Glorious days on the Glory

Eammon, Maisie and I just returned from an absolutely wonderful week long cruise which included perfect weather, total rest and relaxation, obscene amounts of good food and lots of family time. This was the first cruise that any of us have been on and I think it was maybe two days into the cruise when Eammon and I were already discussing when we would be taking our next one.

The day before our cruise we drove down to Florida and spent a night with my parents. Maisie was spoiled with numerous gifts & treats and the two people who brought her got a good dinner and a bed but we know who rates in Grandma & Grandpa's eyes! The following morning we drove to the port and Maisie spent the entire drive playing her new Kai-lan Leapster game that my parents gave to her...So I guess we did get a gift too, an engaged, happy and quiet passenger.

Our trip was absolutely perfect as we couldn't have asked for better weather, better service or a more relaxing trip. It was so nice being totally disconnected, no phone, no Internet and I didn't even watch television. Our ports of call included Cozumel, Belize, Costa Maya & Nassau and I hope to one day make it back to all of them...well maybe not Nassau...but definitely Belize. Eammon and I were interested in doing a canopy zip-line excursion which included five zip-lines and two repels but I didn't feel secure in leaving Maisie on board ship at the camp for six+ hours so we opted not to do it but next time it is first on our list. In Belize Eammon went scuba diving for the first time and loved it. Most mornings Maisie went to camp after breakfast and then we picked her up so that we could have lunch together, then a nap and our afternoons were spent together in the pool which was Maisie's favorite part of the trip. Another favorite part of the trip for Maisie was returning to our cabin after dinner to see the towel creation and get the chocolates that our cabin steward Fery had left for us. Once we left Port Canaveral, other than taking a nightly piccie of Maisie and the towel creation I didn't pull out my camera so this is about it for pictures. There were two formal dinner nights but Maisie and I enjoyed dressing-up pretty each night and Maisie loved helping me zip up my dresses and picking out and putting on my jewelery, she's such a girly-girl. I think one of my favorite parts of the trip was that every time we left the cabin we'd return to a straightened up bed and a clean bathroom stocked with only fresh towels and big fluffy robes. For Eammon the relaxation, time away from work and the exhilaration of his first dive had to be the highlights.

We had a really easy 9 hour drive home thanks in part to an early birthday gift for Maisie which my parents had given to me, to give to her for the drive home, another Leapster game, Disney Fairies. Maisie loves this game too and played on and off almost the entire ride. It's good to be home, rain and all and back to our usual schedule but trust me, I'm already looking at deals and options for our next cruise.

We of course have a busy week ahead and I have to prepare for Maisie's birthday and party this coming Saturday. Can you believe that my little baby will be four, where has the time gone, she's such a big girl now!!

Swing of life

I've been so neglectful in posting to my blogs and my only excuse is that life has gotten in the way and when the day finally winds down I just haven't had it in me to sit down and write a post. Nothing bad, all is good, we're just busy with life and life with a busy almost 4 year old is extra hectic. For now just a quick bullet post.

* We're heading off for a week-long Western Caribbean cruise and hopefully when we return I'll have lots of wonderful pictures and the motivation and time to resume more regular posting.

* In 16 days Maisie will turn four!! Oh my gosh, how did she get so old and where has the time gone? Maisie's excited for her birthday party which is being held at her favorite place in the world, her gym. I love parties at the gym, no clean-up for me before or after and a very tired little girl at the end of the party.

* I have a shiny new laptop, woohoo! Eammon hasn't loaded my camera software onto the new computer yet so I still have to use the old clunker if I want to add pictures. This too may be part of why I haven't posted because in my mind, every post needs a picture.

* Maisie loves, loves, loves school and the teacher reports and her papers thus far have all been good. Her first report card will be sent home the middle of this month, it should be interesting to see what it says.

* Maisie has learned to snap her fingers and loves showing me her new found talent hundreds of times each day.

* Maisie adores recess and the swings. She has no difficulty getting herself up onto the swings, even the high ones which on her are chest high. She no longer needs anyone to push her as she'll let you know, because she's a big girl who knows how to pump and pump she does, getting herself higher than I care for her to swing.

* Sleep is still a major issue as Maisie just doesn't want to sleep in her own bed all night and wakes anywhere between 10PM and 1am crying that she wants to sleep with me. No matter what I try she will not go back to sleep in her own bed so in with me she climbs so that we both can get some sleep. She's also been super clingy and attached to me lately so maybe this is all part of the same thing. I'm just giving her all the attention she craves and hopefully whatever is going on with her will pass. Honestly though I'm not sure how she functions most day as she averages about 10 hours of interrupted sleep a day. Is that really enough? Readers, how long do your children sleep?

* Eammon continues to work crazy hours arriving home most nights after 8 or 9PM so a week with no work, computer, phone or responsibilities will be a welcome change.

* Well I need to finish packing so posts and piccies when we return. Have a great week.

Rain...yet again!

It is dark, gray and pissing down with rain and I am SO over it now and ready for the sunshine again. Luckily our lake level was back to a high normal level and it doesn't appear that there will be any flooding for us and I can only hope that the other water-logged and previously flooded areas fare well. I am so looking forward to our cruise and thankfully in just a week we'll be sailing around the Caribbean with what I hope will be gorgeous sunny weather.

Friday I decided that Maisie needed a haircut before our trip so we paid a visit to Miss Tina and now Maisie's hair is adorable and cut perfectly! Tina is a fabulous hairdresser and a very precise cutter and in fact I've been planning on switching to her at the adult salon where she also works but I just haven't gotten around to scheduling an appointment so while we were at the kid's salon I decided to have Tina cut my hair too and she did a great job. Even though it's a kids salon there are many Moms and Dads that while there, get their hair cut too and yesterday I was one of them. Thankfully they have real salon chairs too and I didn't have to squeeze myself into one of the airplane, taxi cab, police car or fire engine chairs as that would have been quite the sight!

Friday afternoon K & A came over to play for a bit and since it was rainy and cool out I decided we needed to make brownies from scratch. All three kids had fun adding ingredients to the bowl and taking their turn at stirring everything together. The afternoon play date turned into a super long play time thanks to K & A's Dad being out at a concert for the evening and Eammon being gone for the weekend at the Petit Le Mans. K & A's Mom and I raided and combined what we had in our refrigerators and came up with an tasty, easy and loved by all dinner followed by the kids brownies. We then hung out until well past all the kids bedtimes with Anne and I chatting whilst watching the children play. After everyone left it took Maisie a while to calm down and she finally fell asleep around 10:30PM.

After such a late night my girl slept in a bit not waking until a little past 7am, which for her is a late morning. Our morning included more play time with K & A and then Maisie, K and I were off to the gym as there was a competition and Maisie and the other girls on the Jr. Pre-team were doing a performance. It was fun watching part of the competition and K enjoyed watching Maisie perform and the big girls too. I'm a little bummed because my camera didn't work properly so my video didn't come out and I didn't even get a decent picture of all the girls but trust me, they all looked adorable and did a great job.

Since Eammon is at the racetrack until sometime tomorrow, tonight Maisie and I are dining at K & A's and all I was asked to bring were some brownies, so an easy night for me and I know we'll have a good time as we always do. My big project for the weekend is to get everything we're taking on the cruise washed and packed and I'm halfway there as everything is washed, so off to a good start. Tomorrow it's supposed to rain again but Maisie and I have nothing planned so it will give me the time to get everything packed. After tomorrow we should be rain free until next weekend, woohoo!!

Maisie & Jonathan

After two days off from school Maisie was itching to return and why...well to see Jonathan of course. As you can see from the piccies, this morning they were both happy to see one another and they were just too cute together! When I picked Maisie up from school she told me "I had a perfect, perfect, perfect most excellent day. I didn't eat my sandwich because I didn't like it and Jonathan was so funny...Jonathan said...Jonathan tickled me...Jonathan played with me..." Watch out Baba, Maisie has a cute young guy that currently occupies her thoughts.

High & Dry...Thankfully!

Thankfully our lake never got much higher than what the pictures in my last post show and for us, by continually keeping the drain at the front of our house raked out and cleared of the build-up of mud, silt & debris, we averted any and all flooding in our home. Our neighbor's wayward detached and floating dock was rescued by a couple of guys and is now tethered to the owner's property. The wood is so waterlogged though the dock seems to be slowly sinking so who knows if it can be saved.

Along the east & west sides of our property we have water inlets to the pond which both turned into raging rivers. Along the east side of our property, as well as the neighbors yards along that side, we all had a lot of soil wash away which greatly widened the inlet. Once the water subsided a little sandbar appeared which was ceremoniously claimed by two of the neighborhood boys. When the water was at its highest it was up to and beyond our neighbor's fences so it's amazing how far the lake level came up and also how much it has dropped already.

Thankfully the predicted additional week of rain hasn't happened as we've had two days of sun or just overcast weather allowing lake and stream levels to subside and water to drain out of flooded areas. So many of our neighbors and friends weren't as lucky as us and took in water so their clean-up will continue for some time.

Yesterday and today all the schools have been closed as our county had almost 200 road closures due to flooding, mudslides or being washed away. Currently there are still 39 roads closed but thankfully for me, they're not roads that I need to travel. Maisie and I enjoyed our two days off doing a little of her school work, some arts & crafts, we played games and did puzzles together and today we ran some errands, did a little shopping and enjoyed a girls lunch out. In addition Maisie has loved that her friends K & A have been home too allowing them time to play together much more than what they generally get to during the week.

Thank you to everyone for your concern, prayers, good thoughts, comments, emails and phone calls, they were all very much appreciated.

Flooding and a floating dock

Yesterday the pond in our back yard exceeded the 100 year flood plain and was scaring me as to how high the water came up into our backyard. Out of the six docks on our lake, only our dock and one other high one were still above the water, barely!! There was one dock, chairs and all, floating in the middle of the pond! Scary too is that we're on the high side of the lake at the far end from the dam and there are houses on that far side which from my first level I look into their second level, I hope that they didn't flood.

Picking Maisie up from school I had to do multiple detours as roads were being closed right and left due to flooding, mudslides or being completely washed away. Some school districts had canceled school because of the flooding and power outages and our county did an early release for the later students and canceled all after school activities. Maisie's ballet teacher called to cancel her class which was good because I wasn't venturing out again as it was just too dangerous. Eammon headed home early to help clear out some flooding that we were having in the front of our house which without intervention would flood our home. We're in for another full week of rain, I can't believe it, crazy I tell you, crazy!!

Princess friends

Sunday afternoon Kathy, Matt & Chani and Lisa, Doug & Briana joined us for what was to be a BBQ and little girl swim date but because of our never ending torrential rain it turned into an inside dinner and Princess play time. It was a fun evening with the little Princesses running around, giggling, and having a great time playing with one another while the boys were playing, shouting and giggling like 5 year olds as they played with the Wii allowing Lisa, Kathy and I to sit and chat while loving the sound of our little Princesses having so much fun.

It just amazes me how grown up the girls are now, the way they play together and how oh-so-independent they have become. It seems like just a short while ago I would have spent the entire evening coaxing Maisie to eat or to play with her friends, reprimanding her or holding her and being very hands on but now she's so grown up, I'm happy but a wee but sad too.

My little girl isn't totally grown up yet, come bedtime she wants to sleep with her Mama, snuggled close. Maisie's been having a bout of major night terrors which usually happen around 1am and keep us up for 1 to 3 hours before she's able to settle back down and sleep again. Then we're both exhausted and with our busy days it just wasn't working. The terrors only happen when she sleeps alone so to allow us both to get some decent nights rest, she's been sleeping with me. She begrudgingly starts the night in her bed but around 11PM-12am she wakes up startled and crying like she's had a bad dream and at that point she'll come and get into my bed. If I just go in to her, get her calmed down and back to sleep I'm almost 100% guaranteed that within two hours she'll have full blown night terrors and the night will be shot.

We do this routine on school nights to allow for us to sleep but on the weekends, that's when we work on trying to get her to sleep all night in her bed. Because she sleeps with me so much at home and always when we travel, I don't want her to also have the pattern of me sleeping in her bed with her as that would be one more habit that we'd have to break so on non-school/work nights Eammon is the one who will go in and lay with her, calm her and help her make it though the night without Mama and terror free. I will say that I do love sleeping with Maisie but I do think she needs to be able to sleep in her own room and I know that Eammon would love to be able to sleep full nights, every night in our bed and hopefully one night soon that will happen. For now though, sleep and the absence of night terrors is our main priority.

Three Word Sunday*

Despite the constant rain, we've had a nice weekend but since it's late already and I'm ready for bed, I'm just going to post my Three-Word-Sunday* piccie and call it a night. See the post below for an explanation of this picture.

Hopefully I got some cute pictures today of Maisie and her friends which I'll post tomorrow. Have a great night!

*Sum up your week in three little words. You can sing it, you can say it, you can write it, you can draw it. It can be funny or sad or poignant as long as it’s honest. Check out Pug Mama's blog later in the week to see her video of all the participant's pictures.

Ten years

Wednesday marked Eammon and my 10 year wedding Anniversary, ten years, holy cannoli!! On Wednesday we had a nice dinner at home, exchanged cards, shared some fancy chocolates that Eammon purchased and Eammon let me know that he ordered a new laptop to replace my ever failing and soon to become Maisie's laptop. Because of weekday busyness we decided to hold off on going out and celebrating until the weekend so tonight Eammon, Maisie and I got dressed up and went out for a fancy dinner. Maisie was very well behaved and the food was delish, a nice way to celebrate and spend an evening.

You may notice that in the picture above I'm wearing the exact same outfit, dress, shoes & jewelery that I wore when we married. I've had the dress & shoes put away for 10 years and last week I pulled everything out, got the dress cleaned and tonight it was fun to wear it all again. Maybe I'll put it away again and pull it out for another big Anniversary. Ten years together, can't wait to see what the next ten bring, kisses!

Jonathan

Jonathan said..., Jonathan did... Jonathan was... Jonathan, Jonathan, Jonathan. Maisie favorite topic of conversation lately revolves around all things Jonathan and it's the first thing I hear about when I pick her up from school and on any given day I'll hear his name no less than two dozen times. Jonathan sits next to Maisie at school and is a sweet little boy who Maisie just adores and thankfully, he really likes Maisie too. They are so sweet together and have fun being together at school, just too stinkin' cute!

Make-up fun

Maisie is such a girly-girl and loves anything and everything sparkly and if it's pink and sparkly, all that much better. So for her, what could be more fun than to have a mirror and a full palette of pink sparkly make-up to make herself in her words, "even more sparkly pink and beautiful!" I'm telling you Maisie spent about 40 minutes completely engaged, putting on different eye shadows, trying out the different colors, deciding that the powdered eye shadow did nothing for her eyelids but loved it on her cheeks and in the end, that hot pink glittered eye shadow was the bomb.

Maisie thought she was the most beautiful girl in the world and though I wholeheartedly agree I have to question the glittered uni brow look and powdered cheeks, I definitely prefer her au natural.

Once she had her face looking exactly how she wanted she decided that it was time for a snack and some playtime with her Leapster. She decided to climb into a box and make herself comfortable with her cup of grapes and game and there she played for almost an hour!!

Maisie's at such a great age, is so much fun, has such personality and spunk and I just love being with her and watching the fun and quirky things she chooses to do.

Bubble Wrap Wrestling & Computer He!!

I've been having major computer problems which has kept me off line and away from my blogs but hopefully Eammon will get things sorted and I'll be able to start posting again. Life has been busy and fun as usual. I did want to participate in three-word-Sunday so I'm attempting a post from my phone and we'll see how it goes.

Eammon brought home some huge sheets of bubble wrap and he and Maisie had a blast wrapping themselves in it and wrestling around, popping noisily and giggling. Yep we lead a highbrow life, first haircuts in the driveway and now bubble wrap wrestling, we know how to live!

Sent from my iPhone

Three little barbers

Eammon is really particular when it comes to his haircuts so he only goes to the best barber shop in town and of course has a team of barbers to keep his look top notch. His favorite barber shop is close to home (our driveway) and hey it includes a lovely water view. His top three barbers Maisie, K & A all worked together to give Eammon a new buzz cut. They all had fun and Eammon was a good sport allowing them each an opportunity to cut his hair even if a wee bit of pain was involved. After the children finished I trimmed everything up so that when Eammon returns to work tomorrow his hair won't look like someone trimmed it with garden shears.

We had a nice laid-back day with children playing in the cul-de-sac and the parents hanging out and chatting. Maisie also had a blast riding her bike on the chalk roads that Eammon drew on the driveway. overall it was fun having a long weekend together, being at home enjoying perfect weather and each other, fun times!

Hopscotch on steroids.


'A' making the hula hoop look easy-peasy.


'K' putting on the moves and grooving it.


Maisie using the big hoop.

1,000 days

Today we celebrated being a family for 1,000 days! I don't seem to remember a time before Maisie as it feels like she's always been with us. I love her more than words can say and can't imagine her not being part of our lives. Maisie has grown from a timid & scared little baby into a loving, smart, daredevil, athletic, self-confident, vibrant, funny and strong-willed little girl. Someone at CCAA knew what they were doing when they matched her sweet cue-ball cutie picture with our dossier as she's the perfect little girl for our family.

Below are just a few then and now piccies of us and our precious little Maisie Miao Miao. The last picture is an early posting for Three-Word-Sunday*.







*Sum up your week in three little words. You can sing it, you can say it, you can write it, you can draw it. It can be funny or sad or poignant as long as it’s honest. Check out Pug Mama's blog later in the week to see her video of all the participant's pictures.

Dueling cameras

Okay so not exactly, more like sharing the iPhone taking pictures of one another and killing time while waiting for the slowest restaurant in the world to serve lunch. Maisie was into making silly faces and being funny but when it was her turn to take pictures of me, she never felt it necessary to include my entire face or head. I'm not saying she isn't a good photographer, I say she's being artistic so don't mind my decapitated head.

On Fridays I try to have some special Mom & Maisie time so before her swim lesson she and I go out for a girls lunch. Today it was absolutely gorgeous, sunny and warm with very low humidity, a perfect day to sit outside and enjoy the weather. Since we were already out and about I though of going to a little cafe which I had been to once before as it was in the area. The first time I went to this cafe the food was tasty and it was nice but today it definitely was not a great choice and it had nothing to do with Maisie as she was well behaved, patient and a little lady. The wait and the food though, that was another story. In a mostly empty restaurant it took forty minutes from the time we ordered until lunch was served and then most of it came out way overcooked to the point of crunchy with the sides which should have been served hot, well...barely warm. Maisie did eat a good part of her meal but I passed on mine because it was just beyond bad and by then I honestly didn't have the time or patience to wait for another meal to be prepared. Then as Maisie was drinking her water the glass slipped right through her hands and shattered on the bricks below us, great, but at least we were outside. So I gave her my water which a few minutes later she somehow accidentally managed to knock over adding more water to the ground below...doesn't it sound like this outing was getting better and better??

Thankfully the second glass didn't break and also I was thankful that we were just about finished and ready to leave. Then the manager came over and made the experience end on a more positive note as she had "taken care" of the bill she said because of the wait and the poorly prepared food and then asked us to pick out a dessert which we could take home.

It's now early Friday evening and Eammon actually got home from work early so we shared an early dinner together of some leftovers from the week and then we all enjoyed the chocolate hazelnut cake slice that Maisie picked out.

Tomorrow is a special day for us and we're going out to celebrate. It should be fun and hopefully I'll get a decent piccie or two. So, y'all come back now ya hear!