Be Careful what you say!

Ever since I was a mother, I have said I want my children to not take dance (or gymnastics) since those activities have a very high rate of body image issues. I dealt body image issues as a teen and I don’t want my girls to do the same.

 

Well here I am 3.5 years into being a mom and this week Brady is starting ballet on Friday and Reese is starting gymnastics in March. The girls’ Great Nana (Karl’s paternal grandmother) gave the girls money to do something to fun. THANKS NANA!

 

Well when I told Brady that she would be starting ballet classes, she asked me if her prince would be there to dance with. That is what you get when her only exposure to ballet is the Nutcracker Ballet.

 

So yesterday we practiced putting up a bun. She immediately starting dancing around the house.

 

Today we stopped by the studio to sign her up and I got to peek at her recital costume! SO CUTE!!! Then we went to the dancewear shop to get the gear. Brady with all her ballet items, shoes, tights and leotard. Reese with her little gymnastic leotard.

 

 

I do have to say after all my years of hesitation, I am pretty pumped about seeing my girls doing activities they want to do badly. I am also REALLY excited about the May recital. I will try to get pictures this Friday of Brady’s first ballet class…

My little Readers

This is the link to Brady at 27 months old.

http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/ALLfJpVhAG_WxOFwGX-KQA?feat=directlink

This is a video I shot of Reese a couple days ago at 25 months old.

Reese at this point knows all but like 5, but she was having a hard time sitting long enough to video them all. I think watching one video then the other is interesting because it shows their contrast in personalities but that they both have a bright future!

 

My girls love books as I discuss in this post about a year ago, but I feel like now more than ever they are little readers. In the car, the only toys I keep in there to entertain them are books, about 50 of them. No DVD player, no gameboys, no gagdets, just books. Reese asks to carry a book with her EVERYWHERE she goes. It is as though her ‘lovie’ is a book. Every time we drop Brady off at preschool, just to walk into the building real quick Reese insists on having a book in hand. Now they both request having a book or two to go to sleep with, most nights Reese falls asleep with a book still in her grasp. Here is what they did the other night with some beanie babies. Brady was teaching the bears to read.  She set up sets of reading circles.

Deep Thoughts by CO

Tonight during my Zumba class I had a collection of thoughts that kept cycling through my mind so I have decided to share them with you.

 

• Why do women wear their hair down while the workout? What function does that serve? Who are they trying to impress? And is it really worth being that hot to impress this unsaid person?
• On that same note, why the heck would you ever wear a thong while exercising?
• Standing near someone who smells like an airplane bathroom makes class seem like twice as long as any other class.
• Lastly, Zumba is pretty darn fun, you should give it a try if you haven’t already.

Orthnerisms: Chapter One

Yes the epic publication of the web novel Bradyisms did real come to a close, but its much anticipated sequel is being premiered today! Like Bradyisms this publication will be released in chapters… I hope you all enjoy the sequel as much as the first.

 

This change to all Orthners is necessary due to the fact we have now two little girls that can have full conversations.

 

Bradyisms:

 

• “Mommy, when I am grown up, can I go grocery shopping by myself and cook chicken just like you?”
• “ After I am four, I will be five!” Yes, sweetheart “What will I be after I am five?” Six “oh, then I can smush?” Smush, what are you talking about? I look back and she has her cheeks blown up and ‘swishing’ them back and forth.
• Me: Do you want to sign up to learn how to play baseball like daddy? “YES!!! Then I can do cheerleading there too?”
• I have to add a story to this…When I was pregnant with Brady, Karl and I were talking about what activities we envisioned our baby girl doing one day. I stated I hoped she didn’t dance because of the body image issues I had as a teenager. He said well we will sign her up for soccer! I said she may not want to do soccer, his response, well she will have to try for at least one season. I said there was no way you could have gotten me on a soccer field when I was a kid.
• So when Brady said this cheerleading thing to me, I brought that conversation up to Karl. He now realizes his first born will most likely not be playing soccer, at least in the near future! He is of course okay with that.
• We were driving around in the car as a whole family and Brady started saying “palandges” over and over cracking up. I said “what are you saying?” Her response “toesies “ Then I realized that she was saying a word that sounded vaguely familiar from my grade school days “phalanges” I immediately pulled out my iPhone to figure out what it meant, since Karl and I had no clue. And sure enough, after I figured out how to spell it, it means the bones in the foot!

Of course, I had one to write for Reese and I can’t think of it now. I will post more when I think of them (or hear new isms that crack me up)

Surrounded by amazing people!

I have been reflecting a lot lately about how lucky I am to be surrounded by people who so compassionately love those around them and give back to the society in many ways!

 

Here is a list of what I am surrounded by:

 

• two families adopting: one family become official  as of today the other in the beginnings of the long process
• another family at the early stages of considering becoming foster parents
• a family run business that employs a mentally handicapped fellow so that he can be a part of the community
• a doctor for the Navy
• future pharmacist
• pilots who fly for the U S Navy
• missionary couple in Dominion Republic
• a friend who gives back in many ways to my Alma Mater, Meredith College, a school that needs alumnae to care like she does
• a woman who supports her husband fully so he can go to pharmacy school
• many many of my friends and family have degrees in higher learning, I love being around such smart people!
• a speech therapist who works in the public schools so that she can touch those who can’t afford surfaces in a private setting even though there is much more money to be made in a private setting
• a friend who never ever forgets to send birthday cards to all her friends, whether or not she gets them in return

This is just the beginning! Thank you to all of you for surrounding me with your amazing talents, generous offers of love and act of inspiration. I love you all!

“Up in the Sky”

On Friday, Karl had a scheduled flight. Most of the time he takes off and lands on base and there isn’t easy access to watch on these runways. He called me midday to say there was a need to have a T-6 airplane parked at the Pensacola Regional Airport over the weekend. So the girls drove on over to the observation  deck and waited. The girls utilized the stage while we were waiting.

 

 

They were very excited when we finally saw Daddy fly in front of us. Well, Reese thinks every plane she sees is Daddy (even if she is in Daddy’s arms). He did two landings and one fly-by. Lots of fun, I always enjoy to watch Karl doing his job. (Karl is in the front seat).

 

 

 

They were very sad when he landed and kept saying “up in the sky”. But they were very excited when daddy came to the van. Here is Karl in all the gear he has to wear, including a G-suit (helps keep blood flowing throughout his body when he reaches high Gs).

 

We Wish You a Merry Christmas…

Yep, that’s right! Come to the Orthner house and you will be wished a Merry Christmas in song every night! This apparently has become part of our night time routine. It is a child’s version that has motions with it. My girls love it and sing it every night after their bath. Some nights, like tonight, they like to sing in the buff!

 

The lyrics:

 

“We wish you are merry Christmas (three times) and a happy new year”

“Let’s all do a little marching (insert any action) sing three times, and bring Christmas cheer.”

 

Every night we do this song over and over inserting actions like jumping, twirling, running, jumping, bouncing, stomping, clapping, and patting.

 

 

Little Tiana, Sweet Tooth and Picasso

If you don’t know the Disney movie, “Princess and the Frog”, it is based in New Orleans and Tiana loves to cook the food New Orleans is so well known for. Brady got a Tiana cookbook with all the recipes plus some of the food in the movie. About a week ago, we tried our hand at making beignets. That was to say the least an epic failure! So this week we tried cooking some Jambalaya. I was the only one that really enjoyed the results but honestly that was no surprise from my picky eaters. Here is Brady putting in the final touch just like Tiana does…a dash of hot sauce!

That same night we got a surprise package in the mail from Beppa. Nine, yes I said NINE, boxes of white fudge covered oreos. These are Karl’s favorite part of the holiday season, but also his least favorite part about the close of the holiday season, because they are just that, seasonal! Well, thanks to Kim for stocking up our pantry for well at least the next week or two Also, if you look at the corner of the picture you can see Brady looking through the People magazine for more Taylor!

Lastly, we just moved our art easel from the garage to the back patio. Our garage has been getting more and more full and the easel was no longer accessible. Brady enjoyed painting a picture of Taylor Swift with flowers in her hair (like in the Tangled movie).

 

Hope you enjoyed your random photos on this lovely Saturday afternoon!

Wordless Wednesday: Miracle Grow

Little miss Independent

I did not touch this clementine once. She spent 6 minutes full of shear determination and peeled it completely herself. Here is the proud little girl showing off her work.

 

I have learned that I have to give her time and be patient big time. She is at the age where even if it takes her 20 times longer to do something she would much rather do it herself. But an independent Reese means a happy Reese. Patience is what I need right now!

A Christmas to Remember

I haven’t really gone into much detail about the Christmas day with the girls. I know we have all moved on to thinking about what 2011 will bring us. However, before we get too far from the holidays I wanted to jot down some memories from this past holiday season so that I can look back years to come.

 

• The girls LOVED seeing Christmas lights on the houses. We probably drove around neighborhoods at least 10 different nights in December. The girls would announce which side they saw the lights on “Brady’s side” or “Reese’s side”. Then they would talk about the lights they saw “blue lights” Then it turned into hunting out things like “snowman” or “Christmas tree”. However, in one neighborhood there were a lot of nativity scenes, so the last few days of driving, the girls were all about finding a baby Jesus. We all really enjoyed these drives and look forward to doing them again. Poor Reese, still to this day, asks to “see lights” every time I buckle her in her car seat.
• Also, we loved Maria, our elf on the shelf. Maria traveled with us to NC and VA. Every morning the girls would walk out of their bedrooms hunting for where she showed up that morning. Reese would say “where’s ee-ah?” Brady had lots of conversations with her and enjoyed meeting Maria’s best friend, Molly, at the Busch Gardens feast with Santa.
• Since Thanksgiving, Brady will occasionally ask our family to “hold hands and talk.” Then I would ask her if she wants to say grace. So she has us all hold hands and close our eyes. She will talk for a good minute about different interactions of the day. Then the last two words she always says is “Grace Amen” She literally says grace!
• At Christmas Dinner Karl asked the girls what their favorite part of Christmas was, Reese said “M&Ms” and Brady said “getting mic stand” Also the day before we had asked them what their favorite part of the two week trip was Reese said “seeing lights” and Brady said “opening presents”

2010 in review

The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here's a high level summary of its overall blog health:



The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads Wow.

Crunchy numbers

A Boeing 747-400 passenger jet can hold 416 passengers. This blog was viewed about 5,800 times in 2010. That's about 14 full 747s.

 

In 2010, there were 190 new posts, not bad for the first year!

The busiest day of the year was January 24th with 66 views. The most popular post that day was The new house….

Where did they come from?

The top referring sites in 2010 were blogger.com, wolfepackheadseast.blogspot.com, coxchronicles-amy.blogspot.com, bpmkdm.blogspot.com, and 2dewdrops.blogspot.com.

Some visitors came searching, mostly for orthner outtakes, five dollar footlong mermaid, blonde curly boy, sesame street zoe halloween costume, and sweetest little girl.

Attractions in 2010

These are the posts and pages that got the most views in 2010.

1

The new house… January 2010
5 comments

2

The Bravest Little Girl in the world July 2010
8 comments

3

What is a Veteran? November 2010
5 comments

4

Taylor Swift Mania… October 2010
1 comment

5

FYI...easy way to follow blogs March 2010
2 comments

Happy 1/1/11!

oh and Happy New Year too! How did you bring in the new year?

 

My father was in town after doing a job in AL, thus Karl and I got to go on our second date of the year. Yep, you got that right July 9th and Dec. 31st were our two dates. Back in a July we went to dinner and then saw a movie (animated of course). Last night we got in the car at 5 and looked at each other not really knowing what to do with ourselves.

 

Here I am in my new jeans, with my new jewelry and purse ready to go!

So we had dinner at Ruby Tuesday, we couldn’t decide on a movie so we went to Target bought Slumdog Millionaire for like $4 (a lot cheaper than a movie in theater!) and then hit Wendy’s for some frostys. We were home by 7:30! But here is the funny thing, we had a blast enjoyed each other and didn’t feel like we were missing out on anything by not doing anything else.

 

At one point in the date, I asked Karl, “I feel like I am suppose to be super excited to get away from the kids, but what is it I am suppose to be excited about?”  Karl’s response: “We are lucky Christy, we have really good kids!” I think about people saying they enjoy finally having a meal without kids nagging them, well are girls are great at meals, even when they have to wait for others to finish. Or about how they want to have an adult conversation without being interrupted, again Karl and I don’t feel like this is lacking in our lives either. So you want to know what made me the most excited during our date…. when we got to park at the back of the parking lot at Target and casually stroll in. I have always loved parking far away and enjoying the outdoors on the way into a store. With kids I feel like it is hard to carry one and hold the others hand with a purse, so I try to park close.

 

Anyways, Karl and I continue our date at home with our DVD we bought and then watch Pensacola’s pitiful excuse for a countdown on TV.

 

We are happy to welcome a new year, but we look back and realize that we had a GREAT 2010! There isn’t much Karl and I want to change about our lives.

 

New Years Resolution this year: Take over the bills and budget for us and do better about my spending. Thank goodness Karl gets 3 raises this year! Just kidding!

Extreme Room Makeover: Orthner Edition

For Christmas, Karl and I got and made stuff for the girls’ rooms. Combined with the gifts from Santa, their rooms have a whole new look. Despite not being the paint the walls since we are in a rental, I think their rooms look quite different.

 

Brady’s room: She as you all know is obsessed with Taylor Swift. So she wanted “a bedroom like Taylor Swift” Well I came upon with picture in my searches of exactly what a TS bedroom might look like.

 

 

While I believe this is an old photo from when she still lived with her parents, Brady (upon seeing the photo) “Yeah, I want a room like that!” I figured this is better then buying something off ebay that had her picture cheaply plastered all over the blanket.

 

Since Santa informed us ahead of time he was giving Brady a stage, mic stand and guitar for Christmas, I decided to make a tulle canopy for her stage instead of bed, for safety. I had plans for do faux four poster bed, but the ceiling fan interfered with that plan. Here are pictures of her room now:

 

We were at Hobby Lobby the other day and Brady went looking for more things for her room. I knew she had Christmas money from Beppa, so I allowed her to go for it. She choose to buy a nightstand, light switch cover and a lamp. She is very proud of her lamp which she completely picked out all by herself and it matched PERFECTLY!

 

A funny story about her new room setup… Brady gets to watch Taylor Swift videos on the internet sometimes. There is a song titled “Teardrops on my guitar” and it is one of the ones she enjoys quite a bit. Here is a snapshot from that video:

 

 

Here is what Brady is often seen doing with her guitar:

 

 

Reese’s Room: For her theme, I felt like I was still able to make the decisions for it. I knew if I asked her I would be told Disney Princesses for something and I refuse to do something commercial. So I went with a bedding set from Target I have had my eye for awhile. She was excited about it when we got it all set up.

 

 

Can you tell I had a BLAST redecorating the two rooms?

I love family time!

Our family took advantage of Karl being on shore tour and took a two week trip to NC and VA to see family. Along the way we saw some friends, had precious memories with family and got to do LOTS of great things. Here is a small snip-it of the great time we had.

 

On the way up, we had to stay in Anderson, SC, which just so happens to be next to Kristen’s hometown. Kristen was my college roommate for 3 years and I love every chance I get to see her and catch up.

On the next day, driving through Charlotte, we decided to make a stop to see the NASCAR hall of fame that recently opened up. It was nice to make a “pit stop” to break up the second day of driving all day long!

The girls were very excited to see Auntie Andi and Uncle Jason. They got right to doing one of their favorite things… Ring Around the Rosie. We also got to see the Wolfpack play basketball, and Brady LOVED the cheerleaders and all the lifts they did. THanks to Uncle J for being her spotter.

We celebrated Christmas with the DeWeeses. The big hit with the girls were their new pink cowboy boots and their paper jamz guitar.

While in Raleigh, I took the time to see some good friends too. I got to see my Meredith girls that still live in Raleigh. Also got to eat Khanki with Ashley. I loved sharing these special moments with my dear friends.

My mom and Ashley gave the girls these adorable knit caps that bow attach to. Here are a couple of cute shots of them wearing the new trendy accessory.

Reese’s actual birthday feel while we were in Raleigh. We celebrated by starting the day with one of her favorite foods, DOUGNUTS! And ended the day with one of her other favorite foods, pizza. We all enjoyed being a kid again at Chuck E. Cheese’s. However,  I will have to say Karl had a BLAST there!

Then after a week, we made our way to Williamsburg. Kim had lots of great activities planned for us.

First day we made our way to Busch Gardens to visit Christmas Town. There we meet Santa and feasted with him. Also, enjoyed walking through a magical lighted wonderland.

The next day we had all you can eat pancakes while watching Tangled in the theater. This was a very fun experience.

I know picture is random, but I thought you would appreciate this…Three females=lots of shoes!

We also opened presents at the Orthner family. The girls are blessed to have so many people that love them!

Beppa really enjoyed bringing her girls to the Nutcracker. She picked out these special fancy coats for the girls. Brady now REALLY wants to sign up for ballet classes.

SNOW…enough said.

We also visited the Yankee Candle Village where we dipped our own candles. On that same day, we had a BLAST at inflation nation, which had 9 jump houses…boy did I get a work out there!

Our trip home we were able to lunch with Uncle Jason and eat with Kristen again. But along the way Karl thought he would treat the girls to a kit kat bar…hind sight is 20/20!!!!

 

Merry Christmas friends and family! Know that this family loves you dearly!