Sweet Dreams

The last few weeks....oh who am I kidding....since she was BORN Princess has not slept through the night. When we bought the house we are currently in, we bought a king size bed just because we knew we needed more space with her joining us every night. At the age of 3 I was told it was night terrors but at age 4, we were sent to her ENT who had already done 2 sets of ear tubes and taken out her adenoids. He did a sleep study and discovered she quit breathing about 14 times an hour so we got her tonsils taken out. We haven't done another sleep study since surgery but she did start sleeping better so I dropped it.

Fast forward to about 6 months ago and here we are again....every night she gets up and comes and gets in our bed. She is not a good person to sleep with and since she is bigger, our bed is not big enough for all three of us. Since I am not a happy person when I don't get enough sleep, I am willing to do just about anything for her to stay in her bed all night long. After talking to her she informed me that she didn't like her bed. Nice. I worked hard to find that bed and make it cute! It was a canopy princess bed. What six year old doesn't like a canopy? Well, she didn't like all the "stuff" above her head so we looked for a change.

I had my old day bed in my in-laws attic so we decided to switch out her old bed and put in the "new." We even bought a new bedspread to go with her existing paint and decor but was enough of a change to be exciting. So, making a long story even longer, here is the new bed and bedspread. I am really pleased with her choice and she loves it. Now to see if she stays in it......

Labor Day fun...

Our last few days of "summer" have been event filled. Surprise, surprise right? :) We went to the ranch on Saturday and came home Sunday evening. My aunt and uncle from Tyler and my grandparents were down there also. Much to my great pleasure, my sister and her family (baby included) were there as well which meant I got to get in some major Jacee time. Yay! I mean, my aunt, uncle, grandparents, parents and siblings are great and all, they just don't smell as good and aren't as soft.

My aunt Becky with all five of her "greats"

My brother serenaded me on the front porch of the bunk house. He is getting so good at his banjo and even wrote a song. I videoed him playing it so I could listen any time I wanted. I haven't figured out how to post videos yet or I would share.

My nemesis of the weekend....the dang grasshoppers. They were everywhere and they are huge! Even worse, when you rode on the 4-wheelers, they flew right at your face. My father had a blast making me squeal and torturing me with them. Some things are just not right!!!

My dad really would rather me not post this picture of him but guess what? He tortured me with grasshoppers and enjoyed it so here it is. :) I never realized that Princess' fashion sense came from him.

Again....tortured me with grasshoppers....shorts, boots, gun, ear protection: enough said!

Enjoy!!!!

The dove were not cooperating so the boys shot skeet instead. Some were really good, others (I'll not name names) were not so good. Let's just say genetics run deep when it comes to being able to hit those flying targets so if you didn't share genes with my father, you didn't hit many targets.

Father and son team....these guys are really good! They hardly ever missed a shot!

The next day, my dad got to enjoy some time with his two grand-daughters. Well, to be honest, anyone that held Jacee also got in some good time with Princess. :)

Princess getting her turn at holding the "Queen of everything." Princess gave her that name.

My cutie pie nephew down at the bass tank getting ready to show off how he learned to cast. His momma even came down to watch and that made his day!

Princess caught a good size fish!

Mamaw caught a good sized fish too.

Little Man stayed pretty serious this trip but when he was holding Jacee, I got a little bit of a smile. He sure is growing up!

Great family time with great weather. Another great weekend in the books.

Type A? Yeah right!

Why is picking up a room so hard? This is the battle of our week with Little Man. He owns several Lego sets which causes itty bitty pieces to end up EVERYWHERE! I tried organizing him with a system of like-colored pieces going together but it doesn't work out so well. Sigh...

My husband says I have too high of expectations and should just relax and realize that they are not going to clean up as well as I do. I find that humorous because he doesn't realize that he doesn't pick up as well as I would like either. (He does really well though so I'm not complaining.) Sigh...

So I went to the person whom I trust in these kind of predicaments: my mother. (By the way, when did she actually know what she was talking about and when did I decide that asking her advice was a good thing?) Anyway, I asked her how to help him get it done because out of her three children, I was not the one that needed prompting when it came to cleaning. In fact, there was more than one occasion when I was bribed to clean my sisters room (from my sister not my mom). I find cleaning relaxing and very rewarding...Little Man did not get this quality from me. I digress...where was I? Oh yeah, advice from my mom....she said to break up every part of his room and write it down for him. Then he could take it one little section at a time. So this is exactly what I did....an hour and a half ago!! I never imagined it would take him this long. I'm not even sure if he's still cleaning and not playing. I'm afraid if I go check on him and he's not cleaning, I'll have to throw a fit so I'd better find something to do. So here I am.....sigh.....

The funny thing about this is that I told them at lunch that since we just finished studying about Joseph, that when they were done picking up, we would watch our Joseph movie. Since my son loves T.V. so much, I thought this would be a nice incentive for him to get this chore done quickly. Obviously, not so much. Sigh....

I will tell you a funny story about our morning though. We've been discussing Adam and Eve and how Cain killed Abel etc. etc. The kids were writing summaries of the story and drawing a picture of it when I read about how Cain had a son. I decided asking them a question would be a good way to get them thinking and break up the silence a little. (I always enjoy a good conversation while drawing don't you?) I'll give you the conversation.......

Me: "So, if there is only Adam and Eve and their son Cain left, who did Cain marry and have kids with?"

Silence....

"Where did his wife come from?"

More silence.....

"She had to come from somewhere...what are your thoughts?"

LM: "God must have made her just like he did with Adam and Eve."

"But the Bible doesn't say that. What else could it be?" At this point I'm beginning to wonder why on earth I decided to bring this up but the can had been opened and I had to make sure the worms were controlled.

Princess: "She just showed up?"

"They were brother and sister...both of them came from Adam and Eve."

HUGE GASP! A glance at each other and then a very loud, "EWWWWW!!!!!"

LM: "I'm never marrying my sister! Gross!!!! That's disgusting and wrong. NO WAY!"

P: "Yeah mom, that's not even allowed! It has to be something else!"

Seeing that I completely freaked them out, I then had to go on to explain that while it's wrong currently, Adam and Eve's bloodline was so pure that it was okay and that was the only way the earth could have populated.

Silence...

Great. Now I have them wondering what a bloodline is and if Cain's son is also his brother and many other questions I never intended on answering today. Thankfully, a text came through on my phone and I "got distracted."

Moral of the story? Mom, when they are quiet and working, keep your mouth shut!

Teeth

Last Monday I took the kids to the dentist to have their teeth cleaned etc. and learned that Princess is about to lose several of her front teeth. Too bad I had already taken out a 2nd mortgage to pay for all the x-rays, cleaning and consultation just to figure out she had one lose enough to pull five days later. Oh well....at least the dentist has a really nice office with a small corner I can claim I own. Anyway, on Friday, one of her front teeth was so lose it was literally dangling and I wouldn't let her eat anything but jello and yogurt for fear she would swallow it. An appointment was made with Grandpapaw to pull it and we headed over there Friday afternoon.

He is acting so serious here, asking her all kinds of questions while holding her tooth in his hand the whole time. He said it just fell out when he touched it. She had no idea.

Here is a classic view of my Papaw being ornery. He just told her that it wasn't lose enough and she needed to wait a week. Keep in mind he has the tooth in his hand. Her reaction was priceless and he got great pleasure from it.

Ta-Dah!!! One missing front tooth....several more to go! :)

That night Little Man stayed with my mom overnight and so we treated Princess to dinner and a Red box movie. She enjoyed getting to munch on crunchy chips and picked out the movie "Tooth Fairy"...very appropriate indeed.