Ralphie and Randy

December is here, and Christmas is next week. Can you believe it? I can't for several reasons. 1. Time has indeed flown way too quickly this year and 2. It's 80 degrees here. Sickening. Hot chocolate anyone?

We've had a busy few weeks since Thanksgiving. Jack has had two Christmas performances, we've taken a trip to NC, and we've made the most of every Christmas opportunity around.

Although it's currently 76 degrees outside right now, it was really cold here a few weeks ago. So cold that the boys actually needed their new coats (courtesy of Karen and Brad...THANK YOU!). After I took this picture I realized that I have given birth to the modern day Ralphie and Randy from the movie, The Christmas Story. You know, the Red Ryder BB Gun movie that plays nonstop on Christmas Eve? Jack (Ralphie) has the lisp and glasses thing going while Finn (Randy) is a bundled up munchkin who eats his food like a pig, too.






The other night "How the Grinch Stole Christmas" came on TV. The REAL Grinch cartoon, not the movie. Anyway, we let the boys stay up to watch it. Finn watched about as long as it took to take this picture, but Jack really enjoyed it. The day after this I happened to go through the boys' toys to pack up and give away a lot of their things. After Jack got up from his nap he went to the playroom and noticed a few things were missing. He looked at me and yelled, "The Grinch was here!" Sort of.
Along with the kids' parties and things, we've had our own adult events to go to as well. After returning home from John's office party the other night, the babysitter gave us a great report on the boys and said they went to bed so well. Then, we hear, "Hey, Mom! Hey, Dad!" coming from Jack's room. He had stayed up to give us a proper welcoming (which he often does). When John opened the door to let him out of his room, we found him looking like this. Somehow he had gotten ahold of a ball point pen, and somehow that pen got ahold of Jack's face. Our little Maori tribesman.

We attended the gingerbread (jeengabwed) house decorating fun at Hampton Lake the other night. Jack had more fun eating the house decorations than either of us had putting that thing together. It's so hard. If you ever make a gingerbread house from a kit, plan on needing about eight times the amount of icing that they give you. Our gingerbread home looked condemned with it's cracked roof, drooping walls and half eaten shingles. Jack was able to sit on Santa's lap while we were there. He got right to the point with Mr. Claus: "I want a racecar. I want it yellow. And that's all I want." Nuf said.

The Bluffton Christmas Parade did not disappoint. It was the typical mix of fun and freaky. You decide which category the lady below falls into. There were drill teams, a gazillion tow trucks, a strange pirate shrine club, some adorable elementary school bands, and a handful of other things that I cannot put to words. It was fun being there seeing all the families and hanging out my my three men.

Jack had an awesome time. We were reminded again about his gifting of encouragement. John and I would love to take credit for that, but we're convinced the Lord passed this down through his Poppy Johnny. Whenever another float, tow truck, person or group would pass by, Jack would wave and yell as loudly as possible, "Great job! You're doing a great job!!!" Don't get me wrong. He's your typical feisty little boy who slugs his younger brother and steals toys from the innocent, but the kid can really boost the ol' morale. And I LOVE that about him.

We packed the family up last weekend and headed to NC to visit my family for Christmas since we'll be holding the fort down here on the actual day. My Grandaddy and Grandmom treated us all to yet another amazing dinner at the Angus Barn. If you're ever in Raleigh, make sure you go and (close your eyes vegetarians) eat some cow! Even though there were 20+ of us this year, and it was hard to talk to everyone, it was so cool to be with our funny family and celebrate Christmas with a tradition that means a lot to us. Thank you, thank you, thank you! (I know you're reading this because you're our most loyal blog readers!)

Jackie was still at NCSU after finals, so she came along with us this year which was great! It was fun to see her as always. Jack and Finn just love their Aunt Jackie.


Finn was a complete maniac at the restaurant. There were cameras flashing everywhere and he started doing his thing. Whenever he sees a camera light up for a picture, this is the face you get. So we have this shot with about everyone at the table holding him. I did get a group shot, but the table was long and it was a dark picture and a lot of people were mid-filet bite, which is never very attractive. So just picture everyone in my family downing large slabs of beef and you'll pretty much get the picture.

Mama and Finny Finn Finn.

And what would a trip to NC be without inhaling a sizable amount of sweet tea? I've realized that grandparents can get away with a lot. They fall easily for the sugar snack lies and vegetable avoidance tactics. Multiply what grandparents get away with by 1 million and what you've got now is a great grandparent. My Gammy gave Jack and Finn more sweet than Bojangle's serves in an entire day. It was diluted, but it still had it's magical powers over them. And me. Her tea is BOSS! And so is everything that she makes and does.

Finn moved up in the sweet tea drinking ranks this trip by getting his own special cup. Last time he just had a sip. This time, he saw that cup and just knew that something amazing was going into it. It was like a little sippy cup bong of sorts. John and I looked at each other when we saw it and, not having any personal experience with said items, we were pretty sure it looked like something questionable. So you'll be happy to know that I just googled 'bong' and indeed, this cup does resemble one. Oh dear. Like I said, great grandparents can do no wrong.

We were able to do a lot of fun things while we were in NC. My parents sang in a Christmas program at their church, and it was so good! It was neat to see this part of their lives and to know that they love it so much. Jack really enjoyed watching it, and not to disappoint, he very audibly would announce "Great job, Poppy!/Mimi!" after the end of every song. He was a little confused watching some of the nativity parts and seeing a real baby playing the part of Jesus. That may explain why he likes to tickle the baby Jesus that is in our nativities at home. "Tickle, tickle, tickle, little baby, Jesus." I figure that any interaction with Jesus is always a good thing.

We exchanged presents with some of the fam while we were there. Jack's favorite gift by far was his awesome Tarheel's football uniform. He's very excited to announce to anyone that "My name's Jack and I'm a football player." This changes based on whatever shirt he's wearing that day. It's either a football, baseball or fireman shirt. He becomes what he's wearing. It makes dressing for church and nicer events really difficult. The other morning we convinced him to wear a button down because we told him Uncle Jeff (his new favorite person) gave it to him.

And last but surely not least, our firstborn stole the show yet again at his Christmas performances. Recall last year's CBS performance where he laid on the ground while all of the other kids sang and stood on stage. This year we made it one step closer to normalcy. He did stand on the stage. He also picked what must have been the world's most hard to reach booger for the majority of the CBS performance. Not to mention, he was the only child who walked in with a stolen item from his classroom: a hard hat. The other children sang while my little construction worker dug for gold.

And did I mention that the digging just wasn't enough? Jack has the gift of encouragement AND completion. He had to finish the job. He didn't recall the Pick n' Flick technique we taught him. This picture was taken at CBS and the above was taken at his preschool performance. Both performances warranted pickage. Hopefully this isn't proving to be his nervous habit. If that's the case, middle school dances are going to be a blast.


If I don't get the chance to blog before Christmas, I hope you all are blessed by the celebration of Christ's birth!

Giving Thanks the Munchkin Way

Thanksgiving was such a wonderful holiday for us this year. Besides all of the fun with family, friends and food, we had/have so much to be thankful for!

Remember the blog promise I made to teach the kids about Thanksgiving? Well...I can't say that I accomplished it since Jack still refers to the Mayflower as the "May Boat", but we gave it a wholehearted effort. On Wednesday, we threw a Kid's Thanksgiving Feast. A lot of our friends were able to come, and we had the best time!

Here are the children at their peanut sized tables and chairs on our back patio. The weather was a little chilly, but they hung in there. Jen is blitzing it through the Thanksgiving story. Leslie brought a great Thanksgiving book that was on the kid's level. Religious freedoms isn't exactly an understood topic at three, ya know?

Leslie, Eliza, JP and Kim posed in their awesome hats. Several of the party attenders came decked out in their respective pilgrim and Indian clothes. They were so cute! It had been years since I made a girl pilgrim hat. Probably because of all the emotional damage I suffered after being forced to wear a full out pilgrim costume to my Aunt Pat's house for Thanksgiving dinner when I was a child. Pilgrim costumes are only safe in numbers, NOT flying solo, which is what I had to do while holding a 40 pound platter of turkey with cameras flashing all over the place. If I ever lose it, please know it's because of that.

Enough of that....Here are Neely and Shelby listening to the story. It was amazing to see the girls sitting quietly at the table while most of the boys wandered around, chewed on their juice boxes or stared into the sky.

Carson made an adorable Indian headdress and sported it well.

After the hat making and story time, the moms served the kids their feast! We had turkey/cheese roll ups, mac n' cheese, peas, carrots, sweet potato casserole, grapes, pretzels, rolls and cupcakes! I didn't get a picture of the food because I was either trying to convince Jack that it was good, or I was stuffing my own face. Thank you, Moms, for bringing all of the awesome goodies!!! Here's JP enjoying his bread.

Here's Owen, Amy and Lucy. Jack was excited to see Owen at his house. They go to school together and after the party, Jack kept saying "Owen from school was here." Jack and Owen both opted for baseball hats over the headdresses.

Camden enjoyed some mac n' cheese (which was awesome, Jen!) with the gang. As smart as he is, I'm sure he went home and retold the Thanksgiving story to his parents.

Here are some of the busy boys ignoring their food and playing instead.

Do these boxes look familiar? They're the forts that were in our dining room since June. Thankfully this gave me a reason to get them one step closer to the dump. They easily converted into a Mayflower and a teepee. Tomorrow...the dump!

Finn gave the cornucopia cut out a try. Sadly, his head was too small. Which is a first.

Camden was part of the horn-o-plenty, too!

The kids got to make their own cornucopia treats to take home. As always, I prepared too much food, so we've been eating our share of chocolate chips, peanuts, raisins and marshmallows. The woes of over preparing.

So that was our kid style Thanksgiving. It was so much fun for me to look around our home and see all of these amazing friends of ours, none of which I even knew five short years ago. We are so thankful for all of you.


One more thing we're thankful for: make up remover! Jack has witnessed me putting on my make up one time too many. This is mascara art. I'm not sure if I should be proud or ashamed that he knew where it was supposed to go.

Our Firstborn

This blog posting is dedicated to Jack. He's been having a rough go of it lately with obeying, so we're trying to focus a lot of our attention on him. It doesn't take much effort on our part to realize what a funny little guy we are blessed with. While the days are long and full of discipline measures, we're still so thrilled to be Jack's Mommy and Daddy.

Who says boys can't play dress up? Jack enjoys role playing, and his favorite costume is currently his knight costume. We had some friends over last week and he got excited about all of the praise they gave him after he performed song after song. When he got down from the "stage" (the kitchen table) he whispered to me, "I wanna show 'em my knight clothes." He had this devious grin like 'If they liked the singing, they're gonna LOVE this!'


Jack got a haircut last week, thankfully. His bangs were touching the tops of his glasses, and it was about to send me over the edge. We went for a shorter do this time and it turned out well. Jack was excited that he could put gel in his hair to spike it up a bit. He fixed it himself on this particular morning, so it turned out super spiky. He loves his new "funny hair".

We made this Thanksgiving Tree in an effort to hold to the promise to teach the kids about Thanksgiving this year. Thank you to Leslie who I pawned off the idea from. Jack had so much fun picking out the sticks and shoving them into the florist foam. When it came to writing the things he was thankful for, he answered (as any true Sunday Schooler would...) with God "Dod".

After God, came...

I, too, am thankful for PB&J! This also made the tree:


Hope everyone is doing well!

AHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!

Some call it a Sugar High, or a Trans-Fat Trance, others a Glucose Gaze. Whatever you call it, our family had a huge dose of it last night. We high tailed it to Gigi and Poppy Johnny's house for some treatin' fun. Without much planning, our small group kids consisted mostly of marine-themed costumes. Jack was a fisherman, Finn was a shark, Gracen was The Little Mermaid and Pavin was a fish. Camden went rogue on us and was an organic banana. It was the cutest costume ever, but as my photo fortune would have it, all of my pictures of Camden were taken in the dark and didn't turn out. But just imagine a super cute little guy dressed up like a banana. So cute! We had a blast with everyone! Thanks, Gigi and PJ for having us over!



Before the sugar coma set in, our boys stood still for just this moment so we could capture their costumes for Halloween 2008. This shark costume has survived many tumbles, melted candy smears, pointing fingers and laughs. It will go down in our books as one of our all time favorite kid purchases. Jack went for the real life style over fairy tale. "I be a fisherman!" is what rang through the streets of Spanish Wells.


Jack, Gracen and Finn do some pre-treatin' relaxation and stretching exercises. They wanted to beg for candy with their game faces on. I think all the preparation worked. Practice makes better!



Pavin reluctantly joined the aquatic themed crew in his fish costume. This pushed his usual laid back style to the limits, but, as always, Pavin persevered and stayed cool as a cucumber in his stroller, not making a peep!



The people who took Halloween to ridiculous measure last year decided not to be outdone again! Jack and Gracen clung tight to their insanely nice Halloween toys that these folks gave them (and the other hundreds of children who came by). Unfortunately, Jack's toy makes noise this year. Next year I expect nothing less than a silent toy that makes Jack eat his vegetables.


Hampton Lake hosted yet another fun family event last Saturday. A Pumpkin Fest! They brought in hundreds of pumpkins used for carving, painting, and even pumpkin rollin'! Jack and Finn had the best time running around the pumpkins in the field. Unfortunately, it rained all day on Friday which made for a very wet pumpkin patch. Within two minutes of hitting the fields running, Finn found the muddiest of all mud puddles. Here he is before the mud slinging began.



To top of his dirtiness, Finley added some paint for good measure. A little acrylic paint never hurt anybody right? I was so upset at first because of all the mud, but John calmed me down and told me just to let him play. I was thinking that our great photo ops were ruined. WRONG!!!!



Finley is turning out to be the weird kid. Without any prompting he stuck this cone on his head. Maybe he was ashamed of how dirty his parents let him get. Maybe he thought it would be awesome and make everyone laugh. Either way, he looked like a little road construction gnome toddling around the parking lot.



The Pumpkin Fest was a benefit for the local Fire Department, so Jack was in preschooler paradise when he spent the afternoon climbing all over the fire trucks. There were several occasions where I saw him randomly give strangers the thumbs up sign.



After the crowds dwindled and our patience was running thin, we let Finn ditch his dirty duds in the back of the car. Thankfully we had packed an extra shirt and a boat load of baby wipes.



So, Fall continues to surprise us with lots of fun activities! We're past Halloween and cruisin' onto Thanksgiving now. I was so sad today to push the cart through Walmart to the tune of "Silver Bells". Seriously? Already? Did we slip into such a deep sugar coma that we missed Thanksgiving? The discount Halloween section was larger than the wimpy rack of Thanksgiving goods, and the entire outdoor section was already filled with Christmas trees! It was so unnerving, but so reflective of how we treat thanksgiving, the holiday and the practice of it. We have so much to be thankful for! To all three of you who read this, I'm pledging this year to highlight Thanksgiving as much as we do other holidays in an effort to teach my boys (at least the older one) the importance of it. I know times are so hard for so many people right now. Illnesses, financial struggles, government instabilities, war...the list could continue. I don't know why these things happen. But for every 'bad' thing, I can think of at least 5 great things, too. And I don't know why those things happen either. I surely didn't earn them. So, the way I see it, I cannot repay God for the gifts He's given me. But I can thank Him. So, here's to Thanksgiving! Join me, will you?

Psalm 95:1-6

"O come, let us sing unto the LORD: let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation.
Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving, and make a joyful noise unto him with psalms.
For the LORD is a great God, and a great King above all gods.
In his hand are the deep places of the earth: the strength of the hills is his also.
The sea is his, and he made it: and his hands formed the dry land.
O come, let us worship and bow down: let us kneel before the LORD our maker."

Fall is Here!

Fall has finally arrived in Bluffton! There have been at least 5 consecutive days that the temperature hasn't reached 85, the seasonal section at Target smells like mixed candy (you know the distinctive smell of Tootsie Rolls and Snickers and lollipops all mixed in) and the small grassy lot across from our neighborhood has pumpkins in it! Fall, baby! And I LOVE IT!!! John has always been a Fall lover. It generally means more use of his outdoor clothing, and in times past has been the season of a healthy real estate market. I guess growing up in NC, I took Fall for granted. I'm sure I focused more on the loss of my summer tan and all the leaf raking instead of the many cool things about this season. But living here for the past 5 years, my appreciation of Fall has grown so much! Throw two kiddos in there with all the festive things to do for them and this season may soon become my favorite!

While Jack was at preschool on Tuesday, Finn and I ventured to Cahill's Market to roam the pumpkin patch with some of our MOPS friends. Of all times to forget my camera! Fortunately my friend, Vicky, had her camera and snapped a few shots of my little Jaws maneuvering himself around the pumpkin yard. We escaped with buying apple butter and pumpkin butter, but no pumkin. Jack wouldn't allow such a purchase without his blessing.



So...we went back to Cahill's that night with Gigi and bought the most beautiful pumpkin you've ever seen! (Shout out to Cahill's...it's the coolest little store. If you're ever in the area, you have to go there and eat lunch. Best food around!) Here's the fam checking out the animals. The horses were pretty friendly. That could have been because Jack is our resident horse whisperer. He approached the horses as he does every other animal: "Hey horsey, horsey. Awww....yeah. Hey, buddy. It's okay..."

Jack enjoyed his pumpkin patch frolick.

And here's the finished product! We bought one of those stencil books that teaches you how to carve one, step by step. We let Jack choose which picture he wanted. He made it clear that he wanted a happy face and not a scary one, which surprised us all since he has an odd fascination with scary things.

Gigi and Poppy Johnny joined us for the Ussery Family Night of Fall Festivities:) We started at the pumpkin patch, headed to the driveway for the gutting of the pumpkin, and then took our party to the kitchen for some chili, cornbread and pumpkin pie. It was so much fun! Maybe we can make it a little Fall tradition.


Happy Fall to everyone!

Where Dreams Come True

No, we didn't go to Disney, but we did venture to the Hampton Lake playground last Sunday night, which was close enough. Our small group got cancelled so we headed out for an evening of slides, sand and silly-face making.

Jack was caught in a moment of extreme excitement. Whenever he gets really excited about something he goes on a short streak of goodness. He'll either randomly compliment you (Let's go to the cookie store, Jack. "OK! I like your hair, Mommy.") or run and give someone or something a hug. I guess Jack was overwhelmed with happiness at just being at the playground with his Daddy in tow that he hugged Finley instead of cramming his face down in the sandbox like usual.

These boys melt my heart!!!

Finley has taken to making the game face quite often. This may be the one thing he got from his father.

I guess this answers the question that I ask Jack most often: "Why are you doing that?!?!" The apple ain't far from the tree, folks. Jack was a little worried here and came to catch John.

And here's the silly face.

Finn weaseled away from me during a diaper change before I could get the clean one on him. It doesn't get much more relaxed than playing on the playground in the buff. It must be noted that, as far as I know, Finn did NOT learn this from his father.

John and I couldn't get enough of Jack in his baseball hat. He NEVER keeps a hat on more than a minute or two, but that night he was happy to wear it most of the time. So grown up looking on him.

The Great Outdoors

John played his usual role of Awesome Dad by taking Jack camping two weekends ago. John's buddies, Phillip and Jason, tagged along as well as Phillips little boy, Carter (2.5 years). The plan was to hike 1/2 mile into the camp site, set up camp and stay for 2 nights. Unfortunately when they got to their location on the mountain, that part of the mountain was in the clouds, which made for a wet camping trip. Wisely they cut the trip short one night and opted for a cabin and some trout fishing. Can't say anyone can blame them.

Despite the cool temps and wet bodies, Jack and Carter had a great time. Here they are under a tarp while their dads pitch the tents.

A little rain couldn't stop these boys from having a good time! Check out Carter's horse flash light. All serious campers need one.

Here's Carter, Jason, John and Jack staying dry in the tent.

If you look closely you can see Jack and Carter acting like the nutty little boys they are.


I'm sure John can post more detailed stories about the trip, but I do know they all had a great time! Jack mostly enjoyed hanging out with Carter, "sweepin in a sweepin bag" and "touchin' a fish".

Thank you John, Phillip and Jason for risking your sanity and spending quality time with these two little boys.

Hangin' with the Homies

Sorry for not posting in a while. (Do I always say that? It feels like it.) Busy as usual. Mostly fun things as usual. The boys are doing well. They have been enjoying time with Gigi and Poppy Johnny over the past few weeks.

John took the boys to their house the other night while I had a meeting. As you can see, Finley really loved the storybook time. They figured out that whenever they'd focus the camera for a picture, the red eye light would come on, Finn would then recognize that it was indeed a camera pointing his way and he'd put on his best cheese face.

Jack thought that a batter face was better. He's still into giving the thumb's up. This morning I saw him playing "Thumbkin" with both of his thumbs poised towards each other, but instead of singing, "Where is Thumbkin, Where is Thumbkin" he was singing "God our Father, God our Father, Here I am, Here I am!" They're both to the same tune so I can see where it's confusing. Just funny watching Jack's thumbs talk to each other, saying they were God.

Finley was all cuddles the other morning when we let him in the bed with us. The temperature has been dropping pretty low at night, which means that we've been busting out the footy pajamas! Children are adorable in most clothing options, but you throw a pair of footy PJs on them and they're insanely precious.

Later in the day Finley ditched his PJs for a nice covering of baked ziti. He's such a big eater! Whenever we fix oatmeal in the morning, Jack gets the small bowl and Finley finishes off a large bowl AND a banana AND some Cheerios. He's still a little guy though. Go figure.

Jack is much like his mother in that he enjoys packaging. You can see his pirate cup in this picture. It's one of his favorites. He doesn't even like red juice that much (cranberry juice), but he drank it solely because it was flowing from the pirate cup. I made the mistake of forgetting that cranberry juice is a natural diuretic. The poor kid spent half the day in the bathroom.