A Green Thumb and Other Good Stuff

Jackson is super interested in flowers and such.
We water the flower beds out front regularly and he's got to be right there helping me. (And to pick the dead flowers off my petunias.)

The Easter bunny left him a kit of basil and a sensitive plant in his basket to grow for himself. Well, the basil was for me really, but he doesn't know that.

So we planted them the other day.

Tiny hands at work.

I love it.

And wouldn't ya know, they are actually growing! The sensitive plant (for those who don't know what that is) is a plant that if you touch it's leaves, it closes up, kinda like a venus fly trap, but without the thorns and blood and tears.

I think Jackson will like it.

Found this curled up in front of the kitchen sink last night as I was making dinner. He was crying for me to hold him, so I would, then have to put him down and continue making dinner. Which by the way was excellent. And I'd love to share the recipe with you :)

I could just munch on these ham hocks all day.

I love his squishy-ness.


Dinner, yeah, it was good. See I cleaned my plate.

You may be asking yourself, "Self. Why did she post a picture of a dirty dinner plate."

Cause dinner was that good.

And I had to prove my point.

We have been eating dinner out on the back porch the last couple of weeks. The weather has been awesome...so we are taking advantage of it.

Cause once summer comes, it'll be air conditioned quarters for us!

Charlie insisted he have two utensils to eat with.

Maybe so he could shovel the food in faster...

maybe just so he'd have something in each hand, which is usually the case for anything.

Um, hi.

Yes, I did birth this freakish individual.

Yes, I claim him.

No, I don't understand him...yet.

The "JEEJEE"

Just thought I'd show my viewers what happens when I pull a fresh "JEEJEE" (Charlie's word for his blanket(S)) out of the dryer...

Small children start flocking to the laundry room...

And get all up in the JEEJEE's warmness. This makes for a very happy Charlie.


Now commence the finger sucking. Ladies and Gentlemen: It's naptime in little Charlie's head. He can now slip into a deep, happy slumber knowing that fresh, warm JEEJEE is going to bed with him.

Oh! What's this? Big brother needs to see what this bliss is all about.


Charlie pushed him quickly away.
My JEEJEE he retorts. And rightfully so.

It looks as if Jackson is circling his prey like a shark trying to get in on the action...



Charlie just doesn't want any of Jackson's lunch left over on his face to reach the depths of his freshly laundered JEEJEE.

And night night. Right there on the hard laundry room floor.

No....... I put the happy kid in his bed. And shut the door.

And let that magical JEEJEE do what it does best :)

Easter 2009

Jackson dyed Easter eggs on Friday.
They were Cars eggs.
Thanks Nonna.

Sunday morning the boys found their baskets the Easter Bunny left them.

They were excited.

Charlie didn't get candy in his eggs....just baseball balls.

That seemed to be enough!

Jackson's got a chokehold on his brother.

Charlie's just trying to figure out how to open that pack of Starburst.

There are many uses for Charlie's "easter bucket."

Ready for church! James took some pics while I was still getting ready.

Don't get all wrinkled!

The Gilmore's :)

Jackson likes to pick the dead flowers off my plants. I taught him how to do this. Now, it's not only my obsession, it's his too.

We went over to my cousin Steph's house for Easter lunch. It was, as usual, delicious. Then we had an egg hunt for the kids.

Charlie got it this year. Mission: Find eggs.

All excited about seeing the kite flying in the air...

Christian and Emma, my cousin's kids!

There's the kite Jackson got in his basket. We had a nice day. Except that I was sick, and still am. Stinkin' allergies! Happy Easter!

Crescent City Classic 10k

Just wanted to share some pics from our day. It was racin' day for Jess. I ran in the Crescent City Classic 10k race with, get this, 28,000 other people!!! It was a large crowd to say the least. But tons of fun, a great challenge, and I'll definitely do it again!



The boys were waiting for me to get finished! They dropped us off at the start and drove down to the finishline.

Having a little breakfast on the sidewalk....

Here were the first overachievers of the day. They were from Kenya (I'm guessing here...) and finished the race in 20 minutes...or something like that. If I had long legs, I could do it in that amount of time too...I mean, come on.

My boys!

Just a pic James took of the masses of people! It was crazy. There was no way I was going to stop running, I might have gotten run over!

Ah, here I come galloping towards the finish line...see me? I'm towards the left in black shorts and pink top?

Waving and smiling...cause I see the finish line!!!

6.2 miles is a long way to run. It was all good till I hit the 4 mile mark, then I struggled. It's where it got harder. My shoulders were tensing up. My legs were getting heavy...but I kept on truckin'....

And I did it! My boys were my best cheerleaders :)

Red faced and all, I actually enjoyed it. I enjoyed the sight of that finishline even more though...

My cousin, Steph and me. Oh and Charlie peeking down in the corner.

Here's my speedracer sister, Lana. I started out running with her. Then she got a wild hair up her butt and took off, leaving me her dust to choke on.

I finished the 6.2 mile race in 1 hour 3 minutes! And today I hurt. And I'm sick. On Easter.

I've got cute Easter pics to come....hopefully tomorrow!