Hair Cuts By Josh

I am still not caught up to date on this blog yet, but seeing as we had a BIG event today, I thought I'd go ahead and share. Emily got her first hair cut! Yeah! Well, not exactly how I'd planned it going. That's for sure.

Jessie had woken up early for her nap, so I was in the bedroom trying to put her back down. When I finally came out, I saw Josh standing in front of Emily with scissors in hand. Emily's hair looked like it was laying in such a way that didn't make sense, unless it was cut. I stopped and stared for at least 30 seconds, if not a whole minute. I think my jaw was laying on the ground. I think Josh new he was in trouble. When I asked if he'd cut her hair, he said really fast "No." Obviously not true. So, he went to his corner as I inspected the damage. It could have been worse. Had Jessie taken much longer, there might not have been anything left. Right now, I'm just going to leave it alone and see how it grows out.

Of course, Josh cut the hair at the crown of her head. If you'll remember, Emily had quite the mohawk at that spot on her head when she was little. (Click here if you'd like a refresher.) So we're in for some interesting hair styles for a while.

This is all the hair I collected to save from her first haircut. He really chopped off quite a bit.

Emily and Jessie. Never figured their hair would have such similar characteristics at this point in their lives. :)

Oats and Tractors

We are still during the week before Christmas. We were in Guthrie, visiting Peter's family and they needed to go get some oats. I don't know where they took the oats, or why they got them. But they needed them. So they took the kids with them to the farm and loaded up the oats, and the kids, in the back of the truck.

Everyone just checking out the back of the truck. I assume it was empty otherwise at this point. I wasn't there, so I'm not exactly sure how all this happened.

Looks to me like Josh was enjoying watching how the oats get into the truck.

But sitting in the oats was obviously far more fun. Josh apparently had a bad string of luck while we were in Guthrie. While they were having all this fun, Josh touched a belt on the auger (That thing you see dropping the oats into the truck)... they had warned him... and lost some skin on his hand. I'm not sure a day went by that he didn't get himself hurt. Fortunately, nothing was serious.

Josh loved getting in the tractor with Granddad.

I'm not sure what Emily is so upset about. But this is our van. She's holding the camera case. My guess? She probably wanted to take some pictures, but the camera was obviously busy. Isn't she cute? Peter just informed me that it was Josh who had the camera and she was just looking at the case. He doesn't think she was actually upset... yet.

I don't think Emily wanted to get into the tractor with Granddad, but Daddy managed to coax her in. Doesn't she seem so happy to be up there? :) Here, she was upset. She may have just been really tired.

Josh apparently liked it better with Granddad. Oh well, Daddy. Can't win them all.

Dogs and Trains at Christmas

In December, we took a trip back to Oklahoma to spend time with family for Christmas and have Jessica's blessing. We had a great time. We got to Peter's family's house in time to go to Grandma and Granddad's Christmas dinner on December 19. It was great to see Peter's grandparents and aunts and uncles and cousins and their kids.

The biggest story from the Christmas dinner kept Josh off his feet for a little while. Grandma and Granddad now have a dog. Josh wanted to see the dog, so I took them over close enough to pet him, but far enough away that the dog couldn't jump on him. I told him that he wasn't to go any closer. Later, I was sitting on the swing with him, and Josh pointed out that the dog looked lonely... should have seen the big red flag there. I can't remember what I said but I took him back over to pet the dog again, and told him that he shouldn't go any closer because I didn't want the dog to jump on him. Josh started playing with the other kids and having a great time with them. The other kids were being careful with him, making sure he wasn't getting hurt in the dodge ball game they were playing, and just being all around nice, so I eventually went inside for a little bit to spend time with the adults. This is on a farm in the country, so I didn't figure I had anything to worry about. By this time, the dodge ball game was over, and Josh was sitting on the swing with Tiger, who I believe is 5? A few minutes later, Tiger came inside and said the dog was jumping on the little boy out there. I was in the other room in the back of the house, so I didn't hear any of this until the adults came inside with Josh crying. He had decided to go visit the lonely dog all the way over at his doghouse. The dog then jumped on him... he's a very jumpy dog... knocked him over and kept jumping on him. Josh, in the process of falling over, sprained his ankle, so he couldn't walk on that foot for a few days. Thank goodness the dog didn't bite or scratch him. We were really blessed in that. After Josh could walk around, somehow, he kept falling and twisting it again, and again, and again. Poor kid.

Granny and Granddad (Peter's parents) have this little tractor to ride. It was Josh's favorite toy to play on... until it snowed and we couldn't use it any more. He sure had a blast while it lasted.

Emily thought it was a pretty cool tractor, too. She just couldn't reach the pedals.

One of the evenings during the week before Christmas, we went to see the Christmas lights in a neighboring town. Can't remember the name. They have a train ride through the lights that you can ride through the park. Here's a picture of Josh and Emily with their cousin Savanna, waiting for our turn on the train.

Here they are waiting some more. I just thought this was a cute shot to share.

The train that we got to ride through the lights was lit up itself. It was such a fun night.

Higginbotham Visitors

Way back at the beginning of December (I promise to catch up soon. Really!) we had some friends over for dinner. AnnaLea and Janessa Higginbotham were in town on business and we were fortunate that they were able to squeeze us in. They were super busy and we were so glad to see them. The kids had a blast playing with them, but I think they had just as much fun. Below are some pictures from their visit.



Janessa going down our clubhouse slide. By the way, this slide is completely made of cardboard. Peter is such the engineer. He designed it so that even he can go down with concern of squishing it. Amazing, I tell you!

AnnaLea enjoying the slide as well.

The little kids finally got a turn after the big kids got tired of it. :)

Josh stole jewelery from them while the were here. (We did return it when they headed out.) He is so funny. The stuff on his forehead and chin is makeup from earlier in the day. Yes, he does still love to wear "his" makeup... my old Mary Kay samples. Silly silliness.

YUCK!

The picture below was taken back in December. It doesn't look so bad, does it? Any guesses as to what Emily is drinking here? Well, the food on her plate is pizza from Papa John's. As many of you may well know, Papa John's includes dipping sauces with their pizzas. Emily is drinking the garlic butter that came with the pizza! And she liked it! We took the picture after she continued to drink it after her first taste. Crazy kids. What can I say?

Perfect

I (Peter) am making the kids a small chest to keep their play dress-up clothes in. I bought some plywood and then took it to my lab to cut it into the pieces I needed with the table saw. When I started putting them together at home one evening, I realized that I had cut a couple of pieces for the lid wrong. Josh was helping me build it. I said to him that we could not put the lid together that night because I had made a mistake in cutting some of the pieces.

He asked: "Why did you make a mistake?"

I said: "Because I'm not perfect."

He then got off of the chair he was standing on to help at my workbench and went inside the apartment. The next thing I hear Angie say is that she will come when she gets a minute. Josh then comes back to me and says:

"Mommy will be here in minute."

I asked: "Why is Mommy coming?"

Josh said: "Because she is perfect."

Bikes and Games

So, I'm still playing catch up. Here are a few pictures from November.

Sometime at the end of October, Josh really figured out how to cruise on his bike. I think his Grandma may have been the cause of this, since she took him out there on it, when mommy wasn't able to. Thanks Grandma! This is just the picture I got as he zipped right on by me. Good job Josh!

This past football season, Peter and I got tickets to the games. We decided it would be fun for Josh to be able to go to one of the games. So, he went to the FIU game. We figured that would be a bit more tame for him. Definitely a much better choice than the FSU would have been.

Peter let Josh go down and watch the game all by himself standing by the wall. Peter assured me that he was only a few rows back and could see him the entire time. Doesn't it look like he enjoyed the game?

It sure looks like he's on the feild here watching the band. What good seats they had.

Josh really did have a great time at the game. They stayed all the way through half time and then came home. Apparently his favorite part of the game wasn't the game at all... or the band for that matter. He had a blast flirting with a couple college girls sitting behind them. Already? Boy, is he going to be trouble. :)


To get to the game, Peter parked the car at a park a couple miles from the stadium and rode in on his bike with Josh in the child carrier. Since Josh was going to have so much fun that day, Daddy made sure to spend some time with Emily. She had a blast riding on the back of Daddy's bike for a while that day as well. So much fun!