She's leaving me for Academia

So, G was lucky enough to be able to start at her new school this week (it's a magnet school and is supposed to be really great). And as excited as we are about this, I am having a bit of a hard time with it. Kindergarten is full day at her new school. After I dropped her off at her first day, I just drove around sobbing and listening to "Gracie" by ben folds (see sidebar music thingy) on repeat. It wasn't pretty.
I just realized that she is in full day school now and will be forever. After elementary, it's highschool, college, and then onto the white house. Full speed ahead is not really my ideal speed.
And secondly, I'm having to learn how to parent Bubba on my own without G's help. I know, yikes, right?
Thirdly, since I haven't made too many friends yet here in my new town, G is pretty much my bff. Now who's going to tell me when my outfit looks stupid? Or give me a funny look when someone at the library's crack is hanging out as they are leaning over to get a book off the bottom shelf? Bubba certainly isn't.
And most importantly, who's going to potty train Bubba? I was sort of counting on G to do it. I guess I can go ahead and forget about that.

Maybe the Dingo Ate Your Babies

No, no it didn't. I still have them. And here are the pictures to prove that in fact, the dingo did not eat my baby(ies).(man, i miss seinfeld). I figured I'd better post some pics of the kiddos before the grandparents started getting hostile. We had our church Christmas party tonight... It was really fun, we got to meet a lot of nice people and Santa came! Also, we had ham. I love me some ham. I need more ham in my life.






G said she knew it was the real santa clause because he was old. I like that it was his oldness that made him legit.

Happy Halloween!

Bubs is trying to hook G, but she is immune b/c she's doing this witch pose.

Get Yourself a 5 year old

It's a great cover to allow a grown person to go see High School Musical 3 in the theater. I took G after school today, and it was pretty much awesome.

Oh the Loveliness of Fall

Fall is the most splendid of the seasons. There is just something so romantic about it. I love to bring out my sweaters and jeans again. And something about fall just begs for goodies to be baked. And who doesn't want a delicious baked good?
We participated in some good old fashioned autumn jolliness today by raking and jumping into leaf piles. We documented it on film for all to see. Life sure is different now that every event is a potential blog post.

One Happy Girl and One Sad Boy

G had her first day of kindergarten and it was exciting for us all. Except Bubba, he did not like it one bit.

This was little bubs after G went into the school building with her class. "No Sissy go school".

After school. Reunited and it feels so good.

Cream Truck

We’ve been teaching G to read for a while now. (when I say “We”, I mean Jared). So, he started this chart where she gets a star for every book that she reads on her own and after she reached 12, she got to pick a reward.
*Flash-back* to about 6 weeks ago when the “Cream Truck” (aka: ice cream truck) started driving through our neighborhood on daily basis calling to the kids by blasting “The Entertainer” from it’s speakers. I made it very clear that they would never get any ice cream from the Cream Truck. I wasn’t trying to be mean, but you see, J or I never got ice cream from the ice cream man growing up and we were simply trying to uphold a long-standing family tradition. My children would stare out the window longingly, watching the Cream truck stop for other kids all the while knowing that that ice cream would never be theirs.
*Flash-forward* to G’s star chart. The reward that she picked for reading was, you guessed it, ice cream from the Cream Truck. Neither my cheapness or my respect for a fine family tradition could justify telling her no after she had done such hard work getting those books read on her own.
So the other day, when we heard “The Entertainer” in the distance, G froze and then starting shrieking. She continued the shrieking until the ice cream man handed her the power-puff girls popsicle that she picked out.


Here she is (and her best friend, and Bubba) watching the Cream Truck come down the street toward our house. What you didn’t see, was me, in all of the excitement, running down our front yard (it is on a bit of a decline) to snap a quick picture…Tripping, Falling, and Rolling down the front yard. The Ice cream man totally saw me. He didn’t say anything though. I think it helped that as he was pulling up to the curb in front our house, he hit the speed limit sign. We just didn’t make eye contact during the transaction. It worked for us.

"Sick"

I'm pretty sure that G faked sick the other day. She said she didn't want to go to school because her "cough was too bad and she didn't want everyone to get her germs".
1. she didn't have a cough
2. I think it had something to do with the homemade 'maraca' that J made her to take to school for instrument show and tell day that day. I think the duct tape really pushed her over the edge.

A Hamily of a Family

G has really been into rhyming things...she's given a few of my family members special names...
S....Master of Disaster (oh, so accurate)
J....Creature of a Teacher
Alicia....Wack of the Back (I was just explaining to her this morning why alicia, (who is coming to visit today!!) is going to sleep in her bed b/c she has back problems)
Grandma Rosemarie....Whopper of a Shopper
Me....Wiener of a Cleaner (she uses this word (wiener) as if it's a perfectly acceptable everyday word...without laughing even. (i giggle every time I hear this word, it's out of my control). I think if I point out that is a little socially unacceptable, she either a). won't believe me or b). will cry and be forever traumatized. My hope is that eventually she will realize that it's not a normally used word on her own, and then she will stop.)
Herself....The Award of the Bored
(she named this blog post, too).
It appears that cabin fever has really sort of taken over here.

Ponies in Trucks

The perfect fusion of 2-year-old-boy-play and 4-year-old-girl-play. My kids could play Ponies in Trucks all the live-long day.
p.s. I ate cake for breakfast. I feel like I should tell someone that.

I hate January

In an attempt to try to remedy some January cabin fever, we decided to go visit the great state of Kansas for a couple of weeks. Turns out it was just as freezing there, and we spent most of our days inside, hence developing the very cabin fever we were trying to avoid by staying home! Only, this was the kind of cabin fever where you mostly stay inside, but you have a lot of visitors. And you leave the house a total of 2 times.

So, here are a few ideas we came up with to bring a little fun and excitement to the horrible 31 days of January. I will also credit each idea to it's author. You know how I like to give credit where it's due.


There's always throwing a party for your sister's boyfriend who you've never met before. The Cake says 'Congrats Rocky'.
G said he deserved congratulations "for getting a girlfriend".
credit: G



And of course, there's always the old standby of building a sweet fort.
Credit: Brenna


And if there comes a surprising sunny day in January, you could always experiment with different objects to keep the sun out of your eyes.
Credit: G
G: Mom, the sun's in my eyes.
Me: Hmm, why don't you find something to block it with.
G: Ok. How bout these 'bungo' drums?



You could always visit some friends and family! Above is my sister Jessica's little boy. Do you think that G and he are related!?
Below, we visited our friends who have just recently moved to KS.

You could always do some thinking. A little thinking never hurt anyone.
Credit: G


We did a LOT of reading.
Credit: S

Don't forget about bean-bag peek-a-boo.(wow, 3 -'s)
Credit: S



Of course, if any of those idea's don't work out, you can always do this for a while.
Credit: S

Happy Christmas!

Neal Family Christmas Letter 2007 ahead!....

I know what you’re thinking. You are thinking, I don’t need to read their Christmas letter, don’t I know enough about the Neals? I mean, I read their blog, what more do they want from me?
Here is the answer to that wordy question. This year, I sent out Christmas post-cards instead of actual Christmas cards with a letter.
1. Because they only require a post-card stamp, and I am cheap and don’t want to pay full price postage. I feel like 41cents or whatever the outrageous price of postage is these days, is just that. Outrageous. So, post-cards are my way of beating the system. At least in my own mind.
2. I thought that maybe postmen and women might secretly be thankful when people send post cards so that they could do a little light reading while on their mail route.
So, I thought that I would whip up this little diddy of a Christmas letter just in case, and I did say, in case, you might be looking for a little more information about us than you obtain from this blog. And if this is not the case for you, you are excused from reading this letter.

Ok, so J first:
He is in his last little bit of his masters program. He just has student teaching, which starts in January. I am extremely proud of him for how well he has done in school. He has a 4.0 GPA. I honestly don’t know how in the world he does it with a wife and two kids, I know that we are a huge pesky distraction to him sometimes. Also, he actually seems really excited about what he is doing. A couple of months ago, he came home from teaching one of his first lessons in a school, and told me how invigorating it was to teach about art to a group of students, and how it made him feel really alive. I think that’s great. I can tell you for a fact that not one of my high-school teachers felt alive or invigorated by teaching me about anything. He’s going to make a great art teacher.

Then there’s me:
I just pretty much hang out at home, do some laundry, cook some meals, basic damage control around the house. Pretty ordinary stuff, really. Oh, and I also have a part time job at Bath & Body Works. I work a couple of shifts a week when J is home. For some reason, I’ve always sort of dreamed of working there. (I know, I should probably set my goals a little higher in the future). It just always seemed like a really fun environment. And it is, but some people take lotion a little too seriously in my opinion. While I’ve enjoyed my time working there (sort of), I will be glad when J graduates and I can go back to just being home full-time again. The hardest part about working is that I really miss my kids when I’m away.

Miss G: She is great. I really love being her mom. Ever day is interesting and fun. (and sometimes frustrating and overwhelming). But mostly just lots of fun. She is at a great stage right now where she is just so anxious to learn new things. J is teaching her to read and she is picking it right up. She loves to cook with me and has even filmed a cooking show of her own. She is very social and is always asking to “play with a friend”. When the answer to that question is ‘no’, she just plays with her brother. She is a great big sister to him, she is very protective of him and they are very loving toward each other. I love it. We have also been able to spend a lot of time with family over this past year. G absolutely loves both sides of our family and is constantly talking about different family members and asking to see them. She adores her grandmas (grandma rosemary, grandma marcia, and great grandma) who are probably the only people still reading this.

Bubba: He is crazy. To me, I feel like there is a big difference with this boy child compared to my girl child. He is constantly destructing or thinking about destructing. On a great note though, he is happy 99 % of the time. People tell me all of the time that they have never seen a kid smile as much as he smiles. It’s true, he is pretty much always smiling. He's a very sweet boy and we love him very much. He loves singing, looking at books, squeezing things, and did I mention destructing?

So, that’s us this year. We are counting down the days (171) until J graduates and we are really looking forward to getting out of student-mode and back into regular-mode. We have been really reminded this year of how much we love our family and friends and the support they’ve given us while J has been in school. We also know that the Lord has really watched over us and blessed us during this time in our lives, and we are so thankful for that fact.
We hope that everyone has had a great year! And thanks for reading our blog! I love to read other people’s blogs, so if I don’t know that you have one, post a comment so that I can find it! And if you don't have one, and maybe you also don't have a new year's resolution, you should resolve to get a blog this year!
Merry Christmas!
Love from,
The Neals

My Offspring, Future Leaders of the Fashion World

And why wouldn't they be, I mean, look at their dad....(3rd from the left). If he is not at the pinnacle of fashion, well, then, I don't know who is.
He did the 'snake as an accessory' thing way before Britney Spears.

And I've certainly rocked my fair share of overalls in my lifetime, which we all know are always at the height of fashion.

Now this is some edgy couture fashion here. Let me see if I can explain this right. You see, her top is actually the bloomers attached to the skirt. The whole thing is upside down with the crotch (eww) buttons over her shoulder. One would really have to have a mind for fashion to have come up with, let alone, execute this.

Two words. Doo. Rag.

And little bubba here has fashioned himself some shoes out of your common swim diapers. Ingenious.

Lipstick on lips is really highly predictable. Here, S is really re-inventing the 'face' of make-up, by suggesting an alternative location for lipstick.

What's that you say, this post wouldn't be complete without a mashed potato turkey? I agree.

Halloween Cuteness

This year for Halloween, G wanted to be a Fairy-Mermaid, and having no idea how to help her achieve this, I pointed her in the direction of my sister Alicia to make her costume. Didn't she do an awesome job!
S would not hold still for photos, so here's the best one I have of him.


We went with our good friends Scott and Lindsay and their kiddos, and here are the tired trick-or-treaters in the wagon after a long hard night of getting free candy!