Reminiscencing..........

This past weekend I was able to visit one of my old girlfriends, Melissa. We met our freshman year of high school and were the best of friends by our sophomore year. She was my partner in crime during high school... man that girl got me in some trouble.

I like to say that I was very innocent coming to 9th grade from junior high. Heck, I was in the band in middle school, I took homemaking classes and I was on the freakin history team. (by the way....I hate history courses!) I had never drank or smoked and I had only kissed one boy, my true love...Jeff.

My freshman year I got exposed to all new people from different middle schools and they were crazy partiers!! I ended up quitting the band and joining the drill team full time, me and Jeff broke up, and I was a crazy party girl right along with Melissa and all of her friends. We had so much fun. I loved spending time with all of them. My parents couldn't get over how "social" I was and all the friends that came and went in our house. (My brother was more subdued and had just a few close CALM friends.) In their eyes I was their "wild" child.

Anyway, Melissa met Robert our sophomore year and they were inseparable (he was 2 grades ahead of us). Once he graduated, he joined the Marine corp and they continued to date. It was hard for them, but they were really serious.

Fast forward to the future......Melissa and Robert have been married for 15 years in September. Steve and I will be married for 14 on January 9th. Weird how we ended up BOTH marrying our high school sweethearts and we're still going strong.

We had such a good time visiting with them and their kids this past weekend. We've kept in touch via email throughout the years, but I hope we start doing more visits. They only live an hour and a half away!

Here's what 15 years will do to ya........(Melissa...I picked the picture that you were NOT chewing in).

Love you Missy! We had SUCH a good time visiting with all of you!

A GREAT Christmas

This year Christmas was very eventful. The boys kind of got what was going on. Brittney was the most excited that I've EVER seen her get about Christmas. Maybe because she REALLY wanted a Nintendo DS and Santa was able to deliver it to her.

Her friends are trying to tell her that Santa isn't real, but I told her that if she doesn't believe then she doesn't receive!! Heck, I still believe in Santa. It's just a magical time of year.

One of my favorite Christmas memories this year was playing Christmas songs in the living room and just dancing and acting silly with the kids. Cade is such a musical kid, I love to watch him move his head back and forth. He can easily pick up on the tunes. His favorite Christmas songs were Away In A Manger and Jingle Bells.

Jace loves music too! But his favorite thing to do this Christmas was to turn the tree lights on and off. He found the one button that controls the lights underneath the treeskirt about a week after we put it up. Since then, whenever they go down for a nap or to sleep for the night he has had to turn them off. Cade, of course, learned this from his brother.

I have too many pictures to post all of them so here's my slideshow.......... Hope everyone had a Merry Christmas! We were truly blessed this year! We didn't even need to exchange presents this year because we feel like we already have everything!

Christmas Cookie Time

The boys "helped" me make cookies this past weekend. Brittney was off having fun with her friend, Kaylee. They went to see Santa Claus 3, went to eat ice cream and then went shopping at Limited Too. Sounds like too much fun for her.

The boys liked rolling out the dough and using the star cookie cutter. Cade kept humming "Twinkle Twinkle Little Start" while he was cutting. It was pretty cute. Jace is definitely my child.......he was eating the dough right along with me. Cade wasn't crazy about it.

They REALLY liked decorating the cookies. Who wouldn't when there's icing and sprinkles to eat!!!???

Then Brittney and Kaylee came back from all their fun and helped us decorate the cookies. Granny stopped by too to babysit for a little while.

My little angel of a son Jace seems to have a problem with transition. I mean this to say that he can be totally fine one minute but when it's time to leave somewhere, change something, stop doing something ... whatever it is, he can't handle the change. After they had dumped the ENTIRE contents of the sprinkle containers on their cookies, I said that it was time to put the stuff away. I had let them go after it with everything, it wasn't like I was restricting what they wanted to put on the cookies. Jace ended up in the naughty chair (as usual) b/c he wasn't ready to stop.

Brittney never experienced the "terrible twos", she went insane at the age of 3. Temper tantrums, attitude, she even told me off in her own little way lots of times. We still laugh at the time that she was SO frustrated and she was stumbling for her words. All she could come up with to call me was a "um, um,.....you're a FREAKY CAT!" It was SO hard not to laugh at her as she was sent to her room for that one.

I think I'm getting a big taste of terrible two's right now. I know there's an end in sight though because I made it through being a freaky cat!! Whew....barely.

Thanks alot Lady!

Yesterday Santa was in our neighborhood! We had been told tales of hot cocoa and cookies with Santa. Also that they had a "sleigh" ride for the kids to ride down the street and throw candy to surrounding houses. Then you could get your picture with Santa!

So with only 15 minutes notice.....we headed out. We had JUST finished dinner so I didn't think it would be necessary to pack a full diaper bag. I figured the cookies they were going to have with Santa would pacify them so I brought along the staples........diapers, wipes and only one sippy cup (it's all I could find at the time of leaving).

When we arrived there, all we saw was a line to take pictures with Santa. So, we got in line. The line didn't really move that fast at all. We saw our friends and chatted a bit. They were in line ahead of us and had somewhere else to be and weren't going to step back in line to wait with us. I can't say I blame them (especially since his wife is 38 weeks pregnant).

They had run out of cookies and only had cheesecake bites and brownies with the hot cocoa. But at this point, I didn't care. We were there and we were going to get a better picture of our kids with Santa.

Well, Santa was a really good Santa. BUT Santa was a very chatty Santa!!! I think it's GREAT that he was spending such quality time with each child, but try waiting in that line for an hour and see how happy the Kearley boys are to meet this man. Brittney told him her wish of getting a Nintendo DS and he gave her a test to see if she was ready for a game like that. It was cute, but come on already....there's lots of screaming back here (and it wasn't just our kids). Here's Brittney chatting it up with Santa.

So, when we finally got into the gazebo where Santa was Jace was getting VERY impatient. So the nice lady assisting Santa came over to talk to him and handed him a candy cane. My boys have never had a candy cane so I thought why not give it a try. Jace loves candy and boy did he love that candy cane. Well, the nice lady picked a blue candy cane out of ALL the candy canes she had in her lovely little basket. Cade decided that he wanted to try it too.

With all of that introduction, I give you another Kearley Christmas picture............

What treasured memories we have of Santa this year. I really appreciate the lady who was handing out candy canes. I could hear other parents behind us saying "what's with all the blue stuff?" Steve politely said (b/c the lady was within ear shot) that we had been handed a candy cane BEFORE seeing Santa. You could hear a collective sigh and giggles. I'm sure we had the BEST picture of anyone there!

We had to come home and throw Mr. Cade into the bath to scrub off all of the blue.

So now we have 2 pictures with Santa - one of Jace screaming and one of Cade screaming. When I pointed that out to Brittney, she said "I am the only little angel in the family for BOTH pictures." I think that I have to agree this year. Gotta love her.

We're ready for Christmas

Today was Gingerbread House Day at Mother's Day Out! Everyone brought a candy to help decorate. I think they had a lot of fun!


By the way, I signed up to bring striped gum. You know the gum.....with the Zebra....the fruit striped gum?! Well, I sure do remember it as a kid, but apparently it's no where to be found around my house. I went to FOUR stores looking for it. I decided that the gingerbread houses would be just fine without it and opted to NOT make myself crazy!! We brought M&Ms and candy cane lollipops instead. Watch though, now that I'm NOT looking for it, I'll find it everywhere I go now.

I know Jace loved his. He has the sweet tooth of the boys. Cade wouldn't touch his.


Now when you ask Jace what Santa Claus says, he says this ..........


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Notice that Cade is still walking around with his binky. At least it keeps him quiet for now!

Almost there........

Two-thirds of the trio are feeling good. Jace sounds so much better. But now poor Cade just is not himself. This was the scene last night when I got home.......

I know he doesn't feel good because they NEVER fall asleep anywhere but their beds. Plus he was whiney and just wanted his binky all day. He napped for about an hour earlier in the day then fell asleep from 4:30 to 6:30.....THEN he was ready for bed at 8:00. He's from my school of thought ....When you're sick, sleep it OFF!

Then Brittney snapped some cute pictures of Steve and Jacey Poo. They love to wrestle and cuddle on the couch!

I was reading 1girland2boys and she was saying how hard it is to get this age group to pose for a decent picture. I have to agree with her. Mine are going through an awkward smile age and they're hands are always in their mouth b/c of their molars coming in, I guess.

Here's a few rejects of our Christmas card poses.........

Oops!....Jace is on the move.

Here they are actually eating the M&Ms that I was bribing them with for the picture.

Here's our final product. The next night I dressed everyone and headed outside.

I was happy with it because everyone was smiling......no one had their hands in their mouth and no one had their hands down their pants (ahem...Jace).

Merry Christmas from the Kearleys everyone!

On the Mend........I think

I think the boys are feeling a little bit better. They still aren't eating like they normally do, so I know that's a sign of not being 100% yet.

I snapped this picture Sunday morning.......they were chowing down on some cereal and each had their OWN box. They were very happy!

I forgot to mention about my new little songbird in the house. Brittney has been in choir this year at school. Her school was invited to sing out at Old Towne Spring which is a neat little shopping area by our house. It's made up of old little homes that have been converted into shops and around Christmas time it's very festive. They had a train ride with Santa, festive decorations and the choir filled the little town with sounds of Christmas. It was really neat and boy was it really COLD!!

Here's Brittney posing before the performance. She HATES the outfit. It's SO NOT her. She hates to tuck things in and she hates to wear a belt. BUT, I think it's adorable and she actually looks more her age in something like that. She's so grown-up in her fashion these days.

This is one of her choir friends Danielle.

Nana volunteered to stay at home with the boys since they were under the weather and Jace was still in the middle of his "pooping" marathon. But Granny (Steve's mom) and our cousin Ashlea, who is 5, made it out to the festivities. They went on the "train" ride and got stuck riding all over the shopping center. When we drove up to find them, we cracked up when we saw that Granny was actually IN the train with Ashlea.

The driver of the train said they couldn't get off until they made it to Santa Land and just kept feeding them popcorn. I guess to just shut them up. Brittney thought it was hilarious!

It was a nice getaway this weekend! I could've stayed and shopped all day, but I had to go back to reality!

Sickies and Santa

Well, we've been under the weather the last few days. I was waiting for the boys to get sick to tell you the truth. They typically have a 6 week cycle of sickness/wellness. We had made it approximately 3 months with nothing but feeling good and being relatively well behaved.

Thursday morning around 2:30, Jace woke up "barking" and just burning up! When I say burning up, I mean BURNING up. My ear thermometer gave me 3 readings of over 105!!!!!!! 105.2, 105.4 and 105.1. Then I went to the under-the-arm one and it said 102.5 (I know to add 1 degree to that). So, realistically it was somewhere around 103ish. That is still very HIGH. Me and Steve kind of panicked......ok, mainly I did. We immediately gave him some motrin and it started to drop within the next 30 minutes. (By the way, I purchased the new and improved temperal reading thermometer. It's wonderful and gives very accurate readings.)

So that morning I sent Cade to Mother's Day Out since he wasn't sick and I headed to the dr. with Jace. I just want to say also that Cade did wonderfully without his brother at school and Jace did extraordinarily good at the dr. without his brother.......interesting. I was kind of worried that Cade would have a meltdown at school, but actually he could have cared LESS.

Jace ended up having croup and a horrible ear infection (wonder if that explains some of his behavior at Brittney's cheer competition last weekend). So we've been managing the fever all weekend and now we're dealing with the severe diaper rash he has from the antibiotic messing up his stomach. Poor baby! He had ELEVEN dirty diapers Saturday morning. His butt was literally on fire and he would just SCREAM every time he went. The doctor told me to start giving him immodium 3 times a day and that stopped it for the rest of the day thankfully.

I'm REALLY tight with my doctor. I even have his home number. He's totally AWESOME! Plus, he was the dr. on call this past weekend. So, I spoke to his office each day since this ordeal started.

Despite all the sickness though, he had planned WEEKS ago to take a picture of Steve's side of the family for a present for his mom. She's been wanting one of all her grandkids for a while now. That day was yesterday. The boys took a GREAT nap before so everyone was absolutely wonderful for the picture. I was so thankful. I'll post a picture when we get them.

On our way out of the mall at 6:55 p.m. yesterday, we passed up Santa's village. There was NO ONE in line. Well, I'm all about no lines for Santa. So, we tossed the kids on Santa's lap and snapped this treasured photo.........

I'm actually surprised that it was Jace crying in the photo. I would have bet money that Cade would have been screaming. Just when we think we've figured out their little personalities, they go and change it up on us.

Just an update too.....as I was trying to post this last night, Cade woke up crying with 102.2 fever. Will it ever end around here???????

My Two Handfuls.........

We have determined for sure that the terrible two's have officially started in the Kearley household. I know........news flash!! But it has really hit us hard in the last few days.

For example, Brittney had a choir performance last Thursday night. Steve couldn't attend because he had class so I was going to videotape the performance for him. I knew that I couldn't watch both boys AND videotape so when Nana said she was going, I thought we were in the clear. We thought the boys would be fine because they absolutely LOVE music and they had the strings, chimes and then the choir perform.

Well, the school cafeteria is small. We could barely HEAR the kids let alone SEE the kids in the strings and chimes. So much for entertaining my boys. Jace decided that he wanted people to KNOW he was there. He just can . not . sit . still!!! He was starting to get ancy and we got a few "looks" as he was just being his LOUD self. Nana decided to take him out into the hall. I am NOT kidding you that I could hear him throughout the cafeteria during all 3 performances. I knew exactly when he spotted Steve's mom and step-dad too! I could tell by the inflection in his voice (outside in the hall!).

Anyway, lesson learned. No more indoor choir performances for 2 year old twins.

Apparently we did not learn our lesson too well though. We had already decided that we were ALL going to attend Brittney's cheer competition on Saturday. It was probably the best venue to take the boys to out of all the competitions she's got going on this year. So off we went into downtown Houston - right about the time of the boys' usual naptime. Luckily Cade took a "cat-nap" on the way. Here he is during our waiting time until the awards ceremony.

He was fascinated with the construction going on outside of the convention center. All he wanted to do was look at the big trucks and cranes.

Then there was Jace..............

He did NOT take a catnap on the way. Hmmmm....I wonder what in the world he is trying to communicate to me here in this picture? It was hard to even concentrate with the ear piercing noises that were coming out of that child.

After about the 20th time he threw himself on the floor...maybe it was the 25th, who was counting....we decided we really might need to go whether it was time for the awards or not. What in the WORLD were we thinking?? My mom wanted to see Brittney's team perform, but she's always babysitting the boys for us. That was one of the reasons that we all wanted to go. By the end of the day with all of the loud music, glitter, and chaos, she volunteered to stay home from now on so we won't have to endure such torture for the boys AND for ourselves. People were probably wondering why I was sitting there taking pictures of my poor child throwing a fit. I guess I've just become accustomed to it!

They sure did look cute in their "Cheer Brothers" t-shirts in Brittney's team colors. But whew...were they a handful.

I almost forgot the best part though. When we had JUST arrived at the competition. We settled into some front row seats on the side of the floor where the girls perform. When we "released" them from the stroller, Jace proceeded to climb the stairs all the way up to the top of the seats. They were not steep, the steps were really wide and it wasn't crowded in this area so we thought it would be okay for him to run off some energy. Well, Jace is famous for finding the one little piece of railing missing. He started to head to the very top corner where it looked as if there was NOT any railing. I haven't seen Nana move that fast to catch Mr. Jace in years!! I had a perfectly behaved little boy named Cade on my lap, so she took off for Mr. Active - Jace. All I could imagine was him falling down the one story drop off. It was very scary for a minute.

Anyway, we've had a couple of life lessons this past week! I guess we're going to be hermits for a little while longer until we can learn to deal with Jace in public.