Making cookies

On Monday, Kate and I were hanging around the house and were both really bored by late morning, so I racked my brain to think of something fun to do. I came up with making cookies. Kate loves to help make things. I think her favorite part is cracking eggs. It's pretty funny - she taps the egg gently on the edge of the bowl, just as she should, then crushes it in her hand no matter how many times I try to coach her to pull it apart with two hands. Luckily her hand is small enough that only part of the shell crushes in and we don't get TOO many shell pieces in the egg. We always do this over a separate bowl. Anyway, it made for some cute pictures. The recipe we used was Nana's "James Cookies" recipe, which just uses a cake mix. Her 2-year-old attention span isn't nearly long enough for a real cookie recipe. Oh, and she really enjoyed licking the spoon.

Where are we?

Here we are!

Ok, so it's been another month since I've posted anything here. It's been pretty hectic around here with traveling, birthdays, anniversaries, switching every room in our house but the master and kitchen, general life with a two-year-old and a being pregnant mom. Mostly, I'm trying to just get through my days so I haven't been much into blogging about them, or really spending any time on the computer at all. Kate is in the throws of two-ness and is so funny and so frustrating all at the same time - she wears me out. When (or, more appropriately this week, if) she takes a nap, I'm taking one myself and in the evenings by the time Kate is down I just need to relax with James until it's time for bed. Not trying to complain, just hoping I'll get some clemency from any readers I have left! James will be out of town a lot in October, so we'll see how it goes. You may not hear much from me then either. In the meantime, here are some random thoughts and happenings from our life.


I let Kate's MDO teacher pressure me the other day about potty training (it was really more me feeling guilty than her pressuring, but she did comment) and so I tried putting Kate in panties one day this week. That went over like a lead balloon. I lasted 2 hours after going through 4 pairs of underwear. She never would tell me or even go on the potty at any time - all I got was "Uh-oh!" after the fact. I don't know if she's not ready or I'm not, but I don't have the patience right now to push her. Her teacher is just going to have to deal with the diapers and the fact that Kate is the youngest in the class. She's doing really well in there though. Her teacher tells me she's getting pretty comfortable - speaking out in circle time and being assertive on the playground. The day before UT's home opener they had "Wear Orange Day" at MDO and we had received a little Vols cheerleading outfit in a bag of hand-me-downs the week before, so she wore that to school. All she wanted to do that morning was run or give cheesy grins, so this is the best picture we got. Go vols!


This summer our church held only one service and we were encouraged to bring our children to the service. We brought Kate to the first part of the service for the worship music and then took her to her class before offertory/communion. Now we're back to regular services, but Kate still asks to hear the music every Sunday, so we're still taking her in. She points out the guitars and drums and watches very intently, sometimes even trying to sing along. She loves it! And so do I. It's really a great feeling to worship with my child. Last week they did a rockin' version of Power in the Blood - everyone really gets going when we sing a great old hymn and Kate thought it was great! They ended with that one and in the quiet after the music stopped there was Kate's "Do it again?"

Kate's been calling James by his first name for a while now. Not all of the time, but a lot. We've gotten her to call him Daddy James most of the time, but sometimes it's just James. I'm Mom now. She went from Mama to Mommy at 18 months and now at 2 she's calling me Mom. I guess it's better than Angela (sorry James!) but I thought she'd be a little older before I became Mom. She thinks she's so grown up and has to do everything by herself.

Kate turned 2 on August 24th and it was not a very exciting day, but we did stretch out presents across the day (and more) so she didn't mind. We had breakfast and opened some presents here before hopping in the car to head to NC for Grandfather's 60th birthday the next day. For a whole month before Kate's birthday, she kept saying "Kate bike birthday" so we hid her tricycle in the back of the car and gave it to her at Nana and Grandfather's house and it was a hit. She's getting pretty good at maneuvering it around by herself but still can't pedal. James bought her a stroller and little baby doll with GG's birthday money last week and she's loving that stroller! It converts to a shopping cart so she can push lots of stuff around. I'd post a picture, but she either won't be still or slow down enough to take one or she only wants to look in the viewfinder and won't let you take her picture, so I don't bother much lately.