First Day of School... #2

Ok... so today was Kaylebs' turn for school. And I must say i'm very impressed with this school. They hav ethe parents come in, they divide the kids into groups and do a school tour. Then they take the kids into a room and do snacks and an activity. Then parents leave kids with the teachers and go to have a little info mtg.
All kindergarten kids are shipped from class to class and "experiment" with each teacher. The teachers take notes and then tonight, they go over all the students and match the kids to the teachers and who they feel best meshes with your kid. So I must say that I'm happy about that.
So- boy is at school today for the first time and will be riding the bus home with Hailey for the first time. At first he didn't want me to leave, but then got into it and by the time I had to say good bye to him, he could care less whether I was there or not. lol
SO here are his first day pics. He's such a goof ball. i loved these pics too- had to throw in that goofy grin because it wouldn't be Kayleb if I didn't post one.

The Morrissey Curse: A Story

Once upon a time there was this girl. She was a good girl, found a good guy (with the last name of Morrissey), got married, found a nice little apt. to live in. Her husband then deployed soon after they were married. This girl was left to live by herself in this cute apt. One day, this girl gets home to find that there is a leak in her ceiling in her bathroom-enter: Morrissey curse and new best friend :). After months of asking for repairs and hassles with the complex, she moves into another apt with help from best friend. This apt. wasn’t as nice, but at least it didn’t have a massive leak in the ceiling. Her husband then comes home from deployment and they decide to buy their first house. They find one in a brand new neighborhood. They decide to buy this house… enter: Morrissey curse. Now, being that this story is obviously not about me, I can’t tell you all of the details or ALL of the things that happened. Continuing on…… They move into their new house. The house next door hadn’t been built yet, so the builder starts on his next project. And for reasons unknown, this said builder hires some men who don’t speak English to work for him. And I don’t know what it is, but these men felt the need ruin this girls’ property. Enter: Morrissey curse. These men plugged in a little oven thing to cook burritos on her front porch without asking. They used her water without asking. They dug up her yard without asking. Husband gets deployed again. Now…. It’s a good thing this girl had this best friend, otherwise she wouldn’t have made it. ;)
The house next door finally gets completed and she can finally breathe. WRONG. ENTER: Morrissey curse. Her power gets cut off. Why? Well…. Someone “forgot” to write her street down and had the wrong address under her name. So after days of complaints, they finally get it worked out. And all the meanwhile, there are family issues going on that drive the stress level up. Like I said… good thing she had the best friend.

Now… Why do I tell you this tale? Because. I don’t want to toot my own horn (although I totally am), I am the best friend in that story. And little did I know what I was getting myself in to when I became the said best friend. I know I couldn’t go into detail about this whole Morrissey curse thing… but believe me, it’s bad. Actually, when you’re the one looking in from the outside, it’s pretty dang funny. BUT I BECAME THE BEST FRIEND. And when that happens, things sort of “rub off” during a relationship such as this. What am I talking about? If you haven’t figured it out by now, I now have THE MORRISSEY CURSE. Yes…..I have the curse by proxy. Now how, you ask, do I know that this curse has followed me and my family? Well I’m prepared to make the list of what this curse is capable of. And mind you, all this has happened in a 3 week period.

1) Our moving van we thought, would be big enough. Nope. Couches, 2 hutches, and about 20 boxes get left behind in Savannah. ( And this may be bad.. but I’m actually happy about it)
2) We move. Simple enough, but our 10 hour drive turned in to 17 hours, 2 days, a hotel night’s stay, and seeing every rest stop and side of every highway from GA to Memphis.
3) Day after we arrive at our new home, van breaks. $400 later…..
4) Kayleb decides to play and throws a shirt INTO his fan in his room. Blade breaks off, shoots across the room, knocks the blinds off the window, shatters the light fixture on it, and kills the motor. $60 later for a replacement fan……
5) We’re in our new house, been here for 2 weeks and AC breaks. And of course, it breaks on a Saturday night. We live in 95 degree house for 3 days until it gets fixed. TORTURE.
6) Car starts overheating. Take it in to get fixed. $700 later……
7) Rick starts work. He’s been warned over and over again about how this is one of the worst schools in the area. Yup…. He’s been working for 3 days and he already wants to look for a new job.

Ok… I’ll leave it at that. There’s more, but I won’t bore you. Lol So hence…. The Morrissey Curse. It’s followed me and I’m hoping that over time it will find its way back to savannah and leave it there.

Moral of the story…if you become best friends with someone who’s married into a curse……either dump them as a friend or be prepared for the curse to follow. In my case- I’d much rather have the curse follow and have a really good friend to depend on. (aaahhhh..... so sweet huh?)

The End

Or is it???...........lol

First Day of School

So here in TN, they do this whole thing sort of wierd. Everyone starts school on the same day, minus the kindergartners. They only go ONE day this week. They either go Tues., WEd., or Thurs., depending on their last name. I guess the idea is to have them get in small groups to get to know their teacher and know their way around the school and room and such. I guess that's good and all, but hello! School starts today and I want my son in school! hahaha.
Actually, it was a mess this morning trying to explain to him why Hailey got to go to school and he didn't. Oh well. Hulk backpack and Spongebob lunchpail will have to wait for another day.

So here are Hailey's first day pics. I"m actually VERY happy the my house is brick... makes for a nice background for pics! Isn't she adorable? I'm taking full advantage that my kids don't have uniforms.... cause in 2 years, they will. ugh.


And.... just to throw this out there for laughs- I had to take all 4 kids in to her school with me this morning. Took her to her class, then had to turn in some paperwork. I had all 4 of them trailing after me in a SWARM of kids and parents. I had to laugh. And honestly... i've never seen so many freaking parents taking their kids to school on the first day. It was a nightmare. guess everyone around here either feels the need to drop their kid off the first day, or the bus system is horrible. I'm opting for the first one. lol

INfo Needed

So my external harddrive went AWOL on me and so being that i cleared my computer before i moved and put everything on that stinkin thing (yah..i know)- i no longer have ANY of my email addy's.
SOOOOO......
i'm putting my personal email out there for ya'll. I want you guys to email me personally so I can have your email addy's on file. ANd if you want to be my friend and want me to email you- shoot me a message too. :)-
Actually... i've made some REALLY GREAT friends just by becoming email buddies, and i'm always looking for another excuse to get on my email even more than i already do.... so send it on over! lol

anyway-
here it is, winwards4@comcast.net

Gettin ready for the big day tomorrow. Kids start school and hubby starts teaching his first day. I'll go into the whole saga of what he has in store for him sometime this week. I think I'll wait to post about until after the first couple days of school to see if he survives. ;)-
toodles!

First Smile!

Yes.... little baby smiled his first smile just yesterday. I love this point. I was attempting to get his smile on camera- but of course they never cooperate when you want them to, but I got a pretty close one. he was on his way to a smile, so that's as good as i'm gonna get i'm sure for another little while.
but here's little guy, aka little monster at almost 7 weeks.

SO here it is!

Ok... finally got around to taking some pics of the new place. Let me tell ya.... it's what i call FUGLY. yes.... it truly is. BUT... i'm so not compaining because it's a house and i'm just glad to not be in an apt. anymore. And it has nice new hardwood flooring and new tiling inside- which is way nice. And the story supposedly goes somewhat like this: there was a n old lady and her husband that orginally built this house back in the day. SHe lived here until she died. She was a true blue NATURAL woman- which means..... if something grows- it stays. If a bird dropped a seed and a tree grew, it had a right to stay. The house needed to stay "natural"- so until the place caught on fire- she didn't change a dang thing. And how do we know all of this? well.. we have a very nice neighbor who moved into the next door house about the same time and has been there ever since- and he's not short on words-if you know what i mean. He is really nice though.

so there ya go- nice story huh?!

and then i was faced with where to put a whole rooms worth of scrap crap and fit it into one corner of my really small kitchen. but we make do with what we have right? it worked out pretty well though!

then i got my spankin' new couches because my old ones conveniently couldn't fit in the moving truck. and although this set wasn't our first choice- i'm so glad this is the one we got. it fits so well in the room and i love it morw and more every day.

THEN.. ( i know- so much to tell huh?) i got to pull out all my fun shmancy new decor that i've had shoved in a closet for 3 months. And lets say that i couldn't even use all of it- cause theres just not enough room. but i LOVE how it turned out! i still need to print up my kids' pics to go in those empty frames- just so you know that i just don't hang up frames with nothin' in them for the heck of it. lol

and i threw in this pic of a tile thing nailed to my front door. have no clue what it is or what it means- but it's comin off today. anyone know what it means?

ok... so there ya go- isn't this all fun and exciting? i'm going out to take pics of the kids today-so i'll post those tomorrow!
oh.. and since i'm posting from Rick's comp, i can't figure out how to get my pics where i want them in the post, so i've lumped them all together. i'll figure it out eventually. :)-

toodles!

She Lives!

Yah- no kidding... i'm actually alive!

Ok... so things are starting to settle down a bit. got unpacked, starting to decorate (which i'm totally loving!) and got all my scrap stuff set up to start working again.
my only issue is that my comp is seriuosly retarded and now hubby and I are back to fighting over the one comp- and the wireless on it isn't working, so we're stuck to one spot to use it. and of course.... my external harddrive crashed (and it better be fixable or 3 years worth of photos are lost) , and all my recent pics are on my computer, so i can't post anything from here.

upside..... i got my new couches, my new kitchen chairs come tomorrow, and i'm having fun putting up all my new decor- it looks fabulous!

so..... once i get this whole comp/internet thing settled, i'll post a ton of pics and a more detailed version of the move from hell.... lol

miss you guys!

I lied....

Said i wouldn't post anything until after the move, but for once brief second- i actually have internet and I want to take advantage of it until it gets cut off. (what ever will I do without it?)

so just a few highlights from this past week. It was so fun.

As you know (or maybe not..) my mom and sister were able to fly out for the week to help out. Oh boy..... I'm so glad they did! It was so much fun becuase I was pretty much healed up and we were able to have a ton of fun.

We hit the beach a few times and went to River street- that was awesome. Painted toenails and went to the pool, did funny hair-do's, and most importantly.... I got to sleep in!! (thanks mom!)

So here's my little sis with the baby- aren't they cute?

And the kids with the uber cool pirate- (can we say this will be the ONLY time i let them hold guns? lol)

And my mom just had double knee surgery about 2 weeks ago and she's still a cripple. I had to get this hilarious shot of her attempting to come down what seem to be the steepest stairs in the world. Yah... i thought it was funny- my mom... not so much. lol

And in our church, instead of doing baby baptisms or christenings, we do a baby blessing. And yesterday Jayce got blessed and this was how cute he was.

And of course I had to get the rest of the uber cute kiddos as well. These are the adorable dresses great grandma sent- cute right? And if you can't tell from the picture- Hailey had been crying forever. We had just gotten back from taking grandma and nana to the airport and she was devestated- literally.

And here we are- the first ever brother picture. isn't it to die for? You'll be seeing this picture on a scrapbook page VERY soon. (well... after i unpack my massive amounts of scrap crap- lol)

And one just for the records..... this is my current living state. This folks, would be my dining room at the moment. And I still have 2 rooms to go through- it's all packed for the most part, just have a bunch of the odds and ends to put in boxes. (hate those kind of boxes!)

Anyone wanna come finish packing my house for me? I could use a nap.... or two... or three. ;)-

see ya in a while. :)

I know i'm missing....

sorry!
but little baby, family visitng, and a move in a few days is taking up quite a bit of time. :)

I'll post some yummy pics later of projects and baby soon enough. i'm moving on Thursday and hopefully will have internet back come a week from now- so be looking for me around then.

will be fun stuff to get into a new house huh? I'm very excited to move on with my life. nothing like a nice change to get you going right? (isn't that just the BIGGEST understatement of the year?) hahaha

over and out.

More Baby Lovin'

Ok.... so of course I have to post more pics of the baby. I'ev taken about a gazillion so far (go figure) and he's just too cute to not share!

Have to say- that this first week has been awesome. Can't believe it's been a week already. Just goes to show how fast time goes by and how precious every second is. I'm just eating it all up cause i know it won't last long.

anyway-

here's a few more pics of Jayce and his chubby cheeks- can't wait to see how big they get once he starts gaining some weightage.... :)-

And i think his shirt says it all!

Jayce Richard Winward

Well folks... he's finally here! I've been resting up and trying to get used to life with 4 kids- hence the reason I haven't posted until now.

I went into labor on Sunday night and Monday morning at 11:04 am Jayce made his debut into the world. I had to push only one time..... so it was great for me (and he had no cone head either.)

So things are good. He's healthy and for the most part a happy baby. He's uber cute with those fabulous chubby cheeks. Having him makes me realize how much I NEEDED another baby. (yes...needed) And being that the kids are on summer break, I don't get to ease into the whole 4 kid thing. Rick left me the other day to go to the store and I had all of them. It was good- pretty funny actually. Thing is, I'm handling 4 A LOT better than I did with 3.

I'm feeling great! Just not being pregnant anymore is wonderful and being that I can fit into some of my non-prego shirts makes me feel so much better. It's been nice to just rest and not worry about things. (even though it won't last much longer)

Anyway- Here's the specs and some pics. The pics of Jayce look funky- his head isn't THAT deformed. it's not deformed at all. guess i just had the wrong angle. But he is just so cute- I love him. Guess i'll keep him around....... :)-

Jayce Richard Winward

June 23, 2008

11:04 am

7 lb 2 oz

18.5 in long

(yes... he's my biggest baby and even came 3 weeks early!)

And here's a few funnies:

Kids came to visit in the hospital and kayleb was so excited. He wrote his name on a napkin and when he first saw Jayce, he walked up to him and holds the napkin up and says "Hi baby Jayce. I'm Kayleb. see.... here's my name. K A Y L E B" It was so stinkin cute. I got a pic of it. :)

Then the proud oldest sister holding him for the first time. She is at my feet all day long saying "mom... i washed my hands, can i hold him?" "mom.. can i touch his head?" "mom... I'll feed him if you want me to."

She's so helpful- it will be really nice once we move.

Then the proud papa. this pic is smooshed for some reason..... but you get a better idea of how round baby really is.

And this cake.... the hospital made it and gave it to us. How cool is that? and it is SO YUMMY!

anyway...... there he is... all perfect and wonderful. I'll post more later when I get around to it. :)

Pre-K "Graduation"

So between last year and this year, something changed to where pre-k "graduation" isn't "allowed" anymore. What the? So instead of doing a ceremony-like what we got to do with Hailey- they held a family party instead. It was actually really nice as we could show up when we wanted and leave when we wanted. Sad I didn't get the cute pics like with Hailey, but we had a good time. They had this blow up toy to jump on and a sand box and the fun park there as well- so the kids were plenty entertained the whole time. So here are my fav. shots from the party. Mia had a blast as well- which was nice to not have to try to keep her contained.

Kayleb is so funny- these pictures are SO him, which I love. And this is our favorite teacher in the world, Ms. Marty. She was Hailey and Kayleb's teacher and we are very sad that she can't be Mia's teacher as well. We will surely miss her.

I'll post picture of Hailey's awards later- like i said... a lot to post, don't wnat to do it all at once. :)

Oy vey!!!

Ok- so craziness has entered my life and i have a feeling it won't settle down anytime soon. You forget how much it takes to move and all the little things you have to settle and organize. Then you have the task of packing and in the process you realize how much CRAP you have and wonder why you've lived with it for so long. During this past week, Rick and i have gone through only 2 rooms. We cleared out the office and turned it into the "box room". It's about half full of boxes right now. most of them are for the garage sale we intend to have. (don't ask me when though)

Anyway- I have a lot to update on, so I'll blog a little at a time over the next few days to get it all in.

First off- it was Kayleb's bday this week. he turned 5. Can you believe it? He's getting so big- i'm freaking out that he'll be in kindergarten in the fall. We had a good bday for him. Went to Sonic for dinner, went to the store, opened presents, etc. he opened his presents and LOVED them. there's nothing better than having the kid love the gifts you get and play with them non stop. He hasn't put them down since he got them. He got this pirate ship set, a kings castle set, and Soccer Boppers. Then we ate cake. Actually- let me rephrase that.... Rick, me, and Mia had cake. Hailey has all of a sudden decided she doesn't like cake. and Kayleb - for whatever reason- didn't want any. But it sure was good! So here are some pics from the night. isn't he so cute?!

Then another "fun" thing that happened was little miss decided to get into an ink pad of mine. Yah. I have everything in the office, and we keep the door shut. But like that matters right? She snuck in, grabbed my ink pad and decided to literally paint herself in it. She came up to me and said "Makeup mom!" . luckily, she didn't touch ANYTHING but herself. she did manage to ruin her shirt and panties, but i can deal with that. The pics pretty much suck, the lighting was terrible. But you get the idea. Can't tell you how long it took me to scrub this girl- i think my bathtub is permanently stained. hahaha gotta love the little stinkers.

If you hadn't heard by now

We're MOVING!!!!!!!!
Yes folks... after months and months of applying anywhere and everywhere, RIck has landed us a job!
See this place? This is going to be our new home.

Actually- I wish. If you don't recognize this place, this would be called Graceland- or Elvis's house. (or was for that matter) This will be just down the road from where we will be.
And if you haven't guessed by now, we're headed to Memphis, TN!

Rick had a bunch of job interviews last week and before we left, we had a job offer. He will be teaching middle school art for a school just oustside of Memphis. We are very excited to have something to depend on and BENEFITS!!! :)

so..... any of you out there that read my blog.... have any suggestions of places to live or wanna pitch in to get me a house? ;)-

See that number on the side?

The little icon with the morbid floating baby?ol See that number on there? Yah. THat's how much longer i have to endure this kid inside me. ALl i can say is that I'm over it, I'm done, and anytime after next week, he can come. I"ve had a wonderful pregnancy, but I"m done. There's so much going on right now, that i just need the first major event of the summer over so I can focus on other things.

just letting you know that I'm still here and things are good. I'll post an update later on. (oh... and my computer is on the fritz.... so i haven't been posting because it's sick. I'll post as soon as it gets better.) :)