Olivia Takes Jesus To School

Olivia brought home some of her artwork from the first couple of weeks of school. I took this picture of the one I was most proud of. It was hanging on the wall of the classroom at the first open house. There was a picture of each child in the center then they were to write all the things they liked or things that were special to them around the picture. Of course the first thing I noticed on Olivia's was Jesus. I looked around at the other children's and no one else wrote down Jesus....it made me a little sad as I further adjusted to my child being in public school.

When Olivia brought the picture home the other day I looked at it again and begin to think why hadn't any other child put Jesus or God on theirs. I knew there were several other children that were Christians. Two of them even go to our church. Then I thought....Olivia was fresh off the boat from private school were they talked about Jesus all the time at school. These kids are used to just the opposite. They probably are conditioned not to think, talk or write about Jesus at school. They only do that at church. I thought I can't let that change Olivia. I want her to think, talk and write about Jesus at school. So I took the opportunity at that moment to go talk to her and tell her how proud I was to see that she wrote down how special Jesus was to her and let everyone else know that. I told her I know they don't talk about Jesus at this school like they did last year at her school, but that doesn't mean that you can't talk about him, I told her. And I hope that you will continue to do that even though that isn't what everyone else does. She did say her teacher does talk about God sometimes..... I don't know if that is true or not.....but I would like to think so!

Is It Christmas Yet????????

Well the Christmas season is here....yea!!!! It is so much more fun with kids...unfortunately we have opened the Christmas season with sickness. Yuck! Emily has missed school, Olivia has missed school and we have missed every Christmas party and other such festivities. So we are off to a rough start but there have still been a few funny things to note in the process. Like everyday Abby asking is it Christmas yet? This started the day after Halloween I do believe! Then it was when are we going to make our gingerbread (house). They had fun making it with Daddy. Decorating the tree was something else. Abby kept asking if we had anymore almonds. Finally we questioned her about the almond thing...to discover she was trying to say ornaments but was just being lazy. We had a few broken ornaments but everything got glued back together. It took two days to decorate the tree and a week to get the house decorated but it is done. Now we can sit back and enjoy being sick in a nicely decorated house!

We did venture out last night, because I was determined we weren't going to miss another Christmas outing, for our annual cousin's outing to The Galleria for pictures with Santa! In spite of runny noses we still had a pretty good time. No tears for Santa. Everyone smiled pretty. Though Olivia's nose was pretty red!. Abby asked Santa for a choo choo train and babydoll. What a combo but that is Abby. Emily asked for toys. And Olivia....well she was just there for the picture now that the truth has been exposed , she wasn't really interested in telling a strange man dressed up like Santa what she wanted her parents to buy her for Christmas! She said she wanted to know the truth but I knew she really didn't.

Olivia has missed two days of school and yesterday she was asking about going to school today. She said will I miss school tomorrow? She then said I like school but that is life...sometimes your sick and sometimes your not.

Olivia let the school nurse pull her tooth!

Well Olivia lost the last of her two front teeth yesterday. It had been loose for quite some time. I kept asking to pull it but she refused my offer. Then yesterday she comes home from school and bounces right up to me and opens her mouth. She was so excited she lost her tooth at school....every grade school student's dream....or at least Olivia's. She has been talking about losing a tooth at school since last year and it finally happened with some help apparently. Her tooth became so dangly that the teacher sent her to the nurses office where the nurse put on her surgical gloves and yanked the thing out! I told Olivia I couldn't believe she would let the nurse pull her tooth and not her own mother.....to which she had absolutely no reply. She was just thrilled to have lost her tooth at school were she got a treasure box to to hold her tooth until she got home. Plus all the recognition for being the girl that lost her tooth at school. I think overall...yesterday was a very good day for Olivia.

Abby did you cut your sister's hair?

Two days ago I found a lock of hair on the floor as I was cleaning. I decided to pick it up and move on.....not in the mood to investigate. It wasn't enough to ruin anyone's appearance. But then the next day a found quite a bit more laying beside Emily. I looked at her crossly and quickly informed her that we don't cut our own hair, EVER! I was a little preplexed because I didn't see any scissors . But as I continued to get on to her for cutting her hair she finally said, "Abby did it!" I looked at Abby and said, "is that true" Abby said no I didn't do it. I asked her two more times and then decided that the girl was lying to me. I told her she would not be going to Chuck E Cheese with her dad if she was lying.....to which she confessed quickly. She said Emily had something stuck in her hair, Emily says no she didn't. So who knows what possessed her to cut her sisters hair, but let's just hope it doesn't happen again.

THE BIG SLIDE

Thanksgiving is still a few weeks away and we are already hearing about "The Big Slide" as Abby calls it. Her favorite thing in the world is her PawPaw's "big slide" in Louisanna. She starts asking about when she will be able to go on the "big slide" and she doesn't stop talking about it until we get there. She is obessed with the slide. So just a few more weeks Abby and you'll be sliding down the "big slide" hopefully all bundled up in your coat and not in a pair of shorts!

Would they just hurry up and pick a President!

As we all know Olivia could keep me blogging on a minute by minute bases with all the things she says but who has time......and there is so much I usually forget when it comes time to write it down. But today when I picked her up from school she reminded me she didn't have school tomorrow. I said, "oh yea that's right....what are you going to do tomorrow"....... Watch the election! she said. Can I call Melissa and Allyson over to watch it with me! Who knew 2nd graders were excited about the election.....just the other day when she was riding in the car with me, while I was listening to talk radio she said, ...."would they just hurry up and pick a President!" What caused the sudden change in interest.......who knows?

Life is SO good!

Well I have not being documenting my children's activities as faithful has I had hoped. The scary thing is if I don't get it down in print soon....it will soon leave my memory or at least the exact wording, which of course is what makes is so charming........regardless let's get with it. Olivia was doing her homework the other day and she had to use her spelling words to write sentences. My favorite sentence put a huge smile on my face when I read it. The word was life and her sentence.....Life is so good. Very sweet....I am SO glad she recognizes her life is so good!

Of course it is so good,.... she was one of the winners in her school's pumpkin decorating contest. We spent a few days deciding what book character to make our pumpkin into. Her daddy and I wanted it to be Olivia the pig. But she opted for Fancy Nancy, which I had originally suggested to her. So the planning begins. My sweet friend Amy gave me her daughter's pink wig that Chloe hated. She said we could do anything to it we wanted which was a good thing. Then my very sweet friend Kenia painted Nancy's face on the pumpkin. We made her very cute and had a crazy time getting that big pumpkin to school but we made it with three kids in tow.

She was very excited when they called her name over the intercom announcing the winners. She said I loved hearing my name called.

When David told some of his co-workers about the win...they said, " tell Keri congratulations"...I wonder what David must of told him for him to send me congrats! The school did state this WAS to be a family project!

Where did you find Daddy?

Yesterday Olivia and I were talking in the kitchen. She was asking me what school she would go to after she finished at Kuehnle. Then she wanted to know after that school where would she go and so on until she got to college and I told her she then got to pick which school she wanted to go to. She said Texas A&M was her pick. She then wanted to know again, where I went to college and where her daddy went. I told her that her poppy and her daddy went to the same college. She thought that was pretty neat. She then said, " what if I marry someone that went to the same college daddy did, then before she really even got that complete sentence out she quickly asked, "Where did you find Daddy? I told her I found him at church. I asked her what made her ask that question and she informed me I wouldn't understand if she told me!

Later that evening we were in the car and on the radio was a lady talking about wives honoring their husbands, apparently Olivia was listening to all she was saying about husbands and wives. Olivia looked at me and said you and daddy do that....y'all take turns cleaning the kitchen and....other things like that. I was reminded how are children watch everything we do and take it all in....the good and the bad. I was glad this was something good. And hopefully one day Olivia will find herself a husband that will take turns cleaning the kitchen with her!

What is Tax, Mommy?

I took Olivia shopping the day after her birthday to spend her birthday money. We had more fun that day going from store to store finding all kinds of things she just had to have. At one store she was making her decision, which always included how much is it and will I get any money back. I told her how much the item cost and told her including the tax it should take her entire 20 dollar bill. "What is tax", she asked me. I told her it was money that you give to the goverment. Her reply, "YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME"! Priceless. I wish I were girl....but get used to it, cause it aint' going to get any better!

Happy 7th Birthday Olivia

Well I am a little late on posting a birthday story. A little storm named Ike got in the way. Olivia's birthday plans got 86'd but hopefully we made up for having no electricity on her birthday. From the moment the storm hit and the power went out, the only thing on her mind was....." are we going to have power by my birthday" And of course since it was a week away, we said oh yes, we will have power! Little did we know it would be two weeks before we got power. But fortunately we found a restaurant with power and celebrated with family at Lupe Tortillas. Afterward we went to Auntie's ,since she had power, to have cake and ice cream. There is no doubt your birthday was over shadowed by a huge storm that transformed our city and our lives into something we did not recognize. For that I am sad, I did not get to ponder thoughts of what happened 7 years ago in the wee hours of the morning. Though Olivia's birth is not one I care to ponder actually, so I probably would have fast forward 6 months to ponder on those times. I will always remember you as the perfect little baby and little girl, who was so incredibly easy. Happy Birthday my precious Livie Lu....... I love you so very much!

"Let's get a new baby," says Abby!

Today we are getting ready for Hurricane Ike, so while I am busy baking, washing clothes, freezing water and cleaning the house Abby and Emily are playing. Of course Emily starts getting into things like the computer. Abby calls me to tell me Emme is at the computer. I come upstairs to see she has thrown the cd's all over the place and just messed up the computer desk. Of course I say," what a mess she had made, that crazy girl, what are we going to do with her." Abby says, "Momma, let's get a new baby." I said you know Abby that sounds like a good idea are you sure you want to get a new baby. She said yes, but later changed her mind.

I think Abby knows her little sister is a mess and she is just thankful she is because I am pretty sure Abby remembers she used to be the one that was the mess and is glad to be done with that time in her toddlerhood!

Yesterday when we were walking out of Target, Nana asked her if she still wanted her icee and she said no. I asked her if we could throw it away and she said yes. Nana then said to her, "your just an easy girl Abby." To which Abby replied, "but Emme is not easy! That sums that up pretty well! And here is a picture to demonstrate just the messes Emme can get into! But how can you get mad at that smile!?

Time for T-ball

Saturday was Abby's first T-ball game. She was very excited to be following in her sisters footsteps! Her cousin Jenna is on her team and her uncle is her coach, along with her daddy who will help out. Abby was so excited when she got dressed in her uniform Saturday. She did pretty good for her first time out on the field. She wasn't quite sure what to do after she hit the ball, but she soon figured out everyone was yelling for her to run to first base! Fortunately most of the other kids out there didn't know what to do either. Her daddy said while she was out in the field she kept saying I want the ball....I want the ball. She did catch the ball once and throw it to first base. Of course I wasn't paying attention at that exact moment and Poppy didn't get a picture either, but her daddy knows she did it. Of course just like her sister....it appears the snacks afterwards are the best part of the game!

Livie wants her name in the title........

Olivia was looking at my blog today and she noticed the title of the blog....Dabs & Doodles.....she wanted to know why her name wasn't up there. I tried to explain that it was really their names....that Dabs and Doodles had other meanings too......but she wasn't buying it...... So I told her I would write a story just for her about her nickname.....since technically the name of my blog is Abby and Emily's nicknames, which are Dabbers otherwise know as Dabs and Emily's nickname which is Doodles.

So here is Olivia's story about her nickname ......Livers Lu or Livers or Livie Lu regardless....you can understand why Livers is not in my title. I should have thought harder on her nickname before I gave it to her! But she loves it and that is all that matters!