Birthday Party - Take Two

A couple of months ago, Paul and I made the decision to have Railey's birthday party one week late so he could be home to celebrate. At the time, I thought it would be perfect to spread out the birthday activities rather than do them all in one or two days. Since Railey's actual birthday has come, I realize that I made a MAJOR mistake...I TOLD Railey when her birthday is. Rather than just waiting until Paul got back in town to celebrate, I decided to have cake with Railey and I on her birthday night and then celebrate the next day at school with all of her friends. Keep in mind, this is in addtion to the party that we already had in Tallahassee and we still have a party with all of her friends this coming week. Railey has had the time of her life. She is, as I have mentioned before, the princess.

Here are some pictures of the festivites. Pay attention to the shirt she is wearing. Not the Santa shirt that Miss Railey is wearing in March (I let her choose what she was going to wear) but from her school party. Railey's Aunt Garrett made that shirt for Railey...HOW CUTE!

Springtime in Atlanta!!!

Springtime is here...thank goodness. I really didn't know what I was going to do with another cold and/or rainy weekend ahead of me. Instead of that, which has become the norm here in Atlanta this past Winter, we had 70 degree sunny weather this Saturday. Railey and I decided to do some finger painting. Enjoy these pictures, not sure if I will ever buy finger paints again:)

And the Moral of the Story is...

Every night before Railey goes to bed, I read two books to her. Her favorites come in cycles, and tonight I decided to try to introduce a new book to her....it is a book of one minute goodnight stories.

The one minute story that we read tonight was about the messy gnome who hides childrens toys if they leave their playroom messy. I was VERY excited about this theme because cleaning up toys has become a major point of discussion between me and Railey.

When the story was over, I told Railey that she needed to be more careful about leaving her toys out. She was quiet for a minute, turned to me and said, "Mommy, can you watch my toys tonight since I didn't clean them up?" I told her that I would watch them tonight (the LAST thing I wanted was for her to get out of bed to clean). But then, after thinking about it for a minute, she said "Mommy can you go clean my toys up?"

For some reason, I think that the moral of the story went RIGHT OVER Railey's head. And from now on, I bet she will make sure that I am cleaning up her toys every night so the messy gnome doesn't hide one of them.....

Gotta Love Tantrums

Earlier today, I called Mom and told her that I felt like I had hit a wall. I guess that Paul being on week four out of town, construction on the attic, and Railey's birthday week finally caught up with me. When Railey woke up from her nap this afternoon in a grumpy mood, I decided that we were going to burn off some energy by riding around our neighborhood on the tricycle.



Railey was fantastic for the first ten minutes but then something set her off and she was MAD. Luckily, not at me, but she was furious at her bike. First she turned the bike upside down and when that didn't get a reaction out of me and Mike (our neighbor) she decided to walk about 20 feet away on the sidewalk and pout...half crying, sitting on the ground. Again, no reaction.



Then, it happened. She started to undress. First her jacket, then her shirt. At this point, a random person stopped to talk to me and laugh about it. This made Little Miss Railey even more mad! She proceeded to take off her pants and panties and was left with just her socks.



Then, just as quickly as it started, she was finished. She stood up, walked over to her bike, turned it over and started riding down the sidewalk, naked as can be, on her tricycle.



Now, we are watching her new Princess and the Frog DVD from Aunt Garrett and I think that I deserve a glass of wine.

Believe it or not, I have never liked speaking in front of crowds. There are probably a bunch of people out there who would swear otherwise but I really get nervous when all of the attention is on me. Up until a few days ago, I thought that Railey had inherited this unfortunate trait from me. I think I might have been wrong.

This past weekend, Poppy (my father) took Railey to the Jr. Museum which is a natural habitat zoo in Tallahassee. Right when she got back from this trip, Tutu (my mother) and I loaded her up in the car to make the trip back to Atlanta. She fell asleep immediately and when she woke up we started asking questions about her trip, thinking that we were going to hear about the bears, alligators or other animals she had seen along the way.

Not even close, Railey talked about dancing. She did mention that they saw deer, squirrels and alligators but the highlight of her day was dancing in front of everyone. Railey could barely contain herself when she told me and Tutu about how she would dance and then everyone in the audience would cheer for her. I couldn't believe my ears....Railey typically gets embarrassed when she is the center of attention.

Later that day, once Railey had gone to sleep, I asked my father about Railey's dancing and wanted to know how she made it up on to the stage to dance. He seemed very confused and when I explained Railey's version of the story, he couldn't stop laughing. It turns out that Railey was in fact dancing, but the applause from the audience came each time the jazz band that was performing finished a song. I can't even imagine the smile on her face when she thought that the audience enjoyed her dancing so much that they kept on clapping for her.

Picture Day!

Today was picture day at Railey's school, and one of my best friends happens to be the photographer that takes these candid, black and white photos of the children. I got a message from her saying how cute Railey was and well adjusted she was to have her Aunt Deana running around snapping pictures. In her words, she said, "Railey played with her friends and when it was her turn to come over and get her pictures taken, she came over, smiled when she was supposed to, then went back to playtime with her friends.

Of course, a call like this is a parents dream. Not only did I hear first hand that the school choice I made was the right one, but Railey just might be out of her terrible twos. Now if anyone else tells me that three is worse than two.....

I got the following email from Deana:

railey is the cutest thing ever. they are all good. one peek!

Construction!

Almost two months ago, I wrote about all of the things that I need to do before baby #2 comes. Well, nothing has changed...until today. Today was the first day of construction on our attic and, besides one of the workers tearing up the grass on the side of our driveway, things went great. I am hopeful that our luck has turned around when it comes to contractors.

Railey decided to entertain the workers today by showing them her roller skates and her walking kitty. Could it be that she is finally coming out of her shell...the shy bit was about to drive me crazy:) Since the new bathroom is going in right above her current bedroom, we have also set up an air mattress in our room where she will take her naps for a while. She is the happiest girl in the world!

Did I mention that I have also taken on potty training the cat? Really, this is getting crazy.

Railey's Birthday - Take One

On our visit to Tallahassee, Tutu and Poppy decided to throw Railey a birthday party so she could celebrate with her cousins, Brooke and Sydney. Tutu went all out, getting Railey a ladybug cake to go along with the theme for her 3rd birthday party.

We ate dinner, played with the cousins, opened gifts and then it was FINALLY time to eat cake. We all gathered around the almost birthday girl and lit the candles. After we had finished singing, Railey blew out her candles in only two tries.

Of course, she was beaming from ear to ear and then announced that she wanted to do it again. I asked if she wanted me to light the candles again so she could blow them out, and she said yes, and sing to me again too.

Every family has to have one princess. Hint hint...it is NOT me!

What a Day...

So far this morning...

• Railey woke up 45 minutes early
• The nanny called to say that she couldn't come today
• The dog threw up on the bedroom carpet

I wonder what 8:00 a.m. is going to bring.....

Wonder Pets

I always thought that I would be the type of parent that restricted television. I am quickly learning that when Darby said "never say never" when it comes to parenting, she was absolutely right. A few months ago, I somehow stumbled on the show the Wonder Pets. I had turned on the "babysitter" so I could clean up around the house. About ten minutes later, I had to come back into the room because Railey was crying. It turns out that the Wonder Pets had come on and a kitten was stuck in a river in distress. From there, we were hooked.

Last night, Railey and I sat down to watch Wonder Pets, which had a Bengal Tiger for this episode. For those of you who know Railey, tigers are her absolute favorite. This is partly because she likes to impersonate them growling and also because she gets to visit them at the zoo. We sat down to watch the show and almost immediately, the was sobbing....HYSTERICALLY. She kept saying "poor Tiger" and "Tiger has a boo boo." She sat in my lap and every couple of minutes would bury her head in my shoulder.

After the show, I had to bandage her stuffed Tiger's paw and talk her off the ledge for about one hour. My sweet caring little girl.

I am now convinced that our little animal lover Railey is going to be some sort of animal trainer or animal doctor. That, and Paul and I are going to have to spend thousands for all of the animals that she brings in over the next 18 years....

Curve Ball

When I was pregnant with Railey, I got a lot of advice about becoming a mommy. How to get her on a schedule, which pediatrician was the best, what kind of diapers to use, etc. It took me a while to figure out that I needed to wake up each day expecting some sort of "curve ball" to be thrown my way. Needless to say, now that I plan on things to come up on a daily basis, I am a much more sane person!!!

This week was no exception. Paul is on week two of being on tour (he will get back in two more weeks) and on Thursday night we got a call that his Grandmother had a very serious heart attack. Paul was obviously very upset that he was stuck on the West Coast so I decided that Railey and I would take a detour and drive to Charlotte to see Grandmother before going to Murphy's 2nd birthday party in Rutherfordton,NC. On the way up, Paul suggested that I prepare Railey for our trip to the hospital. The only thing that I knew to expect was that Grandmother was barely awake and that she had an oxygen mask. I only told Railey three things:

• Grandmother had a mask over her face to help her breathe
• We had to use our inside voice at the hospital
• Don't touch ANYTHING at the hospital

I bet you can guess which one Railey kept on repeating....don't touch anything. We got to the hospital and Grandmother was completely awake (despite morphine) and she was very excited to see me and Railey. Railey was a complete dream at the hospital...although a little bit shy. After visiting for 1 1/2 hours we were on our way to drive for another 1 1/2 hours to Ashley and Jimmy's house.

Our sweet Railey was a DREAM the entire trip. Now I am crossing my fingers that Grandmother will continue to show improvement so Paul can go up and see her when he gets back from his trip.

Ahhhh...marketing to children

For any of you who have watched kids television stations, especially Sprout, you know all too well what a pillow pet is. For the past year, I have successfully dodged the bullet of getting one for Railey by distracting her or just pretending like I couldn't hear her (I know, I get a big fat F in parenting for that tactic).

Today, the commercial came on and Railey was especially zoned in on it. At the end of the commercial, it said, "If you have a birthday holiday or special occasion coming up, these are the perfect gift" To that, Railey turned to me and said, "I have a birthday coming up."

How do I compete with that? Panda pillow pet was ordered within 5 minutes.