Of new highs and lows

This coming Friday brings about a major event for Miss A: her debut as a flowergirl in my cousin J's wedding!!

Now, I'd like to say we are fully prepared for this momentous occasion but I know better than that. Miss A is a feisty and lively little three year old lady who has been known to look at us and say, "You're being ORNERY." (Kids say the darndest things, eh? You can imagine how often she has heard this said to her these days that she has learned it by this point. *Grrrr*)

Nevertheless, I'm optimistic that despite the fact that work/teaching obligations require us to miss the rehearsal  of the ceremony, Miss A will be the best darned flower girl that side of the Mason-Dixon. Too optimistic of me to proclaim such a thing?

Well... I DO have this up my sleeve to help to convince her to get from one end of the aisle to the other if such a thing becomes so necessary...

*sigh*

Miss A is SO into mermaids right now and though we have resisted the pull of all things Disney Princess to this point, I'm giving in because I know that the above will be more than enough to convince her to walk very happily down the aisle. *shrug* What can I say? I'm not above bribery.

Things to do in a hurricane

As I post this we are just about on the verge of the first of the worst that is hurricane Irene for the DC metropolitan area. It's actually been pretty quiet around here for the most part and at present time we still have power, water, and cable service. (Obviously, since I am blogging right now.)

Earlier today I started laundry so that I will have my nice work clothes to wear for work (God-willing) next week for the second go 'round of school and I also gave Miss A a haircut in good ol' Buster Brown fashion...

I'm pretty amazed that I have been able to continue doing home haircuts for Miss A and NOT have them look too bad but I know those days will end soon enough when she gets to the age wear the Buster Brown look just won't hack it anymore and/or her friends are the reason why she will not subject herself to me with the best pair of scissors I can find in the house. (I don't have hair cutting shears. I believe that Nana V is going to be remedying that this Christmas though.)

This evening we have had a delicious dinner - steak (in case we lose power for days and thus our better groceries), fresh corn on the cob and broccoli - and right now Miss A is watching her new favorite episode of Caillou and D is in his man-cave enjoying a cigar. After I'm done blogging I might try and squeeze out some photo editing of my latest portrait jobs - that of which I am totally backed up on because ragweed and the start of the school year has robbed me of so much work time. *grrrrr* We are pretty well set for the storm to pass over us though and we're just praying for all of our friends and family who are also going to be affected. Tomorrow I am scheduled to run the projector at church but since the worst of the storm will be hitting us in the middle of the night, I might very well be out of the job! Still, our church plans on having services - power or not. (Thank God for having a church family/community that knows faith and belief requires nothing more than two or three gathering in His name.)

I guess that's it for us. In case you were curious, this is what it looked like outside our house maybe an hour ago...

Obviously when the storm hits we are going to really try and stay away from such a huge window but it's been nice to have while it's not been too dangerous because it really does give us a terrific view of the happenings outside.

Signing off for now! Hope you all are dry and comfortable wherever you are. :)

How many is too many?

No pictures today but just something fun/funny that might brighten your Friday...

Last evening while we were finishing up dinner, Miss A finished her plate and trotted off to amuse herself. Ten minutes later I checked on her and discovered just what she was doing. And that was? Putting on underwear, of course. FIVE PAIRS of underwear.

FIVE PAIRS.

Internet people, Miss A was wearing five pairs of underwear last evening.

*sigh*

Blessings galore

So much to report since whenever ago when I last posted. It's been so long I don't even recall when that is.

Here's the short version of our latest...
- we have a new roof on our house thanks to our amazing grandpap and Grammy. They came down our way and worked diligently with D to reroof our house during the worst heat wave felt in these parts in over a decade. We are ever grateful for the ways they support and help us.
- we took a much needed vacation up the east coast to new England and visited my brother and his family as well two of my dearest friends and their new babies. The whole trip was such a blessing and we had no idea how badly we really needed it with it coming just in time for the schoolyear to start back up for us.
- my photography business has been absolutely booming. I can.hardly keep up with all of the work these days. days

- miss a has become such a little woman these days. She just about a mini teenager and she is constantly saying or doing things that are nothing short of entertaining to witness. - we have officially joined the harry potter fandom bandwagon. I've been reading through the series for awhile now and was fast becoming a fan anyway but now that also watched the movies with d in tow, he's hooked as well. We saw the last movie in 3d imax and it was amazing. Someday we hope to get to harry potter world with miss a as well. - my beloved blackberry finally kicked the bucket and i got myself the next best thing to an iPhone thanks to my very timely and generous upgrade. (I am blogging now from any Droid.) D has become a fan of my Droid as well and we have both joined the ranks of angry bird addiction and adoring then coolness that is Droid technology he will be getting his own Droid next year when he's finally up for his upgrade. It honestly cannot get here soon enough. So that's the most of the goings on around here with us. We both start back to work this week for teachers work weeks and we can't help but wish we had a little more summer yet. It's been so fun while its been here.

Today was only the most annoying day in the world

Is it bedtime yet? Is it? Because I'd like it to be bedtime. I'd like it to be time for me to soak in a tub of bubbly hot water and then crawl into a bed clothed with cool bed sheets and turn on the overhead fan and then fight to stay awake as I try and read the 6th Harry Potter installment and then finally give up and give into to just closing my eyes and drifting off to the land of nod. Why? Because my day included the following...

- Finally getting a letter of notification about the grad school application I worked all year on stating that No. I did not get in. (To my credit my admissions counselor stated that she couldn't believe this either and is going to be investigating the situation on my behalf to perhaps determine what the cause of such a decision was.)

- It was so ridiculously hot today that nowhere - inside, outside, wherever - was comfortable to be. Miss A stayed home from school today in an effort to salvage this into a "family day" and we tried to go out and play in the pool and make mud pies but we honestly couldn't it was too hot! It was SO hot that the pool was unavailable for the most part because of this...

*sigh* Who can blame though? Seriously. It was SWELTERING today. I would have been mad at him and fussed at him so he would get himself out of the pool but I felt sorry for him. I mean, if WE were hot he must have been burning up!

- And Miss A has been a real piece of work today. SERIOUSLY. I feel like after today I have been officially inducted into the world of survival of parenting through the "terrible threes." It's to the point where I feel like (perhaps?) we could rightfully change Miss A's name to Ramona Quimby - ever heard of her?

She's a character from one of my favorite collectives of children's literature but the thing she is hugely notorious for is her ability to get into every kind of mischief a person could every dream up. Certainly she never means things to turn out as disastrous as they do in all of her storybooks but she always manages to cause serious trouble without hardly trying to or meaning to. And today? Well, today was like the incarnation of Ramona Quimby. I've actually been convinced that she's like the next Ramona Quimby for weeks now since we cut her hair Buster Brown-style...

If that's not some serious Ramona Quimby resemblance than I don't know what is!

Anyway... back to what has made this the most annoying day in the world...

Well, all day long she has just been very challenging. Her latest "thing" is insisting on digging into her winter wardrobe. It has been nothing but a battle with her every time I try and get her dressed because all she wants to wear are long-sleeves, long pants, sweatshirt jackets, wool hats, and furry boots. It's gotten so bad that I've just let her wear what she wants but I just have made a rule that she can't go outside in whatever she's wearing because she will absolutely roast if she is not in air conditioning wearing what she's wearing. Earlier this evening I felt like I had a small win when she finally relented and asked me to take off the sweatshirt jacket she was wearing OVER a long sleeved shirt but she still wouldn't let me change into something a lot cooler. *so annoying!* In the midst of us trying to pick her pajamas she threw herself down on the ground and I actually had to fuss at her and say something along the lines of, "ABSOLUTELY NOT. I WILL NOT HAVE YOU WEARING THAT SO YOU END UP PASSING OUT FROM HEAT STROKE." She refused to listen to me and I only was able to get her to calm down because I changed the subject and suggested we go "swimming" in the bathtub because wouldn't that be so much fun?

Earlier (before the aforementioned pajama incident) she tromped off to the bathroom to "go potty" by herself and forbid me from following her in because she needed her "privacy" and would do everything herself. She wasn't in there ever 30 seconds and I went it to check on her and this is what I found...

Seriously? I cannot believe I was able to catch her when I did because I actually managed to save her from doing the whole roll of toilet paper. But still! SERIOUSLY?!!!

After that (sorry, this is a little out of sequential order) she was taking her bath and I was trying to wash her hair and she laid back and I noticed she had a mouth full of something unidentifiable. I asked her about it and at first she said it was nothing but I was concerned and demanded (in my most stern voice, no less) that she tell me EXACTLY what she had in her mouth and she looked at me all big-eyed and said, "The WINDOW." *Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!* She had SERIOUSLY been peeling off paint chips from the window sill in the living room and was CHEWING on them like the were Bubbalicious!!! Since when did my kid become the kid who ate paint chips??!!!! And what did I do in reaction? Well, I, thinking about the LEAD that could have been in the paint, couldn't contain myself and started yelling at her, "We NEVER EAT THE WINDOW! WE NEVER EVER EVER EVER(!!!) EAT THE WINDOW!!! EVER!!!"

I've had it with this day. I have honestly and truly HAD IT.

I need to decompress STAT.

Please excuse me while I go and eat whipped cream straight from the can.