The Beach!

We got to go to Melbourne beach for a 3 night stay at the Double Tree! Joey's daddy hooked us up with some Hilton points! Thanks for that one Pa! So here is a pictorial journey through the long weekend.


Josie and Jake after arriving at the beach. Of course we intended on leaving by 3:00, but no such thing happened..... You'll notice it's dark in this picture :)

Here's the kiddos and Daddy at Ron Jon's Surf Shop! I've never been. The kids really enjoyed it. Josie's sportin some beads she picked for Gigi and her very own cool rays. Please take note of Josie's stance. Jake's got his super high bouncy ball.

The Cannon's came Saturday for a day trip. Jake and Josie LOVED being with them. The waves at this beach were c-razy rough. So they kind of waded at the shore....often getting knocked down by the waves. Jake and Connor would just get up and say something about how fun it was. Yeah, real fun to get smacked down by a big ole heavy wave. Not so much for this little mama. Jake's the one on the right looking like he's about to dive in.

Here's Jakey at the pool (without his floaties)! He's so stinkin brave. I'm afraid he may be one of those adrenaline junkies one day! Heavens, I pray not. Anyway, every time he'd jump in to swim to Joey he'd say Janaminioes! It was supposed to be Geronimo. :) He did that over and over and over and over. The next day Josie got brave and decided she wanted Mommy to learn her how to swim like Daddy does Jake. So, I learned her!

My little surfer dude posing!

Josie would get blobs of sand and call them "puffer knuckles". She'd just drop them and smile. There were tons of those little treasures all around. Who needs a sea shell??

Jake's sweet innocent smile here! You see it? As I was taking the picture he was taking his sister's juice box thinking I wouldn't notice. The smile gave it away.

My girl...always posing. Seriously, it cracks me up. I had like 10 of these shots to choose from. She'd be like, take this one. Wait, do it like this. No, over here. Aw man, she's too much.

Our first day out. The water was c-c-c-c-old!

Our last day there! I told them to get together so I could take their picture. This is what I got! Perfect I tell ya!

All the way there Josie says the infamous, "Are we there yet?" We hadn't even gotten past Irby when the questioning began. Jake was pretty quiet. He's a good traveler, but he should be....he owes us!

The first night they were so excited to get to share a bed. However, Jake kept bothering Josie. I know it's almost impossible to believe, but he did. :) She'd say, "Stop hitting me Jaaaaakkkkeee!" He'd say, "I not hit you Jos. I touchin you!"

The first morning after the hullabulu of sunscreen, going potty, swimmers, suits, hair, packing, snacks, etc. We were stepping out the door when Jake blew chunks. YUCK! It was literal chunks. He'd had fruit loops and sausage for breakfast. He just wiped his mouth and said, "C'mon. I wanna go to da beach." After some much needed clean up we headed down.

The elevator was the biggest hit! They took turns pushing buttons.

Our last night there we let the kids pick where to eat. Of all the places they begged for the Waffle House! Can't take Sumter county out of them I guess!

We really had a wonderful time. And no one burned! :)

The Bible says....

Look at this boy in his Daddy's hat! He thought he was so cool. Check out the rain boots. Jake calls them his work boots. What kind of job does he plan on having??? This has nothing to do with the blog. I just thought it was cute.

Jake and Josie have been saying some pretty funny things lately. They're always coming up with something to make me laugh. Here are a few....

Jake:

"Da Bible says don't drive your monster truck backwards!" This happened when I was playing trucks with him on his ramp. We used to have a basket and 2 books that made up a ramp. (See picture above). Not anymore. Thanks to Aaron we have an official monster truck ramp. (Picture to come soon). I was trying to show him some cool moves by doing the truck backwards when he came up with this scripture that I knew nothing about. According to Jake God's pretty adamant about only going forward. :)

When Joey hasn't shaved in a day or so he rubs Joey's chin and says, "Daddy, you gots ants on you face?"

Almost every morning Jake runs into our room crying. The other morning he came in and yelled, "Hey mom. I not crying. Will you make me milk?" I say it's still dark outside. He says, "Ok, can I lay wif you daddy? I need to kiss you." Guess who got up with Jakey??

Josie:

Tonight in the car on the way home from my Paw Paw's 82nd birthday party Jake's being Jake. Josie wanted the car quiet. Joey and I were good for that, but Jake kept making all these noises. Surely he wasn't doing it just to bother his sister. So Josie says, "Mommy, Jake is making me crazy. I'm bout to get mad at him and I really don't want to!" Joey cracks up laughing mumbling something like you are your mother's child.

About a week ago Josie busts out with, "Mommy, I want to die!" I'm freaking out like Holy Canoly what kind of 4 year old says something like that. My hearts racing. I'm trying to come up with some Word from the Lord. Then she continues with, "Did you tell me that there will be lots of candy in heaven? And God will let me have as much as I want?" I'm feeling better now because I can see where this is going. I tell her yes because when she gets to heaven she'll have no tummy aches. So she can have all the candy her little heart desires. At least that's what I'm hoping for myself :0) I let her know that she can have candy here too and she doesn't need to go on to the sweet by and by for some Airheads. That resolved it! She now wants to live!!!

Tea Party!

Josie and I went to Polly's Pantry for a tea party with the Gaskin's girls. I'm pretty sure it was Kelly's idea. I think there were 15 of us there. Josie was very excited about the "Mommy & Josie" day. She's all about her some quality time. We spent 2 hours there and she was absolutely wonderful!

She ordered hot chocolate. It came in this little porcelain teapot. Josie got to pour some cold milk in all by herself to help cool it off. She thought she was so grown!

Josie Ryann and Taylor Rae! Josie is crazy about this girl!


Mommy & Josie!

She just stared at this dollhouse for a very long time. They even opened it for her later.

Look at that ice cream....along with that big ole happy grin!!

Nana, Josie & Me!


See this gentleman's shirt? Josie saw this and was like, Oh Mommy! His shirt it b-eauty-ful! We need to get that for Daddy! He didn't mind that I took his picture to show Joey.

Here's our girls! It's the only picture I have. Nana's got her eyes closed, but she still looks pretty! :)
Josie felt just like a princess. Mrs. Polly even gave the girls princess lessons. They got little gifts. Josie received a lollipop (blue one her fav) and some fru fru hair bows. We'll have to go again.

Is there such a thing as too much Taylor Swift?

Josie and Jake love some Taylor Swift. I must admit I like her, too. It's a good thing because Josie's got the Fearless CD and the child knows almost the entire album by heart. No joke. She has her own little way of singing it like "You be da prince and I'll be da princess. It's a lub story, baby just say yes!" I'm smitten with those 4 year old words that are turning into big girl words too fast for me to handle. Yesterday, she whipped out her doll that sings "Teardrops on my Guitar." Her Aunt Annette came down to visit and bought her that one and the "Our Song" one. Oh, and a Snow White doll, too. We can't leave out a princess! Anyway, I'm glad I had the camera right there so you can see how much they enjoy Taylor Swift. I'm laughing in it because Jake's so darn cute.

Kindermusik Recital!

Jake and Josie have done Kindermusik for the past two semesters. They've thoroughly enjoyed doing it. This spring we did Fiddle De Dee. There were all kinds of crazy songs in there. Luke and Laney were with us this time. The kids loved having them some twins time. Here are a few pictures from the recital this past Saturday.

See Josie's face in this one. She's shouting out to Bazoo Bazoo Butz. It's a donkey song and we're going hee-haw, hee-haw, hee-haw hee-haw hee-haw in our big voices! Man they were hilarious. The two beside us were focusing on playing the resonator bars.

This is some egg shakin goin on here. The kids made some good friends. They were with most of the same kids from the last semester. Such sweet bonds were formed.

Jakey was getting down in this shot. I'm sad it's over. They'll miss it next time.

After the recital we had lunch at Mickey D's, took Jake home for a nap, and headed to Ocala for the movie UP! Jake's never been to the movies, so we were a little nervous about taking him. To our surprise he was a dream boat. His sister, the old pro, did just fine. She didn't like it quite as much as the Hannah Montana movie, but the popcorn and candy were big hits. Jake just sat there in his booster seat, crossed his ankles, and ate his popcorn the whole time. He would start laughing in some scenes and give me this "I don't like this part look" in other scenes. I asked him if he loved the movie. He said, "Sometimes Jakey likes it, and sometimes Jakey don'ts." We topped the night off with some Chic-fil-a ice dream cones and went home for some much needed rest!

Raindrops, an Airboat, and Bobo!

If you live in Florida you are more than aware of the wonderful rain we've been getting. Back in the day, before kids, I would have probably slept through it all. Now, they'll be NO such thing happening :)

When we were at Mama's the other night I couldn't resist letting the kids play in the rain. They were so stinkin cute. Jake loves the puddles. No surprise there.



It looks like he's squatting to pee in this one. Yeah right! He simply won't potty train even if it means getting to pee outside. Maybe one day we'll be past the diaper phase :)



Josie refused to remove the hair bow or barrette. She insisted she have her hair that way. It looked hilarious even before the rains came. But she told me she looked beautiful and she did and that's what counts! There were pants on her when we started, but she got too cold to keep them on. She certainly looks warmer now. :)

The rain slowed down so good ole Angie got the hose out. Some of you reading this live close enough by that you probably heard the yelling.

Then comes Bobo pulling up with his airboat in tow. Oh you guys there are way too many "you might be a red neck jokes involved in this visit." And I mean that with the utmost respect. I dearly love my big brother. The kids are crazy about him. I need to find the picture from Christmas when he and Josie were comparing tattoos. His aren't washable though! Brett fired the engine up on his airboat and Jake started screaming with delight. He kept saying, "Bobo turn on dat washing machine." I'm like yeah buddy that's a washing machine on the back of the boat! Ha!

FOUND IT! Here's the tat shot!

Then he cleaned up real nice for another visit the next day. We very very very rarely get to see him, so it was really nice to have his company two days in a row!

Yeah, that's my kid in her p-jammers. It's one of the simple pleasures of being home. She would wear them all day everyday if I let her. Of course there'd have to be some princess costume intermissions off and on throughout the day. I just let her because in a few short months she'll be a big girl going to preschool (for real this time). It's amazing how quickly time goes by.

I thought she looked pretty here. She's forever posing for me. In this particular one she grabbed the basketball net and was like, "Hey take a picture of me. This is such a good one Mommy."

They looked too sweet not to put this one in. I love these children and this life. Their sweet little faces make it all worth it at the end of the day! Ummm, ummm, ummm!!

Your Son!

Yes, YOUR SON, as my husband so affectionately called "our sweet little innocent "Jake last week. Your son equals when our child makes a poor choice he becomes Mommy's. My son equals when our child makes a good choice he belongs to Daddy. Let me use these in a sentence. My son cuddled up with me in the bed and gave me the sweetest sugars this morning. The flip side is where this post comes in. JEANNE, LOOK WHAT YOUR SON DID!!!!!!!


First of all, how could this face be the face of a little boy who could do such a thing? For real?


Well, it is the face of such mischievousness...... This is where Saint Joey is using major tone-age with me. Joey is so spirit controlled it's enough to make this loose lipped woman lose it! He rarely gets upset. Can you believe he's actually telling me to put the camera down ( in his meanest voice possible)? Here's the proof that Jake really is MY son. Do you see the permanent marker all over his legs? Oh my!!!

He didn't stop there. Here's some Sharpie on Saint Joey's console......

......and seat.....

......on the outside of his truck.....

........on the headrest......

As we tried to clean up we kept finding places where MY son Jakey had been. There was marker on the seat belt clip, the floor mats, the passenger side door. Alot, alot, alot as Jake says. Oh man, what a mess! So after googling "how to get permanent marker out of skin, upholstery, vinyl, outside of vehicle" and then some. I stumbled on to the items below.

Spray sunscreen was the big winner! It got almost all of the marker off Jake's legs!

Hairspray was a close 2nd removing Sharpie off the door.

The baby wipes did absolutely nothing for us! Folex, as suggested by Aunt Krista, got most of the marker out of the upholstery. We tried toothpaste and hairspray on the dash, inside door, and console, but to no avail. Google isn't Gospel! Before I googled I tried Magic Eraser. That stuff does everything, right? Yeah, including taking the finish off Saint Joey's interior...oops! Turned out spray sunscreen saved the day on that one, too! So what if his finish is a little dull. It's better than black from permanent marker.

I hope you're wondering what I wondered out loud to my very irate husband! What on earth were YOU doing while Jake had the time to do what he was doing? Believe it or not, he was right beside him laying sod. He was just a few feet away. Joey said he had that moment. The one where you say to yourself, "Uh-oh, Jake's been quiet for some time now!" Then the feeling of panic hits and you realize.......that your wife's son has just made a very poor choice, to say the least!!! He always says, "I sowry mommy!"



Tell me, honestly, could you really be upset with this face?