jhuxcsaqr7

2 Seconds Honey I'm on the Phone...

I sometimes dread for the phone to ring...I cringe, I sigh, I start to get anxious...and not for the reasons you're thinking. I actually enjoy talking on the phone. I love to talk to friends and family or customers or whoever, but seriously...my kids can go from perfect angels to miniature demons in the amount of time it takes me to answer the telephone. I mean seriously...children I can still see and hear you...please don't decide to destroy the house just because Mommy has answered the telephone...

Case in point...I am enjoying my morning on the porch. The kids are splahing in their swimming pool and I'm enjoying a nice cup of coffee and talking with my sister in law about about my nephew's first birthday. All is well...until...I notice that my two darlings have found a small plastic clear bin in which they have filled with swimming pool water...and they've added garden mulch...and dog food...and dirt...and last but not least...the nastiness from their Daddy's spit bottle of tobacco that he so considerately left on the porch for uss...and they are using a plastic sand shovel to stir up the concoction... AT this point I'm just thankful they didn't find a drinking straw and give it a good chug...

I then made Noah march his nasty mess across the yard and pour it out in the field...
accompanied by weeping and wailing and complaining...I am so UNFAIR...

I am happy to report I think that we nipped it in the bud before he fed it to his sister...at least I'm pretty sure...

The going rate for crickets

Ah the joys of raising a boy! Summer is barely in full swing and so far this year the Parsley house has been home to two frogs and two turtles. Both of these sets were caught wild in the field and happily packed inside by Noah Thomas. He packed the things in and out and in and out...I finally convinced him that wild life is supposed to stay outside (and the poor things were looking like they were on their last legs) so he let them go. Or at least he let the frogs go...the turtle "bucket" was knocked over during the storm and the turtles scurried away to safety. OK I know turtles don't really "scurry" but I feel sure to get away from their five year old tormentor they probably were a little faster than normal...lightening storm or not.

Thank you to my wonderful mother who informed Noah that the kind of frogs you can keep as pets were sold at the pet stores. Thanks Mom! So Noah and Nana took a trip bright and early Tuesday morning to purchase not one but two firebelly frogs. GREAT... Not only do I now have two frogs living in my playroom in an aquarium but we have to feed the things live insects. Yes you read that correctly...Live insects. Correction...Jessica will not be feeding anything live insects. Noah or Daddy can feed the creatures...lest they shall perish...because I'm not doing it!

I have also learned today that you do not send your husband to Petco to purchase frog food. I call him today to instruct him to go and buy millworms. (Can't say this is something I ever thought I would spend money on...) Travis dutifully trucks off after work to make said purchase. He calls me on the way home and tells me, "I'm not sure about the whole frog thing...the lady at the store said they need 6 to 12 crickets a day and that's going to cost over $40 a month..."
I told him she was crazy and trying to make cricket commission...long story short. I now have two frogs in my house and thirteen live crickets....and tomorrow I will be going to purchase millworms...

Fantastic...two frogs, thirteen crickets, a husband who won't follow instructions and two children...Oh and we have a dog...

And now it's bed time and I can hear the chirping of crickets...not on the lawn...in the next room...

Siblings...

As an only child the whole sibling relationship is relatively foreign to me. Don't get me wrong, I have a huge family who I am very very close to, but I have no experience of sharing the same parents, the same home, the same experiences with another person.

I suppose I had never really given it that much thought. I didn't have a brother or sister so the family dynamics between a brother and a sister had never really interested me I guess. That all changed when we decided that our family of three should become a family of 4. One of my best friends in the whole world used to tell me that having a second child was the "very best gift you could give to your first child" and at the time i believed her but I didnt' really understand it. That has all changed now.

To watch my two babies together constantly amazes me. They are so different yet so exactly the same. They crinkle their noses the same, they have the same expressions when the sleep, and even the pitch of their voices are the same when they really get loud...

They are the sweetest things to watch when they are getting along. They will hold hands and hug each other. Lil wants to be right with her big brother and doing whatever he is doing and usually that thrills Noah to death.

Unless it doesn't...the then all you-know-what can break loose. "She's messing up my stuff.." She's stinky...she took my food...to which Lilly just replies with a screams and tears...and then five seconds later they love each other again. I'm serious I think they can go from hating one another to being best friends again in 2 seconds flat. Everyone tells me this is normal and that it will get worse so I'm trying to adjust!!!

Noah is amazing to watch as a big brother. He loves to read to Lilly and play with her and to try and teach her stuff and she usually goes along with whatever he is trying to show her. He will even attempt to try to help her get cleaned up and dressed for the day.

After we found out that Lilly had food allergies (egg allergy) too, I went through a little shall we call it "bitter" spell. I was in total feel-sorry-for-myself-mode and kept telling myself that it just wasn't fair. I already had one baby who had to suffer with food allergies, why did my second baby have to have it too? And then not too long after that it occured to me, that Lilly's food allergies just help Noah to feel "normal" at home. When Noah can't have the birthday cake at his friend's parties he used to be all alone, now he shares his special cupcakes with his sister. He even asked me the other day if a snack he was going to share was "safe" for Lilly to eat too. He is becoming more independant at taking take of his own needs by learning how to help protect Lilly from the foods that would make her sick.

Anyway, they just amaze me how they interact with each other and I hope that they will be close when they grow up. I'm sure they will go through long long spells where they are not as close to each other, but in the long run I hope that they end up best friends.

Take Me Out to the Ballgame

I am not much of a sports girl. I mean OK, I will root for UK basketball if being forced to watch it and I'll even sit through a Reds baseball game and lately I am rooting for the Phillies since the pitcher is one of my friends from high school, but other than that, not so much on sports (much to the dismay of my dear husband who lives for ESPN).

However, I have had the most fun this summer rooting for my new favorite ball player, Yep Number 4 on the Cardinals, my own little Noah. This is his first year to play and most of the boys on his team as well. But they are having so much fun. The highlight of Noah's game is to get a lemonade from the concession stand and he does love to play in the dirt, but man are they ever cute!!!

Noah has been so proud to report that his Papa (My Dad) has not missed a single game! Also, it is so sweet to watch Travis practice with Noah and play catch and have batting practice.

Of course Lil on the other hand is a fan of the concession stand and of spying if anyone has left a hotdog laying around she can snag...

But I suppose the best part of being on a team with 4 and 5 year olds is that they just have alot of fun and they really don't care about winning and losing...they just want to play ball. In fact, a few games ago Noah's team won their very first game after losing several. Travis was congratulating Noah and telling him how proud he was that his team had won. Noah just looked at him kind of confused and asked, "Had we lost the other ones?"

Africa, Asia, and WHERE???

At the morning breakfast table I try to get Noah engaged in some type of conversation that surrounds his current interests. Lately he is loving wild animals and jungles and we are reading all kinds of books about them. In the books is usually a description of the exotic places that these animals live. Noah tells me this morning when he gets big he's going to go all kind of places to visit.

"You know like, Africa, Asia, the desert, and OHIO..." Noah says.

Who knew, there was a tropical oasis so close to home?

He also informed me that he is going to be a zoo keeper in Nashville and move far far away...right next door to Nana's house.