Playing Catch Up

Feels like forever since I last posted and it has only been 5 days! We've packed a lot into those five days though! Our computer situation still has not been remedied, but I could not put off posting any longer. Too many things to write about that I don't want to forget! :) And, I am starting to get the hang of David's laptop...

I love this picture of Elise and Grandpa sitting on the porch. One of Grandpa's favorite things to do is to sit outside and watch the rain. So, when he and Mimi spent the night here waiting for their power to come back on, he and Elise watched the rain together. It was adorable.



I think this was on Saturday morning...I walked out of the kitchen for just a moment and returned to find Bennett having a blast with the plastic garbage bags. Obviously, because of the many dangers involved I could not continue to let him play with them, but I have to admit I did consider letting it go on because he was just so HAPPY! He loved the noise they made when he flapped them around....He is definitely turning into a little investigator...Too busy figuring out how things work to figure out how to walk!! In addition, his sisters' shoe obsession has rubbed off on him and he now pleads to have shoes on as well. Otherwise I wouldn't usually have shoes on him with his pj's!!



Sunday we woke up to find that we had some very unwelcome house guests!! Usually David gets the kids up and starts breakfast so that I can start getting ready for church. I heard him yelling and when I walked into the den I could see why. I swear our house had been taken over by ants overnight!!!!!! Millions of them were everywhere!!! We think they came in through the dishwasher looking for some dry ground (since there was NONE outside) and decided our house seemed nice enough! They were really EVERYWHERE! I like to think of myself as a calm person (or at least I try to be), but I definitely lost my calm. I was so panicky that I RUDELY called the Bristers looking for rubber gloves (Su is a cleaning pro) and didn't even think about the fact that it was 8 o'clock in the morning! Luckily, they are still talking to me (and of course, they had the gloves) and luckily we had two full bottles of Raid and so we went to town. Then we decided it would be best to just get the kids completely out of the house and away from the chemicals, so David took them out to breakfast in their pj's while I got rid of our house guests! Yikes!!
Some good did come out of the situation though....I don't think my floors have been that clean in months!! I was so paranoid about Bennett crawling around on ant killing chemicals that I scrubbed those floors with vinegar and water until they were spotless!
In addition, something else from that situation has had David and I cracking up today. Elise had a little tantrum earlier and was stomping around on the kitchen floor when I questioned her behavior.."Elise, is that the way to act when you don't get your way?"
She paused for just a quick moment and then said, "Mom, I am just getting one of those ants!"



This picture does not look that bad because they are all shriveled up and dead. But, I swear they were big and gross and scary when we saw them and there were about a million more than you can see in this picture!

In other big news this week, yesterday was Lila and Bennett's first day of Mother's Day out!
I had every intention of taking a cute little picture of them next to each other with their little school bags, but that didn't happen. At least I captured some shots of them on their first day!
They were happy to go to school and didn't seem to mind at all when I left! I had a little moment of sadness (my babies!), but I know that I really need the time to spend with Elise and to get errands done; and, I think it will be good for them to play with someone other than just each other. It was a little embarrassing to have to point out all of the bite marks that they have given each other (we are working on it, I promise) in order to insure that no little innocent child gets blamed for their injuries! In addition, the choreography of getting them into the classroom (Elise was with me too) was enough to keep my mind off of the fact that my babies are going to school! I was also laughing at the fact that they are the GIANTS of the classroom! Bennett is definitely the biggest one and it is really getting to the point that it just looks strange that this big boy cannot walk (or I should say doesn't want to walk!) The teaches said they had a great day and they were exhausted afterwards!



Lila with her "school" bag...



Bennett ready to go...



Elise had her first day of Preschool today! She was thrilled and did great! I was surprised that today was even more emotional for me with her than it was bringing the twins on their first day. Something about sitting in car-pool line just made me very sentimental. She practiced the new prayer she learned on the way home, which was very cute....and as the day has gone on she has remembered a few other things they learned- apparently "criss cross, applesauce, hands in the cookie jar" means sit with your legs crossed and your hands in your lap. She taught us how to do it...

In addition, here are a few "quotes of the day":
1. "Dad, how long is this time out going to be?"
2. "Su Su- I think that toy got broken in the storm" (As IF!)
3. "Su Su's house has a big bo-bo, but the big blue band aid (tarp) is going to fix it up"
4. Needs a little background...Kimberly had her over to play for a while on Monday while I ran some errands and when I picked her up I said, "Elise, now what do you say?" (prompting her to say thanks).....Instead, she walked up to Kimberly and said, "I'm sorry for not listening."
Gives you an idea of how much time she has spent in time out and how many times she has had to say those words to us this week!

I also realized that I forgot to document my most favorite story from our Brookhaven evacuation. We all took a walk one afternoon (babies in stroller, "big" girls on foot) and as we were walking we noticed one of those HUGE black grasshoppers...Just as Elise was oohing and ahhing over it Quinn saw it and made a mad dash towards it! When she reached him she proceeded to stomp on him as hard as she could! Elise's jaw dropped. David quickly said, "Oh look...the grasshopper went nite-nite". Under my breath I said, "yeah, permanently!". Elise seemed to accept that, but then Quinn chirpped up, "It's not nite-nite, I KILLED it!"
It was so hilarious. I worried Lissa might go into labor. It was even funnier with Quinn's adorable Mississippi accent! In Quinn's defense, she has been taught by her Gimme (Brad's Mom) that those grasshoppers are evil and will eat up your whole garden (their yard is beautiful!). Of course, since I am not much of a green thumb I did not realize this! So, I guess Quinn did all of the Brookhaven gardeners a favor!

Hope everyone is having a good one.
Goodnight!
Love, Nicole