A yogurt baby

Baby James was hungry and wanted a snack one morning.  Since I had already put his tray in the dishwasher I thought I'll just give him his snack in his chair without the tray.  Lil'Will requested a cup of yogurt which of course meant that Baby James also had to have some yogurt.  At first it went really well.  I was impressed with how well James was getting the yogurt out of the cup and into his mouth.  He was just so happy to trusted with his cup and spoon.  Well, I walked out of the room to get a cup of water for the boys and I came back to find that James had dropped his spoon and was now eating with his hand and was sharing his yogurt soaked hand with the dogs!  Again he couldn't have been happier!

Baby James swears by the yogurt bath to keep on youthful

Always put the yogurt in between the toes if you want a really good pedicure

If you follow these simple steps you will always look as young as me!

Trying to get mommy covered in yogurt!

The many GQ looks of Baby James

The wandering crouch

The I am to sexy for my towel

The I can even cook look

The I am very athletic look

And of course the old stand by I am to sexy for my shirt look!

Videos of the boys playing on the slide

Here is a few videos of the boys playing on the slide at the park.  They love that the slide is make of little rollers.  It is very exciting.

Lil'Will is making his own lunch!

At lunch time one day I come into the kitchen to find Lil'Will making his own peanut butter wrap.  He got the tortillas out of the fridge and the peanut butter out of the pantry and started to make his own sandwich.  He is getting to be so independent.  He still needed me to roll it up for him, but I was very proud of him to take the initiative and make his own lunch!

He was very serious about spreading the peanut butter

Here he is trying to wrap it up

Daddy Jammies

These are the infamous pajamas that Lil'Will got from our neighbors.  He calls them his Daddy jammies.  I think it is because of the camo print on the trucks and such.  He would never take these off if given the option.  The other day the top was dirty from being worn and getting food on it, so I wouldn't allow him to wear it to bed.  He was not happy with me at all.  I finally got him in another pair of pjs and he took the bottoms of these and put them on over his other pjs!!!  As soon as we get home from going out he quickly changes into these pjs.  He loves them!!

He wouldn't let me take a picture unless he was making a funny face.

We just made some cookies so he has a dirty face.

Notice the pants that he had just taken off thrown on the floor.

My fall wreath

I was at Micheals while they were having this amazing sale and so I felt the urge to create something.  It has been a very long time since I have flexed my creative muscles. I really wanted create an orange peppercorn wreath for the fall.  Once I started looking at what they had available I ended up with some fall accents to put on the wreath and a bunch of peppercorns.  Well as you can see there are very few peppercorns and a lot of other things.  I am actually very happy with how it turned out and realized how much I miss making things like this.  Although I think it may be a bit full or over done, but thats ok.  Every once in a while its good to go all out! 

More pictures of William

William with another Soldier in all their gear.  He was still in Kuwait when this picture was taken.  I have very mixed feelings with this picture.  I was showing Lil'Will these pictures and he noticed the gun and was like that is so Daddy can kill people.  I did not like that being what he thought so I told him that it isn't for Daddy to kill people but for him to protect the base and keep people safe.

This is a picture of William standing in front of a mosque on base.  It is actually right across from his room.  It is for the muslim workers on base, but it is closed for construction.  Since they will only let muslim construction workers work on it and they are in short supply it wont be open for awhile.

This is a picture of Williams room.  He is living in a single wide trailer that is called a pod.  Each pod has three rooms in it.  These rooms are not connected.  They each have a separate door on the outside.  Their bathrooms are in a different building all together.  He shares this room with another soldier.  

Some pictures of William

William sent me some photos today.  So I thought that I would try and post them for him since he has very limited time on the internet lately.  He wont get internet in his room for almost two months so most news will come from me.  There are only two places he can use the internet at, the morale room and the USO they are both closely monitored on time.  They have a 20 minute time limit at both or maybe its 20 at one and 10 at the other but none the less it is limited.  He is doing really well.  They are training with the Army right now and will fully take over the position by the end of the week.  It is a very fast turnover.  He will be working 7 days a week in 14 hour shifts, so he will be very busy with that.  They also want them to be volunteering a few hours of almost everyday at either the hospital or the USO.  I personally think that is a bit much, but oh well.  He has a nice room mate and he is learning his way around.  I will post more tomorrow with pictures from Iraq.

This was when William was awarded BTZ.  If you notice there is an extra stripe on his arm.  They punch it really hard while they are taping the new rank on his uniform.  He had just gotten his small pox vaccine the day before so it hurt really bad!  I am so proud of him for getting BTZ!!!  He is so amazing!

This is a picture from when William was still in training for Iraq.  They take a course in which they learn how to give IV's so everyone in the class gives IV's and of course like in this picture receives IV's.  Look at all that blood!!  It pays to go to someone who has more training than a few hour course.

Here William is putting in the IV.  They took pictures of him doing and made a movie to show future classes!  Crazy, huh?

This is an advertisement for Coke in the German Airport he was stuck in.  This picture is mostly for Amber since she wanted him to try the German coke.  When we ( Amber and I) were in Atlanta we stopped by the coke factory/museum and they have a tasting room where you can taste all the coke products sold around the world.  For Germany coke makes a very bitter drink that would be like our sprite here.  I imagine it tastes like a beer.  He didn't find any of that for her so he took this picture.

Gettin' Jiggy with it!

Aunt Peggy gave Lil'Will this tattoo which he was very excited to get.  Since we don't want him to think tattoos are a cool thing we call it a skin sticker.  I know cheesy.  I had to be very careful when bathing him so as to not injure the skin sticker.  I was finally able to wash it off tonight.  I was impressed that you could still see in pretty well after all this time.  Especially since he gets a bath every night.  Here are some other pictures of my boy, or as he says, a very big boy!

A picture of the amazing skin sticker

Our neighbor gave us some clothes for the boys that theirs had out grown and he picked out this Carolina Panther Jersey and the matching pants.  He looked so cute that I wanted to take a picture, but he wouldn't let me.  So even though we left the Carolina's we still have some Carolina pride!!

Lil'Will looking very cute in his hat

He is so sweet even with his cockeyed hat!

Cute pictures of the boys

These are a few of the cute pictures that were taken of the boys by, Skip, Peggy and Nana while they were here.  We had the best time with them and the boys just loved it.  Baby James just fell in love with Skip.   He was always having Skip hold him.  It was very sweet.  Lil'Will loved his Aunt Peggy, he called her Aunt Puggy, but it was said with love.  And of course they loved being spoiled by Nana.  Nana brought them some toys to play in the sandbox with which they loved.  A good time was had by all.

Baby James got into Uncle Skips shoes all by himself.  Double click on this picture so you can see the drool coming out of his mouth.  Very cute!

Lil'Will enjoying the new sandbox toys

As you can see there was a progression in nakedness.  Soon he was running around the yard bare bottomed!

Aww! There is the bare bottom!

Baby James loving the chance to hold the hose while water is coming out!  A huge treat!

Driving the car

At the BX they have these great rides for the kids.  My favorite part is that they only cost 25 cents.  Where as everywhere else they are like a dollar.  So both the boys can drive the car or ride the horse.  They think it is so much fun.  Plus all the ladies getting their nails and hair done right there love seeing the kiddos have fun on the machines!

Lil'Will takes driving very seriously, while James is hanging cool checking out the ladies.

James now has a turn at the wheel, while Lil'Will does shout outs to the ladies.

A very pretty James

We went to visit our friend Jessica who works at a Claire's boutique on Wednesday. While we were there the boys found many things to get into. They had lots of fun grabbing purses off the hangers and trying to open cases, but the thing that entertained them the most were these beaded necklaces. Baby James especially was thrilled to see them and try them on. It was so cute that i took a video and lots of pictures. I am thinking of dressing him up as Auntie Mame for halloween!

Will has finally made it!!

William is now in Iraq! I know that most Wives probably wouldn't be excited that their husbands are in a war zone, but his 179 day of deployment don't start until he gets to his place of station.  So the sooner he gets there the sooner he comes home.  It took him 2 weeks to get there, so we are praying that it doesn't take 2 weeks when it is time to come home.  He flew from kuwait in a C130 which he said was very full mostly with other military personnel.  Only 7 of them were people that were coming to Iraq to work with him.  They stopped at lots of other bases on the way to drop off and pick up other people.  Plus he said that with all that there were some really rough flying in between the landing and that he was really happy that he took anti-nausea  medicine because if not he surely would have thrown up.  He did say that it was really neat being in there since they were sitting in jump seats.  He wished his camera hadn't been packed up because there were some really neat shots.  But he is safe and sound at the air force base.  He is getting everything set up.  I will write more in a bit.  He doesn't have internet in his room yet so it will be a while until he is able to post something on the blog.  He goes to the USO to use their internet and he is only able to be on for 10 minutes at a time.  So I will be giving updates for a while.  He loves you all!

The Fountains at the Bellagio

Here is a video I took of the fountains of the Bellagio.  I made a movie for Skip and Peggy but for some reason the music of the fountains were off set so I wanted them to be able to show it with the music and such.  So here they are.

A day with the Dolphins

One of our favorite places here in Vegas is at the Mirage.  It is the Secret Garden, home of the Tigers from Seigfried and Roy's show as well as dolphins.  The boys love it there.  It is the closest thing to a zoo that we have.  The boys love to see the dolphins and they got baby tigers this summer so we spend a lot of time watching the cute baby tigers.  We have gone three times already this summer.  We would go more but its a bit expensive.  We spent 4 and a half hours there on Friday.  We were excited because when we got there they told us that a new dolphin had been born on a week ago and that we would get a chance to see the baby.  There is an area where you can see below into the tank.  While we were down there looking through the windows in to the dolphin tank we got a view of a very happy male dolphin.  My son Lil'Will quips up, "Look there is a Daddy dolphin!!!" pointing very happily!  The room erupts into laughter.  Then a couple of minutes later Jessica was pointing out to William that the dolphins also had belly button just like him.  He then says, "My mommy lost her belly button."  Very seriously.  It was funny.  The people in the viewing room thought he was a riot.  

A picture of Me with Baby James

Jessica and Lil'Will posing in front of a tiger.

The dolphins

One of the baby tigers.  Her name is Chakra.

Baby James and Lil'Will in front of the big fish tank at the Mirage.

Dancing Fever! Wait no! I mean Dinosaur Fever!

Actually I may mean both.  Here is a super cute video of Lil'Will dancing to We are the Dinosaurs.  The little boy in the video is our neighbors son Cayson.  He is about to turn two next week and loves playing with the boys.  Get ready to get your groove thing on!  

video of Baby James cooking!

Baby James was very happy to be able to fake cook.  What made it even more exciting was when he got the pot lid.  That just made him so happy.  He loves to make noise and be a boy!  Ohh, how I love this little chunky monkey!!

Baby James in big boy undies

I am learning that Baby James can not have juice.  It irritates his system and then he gets horrible diaper rashes no matter how much I dilute it.  Three days ago I made some juice and it was seriously half juice half water and I am still paying the price for letting him drink it.  He has this horrible diaper rash, so I was letting him air out his heiney but he was catching his peepee, cause he is a big climber, and it was causing him pain.  So i put a pair of his brothers big boy undies on him so he could still play but his bottom could still get some air.  He looks so adorable with the big boy undies that I had to share the pictures.

He was running away from me.  I am impressed that it isn't a fuzzy picture

Like I said he is a climber and there is nothing better than being on top of the train table.

He's got a train and big boy undies, watch out world!

Lil'Will has been fighting me on naps so I have almost given up on them, but he keeps falling asleep at 6.  Here he was put into time out because he wanted to eat so bad that he was whining on the floor of the kitchen while I made his plate.  I had asked him several times to wait a few minutes and it would be ready, but that wasn't enough so he had a full tantrum and was put in his room until he decided that he could be with the family and not cry.  I kid you not less than three minutes later I go in after calling him for dinner did not get a response.  He had gotten under his covers and snuggled with his blanket!  Then at 11 he woke up ready to eat and play.  It took me until 2:30 to get him back to sleep!!

How quickly can a mess appear?

In our house the answer is less than 5 minutes.  I left the boys entertaining themselves while I seriously took a five minute shower to get rid of the stink.  The baby was playing in the kitchen, getting into the lazy susan, the only door not childproof, and Lil'Will was coloring in the dining room.  Well by the time i got out of the shower I heard things being thrown in the kitchen, not a good sign.  So I wrap my towel around me and this is what I see, except that baby James is on the kitchen counter getting into more trouble. 

They moved the learning tower to the counter and baby James climbed right on up and then got into butter all my spices, the salt and pepper on the stove top, all the utensils and when I found him he was about to get into my dishes!

The glass I heard was my spices being thrown to the floor.

Everything needed to be cleaned!

Now while James was being trouble in the kitchen Lil'Will decided that he needed a snack so he got a sleeve of crackers which he opened with scissors, he told me when I asked how he opened them.  When I asked about the tongs he said that his brother gave them to him.   I guess James wanted him to help in the mess making process.

While I was taking the pictures James decided that he needed to sit down and eat some of the crackers since it is such hard work making that kind of mess.