All Our Redneck Glory

Growing up in the South, there's a soft spot in my heart for for rednecks. Merk, however, has never fully embraced my less than cultured upbringing ... until last night.

Here's what happened:

Late in the afternoon I got out Luke's old clothes to see what I could pass down to Max. One box had Luke's favorite pajamas, so he spent the better part of an hour trying them on. It didn't matter to him that they were almost uncomfortably small, he was just happy to be in his old Spidy pj's again.

When Merk came home the kids were still in the old pajamas. So imagine my surprise when he said he was taking them to see an old Jeff Gordon car, pajamas and all.

So yes, at 7 pm on a weeknight, my husband took our kids out in public in their pajamas to see a NASCAR. If that's not a redneck move, then I just don't know what is.

Here are the pictures to commemorate the event.

I knew I was behind on my posting when I had to look up my Blogger password, but I didn't realize it had been six weeks until I logged on and saw that kindergarten picture. Wow. A lot has happened since then. Let me try and catch you up.

It all starts with Kindergarten. I can honestly say I wasn't prepared. For starters, coming off a lazy summer did not prepare me for getting a sleepy five year old up at 6:30 every day. And getting that same five year old into the bed and asleep an hour earlier, well that has been almost impossible.

But the real trouble has been with kindergarten itself. To say it wasn't what we expected is an understatement. I'm not going to go into the details, but let's just say it put me into a state of shock that lasted almost a month.

To add to that, Luke took a long time to make the adjustment. He cried every day for four weeks. Every morning he would beg not to go and usually made up an illness to make his point. In fact, this became so common that one morning when he said his stomach hurt, I didn't believe him. It was only when he started throwing up that I realized that he really was sick.

Where we live, you can't transfer a child until December so we've been forced to wait it out. I'm glad we did because he turned a corner a couple of weeks ago and is doing better now. Honestly, we were very close to becoming a homeschool family. Can you imagine that? It's amazing the things you will do when pushed against the wall.

So as soon as we passed all that, I turned 39. When did that happen? I still think I'm somewhere around 32 and am genuinely shocked when I see a new laugh line or wrinkle.

Adding to all this, there have been men in my house for the past month. The shower remodel that was supposed to take two weeks ended up taking three months and required a parade of big mac loving plumbers, tile guys, painters and a varied assortment of odd and end guys to get the job done. I stopped even trying to learn their names and just called them all Johnny since over half of them were named that.

So I've been preoccupied and getting through the day seemed like a big enough accomplishment. But realized that I would lose a lot if I stopped. How else will I remember that Max fell on the sidewalk and had a huge scab on his nose for his school pictures. Well, there may be proof of that one, but not how Luke almost broke his arm trying to kick a ball with both feet at the same time. Or how Luke got three Yankees out in one inning of his t-ball game and how Max wore snow boots to school on a 95 degree day.

So I'm back. And to welcome myself back, here are a few photos from the past six weeks.


I can't believe how big he's getting.


First day of preschool.


Look Ma, no tee.


One awesome birthday cake.


Snow boots in September.