BUST!

So, the stroller I was so super excited about turned out to be a HUGE bust. It was a joke, actually. The seat backs were only 17 inches high. Camden's head was already at the top, at five months! And Carter's head was well over, with the steel frame resting uncomfortably at the base of his head. I called Schwinn and the, not so nice, lady reassured me that their standard is 17 inches. So, I guess that their 50 pound weight limit per child is for children who are very short and quit pudgy. It's going back.

God Moment

The boys and I experienced what my mom likes to call "a God moment" today. I was stopped at a red light handing some food to Carter when my light turned green. I paused for just a second to place something on the center console, and then proceeded to hit the gas. As soon as I entered the middle of the intersection, a van going about 55 mph sped through a red light in the opposite direction JUST missing my front bumper. Now, had I not paused for that quick second, that van would have t-boned our van right on the driver's side hitting Camden and me. I couldn't help but sit in the middle of the intersection in a bit of shock for a while. The van was going so fast, I could barely see it after it flew through the intersection. In my previous post, posted this morning, my last line was "life is just so darn precious". It's amazing how fast Dan's whole family was almost wiped out. I really don't think we would have survived. We certainly need to remember how precious our loved ones are. We are just never guaranteed another day. Our close call was just a little too close for comfort.

This was what happened the last time we were t-boned. No thanks.

5 Months Old Today

Our little Camden is growing up way too fast. Cam Cam is five months old today. We were thinking that we would be able to take time to cherish this stage of our lives, but it just keeps going by so quickly! Camden acts very much like a two year old stuck in a five month olds' body. He watches Carter play, and his little legs kick and he gets so excited. We can tell he wants us to put him down so he can run around and play with his big brother. Carter flew through the baby days, so we are making a special effort to apply the brakes. We might want to plan on bringing our "baby car" into the shop because the brakes aren't working so well. Life is just so darn precious.

Emerald Isle Family... Vacation?

We were lucky enough to be blessed with a free condo at Emerald Isle this past weekend. One of Dan's patients owns a home down at the beach, and was very gracious in letting us borrow it. I was pretty stressed out getting us all packed up and out the door, but the weekend was fun. It was nice to get away and have a change of scenery, but I couldn't help but feel like I needed a vacation when we arrived home last night. If Dan wasn't so darn efficient at loading and unloading the van, I would probably go nuts! At least all I had to do was put everything away and start all the laundry. Dan even carried everything up to the condo (which was a pretty good hike) and everything back down when it was time to leave, God bless him.

It was ridiculous how much we had to bring for just two days!
Thank goodness we have a van...phew.

All the comforts of home...even Noggin!

Ready for the beach.

Carter LOVED the giant sandbox that God created.
He really enjoyed playing on the beach, definitely a
highlight of the whole trip.
SAND!!!

Cam Cam was nice and safe, sun-free and sand-free!

Dan reassured me that if I took a picture, it would last longer.
No such luck.

We visited the NC Aquarium at Pine Knoll Shores
before coming home yesterday.

Wilmington Air Show

Dan took Carter to see the Thunderbirds in Wilmington two weekends ago. I am afraid that Dan expected Carter to be a little bit more excited than he was, but he is just a little too young to fully appreciate it all I think. The day was long and pretty tiresome for both of them. Carter was so pooped that he actually slept, in his stroller, through VERY LOUD jets flying above. I enjoyed the break from Carter and spent some quality time with Camden. As usual, Dan is already busy anticipating the next air show. He LOVES them!!!

Here is the pooped out Car Car. Poor guy.

LOL...............................

The next time you want to complain about rush hour traffic,
check out this rush hour train in Tokyo. NO THANKS!
They actually have "pushers" to push people onto the train.
I sure hope no one has a flatulence issue.

|

So Super Excited...

I have decided that I am officially addicted to strollers. I am a literal stroller hoarder. I have owned, and currently own, all sorts of strollers. Some of my past strollers were given to me, I seem to attract free strollers from garage sales. I find most of my strollers used, use them for as long as I need them, and then I sell them to some other fellow stroller hoarder. I usually make a profit, which only funds my next stroller purchase.
My newest addition, well soon to be, a Schwinn Double Jogging Stroller. At last, I can finally exercise while both of the babes are firmly secured. I currently only have a single jogging stroller, so Camden usually enjoys the ride while Carter walks. Now, for all of you mothers out there, I am sure you will agree that there is absolutely no exercise to be had while towing along a two year old.
I was lucky to find this stroller on sale, always appreciated, and with free shipping, bonus! The new stroller should be arriving any day now...I can't wait! And, the way gas prices are looking these days, I will need to buy another one for Dan and me to take turns riding in on the way to the grocery store (now that's a funny visual). I wonder if you can attach a moped motor to one of these beauties?

Worth a Thousand Words...

Picture Post

Camden cuddling with my sisters.

Nipple

We do our best to properly educate Carter about his body parts. It became clear to us yesterday, however, that he was a bit confused about something. As we were driving to church, Carter sat in his seat saying, "nipple, nipple, nipple...". I turned around to see him pointing to his leg and knee. "No, no sweety, your knee doesn't have a nipple". "Nipple!". "What do you think he is saying?", I asked Dan. Dan turns around, as if he is the stay at home Mommy spending loads of time with him, and simply asks, "Carter, is there a freckle on your leg?". "Yes, freckle!". Carter seemed to be so relieved that someone finally understood him. OK, so he now knows that he doesn't have nipples on his legs, and that they are called freckles...right? While I was getting Carter dressed this morning, I asked him what Daddy has on his neck. "Nipple!" he proudly states. *Sigh* On to his A B C 's.

Trip to Atlanta

We recently took a trip down to Atlanta for Dan to attend a seminar and for me to spend some time with a dear friend. I was terribly worried about traveling with CamCam, but as it turned out Carter was the one that I should have worried about! He was so obnoxious! I can't really blame him though, because our day started off with running errands to prepare for our trip...the grocery store, the pet store, dropping Oreo off at our most gracious friend's house, and I even squeezed in a haircut for Carter. So, by the time we got in the car to start our trip, the boys were DONE with the car. One of the funniest moments (not funny while it was occurring however) was when Carter refused to stop imitating Dori from Finding Nemo. He sat in the backseat for over an hour, while Camden and I were trying to sleep, making whale noises (remember when Dori "speaks" in whale?) and kicking my seat. At least HE thought it was cute. We ended up having a great visit with our friends, even though brief, and our trip home went very quickly...thank God!

A Day From H-E Double Hockey Sticks

Today was going pretty smoothly. I had to prepare a few meals for a friend who just had a baby and bring them by for dinner. I left the house around 4:00 and headed to Durham, but I had to stop by the bank first. I waited in line for the teller for 5 minutes and then he took my deposit, it took him 10 minutes to process it because he was talking inside with a friend. I grabbed my receipt and sped off only to find out that he had shorted me almost $600! UGH! I had to go back and wait all over again for him to fix it. I finally made it to Durham around 5:00 and dropped off the food. After my brief visit I was nervous about returning home to Holly Springs on Hwy 55 because of the traffic, but I decided to take a deep breath and go for it, no rush. The traffic was bumper to bumper and I had to stop a few times to calm Camden down. Carter was starting to whine, loudly, and I couldn't wait to get home. "We're almost there boys, hang in there!" I was saying as I approached the intersection of US 1 and Hwy 55. As soon as I got to the intersection I noticed a few fire trucks and we were immediately detoured onto US1 South towards Sanford. At this point I felt pretty darn inconvenienced, but I had no idea how bad it would get. As I was approaching the first exit, which was four or five miles down US1, I noticed that there was no traffic headed in the other direction on US1 North. How the heck am I going to get home!? I pretty much started having a panic attack and started crying. Carter was crying for food and I was able to find emergency peanuts in the glove box- THANK GOD! I was TIRED and I couldn't imagine the boys lasting another minute. Dan couldn't find anything on the news about the congestion and there was nothing on the radio- he even called the Apex police, but they wouldn't tell him what was going on. I saw tons of helicopters hovering above, and there were cop cars EVERYWHERE. We figured that there was a chemical or bomb scare or something. To make a L O N G story short, I ended up exiting in New Hill and traveled North up Old US1. All the right hand turns were blocked off with flares and police cars and traffic was quickly piling up, it was a nightmare! As soon as I started to find my way into downtown Apex, Carter started complaining about a moog (booger). I couldn't imagine why the heck a booger would hurt so bad. He then told me that he stuck a peanut up his nose and he starting panicking and crying out for daddy. I had to pull out of traffic and whip the van over to preform nasal surgery on Carter to remove a peanut. I couldn't help but laugh at all the shenanigans. The traffic was so bad into Apex and down Ten-Ten Rd. that I had to go all the way to Hwy 64 to Kildaire to get home. It was NOT FUNNY! To top it all off, the Check Engine light turned on as I pulled into the driveway. It took 2 1/2 hours to get home. As it turns out a cement truck spilled some cement. So why in the heck did they not tell people to stay away from that area? When there is a silly little fender bender they put it all over the news. How stupid. It was already time for bed when we got home...what a waste of gas!

He's Crying

The other day, Carter was playing in his sandbox while Linda (Dan's Mom) and I were talking. We weren't outside long before our resident anole (green lizard) came for a visit. Carter hopped right out of the sandbox and proceeded to chase Mr. Anole along with a very excited Oreo. Linda handed Carter his sand bucket and told him to catch the lizard certain that the anole would run like the dickens from him and Oreo. Linda and I stepped inside for a moment to look at something, and within seconds we hear Carter screaming, "Got him, got him!" and Oreo was jumping up and down. I ran outside to see what was going on, and poor Mr. Anole had been smacked with the bucket and was in shock. I told Carter we had to leave the lizard alone and that he had a boo-boo now because he wasn't careful with his bucket. When Carter came inside, he turned around and looked out the window and in a very soft, concerned voice stated, "he's crying, the anole is crying". Poor Mr. Anole. I don't think two year olds are cut out to catch lizards quite yet. Maybe next year.

Going Coo Coo

I decided to venture out into the rain yesterday with Camden to pick-up some essentials from Target. While I was there I added six packages of baby wipes to my cart. During check out, I noticed there were only five packages. Huh, I guess I was wrong. After ringing through, and paying WAY too much for groceries once again, I decided to look over my receipt to ensure accuracy. I quickly noticed that the cashier had charged me for six packages of wipes. Well I guess someone else can't count either! I proceeded to the customer service desk to receive a refund for the extra package I was charged for. While waiting, I double checked just to make sure, yup, five packages. After waiting in line, pleading my case, and walking away with $3.77 in my pocket I headed home. Once I arrived home, I started to put away the groceries. Guess what... I had six packages of baby wipes after all! I counted them a few times just to be certain. I thoroughly believe my brief lack of intelligence was a blatant display of sleep deprivation.