She Will Always Be My First

When I posted about my pregnancy last week, I intended to come back within a day or two to post the earliest belly shots that I have (which I think is just one). I was very diligent about documenting my belly growth with Jayla and have been advised by most of my friends and family that I need to do the same thing with this second child. Ummm...I am not getting off to a good start. Instead of belly shots, I bring you more obsession with my first child. Behold, Jayla as Dora the Explorer last Saturday night:




She really wants to be Sleeping Beauty for Halloween but, seeing how she has FOUR Halloween outfits this year, she decided that being Dora for an early Halloween party was acceptable. She's saving her Sleeping Beauty gown for Friday at school.

13 Weeks

For those of you that don't already know this, it looks like I'm going to have another baby - somewhere around April 29, 2009. And it's a good thing, too, because somebody stole my other baby...


...and left me with some random big girl that thinks it's funny to put a spoon on her head when you ask her to look at the camera for a picture!

Speaking Her Mind

Me: Jayla, you're the best!
Jayla: Mama, I know I'm the best!
Me: [Giggle] Well, don't ever let anyone tell you that you're NOT the best.
Jayla: [In all seriousness] I won't, mama.

And somehow she has managed to channel my grandfather's personality...or at least his loathe for people walking on his grass, which is impossible because he has a fence around every square centimeter of his property but, he likes to warn people about walking on his grass anyway. Twice in the past week, Jayla has done the same thing.

We were getting in the car to take her to school one morning last week and the same cute little old Asian couple that is always walking around the neighborhood was doing just that. They, however, were walking on the opposite side of the street from our house and on the sidewalk. This little factoid did not stop Jayla from running to the end of our driveway, putting on her mean face, and shouting, "Hey! Don't walk on our grass!" at them. And I wish I was kidding. I had to muffle her, pull her back over towards me, and tell her to stop saying that. Her response? "But, mama, these are OUR grasses!"

And then yesterday, we were pulling into our driveway on the way home from church. My husband stopped the car to let a little girl ride her bike past our driveway before he pulled in. Apparently, even though this girl looked like she a good 8 or 9 years old, she hadn't quite mastered the art of riding a bike well. So, in her nervousness, she lost her balance and ended up in our grass. From the backseat, Jayla witnessed it all and I could tell that she was getting fired up. Once we pulled into the driveway and I got Jayla out of the car, as soon as her feet hit the ground, she ran right up into the little girl's face (she was still trying to get her balance on the bike long enough to ride out from the front of our house) and screamed, "Hey! What's the big idea!?!? Get off our grass!" Again, I'm not even kidding. Seriously, if she weren't three years old, I think she would've scared the little girl. We directed her into the house and told her that it wasn't nice to yell at people that you don't know.

And then I told her to give her great-grandfather's personality back to him because our grasses really ain't worth dying over.

One Month Later

A month ago today, my little family and I were in a hotel room in Shreveport, LA flipping between all of the national news stations and The Weather Channel. We watched Hurricane Ike roll through and attentively watched for any reports of what kind of damage had been left behind, especially in our own neighborhood. We had evacuated to Shreveport two days earlier because we knew we wanted to leave if it was coming straight for us (which it did!) and we did not need a repeat of our Hurricane Rita evacuation experience!

We stayed in Shreveport for two more days after the storm and enjoyed the absolutely gorgeous weather. We played outside at the park even.



It’s almost like it was fall or something in Shreveport. Fall is something that just does not exist in Southeast Texas!

I was in absolutely no hurry to come home but, my husband was and so we came home to power poles snapped in half and laying across the road, blocking our normal access to our neighborhood. Once we finally made it to our house, we were relieved to see that we were merely missing a few shingles off of our roof, which thankfully managed not to leak. As we pulled into the driveway, Jayla said, “Look mama! God saved our house!” Indeed, He did.




In the aftermath of Hurricane Ike, we got our power back about a week later but, the damage had been done to my semester. The schoolwork apparently did not stop just because I had no access to the computer or gas to drive to school and the university says that students who were affected by Hurricane Ike could have excused absences from class that week. None of that mattered and I fell behind quite a bit.

Then we went and had to go out of town two weekends in a row. They were awesome trips but, served to stress me out more about the whole schoolwork thing. First, we went to Detroit for the weekend. My grandparents had a party for their 50th wedding anniversary ON their 50th wedding anniversary! So, my whole family made the trip and it was nice to experience a little fall once more.



Then last weekend, we took my dad to San Antonio to celebrate his 60th birthday. It was a lot of fun and he declared it to be the best birthday he’s ever had, which may or may not have offended my mom who took him on a surprise trip to New York City for his 50th birthday.



And so now I think we’re caught up as to why this blog has been so neglected. I guess I’m back now. I know you've missed me terribly!