These are some shots from James's party that I had to miss. :-( Happy second birthday to James Dexter!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Okay...going back 2 months ago, here are a couple more pictures from my birthday weekend that I wanted to share!
Life is Good!
Why kids love their Daddy:
Roll Tide!!

A couple of outfits I sewed for Daniley. :-)

I'm skipping around a little on the blog...we've been doing about 10 times more stuff than I've listed on here....a big part involving a very important wedding for which I don't have pictures yet. So when I get them, I'll write about it. In the meantime, here are some pictures from Halloween.
Friday we went to Daddy's office to trick-or-treat (pictures later). Saturday we went to LeLe's party and then trick-or-treated the neighborhood. Sunday we went to Honey's to play with James and Eli (and Honey and GPaw too!) :-)
I invited my nephews and a couple friends to LeLe's party. However I forgot to invite Sarah Katherine. Thank goodness Erin called me a few hours before the party and we got the details worked out. They came to LeLe's for the party and to trick-or-treat. We had a fun time. Crystal and Shane also came and they had AWESOME costumes.
Trick-or-treating was tons of fun!!!! Daniley ran into several houses (those containing pets--dogs, then fish tanks, then a cat). I don't mean she ran into the foyer and stopped. No. They opened the door and she shot out through their living rooms. I didn't know if I should bust in a retrieve her, and they seemed even more shocked than I was, and didn't know if they should pick her up and return her or just stand there and wait to see what she did next.
We used a wagon to get from house to house, but we'd let Daniley and SK out at street level and the two of them had to go to the house, ring the doorbell, and if the owner's were lucky they'd get a "Trick or Treat." Daniley ran the entire, whole entire time. If her feet were on the ground, she was running. Poor SK was having a great time but not quite as fast as Daniley Lightning. It was a fun night and they got lots of candy and we had a great time.
Sunday at Honey and GPaw's Daniley played with James and Eli but I didn't take any pictures. :-( We got there first and Daniley was acting pretty good, playing her ukulele. Then when James walked in it was like she went into overdrive and started hopping around and acting all silly. We finally gave James his late birthday present and they played outside, went trick-or-treating on Honey's street, and just had a really good time.

ATTENTION LITTLE KIDS!
Have your parents ever told you not to smoke? You should listen to them. Smoking is VERY BAD. In case you can't understand what your Mommy and Daddy are trying to tell you, here is an illustration:
First, someone gives you a candy cigarette, possibly for Halloween, when your Mommy and Daddy aren't looking.
Then they tell you, "Try it, it's good." It does look interesting, so you give it a puff.

Then you quickly realize you have been tricked. It's not good at all. And you feel loopy. Not only that, now you stink.
Take it from Daniley.....NEVER TRY CIGARETTES!!!!!!!

The Fish Tales continue....

Have you ever had one of those moments where you'd rather just say nothing at all rather than tell the truth, because you know the truth is unbelievable and people are just going to think you are nuts? This is one of those times:

One day last week, Mom had picked up Daniley and was passing by my office about 15 minutes before quitting time, so I had her just drop Daniley by here so I could save having to go pick her up. We arrived home about 5:15. About 15 minutes later, Dan came out of the bedroom giving me this strange look, one that I couldn't quite interpret. Then I got it...."Uh huh, Daniley tooooold me what ya'll did today." I'm looking at him like, ok, what? "She said ya'll went to the fish store and bought ONE fish. And that's funny because there are 6 fish in the fish tank. And she was with you this afternoon so it all makes perfect sense." In his mind, the case was closed. Just the thought that Dan actually believed this made me fall out in the floor all over again. After regaining control of myself, I tried to understand what was going on. I could not. We have looked in the fish tank for the missing fish 100 times + 4 hours minimum. Dan looked. I looked. GPaw looked. I thought someone was playing a trick on us. I'm still not too sure someone isn't. But that seems unreasonable. I have NO IDEA what is happening in our magic fishtank but now we have all 6 fish swimming happily. The only thing I DO know for sure....we have a 2 year old story-fabricator living among us, complete with details, hand motions, re-enactments, the whole bit.

PS. After many hours Dan still didn't believe I didn't go buy a fish. So to make a point, I said, "Daniley, did you go trick-or-treating today?" She happily replied, "YEHHHH!!!!!!!!!" I looked at Dan, raised my eyebrows, gave him a grin, and didn't say another word. HAHAHAHAHA.

Daniley and I were at home Friday enjoying the afternoon. Dan came home from work and within 10 minutes he was upstairs piling it on. As soon as he said "It SURE seems strange..." I thought to myself Wow, only 10 minutes to find something to gripe about. So anyway, I let him finish. "It sure seems strange that my fish net has been moved from where I left it this morning....and there's a fish missing from my fishtank." I replied immediately: "Daniley moved your net while brushing her teeth, and I don't know what happened to your fish." Of course he thought I was lying, as I was in charge of feeding the fish that day and he thinks you need some kind of college degree in Fish Feeding to be capable. In his mind it was Guilty As Charged...and by this point, I'm in the floor laughing. Sometimes Dan can't see the forest for the trees, so I went down to the fishtank to help him find his stupid fish. (1.5" long tetra type thing). Well. Hmmm. It's gone. Hmmmm. I said, maybe Daniley got your fish. He looked at her. "Daniley, did you get Dadu's fish?" "YYYYEEEEEAAAAAAHHHHHH!" she exclaimed. "What did you do with it?" "I EAT IT!!!!!!" I hit the floor laughing. At first we found this story unreasonable. Then I remembered, nothing with a 2 year old is unreasonable. We questioned Daniley all night long. Frontwards and Backwards. Every part of her story was consistent. She said she scooped the fish out of the fish tank (as she demonstrated her motions) and put him and her mouth, and SWALLOWED HIM WHOLE. She said he tasted like "Pich Pood." We have never found the fish, or any remains. So she ate it....that's all we have to go on.

Now I suppose I'm about as caught up on the blog as I'm ever gonna be. So that brings me into this weekend, which was nothing short of horrible. Wednesday I started feeling really bad at work, but I was able to make it through the day. I came straight home, threw up, and went straight to bed. I have been feeling a little nauseated during this pregnancy but nothing to complain about, as I know what true nausea-preggo-misery really means. I threw up with Daniley every day of the pregnancy. I was sick until the moment she arrived, and like someone flipped a switch, the moment she was out, I felt like my old self. Anyway, Thursday morning I woke up and immediately began throwing up, even before the teeth brushing which is usually what sends me over the edge. I got to work a little late, then had to leave again to come home and use my PRIVATE toilet to throw up some more. I took a 2 hour nap and then returned to work. At this point I was sure the pregnancy nausea had set it, and I was weeping uncontrollably because I knew exactly what I had to look forward to. Stayed sick into Friday morning, when I woke up with diarrhea, and at that point I knew 1. I had a stomach virus and 2. I had better get to the hospital to get fluids. Friday morning I'm at the house, in BAD condition, with Daniley. I'm sitting there knowing I'm in deep trouble and there's no way I can handle all this on my own. I called my grandmother and asked her to please come and just be with me and help me with Daniley. Within an hour, my Mom had picked up Daniley and me and my grandma were on the way to St. Vincents. The Dr. prescribed me Home Health Care, and after finding out the IVs were going to cost me about $1000, I decided to try the new meds for 24 hours and see if I could get some fluids down, which I did. The rest of the weekend was just recovery, trying to eat and get over the weakness. My mom and grandmother took good care of me and made sure I had everything I needed to survive this horrid, evil virus. And Dan, among a little griping here and there, did make delicious cinnamon toast. Thank you so much to those who have cared for me and checked on me while I've been down!!!

On another sad, sad note...I had to miss my nephew's 2nd birthday party! I was heartbroken...absolutely devastated, I can hardly type it up because it makes me cry all over again. :-(

Last weekend we took the Shelby Calera Railroad (Heart of Dixie Railroad Museum) to the Pumpkin Patch. It was a lot of fun. We will go to a "real" pumpkin patch hopefully sometime before Halloween. This one was fun but it's more about the train ride than the typical pumpkin patch. They did have a hayride, boiled peanuts, a large jumping inflatable, and a corn maze. But there just wasn't a lot of territory to romp. It was a lot of fun, but on the downside, I thought it was kind of expensive. ($40 for 2 adults and a 2 year old). I guess if you go to Old Baker's Farm during the festival, it's $10 each and there's no train ride. So maybe the price wasn't that unreasonable after second thought. I guess I should just get used to the fact that fun things to do cost money. I've lived cheap for long enough, I suppose. :-)

So we've done it again. We don't need to define "it" do we? LOL.
We are expecting another baby May 24. Just to save you some calculation time, the babies will be 2 years and 9 months apart. We were shooting for 3 years but going over wasn't an option so we tried a little early. And as you all know Dan is very good at everything he does. I'm happy I won't be pregnant during the summer this time. Daniley says she's getting a little sister. Neither of us care what the sex of the baby will be. We'd be thrilled with either, or even both. I've already been asked at least 5 times if I'm having twins...and yes, I'm only 6 weeks. It's the same as last time...I'm cool with looking a little oversized. :-) I've been hiding pictures of myself showing the baby bump. But the family has all been notified so the secret, and the belly pics, can come out now!

Our vacation to St. Augustine with Honey and GPaw was fabulous...mostly. :-) Daniley got sick with a stomach virus and threw up in the car a couple of times, which was less than desirable. Thank Goodness Honey and Dadu were there to help me keep things under control! Outside of that, the trip was marvelous. The weather was nice. One day was rainy but that was the day I had to stay in with Daniley anyway, and quite frankly I didn't mind being a little lazy myself! We toured the beautiful city, took a ride in a horse and carriage, rode the trolleys, toured the old jail which was fascinating, swam, and rode the carousel 9 times among 3 stops. Daniley loved it..and I loved that it was only $1 per ride and parents ride free. :-) We did some great eating and napping and just had a good time with our family.

Daniley found a frog on the playground and it was absolutely the cutest thing. She wanted to get it right away. So Dan caught it for her. Then she wanted to touch it and each time she did she'd get allllll excited and grin from ear to ear. Then she kissed it and that was very cute....but no prince ever showed up. That was good because I'm not ready for her to ride off into the sunset just yet anyhow. :-)

We want to thank tremendously Honey and G-Paw for inviting us on vacation. Putting up with a 2 year old on vacation after your kids have been grown for years can't be that easy of a transition. We appreciate your love, patience, and generosity, and look forward to many great vacations with you in the future. :-)

Well I really don't like posting without the pictures to go along, but I can't seem to get it all together lately! I still have more pictures from our trip to Montgomery 3 weeks ago. Since then, Sarah Katherine came and spent the night with us. Erin needed a sitter and it fell into my schedule beautifully (the only free weekend of the next 6!!!). We also went to Sarah Katherine's birthday party. I have pictures from that too, but you can go ahead and see them on Erin's blog. My brother is getting married in a few weeks and I have several weekends committed to teas, parties, wedding, etc. Daniley is going to be a flower girl and I am so excited. I was going to make her dress from my wedding dress but I chickened out, and since we had a backup, I didn't stress over it too much. We've got to practice throwing flowers (or actually, feathers!). I'm pretty certain she is going to make a huge mess of being a flower girl, but one thing is for sure, she'll be cute doing it. :-) I just hope she'll be quiet during the wedding so I can actually watch my brother get married. PS. Does anyone have any cry-stopping medicine???

My 30th birthday has come and gone. We celebrated with a short trip to Montgomery, the highlight of which was a trip to the zoo. Whoever told me about the Montgomery Zoo, thanks. It was everything you said it was. I liked it multitudes better than the Birmingham Zoo.
About being 30...unlike most of my friends I've had no dread about this new decade. I remember turning 20 like it was yesterday, but let's review how much my life has changed since then. Turning 20, I was in college, just starting at UAB. I didn't even know Dan. I lived at home with my Dad and brother. During the decade, I moved out on my own, graduated college, got married, graduated college again, bought and sold some land, bought some more land, bought a house, graduated college again (for the LAST time), and had a baby (who is now 2). Now that's some serious change! I know my thirties will bring more great things for me, hopefully including another baby and a paid-off mortgage, kids in school, sleepovers, and swim parties (at the pool we hope to install). I have big dreams and plan to continue working hard to reach them...check back in 10 years if you want to know how I did. ;-)
I definitely look forward to the great things in this next decade! :-)

We went to the Dr. today for a checkup. Turns out, Daniley has worms. Ok, just kidding, you ought to be able to look at her and know THAT isn't true. She has hit 3' tall which is 95% on the height chart. I hope she continues to be tall! I don't consider myself all that short but I wouldn't mind having a few inches to spread my fat out across. :-P She weighs 28 lb. 13 oz. which is 75%. And who cares about head circumference? LOL. I know plenty of people with big heads that are lacking on the smarts, Einstein! (But I think she was 60%.) Dr. Jolly said she is speaking like a 4 year old. I don't know if her speech is really THAT advanced, but it is definetely advanced. He was asking me if she could put two words together. I was like, "Doc, she'll tell you a whole paragraph in complete sentences with pronouns and adjectives included!" Before the visit was over, she confirmed it. She told the Dr. that his shoes were black, she couldn't jump up into the trees and clouds, and that she couldn't find Old Macdonald on her iPod. (When I helped her find it, she performed it for him. LOL.) As it sounds, we got a good report and she's as healthy as a horse. Yay Daniley!!! We are so blessed!!!

Fun times at Unc's house (thanks Brooke...I stole the pics from your FB page) :-)

Here are picture from the actual birthday (the day before the party).

The birthday has come and gone. Friday Daniley turned two. We went to the nursing home to visit with Aunt Katie, then went back home for a nap. After that we made cupcakes. Then that night Brooke and LeLe indepently showed up to visit so we ate the top off the cake (what's left over after you level it) and opened a few presents. Daniley LOVES hearing Happy Birthday sang to her. I don't think I've even seen her grin so big so long! Here are the pics.

The party was great. We saw lots of our little (and big) friends. We played outside about 45 minutes then it started pouring rain. The inside was set up for a party too, so we just mosied on in and had pizza and cake. Then we went up to the bar to party harder and open presents. Daniley got lots of fun toys and nearly everything has Dora on it. Everything she got was sooo cute and none of it was something we already had! I appreciate everyone coming out to celebrate with her. We hope you had a great time. I know Daniley did!!!

Tomorrow is the big day...
Daniley will be two years old. Signs of the terrible twos have already presented themselves. I don't think they are all that terrible, of course until those moments arrive and I feel like pulling out my hair or at least her's. Generally Daniley is just a whole lotta fun. She is smart. She can count (not just say numbers but count items) up to 10 (sometimes more) and sometimes in Spanish. She can identify any specific number if you call it out, and she can call it out if you point to it. She can sing her ABC's. She talks fluently. She can really say anything and answer any question you have. She remembers people's names and calls them by them. She frequently sings songs...today it was "Rain rain go away, come again another day" even though it was sunny outside. She knows tomorrow is her birthday and she thinks her party is tomorrow too. We're going to give her her presents from us on her birthday and not wait til the party. If you ask her how old she is going to be, she now says TWO. But we did have to retrain because SOMEBODY has been teaching her that she is going to be 21 and that's exactly what she'd tell us when we'd ask. I don't yet know what tomorrow brings for us. I want to do something fun and special and make the day all about her. I am thinking that there will be some macaroni and cheese involved. Maybe someone will call and invite us to lunch! :-) We'll be baking cupcakes Friday night. Hopefully things will go better than last year in that regard. Happy birthday Daniley...I LOVE YOU A WHOLE BUNCH!

Honey invited us over to play with James two weekends ago, I'm just getting around to posting the cute pics. Daniley is a real sweetheart...but she also likes to play...hard!

After our other dinner plans fell through Saturday night, we headed out for Habenero's where we celebrated Daniley's upcoming birthday! She will be 2 this coming Friday. I'm plenty sure I'll have plenty to say about that later...but for now, here's a cute video from our live musicians at Habenero's. Happy birthday little senorita! Mommy loves you!!!
Note: The poor kid is so used to saying CHEESE that when you point the camera at her, she says it til she sees the flash. If you can't understand her at the beginning, this is your hint. :-) Also, sorry for the quality. I had to compress it from 125MB ot 15MB.

Pictures from the weekend. Saturday was great. Sunday our patience was really tried!! First Daniley pulled a plate of eggs I cooked for breakfast onto the floor. A little later she knocked the trash can over and broke it. She suddenly (again) has her hands on EVERYTHING, can't leave anything alone. I get to the point of breakdown and I have to laugh or cry and usually I do laugh but that doesn't mean I don't really feel like crying! (Click on the pictures for a better view!)
At dinner, Habeneros! (Thanks again Rachel!)

Don't know what this was, don't even remember it happening. Got it on camera by accident but it defenetely made me laugh. So you enjoy it too! :-)

And you thought Wal-mart was busy....


LOVE this picture! I don't think an explanation is needed!

Can she read my mind or what? ;-)

This past weekend was a good one. I was happy to see the rain. We needed it badly. Daniley had a good time playing in it.


We went to Publix and took Daniley's buggy thanks to a good idea from Honey. She zipped and roared all over the place. I'm glad it was late and the store was almost empty. She did stop to talk to one particular customer. She just walked up to them and started carrying in a conversation like she was picking up where they left off in the car or something.



On a different note, most of the Publix pictures are BLURRY which I feel is all this stupid camera takes. It just cannot handle indoor lighting. I'm so sick sick SICK of it, I've been wanting to get rid of it for a year. Now my wish has come true. Honey gave me a spare Nikon she had and I can't wait to finish reading the manual and get it in use. This Sony camera is history. Wooohooo!

Well I'm getting requests to update the blog. My reply: "Would you like to hire me a secretary?" Just kidding Poppa. Anyway....we've been having our usual good times but I've been caught without a camera here recently. Daniley's birthday is coming up in a couple of weeks so we are planning her second birthday party. Feel free to ask her what she wants for her birthday. She'll shout "Birthday Cake!!" and "Pizza" so I guess that's what we'll be having. She has also asked for money, birthday presents, green presents, 3 presents (2 from LeLe) and all those are direct quotes.

Right now Daniley's thing is singing, especially the Blackeyed Peas "Im'll Be." She could also sporadically burst into Twinkle Twinkle Little Star or her ABCs at any moment. I've also heard her singing parts of songs on Dora. She matches the words when she can. She plays the ABC song from the magnet on the refrigerator and can actually keep up with the tune, so I'm impressed. She's talking a lot, saying things like "I go doctor my boo-boo and I put a bandaid on it." Well I must say I might be biased but I think that's pretty darn tootin' good! She'll even admit to you, "I so crazy!" There's always something to laugh at!! Now here are some pictures to enjoy.
Watching TV with some of her best buds.

Feeding the ducks.

Just being herself.

Unfortunately I have no pictures, but I wanted to say thanks to Chad for inviting us to his birthday party. My camera died when I tried to take the first picture at the party. Daniley had a BLAST and thank you so much for the wonderful time! I hope you got everything you wanted, and then some! Happy Birthday!

Also, thanks to Austin and Aiden for inviting us to their swim party! Daniley had a great time there. It was very, very unfortunate that I didn't have a camera when Daniley streaked through the YMCA COMPLETELY naked. I was changing a nasty swim diaper when she decided to get up and run. By the time I secured the messy diaper and took out after her, she was already half way across the YMCA and made it completely to the other side before I was able to catch her. It was after hours so there weren't many people in there. Good thing, because the signs said "Use modesty at all times." LOL. Happy Birthday to Austin and Aiden!

So I found an older iPod at a yard sale this weekend. It didn't work, so I offered $2 for some slim chance I could get it working. It had a cool cord that allows you to plug it straight into the wall to charge it, and that will work with my new iPod so I thought it was worth $2 regardless. I had no luck fixing the iPod following the button mashing ceremonies I found online. However, I came across a post and down into it someone had written that he slammed his iPod against the wall and it started working again. I read on and person after person were replying they tried the HARD HIT and it worked for them too. So after thinking it was a joke I slammed my iPod twice into the side of a wooden chair...and....it fell apart. NO! Just kidding! LOL. It started working! And all the music on there is unbelievable. I'm still in disbelief and loving my new $2 20GB iPod. :-)

The past week has been nothing short of horrible. First, my grandfather AJ Austin passed away. This was the second and last of my grandfathers to die. I have been so blessed to make it into my late 20s with all 4 of my grandparents still alive. However, in the past 3 years both of my grandfathers have passed away. I still have both of my grandmothers and I know they will live a long time. :-)

We had a gas leak and all the gas (propane) leaked out of the tank. Not only did about $300 go up into the air, the line had to be replaced which Dan and his wonderful father took care of. But, I haven't had hot water or been able to cook in 9 days...and counting. The line has been repaired and we are supposed to get gas tomorrow. I've been ridiculously stressed out over the past week or two over these things and more. If I had a cigarette I most likely would have smoked it.

We did manage to make it to McWane Center last weekend. Here are some of my favorite pictures. Oh, how she loved all the buttons and knobs!





In this last one, how is it that she is only 1? She looks about 6! I guess that's your sneak preview. :-)