The Return of the Tea Party

Lucy's tea set was such a huge hit last Christmas that Camille now has her own (thanks Grammy and Pawpaw!).


Click here to see the December version, where Camille was too little to participate at 18 mo.


Here is the new summer version. With this more sturdy set, a 2 year old Camille gets to dive in! I love to see how "proper" my girls can act with tea and miniature cookies.





* note to self - wash spaghetti sauce off face before taking pictures to post here next time.

4 Thumbs Up

A few weeks ago we received an "Edible Arrangement" while Brad was out of town. I highly recommend this for some good, cold, juicy, nutritious summer fun. Thanks Noni and G-Pa!

Cars and Trucks

I just wanted to remember this one.

I think it was a few days before we made our very long drive to Houston and back that Camille started a new game with me. When we are in the car she asks, "How do people do cars?"

My answer (imagine all sorts of exaggerated gestures along with the words): 'Well, they open the door and get in and put in their key in and turn it, and push the pedal with their foot to make it go and turn the steering wheel. That's how."

She always nods and immediately asks "How do people do trucks"

I give the same long response, and she's satisfied. She does this each time we get in the car now, and sometimes in the house.

Last night Brad asked, "Camille, how do people do cars?" and she just nearly repeated it back to him!

A ringing noise

I lost my cell phone in May and gave up finding it after we moved in July. So now I have a new one and am loving it.

Unlike my old one, this one allows me to set different rings, depending on who calls. So far I have set about 4 different rings. Most of them are songs.

I have not received enough calls to recognize what songs play. So I find myself jumping up and looking for my phone a lot: like when our Little Einsteins Rocket toy plays its classical music, when the ballerina music box is turned on, when a cartoon in another room makes an odd beeping sound, and even sometimes when my phone actually rings!

Back from the beach

We're home again after a wonderful visit to the Houston area. We spent a week with Brad's family on the Gulf of Mexico (Surfside Beach) and loved every minute of it, except the two days spent inside thanks to Hurricane Dolly. The other week was spent at Grammy and Pawpaw's house - which is always delightful!

I'll post lots more pictures soon, but I am a little overwhelmed with the amount of work waiting for me here. We have tons of unpacking to do (boxes from the move, at least suitcases from the trip are done though). I'm also behind with my part-time job.

Here are a few pictures (thanks to "Tia" Angela- who has a couple of great posts about our visit).

The James cousins (not including my niece or nephew due in November)

L to R, Kilian-6, Lucy-4, Phillip-6, Camille-2, Max-2, Ryan-7

Freebies

After we closed on the house and made the first visit as the owners, I was so happy to find all the neat things the previous owners left for us.

Besides some roses, these festive outdoor lights and a little wooden wishing well

more of the lights and some flower pots

a pretty stepping stone

a basket ball goal (well, I guess I wasn't surprised they left that). My dad pointed it out to Kilian, who shrugged and asked if he could go look for ants in the yard.

and finally, they left a really nice note welcoming us and telling us they hope that we enjoy the house as much as they did. I wish I would have thought of that. I could have made several families feel good, since we've moved out of so many houses lately.

This pretty much sums them up

Recent quotes heard around here:

Camille: ME BYSELF!! BIG GIRL!! - pushing me away so she can climb into the van without my help.

Lucy: Why do I always get hurt? - sobbing after running into a doorknob, then kicking the leg of a chair on her way to tell me about her head injury.

Kilian: You know those numbers that are smaller than zero?
Me: Yes, you mean negative numbers.
Kilian: Yeah - they are kind of zeroish. It's like they are on zero's team.