More Thursday Randomness

Caroline ran a fever for a few days last weekend, so she was a little lethargic and sleepy until mid-day Monday. In spite of the still-unnamed sickness, she managed to entertain herself (and me).

And yes, that is a cheerleader costume over a t-shirt with a tiara and a Rudolf nose.

Charlotte is working had on sitting up and getting better by the day.


And finally . . .



After our mid-April debacle that was supposed to be "swimming lessons" at LSU (those lessons that I would have been better off throwing my money into the pool on the first day and walking out the door? Yep. Those.), guess who is learning how to swim?



And now on to the randomness -

So far this hasn't been very random, all about my family in fact! But here are a few things that will make the title of this post appropriate:

Again, I have to give it to Oswald Chambers. He hit it out of the park today (and the baseball analogy was intentional, Geaux Tigers!)

Hmmm. Was the placement of that analogy in bad taste? I'm leaving it, so let me know if you're offended! Not that I'm going to delete, just info for me for next time. . .

Finally, it's a sad day with the passing of both Farrah Fawcett and Michael Jackson. As I understand it, Farrah Fawcett was suffering pretty terribly in recent days and while I know her loss will be keenly felt by her family and friends, I know that there must be some solace in her release from suffering.

As for the loss of Michael Jackson, I am flooded with memories of my childhood that involve him and his music. The Thriller video alone brings back memories of slumber parties and girls squealing and trying for what seemed to be hours on end to learn "the dance".

I was talking to Jeff tonight about his passing, and it might sound so simple, but I can't stop thinking that he was a real person with real feelings, a real life, and a real story. I know he was surrounded by turmoil and conflict and I don't want to idealize him in any way or brush that part of his life under the rug; quite the opposite, I am struck by the fact that despite his iconic persona and larger than life image, he was a man who had a story just like any of the rest of us.

In recent months I've been so undone by the number of people in my life to one degree or another who have died unexpectedly; it is a reminder to me always that life is fragile.

I hate to end on a semi-sad note when I have much to be thankful for, so here you go:

All I have to say is . . .

What in the world are these people still doing on television? I know the answer: making money. And I guess that is what's most disturbing about the whole thing. Not that they will care, but I've officially decided that the show isn't for me anymore. It's sad to say, but I'm kind of going to miss them.

Weekend update

Jeff and our friend Denver put on a race this weekend, the first of many they hope! It went really well; they had about 200 people participate in a 1 mile scramble and a 6K trail run. It took a lot of preparation and hard work to put it on and from all outside appearances, it was a success. Everyone had a great time and most of the people had not participated in a trail run before (this being South Louisiana and all). They also ended up raising a good sum of money to donate to Braveheart Children, a charity in town that serves children in the foster care system.

Sunday was of course Father's Day and the day greeted Jeff with a sick child! Caroline ran fever all night Saturday and most of the day Sunday. She seemed okay otherwise, maybe a little tired and lethargic, but no complaints out of her. So, after we made french toast with fruit for Jeff and gave him his cards and gifts, we sent him off to church all alone to celebrate Father's Day without us! Or maybe since we were the ones at home we were celebrating without him . . . In any event, it was a less than eventful Father's Day, but Jeff did get to relax a little after church while the girls took some loooooong naps.

At one point yesterday afternoon, Caroline said, "Mom, it's Father's Day, right?" I said, "Yes, Caroline it is." She looked a little perplexed and replied, "So why it isn't Girls' Day?" I laughed and wanted to say, "Because every other day of the year is Girls' Day", but I refrained and just said, "That's a good question!"

Finally, I noticed a couple of Caroline-isms this weekend that I wanted to be sure to share. Whenever someone tells Caroline "thank you", she replies with "I welcome". Not sure where that came from. She also says, "Never me either" when most people would say, "Me neither." Again, I'm not sure where that came from, but it always makes me smile when she says it.

Thursday Randomness

Just to start off the day on a good note, here's the link to My Utmost for His Highest today. I often find Oswald Chambers to offer some really challenging words to start my day; today was no exception. I should have this one rolling through my head for days (and weeks and months?) to come. Anyone have some insight on how to do this?

Here's a really good article about Lenny Kravitz. I had heard that he was a Christian, but honestly I hadn't ever taken the time to look into his story. I really like that his faith seems authentic; he has struggles and is honestly and faithfully trying to wrestle with walking as Jesus did.

I love give-aways! Granted I rarely win anything (I actually did win something for the first time in recent - or not-so-recent - memory a couple of weeks ago here!), but it's fun to dream!
You can enter to win a Coach bag here (I don't own an expensive purse because I can't really justify spending the money on one, but free? Well, since you're offering, I'll take one of those thank you very much.)
You can enter to win a couple of things here from Amanda - Little Debbies (Ah! The memories) and a book.

And finally an interesting observation from Caroline this morning: On our way to school she said, "Mama, I like the sun to be in my eyes. It means I'm hot and not cold." Well said Caroline.

Write it down

Or in this case, type it down. I'm taking Shannon's advice and making it a point to record some of the happenings in the lives of our two girls, because I know already that if I don't, I do indeed forget.

Caroline has some quirks that are really entertaining and endearing. She is much like her Papa in that weird textures do a number on her (if you want to get to Jeff, just put the corner of a towel in your mouth; he will never forgive you).

When Caroline was nine months old we visited our friends Allison and Jeremy in Nashville. We took her to a park in their neighborhood and as she when she was playing, Allison blew a bubble with her gum. Caroline was intrigued. That is, until she reached out to touch the bubble. At that point she gagged. All of the adults of course thought that was odd and sort of funny, so Allison did it again and Caroline again reached out to touch it. Lo and behold, she gagged again! That was our first indication that odd textures did something funny to Caroline. Over the past almost four years (gasp!), we've discovered that even looking at a cotton ball will elicit the same response out of Caroline. Don't put gauze near her and any food that looks odd or has an out of the ordinary smell to it will get her gagging.

She can't stand to look at baby food. When I feed Charlotte, I have to warn Caroline not to come into the room. This morning I was feeding Charlotte her breakfast of oatmeal and fruit. Today Charlotte tried peaches for the first time (and I'll admit that baby peaches are nothing nice to smell). Caroline walked into the kitchen to ask me to help with something and it went a little like this: "Mom, [gag] can [gag] you [gag] please [gag, gag, gag] . . ." At that point, I interrupted because I didn't want to clean up throw up before work, and said, "Caroline, I'll come get you when I finished feeding Charlotte." She replied as she made a mad dash back to her room, "Good. Charlotte's food makes me cough!"

Caroline is a do-it-myself kind of girl. She loves to clean up by herself, mostly I think because of the response she gets after her room is clean: lots of praise and hugs. I've recently discovered though that her idea of cleaning relies in large part to the empty space under her bed being a receptacle for anything she doesn't want to put away. We're working on that!

Charlotte is doing great. She is trying hard to sit up and as of now she can sit in a little tri-pod position for a while. After about a minute or two she falls down to the side in a kind of slow motion. She is trying to mimic what we say to her and you can tell that little brain is working hard when we have "conversations". Much to her sister's chagrin, Charlotte loves to eat and over the past couple of days she's upped her food intake significantly, eating cereal and a jar of fruit for breakfast, cereal, a little fruit and veggies for lunch, and the same thing again for dinner. She is still on the small side though, so perhaps she's storing up all of that food in preparation for a growth spurt. We'll go back for a check up with the doctor in a couple of weeks, so I'll report back on those stats.

Rookie Season

Caroline is officially finished with her first ever soccer season. It was fun to watch her practice and play in games (but I think the distinction between a "practice" and a "game" is still lost in that three year old head), but it was probably most fun for me to watch Caroline and Jeff take this soccer endeavor together. Jeff had fun coaching a bunch of rowdy three, four, and five year olds and he really did a great job. It was probably more often like herding them than coaching them, but I think all the kids really enjoyed it.

In the last game Caroline played in, she scored a goal. In our goal. We celebrated nonetheless. I think she was more excited about the Gatorade and granola bars that came shortly after her goal when the game ended, but I suppose that playing soccer as a three year old is all about the same thing that the rest of her life is about: enjoying each moment.



So excited about that trophy.


Getting her trophy (and a smooch) from Coach Papa.

Readjusting

So, we spent the past week at the beach. It was fabulous; great weather (save for one rainy day, which was actually kind of a nice break), great sand and water, great company, great food, . . . You get the idea. We saved all of the pictures and videos while we were there on Jeff's work laptop which isn't connected to the internet at home, so I'll do my best to get those pictures transferred over to the desktop at home to get them on HERE to share with all of you soon!

In the meantime, you can click right on over here to my sister in law Amelia's blog to get a little taste of our week (and some really good writing as well).