Halfway there!

Yep! I'm 45 years old today and since I've always thought 90 would be a good "final" age, today is my halfway point. Good God, how did I ever get this old? I still feel like that 21 year old scared small-town girl who packed up all her belongings in her 1984 black Dodge Shadow and drove halfway cross country to try to figure out what I wanted to do with my life. I made it in the "big city" -- spent years creating a life. Over the last 20+ years I've worked hard, made friends, gone to school, done some traveling, learned what love is, experienced loss, come to really realize the importance of family, gotten married, had a baby and created a family. Whew, I've been busy! I feel so fortunate to have had these first 45 years and I'm looking forward to the next 45! Happy Birthday to Me!

Happy Holidays!

A very proud builder of his first gingerbread house! Notice the halloween pumpkin in the background -- a little holiday confusion at the Bailey house? Have a great weekend.

Holiday Preparations

Well, Thanksgiving was a blur but we had a very nice one. Christian was really into the whole "first Thanksgiving story" this year from reading books at school about it. And, he loves the fact that he is an Indian and not a pilgrim. Truely, he is a card carrying member of the Chippewa tribe as am I, but that's a whole other story. I knew when I bought this Indian costume at the Goodwill store a while back it would come in handy! I'll let the video speak for itself. It's a bit long by blog standards but very cute!

And although I'm sure Christian had a great time visiting with all his family at our Thanksgiving celebration I am pretty certain he was most excited about seeing his cousins Connor and Josh. He loves hanging out with them and they are so good about being tolerant of his youth, exuberance and excitablity. They are the closest things he's got to brothers and he loves them.

Now its all about getting ready for Christmas! Almost all the shopping is done which I'm very happy about. The cards have been mailed, the tree has been decorated and the stockings have been hung.

Our little tree

Stockings to be filled

The reason for the season

Even Gordon's getting excited

We're taking our annual drive through the Lights on the Bay display this weekend. And next weekend I'll try to get some wrapping done and start my annual baking. So far the holiday season is off to a great start. I know the economy is not so great and we certainly couldn't spend as much money as we've done in the past but we have so many other things to be thankful for. I'm going to try to get another blog in before the 25th but if for some reason I don't, Happy Holidays everyone!

Fall leaves and then some...

To all those people who say they love living in the Northern Virginia area because you get to experience all four seasons, I say, "wanna come to my house and help rake leaves"????? OMG, they are out of control. It seems like we've been raking non-stop for the last two weeks and we've just finally made a serious dent. I didn't think they were ever going to end and we actually quit counting at 100 bags full. And, I'm sad to say that there are still some left on the trees. We have them piled up along our fenceline and behind the screen porch not to mention the 20+ bags out in front of the house along the curb waiting for this Wednesday's pick up.

But for Christian and his buddy J.R. who lives across the street, they were a blast to play in! A few more years though and Christian won't think they're nearly as much fun when he becomes part of the clean up crew!

All I've got to say now is "think snow". I'll take a few hours of shoveling over days and days of raking any time.

Future Olympian!

Future Michael Phelps???? Never say never and a mommy can dream can't she? This kid sure does like the water and even practices his strokes and holding his breath under water when he's taking his bath. Shane snapped this picture of him last night.

He loves his swimming class and got to be the coach's helper this past Saturday demonstrating for the new kids the strokes they were going to practice. He thought that was pretty cool.

Everybody into the pool!

Happy Halloween!

Last night was pumpkin carving night at our house. Christian did most of the "goo scooping" and then I carved the face to his specifications. He was adamant that we have a vampire pumpkin this year with fangs.

He was very happy with the finished product and he's uber excited to go to the neighbor's Halloween party tonight and then on to trick-or-treating. Looks like we're going to have decent weather too -- I'm very happy about that.

I also had to include this picture I took of Christian with his friend Will at a neighborhood Halloween festival we went to on Sunday. Christian knew exactly who this guy was when he saw him since they've been learning all about the election at school. And even thought Christian says he is voting for Barack Obama he still wanted to get his picture taken with John McCain. So, no matter who you decide to vote for, you still have to admit this picture is pretty funny!

Have a great Halloween and a great weekend!

School Picture Day!

Remember when you were a kid how excited you were for school picture day? Well, today is the day for Christian and he was ready and raring to go this morning. He didn't want to eat breakfast or even watch any cartoons. He just wanted to get dressed and get to school.

Last night we got all his clothes ready. I let him choose his own shirt, tie and belt. He was so proud of his handsome self! This kid loves to wear a shirt and tie! Shane kids him and calls him Alex P. Keaton!

I'm sure it won't last forever. Soon he'll be wearing ripped up baggy old jeans and a t-shirt and wanting to let his hair grow -- I'm just going to enjoy this phase while it lasts.

Happy Friday -- have a great weekend! :0)

Busy Weekend!

It's hard to believe my first blog was almost a year ago and it was all about our day at Cox's Farm. We made our annual trek there again this past Saturday and it was a blast as usual. We've been going there with Christian since he was two years old and we always look forward to it. This year they added a new corn maze called the "Kornundrum" and it was Christian's favorite thing this time. We walked through it no less than five times!!! It's a great place to visit so if you get the chance to go I highly recommend it. They have tons to do and see -- we were there for over five hours!!!!! I'll let the pictures and videos do the talking....

Scary Monster!

Farmer Brown

Family Picture

Hatching

King of the hill

The Hayride

Hanging with the corn cob in the Kornundrum

Milking a cow

Riding a horse

Welcome Baby Ella!

Shane's niece Crystal and her husband Todd had their first child a few weeks ago -- a beautiful baby girl named Ella Marie. We finally got to meet her this past Sunday at a small get together at Shane's folk's house. Christian loved her. He wanted to hold her and touch her and watch her while she was sleeping. What is it about little kids being so drawn to babies? Even when we're out and about somewhere -- if he sees a baby he makes a beeline for it and asks, "can I look at your baby?" I know, I know, maybe we should have given him a sibling but alas it is much too late for that now. He'll just have to enjoy his cousins!

Captain Bailey!

We were on vacation the last two weeks of August. We went to Michigan for a week and visited with my family. One of the highlights of the trip was Christian getting to go into the cockpit of our airplane and sit in the Captain's seat and wear his hat. That's a pretty big deal when you're five and he loved it!

We had a great time in Michigan and for the most part had some pretty great weather. We spent several afternoon's at Aunt Mikki's pool and for the first time Christian swam without "swimmies".

We also spent a day on Mackinaw Island. Our weather was perfect. We took the ferry over at about 10:00 a.m. and the first thing we did was visit Fort Mackinaw. It's a really neat place so if you ever get the opportunity to visit you should. We had a picnic lunch in the park afterwards and then just walked around the island a bit before taking the ferry back to our car.

Riding on the ferry boat to the Island

Hanging out the soldiers

Learning about the rifles

The cannon was really loud!

Dressed like a little soldier

Another highlight of the trip was the bonfire at my brother Ted's place. Christian loved the bonfire because he got to play with his cousin Connor, roast marshmallows and eat smores and ride on Uncle Ted's 4-wheeler. I'm really disappointed in myself that I didn't take more pictures, especially since all of my siblings were there and it would have been great to get a picture of all of us together. I guess I was just having too much fun sitting around the fire and gabbing to think about getting the camera out.

Christian and Connor playing with their cowboy pistols

I did get a picture of the old high school gang when they stopped by my mom's to visit before we left. It's hard to believe we were ever in our teens and in high school but not hard to believe we're still friends. There's just something about growing up in a small town.

Julie, me, Mindy and Donna

We all loved visiting our Michigan family and like always, the time went by way too fast. Christian did not want to leave and can't wait to go back. He really wants to go in the winter so he can play in the snow so we may have to plan a Christmas visit soon.

Now, summer is over and school started back yesterday. We're looking forward to fall and all the fun it brings -- Cox's Farm, pumpkin carving, Halloween, raking leaves (not sure how fun that is!) -- hope your summer was as fun as ours.

Visit from the Tooth Fairy!

Christian lost his first tooth yesterday while he was at school! And, it happened to be the very first tooth he got when he was 4 months old! He was so excited about it and actually anxious to go to bed last night so he could put it under his pillow for the Tooth Fairy. She arrived without fail and he found $2 under his pillow this morning.

Arrrrrrgh!

On Sunday we took Christian on a Pirate Adventure and he had a blast. It's located in Annapolis, MD so it's not too far away. It was most definitely worth the trip. The kid's get to dress up in pirate gear and go for a ride on a "pirate ship" on the Chesapeake Bay in search of sunken treasure. Here are some of the pictures.

Summertime and The Living is Easy!

A 10 ft. inflatable pool with filter - $45.99

Chemicals to keep the water clean all summer - $28.79
Miscellanious pool supplies including skimmer and vacuum - $69.99

And grass seed to use in the fall to re-grow the grass in the dead patch where the pool was - $19.95

Watching Christian cannonball and play in it all summer - Priceless!!!!

We bought this pool the second week of June because Christian was going to be off school for a week and I was going to be home with him. The weather report for the week was calling for extremely hot (90 degrees +) and humid conditions. I knew I'd go crazy being cooped up in the house with him all week and I also knew I'd be miserable if we had to be outside in that nasty heat all day long so Shane and I thought it would be worth the investment to get this little pool. We figured that even if we only used it that one week it would be worth it! Well, we used it that week and we've been using it consistently ever since. Shane and I even get in it! It's actually fairly easy to maintain and keep clean and the filter does a pretty good job although it's pretty slow. But, if we know we're going to use it in the evening when we get home we just turn it on in the morning before we leave and it is ready to go when we get home. Christian has even had a few pool playdates and everyone seems to have a blast. Cowabunga Dude!