Ava's Fashions

Outfits are always cuter when you're with your best friend. Ava and Sarah, a study in lavendar and pink.

Smells Like It's Been WORN On A Safari

The kids went to Christ's Church of the Valley's Safari VBS last week. As part of CCV's evil VBS marketing scheme, you must come to the service the following Sunday morning to get your VBS tee shirt. Since we were planning on attending anyway, the kids were excited to get their tee shirts.

When we picked Colson and Ava up from their class, everyone had their VBS tee shirts on over their clothes. Cole and Ava were jumping around showing us their tee shirts. I went up to get Zachary from his class, and as I walked in, the sea of lime green showed that every single kid up there had their camp shirts on as well.

Every kid except Zachary. He had his tee shirt slung over his shoulder. He was the only kid in that whole building of probably 800 kids who wasn't wearing a lime green tee shirt.

When Zach saw me he walked over and handed me the tee shirt. He said:

"Mom, can you wash this when we get home? It smells funny and I don't want to wear it until it smells right."

799 kids aren't swaying him, that's for sure. I'll never have to worry about Zach jumping off a bridge.

Colson's Dreams

If I know nothing else, I know that Colson would LOVE to have this. Unfortunately, it doesn't exist for purchase anywhere. If someone wants to make all of his dreams come true, they'll make one of these for him for Christmas.

Ava's Fashions

The proper way to eat corn on the cob; while wearing blue organza and satin ribbons, and sitting in a puffy lawn chair.

Let There Be Football!

Whaddaya think, will the lockout end next week? Our annual Lewis Family Trailer Park Labor Day Fantasy Football Draft party will be a huge letdown if not.....

Mom Of Few Words

Ava to Zach, in the car yesterday:

Mom pretty much only says two things. "You're welcome", and "No".

No Points For Creativity

Zach and I were watching some show on the home and garden channel, Design on a Dime or a show similar to that. Designers making over someone's master bedroom on a budget. The female designer was making a headboard out of an old door she'd found at a garage sale. She was sanding and staining it, then she hot glued some decorative paper and wood onto it.

Zachary was watching intently, and when she started hot gluing he looked at me with his brow furrowed and said, "Mom, why doesn't she GO BUY ONE instead of making one?? I just don't get it..."

His face was so full of disdain at the thought of wasting time making something that you could just go out and buy. Which means no macaroni necklace Christmas presents in my future. Thank goodness for that.

Word Wars

A conversation between my husband and I the other day. It's word wars like these that make me fall in love with him all over again.

Me: I'm done talking to you now.

Eric: Why???

Me: You're annoying me.

Eric: No, I'm being thought provoking.

Me: If that were the case, that would be great. I love thought provoking conversation. But as it is, you're just being provoking.

Eric: Exactly, and I'm putting a lot of thought into how to best provoke you. Thought provoking.

Where's Your Sugar?

Zach asked me the other day, in regards to his friend:

"Mom, why doesn't Sarah's gramma give her sugar?"

I had to explain to him that Sarah's gramma isn't from the south, and doesn't know about sugar. "Sugar" is a Southern expression that can mean many things, most having to do with giving kisses or being kissed. In my mother's version, sugar is a location. It's the back of a child's neck. So when my mother asks the kids to "give me some sugar", they know to turn around and bend their heads down so she can kiss the back of their neck.

I can't wait until Zachary is on his first date and the girl asks him to pass the sugar....

A Big Year

Happy birthday to Brookey with the unsalted peanut in her belly!! She'll never forget being 25...

They Call It A Playdate

My 11 year old great nephew Christopher was im-ing with my niece Brooke yesterday. He's got his first little crush, and this is what he said about it:

Christopher: guess whats in one day? im going to the girl from churches house. they call it a playdate. i call it the best day of my life.

Typical Monday Night

I know this scene has played at your house before, right??

I'm sitting in the bathtub trying to remove my Ke$ha-esque black and platinum hair extensions while watching past seasons of Sex and the City on my laptop. Eric is standing in the doorway of the bathroom in his underwear telling me in wildly excited tones about how while I was gone he hooked all the televisions in the house up to one of our old laptops, and he can now control that laptop from his Macbook, hence controlling all of the televisions from his Macbook. Every 20 seconds he pauses in his story to say, "Whoa, that is so weird" when I pull a weft of 24 inch long platinum hair from my head.

That's normal, right?

Ava's Fashions

Ava at Brookey's wedding, in a beautiful floral chintz gown. (I hate that you can't see her shoes, which were white eyelet slingback wedges.) Flanked by her cute boys-in-waiting in seersucker, she looked perfect for the perfect summer wedding.

Brave, Beautiful Juror #3

With all the histrionic declarations on my Twitter stream and Facebook news feed, one might wonder "how in the world did Florida find a group of 12 random people that would have a different thought process than everyone else in the US?"

Obviously they didn't. They were a cross section of regular Joe Schmo's and Jane Doe's. So what made the jurors in the Casey Anthony trial come back with a decision that was so violently at odds with the rest of the Twitter and Facebook population? What made those 12 people come out of that trial with beliefs that no one else "out here" did?

It's simple. They didn't hear Nancy Grace hounding them 24/7. They didn't hear an endless stream of experts putting their spin on every little inflection and facial expression in the courtroom. They didn't hear late night comedians cracking jokes about Casey. They heard the facts in a vacuum.

Their decision is untainted by public opinion. Whether right or wrong, and with this case's lack of evidence you can't say whether the verdict was "right" or "wrong", at the very least the jury's decision is closer to pure because it is untainted by the media frenzy.

They heard and saw everything in that courtroom. Even if you sat in front of your television for 24 hours a day, you didn't see or hear everything. And what you DID hear or see, Nancy Grace made sure you saw or heard her way, or the way of one of her many experts.

Juror #3 said it best:

"I did not say she was innocent," said Ford, who had previously only been identified as juror No. 3. "I just said there was not enough evidence. If you cannot prove what the crime was, you cannot determine what the punishment should be."

Thank you Juror #3.

If you think you know better than the jurors in this case because you had more information from your hours of Court TV watching, you're wrong. You had less information, and the information you did have was tainted. So while no one knows what happened to Caylee Anthony, I'm going to lean more towards the opinion of those 12 people (plus the alternates) who heard the facts in a vacuum.

The Apprentice

Big Apple dance competition this weekend. I get to apprentice judge at this event. I have visions of making broomsticks carry buckets around the dance floor.

There's Living, And There's LIVING

Colson had a grand time at our family 4th of July picnic on Monday. He said his favorite part was "sitting around in the circle talking to everyone". He has just entered the pre-teen stage, very hungry, very sleepy, and very moody. So being treated as part of the adults was VERY exciting for him.

He had gotten everyone to play along with his favorite question and answer game. He was very happy when others in the circle jumped in and posed questions of their own. Someone asked the question, "If you were stranded on a desert island and only one person in your family could be there with you, who would you want it to be?"

Colson thought for a moment and said, "Papa, because he knows how to live".

Now, the uneducated might think that when Colson said "he knows how to live", he meant that his Papa walks into bars and women fall at his feet, beer flows freely into his mug, and waiters bring him free food. That his Papa throws money around like it grows on trees, rolls snake eyes every time, and drives fast cars. You may even picture Colson and his Papa having a Hangover-esque weekend in Vegas.

But no, Colson is much more enlightened. What Colson meant by that phrase was that his Papa would know how to keep him ALIVE. He'd know which bugs to eat for the most protein, how to fashion a shelter from a tree branch and banana peels, and which direction to blow the smoke signals. Colson knows his Papa is this family's Bear Grylls, and won't be caught on a desert island without him. Cole wants to take someone who knows how to LIVE.

I didn't raise no fool.

Underwater Bubbles

My brother Eric, in his Navy submarine days.

And The Emmy Goes To....

Came across the show "In the Bedroom" with Laura Berman on the OWN network. Laura Berman is one of Oprah's protegees, and she is a sexual/relationship therapist. She works with couples who have trouble in the bedroom. A husband having issues with premature ejaculation, a woman having trouble climaxing, etc, etc, etc.

Hey, here's a good idea! Talk about your sexual dysfunction on a national television show! That will solve it! Your husband will feel SO much better about himself once the world knows that he can't get it up that he'll be able to go all night! Your wife won't care that 20 million people know about her body image issues that made her frigid in bed, don't be crazy!!

I don't get it....But I'd really love to talk Eric into making up some issues and going on the show with me. The "homework" she gives the couples is so funny. Doing yoga while looking deeply into each other's eyes. Breathing slowly together while holding hands and closing your eyes. Eric and I doing that homework would win us an Emmy for best comedy special.

(love when she sits a couple down and says "Let's get to the bottom of this erectile dysfunction!"....Personally, I'd rather get to the top of erectile dysfunction.)

:)

Ava's Fashions

Mint green and fushia, with a dark green diaper cover. A combination of colors that caught my eye and ended up being perfect on my little blond beach baby.

Drum Roll, Please!

My new favorite west coast swing routine. Benji and Melissa have never competed together to my knowledge, but at John Lindo's event Libery Swing, last weekend, they decided to throw a routine together. And by "throw", I mean Benji choreographed it in exactly one hour, and then they rehearsed it for exactly one hour. This was the final result, a first place routine.

Untitled from bruce gleason on Vimeo.

Hillbilly Momma In The Stands

Colson has been attending a drama camp this week, put on by Players Of The Stage in Allentown. They are primarily a homeschool theater group, well known in the area for their high quality, professional productions. Today is his last day, and tonight the campers put on a big performance. I asked Cole if he wanted me to show up with a huge sign that says, "Colson is the best actor!!!" and yell and scream for him from the audience. At first he nodded yes, but then he said very seriously:

"Actually no, don't do that. I think it would be very embarrassing for you."

I told him that I never get embarrassed. He wasn't buying it, couldn't fathom how that could be possibly be true.

Maybe I'll have to prove it to him.

:)