A Few Photos and Forever!!

Here are a couple of pictures of Jake and Josie.

One day I'll title my blog high heels and footballs! That is the story of my life. Josie clackin through the house in princess shoes of all designs. Jake jetting through the house throwing, kicking, or hitting balls of all shapes and sizes. I desperately try to make sure we only have soft squishy balls inside.

Mama got Josie that Princess Pop Star dress (as she calls it). The shoes are from Alma or Chloe. They have cheetah print inside. She mostly uses them for Snow White, but today they'll do for Pop Diva. Everyday she goes through at the very least 10 dresses. Watching her is like watching a Broadway performance. So dramatic! Lord, I love her!

Jake has been doing this new thing. I wish you could hear it just the way he says it. I'll try to do it justice. When he gets mad or upset or whatever he'll end his sentence with FOWR-EVEWR! Like he goes, "I not gonna be a nice boy, FOWR-EVEWR!" or "I not gon wear dat helmet FOWR-EVEWR!" It's so hard not to crack up. The other night/morning, it was 5 something, he got in the bed with Joey and me. He had to sleep with one of his squishy balls that night. Well, he brought it with him and kept throwing it at the head board. Joey finally told him to stop or Daddy was going to take it. Jake didn't and Joey took that ball. He chunked it so hard it went flying out of our room and landed in the dining area. Joey later told him he could have the ball if he didn't throw it again. Jake ran in there to get it and said, "I am gon frow dat ball FOWR-EVEWR!" We busted out laughing. He does bring such comic relief. Words cannot express the love I have for that kid!

The End.

Funky Fixins!

**Please note this funkyness is not a typical meal at the McDonald household!**

Believe it or not, I DO try to feed my kids the right food! You know....healthy stuff. It's quite the challenge for my ignorant behind! I have loved the wrong foods for as long as I've lived. Ever since I can remember I'd choose cereal over "real food" any day! I seriously have a crush on candy! Thanks be to God middle age has kicked in and I do actually have a sweet limit. Plus, my mouth gets so raw I cannot possibly eat the entire bag of Now & Laters anymore! Yes, bag! At Halloween they have these hugungous bags of sinful treats!

So I work hard to put good things in my babies bodies! I don't want them to love the junk I love! Tonight was hilarious! The combination was actually kinda nasty, but the kids ate it up! They had oatmeal (real Quaker Oats), edamame, and a hard boiled egg! I threw the grapes in for color! :)

Joey laughed his butt off when he saw their plates. He was like....eew! But, when my sweet little Josie sat down, she exclaimed, "Mommy, this is the BEST supper ever!" Ha!

Just thought I'd share this! Real food is getting easier for me! I'm no Paula Deen! Everyone who knows me knows the kitchen is my thorn! But I am trying! Who would have thought Jeanne of all people would care about the food groups (at least when it comes to my kids)?

Lori's been a feen about taking pictures of my kids. I put a few on here that I love! This ones for you Nana Net!

One Week Today!

Praise the Lord! It has been one week today that my Jaker's has slept through the night! YES, through the entire night. We haven't had to go in his room once during the night in a whole entire week!

Not only has he slept through the night, he has slept until "The big sunshine day." That's what my kids call it. You know the time when normal people should be getting up. I've told both of them in the past that I am a stay at home mommy and there's no reason for us to be starting our day at 5 in the a.m. :) He's now getting up anywhere from 6:30 to a big fat thank you Jesus 7:30!

I tried everything with him to get him to stay in his bed and sleep. Ya'll have heard how he did. At any given moment, in the pitch black of night, Jake would show up beside me saying, "Hello Mama." He's even stopped doing that. He stays in his bed for naps and bedtime. Oh, hallelujah!!!

So I figured since I'd vented about the sleepless nights that I'd rejoice about the sleep-full nights! :) Love me some Jake Landon!!!

Josie is 4!

My Josie girl turned 4 on January 31st!

She came early! 11 days early as a matter of fact! I remember wanting to keep her in there until the "Love" month! What a nut you are with your first! I really don't mind the January birthday. Although with those baby calenders that you get, you know the ones you put the stickers on anytime they experience their first bath, first tooth, first poop! Seems like they had a sticker for everything! Well, when your child is born on the 31st you can't put a sticker on the exact day they turn 1 month old, 2 months old, 3 months old....! February only goes to 28 (most years), so I had to put her 1 month old sticker on the 28th instead of the 31st. I had serious issues with that! And darned if it didn't happen in April and June and you get my drift!

Moving on! Josie had her perfect Princess party! Two of them actually! She got her dream doll house and everything princess you can imagine! Lucky duck got two princess cakes. One made by Nana the Great (cook) and the other by Mommy the Not-So-Great(cook)! Honestly though, I was pretty impressed with my cake skills! :) If I ever get the slide show to work I'll show you both cakes! Just couldn't waste my room on the page with cake shots.



Which leads me to the fact that I can only get 4 pictures on this blog page lately! I tried to do the slide show thing, AGAIN! Yes, I know I need some help for rizzle with that mess. Somebody, anybody, show me how to do a slide show!!!!


Look at that bald-headed baby girl at 18 months old! Finally getting some fuzz!



Here's her first piggy tails! I'll never forget pulling up into Aunt Krista's driveway and seeing that hair! I had NO idea such things were possible!



Here's my sweetness getting ready for sleep in her treasured Tinkerbell nightgown. She's got herself some lovely locks now! Josie is forever asking me why I don't have long hair. And I'm forever telling her that if my hair looked like that...I would!


Finally! It's my Jakers singing Happy Birthday to his beloved (way too good to him) big sister!

New York City "Take 5"

It's take 5 for me, but it's take 9 for my sister! Lord love that girl! She's had more surgeries in one year than any number people of should have in a lifetime.

I wasn't going this trip. I'd decided it was too cold (23 degrees was the high cold) and too long to be away from my family. Plus, Christy was having some extensive stuff done that required a 24 hour nurse be with her and something about a bag protruding from her face. This girl sure can't handle that kind of graphic surgery. But, my sister won! I couldn't tell her no. She needed me and I needed to see The Big Apple in the winter. This trip let me see all the seasons...Winter, Spring, Summer and Fall...all you have to do is call...and I'll be there! Good song! I think Christy has seen them 2 times around now! And the face bag was gone by the time I got there. She did have some crazy jock strap thing on her head, though. Man, we laughed till we cried over that mess.

I flew in by myself and the driver met me at the airport to take me to the New Yorker! I'm a 32 year old woman, but was still scared to death to fly by my lonesome and make it to the hotel without Mama and Christy to laugh with. What a big girl I turned out to be!

Our hotel is right smack in the middle of downtown Manhattan! We're only 2 blocks away from Macy's. There's a picture of the view from our balcony of the Empire State building. You'll notice the ball is still there from New Year's Eve in another picture. That was way cool to see! I couldn't get over how tiny that ball was, though. You can't see it from the hotel. We had to take a taxi to Times Square for it.

Like I said earlier it was freezing, below freezing. Nutso cold for a Florida native! Our room was really 2 rooms. There was the living room and down the hallway was the bedroom. The living room was nothing but windows and doors. These doors weren't weather proofed either. The curtains would be blowing from the wind outside. We put chairs in front of the doors and stuff to try to keep the cold out. Man alive I thought we'd freeze to death. NO joke, I had on 2 pair of socks, sweat pants, a hoodie shirt with the hoodie on, gloves and a big ole down comforter wrapped around me. That was the only way to survive. My mama never took her robe off. She'd put that thing on over whatever she was wearing and get bundled up!

The best part was when it snowed. I was flippin out! I've gone skiing before, but never actually watched snow come down. It was so pretty. I ran out there and wrote I love Joey in it! Brr, it makes me cold just thinking about being on the balcony.

Hopefully, this is it for New York for a while! We really think it's time for the beach. If everything goes well with this surgery, we'll be in Anna Maria Island this summer together! Kids too! :)

I feel good!

I love when my kids feel good! LOVE IT! These two have been battling sickness for longer than I want to even think about. So, when they feel good......they feel real good! And, so do I!

It was a lazy kind of day because of the dern jack frost outside. Austin got here a little before 8:00 for school! Lord knows I love that boy! Here's one reason. Our pump had frozen some time in the wee hours (shame on the daughter of a well driller for not letting the water run last night). Joey's alarm was set for 5:00, just like most every morning. He went to take a shower, but no water came out. He bundled up and ran to the pump in the freezing cold to put a lamp on the well or some jive. Low and behold it worked, for him anyway.

Around 8:30 I jumped in. The water pressure was way low, but it was hot so I didn't think too much of it. Until......it shut off. Completely. No water. Thank the good Lord Haysus I'd gotten all the conditioner out of my hair first! :) That's where my appreciation for Austin comes in. Sweet kid went out there in the mid 30's to fix the pressure switch that had frozen. At least that's what I think he did. All I know was there were way too many steps in Joey's directions for me to fix it.

I'm pretty certain that my kids love him even more than I do. I know you saw that mega fort he made with them. I came out and there were blankets and sheets everywhere. You should have heard Josie. "Oh A, this is the most beautiful fort ever. Look how big it is!" Jake was scrambling around like an Army man under the stuff. I even shimmied my little self through the fort maze. We had so much fun.

I do thank God for feeling good and the laughter He's placed in this home of ours. It comes through so many people. Today just happened to be Austin!

Hey!

Hi everyone! I just wanted to post a new blog because I'm tired of seeing my same one! I tried to make a slide show to put up Christmas pictures. As you can see that didn't really work out for me! :) So, I'll just tell you the MacDonald's family is doing real good! I will stick a few pictures in of my cute kiddies, but I don't have all that much to say! Until next time....

Here's Jake hammin it up as a cowboy!

Josie in her Christmas outfit. That girl can strike a pose! She HAD to wear those "Hannah Montana" boots!

howdy folks! Angie typed that. She wanted to give a little shot out to all the bloggers out there!!