4am

Yep, it's 4am. I can't sleep. Why, well that is why I am here, maybe once I get it out, I will be able to sleep. It's really nothing too bad, just my protective nature. Yesterday was a great day. We got to sleep in a little and then Daniel took the kids outside and I got a little stamp time. It was also "Bring Your Parent to Gymnastics Day" and Daniel got to go down and do gymnastics with Christopher. They had so much fun and I'll try to upload the video sometime later today. Then we did some Christmas looking and had dinner. They canceled the Rainbows class that Christopher goes to on Wednesdays at church, but I didn't know so when we arrived we just hung out with the teachers while they planned the Christmas party for next week (Side note: Daniel is going to be Santa). Then IT happened. One of the boys in the Rainbows class came in with his uncle to speak w/ Rachel. This boy is 5 and about to advance into the next class, but Christopher has really taken to him. He follows the boy around all the time and does everything that the little boy does. This really annoys the boy b/c he wants to play with the bigger boys (who ironically don't really want him in their group b/c he's younger). So my son that still does not talk much runs up to him and says, "Hi Dalton! Look, Christopher has nice GoGo shirt!" while holding his shirt out for Dalton to see. (Translation-- Hi Dalton! Look at my cool Diego shirt.) Of course Dalton was unimpressed and just looked at Christopher like he was from another planet. So Christopher repeated himself and got the same response. You could just see his little heart just break. I felt so bad for him and tried to make up for it by telling him that Dalton loved his shirt. I don't think he believed me, but I tried. Then Dalton and his uncle left and I could see that Christopher's feelings were really hurt. When Daniel got home from Jiu Jitsu, I pulled him aside and told him to make sure to comment on Christopher's shirt. He did, but Christopher didn't seem to get all excited. I now realize it wasn't about the shirt at all, he just wanted to impress his friend. And that is why I can't sleep and I'm crying my eyes out at the keyboard at 4:18 in the morning. It was so hard to see my baby hurt like that and to know that there is absolutely nothing I can do to protect him from it. And I also know that it won't be the last time his heart is broken and each time his heart breaks, mine will too. Who knew being a parent was so hard?

Our Secret Lives

I wanted to let you all in on a secret. We are not really the happy Sharpe family that we seem to be. We are Santa's elves here in Texas making all the naughty and nice lists for him. I have proof! Click HERE to see us in action!

Scary!

There is a Boxer in the neighborhood that has been getting out of it's yard (usually at night and it is gone when I get up in the morning). I have seen it out 4 times now and each time it has been out, it has started running at me and barking and growling. Last Tuesday, I saw it out again while the kids were at school and told Daniel that I was going to call animal control. He thought it might belong to the neighbor, but we weren't sure. He went out in the driveway and the dog started to charge at him. He stood his ground and the dog finally backed away. I called the police station and Animal Control came out and got him. Last night I opened the side door to take out some trash at 10:15. I saw the dog in the street and he heard me open the door. He ran up to the fence and was barking, growling and jumping on the fence. As soon as he started running toward me, I just stepped back inside and shut the door. At that point, I was pretty mad, I don't know why these people keep getting the dog back and it keeps getting out. I called the PD to complain in hopes that whose ever dog it was would at least get fined (again?). I told the dispatch that it had just gotten out on Tuesday and almost attacked Daniel and I was tired of this. She told me that she would send an officer out to speak with me. Fast forward 5 minutes or so and the doorbell rings. I look out the window to make sure that it is a PO and there are 3 cop cars right in front of the house. I open the door and started telling the officer what had been going on. Then he said, "There he is..." I turned to look and the dog was charging at PO #2 under the pecan tree in my front yard. It was nothing but muscle and running fast barking the whole way. Vicious was the word that came to mind, you could tell this dog was just plain mean. PO #2 had his pistol drawn and I heard the shot and saw the muzzle flash. I turned around not wanting to see what happened next. PO #1 walked off and I came back in. A few minutes went by and I started peeking out windows. I saw the officers talking to my next door neighbor and I figured it was her dog after all. Eventually the officers came back to the door and told me that if I saw the dog again I was to call them again. Apparently PO #2 just scared the dog. I can't believe that they are letting the lady keep it. Maybe she will have the sense to have him put down, there are a lot of kids (including mine) on this block and I've seen enough to know that dog is dangerous. She keeps it on a chain in the back yard, so I think that would be the best thing for everyone, including the dog.

I'm uploading some video now to post, I'll be back in a little while.
Mary

Happy Birthday Christopher!!

Today my boy is officially 4. That makes me sad and happy at the same time, so I am trying to focus on the happy. I will return later with a photo of the birthday boy, I do not have any uploaded to the computer yet. I do have some others, though:).

The kids were really sleepy and both decided to take a nap. Of course going and getting into bed was too much trouble so they just fell asleep right where they were.








Natalie has turned into quite the little girl/mommy. She loves to clean the house (and it's occupants) with baby wipes. I get a tummy sponge bath regularly. She'll wipe down the table, the walls and the TV mostly. Here she is wiping her bear's bottom. I didn't have time to get the camera out, but I also caught her nursing her train. Not her baby, her train... seems a little strange to me, but whatever makes her happy!



The kids got to dress up for school on Tuesday. N was an ice princess and C was Bob the Builder. I wanted him to be Mater from Cars, but he insisted on Bob. I relented and we added B the B to our family:)





Time for church, I'll see you all later:)
Mary

Birthday Party!!!

The kids birthday party was great! We all had so much fun bouncing and sliding then cake, ice cream and presents. A big thank you to everyone that came and to everone that helped! Here are some photos:)


Sliding, sliding and more sliding!








Basketball




A little birthday love:)


Fun, fun, fun!



Mmmmmmm, cake and ice cream!





Present time!




It was a tiring day!

Whew!

Life around here continues to stay busy, busy, busy! So much has been going on I haven't had much time to do anything, but we are all having fun and enjoying life. I have lots of pictures on my camera that I need to upload and post, but for now, I have a little slideshow for you:) For those of you that are subscribed to my blog, you will just see a blank space. Go to the top of this email and you will see my blog name and under that you will see 3 recent articles. If you click on the first, it will take you to this blog post and you should be able to see it.

I'm Back!

My DSL connection was down most of the time all week:(. When I could get online it took about 5 minutes to load each page, so I really didn't spend much time on the computer. It has been fixed for a few days now and I have some things for you:).

Natalie told me she had to go potty last night! YAY!!!! Hopefully this will be the start of a quick and easy potty training period. We'll save over $40 a month on diapers which is a good thing! I'm so proud of my little girl that I could just pee. Pun intended, ROFL.

Christopher got to be the Line Leader at school this week. He was apprehensive at first, but he ended up enjoying it to the fullest! I can't wait to see what job Ms. Kristie has him doing next week. Next week they are going on a field trip to the Fire Station. I was asked to come along, so hopefully I'll get some good pictures!

On to me... My photo class is going well, I am really starting to learn my camera and all the power I have when I get it out of Auto mode. Here is the photo I ended up turning in for the tree assignment



It wasn't the best one, but it made me happy and I guess that is all that counts, right? Our last assignment was a picture that we would not normally take. With me, that is easy, I just had to take a photo of something that was not my children, LOL. This is what I did for that one and the instructors seemed to really like it



And now here are some photos that I have taken this week that I was pretty happy with








If you have made it this far you get a reward! I have 2 videos of my precious kiddos:) Uncle Keenan came over last night and the kids had a blast using him as a trampoline and sounding board.



While Christopher is in his gymnastics class some of the older girls are always there practicing their vaulting. Sometimes he watches them and sometimes he doesn't. Apparently he has been paying close attention to them, though, this morning he put a pillow on the floor to use as a spring board while he was doing flips onto the loveseat. Now he does the flips regularly, but the pillow is new and I thought it was too cute not to share!