Peanut and her daddy

Skylar and her daddy playing on the floor in her bedroom.


Daddy and Skylar playing with her ling-a-ling toy that Aunt Jeannie sent her for Christmas.


At Daddy's work being carried around in her snuggly. By the way, that is a hairnet on her head. It's necessary for all babies working in the deli.


At home in the snuggly. Look at that big toothless grin.


Skylar and her daddy doing laundry.


Watching Saturday morning tv together. I think they were watching Handy Manny.


At Wal Mart with her Daddy.

The Children's Bible in a nutshell - through the eyes of a child.

In the beginning, which occurred near the start, there was nothing but God, darkness, and some gas. The Bible says, 'The Lord thy God is one, but I think He must be a lot older than that.

Anyway, God said, 'Give me a light!' and someone did.

Then God made the world.

He split the Adam and made Eve. Adam and Eve were naked, but they weren't embarrassed because mirrors hadn't been invented yet.

Adam and Eve disobeyed God by eating one bad apple, so they were driven from the Garden of Eden.

Not sure what they were driven in though, because they didn't have cars.

Adam and Eve had a son, Cain, who hated his brother as long as he was Abel.

Pretty soon all of the early people died off, except for Methuselah, who lived to be like a million or something.

One of the next important people was Noah, who was a good guy, but one of his kids was kind of a Ham. Noah built a large boat and put his family and some animals on it. He asked some other people to join him, but they said they would have to take a rain check.

After Noah came Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Jacob was more famous than his brother, Esau, because Esau sold Jacob his birthmark in exchange for some pot roast. Jacob had a son named Joseph who wore a really loud sports coat.

Another important Bible guy is Moses, whose real name was Charlton Heston. Moses led the Israel Lights out of Egypt and away from the evil Pharaoh after God sent ten plagues on Pharaoh's people. These plagues included frogs, mice, lice, bowels, and no cable.

God fed the Israel Lights every day with manicotti. Then he gave them His Top Ten Commandments.

These include: don't lie, cheat, smoke, dance, or covet your neighbor's stuff.

Oh, yeah, I just thought of one more: Humor thy father and thy mother.

One of Moses' best helpers was Joshua who was the first Bible guy to use spies. Joshua fought the battle of Geritol and the fence fell over on the town.

After Joshua came David. He got to be king by killing a giant with a slingshot. He had a son named Solomon who had about 300 wives and 500 porcupines. My teacher says he was wise, but that doesn't sound very wise to me.

After Solomon there were a bunch of major league prophets.

One of these was Jonah, who was swallowed by a big whale and then barfed up on the shore. There were also some minor league prophets, but I guess we don't have to worry about them.

After the Old Testament came the New Testament. Jesus is the star of The New. He was born in Bethlehem in a barn. (I wish I had been born in a barn too, because my mom is always saying to me, 'Close the door! Were you born in a barn?' It would be nice to say, 'As a matter ! of fact, I was.')

During His life, Jesus had many arguments with sinners like the Pharisees and the Democrats.

Jesus also had twelve opossums.

The worst one was Judas Asparagus. Judas was so evil that they named a terrible vegetable after him.

Jesus was a great man. He healed many leopards and even preached to some Germans on the Mount.

But the Democrats and all those guys put Jesus on trial before Pontius the Pilot. Pilot didn't stick up for Jesus. He just washed his hands instead.

Anyways, Jesus died for our sins, then came back to life again.

He went up to Heaven but will be back at the end of the Aluminum. His return is foretold in the book of Revolution.

She laughs!

Here is a short video of Momma tickling Skylar and making her laugh.

Skylar's first Christmas

Skylar and Momma baked cookies for Santa Claus last night and left them on the book shelf right next to the Christmas tree before she went to bed. When we got up this morning there were some cookies missing and we found two under the tree. Now my guess is that when Santa was bending down to put Skylar's presents under the tree that he brushed his big fat butt against the plate of cookies not realizing that he was knocking some off onto the floor.


Skylar had a wonderful first Christmas today. After Momma and Daddy got her up and fed we put on this beautiful Christmas dress that Aunt Jeannie sent all the way from Florida. She looked absolutely adorable posing here with her daddy. Since she hates wearing hats we took it off after this picture and opted for a headband instead.


Since we had no breakfast fixings in the house we decided to go on a hunt and see if there were any restaurants open today. We thought maybe IHOP would be open but when we got there the parking lot was empty so we went and had an early lunch at Star Diner. The food is always delicious but a little overpriced.


This is the pretty tree that Skylar awoke to this morning. Yes, we know our tree is leaning a bit. The biggest present under the tree was for daddy.


Here is Skylar and Momma with one of her toys that Santa brought. It's a tumbling ducky thing that she will have to roll and chase across the floor.


Jordan made himself comfortable in Skylar's boppy pillow while I was holding her and opening presents.


We chased Jordan out of her boppy and stuck her under the Christmas tree so she could smile at, talk to and flirt with the lights and ornaments.


Our little angel peanut was a VERY good girl this year so she made out like a bandit in the toy area. She also got some clothes from Gymboree from our friends Kayo & Kenny in California, an outfit from her Nani Wanda in Tennessee, a princess devotional Bible from her Great Grams, socks from her Nina, a teddy bear from Harumi & Chris in Japan, a "going to grandma's house" bag, 2008 coins and a couple of ornaments from Grammy and Peepaw, diapers and baby wash & lotion from our neighbors, the Gilmores, a play gym from our neighbor, Steven and a $20 gift card from her Aunt Alacia and Uncle James.


This was by far Skylar's best present ever. Santa brought her a Fisher-Price Galloping Fun Jumperoo that gallops and plays music as she moves. She did a lot of smiling while she was in it. It will be even better when her legs get a little bit longer and she can really push herself up and down.


She got so tired out from all the present opening that she fell asleep in her swing.


After Skylar woke up from her nap we took this picture in front of our tree and walked over to Kay and Jim's house to visit with them, Tina and the boys.


When we got there we were surprised to see that Tucker had completely taken over Jim's chair. He was so relaxed. The chair actually spins and I periodically spun him around in the chair and he loved it.


Joey's favorite gift this year besides his Nintendo DS games is all the Bakugan stuff he got. I think Tina said he had the arena at home. Boys toys are crazy.


Tina was laying on the floor with Skylar and Tucker got insanely jealous and laid down behind her and nuzzled his face up near hers saying, "hey...look at me!"


Joshie was being a real sweetheart and shared his new big green blanket with Skylar. It was SO soft!


After we got back from the Gilmores we all got into our PJs and Robert played my new Wii game for a while. We couldn't have asked for a better first Christmas with our little one.

Skylar's first Christmas at Great Gram's house

This afternoon we went up to Dahlonega to spend Christmas Eve with my family. Robert's parents are down in Florida spending the holiday with his brother and sister and their families. We had such a nice time. There was no set time to arrive....family members just showed up whenever. There was tons of finger-foods, appetizers and yummy desserts to nibble on. We exchanged presents and hung out for awhile chit-chatting. Skylar was a perfect angel today...totally loving being passed around and loved on by everyone. She got to spend quite a bit of time with her Grandma Bobbie which was extremely important as her Grandma hasn't been well. Skylar also got to spend time with her Nina. That is our name for Amanda. We wanted to stay longer but we had three puppies at home that needed to be let outside to pee. When we finally got home we realized that Sweetie Pie had been locked up in Skylar's room all day....no food, water or litter box. You would think she would learn her lesson and not go in there for a while but sure enough she's in there now. After we came home we made cookies for Santa and read "The Gift of the Magi" and Skylar went off to bed. She's got a very BIG DAY tomorrow!
Skylar & Momma looking pretty with Aunt Karen.
Skylar and her Nina...their first Christmas together.
Cousin Chelsea feeding Skylar as little Ezra looks on.
Randy, Kayla and Teddy.
Look! Great Grams has reindeer on her feet!
Skylar, Elijah, Vondre & Ezra posing for a picture. Momma's little Christmas bunny was pitching a fit.
Skylar asleep in her Grandma's arms. They spent a lot of quality time together.
Ally and Josh. Oh gosh....I hope that's his name. I forget. Nice guy though!
Toni, Elijah and Chelsea getting ready to open presents.
Skylar & her favorite Aunt Karen.
Great Grams and Skylar Belle.
You see this butterfly right here? I got's this in honor of my Mimi!
Momma and her greatest Christmas gift EVER!
A few quiet moments with Grandma...

Daddy and his boys

Everytime Robert sits down in his chair to do anything...watch tv, sleep or work on the laptop he is surrounded by his boys. All four of them! This picture is a classic example of how the boys love their daddy. We were watching House (best show ever!) and Robert decided to play a game on the laptop. Well, along comes Jordan hopping up into his lap. Naturally Bailey quickly followed because for goodness sake he can't be left out of anything. After that Baby sat at his feet whining to get up too. After all three of the dogs were settled into the chair with him, Smokie decided that there just had to be a little bit more room for him too. He crawled up into the chair and got his big lard butt in the way and chased poor Jordan off the chair which is why he's missing from the picture. Since Smokie Joe is so massive and needs a lot of laying down space he had nowhere else to rest his big rump but right in the middle of the laptop. It was definitely a Kodak moment.

Been making goodies

This year I made chocolate chip cookies, dipped them in chocolate and threw crushed candy canes on them.
My homemade chocolate covered cherries and peanut butter buckeyes. They are always a favorite.

It's finally over!!

As usual I was the first one up this morning. I really didn't mind though because Skylar went to sleep around 8:30 last night (shocker, I know!) which allowed me to get the sleep I needed to get through the day today. After I had my shower and had gotten dressed I got the baby up and fed her and changed her diaper. I actually put her to sleep last night fully dressed and ready to go to court this morning so it really didn't take long for us to get ready. Our hearing wasn't scheduled until 9:00am but we pulled out of the driveway at 6:50am just in case we hit a bunch of traffic on 400 or I-85. We made it to downtown Atlanta around 7:45am and decided to kill time we'd go eat at Waffle House since we saw a sign for it inside the Underground Atlanta parking garage. We started walking around Underground ATL looking for the Waffle House but had no luck in finding it. Then a homeless guy came up to us and asked us if we needed help. He did better than give us directions to the Waffle House....he actually escorted us there. It was around the corner, down a block and then around another corner. We never would have found it on our own. This guy was very nice....I wish I could remember his name! Anyway, he waited for me outside and I went in and got change and came out and gave him a $10 bill and thanked him for getting us there. His eyes welled up with tears and he wrapped his arms around me in a big long hug....not wanting to let go. He asked me if I would pray for him and I promised I would. I asked him to please try and find a warm place to spend Christmas. I really hope he does.
We met up with Judy outside the courthouse, went through security and then went upstairs to the 8th floor to the judge's chambers. We went in, met the judge and got sworn in. He looked over the final page of our home study, looked up at Skylar and said, "Skylar.....you're in." And with that my precious little one officially became our daughter. Judy took a picture of us with the judge and then after our first congratulations of the morning we went downstairs with Judy to file the papers. She gave us our certificate of adoption and told us to go over to the Vital Records office and get her new birth certificate. Well, we did and after we got there I realized that Judy had listed Robert's date of birth as our wedding date and not his actual birthdate. We showed them Robert's drivers license to have the date corrected but they need to see his birth certificate since he was not born in this state so he'll have to take care of that tomorrow. If only our attorney had asked us to look over the form before she had it notarized.
We got home and I finished making my peanut butter buckeyes and chocolate covered cherries. I've got about eight dozen homemade chocolate chip cookies I'm giving away too. I think I will make peppermint bark again and rice crispy treats to take to work. Well, I better go hunt down Robert's birth certificate and get dinner started. What a great day today was......

Our new baby!

Bailey got a haircut and he doesn't even look the same anymore. It's almost like we have a whole new dog.

Founders Day Parade

This morning Robert and I took Skylar to see her first parade. We bundled her up, put her in the stroller and walked out to the front of the subdivision and set up a couple of chairs and got out a blanket and prepared to watch the Johns Creek 2nd Annual Founders Day Parade. Our neighbor Marissa from down in the culdesac set up her chair next to ours and a little while later Tina came out with Joey, Josh, Jack and Moriah and hung out with us. It was freezing out there at a very nice 30 degrees! Here are some pictures of us at the parade.


Santa Clause took time out of his busy schedule to appear.

The guys from Medieval Times came out and rode in the parade.

Daddy and his bundled bunny.

Josh and Moriah waiting for the parade to start.

Momma and her peanut baby. Oh look! It's the Oscar Meyer Weiner car!

The Mayor of Johns Creek. The dude driving...not the horse.

Moriah, Josh, Jack & Joey. Watching the parade and waiting for them to start throwing candy.

Me and my Herbie.

Robert and our neighbor, Tina.

Skylar's daddy - waiting to see Santa in the parade.

Snow Flurries!!!

Yesterday we actually got snow flurries throughout the day. Having it snow so early in December gives me hope that there's always the possibilty of us having a semi-sort of "White Christmas" and that would be totally cool if I could tell my daughter the story of how we had snow for her first Christmas. It would be nice if we got snow like we did last January. I posted a couple of videos from that time on our family video page.....link to the left of this page~~~>

Turkey Day 2008

I'm a day late posting but we just got home.

Yesterday we went to the North Georgia mountains to Robert's parents for dinner. The turkey was SO delicious! I only had a slice and a half...now I wish I had eaten a little more. Mom's dressing and rolls and pecan pie were good. I tried green bean casserole for the first time too...it was pretty good. A lot better than I thought it would be. All these years I have never bothered trying it because I was afraid I wouldn't like it but I did. My corn casserole was yummy and my cheesecake was too. Or at least everyone else thought so. Because it had pumpkin in it the consistancy of the cheesecake wasn't the same as what I am used and it didn't taste cheesecakey enough so it definitely was not one of my favorites.

I went to bed last night just after 6:00pm. I was freezing cold and felt fevery so I crawled into the bed with my clothes on and three blankets on me with the intentions of just getting warmed up but I never got up because I was too comfortable. I got up at 5:00am and heated a bottle and made Robert go outside with me to let the dogs out. He went out into the yard with them and I stood bare-footed on the back porch which was covered with ice crystals. Needless to say I was freezing once again. A hot shower warmed me up but it was temporary....the cold set back into my bones 15-minutes later. It had to have been me because I was the only one that was cold. Maybe I need to boost my iron.


On the way home we stopped at Wal Mart and braved the Black Friday crowds. All we bought was a bumbo seat for Skylar, some wipes and a couple of cans of formula. We can't afford to buy anything for Christmas this year...especially for each other. The baby will have a couple of toys to open that we bought her a couple of months ago. I'm feeling sort of lazy and not sure if I want to put forth the effort of putting up a tree but it's my daughter's first Christmas. I know she won't remember it but I will and we want to have pictures for the record anyway.

Well, she's fussing so I've gotta go.....

Unfortunate change of plans

Our original plans for this Thanksgiving was to have dinner with my family at my cousin, Dave's house up in Chickamauga, Georgia. Since it is within a 30-minute drive of Lookout Mountain Robert and I were just going to get hotel reservations in Chattanooga, spend the day with the family and then go to Rock City's Enchanted Gardens of Light that evening. We decided that it would be too much to try and make the trip up and back home in one day and that spending the night would be the best idea. Naturally I wouldn't even think of asking my cousin to stay at his house and even if I had the nerve I wouldn't because his younger siblings probably have dibs on any of the extra rooms in his house. Then there's what to do with the dogs...I doubt they'd be welcome to run around the house and there's a great chance one of them (Bailey) would slip out when no one was looking. Well....that was what we WANTED to do but unfortunately our bank account is a dry hole and we don't have the money to stay in a hotel or go to Rock City. We don't even have the money to go buy the fixins for our own dinner either so we've decided to go Robert's parents house instead. It's only fair really since we spent Turkey Day with my family last year. I know that there are a lot of my family members who want to see Skylar for the first time and they will be disappointed because we're not going to attend but there will be other times to visit. I know that my dogs are welcome at Mom & Dad's and the house isn't too big to keep track of the three little ones. Plus we can stay the night for free and don't have to worry about paying for a hotel. And we always enjoy the time we spend up there so it'll all work out for the best. Skylar's first Thanksgiving will be spent with Momma, Daddy, Grandma, Peepaw & Aunt Carolyn & Uncle Richard. Uncle Richard is frying a turkey for us this year. It's supposed to be a clear day so hopefully he'll do it outside in the driveway and not in the garage. I'm looking forward to it because I have never had a deep fried turkey before. Yummy! Robert and I are taking my delicious corn casserole and homemade pumpkin cheesecake. Most everyone knows that I make the best dern cheescakes EVER...either because I've told them how good they are or because they have been lucky enough to actually taste them. I've never made a pumpkin cheesecake before so I hope this one comes out good. I may garnish it with whipped cream and sugared pecans...not sure yet because I'd have to sugar the pecans myself and I know I won't have time to do that. As it is I will only be able to get the cheesecake made tonight if Robert keeps the Peanut busy so I can monkey around in the kitchen. It really wouldn't take too much more effort for me to bake two of them. Maybe I will make a chocolate one with Heath bar crumbles on the top. I know that one would be really good. Wow....I am totally making myself hungry so I need to stop talking about food. Next year I am hoping to have Turkey Day dinner at my house. That is unless it's going to snow in Blairsville and that's where I'll be!

Speaking of snow.....it's supposed to snow on Monday up at Mom & Dad's. This totally sucks because I won't be there Monday...just Thursday and Friday. I'm kinda bummed that we won't be able to go out and take advantage of all the Black Friday sales this year. Being poor is awful. I know that God will provide and meet our needs as long as we don't blow our money on things we really don't need. I just can't see Him blessing us financially if we blow our money on things we have no business buying. I'm not looking forward to my paychecks being cut by $150 every two weeks starting in January. Our insurance for Robert, myself and the baby is going to cost us $300 a month but that will be medical, dental and life insurance. The good thing is that our co-pay for the urgent care clinic that's right next to our subdivision is only $25 so we can go there when we get sick. I have to find us a new physician as the one we had decided that he wanted to dump his practice and open a "consierge type" practice where you can get same day or next day appointments. He sent out a letter saying that he was extending the invitation to be a part of his new practice to his existing patients and only had room for 500 patients and that if we wanted to be a part of it we would have to pay $1800 a year to be a member. Is he freaking out of his mind? That is a man that is all about the money....not about his patient's care. That gives him an extra $900,000 a year on top of all the co-pays he collects and what the insurance companies pay him. So what that I'd have access to him 24/7 via e-mail or phone! That would be $150 extra a month (just for one of us) on top of our insurence premiums and co-pays for medical care we wouldn't even be using every single day. If I was sick and at the doctor's office several times a month it might be worth it but to pay $1800 to see him twice a year....Matthew J. Britton is out of his freaking mind! Yeah, I just put his name out there. Maybe if that pompous fathead GOOGLES himself he'll find some people like me out there who are really ticked off at him. All of his patients couldn't have been rich Alpharetta/Johns Creek snobs. There have to be regular shmos out there like me.

Okay....I guess I'll get off my soap box now and hush for the day. Here's a recent video I took of the Peanut. Enjoy!

How in the world is it physically possible?

Can someone please tell me how a tiny baby has enough force in her tail pipe to shoot poop from her heiny-hole to her shoulders? Seriously! Is there an unseen little tube that comes out, points upward and just sprays all over the place like the jets at a car wash? When a baby is laying ON HER BACK and she has one of those nuclear fall-out poops does it seem possible for it to shoot up and over her bajingo, out the top of the diaper, whoosh over her belly button and spray her fat little baby boobies? You wouldn't think so but I swear, these are the type of poops my daughter has! And I can't believe that I am sitting here blogging about baby poops! Don't get me wrong.....I am extremely happy with my new life as a mother....over-joyed in fact. But I'm afraid if I don't make some "new mommy" friends that I can relate to soon I fear I may chase all my old ones away. They've all been there and done that and to them all the poopy diaper (and other) stories are just a memory while for me, this is the new world I live in.

I was thinking today at work (during that last hour stretch when I'm watching the clock) how much my life has changed. I never thought that the love of my life would be short, fat and bald. Well, at least she is for now anyway. I watch her change a little bit more every day and it makes me sad because I know she's going to grow up way too soon. Already she perks up and listens to me and turns toward me when she hears my voice. I get at least two or three smiles from her a day and she's almost holding her little bobble-head up all the time now. Before I know it she'll be begging for the keys to the car so she can meet her friends at the mall to shop and talk about boys. ::: sigh ::: Her daddy and I will be big basket-cases by then I'm sure.

Peanut got a bath today

This is not the first time that Skylar got a bath of course but this is the first time I've video-taped it and since it came out so good I thought I'd publish and share it with everyone.

Happy Halloween!

It seems to be the norm these days that my good intentions of keeping a blog just sort of fall by the wayside. This of course is not at all what I had intended. I originally was going to start blogging every day or so once the baby was born so I could keep a record of her progress and developement. Well, here she is....two months old and this is the first I have blogged about her. Man.....being a mommy is such hard work! It's exhausting too! Since she was born on September 7th, 2008 our lives have not been the same. Much of the time we feel so tired and frustrated and yet incredibley blessed at the same time that God brought such a sweet and beautiful angel into our lives to love forever and ever.

I did post this on another site a couple of weeks ago:

First honest-to-goodness smile! 10/14/08

Today, in the still quiet of the early morning hours I shared a beautiful moment with my five-week-old daughter. After her diaper change and before her bottle I sat here at my computer with her....holding her as she sat on the desk in front of me. As I told her how much I loved her and what an amazingly pretty baby she was she broke out with a huge grin for me from ear to ear. I know many people might argue the fact and say that she just had gas but I know that it was an honest-to-goodness smile for her Momma. Not only did that smile light her little angel face up like a Christmas tree once, but she did it twice in a row and I swear if she were capable of laughing she definitely would have. In that moment my eyes welled up with tears and made every single sleep-deprived hour I've had over the last five weeks suddenly and completely "worth it".

Of course now Skylar is throwing smiles our way all the time and still my heart does flip-flops when she does. Today was her very first Halloween and Momma got her all dressed up in her kitty cat outfit and put her black "BOO" hat on. She looked absolutely adorable I think! Next year we may take her Trick-Or-Treating....not for the candy but just to show her off to everyone. We were supposed to go to Kathy and Frank's Halloween party tonight and we did show up early before Robert went to work (like Kathy told him to) and she was nowhere near ready and asked us to come back . Well, after we came home and she had her bottle and I got a chance to sit down for a while I decided that my little Peanut and I would have a quiet evening at home together instead.