no" now and uses it frequently, especially with the dogs. We now have to physically hold him in timeout, or else he jumps up and runs away squealing with delight. On that note, he really doesn't behave much at all.

But probably the biggest change in month 20 for John Dickson was his big news. That little man... he's a big brother.

Updates to come...

I've been a major blogging slacker...its true. And that's not going to change quite yet. But I will let you know to stay tuned for pictures from Thanksgiving, our trip to the Christmas tree farm, where we ACTUALLY bought our Christmas tree, a great video of John Dickson majorly breaking it down to some Christmas tunes, and, potentially, pictures of John Dickson meeting his cousin tomorrow.

Also, John Dickson got his H1N1 shot this morning and the entire way back to daycare said "all done. all done. all done." And then when I asked him if he was a good boy, he just put his hands up and said "I dont know" which comes out "I-ou-ow" Very cute. Trust me.

An oldie but goodie

We love our niece!

After we begged and pleaded with Ella to make her debut anytime over our long Thanksgiving break, she ultimately decided to begin making her move early Monday morning, arriving early afternoon. We went up there to see her, and got there about 2 minutes after they had taken her to the nursery for a couple of hours, but we finally got about 10 minutes with our beautiful and perfect niece.














She has the teensiest little mouth! This picture really doesn't do her justice, but it was hard to photograph her upside down...

















Proud Uncle Ad















Prouder parents


















And what did John Dickson think of all this, you ask? We'll let him tell you himself -

















I assure you that picture has absolutely nothing to do with the ice cream cone he just devoured :-) Little man actually didn't get to meet Ms Ella this trip, as he was not allowed in the hospital. But don't worry about him too much - I think he did just fine with his playdate at the mall with his Granna and Papa. He slept the whole way home.

We love our niece!