Ashleigh, Cade & Breyden

My Son, the baseball player; My Daughter, the smoocher.

2010-05-04T20:47:00.004-04:00

The kids are in the middle of two athletic firsts:

1) Cade is playing "up" with the 7 and 8 year olds on a machine pitch baseball team. He's doing great and I'm really amazed at how he's acclamated to playing with the older kids

2) Breyden is on her first season of soccer and spends more time chasing the boys than the ball. Her dad even had to tell her to stop kissing the boys during the game. I guess you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink.

We've had a busy Spring with family visiting Charlotte. Nanna came to the East Coast for three weeks and spent Easter with most of the Anderson's in Pawleys Island (though we missed Clay, Luke and The Duke). Grandpa Dick even made his way to Charlotte for a bit during his yearly cross-country tour. Then less than a week later, Bubba and Snookie came to see Cade and Breyden do their thing and saw a couple of games.

We have had a WONDERFUL Spring!

Just going to start doing this again....

2010-04-28T22:37:00.002-04:00

So today Cade told me "Back in the olden days" he liked to watch Little Bear....today he got a Mohawk!

SLACKER

2010-01-19T22:54:00.009-05:00

I have nothing witty or interesting to say....because if you are reading this, then you know what the past 12 months have involved:

Finding forgiveness

Loving my kids more every day

Surviving a major loss and a minor flood

Landing an amazing job (with the help from an old friend)

Remembering that while I can "do it myself" - I get by with a little help from my friends

Cade is 6, Breyden is 3 and I am a single mom .... which somedays makes me feel 63. But I have family and friends who love and support me and that is all the fountain of youth I need to get me through each day.

My baby boy is 5...where did the time go?

2009-01-13T22:50:00.000-05:00

This birthday has been tough.

It's funny that a child's 5th birthday could be tougher than a vain mother's 30th ...and I think I can say with some amount of confidence this 5th birthday will be tougher than what that same vain mother's 40th will feel like. But - even though it wasn't an easy one to get through, it was a fantastic 5th birthday and I am thankful for everyday God has given me with my beautiful son.

He is smart. He is kind. He is happy.

And because he is happy, I know every prayer I have made over the last 12 months has been answered.

Happy Birthday Cade. I love you!
Your Mama

Ringing in the New Year ...2009 is finally here!

2009-01-13T17:12:00.016-05:00

One of my guardian angels is named Mary Ellen. This angel didn't want me to spend new years eve alone in Atlanta and so right before Christmas, she decided her Christmas present to herself would be a ticket North for me for the new year. We spent 95% of the time in the snowy ski village of Killington, VT ....and neither of us made it to the slopes. Ridiculous I know.
HAHAHA
We did however drink some excellent beer and manage to keep enough brain cells to play Scrabble and Rumikube a few times. Other than that, it was a therapeutic veg session!

The Holidays 2008

2009-01-10T14:55:00.013-05:00

This is the beginning of my post from the holidays this year....the problem is that all of the pictures I have from Christmas Day are on my Mom's camera. I will post those as soon as I get them.

Santa was very good to my very good kids and the funniest part is that everything on their lists was at one time on my list to Santa: Lincoln Logs, Leggos, Cabbage Patch Kids and Slinkies. It was indeed a RETRO Christmas.

We were in North Carolina, Tennessee and Georgia the week of Christmas. It was crazy and hectic but we wouldn't have liked it any other way! We got to see friends in NC, my Grandmother Violet and The Trivetts (who are my other family) in TN, and then hosted the entire Anderson clan at our house for the week of Christmas. It was fantastic!

Thanksgiving in Pawleys Island

2008-11-29T17:36:00.018-05:00

This year, I am more thankful than ever for the two beautiful kids, the wonderful family and the fantastic friends God graced me with. I am also extremely blessed at 34 to have 2 amazing Grandmothers still here for my children to get to know, laugh and play with.

Thanks be to God!

This Thanksgiving, in true ACB form, we packed up and left Atlanta a full week before Thanksgiving and headed to Charlotte. They got some much needed time with their Dad and I got some much needed time with my friend Brooke. She made lots of delicious food and we drank lots of $8 wine...it was a great weekend.

On Monday morning we left early to drive to Pawleys Island to see Bubba, Snookie, GiGi, Uncle Mike, Uncle Clay, Aunt Natalie, and cousin Luke. Cade and Brey were greeted in usual grandparent fashion of being offered Cheetos, chocolate chip cookies and juice boxes for lunch...because as you all know, there are no Cheetos and chocolate chip cookies sold in Roswell, GA (at least that is what I have convinced my kids to think).

Shortly after the oh-so-nutritious lunch, my Dad announced that since Cade had learned how to ride his bike without training wheels, he was taking Cade to the store to buy him a new bike to keep at Bubba and Snookies. Now - please note that they live in a neighborhood FULL of grandparents and this neighborhood has "borrow list" posted at the clubhouse and there are PLENTY of bikes on that list....but Bubba wanted Cade to have his own bike. It is a marvelous thing to be the first born grandchild. And I know because I've been there!

Cade spent every morning and every afternoon riding his new bike around the very flat neighborhood telling my Dad that his "Laser snake bike" (a Razor Cobra) was the best bike in the world. He was VERY appreciative and it was awesome to see he and Bubba head out everyday on their bike rides.

Clay, Natalie, & Luke flew into Charleston pretty late on Wednesday night so the kids didn't get to see Luke until they woke up on Thanksgiving morning. It was so fantastic to see the three kids together. I think the person who got the biggest kick out of watching them was my Grandmother who the kids call GiGi. The coolest part of the entire weekend for me was seeing her read them the books that she used to read to me and Clay.

October has come and gone....

2008-11-13T13:33:00.019-05:00

And we are still in Atlanta...much to the dismay of many. But we have done some wonderful things in the last 4 weeks:

1) Breyden only wears a diaper to bed and other than that, we are potty trained!

2) Cade has graduated to doing book reports at school every week and also is doing a lot more math and reading
3) We had a fantastic Halloween - Holly Hobby and Dash from the Incredibles had a successful trick-or-treat outing

4) I got to Johnson City unexpectedly to see my Grandmother and a few friends that I hadn't seen in years and also went to Clemson for the first time in 5 years

Party at 4 am!!!

2008-09-30T10:04:00.002-04:00

There has been a recent upswing in the number of parties in my room at 4 am - and this is no throw back to my college vacations. These parties at 4 am leave me without sleep for an entirely different reason....

2 kids under the age of 5 (who weigh less than me combined) end up taking up 90% of my bed for at least 3 hours of the early morning. Here is what I woke up to this am. This might be my favorite time of the day now:

The next female super hero: Balance Beam Breyden

2008-09-22T21:01:00.005-04:00

Breyden's most favorite thing to do is go to gymnastics. She says "I flipped" for 2 days after her class and I am CERTAIN that Wendesday is her least favorite day of the week because it is Cade's gymnastics day.

What a GREAT birthday present!!!

2008-09-14T13:52:00.006-04:00

After watching the Olympics, I had had enough of the flipping on and off the couch. And so when a very good friend wanted to do something for them for their birthdays, I knew exactly what could be done:

GYMNASTICS LESSONS!

They both go one day a week for an hour to a great gym where the coaches are super helpful and VERY patient. Here are some shots from their first lessons....sorry they are blurry. Parents have to stay in a glass enclosure so we don't disturb the instruction. ;-)

not - hot - pot

2008-09-09T21:59:00.002-04:00

Cade has had homework almost every night since school started. The good news for him is that it typically never takes us longer than 20 minutes to do it and generally it is stuff that we would have done at home anyway. But I am no early childhood educator and so, don't really know what is appropriate for him to be learning at 4.5. So tonight when I saw what we had to do I was REALLY excited to see the end result would be.

The following is a list of words that Cade READ tonight:

dot * hot * not * pot * got * cot * bat * cat * fat * hat * mat * pat * rat * bin * fin * tin *pin

WHOO HOO! Pretty soon, Cade will be reading the bedtime stories to me!

so at 5:45 on a Tuesday with 2 kids...do I look like I want to "dine"?

2008-09-03T00:15:00.004-04:00

If I walk into your restaurant (I don't care if you are Wendy's or the Capital Grille) on a Tuesday afternoon at 5:45 with 2 kids, you should know I am not coming to your dining establishment for an "experience". If my 2 year old daughter has to ask every person in your assigned blue shirt that walks by "where's mine"...do you think you are getting a 20% tip?

If you actually have a printed kids menu and hand out crayons - you should know the drill.

UGH!

Ah....potty training.

2008-08-29T10:42:00.002-04:00

WARNING - not for those with weak stomachs!

Potty training 2 kids has been easy for me until this past week. Easy because Lois trained Cade over the weekend I was in the hospital having Breyden....and easy with Breyden because she wants to do everything Cade does.

Easy until this week.

Breyden wants to "poop on pink potty" when she is home and by poop, she means peepee. She is pretty good about getting her diaper and pants off and then letting me know when she is done. Sunday afternoon she said she needed to go "poop on pink potty" and I said OK go ahead. Well about 2 minutes later she came into the living room saying "I poop on potty!!" holding what looked to be a mini-Reece's cup. I guess you can imagine my surprise and shock that "poop on pink potty" finally meant going #2...

She was so proud of herself I couldn't get mad. She just wanted to show me her "poop on pink potty".

Never thought I would look forward to Mondays

2008-08-22T17:44:00.011-04:00

It's hard to look forward to weekends these days. Don't get me wrong, there still isn't much that gets me in the mood for a glass of vino more than 5pm on Friday. BUT unless I have plans to leave the state, my weekends typically suck.

My weekends suck because THEY are gone.

I find myself scrolling through photos for hours and probably having one too many glasses of red while doing it. So its been 45 minutes since the weekend officially started and these are some of my favorites that I haven't really done anything with before....

These days, Mondays can't come soon enough for me.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BUBBA!

2008-08-21T19:37:00.002-04:00

Happy birthday to Bubba!!!

WE LOVE YOU VERY MUCH -

Ash, The Mean Machine & Your Baby Doll

CONGRATS TO THE GOLDEN GIRLS!

2008-08-21T15:50:00.005-04:00

The US women have won the gold medal again!

Meet their starting center midfielder for the 2024 Olympics:

BB Felber

She's already playing up....the under 7 team! ;-)

You learn something everyday....

2008-08-20T15:57:00.025-04:00

I know now (after 33 years) that you really do learn something new everyday. But I didn't recognize just how much kids learn on a daily basis until I had a couple of my own.

The new questions I get from Cade and the new orders I receive from Breyden boggle my VERY vanilla thinking. How in the world do they come up with this crap? Most of the time I am left searching the internet for answers for Cade AND having to walk out of the room laughing because of something Miss Breyden instructs me to do.

Now that its just the three of us on nightly basis, I am in a zone defense (my heart goes out to my close friend Beth Norwood who has triplets - so even with a husband around to help, I can't imagine). This makes the new found "homework" time in between dinner and Dora the Explorer an interesting 30 minutes at our house. Let's be clear, I know that Cade looks and acts like he is six years old....but Breyden THINKS she is six and so, there isn't one thing that Cade does that she doesn't want to try. Since I have entered this "zone defense life" I mentioned above, my creativity on how to be a fun and effective mom has dwindled a bit. I had to put in a call to the best Mom I know to see how I should juggle helping Cade with his letters while Breyden fights to stay in my lap. My genius Mother reminded me that I need to use Breyden's desire to be like Cade so now, Breyden has homework too. And TA-DA....she LOVES it.

The homework last night instructed Cade to come up with 2 words that use the "short e" sound (which BTW I had to look up on the internet if that meant "pen" or "bee" b/c I can't tell you the last time someone said "short e" to me). He then needed to sound out the word, write it on the orange flashcard, and draw a picture of the word on the back. Every night before last, we've been asked to use the regular white kindergarten writing paper - but last night we used the orange cards. Well Breyden looked at what Cade was writing on and knew he was getting to do something that she wasn't. So she looked at me and said "Mama, I want the orange paper". ORANGE PAPER? I didn't know that she knew what the color orange was! Honestly, all she says to me is pink, brown or white and those brief conversations about color happen because we're arguing about her shoes (go figure).

But the real freak out that I had last night was when I heard Breyden count to 7 while she was jumping on the couch preparing to do a dive like the people on the TV. She did this twice so it was no fluke. In the words of Harry Carey - Holy Cow!

....so what I learned yesterday is that private pre-school tuition at Goddard is worth every penny!

what we do before homework time starts....

SPOILED!

2008-08-18T21:27:00.001-04:00

I have said for a long time that my kids are the most spoiled kids I know (not spoiled rotten - there is a difference). I don't know 2 other kids that have grandparents that live on the water on 2 different coasts. My parents on the Intercoastal Waterway of the Atlantic and Lois and Dick on the Puget Sound of the Pacific.

This all makes for some pretty spectacular adventures for them at the ages of 2 and 4....so imagine the amazing things they will get to do when they are 10 & 12. Here are some of the pictures that Nanna took of the kids on her beach a couple of weeks ago....

Breyden and Parker testing the water

Caleb and Cade

The star fish pile begins....

Breyden is not a fan of being dirty or wet.

Breyden, Aimee, & Ella

Cade and a good find

Sofia and some prized sand-dollars

Looks like Parker found his dinner

Shots from Anchorage...

2008-08-14T22:07:00.000-04:00

My friend Kathleen and I got restless in Seattle over the summer and decided to go see our friend, Jimmy-James, in Alaska. We had a fantastic and fun filled 5 nights there and all I can say to the two of them is:

Drop and Roll

2008-08-13T14:55:00.000-04:00

A BAD HAIR DAY AT CAMP NANNA!

A BETTER HAIR DAY AT CAMP NANNA

Haircuts by Uncle John at Camp Nanna

2008-08-13T14:32:00.000-04:00

Here is the "stair step" picture from 2008!

Cade (4), Caleb (4), Sophia (4), Jackson (3), Breyden (2), Parker (22mos), Ella (20mos),

& Ellee (16mos)

Breyden is two and Cade is in Kindergarten!

2008-08-12T22:51:00.000-04:00

We just returned from a fantastic Summer with our family. I think the three of us put record mileage on planes, trains, and automobiles...but it was well worth it! 5 states over 6 weeks between the three of us - WHEW! It is time for a rest - at least until Labor Day!

Cade and Brey had 4 wonderful weeks with their cousins. Caleb, Sophia, Jackson, John Michael, Ella, Parker and Ellee all met us at Camp Nanna for many wonderful days outside. There was a slip-n-slid, a jumping castle, a fire pit for Smores at night, and everyone even had their own big wheel. Bubba, Snookie, GiGi and Uncle Mike even made it to Camp Nanna for a few days to see how their grand-babies get to spend their time on the West Coast.

On July 27th we had Brey's 2nd birthday a couple of days early at Camp Nanna with all of the cousins. We had lots of cheeseburgers, chicken sandwiches, and chocolate cake. It was really wonderful to have family (not all of it sadly) around for her big day. And since "Happy Birthday" is her favorite song to sing, she loved that we were singing it to her. The next day we added (ok, we didn't add her, Leslie did) Molly Grace Merchant to the gang of cousins. So Camp Nanna grew by one camper this summer! WHOO HOO!

We made it home over the course of this past weekend just in time for the first day of school. The kids took the red-eye on Sunday night and so we were all pretty sleepy as we walked into Goddard at around 11 am on Monday morning. I guess that was why I was in such shock when I took Cade to his regular class and they told me he had been moved next door.....to the KINDERGARTEN class. I was in complete shock and I think they got that when I started crying in the hallway which then made Breyden cry. I think a mom prepares herself for what the first day of kindergarten will look like for her first born:

A great breakfast like eggs, pancakes with lots of fruit and pretty much whatever else the first born wants on the first day of kindergarten
A bath...the kid can't be dirty on his first day
A little gel in the hair (for the 200 pictures that will be taken)
Lots of pictures... 200+ pictures
More pictures of him getting on the big yellow school bus
A ride following the big yellow school bus
More pictures of him getting off the big yellow school bus

So you see why I was a little taken aback when I walk in late with 2 kids that have had 8 hours of combined sleep, that smell like soured milk, and are dressed like they have a mother that doesn't care what they or even she looks like....etc.

So we are now done with day 2 of kindergarten and we have had 2 nights of homework. I don't remember homework in kindergarten. I don't remember homework in high school....

So this is my first ABC blog and I promise to update it much more often than I did the last....

Love to you all!

Ash, Cade & Brey