Practice School and Boiled Peanuts

This past week was "practice school" for Shelby and JP. They both loved it so much!!! Whew! I was a little concerned with how JP would handle it, but he hopped right out of the car the first day with Shelby and then never really wanted to come home....that's my boy, loving school so much that he doesn't want to come home!! Anyway, yesterday Shelby had practice school, but JP didn't so I left him at home with Pratt while I dropped her off. It is going to be a very interesting morning the first time I drop Shelby off and he has to stay in the car.

One of the neatest things for me was to look at Shelby's work that she brought home yesterday and compare it to what she brought home the first week of school last year. What an amazing transformation in it!!! It was just really cool to see all the progress that she has made from the last year and even over the summer while we were at home. One work that she did on the easel (which currently is her favorite thing to do, yes, she is also talking a little bit more after her day then she did last year!!!) was a picture of a stick person (a girl I believe as she had on a dress), a sunshine, some grass, and a flower. She also wrote her name, my name and JP's name; then she crossed them out because she didn't want to leave out her daddy and she couldn't remember how to write his name. When she was showing Pratt her work she said, "Daddy, are you sad that your name isn't on there because I couldn't remember how to write it?" Of course he said no and that he was proud of her work; but isn't that so sweet!!! It just melted my heart that she was that concerned over hurting her dad's feelings, maybe we are doing something right after all with her:)

These are just a few pictures from the last few weeks that I couldn't resist....this is JP walking around in his daddy's shoes. We are still potty training and having good days mixed with bad. Hopefully the good days will start to out weigh the bad soon.Of course you know I can go on much longer without saying something about Clemson Football!!!! We are only a short 7 days away from kick-off!!!! Can you believe it? I know that you are all just as excited as I am!!! So in honor of our fun filled fall approaching, here is a picture of JP sporting his Clemson shirt. My family got it for him when they were visiting Matt this summer. It is kind of hard to read, but the shirt says, "Hold on Tigers....I'm coming." and it has a little tiger dressed up in a football uniform. I just love it, love it, love it!!!

And then, last but not least. Last spring we joined a CSA (community supported agriculture) Farm. It was great. Every Friday we would get a delivery of fresh, picked that morning fruits and vegetables from a farm in South Carolina. Let me tell you, those were some of the best fruits and vegetables I have ever eaten!!! The farm (Pinkney's Produce) breaks for the summer and yesterday we picked up our first delivery for the fall season. We got peanuts, zucchini, squash, corn, field peas, banana peppers, green peppers, etc. As soon as I brought that box in, Pratt started making some boiled peanuts with our peanuts. He let them boil for at least 2 hours and then soak for at least another hour after that. Once we got the children all bathed and ready for bed we sat down together on the couch and ate a bowl of boiled peanuts together. It was a great way to end a very busy week for us....just being together as a family. One of Shelby's favoritest things on earth is boiled peanuts and I think she ate the most out of all of us.

Apple Bottom Jeans

Last night when Pratt was putting Shelby to bed he asked her to put her pull-up on. As she was trying to get it on it got caught on her little hinny (I think that she has been blessed with the Harris hinny). She got a little frustrated and asked Pratt to help her and when he came out of the bathroom to help she started to shake her thing and sing, "Apple Bottom Jeans, Boots with the Fur." Pratt said it was so funny!! I so wish that we had gotten a video of it!!!!

Fashion Diva?

So this morning I told Shelby to go get her self dressed so we could be out of the house on time. After a few minutes Pratt went to check on her and she said, "Daddy, I picked out this shirt to wear because it matches my purse."

Hold up!!! What am I going to do with her? This is definitely uncharted waters for me. One day it is purses and shirts and the next day she is going to have to have everything matching down to the color of her nail polish. Yes, I need to start praying now!!!

Some Picture Fun

The gangs all here....JP, Ella Grace, Eliza, Lucy, Neely, and Shelby

JP playing in a hole that Neely dug. She did a great job digging a big and deep hole.

Shelby checking out the famous starfish. Only Ella Grace was brave enough to hold it.

These are just two pictures that I think are super cute of JP and Shelby. Don't you just love their smiles and that twinkle in their eye!!!!!

New and Old

So, I am sorry once again about my lack of blogging lately. Due to the economic conditions I have had to take over cleaning the house by myself, and while this really isn't that big a deal, it does take a good bit of my time that I would otherwise spend on the internet.

Tomorrow I am leaving for a little girls' weekend to the lakehouse. I am super excited about going and having some time with some really great girls. It is going to be so much fun, but before I go I wanted to catch up on a few things that have been going on around here.

This week has been a pretty exciting week in the Reed house. We are in full potty training mode with JP and while he has already had more accidents in three weeks of training then Shelby has ever had, it is going more smoothly than I could have ever imagined. This week was huge because we had our first successful poop on the potty. It was just perfect timing really. I was calling JP to get dressed and when I found him he said, "No mommy, I still pooping." So I promptly grab him up, stripped him down and put him on the potty before he could finish. No more than 5 seconds later we had victory!!!! Shelby and I were so excited for him (actually she was excited for herself because she knew that she would get two m&ms out of the deal). Today we had another success and this time he told me that he had to go poopy on the potty, so, we are making progress; but of course in true JP fashion he did have two accidents today. I am grateful for the ease that we have experienced with him so far, but I really do hope that this accident thing passes quickly as I am getting a little tired of cleaning pee, poop and doing laundry everyday.

Last week we had great fun. On Thursday we went to the beach with some friends. It was the most perfect day for it. The sun wasn't too intense and it was warm enough, but not too hot. The children all had so much fun playing with each other and we found our first star fish on the beach. I think Eliza found it and all the children enjoyed looking at it and talking about it.

Some other minor details....Shelby and JP are really enjoying playing mommy and baby right now. I am sure that you can guess who takes which role. It is so amusing because half the time JP does baby talk, baby whine, and baby cry and the other half he is making sounds like a cat. Sometimes I am not sure which he is supposed to be until Shelby says, "Baby....." We have also rediscovered the Wiggles. A lot of adults find them somewhat annoying, but I kind of like them. Their songs are great and the children love dancing and singing along. I have tried desperately to sneak a video of Shelby dancing to "D-O-R-O-T-H-Y". It is so funny to see her copying the moves and hear her singing along. Hopefully soon I will have that for you because I know that you will enjoy it. We went shoe shopping this week and it truly hit me hard that my babies aren't babies anymore. I got their feet measured and of course, they grew. I knew that, but what I didn't realize until I held JP's little big foot in my hand to put some socks on how much his feet had changed. Yes, I do put his shoes on everyday, but for some reason this particular moment I took the time to examine his foot and see that it wasn't a baby foot anymore. Oh, forlorn!!!!! My heart breaks just thinking about it. Today I went through Shelby and JP's sock drawers to make way for new socks and I found so many of JP's socks from when he was an infant. It was just one of those things that really took me back and made me miss that stage of motherhood soooooooooo much.

Well, I think that is about it. 'Til next time...God bless!