Weatherstone Lawn Concert

Every Sunday night the Museum of the Southwest here in Midland hosts Summer Sunday Lawn Concerts....I've been wanting to go for a long time and finally this Sunday it worked out! Carter as you can see wasn't too sure about it all...she sat in the stroller with a sour face for the first half hour or so.....then....she ventured out of the stroller, but landed right back where she started, although she started to get more interested....

Pretty soon she was up and playing with her necklace that she brought...I'm pretty sure she was just putting on a show for all of the people around us...most of them were elderly, and just loved watching her bounce about!By the end of the concert she was clapping along, and wagging her booty to the beat! It was fun to watch her have so much fun!Of course Owen boy is such a good baby, he just layed on the blanket and smiled, and cooed...I even got half of a giggle out of him! He seemed to really enjoy listening to the music and watching all of the dragonfly's...there were TONS of dragonfly's fluttering over head!I just couldn't help putting these photos on...I know they're almost identical but as his mother I love each and everyone of his little faces he makes, especially those smiles!Just a happy little camper, along for the ride!Owen, Mommy and Carter waiting for the concert to start! The group was called Weatherstone...they weren't too bad...singing a wide range of classic rock and roll!Carter and Daddy relaxing in the shade...apparently the old man in the background wanted to be a part of the photo...he turned, smiled and looked right at the camera too!I just love how soft and sweet she looks in this picture....I know these months are the beginning of the last pictures with the "baby face" look...she's just growing up too fast!Well, we tried to get a good picture of the two of us...John's arm is only so long to hold the camera out, and of course the sun was setting behind us, so we have a bit of a glow!By the end of the concert Carter retired to the stroller, and was rather insistent that Owen should sit on her lap....he liked it for about 1 second....I think he would have lasted longer if he hadn't of been so tired...usually he loves to be right next to her, listening and watching!John, being John makes friends wherever he goes....there was a lovely elderly couple sitting behind us that offered to take our family picture...she must have been watching the charades I was playing the whole time trying to get a few decent pictures! Bless her heart, she even invited Carter over to pet their Chihuahua, the highlight of course of my daughters day! There were a TON of dogs at the concert that she kept telling me about!

***A MOMENT WITH A TWO YEAR OLD***

While we were there, Carter had a bit of a melt down...NOW I absolutely hate it when parents don't remove their tantruming children from a mass crowd...why do they not get it that no one wants to hear their kid crying, especially when there's a concert or something else going on....our deal is always-

"I will count to three, you can stop crying or ....(if we're at home go stand in the bathroom if we're out and about we go around the corner...etc until she's done crying)"....so I counted to 3 and she continued to cry(usually by the time I hit 2 she says "I'm done crying" and stops)....so we went around the corner of the museum where she could cry it out...NOTE: going "around the corner" isn't code for getting a spanking.......anyways there was a wheel chair ramp that she started walking up and down-eventually she stopped crying...our conversation went as follows:

Me: "Carter I think you're done crying lets go back and sit with Daddy and Owen"

Her: "No Mommy I'm crying"

Me: "It doesn't look like or sound like you're crying, I think you're ready to go listen to the music some more"

Her (as she is now running up and down the ramp): "No Mommy I'm crying"

Me: "Carter Mommy would really like to go sit on the blanket with Daddy and Owen, come on"

Her (with a smile on her face, while now climbing the stairs): "No Mommy I'm crying"

****I just had to laugh, she was not very good at convincing me that she was still crying! Raise your hand if you think my two year old was just trying to finagle a few more minutes of playing on the stairs!!!!*****

4th of July

Well of course John had to work on the fourth of July, so the kids and I headed out for the parade in Odessa in the morning with some of our friends. First of all I can't believe that there were no parades...etc in Midland, what a stinkin deal!!! So we piled in their suburban and drove 20 minutes down the highway to partake in some 4th of July delight!Of course my children had to wear red white a blue! We didn't have to wait very long for the parade...if you can call it that! Lets see the flags lead the way, followed by a marching bad, a few trucks with banners and advertisements, a karate group, and the most hilarious display of auto-uniqueness...normally at most parades I've been to there's a lovely line up of classic cars, restored to perfection or close to it, you know a few model T's, Chevy's, etc....well here they had an interesting line up of Lincoln's and caddy's 2 or 3 were pimped with bright paint jobs and hydraulics, the rest were your basic factory line early 90's models....HAHAHAHA....i'm not quite sure why they were even in the line up...quite interesting!I have to say that BY FAR the most interesting float was one put on by a Baptist church...they had huge wood cut outs painted to represent the stone tablets that the ten commandments were on, and then they had a large cross with a man on it wearing a white sheet, splattered with red paint to look (not at all) like blood...now I understand sharing your faith, and I think church floats are great, but where's the taste in this? I almost took a picture to post, but it was just wrong, and in NO way did it reverence the life and sacrifice of our Savior...AND it was just plain creepy...the guy who was posing as Christ was "acting" lifeless and limp on the cross with "blood" dripping off of his head and body, I feel for any kids who don't know the story of the crucifixion, it probably looked like some dead guy dangling on a wood post on the back of a truck.....hopefully their parents could explain....gosh darn it...where are the missionaries when you need them!!!My other big beef with this rediculous parade was that NO ONE THREW CANDY...i'm sure there's a good reason behind it, maybe they've had too many accidents with kids running into the street, or maybe they're very anti-litter....who knows, all I know is that this parade was a BUST! Oh yes, and lets not forget to mention the MANY floats that were proudly adorned with the confederate flag not that I think it's a sin to fly it as it is part of our nations history, especially the history of the south, but gee I don't know it was just weird me being a northern girl and all, it's just not something i've seen in my neck of the woods before! Although I would like to note that that the number of star spangled banners FAR out weighed the number of confederate flags.Well at least my daughter seemed to enjoy saluting the vet who saluted her in play as he drove by in his vintage army jeep!!!

Everyone's been napping, and hopefully we'll find some fun later tonight at the fireworks, that are surprisingly still going forth even though we here in west Texas are in a HORRIBLE drought! Good golly, God Bless Texas!

A night at the movies!

We were going to go to the new water park in Big Spring, TX on Sunday after church...but the other families we were going to go with had to cancel. Carter has been mentioning "Cars 2" alot lately, and since it was showing at the drive in we decided to go! Thankfully Carter had taken a REALLY LATE nap that evening so it worked out well for her to be up late!Of course, my little cheeser, front and present with a big grin! She was excited, although i'm sure she didn't quite grasp the concept until the movie started, we kept trying to explain that we were going to wath the movie on the "BIG" TV!!! This was John's first time at a drive in theater too so everyone was happy and excited to be there!We popped kettle corn before we left, grabbed a few treats at the gas station...and still ended up having to buy an ICEE at the concessions....who can resist it when it's 9pm and 87 degrees outside???!!!Just waiting for the movie to start getting comfy, and sippin that ICEE!Oh, yes we did get a hot dog to share because I realized i'd forgotten to feed my child before we left, so here we are waiting in the concessions diner waiting for Carter's "hog gog"!Who ever decided to put 4 playgrounds (one under every screen and one at concessions) was a genius! Carter loved playing here, she's been asking to go slide for such a long time but it's always SOOO hot, and by the time it cools off it's bed time...she was so brave and finally.....Goes up the stairs all by herself..... sits down and gets ready by herself....Starts off without a shove.....and.....Without hesitation zooms to the bottom of the slide where she.....Does her version of a gymnastics landing and proclaims "TADA I FICK IT!" I don't think it sank in my telling her over and over that she "DID IT" not "FIXED IT" was the appropriate exclamationAll in all it was a fun adventure! The movie was cute as are most Disney/Pixar creations....it just doesn't top the first Cars, but it was still a good addition! And note...of course the jammies that were selected for the adventure...."Teee-moe-mell"! Oh how I love this silly two year olds mispronounced words!!!

Carter sat and watched most of the movie but got silly punch drunk towards the end, and couldn't sit still, it was also too exciting to have access to all of the knobs and buttons, and things of such that are in the front seats, all in all I think the horn got honked twice, the radio got turned off about five times, and she spent a good portion of the movie with her head out the sun roof or the window like a little puppy!

Owen ate a bottle, fussed for a few minutes then ZONKED, he slept in the back seat through the whole movie!!! What a good little champ!!!

I love that we've always taken our kids with us pretty much everwhere since they've been born. It can be quite the challenge, and sometimes ends up very badly with flared tempers, tears and exhaustion....BUT it's all in the name of family time, something that's very precious to us...John's work schedule allows for VERY LITTLE time together, we try to make it quality time, but so much of it gets eaten up by daily routine....sleeping, eating, bathing...etc....so we're SO thankful that we were able to spend this time together!!!