The Naked Chef

No doubt about it, I had to break out the camera tonight. I walked into Sophie's playroom before her bath and this is what I see:

Steven's doing of course. I wonder if the Food Network is looking for a new television show?Maybe they could call it "The Real Naked Chef."

As I mentioned in my previous post, we've been a boring bunch of people lately. The most exciting thing going on in my life right now will go down on Thursday. The season premier of Lost!!! YESSSS! So no one had better call me on Thursday between the hours of 8 and 10 pm unless it is during a commercial break to discuss Sawyer's hotness.

Nada

That's right, I have NOTHING to blog about. No pics. No stories. No nothing. I guess we are just boring people these days. I guess I could tell you about Sophie pooping on the potty not once, but twice. Exciting stuff! And on Saturday my mom and I did do something that was pretty cool. We headed to the Greenbrier resort and went on the "Bunker Tour." In case you've never heard of it, here's the gist. From 1961-1992, the Greenbrier was home to a top secret nuclear fallout shelter which would hold the members of the US Congress in case mother Russia ever decided to drop "the big one." Pretty cool. Grammy and PapPap came down and hung out with the Soph and spent the day with her at the Clay Center. Maybe this week I'll catch a case of shutter bug.

V-day Outtake

So this Sunday I decided to try my hand at some do-it-yourself Valentines for Sophie to give out to her class. I found a giant heart shaped lollipop at the dollar spot at Target (love that section by the way) and thought it would make the perfect prop. I did not, however, think about how messy and sticky a giant lollipop would be. I snapped off 30 shots until I decided that I couldn't take it anymore. Steven was suppose to be on wet paper towel duty but instead he laughed. Lotta good that did. I did manage to get a few good ones, just not exactly what I had in mind. Maybe I'll get crazy enough this weekend to try again. Here's an outtake. (and I have to admit that I had a few licks of that baby and it is goooooood, probably blew 3 points doing that!)

Concerto No. 5 in E-flat Major

I really need to break the video camera out and tape some of this stuff. This afternoon we enjoyed a lovely piano performance with a vocal accompaniment of "kinkle kinkle ittle star" on the mirco-phone. Good times. She can sing "twinkle twinkle" from start to finish and as she's singing I can't help but think "does she really think that she's making sense and sounding good?" For all I know she could be like some of those dodos on American Idol last week who seriously think they can win the whole darn thing when in reality they make your ears want to bleed. But you know what really gets me with those people? 99% of them say "well my friends and family all say that I sound great." Apparently these people need to ditch the friends and family that they have and pick up some new ones.

Ok, I'm off of my AI rant. Do you think Beethoven ever played his piano in his undies like Soph is in her diaper?

Billy Bob's

This is a quick post tonight. I have something funky going on with my left eye. I'm scared that it's a sty in my eye. Of course I only think that because I am an internet Witch Doctor who likes to self diagnose. Anywho, on to the pics. These were all taken by Stephanie, Gracie's mommy, who was a good mommy and didn't forget her camera battery. The girls had a BLAST. And I was shocked to see that the giant mechanical ape was skill playing the key board in his band like he did back in the 80's when I first went to Billy Bobs!

The girls doing some heavy equipment work on the dozer.

The pit-o-germs.

The solo ferris wheel. This is an interesting contraption if I do say so myself.

22 Months

Little Bit,

So I'm posting this on the 15th even though you'll officially be 22 months at midnight. Anywho, this past month has been jammed packed with excitement, the big event of course being Christmas. If anything, this past Christmas has made me even more excited for next Christmas because I know that next year you'll "get it" a little more. Sure you thought that all of the new toys were "cool" and "awesome" (two of your favorite words) but you still woke up on Christmas morning like it was any ordinary day. I'm still a little p-oed that I was unable to get your picture taken with "HoHo" (as you like to call him). Do you understand that when you are 30 years old and you look back over the pictures of your childhood that there will be a big old blank spot in the yearly photos with Santa? And I'll have to say "sorry, you thought Santa was Satan reincarnated that year." C'est la vie, I guess.

This month you continue to be a little chatter box and you've become little Miss Manners by saying "please, thank-you, and you delcome" ALL of the time. And we LOVE it! It doesn't get much cuter. It also doesn't get much cuter than putting your own self in time out for knocking over your doll house. Your daddy looked over at me and said "Is she for real? Did she really just put herself in time out?" Oh yes you did. And we had to fight back the laughter because you truly did deserve a time out for that little number.

We "thought" that you were ready to start potty training this month. I say "thought" because you had been doing great peeing on the potty before your nightly bath. However, just tonight as were letting you run around without a diaper, asking you every five minutes if you had to pee, you accidentally whizzed on the couch. The couch is new no moe (the r intentionally left off of that "more"). So back on go the diapers. I think we've 100% decided that Ms. PJ, who will be your new teacher when you move out of Ms. Brenda's room this summer, can potty train you. That woman has been potty training 2 year olds for over 17 years. As a tall black woman who we've overheard say "boy you'd better get that bathroom and pee and poop" I have no doubts that she'll put the fear of god in you and you'll be squatting and dropping in no time flat. Perfect.

The signing continues around here. 99.9% of the time you sound like those people they show on the first episode of American Idol. Except you're cute and those people are like watching a train wreck. The latest hit around here is "This Little Light of Mine." You especially like part where you "hide it under a bushel" just so you can scream "NOOOOOO" at the top of your lungs.

And you totally crack us up by calling my dad "Rock." Granted his name is in fact "Rocky" but there's no grandpa, no papa, no papaw, it's just Rock. Oh and apparently, PapPap Carr looks like Senator John McCain. He was on TV the other evening and you jumped up and down screaming "PAPPAP, PAPPAP!" You know what Little Bit, you truly are one funny little girl.Keep it up Little Bit, keep it up.

Love Mama

More pictures of Billy Bobs to come, thanks to Stephanie.

Mud Mask

Actually, that should say PUDDING MASK! I turn my back for one nano second to pick up the phone and this is what I come back to. She decides to give herself a facial with chocolate pudding. I must say that I've heard that chocolate does wonders for the skin. What in the world would have possessed her to cover her face in pudding? I guess the simple fact that she can makes it more than logical. She's got some rockin' hair in this pic too. I need to cut down on the ice cream and pudding or she's gonna be joining the chub club with me. But I've gotta get this stuff outta the house!

We all scream....

for ice cream! Who is this big girl that is capable of sitting on the couch after dinner with a spoon in one hand and a bowl of ice cream in her lap, chowing down like it's no body's business? I look at this scene and think that it can't possibly be my Little Bit. But it is! When did she go and get all grown up on me? And three times today she looked at me after I handed her something and said "cool mama." What's up with that???

I also look at this scene and think about ripping that bowl out of her hands and hiding in my closet and scarfing it down myself. Man dieting is HORRIBLE!

The Big Book

Nope, not the yellow pages. That would be Curious George's Big Book of Curiosity. It's the new favorite around here and it happens to be the first book that Sophie will look at with us or even by herself for more than 10 minutes! It has over 400 words and it seems as though she likes to go over EVERY SINGLE ONE!

And sad news in my world. I'm back on the wagon. The weight wagon that is. Fun times. My work has started a "Chub Club" (I should be the captain) and we've all pitched in 20 big ones into a pot. In 8 weeks we'll see who has lost the biggest percentage of weight. So I'm back to counting weight watcher points. This time next year I'll probably be doing it again. What a vicious cycle. I swear if I could find a doctor to do some black market gastric bypass I'd be all over it!

It's "Smurfy"

No need to adjust your monitor, you aren't watching an episode of VH1's "I Love 1984" although you could be because that's the year that this here belt came from. And it's totally awesome because it was mine!! Yep, for some unknown reason my mother had this smurfy, elastic, rainbow hued, magnetic buckle, belt stashed away for a rainy day. She came across it the other day, big score! It's 24 years old!! Does that make it an antique? I personally like how this belt depicts "Greedy Smurf" carrying a gigantic cake. Lord if that doesn't say me, I don't know what does! And I think Little Bit is just cool enough to pull off the Smurf belt.

I mean look at this face. How much cooler can you get?

Picture Perfect

We are on the ball! In just one week's time, Steven hung up my new lamps AND 5, count them, 5 pictures, one of which is my new canvas! YESSSS! While he's on a roll I should probably try to talk him into cleaning out the garage. Hmmmm.

And on Saturday we hit up "Billy Bob's Showbiz Pizza," which is a "Chuck E. Cheese" knockoff(again just what does the E stand for? Ernie? ) with Gracie. The girls had a BLAST. I think they rode every ride in the joint at least 3 times. Our only snafu was Steven having to jump into the ball pit to rescue both girls. Sophie was drowning in balls and Gracie couldn't move thanks to the big kids jumping on top of them. You'd think that if a parent saw two one year olds trying out the ball pit that they'd make their kiddos wait a whole 5 minutes before jumping on in. Oh well, it's a big pit of germs anyway.

The ABC's Of Sophie

Now that Christmas is over I can FINALLY post the ABC book that I made for my mom and Steven's mom. Trust me it's not easy coming up with a picture for every letter of the alphabet so some of them are a stretch. I couldn't do "Xmas" for X because I hadn't taken any Christmas pics yet. I have to thank my friend Janice for designing the cover for me. Never in a million years could I have done that part myself. So here it is. It's a little blurry and the size is funky but you get the idea. And sorry for the stupid song that goes along with it, I didn't feel like upgrading to the "premium package" at one true media, so just pretend that ABC from the Jackson 5 is playing. And while your at it, pretend that Michael is still black.

Make an on-line slideshow at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Top Chef

Happy 2008. I know that I've slacked off on my posting. I have two excuses. Number 1, I haven't picked up my camera since Christmas day. And number 2, I am currently in the middle of reading "The Pillars of the Earth" and it happens to be one of those books that you occasionally come across that's physically impossible to put down and you stay up way past your 10 pm bedtime reading. I HIGHLY recommend it if you are looking for a good book.

As for Little Bit, she's well on her way to battling Bobby Flay in an Iron Chef match up. The girl can cook up a mean batch of sauteed watermelon. But there is one great big giant negative to the kitchen set. It is a MESS!!! We bought her a 100 piece food set to go along with it and all 100 pieces end up thrown around like confetti. Is it bad that I'm thinking about hiding the tiny plastic french fries and hot dogs because I'm tired of picking them up?