Magic Wands & Boogers

I had an appointment with an ENT (ear, nose, and throat doctor) earlier today and went in to the appointment with a bad case of the jitters. Call me crazy but I just was not looking forward to having a wand pushed up inside of my nose. Yeah, so not looking forward to that!

The appointment had a bit of a rough start. I was there at 9:30 and I wasn't seen until nearly 11:00. Add a seven year old kid who is bouncing off the walls, a doctor who is running late and a nervous patient and you've got a mix for a disaster. Thankfully, once my doctor came in, he got straight to the task at hand - checking out a cyst in my right sinus cavity.

My doctor had a lot to work through as I've been dealing with a nasty cold and sinus infection this week. I guess the timing was good for that though. Who better to deal with a sinus infection than an ENT, right? After spraying a decongestant and lydocain in my nose to open up and numb my sinuses, my doctor threaded the dreaded wand into my nose. As he is working his way to the back on my sinuses, the doctor tells me to feel free to take a look on the screen. Umm, no thank you! I was doing well to remain seated and not come unglued at that particular moment. But that didn't stop Violet from taking a good gander at the insides of her Momma's nose! Seriously, what kid could resist that?!!! It wasn't long after that that I heard Violet say, "Ooohh Mommy! I can see your boogers!!!" The proclamation wasn't lost on my doctor, who started laughing as he has a wand inside of my nose!!!

I guess you could say we lived our own real-life episode of The Magic School Bus today. And after I finish a two week course of antibiotics, nasal sprays and rinses, and decongestants, I get to go relive today's magical adventure. Oh joy!

Conversations

This particular conversation was between me and a very handsome, and insanely sweet, seven year old boy in my home school group. We had the opportunity to have a time of fellowship tonight after school with a few other families when this young man came up to me. Here is a snippet of our conversation...

Mr. A. - Mrs. Wiltshire?
Me - Yes sir, what can I do for you?
Mr. A. - I just want to say, I think you are beautiful. And I love your curly hair.

Oh, be still my beating heart!!! He is going to make some young lady very happy someday!!!

Not Our Finest Moment

Do you know what's worse than a nightmare? Walking in to your parent's room and scarring the daylights out of them which, in turn, scares you even more! Umm, yeah, not our proudest parenting moment.

Gregg and I were sound asleep at 2 AM when our daughter woke up terrified from a bad dream. As she ran her tiny little self into our room she accidentally knocked our door against the wall. Hard. Hence the screams of terror that commenced from the three of us. The loud bang against the wall scared the stink out of Gregg and me which set off the worst chain of events in our parenting years. As our poor daughter stands in the doorway of our bedroom seeking comfort her idiot parents are screaming their heads off in fear. Which made her scream in fear. It was awful, I tell ya, a-w-f-u-l!!! Momma, help me!

After about a minute of the three of us screaming at the top of our lungs Gregg finds the composure to tell us, "Everybody needs to stop screaming." Hmm, yeah, he was screaming too. And not only was he screaming, he screamed the loudest. Talk about a rude awakening!

Obviously, no one was able to go back to sleep right away. Violet was trembling from fear, my heart was pumping so hard that I was afraid it'd pump right out of my chest, and Gregg was lying there trying to calm his girls down. Not the easiest task after what we had just been through. Gracious, what a night! There's no telling what our neighbors thought was going on in our house.

I Like My Rock And Roll!!!

I have a major eclectic taste in music but deep down in my heart, I'm a rocker chick. This surprises people for some reason. I'm a pretty straight laced person. I follow all the rules (well, most of them). I prefer order over chaos. But I still like my Rock And Roll!!!

I had a rare moment of freedom in the car earlier today ~ just me with my music blaring on the stereo (which happened to be AC/DC), and the windows rolled down. The perfect way to enjoy a drive alone when the weather is nice outside. I was driving along, enjoying my moment of freedom and jamming to the tune of Back In Black, when a car pulled up next to me with two guys in it. I could see the passenger was enjoying my music as we sat waiting for a light to change. And then he turned his head and did a double take. I guess he wasn't expecting to see a soccer mom behind the wheel of a car that is playing a classic AC/DC song. And here's where I busted a gut, laughing my tail off as I left it at that red stop light ~ the guys in the car gave me a "Rock ON!" hand sign. I guess they approved of my music choice.

Conversation

Today my amazing hubby went to the store and picked up some groceries for me, giving me a chance to get some much needed rest. While at the store Gregg picked up some Peanut M&Ms for Violet as a surprise. She came up to me with a giant smile on her face and showed me her surprise. Here is part of the conversation that followed...

Violet ~ Look Mommy! Daddy brought home a surprise for me!
Me ~ That was awfully nice of your Daddy to do that.
Violet ~ Uh huh (as she shoves a candy in her mouth).
Me ~ I want a surprise too! Do you think Daddy got me something?
Violet ~ Aww Mommy, we can't always get what we want (to which she offers me one of her candies).

It's funny to hear your exact words thrown back at you. Hopefully they're the words that you want to hear! In this case, I'm not so sure I wanted to hear those exact words but at least I know she's finally getting the point.

You Know You're From A Small East-Texas Town If...

This was sent to me in an email recently. I'm not sure where it originated from but I wanted to share it with you anyways.

You Know You're From A Small East-Texas Town If...

1. You can name everyone you graduated with.
2. You know several people who have hit a deer.
3. You know what 4-H and FFA is.
4. You ever went to a party that was held about 20 miles down a deserted dirt road near the woods.
5. Being able to hit a road sign with a beer bottle while driving down the highway is considered a necessary skill.
6. You used to drag "main."
7. A "lap” only takes 10 minutes.
8. You know what's knee-high by the Fourth of July.
9. You said the 'F' word and your parents knew within an hour.
10. Driving to the party on a four-wheeler is quite normal.
11. You thought the 30-year-old guy that still was at all the parties was cool.
12. The town population increases by one-third when the universities go on break.
13. You schedule parties around the schedule of different police officers since you know which ones would bust you.
14. You live for summer, when street fairs signal the beginning of funnel cake season.
15. You know what "cow tipping" and "snipe hunting" is.
16. You see a car running in the parking lot at the store with no one in it no matter what time of the year
17. You've never met any celebrities, but the mayor knows your name.
18. You install security lights on your house and garage but leave all the doors unlocked.
19. When you found someone old enough to buy smokes for you, you had to drive down country roads to smoke them.
20. Running from the cops consists of hiding in the cornfield or swimming across the river.
21. You have to name six surrounding towns to explain to people where you're from.
22. You often switch from "Heat" to "A/C" in the same day.
23. You still go home for Homecoming.
24. It was cool to date someone from a neighboring town.
25. You had a senior skip day.
26. The whole school went to the same party after graduation.
27. All the festivals across the state are named after a fruit, vegetable, grain, plant, or animal.
28. You can't help but date a friend's ex.
29. The first day of shotgun season is a school holiday.
30. Your car is always filthy from the country roads.
31. A cool vehicle had big tires or a bad-ass stereo.
32. The town next to you is considered "trashy" or "snotty" when it is just like your town.
33. You leave your jacket on the back of the chair in the cafe, and when you go back the next day, it's still there, on the same chair.
34. You refer to anyone with a house newer than 1980 as the "rich people."
35. There's a tornado warning and the whole town is outside watching for it.
36. You don't signal turns because everyone knows where you're going, anyway.
37. Using the elevator involves a grain truck.
38. You bragged to your friends because you got pipes on your truck for your birthday.
39. You know which leaves make good toilet paper or you are “road broke.”
40. Weekend excitement involves a trip to somewhere farther than an hour away from home.
41. Your idea of a traffic jam is ten cars waiting to pass a tractor on the highway.
42. You decide to walk for exercise and five people pull over and ask you if you need a ride.
43. Your teachers call you by your older sibling's name or remember when they taught your parents.
44. You are related to more than half of the town.
45. You listen to "Paul Harvey" every morning or at noon.
46. You get married, hit a home run/make a touchdown, or have a traffic accident and the local newspaper devotes a quarter page to the story.
47. You measure distance in minutes.
48. You hang out at Wal-Mart.
49. Everyone knows all the news before it's published; they just read the hometown paper to see whether the publisher got it right.
50. You know someone named Bubba and that's his real name.

This pretty much sums up my life in a small country town and it was wonderful! And while there are many that would disagree, there was never really a dull moment in that small town.

Screams of Terror

My husband has always been amazed at how I can get totally absorbed in a movie. I've been known to cheer on teams, yell at characters, and bawl so hard that he has threatened to sedate me. I couldn't breathe freely for two weeks after watching The Notebook . Gracious, that movie is a massive tear-jerker. I wanted to see it when it came out but couldn't because I was on strict bed rest, trying to give Violet more time to develop before she was delivered. Good thing too! I have a feeling that movie would have made me go into early labor.

Something that was a big part of mine and Gregg's dating experience was family movie night. Gregg and I would go to the local movie rental place and pick out a few movies to watch for the weekend. Often times, his sister or mother would join us. We would all split up, go in different directions, and pick out a movie. Then, we would meet back up and pick the two best movies out of the whole lot. It was always interesting to see what movies we would wind up with. Horror, love stories, action, comedy, even Disney movies would be rented.

One summer day I went home early because I wasn't feeling too well. Only, when I got home I found that our air conditioner was out. It was nearly 100 degrees outside and the mosquitoes were out in full force. There was no escape from the heat and we couldn't open the windows due to the mosquitoes. So, I called Gregg's Mom and asked if I could crash on their couch for the night and she gracefully said yes. Since it was early in the day, I decided to rent some movies to kill time. I don't know why, but I was in a horror film kind of mood that day. I walked out of the movie rental store with the first three Alien movies. (This was before the fourth movie was made.)

After popping in the first Alien movie I settled in on the couch. I think Alien has to be the best science-fiction horror film out there. Especially considering the first film was made in 1979. I was at the ending of Alien 3 when Gregg's family started to arrive home for the night and they laughed at what they saw on the TV. They remembered my reaction to the movie Arachnophobia (imagine me sitting on the back of the couch, nearly on top of Gregg's shoulders) and you can see why they laughed at my movie choices for the day.

I think I lasted through dinner before I ended up crashing in Gregg's sister's room. They pulled out a little folding chair that turns into a bed for me to sleep on. I never heard D. come into the room for the night. At some point, after D. settled in her bed, her cat (Nermil) joined her. Well, around 3 or 4 in the morning, D. ended up knocking Nermil off the bed and he landed on my feet with his nails out. As you can imagine, that's not the greatest wake up call. Especially after one has watched the first three Alien movies! I sat straight up on my little bed and started screaming as loud as I possibly could. I just KNEW there was an alien trying to eat my feet!!! D. started screaming herself because, well, that's not the kind of wake up call she had been expecting.

Within a matter of seconds, (which felt like an eternity at the time) Gregg comes busting through D's door, while brandishing a baseball bat, and his Mom right behind him with the family's two weimeraners . And poor Nermil, he was doing his best to claw his way out of the room. It took us a few moments to figure out what had happened and for me to realize that there wasn't an alien trying to eat my feet. I don't think D. and I have shared a room since then and I'm amazed that Gregg's family ever allowed me back in their house after that.

Silly Girl

I have one heck of a silly girl. Gracious, this kid can make me laugh so hard that my insides hurt! I love her sense of humor and silly faces seem to be one of her talents. She loves telling jokes too. Actually, Violet loves anything that will incite laughter. We may have a little comedian on our hands!

As for the rollers, she saw them in my bathroom recently and asked to "try them on". I managed to get a photo of her before she started to beg for me to take them off. I'm not surprised really as she hates to have anything in her hair. I've given up on hair bows, pony tails, and clips of any kind. Only during the hottest days of summer can I get her to pull her hair up. Still, we had a fun time playing around with all the girly stuff.

Butt-Stuffer?

Violet went with her Mimi to a friend of the family's house to "help" prepare our Thanksgiving meal. (I was graciously given the day off. My contribution to the day is two homemade pecan pies that I just finished baking.) I just called to check on my precious little turkey to see how she was doing and to find out if she was behaving. Violet was given the phone and she excitedly told me how much fun she was having. She then proclaimed, "Mommy, I'm the best butt-stuffer ever!" Yes folks, my daughter has a future of stuffing turkey butts during the holiday seasons from now on and I couldn't be happier!

It's Hard

... not to laugh when you have a child who can be as silly as this!


Have you laughed to today? If not, then find something that will tickle your funny bone and enjoy a good laugh. After all, life without laughter would be a very dull life.

Who Knew?

Who knew that a fake finger gun shot could bring out the giggles in my kid? I told Violet that mine was a magical tickle shot and that whenever I shoot at her it will instantly bring on the giggles. Also, my shot is rather amazing in the fact that I can shoot through closed doors and through walls. My aim never fails. I have the quickest draw in the West folks! Goodness, I love to hear Violet's peals of laughter whenever I do this. Sometimes it's the simplest things that can bring you the most joy. I LOVE being a Mom! But more importantly, I love being Violet's Mom!!!

When I Was Your Age...

Over the years I've been trying to figure something out. Maybe you, my friends and family members who happen to read my blog can help me out. We've all heard the stories of how an older family member had to walk 5 miles just to get to school. Barefoot. In the snow. All uphill. Yeah, that's the story. But I don't understand how the trip to and from school everyday was ALWAYS uphill. That was a 5 mile commute that they walked each day. Barefoot. And in the snow. Wouldn't you think that at some point that hill would go down! And what about that snow? Did it snow everyday of the year? Were there NO summers? Seriously? I've just been thinking about this lately and thought I'd just share this with you.

For a Good Laugh

If you need a good laugh (heck, even if you don't!) then I suggest you jump over to Dooce.com's site and check out this!

It's A Joke!

Violet ~ Knock Knock.
Me ~ Who's there?
Violet ~ Boo.
Me ~ Boo Who?
Violet ~ Don't cry Mommy, it's a joke!

Conversation

While working on a few Christmas crafts with Violet she and I had the following conversation...

Violet ~ Mommy, can I make one for Patches? (My parent's sweet calico cat)
Me ~ Sure, we can do that. Do you want to make one for P.B. and Ebony too? (Their other two cats)
Violet ~ No, they're naughty.

Uno, Dos, Tres...

Quacco!!!

Violet has been learning how to count in Spanish and is doing a pretty good job at it. Only "Cuatro" (aka, four) is said "Quac-co". I love how my kid's brain works! She always knows how to make me laugh, even if she's not trying to.

Conversation

We called my parents last night and here is a tidbit of the conversation between Violet and her Grandpa...

Grandpa ~ Are you gonna come see me for Thanksgiving?
Violet ~ Yes sir.
Grandpa ~ You are? Well, what kind of pies do you want me to make for you?
Violet ~ Buttermilk! (per Mommy's request of course)
Grandpa ~ Buttermilk pie! You don't want a pecan pie?
Violet ~ Yes please.
Grandpa ~ So, you want a buttermilk pie and a pecan pie?
Violet ~ Yes please. And pumpkin too!

Laughter was all I could hear on either end of the phone after this conversation. Guess we're going to have a major sugar rush after our Thanksgiving meal because Grandpa isn't capable of telling his granddaughter no.

Practicing For The Big Night

[photo courtesy of Jack-O-Lantern.com ~ They have some great templates for pumpkin carvings as well as all kinds of tips and ideas for this fun activity!]


Violet is beyond excited about Halloween. It's all she's talked about for a few days now. She begged me to pull out her pumpkin pail so that she could start practicing for the big night.

Me ~ Now Violet, what do you say when you knock on some one's door?
Violet ~ Trick OR Treat!
Me ~ That's right. Then, what do you say after they've given you something?
Violet ~ Thank you!
Me ~ Then what?
Violet ~ HAPPY HAL-OH-WEEEENNNN!!!
Me ~ Perfect!

Another Conversation

I'm still pretty sick and so unfortunately Violet had to go to daycare today. Hopefully this is her last day. Lord willing. Anyway, while helping Gregg and our precious girl get ready for the day the word "Adult" was said, I forget why and it's not really important. What is important is that Violet's mind attached to it. Here's part of our conversation...

Violet: Adult is my favorite!
Me: Yeah? Do you know what adult is?
Violet: Sure. It's like CHOCOLATE!!!
Me: Mmmm, chocolate.
Violet: Yeah, that's my favorite. Can I have some?
Me: At 7:00 in the morning? I don't think so. But nice try!

Note: the photo above is from Violet's birthday this year. Since chocolate was on the mind I thought I'd share with you a picture of her chocolaty cake face. Mmmm, chocolate!

Conversation In The Car...

I had a doctor's appointment today for some physical therapy on my back. I pulled a muscle or something and it's been really bothering me. So, while I was at the doctor's office, Violet was in daycare playing contentedly with her pals there. I picked up Violet after my appointment and then we went to go pick up Gregg. (I can't wait till next summer when we'll be able to get a second car!)

Violet and I had an interesting conversation in the car.

Me: So, Violet, how was your day? Mrs. Mona said you were a very good girl.

Violet: Uh huh. Are we going to go get Daddy?

Me: Yes Sweetheart.

Violet: Why?

Me: Because, Daddy would miss us if we didn't.

Violet: And because Daddy loves us, right?

Me: Yes Sweetheart.

Violet: (a string of words that I couldn't make out)

Me: What was that Baby Girl? I didn't understand you.

Violet: (sigh) Never mind.

I guess Violet's preparing early for her teenage years in regards to her exasperation in putting up with her parents.


[The photo above was taken by my Mom while we were visiting my parents last month. Violet was so excited to be wearing her new outfit that she was flailing her arms about, hence the blurred hands.]