Early Morning Conversations with a Toddler

M: So, what kind of dreams did you have?
Me: What kind of dream did you have?
M: Well!! I had an Ariel dream.
Me: Yeah, I'm pretty sure I had a stressful work dream.
M: No, you had a princess dream.
Me: Well, then I must have had a Cinderella in bondage dream.
M: I don't have any bon-denge.
M: I want to shnuggle wif you, mommy.

Julie and Julia

My sister in law and I escaped one night in the middle of the week and saw Julie and Julia.

It was perfect. It was the late showing and we were the only ones in the theater, so if we had commentary, we just went ahead and said it!

It was delightful! I know everyone's already said it, but I'll say it too. You should see it!!

Really!

I love love love Meryl Streep! She has been one of my favorites for a while now. I think she is an amazing actress. She truly transforms herself into the character she plays, it's not just another version of her (think Kevin Costner, who, has some enjoyable movies under his belt but truly every movie is just another version of him) But Meryl BECOMES Julia and gives you such a wonderful visualization of what she might have been like.

The best part is, you will come home with a new appreciation of butter and wanting to cook things!

I have decided there is too much wine in French food for me to recreate the Julie/Julia experiment but I think I'm going to replicate it. On a much smaller, I-can-actually-finish-this, scale, of course!

Like creating something new (craft, sewing, cooking, you name it) every week. I'll let you know what I come up with. Maybe I'll use my big 30 birthday on Sunday to kick it off!

And yes, I'm silly enough to get inspired over a movie. You would come home wanting Julia Child's cookbook too though, admit it!

my sweet hubby

Have I mentioned how proud of my husband I am?

He is working so hard at school and doing so well!

He works over forty hours a week and helps everyone out at work.

And then he comes home and studies all night every night.

He's enjoying it and working so hard and I'm so proud of him.

He is sacrificing so much for our family.

We're finally getting a routine, and I'm so proud of him for making this a priority.

LG's Second Birthday Smash!

this is what happens when you have a one year old who doesn't understand that she will get her toy back as soon as we can detach it from the packaging :)

and then she's all better when she gets her present back! :)

she loves things that drive by themselves. she goes crazy nuts over those little wind up toys that crawl or jump around!

she was very excited by her cake but had no clue that she should blow out the candle. so I helped her. I was proud of my cake. It had the yummiest gooiest frosting and it was in the shape of a butterfly (two heart shaped cakes end to end-so cute!)

and then she dove right in! we joke that she's never really full, she just slows down. we finally had to take the cake away so the rest of us could get some because I'm pretty sure she would have just kept eating it.

signing "more" for well, more

happy, full of chocolate and cute as can be!

Farewell

My sister goes back to school tomorrow. Usually she's much more sad to leave all of us than excited to get back to school. Not this time! I'm pretty sure she's counting down the time until she gets to see her fiance, Jason.

When she comes home, it will be for a whirlwind weekend of wedding excitement! (nice alliteration, huh!) I'm going to miss her though.

cabin fever

I truly hope that the changing of the seasons helps to somewhat remedy this!

You see, I have had the strong urge, dare I say, impression, that we need a family vacation. A real one. Not a trip to see family where we come home more exhausted than when we left. Not a trip with extended family. That's next summer at mom and dad's timeshare. A real vacation where the WE Holmans are with themselves for some small-family-of-four bonding.

We were in the semi-firm planning stages of a wonderful, thrifty, memorable trip to Washington, DC this fall. We have both always wanted to go there. Instead we paid grad school tuition.

Worth it? of course. Sad nonetheless? of course.

Our life is stressed and busy right now while we adjust to W's new study schedule and my ever-changing work schedule. But then there's this urge.

The urge that makes me calculate how cheap we can go to Disney World for at least once a week.

The urge that makes me figure out if I can drive to Dallas by my lonesome to see my dear friend.

The urge that makes me want to never eat out again so we can still go to DC and yet still make it to Kauai next summer.

sigh... like I said, I need fall to come and refresh my soul!

SEPTEMBER!!!

I LOVE SEPTEMBER!

It is my most favoritest month of the year!

It's the month when the air turns crisper and the leaves change colors (I may have to modify my expectations to fit the Arkansas climate but I will still get excited for it in September!)

It is the month when I crave crisp apples and caramel

It is the month where it doesn't seem so silly to make pumpkin bars anymore

It's the month where I turn 30

It's the month where I get antsy for fall-ish projects. I want to scrapbook and sew and mod-podge something!

It is the month where wearing jeans all day doesn't seem like such a crazy idea!

It is the month of campfires and roasting marshmallows

It's the month of sleeping with the windows open listening to crickets

LOVE LOVE LOVE it!