Pardon me while I weep

Partly from joy, partly from sadness.
We're through buying diapers. My baby is no longer a baby.
That's right folks, Brynna Belle has finally decided to potty train. After flirting with it for months, on Monday, she just decided she was ready! I didn't have to ask her if she needed to potty at all, she would just tell me. It has been 5 days, and she's only had a small handful of accidents, most of which were my fault. She is still in a pull up when she's sleeping. But tonight, after putting her to bed, she got up and went potty all by herself. She started crying when she couldn't get her diaper back on, or I might have never known.
I'm so proud of her, and she's so proud of herself. She wants to call Daddy every time, and when I say no, she says Aunt Cadye? DeeDee? Nana? She just wants to let someone know!
It does make me more than a little sad. She is growing and changing so much these last few months. She talks all the time, though only at home, and her vocabulary has just exploded. Being potty trained is just the final little push into big kid-ness. It's pretty bittersweet.

Flash Back Friday

I'm just going to ease back in to blogging. I have no excuse for my extended absence. Well, my old computer sucked and wouldn't load pictures, but that's only about half of it. The other 75% was probably just pure laziness on my part. You're shocked, I know. No one could ever accuse me of being lazy. So easing in, and the first post from my shiny new laptop, is a simple flashback.

My sweet Laney-bug in the only bluebonnet shots we have. I know, we're bad Texans. We have been in a bit of a drought lately, though. This particular shot happened to be on the day that we found out she was going to be a big sister. And what a wonderful big sister she is! Seriously, I've never known a child to love, tolerate, teach, and appreciate their younger sibling like D'Laney does with Brynna. I just love that girl.
BTW, I am LOVING the new blogger! Do y'all? Any tips on how to optimize it? Or do you hate it and wish things would never ever ever change? (That's usually the way I lean, but I really like this.)

Testing. 1...2...3...

Hello? Is this thing on?

My memories from that day

Are your memories from 9/11 fuzzy, or crystal clear? What about the days following? I can remember every single moment from that day, as well as a few days later. I'm not sure if I've always remembered everything, or if it's come back to me in pieces. I've begun working on our 10 year class reunion, so I'm in a bit of nostalgia mode anyway, thinking back to that year. My most vivid memory from my senior year in high school isn't graduation, prom, homecoming, or basketball... it's Tuesday, September 11, 2001. ~Johnny Kissko seemed to be the first person who knew anything, and at first told us that a car had exploded in front of the White House. We soon knew that a plane had hit a building in NYC (I knew nothing of the World Trade Center at the time.) ~I was in Mrs. Grey's class, and went across the hall to the library to watch the coverage. I can't remember who now, but some one said, "What is that?" as the second plane flew into the second tower. ~Some people were allowed to stay and watch the news, I had to go to spanish class, where Mrs. C wouldn't let us talk about it AT ALL. She had a friend who worked there, and didn't know if she was still alive. ~We didn't work in any of my other classes that day. ~No one knew who would be attacking us. Weren't we the most powerful country in the world? Wasn't the whole world scared of us? Who would provoke us like this? ~I remember very clearly my physics teacher sitting back and letting us talk all through class. I remember the look on her face, watching us as we sorted things out in our minds. I think she knew how drastically the world changed in that instant, and how it might affect us as seniors more than the younger grades. ~We thought that there would be more attacks, and that Texas would be a target. We didn't know where in Texas, but we thought that since George W. was from here, and we had so many resources, that we were prime real estate. ~I honestly don't know if the school was on lockdown. Did they even do that back then? Or is that something that was introduced after the attacks? ~I didn't shed a single tear all day, until after practice. I went to the field house, and as the boys were coming off the field, I saw my dad and I lost it. He just stood there and held me, although I think it took him a minute to figure out why I was crying. I couldn't figure it out myself, because I am NOT a crier. Ok, I WASN'T a crier then. I was just so mad, and I couldn't talk, so I just cried. And then I was completely embarrassed that all the guys had seen me crying. ~That was my strongest emotion that day. Anger. ~I don't remember much else from the middle of that week, except the pictures and footage that we kept seeing. I didn't want to see it, but I couldn't get enough. ~I remember friday of that week just as vividly as tuesday. ~By coincidence, or providence, friday's pep rally was the "Fire Up" pep rally, to be held at the football field. The football players and us cheerleaders rode into the stadium on fire trucks. This had been planned since the summer. ~When we got off the trucks and in front of the student body, the elementary side of the stands was a sea of mini American flags. I think every single student must have had one. That's when I started choking up. ~My mom was in school and working full time, and didn't make it to many pep rallies, but she was at this one, and filming it. When she turned the camera to those kids, you couldn't see any of their sweet little faces, just the flags they were holding high. ~The band played the national anthem. I'm sure this was done at every pep rally across America that day, but I was so proud that we ALWAYS played it, every week. ~Big, sweet Billy Monpere led the most heart felt prayer. Talked about the victims in NY and DC, their families, and the workers. ~The band also played America the Beautiful, while the flag corp held red, white, and blue flags. ~We traveled to Jim Ned that night, and they had a memorial and played God Bless the USA before the game. ~We won the game (we won most of them that year) and I remember after the game thinking that we had no right to be so happy. I was, too, I don't mean I was standing around scolding people for celebrating. I just mean after it was all over, I felt pretty guilty. I know everyone has their own memories from that day, these are just some of mine, and I wanted to write them down. I never have before. I want to have it down in case my girls ever want to know what I was doing that day. Everyone knows exactly where they were when Pearl Harbor was bombed, or JFK was shot. They remember where they were, who they were with, what they felt, etc. If I forget, or heaven forbid something happen to me, I want to have it all down.

Christmas pictures!!

Is it seriously time to start thinking about these?! UGH! Football hasn't even started yet!! But it makes me so happy! Buh-bye, summer, hated the visit, love to see you go!
My friend Lindsey does an amazing job. You should seriously see the "birth" session she just did for my old buddies Sharla and Scott, incredible! And such a good idea, Daddy didn't have to worry about getting all the pictures he was supposed to!
Check out her work!
www.lindseyjostphotography.com

Brynna

My baby is now 20 months. It's almost time to quit counting her age in months. She is ornery and sweet and beautiful and so smart. She's in to everything, speaking sentences, and is very affectionate with her momma, daddy, and LeeLee, always hugging and kissing us.
Brynna's vocabulary has just exploded over the last couple of months. She uses countless words by themselves, and she's begun speaking in sentences. It'll be no time at all that she'll only be speaking in sentences.
Some of her new sayings:
Sure luff you, Momma! my favorite ;)
Share (with) Brynna! when she wants something that her sister has.
My turn!
Don't like it. She usually says this when she's almost finished eating whatever is in her hand, but she wants more.
Ta-La!!! (ta-da)
Hello, is (it's) Brynna. She says this into any phone.
What, Momma? whenever I call her name. or when she's pretending she doesn't understand me.
And my absolute least favorite of all.... WHY???? Honestly, what kind of a kid starts that at 20 months?! Actually, she's been doing it for several weeks now, so it really started at around 18 months. She's not just saying a new word because she likes the way it sounds or hears Sister saying it. She knows exactly what it means and how to use it. She cocks her head to the side, burrows her brows over those massive lashes, and says Why? I've tried combating it by actually answering her. Every time she asks why, I'll say something silly, which leads to another why, something sillier, and so on. It gets boring to her and she walks off, and I feel proud to have outsmarted a toddler. Then I feel silly for feeling proud that I outsmarted a toddler.
She loves to sing. I really hope she inherited Cameron's musical abilities. She got everything else from him! During church, she has begun holding a song book and singing along. She's also picked up some of the words to the songs we listen to a lot. I have several Disney songs on my iPod, as well as some of my fave songs, that we just shuffle and repeat whenever we're in the car. She loves them, and she'll sing along and hit several of the actual words.
Brynna's favorite song, though, by a long shot, is the ABCs. And she knows them! She can go straight through A-G, pick it back up at L-P, and finishes with Y and Z. She can sign about 8-10 of the letters as well. She's trying to learn to count, and knows all the numbers to 10, but gets the order wrong. She can pick out colors when you ask, but will only say PINK! She can sign all of the colors.
Brynna's looks are changing a little, too. She still looks just like Cameron, but she's definitely looking more feminine. Her body is stretching out and thinning, making her look like a little girl and less like my chunky monkey baby. Her eyes are still crystal blue under thick, long eyelashes, and her hair has actually gotten more blonde after a summer in the sun. It's very straight and getting really long in the back, and I think I'm going to have to cut it. The rest is catching up much faster than D'Laney's did, she rocked a mullet for at least 2 years, and I think it'll all get one length pretty soon.
Now that I'm on the road to recovery and things are slowing down, we're going to tackle potty training head on. She's been ready for months, I've just been putting it off. Wish me luck!
My sweet big girl.

D'Laney

Sunday, my Laney-bug will be four. It's almost impossible to wrap my brain around. She has grown into the sweetest little girl. She is very curious about everything, and can be a little bossy and a bit of a know-it-all, I can't imagine where she gets that from! She is certainly a mother hen with her sister, and I have to remind her that it isn't her job to discipline OR grant permission to Brynna. She tends to do both.
D'Laney is maturing by the minute, it seems. She is so smart, and has a memory like I've never seen. She remembers things from months ago, or longer even, in perfect detail. It's crazy.
We're starting to have to really crack down on arguing and talking back from her. It's nothing malicious at all, and just something that she has to work through, but it is exhausting for us! It seems like I spend half the day getting on to her. I sure hope that it's a short phase. Fortunately, there is no attitude to go along with it. Yet. She doesn't roll her eyes, or speak hatefully, or stomp off.
However, when she's not arguing with us, she is so sweet, uses perfect manners, and is so affectionate, to a point that it's a little weird. She'll randomly thank me for things that happened days ago. An example: Momma, thanks for taking me to the water park today (2 weeks ago) I loved it. You're so the best! And then she'll give me a run by hug and kiss whatever she can reach, usually my arm or my hand or something. It's strange. But I love it. And she tells me she loves me constantly. She does have near perfect manners. She never forgets to say please, thank you, you're welcome, no thank you, excuse me (either when she burps or to get by someone,) and yes/no, ma'am/sir. We're working on not interrupting and perfecting table manners. That is both mine and Cameron's number one pet peeve, and our kids might be total hoodlums, but if they have good table manners, we'll be pleased :)
She had another head injury last week, but this one wasn't near as bad as the last. She was running through church and fell into a pew, splitting open her forehead above her right eye. She thought it was much worse, though, because she could actually see all the blood this time, it was running down into her eye. Cameron got her cleaned up and put a butterfly band aid on it. You should have seen the two of them, it looked like they had been to war! D'Laney had blood in her hair and smeared on her forehead, and spots all down her dress. Cameron had a big spot on his t-shirt and a couple of spots on his cheek. We went ahead and took her to the doc the next afternoon, just to be sure she didn't need stitches. She didn't, and he put 3 steri-strips on it to hold it together. The doc didn't seem to think it would scar, and I sure hope he's right.
D'Laney will once again have two birthday parties this year. My post op appt in Angelo is the 26th, which is also my dad's first game at LV, so we're having a party with my side of the family that weekend. We always go to Iraan for Labor Day weekend for football and dominoes, so we'll have a party with Cameron's side that weekend. I certainly don't plan on making a habit of having two parties a piece, but that's the way it worked out this time.
My almost 4 year old. She's never, ever, ever still, and almost always happy, so this pic sums her up better than any other. Her exact words were, take a picture of meeeeeee!!!!! as she was sliding towards me, on her belly, on the coffee table. I have no idea why she keeps busting her head open ;-)