Photo Highlights of Christmas

Here are a few pictures from Christmas.

Checking out the stuff in their stockings when they first get downstairs - after Reagan takes an emergency bathroom break so she's not so grumpy.



Reagan highlighting Jo-Jo's hair with her Hannah Montana highlighter. Jo-Jo didn't realize quite how much it would show up when she agreed to it. It did wash out though!

Everyone enjoyed the Hannah Montana wigs!

Jenny's also enjoying her Hannah Montana guitar and microphone, even though she doesn't have the best fit for the wig and microphone.

This is how Reagan initially used the High School Musical microphone Charlotte and Zero gave her.

This was when Reagan came in and asked me if I wanted her to put some "lipstips" on me. I said no.

Reagan had something very important to tell Nicole - I'm not sure what it was.

I'm also not sure what was happening here. Lee's enjoying Wilson and the knives Justin gave him, and I think Zero's just enjoying his gift, but Nicole and Charlotte are laughing at something amazing.


Lee debuting his gift from Charlotte and Zero - it's a great fit!

I was excited to get a picture here of Reagan forcing someone to look at her by grabbing and moving his head. She does this quite often if she has something important to share.


I don't think this one requires any explanation.

I didn't get good pictures of everyone who passed through our house (before you post your comment complaining, Mario), but these give a good idea of what a great time we had!

Songs

I haven't posted since Christmas, so I thought I should get started. The girls are gone to Hilton Head for a couple days, so I thought I could post some of the funny things from this week while they are gone.

First of all, we had a great Christmas with everyone here! We had fun, and so did the girls, and I hope we have a lot more Christmases like this one. Of course the girls got way too many presents, but that's to be expected. I haven't put my pictures on the computer yet, but I will post some as soon as I do.

I thought I would use this post to transcribe the song lyrics that Jenny and Charlotte wrote over Christmas. Jenny has expressed a desire to be one of those people who writes songs - the lyrics, not the melody - so she and Charlotte worked on it.

Song #1 - Haveing Soopr Fun:

Me and my frinds like to do lonts of things
Here are sum we like to do
Yo mite like thim to.

We like to dantse.
We like to sing too.
We wontta take a chants to shar it with you.

We live to love and we
love to be free.
Do you call your dad he?
Try calling him another name.
He might like it.
You gotta believe
You gotta do what you love
but if it doesn't work
you just gotta try again!
And remember - you just gotta believe in yourself.

Song #2 (No Title):

Here is are frinds.
Mreeayu
and Nucol
and Acadia
and Zero
and Catherine
and Brianna
and Justin
These are our friends.
who are your friends?
Maybe our friends are the same.
I just think you don't need to tell on anybody.
You just gotta say this is what I think is cool.
And then you gotta play!

You may be able to tell that some parts were written by Jenny and some were by Charlotte - either way, Jenny's obviously a budding artist. She and Charlotte make a great writing team!

Happy Christmas Eve!

The girls have already had a great start to Christmas - so have I! We went to Rock Hill on Saturday to meet my parents, my brother's family, two of my aunts and an uncle, and my cousin. So the presents started early. I had also given the girls two of their presents on Thursday.

I got them each Barbie Girls mp3 players, and I wanted them to be able to listen to them in the car on the way to Rock Hill, so that I could listen to my own music. It worked for a while, but Reagan dropped hers where none of us could reach it part of the way through the trip, so she didn't have it the whole time. She did have it while we were out in Best Buy, and she sings her songs very loudly. She was walking through listening to Hannah Montana, and pretty much screaming, "Who said? Who said I can't be Superman? I said, I said that I know I can!" Better than most other things she could be singing.

I forgot to bring the camera with me on Saturday, so I don't have any pictures from then yet. I'm hoping my cousin Tara will be able to provide some. The girls each got an American Girl doll from my parents. They got Julie and Ivy, best friend hippie dolls from the 70s, and they love them. Reagan's very happy to have her own finally. Once my camera's charged, I will take some pictures. Julie and Ivy talked the entire car ride home, mostly about how Ivy (Reagan's) kept calling Julie her sister (I mean "shister"), and Julie would yell back that she's not her sister, just her best friend. And then they would fight. But sometimes they were friends. They also got tons of wonderful presents from everyone else, include lots of new Barbies, Hannah Montana and High School Musical stuff, and cute clothes. Basically, enough stuff for normal children for an entire Christmas, and it was just the beginning.

Jo-Jo arrived shortly after we did on Saturday evening. After we unloaded her car, our family room looked like this:


So there are plenty of presents to go around! The girls opened a couple that night, and we all went ahead and opened all of our presents from Jo-Jo yesterday. We're trying to do this Christmas in phases, and we still have a couple more rounds of presents coming, including Santa Claus presents! The girls got many more great presents from Jo-Jo - lots of Hannah Montana things and other Barbie things. Two of everything, so there's no jealousy allowed.

We're looking forward to picking up Charlotte, Uncle Zero (as Jenny referred to him last night - she decided he wouldn't mind), and Uncle Mario at the airport this evening. And we're looking forward to the rest of our visitors tomorrow!

I'll leave you with a little gem from Reagan when we were opening presents yesterday afternoon. I got a couple sets of pajamas from Jo-Jo, and when I was opening them, I said, "I love jammies."

Reagan was commenting on every single thing, so she said, "Yeah, you do love jammies. And daddy loves jammies, because his belly is his jammies."

Kiss Update

Forgot to put this in the previous post.

For anyone who was worried, Jenny told me that she actually did smack Caleb in the face when he kissed her. So when I asked her if he had tried to kiss her again, she said he had not because he's scared of her since she smacked him.

Fired Off the Hook

We just went out to dinner, and we had a conversation that we felt should be recorded, to the best of my recollection.

Reagan - Do monsters eat people?

Lee - Yes.

Reagan - Do they eat good people or bad people?

Lee - They are monsters, so they don't care if you are good or bad.

Reagan - But do they eat good people?

Lee - Yes, unfortunately, they do sometimes.

Reagan - Do monsters eat Santa Claus?

Lee - Santa Claus is very powerful, so he could beat monsters.

Jenny - Yeah. Fat people are really strong. And the reindeer could use their horns to stab the monsters.

Reagan (moving on) - Do monsters eat babies?

There was more that I can't remember, but here's a little bit of the car conversation afterwards.

Reagan - Justin is a dude . . . Justin is a doo-doo head. Is Kyler a dude?

Lee - Yes.

Reagan - Is it because he cut his hair?

Lots more from Reagan about people being poo-poo heads and doo-doo heads and poop faces. And also how she doesn't like daddy talking in German. And then:

Reagan - Daddy, you're fired off the hook. You're a boo-boo head.

Whatever that means.

Jenny's First Kiss

Here's my version of the conversation we just had in the car - where we have all our important conversations.

Jenny - Guess who Tucker's dating now?

(Tucker is the boy Jenny liked last year.)

Me - Tucker from last year's class? Who?

Jenny - A new girl in my class, Chasidy. And she's also dating five other boys, so me and Jade are going to tell Tucker that she's cheating on him.

Me - Wow. Are you dating anybody?

Jenny - Not right now.

Me - Are there any boys in your class you want to date?

Jenny - No, but there's one who wants to date me.

Me - Who?

Jenny - Caleb. He was dating Keri, but they broke up. When we were on the bus for our field trip last week, he - no, I don't want to say it.

Me - What?

Jenny - (spelling it out for me) - H E space K I S S E D space M E.

Me - What?! He kissed you?!

Jenny - It was just on the cheek, not a real kiss. I told him that if he did that again, I would smack him in the face.

Me - I can't believe a little boy kissed you at school.

Did you guys know that there's such drama in the first grade?

Haircut

Jenny gave herself a little bit of a haircut yesterday. I noticed some obviously cut hairs on the bathroom floor and a pair of scissors on the counter, so I came down and asked the girls who cut their hair. Of course, they both said they didn't do it. I actually thought it was Reagan, but then Jenny admitted that she had cut a little bit because part of her hair was really dry and she didn't want to get it wet. Not that that makes any sense. So I decided to take her today and get it cut for real. And it looks so good. They cut it shorter with layers, so her hair actually looks somewhat thick. Here are a couple pictures. Not sure why she felt a need to include the bell in the picture.


And just because it's cute, here's a picture of Reagan from a few days ago. She found this hat that I believe was part of Tara's old dance costumes that she wanted to wear for a picture.


We went to see Santa Claus yesterday. The girls told him what they wanted, and they were very cute. Reagan let him know that Jenny is about to lose another tooth, so Jenny mentioned how she's hoping that she loses it on Christmas Eve so that Santa Claus and the tooth fairy have to come the same night. Jenny told me that Santa Claus and the tooth fairy are related - according to The Santa Clause 3 movie. Santa told her that it would be nice to see his good friend the tooth fairy on Christmas Eve, so we'll see!

Reagan and Santa

Santa came to daycare on Monday to do pictures. Jenny was at school, so the pictures are just of Reagan with Santa. I think they're hilarious because Reagan clearly does not trust him. She told me when I picked her up that it was because she knew he wasn't the real Santa - the real Santa has a white beard, not all that black stuff. So we're going to go see another Santa on Friday or Saturday with Jenny, and hopefully he'll have a white beard. Jenny had wanted to go on December 10, because that was the day she declared was not too far away from Christmas, but not too close, but apparently Santa is only at the shopping center near our house on Fridays and Saturdays, so the 10th didn't work out.

Photo Outtakes

I took the girls to the park near here (the one with the giant hollow tree) to try to get some good pictures for this year's Christmas cards. I was successful, and I'll keep those pictures a secret so that the Christmas card will be a surprise, but I thought I could post a few of the pictures that didn't make the cut.

They are wearing outfits that Jo-Jo just sent for Christmas. The funniest thing was that Jenny was directing all the photos and deciding how to pose and how Reagan should pose. Also, we brought some mini-bagels to feed the ducks because that was the only bread we had. Towards the end of our little photo shoot, Reagan realized that they were still good and got distracted by eating, so I couldn't take any pictures without either her mouth full or a bagel in her hand.

Tip from Jenny

On Christmas Eve, be sure you turn off your fire. You don't want Santa to burn coming to your house and get killed in your house.

Dead Teacher

Continuing Reagan's obsession with death, last night she told us that one of her teachers had died. I was very surprised, so I asked her who, and she answered, "Miss Jessica."

Miss Jessica is one of her teachers who was out on maternity leave for a few weeks, but I believed I'd seen her this week, so I told Reagan I didn't think that was true. She insisted it was.

This morning, when we walked past the infant room at daycare, I noticed Miss Jessica in there. I said, "Reagan, Miss Jessica's right there, and you told me she was dead."

Reagan said, "I know. She died when she had her baby, but she came back to life."

Jenny explained to me that Reagan thinks that everyone dies when they have babies because she watches Star Wars: Episode 3 with Lee and Queen Amidala dies after she has her babies. I stopped on my way out and told Miss Jessica that Reagan had told me she had died and come back to life, so she went down the hall to give Reagan a hug and let her know that she's still alive.

Mother Nature

This morning when Jenny was getting ready, she asked me who Mother Nature is. I told her that it's not a real person, just something people say. She said, "It is too a real person. That's who decides if it's going to be cold or hot or rainy or snowy." So now you know.

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We were on the way to dinner a couple nights ago, and we were talking in the car. For some reason, we got on the subject of the little procedure Jenny had to have done last year when she had all those urinary tract infections. She was talking to Reagan, and she said, "I had to have something put up my privates. You don't want to have that done because it hurt a lot."

Reagan said, "Daddy, you had something put in your pirate too, didn't you?"

It was very amusing, but I decided we needed to end the conversation before we got to a restaurant.

Christmas Time Is Here!

We put up our tree last night. It looked so pretty.


We had a lot of fun decorating. Jenny loves working on the ornaments -- particularly adopting some of the old ones as her own. Like Lee's Queen Amidala - Jenny just marked out the L on the bottom of that one and changed it to a J. It's quite amusing.

This morning while I was eating a bowl of cereal, I heard a crash. I went in the other room to look and saw a couple cats running away, along with this.


Jenny's sorting through all the ornaments now. We're going to try to get it back up after dinner and hope that the cats will leave it alone. I actually had it tied to the cord from the blinds, so it fell sideways onto the couch instead of forward onto the floor, which I think may have saved some ornaments. I'm glad I got a picture first.

Here are a couple pictures of the girls from last night. Jenny was very into the decorating, and Reagan lost interest after a couple minutes as usual.



A couple more pictures before I get to a couple stories. We had to get a new TV because the sound quit working on ours, and it's not much fun to watch TV without sound. I was very proud of myself because I was able to put together the heavy table I got for it with very little assistance, and I think it looks quite nice. Note the Steeler on the screen. The second picture is of all the toys that remain in the family room. I did a major clean-out to make room for the tree and all the Christmas presents that will arrive. Now the girls will only have one toy bin and their kitchen and a small container of art stuff. It's so nice.



Now for stories. The first is from Reagan this weekend. We went to see the Nutcracker this weekend, and really enjoyed. I had Reagan in my lap the second half, so I got to enjoy her interesting questions, clearly not related to the Nutcracker as far as I could tell.

She whispered, "Do whales have blood?" I told her they do and that we should wait until after the show to discuss it.

Her response: "Well, on Dora one time they went inside a whale. Do sharks have blood?" I told her they do and convinced her to move on until we got home.

When we got home, I told Lee about that amusing conversation and Reagan came in to continue it. "Do pig's butts have blood? Do all animals and people have blood? Oh, of course they do because when the monster bites them, they bleed. But we're okay because daddy has a sword."

Reagan is crazy.

Now, Jenny. On the way home from work today, she told me about the bad dream she had last night. She's been a little obsessed with wars lately, so this was how it went.

"We were just enjoying our happy lives. Then this boy came and said that I had to be in a war against North Carolina. He said that if I didn't want to be in the war, then I would have to hurt myself, like scrape myself. I told him I would just scrape myself because I don't want to be in a war with North Carolina where I live. And I told him that he's in North Carolina and that most people here would not want to fight against North Carolina since it's where they live. I told him he might want to go to New York to find people."

Then Reagan told me she had a dream to tell me about. And then she tried her best to exactly repeat Jenny's dream.

War and Death

Lee just asked Jenny if she knows what war is. Here is her definition:

War is about like two or three countries get together and fight. Maybe it's because one of the countries was doing something the other country didn't want that they didn't like. So they planned a war. And so they would plan a war. And a lot of men in the war bring tools and a lot of women and babies die because two or one of the countries will bring cannonbulbs so a lot of women and babies died.

Color above chosen by Jenny. Very war-like.

Reagan just came in to ask Lee:

When is your daddy coming back to life?

Lee said never. And then she asked:

Does your daddy have a license?

We don't know why.

Reagan's colors also chosen by Jenny.

Reagan and the Swamp

Reagan was just telling us a story about her friend Carissa at school. Apparently Carissa cut Reagan's bangs with a knife - even though they don't look like they have been touched. She's also trying to make Reagan be her friend forever and ever. Then she moved on to the time that Carissa made her swim. In the swamp by school. And all her friends watched. I told her that it was strange that she didn't even look dirty when she came home after swimming in the nasty swamp. I asked her if she swam naked, and she said, "No, I was wearing a bathing suit."

We then moved on, but Reagan came back to tell me that Carissa made her "go inside him."

"Go inside who," I asked.

"The swamp." Apparently the swamp is a man. I then brought her over to the computer so she could continue the story while I'm typing, but she was pulled away by Hannah Montana.

Two side notes:

1) Jenny and Reagan worked on their Amazon wishlists yesterday (so did I). They are all under my name if anyone cares to look. Jenny's is very funny because she learned how to add things to her wishlist and maneuver around Amazon on her own, so she has approximately a million items on hers, though she did use the ranking of highest, high, and medium. Apparently medium is her low because there is nothing she would rank as low. I recommend the Amazon wishlists to everyone. Jo-Jo in particular likes to shop off of them!

2) We saw Enchanted today, and it was actually really good. I had very low expectations for it, but the girls wanted to see it, and we didn't have anything better to do. I actually really enjoyed it - it was very funny.

Table Topics

Wow, we just had the most amazing time. I ordered these cards called Table Topics and we've just been doing some. Jenny had some amazing answers that I need to share. This may be my longest post ever. I wrote down as much as I could. I'm mostly only including Jenny's answers here since they are the most amusing - although some were amazingly intelligent.

Question: Why do you think people do or say mean things to each other?
Jenny - Jealousy.
Reagan - Because they have ugly hair.

Question: Which of your 5 senses would you lease like to give up?
Jenny - I would miss all the fun things I could see. Actually I would miss tasting my noodles the most.
Reagan - I would miss my grandma.

Question: What are the most important rights every person should have?
Jenny - To be able to have friends.
Lee - The right to shoot stupid people.

Question: What is a good loser, and are you one?
Jenny - No, I am not a loser.
Lee - Jenny had the right answer.

Question: Who has the power to shape your ideas and beliefs?
Jenny - I would say me.

Question: What would you like to be doing in 10 years?
Jenny - I would like to be teaching.
I then informed her she wouldn't be old enough for that in 10 years, so she revised it to being head cheerleader.
Jo-Jo - I would like to be on a cruise to Alaska with all my children and grandchildren.
Lee - I ain't going on a cruise ship with ice sharks. I would like to be President of the United States.

Question: If you could master one instrument, what would you choose?
Jenny - Microphone.

Question: What family or school rule would you most like to change?
Jenny - I would like to act crazy and not have rules.

Question: When you're having a bad day, what do you do to feel better?
Jenny - Ask to do something fun to make it gooder.

Question: What skill would you like to have someday?
Jenny - To be able to do splits.

Question: Would you rather live for a week in the past or the future?
Jenny - Past so I could make better things happen in the past.

Question: Would you rather be spanked or grounded?
Jenny - Grounded. I would rather be in my room than be hurt.
Lee - Grounded because I would kill whoever spanked me and go to jail.

Question: Would you travel into space if you could?
Jenny - No, I don't want to be hit by the rocks.
Lee - H-E-double hockeysticks no. Jenny, you are right, and you are so smart.

Question: Would you rather be a leader or a follower?
Jenny - A follower because the leader at school has to hold the door for everyone.

Question: Would you stick by your friend if he/she became disfigured?
Jenny - Yes. I wouldn't be mean because now you're ugly.

Question: What would you like to be famous for someday?
Jenny - Singing so I can get all my energy out and go to sleep.

Question: What special talent would you like to have?
Jenny - Be able to walk on a balance beam so that if there's a ride at Carowinds where I have to be careful I'll be ready.

Question: Why would you rather be a boy or a girl?
Jenny - A girl because I like the way the hairbows look with fancy decorations and fancy outfits.
Jenny's recommended answer for Daddy - Because boys rule and girls drool.

Question: What qualities do you look for in friends?
Jenny - I like friends who respect me and trust me and keep secrets and won't pass them on.
Lee - Obedience.

Question: Is space exploration important?
Jenny - No, because all you see is earth, the moon, and a bunch of nasty old rocks. I don't care about all the stuff that's floating around.

Question: What would be the best and worst things about being a twin?
Jenny - The worst would be that she would follow me around and be a copycat. The best would be that I could see what I look like in my clothes without a mirror. Also, she would understand me and speak English, not Spanish.

The final, most amazing question: When is it okay to lie?
Jenny - When you're in a big conversation and they say I'm gonna kill you if you don't tell the truth but maybe you killed their father so you have to lie to them.

That is seriously what she said. And repeated three times so I could write it down correctly.

Thanksgiving Feast

Not our feast, but the one at Jenny's school yesterday. Her class sang a song, which wasn't really very exciting, and then we stayed and ate some of a bad lunch with them. Jenny seemed excited that we were there, but also just wanted to hang out with her friends. Here's how the cool girls looked yesterday:

Jenny loves this outfit. And she wanted to wear something brown for Thanksgiving.

The sisters. You can tell Jenny was having a slightly allergic morning in her face.

Check out the boots! Reagan will only wear boots, so she has a brown pair and a black pair to wear with all her skirts.

Jenny's current best friend, Keri. Jenny says that they are twins because they have a lot of the same clothes. Obviously not because they look the same.

Silly Faces

I asked Jenny to pose so I could take a couple pictures of her new smile since she pulled out another tooth on Saturday. Reagan had to join in the fun, and these were the pictures I got.

Babies

Here's my version of the car talk on the way home from dinner.

Reagan: When we have babies, are we going to open up?

Me: What are you talking about?

Reagan: When we have babies, are we going to open up?

Me: Well, sort of.

Jenny: Reagan, babies come out of the bottom of you. Or else they cut you open with scissors or a knife to get the baby out. You get to choose. Right, mommy?

Me: Um, kind of. You don't really get to choose.

Jenny: Yes, you do. That's what they said.

Me: Jenny, where did you learn all of this?

Jenny: I don't remember. It's just what they said. I know that I'm supposed to know.

Lee: Doesn't all this talk make you want to have another baby?

Me: No.

Jenny: Daddy, do you wish you had a son to do things with?

Lee: Yes.

Jenny: Well, you can wish upon a star for a son.

Reagan: I'm going to be bigger than Jenny one day.

Jenny: Mommy, Reagan said she's going to be bigger than me one day, and she's not.

Me: It's possible that she would be when she's older. But not while you're still little.

Jenny: Reagan, while we're little, I'm bigger.

There was more, but those were the main points. There was a lot more talk about what grade Jenny will be in when Reagan starts school and then for every year after that.

We have to head off to bed now. Jenny pulled out another tooth yesterday (I'll post a picture tomorrow). She was very upset this morning because the tooth fairy forgot to come last night. We determined that must have been for one of three reasons. I came up with the first two, and Jenny came up with the last one, which we like best.

1 - The tooth fairy doesn't work on the weekends.

2 - The tooth fairy only has time to get a certain number of teeth each night, and there must have been too many last night, so Jenny would be early on the list for tonight.

3 - Her TV was on all night, so the tooth fairy probably thought she was still awake, so she didn't come in.

So I promised her that I was sure the tooth fairy would come tonight. So we need to get to sleep soon!

Spelling, Part Two

We were in the car this evening on the way out to dinner. The entire way there Jenny asked me to call out words for her to spell. Jenny would legitimately try, and often spelled the words correctly. There were many interruptions from Reagan though. They all went something like this:

I know how to spell octopus - s m t p.

I know how to spell moon - s a r p.

Apparently, in Reagan's mind, everything starts with the letter "s." And every word can be spelled with four random letters.

Survivors

Jenny went on a field trip to Old Salem yesterday, which is similar to Colonial Williamsburg. I asked her how the field trip was, and she said, "You should have seen how those people dress!"

I said, "I know. They dress like people did a long time ago."

She said, "Not like people did a long time ago. Like they did. They're survivors from the flower ship. They're still alive."

I tried to explain that there is no way these are people who were on the Mayflower, but she, of course, doesn't believe me. I think it's funny that she is more likely to believe that these people are 400 years old than that I could be right.

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Jenny called Charlotte and Jo-Jo earlier this evening because she had some concerns about the cats. I don't know how she comes up with some of these things. She needed to talk to some cat experts about Cats and Santa Claus. Her concerns were:

1 - Will the cats try to scratch Santa Claus while he's bringing presents? Should she try to keep the cats upstairs on Christmas Eve?

2 - Will the cats try to eat the cookies and drink the egg nog she leaves out for Santa Claus? Should she put them in a box like a present for Santa so the cats can't get in?

I think Charlotte and Jo-Jo both made her feel better. Reagan attempted to ask Charlotte the same things, but I heard it as, "Does Santa Claus kill cats?"

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I was driving back from dropping Lucas off and listening to the girls, and I was wishing that I kept a tape recorder with me at all times. Here's what I remember of the conversation from the back seat:

Jenny and Reagan in whiny voices: I have to go to the bathroom. I've had to go the whole time. Why don't you ever stop?

Me: You didn't tell me you needed to stop.

Jenny: I didn't say anything because I thought that would slow us down, and I just wanted to get home.

Me: Well, I'm going as fast as I can. There's a policeman in front of that truck, so I can't go any faster.

Reagan: Is he going to kill us?

Me: No. Why would you think he's going to kill us? That's not what policemen do.

Jenny: Policemen protect us and keep us safe.

Reagan: What will he do about the crack?

Me: What are you talking about? What crack?

Jenny: She just means, if a crack opened up in the road and our car fell in, would the policeman pull us out?

Me: Oh. I'm not sure if that's what she meant, but I guess he would because policemen help people.

Message from the Girls

From Reagan:

No, not again. Um, poo-poo. I mean. Hello world. I hope you can see that poo-poo fashion show. That's all I just wanted to do.

From Jenny:


Haw do you think of the kitties? Please email me back and tell me how you like the kitties.



Mario recommended after last night's blog that I do a daily message from Jenny. Then Reagan wanted to do one, too. So the first one is Reagan's random chatter. The second one was Jenny - she typed it herself through "think," then had to get back to Suite Life of Zack and Cody, so she told me what to say for the rest. She's having trouble realizing that this is still not an email. Oh well.

Cat Update

Well, the first night with the cats went fairly well. As far as I could tell, neither of them had used the litter box even once by the time we got home from work today. I successfully got them into there this evening, and I can tell that one of them used it, but I don't know which one. They are actually both wandering around down here this evening, slightly less nervous, but that is probably also because Wilson is outside. Jenny's cat is very frightened of Wilson - I've never actually seen a cat stand there with an arched back and fur up, but her cat goes for that. The girls did kindly keep Wilson in bed like usual, so he's fine. Overall, I think it's going to be a success once everyone settles in.

Both girls were so excited to see their cats when they got home. Jenny is maybe hovering around her cat a little too much, but I'm sure some of the novelty will wear off soon.

Jenny has a message for everyone that she wants to type herself:

win are you coming . You emel me bac .I love you ol.


Obviously she thinks this was an email (or emel). Oh well.

New Members of Our Family

No, I'm not pregnant. We got kitties!

I already told Lee that was the joke I was going to put on here, and he thought it was mean since he would like to have babies.

Anyway, we adopted two kitties from the humane society today. I was completely stressed out by this process because I really believed they would reject us and not allow us to get the kitties because I was way late taking Wilson to the vet for his vaccinations, so I was very relieved when they called today to say our application was approved.

They are 1 1/2 year old girl kitties. We didn't really want to deal with kittens, but we had read that it might be easier for cats who are left alone all day long to have companions. And these two were originally rescued from the street as kittens into some lady's home. She had several cats and didn't feel like she could keep them, but they've been on the waiting list for the humane society for a year. So we are keeping them together here. That way, Jenny and Reagan each have a cat.

Reagan initially wanted a pink cat with blue eyes like hers. That's not quite what she got. She chose the lighter colored kitty to be hers. She has named it Marisa - after we rejected Carissa (the name of one of her daycare friends). She has completely ignored it since the initial two minutes of excitement. Her kitty seems very cautious and has spent the entire time in the pantry or being petted by Lee. Here's a couple pictures:




Jenny chose the darker grey cat, and she has named her Lulu. Lulu is very different from her sister. She immediately leaped on top of the kitchen counter and proceeded to explore every inch of the house, with Jenny following her around the entire time, saying, "She already knows me. She wants to be with me." Jenny's very into it. Here are a couple pictures of Lulu:



Someone who is not happy about this situation - Wilson. He was just shaking in fear of the cats and clearly wondering why we have done this to him. He's hanging out outside right now. Fortunately, he stays outside all day, so the cats can adjust to the house without him inside.


We'll see how it goes. I'm not sure where everyone is going to sleep tonight. Wilson would be very unhappy if Jenny chose to have Lulu in her room over him.

Also, for anyone who wants to know, today is World Kindness Day. We celebrated by adopting cats - what did you do?

Sleepover

Someone (Mario) pointed out to me today that I've been failing to update the blog recently. I don't have any really good excuse other than just general life. Plus the change in time for daylight savings has really messed with us - it feels so late when I get home in the dark.

I just told Reagan I was going to write a story on here about her and Jenny, and she said, "And poopie." She's fixing my hair and talking to me while I type. I'll let you know if she says anything exciting - or farts on me like she just did. Then she said, "Daddy, guess what I did to mommy? I farted on mommy!"

The story I have for today is from this weekend. Really the girls had two sleepovers this weekend. Dad spent the night here on Friday night on his way back down to Hilton Head. I told the girls he was coming, and they were excited, but Jenny did point out that she sleeps on the couch on Friday nights and watches Disney Channel all night, so she said Dad would have to watch that. I think that probably actually helped Dad sleep. Reagan came upstairs about 9:30 and told me that Dad and Jenny were both asleep, and she wanted to sleep with me, so she wasn't very successful in that sleepover.

On Saturday, the girls were playing with their friend Brittan, and her friend Elyse, from across the street all day. Brittan's dad, Kendall, told me that Elyse was spending the night over there and that the girls could both come spend the night, too. They were very excited. I fed everyone pizza over here, and then Reagan headed over there to play with Brittan and her dolls. Jenny and Elyse wanted to stay over here long enough to watch the new Hannah Montana episode since Kendall has told Elyse that he doesn't know how to turn on the Disney Channel at their house, and he wants her to continue to believe that. I brought Jenny and Elyse over there around 9:00, along with Reagan's pajamas. I asked Reagan if she was sure that she wanted to spend the night over there since I didn't really think she was ready for a sleepover. She said, "I want to stay here forever." Jenny didn't even say goodbye, and she's spent the night over there before, so I figured she'd be fine.

9:15 - There's a knock on the door. It's Kendall with Reagan. She changed her mind. She just wants to sleep with me. She said, "Can I try that again when I'm older? And can I sleep with you because I don't want to sleep by myself without Jenny?" So she climbed into bed with me.

9:50 - The phone rings. It's Jenny. She's crying and says she needs to come home. So I head across the street to get her and walk her back. She said that they were sleeping in the guest room, and the attic opens onto the guest room, and she was convinced that something scary was going to come out of there in the night. It was so weird because Jenny's not usually scared of much.

So I thought I was going to have a nice, peaceful night of sleep with no children. But I didn't. Actually, it wasn't too bad because they both went back to Jenny's room when Jenny got home - I didn't have to sleep with Reagan.

Happy Halloween!

A couple pre-trick-or-treating photos of Jenny the leopard and Reagan Tinkerbell. We're waiting for it to get dark right now since daylight savings time being the wrong weekend is screwing everything up!