Dear Becca & Grant,
                  Yesterday was Easter Sunday. We didn't go to church. I feel kinda bad about not going but we haven't gone to church in a coon's age and I always thought of those people who go to church just at Easter as Easter Christians and I didn't want to think of myself as just an Easter Christian. I'm probably worse because I didn't even take my family to church on Easter Sunday. It's been a long time since I felt at home in a church. I felt at home in the church I grew up in, Versailles Assembly of God which eventually became Kingsway Assembly of God when they moved to Kingsway Drive and then they became known as King's Way Assembly of God when they moved again to Versailles Road across from the castle. I even courted met and courted my first wife in that church. I also felt at home at Mortonsville Assembly of God when I went there with my family when I was a teenager. Since then I just haven't felt like I belong anywhere. We tried Kingsway but they have become too upscale fro my taste, we tried Mortonsville but the entire congregation was maybe ten to fifteen people and the average age was was probably sixty and we tried Woodford Community Christian Church but it just doesn't feel like home. I know it's probably an excuse because I love to sit up on Saturday night playing on the computer. I think in a few weeks we are going to go back to Woodford Community Christian. I know these kids need to be brought up in church just as I was.
      Instead of church, after the kids saw their Easter baskets and had too much candy for the a.m. we all took a shower and headed out to Cracker Barrel. It was around 11:30 when we got and we decided to have breakfast. Both Mom and I got the Sunrise Sampler and Becca had an egg and a piece of Sausage. Becca ate Mom's grits, a biscuit and a good portion of my baked apples in addition to her food. She was one hungry little girl. Mom and I where hungry as well. It's the best breakfast I have had at Cracker Barrel in long time and I love Cracker Barrel. When I was a child I loved Cracker Barrel because I always associated it with going on vacation because that's just about the only time we ever went but now, while some of those old vacation associations still exist I mainly like it because they have wonderful grub. Grant even had a few bites of grits and a few bites of gravy. We all had us a country breakfast.
      After we ate we went to Wal-Mart and purchased a head of lettuce, a few tomatoes on the vine and loads of junk. We kept within our budget though and I am real proud of that. Cracker Barrel wasn' tstrictly in the budget but I knew I would be off this week so I decided to use our overflow income for having fun while I'm off. By the way I'm on vacation this week.
      Finally we went to Samaritan Hospital and up to the Cardinal Hill floor where Mom works. They had the Easter Bunny up there and they had a big Eater Egg Hunt. Becca ran right up and hugged the Easter Bunny. Grant & Becca also posed fro a picture with the Easter Bunny. After the picture Becca secretly informed me that she thought maybe the Easter Bunny was actually a human because she had human hands and not bunny feet. Becca is one smart cookie.
      She may be one smart cookie but lately she has not been her golden child self. Part of it is my own fault and I readily admit to that. When Mom worked the doubles at Cardinal Hill it was just simpler to let Becca lie down with me in Mine and Mom's bed than to fight with her about going to sleep in her own room. She has become used to sleeping in our bed and it's now nearly impossible to get her to sleep in her own room and when we do we end up waking up with her between us. I also feel like she is going through a stage where she just does not want to sleep by herself. She will drift right off when I lay down with her but Saturday night it took her two and a half hours to go to sleep in her room. I was trying to clean up the house a little while I listened to the Financial Peace lesson that we missed a few weeks back on my iPod. I even ended up getting so frustrated that I took her television out of her room. That's when she really had a meltdown. She ended up waking Mom up and she was able to get her to go to sleep.
      She's also taken to telling little fibs when she thinks she's going to get in trouble. The good thing about it is that she is a terrible liar. Maybe she just hasn't had much practice but she just can not lie to save her life. Becca's been doing real good with her potty training. We let her run around the house totally naked because we feel that if she doesn't have the security of a pull-up she will be more likely to go pee in the potty. Anyway, Saturday she was sitting on one of her many toy buckets in the living room watching television when I heard the unmistakable sound of someone urinating. I asked her if she peed and she looked back at me and told me thawasn'tt she didn't. I knew that she did. I told her to go dump the bucket. She told me there was nothing in the bucket. I got up and checked it out and sure enough there was some pee in her toy bucket. I asked her why she lied to me and she told me it was because she couldn't wait. I told her I was not asking her why she peed in the bucket but why she lied about it. She once again told me it was because she couldn't wait. I never got a straight answer out of her. Later that same day she brought some strawberry syrup into the living room and asked if she could have some strawberry milk. I told her that she could not have any just right now. She blew up like a big ole' bull and stomped back into the kitchen. I heard her throw the syrup bottle. She hollered out as soon as she heard me coming her way that something fell off of the counter. I got in there and I asked her to show me what dropped. She looked around and spotted a package of paper plates that I had knocked off the counter as I fixed breakfast that morning. She was busted again. I suppose all children eventually learn to lie but we must pound it into her head that she can not get away with lying and that there will be severe consequences for lying. She's a good girl and she'll do fine if Mom & I correctly do our jobs as parents.
   Last Saturday Becca and I went to see the new movie out called Horton Heres a Who based on the Dr. Seuss book by the same name. Becca really liked the movie but she was so tired. I thought she was going to nod off a couple of times but she stayed with me through the whole movie. I asked her if she liked the movie as we headed to the car and she told me that she did but she didn't like the fact that she dropped her popcorn. We stopped at Starbucks and got us a cocoa and a cappuccino for the ride home. Becca loved her cocoa and I hated my cappuccino. After she finished her drink she fell asleep. We went down to Mamaw & Papaw's to pick up Grant. Everyone was down at Uncle Rodney & Aunt Lynn's house. We went down there and Becca ended up playing with the boys until almost ten O'clock. Becca and I had a nice day.
   Mom started her second shift job this past week. She has really busted her butt this past week. She's worked twentyone hours of overtime this past week and will be getting a fifty dollar bonus for all the overtime she has put in. Mom doesn't make any extra money on the hour when she works overtime usually. We're doing very good with our new budget. Things have come up that have knocked us off but I kind of knew they would so I planned accordingly. Still when I have to put out money I hadn't planned on spending and I have to steal from another category in the budget it hurts. Mom has a bad habit of spending money before we actually have it. We do have the money but she might buy gas or take Becca to eat and spend money in a category that won't be funded until our next paycheck. It's really no problem because there's always money in other categories to cover it but it just irks me. The other day she called me and wanted to know if she could get a burger even though she had no cash and I told her that if she didn't have the cash she couldn't spend any money on burgers because that's not how we do it anymore. I felt guilty because she hadn't planned on working a double so she didn't take enough food from the house with her so I called her back and told her to go ahead and get a burger. She would just have to be better prepared next time. She had left her debit card at home to avoid temptation. She had a paid off credit card with her and asked if she could use that and then pay it as soon as it showed up on the online statement and I told her that we would use the credit card under no circumstances at all. She took it quite well and agreed that I was right. Of course after we got off the phone she said she looked at one of her co-workers and told her that she was just about tired of Dave Ramsey. She's absolutely on board though. She's a good wife. To be fair she absolutely had to buy gas early because I hadn't budgeted enough to get us through the week. Like Dave Ramsey said, the budget will not work the first month. I've been riding with Papaw to work for so long that I really had no idea how much we would need for gasoline plus Mom started driving to work five days a week instead of two so that throws us off too. I got pretty close on the gasoline budget though. I budgeted fifty-five dollars a week when I actually think, or at least hope it's going to take sixty-five dollars a week. We had Easter that I really hadn't planned on, Alicia's twins had their first birthday and Mom felt like she needed to go out and spend too much on them, I had to pay taxes on the truck other small odds and big ends came up. As a result of figuring out that life can throw a budget off I have added another category to my budget called our non emergency fund. This money will be for things that pop up and isn't a big enough deal to dip into our regular emergency fund but still might need to be taken care of. Things like printer paper, ink cartridges, forgotten birthdays, minor holiday spending, replacing worn out laptop computer mice, and stuff like that that really doesn't have a home in our budget. Even Becca is getting into the act. I printed out a copy of our budget and ended up giving it to Becca to draw on the other side. She colored on it for awhile and said that she knew the perfect place for my budget. I thought she was going to put her art work on the fridge but when I went in there she had my budget displayed. I don't think Grant really cares one way or another. As long as he has the occasional fresh diaper and a bottle of formula he's just fine.
   I am more at peace financially right now than I have been since Mom got her big settlement for when she was almost killed by a car as she rode her moped. Even then we were going through some pretty rough fallout from terrible decisions and poor money management so I am even more at peace now than then. I am more at peace right now than I have ever been in my adult life. SInce we left Powhatan Trail we have done okay financially. We've always had the money we needed and even some to blow, maybe too much to blow but we somehow never managed to come out ahead. I would look at the charts on Quicken and our spending was almost exactly equal to our income. We managed to save nothing. This budget has really opened my eyes to where our money was going and if we could manage to eat out twice a month instead of twice a week and quit spending so much money on spoiling out children we might be able to help them pay for most of their college educations. I have one concern though and that is the fact that by having my kids so late that they will be in college about the same time that I will be thinking about retirement. Where do I concentrate most of our savings. Right now we are paying $215 a month for preschool and when Becca gets out of preschool we are still going to put that money back so that Grant will already be funded for preschool when he gets ready to go and when we get him funded for preschool we are going to start putting that $215 into their college saving fund. Will that be enough? Can I manage to save 15 percent of my pay toward retirement and still make significant contributions to their college fund and if I can do that will we be able to save for things like cars and maybe the occasional toy? I plan on putting seven percent into my 401K because that's the maximum company match and eight percent into a Roth IRA. That's after we get our debts paid off which we really don't have that much of and put back 10 to 12 thousand dollars as an emergency fund.
   I have opened up a savings account with ING DIrect online bank to keep my emergency fund and an ING Direct paperless checking account that pays a small amount of interest. I have thought about opening up a checking account with Charles Schwab online bank because their checking account pays as much interest as the ING savings account, you get actual paper checks for free and you can use any ATM machine anywhere and there is absolutely no charge at all. They even refund the money charged by the bank that owns the ATM. It sounds like that would be the way to go but ING Direct has such an easy to navigate system and moving money about is so easy and simple whereas with Charles Schwab it's a little more complicated to set up an account and I really don't understand how you would move money from our brick and mortar bank to Charles Schwab. I may get a Charles Schwab account and have my check deposited into that account and then I could simply write a check to the brick and mortar bank if I felt the need. I am going to have to research this some more. Charles Schwab is a name that I trust though so I am not afraid of getting ripped off. They are a real FDIC insured bank as is ING.
   I have the checking account set up because I want to put our sinking funds in there. Things that one would normally buy on credit but instead we are going to save for them. I just think that having multiple accounts and spreading our money out would help keep us on track better. If we had this account for just this purpose and another for that purpose we would be less likely to use those monies for other things. Plus I have to pay $5.50 every month to Community Trust, our brick and mortar bank because we always fall below $500 during the month. I might see if I can find a no fee checking account somewhere. I think Community Trust has one. Maybe Mom & I will go over there and ask about it this week. After we change our direct deposits we would close out the account with the fee.
   I know the past two or three paragraphs have been probably the most boring you have read to date but as I was writing it I realized I wasn't really addressing the dear reader but instead was thinking about these things by writing them. I am excited about our financial future and our future in general. It's just that I have concerns. Dave Ramsey talks about how if you save X amount of dollars from the time you are 20 you will have millions of dollars by the time you are 65. Well, I am not twenty years old and I am starting kind of late in the game and that kind of scares me. I have made some absolutely abysmal decisions regarding finances in my life and I'm afraid that maybe I've waited too long to really get on the ball. I would like to live in comfort in my retirement. Is that going to be possible or am I going to have to go back to Kroger after a 40 year absence? We'll see. I'm going to have to crunch some numbers and educate myself on how money and investing really works. I have always considered myself a marginally intelligent guy, actually I have sometimes boastfully considered myself an extremely intelligent guy but investing and finances has always been something I could not get a grasp on. I can fake my way through most conversations on most any topic at all buy when you start talking about mutual funds and the like my eyes kind of just glaze over and a little bit of spittle starts to drool out of the right side of my mouth. I am a financial idiot. I can't even spell it apparently because my spell checker just yelled at me.
   well, kids it's time I hit the proverbial hay. I think we might make a day trip to Hazzard this week. Another budget buster there. Daddy loves Rebecca & Grant!

Dear Becca & Grant,
                  It's almost ten O'clock on a Sunday evening here at the ole' Lanham homestead. I wanted to be in bed by now but when I sit down with the budget spreadsheet and Quicken the time gets away from me. I am excited about this journey of budgeting our hard earned cash. This is Mom's last week working two doubles on a weekend. She does one more double Saturday and then she starts working second shift. It won't be a Monday through Friday thing though. She'll get two weekends off per month and she will have to work two weekends per month. I hope this doesn't hurt her income much. She will get her second shift bonus and she will pick up the weekend bonus for the weekends she makes. She will lose her weekend bonus for the majority of her hours but she will pick up an extra eight hours per week. It should just about even out. She's going to have to spend a lot more money on gasoline though. That's the one stickler for me. I will be glad to have Mom at home occasionally on the weekend.
      We have all been real sick most of the week. I got sick Tuesday night and ended up missing Wednesday. Becca had a horrible night Tuesday night. She was crying out in her sleep, when she was able to sleep at all. She was so tired but she just couldn't get to sleep. Eventually she just gave up and we let her. By this time I knew I wasn't going in so I sat up with her as she watched some of her shows on television. Eventually she dozed off on the sofa so I let her stay there and I went to bed. Mom had to go into work for a training session Wednesday but I had been up all night with Becca so when Grant woke up she got up with him. She let me sleep for a few hours and then she took a nap of a few hours. She went to work feeling just as bad as the rest of us. She valiantly went on into work because she had already missed this session once before because they scheduled her for it after she had worked a double. They told her she could take it later so now was the later of which they spoke. She didn't have to do any heavy lifting or anything physical so that wasn't too bad.
      I ended up taking Becca to the doctor. She had the bug we all had and a slight ear infection. She was scared to death that they were going to give her a shot and she would not cough for the doctor at all. She just flat out refused. After the doctor we went to Fazoli's because we were both famished. I had a big plate of spaghetti with meatballs and Becca had a child's plate of the same. We thought we might want a slice of pizza with our spaghetti so we each got us one but ended up not touching it. I was beginning to feel real crappy after eating so I wanted to go home but I had promised Becca some frozen custard, YUM, from Culver's so we went over there and got us a chocolate cone. I couldn't finish mine and Becca got most of her's on her pink bubble jacket. I was having chills so I decided I didn't want to get out of the Explorer so we went to the drive-thru pharmacy at Kroger here in Versailles for Becca's ear infection antibiotic. We waited in line for almost an hour just to drop off the subscription. Eventually we got it dropped off and had to put up with a guy who didn't know his head from his back side. It was going to be about and hours wait for the medicine. I told them we would pick it up in the morning and then we went home. I really don't remember what happened that evening.
      Becca had another bad night. I decided that if I could get some sleep I would try to go into work. I tossed and turned. I was burning up one moment and freezing the next, all the while I my body was so sore I hated even to move. Becca must have felt much the same way. We decided to have another late night with the boob tube. She went to sleep on the sofa again.
      The next morning she seemed to be doing a bit better as was I. I went to bed at six O'clock Thursday evening so I could maybe sleep off whatever it was that had us down. I was able to sleep straight through with the occasional bathroom trip and I went to work Friday morning. When I got there I felt like death had a hold on me. I was sweating like it was the middle of July. People were asking if I was going to be okay I looked so bad. I had a bad cough and I was still sore so every time I coughed my body was racked with pain. We had a brief black-out after I had been there about an hour and it sent us down for about an hour. Once we got started back up I felt much better for some reason. I was able to make it through the day without much trouble.
      We had the biggest snow of the season Friday night. I know, the biggest snow of the season in March; Crazy. When Becca saw it Saturday morning she wanted to go outside so bad she could taste it but she was still sick and it wouldn't have been prudent to let her go out. She didn't like that at all. Mom had to go into work Saturday afternoon to do her double shift. We had had 5 to 8 inches of snow and Mom's only been driving three years and I have been driving for nearly 25 so I decided I would take her to work. Mamaw & Papaw came up and looked after the kids while I took her. I got back home and away they went. Becca, Grant and I had a pretty good day together. Grant had had the bug as well but I don't think he had it as bad as Becca and I did. He had a snotty nose and a little cough but he was able to sleep whereas Becca & I couldn't. I had to get in bed early because I had to go get Mom from work at six O'clock the next morning. The time change happened this past week so we would all be losing an hour anyway. I had Becca go to sleep with me in my bed and she went straight to sleep. She seems to sleep better when she sleeps with either her Mom or I, but not when it's both of us. I know letting her sleep with us is not a good habit to get into but when she's sick I'm not going to deny her. Anyway, when Mom isn't there the easiest way to get her to go to bed and go to sleep is to let her sleep with me and she loves to sleep in our big bed and she is a spoiled little creature so she sleeps with me. At least until Mom gets home and then she gets carried to her bed.
      Becca and I had the best nights sleep we had had in a long time. I know I had slept twelve hours Thursday night but that was with the help of Excedrine PM and sleep with drugs is never as good as natural sleep. Grant woke us up at 4:30 which was actually 3:30 because of the time change. We both got up and fed him and by the time we had him settled back in it was too late to go back to bed. Mamaw & Papaw showed up at about 5:30 to keep an eye on the kids while I went and got Mom. It was really nice of Mamaw & Papaw to make two special trips just so I wouldn't have to drag the kids out in the frigid treacherous weather. I drove to Lexington and got Mom and came straight home. She went straight to bed. I expected Grant to be getting up at any moment plus Becca was still awake so I couldn't go back to sleep. I sat down with this computer as Becca watched some television. I noticed after a few moments that Becca was asleep. I considered going back to bed myself but Grant was going to get up at any moment. I should have went back to bed because Grant slept until 9:30 and Becca slept on the sofa until 10:00. I watched a two hour TNA wrestling show when I could have been sleeping. Becca was catching up on the sleep she had been missing while she was sick and I was glad for her. She woke up a totally different child.
      Mom was awakened by Becca beating on a bowl with two spoons right outside her bedroom door. I really didn't think it would wake Mom up. I don't know why I thought that. It was almost time for her to be up so she got on up and the roads had cleared so much that she was able to drive herself to work. Grant took a nice long nap as Becca drove me crazy. I took Becca and Grant down to Mamaw & Papaw's to spend the night because Mom wouldn't be off work until I had left for work so they had to stay down there. When I got down there the boys called and asked if Becca could come down and see the igloo they had built. I still wasn't real sure about letting Becca play in the snow yet but she wanted to so badly that like the indulgent father I am I gave in. Becca climbed into the igloo and I asked Jacob if he would give Becca a sled ride. Most of the snow had melted but there was still enough for a tiny girl to have a nice ride. Becca was excited to go sled riding because as she said, she'd never sledded before. Jacob took her to the top of a small hill and rode down with her and she absolutely loved it. She was back up to the top of the hill hollering about going again before Jacob had climbed out of the sled. They went down for a couple of more trips and then Jacob put her on an even more gently sloped hill and let her take a ride on her own. Becca absolutely loved it. That would have been the time to have had my camera at the ready. I was so upset that I didn't get her first sleigh ride on film. I shot baskets with Jon as Jacob played with Becca and I remembered why I was the only kid not to make the Mortonsville Elementary Eagles basketball team. I am probably the most dreadful player to ever put up a shot. I took maybe forty shots and hit probably three and I am not exaggerating one lick. I kissed Becca and I left. As I was driving home Mamaw called me. As we were talking Becca started screaming. She had just then realized that I was gone and she wanted to go home with me. I felt terrible for my poor little princess but it also made me feel good that she thought so much of me.
      I got home and showered and shaved. Sat down to jigger some on the budget and then I started this post. I wanted to watch some television but that is absolutely out of the question at this point. I have to get in bed like an hour ago.
      Becca is 98% potty trained at this point and I am so proud of her. Yesterday she was playing with some play money. She asked me who was on the money and I told her they were presidents and that some day she might be president. She asked me if she could be on money. I told her she could and then I started to drift off on a thought path that only a proud parent with big dreams for their kids go. I told her that they would name schools and battle ships after her. U.S.S. Rebecca Lanham, I told her I would be so proud with a dreamy look in my eyes and then she spread her arms and told that she she would also be poopying in the potty.
      Papaw has finished his first week of retirement with many many more to come. I miss riding with Papaw. As I drove home the other day I decided that the thing I would miss most was the times when Keenland ran and we would go home though the country. That was always such a nice drive. I'll miss Papaw up there but Becca and Grant will have a whole lot more time with him now that he doesn't have to go to work every day.
      I know that I hardly mentioned poor Grant at all in this post. It's just that Becca is so much more interactive than he is at this point. When he starts running about and talking about how he will be pottying as president I will no doubt talk about him just as much. He is starting to get the hang of sitting up now though. He's a lot more interested in things around him than Becca ever was. He will pull and tug on stuff and explore everything he can get his hands or preferably, mouth on. He absolutely love my goatee which I haven't trimmed since Christmas. It's getting quite long now and he's always rubbing it and feeling of it. He's been a good baby. As good a baby as Becca ever was and maybe even better as far as disposition.
      I gotta go to bed. Daddy loves Rebecca & Grant!

Dear Becca & Grant,
                  I have a very spoiled three year old. I give in to almost every whim she has, whether it be the new swimming baby doll or the baby alive or the newest batting equipment for the back yard. I made a bad habit of buying her something every time I went to the store when she was younger. I felt guilty about having to leave her every day and I would go to the grocery store or the department store after work and buy her a tiny little trinket, an Easter Bunny straw, a new sippy cup, nothing huge but something to leave on her desk and let her know that I'd been thinking about her that day. Now, every time I go to the grocery she asks me what I brought her. If I didn't get her a special treat she gets upset and stubs up a little and gets a little bit of an attitude. If I tell her I brought her food to eat for the rest of the week, she has a bit of a tis and then she'll eventually calm down when I find a snack bar or some fruit chewies to give her as her 'special' treat. I know all this is my fault and that it was a terrible thing to start, but we never thought we'd ever have another child (as we were told we weren't) and we made sure we doted on her. Now we DO have another child and we can't afford to buy things here and there every single day. or even every single trip to the grocery store. As a matter of fact we have started going to the Dave Ramsey meetings at a local church just so we can get the A-Z's down on how to live on a budget and how to save money, because now we just have to. I know I have drug this out.. I AM getting to the point.. I like to ramble, y'all know ''at. The point is this: My daughter just asked me if she could have another popsicle after dinner. I said yes. She said can I have another treat, too? A playing treat and not an eating treat. I was busy and I mumbled a 'yes' and went back to my task at hand. "How about a Jack In the Box!?" she asked. And then it dawned on me, she had just 'talked' me into a toy. OK, she snowed me into it.... To which I replied: WE ARE NOT MADE OF MONEY! We have to go out and work to get it! We have to go earn some money to buy you and your brother the things you want and need! I want you to understand this! Look at Me! When you go out and get a job and earn your own money, then you can have a Jack in the Box! To which she replies .. with her nose stuck up in the air.. "I'm gonna go earn some money in the kitchen."

Dear Becca & Grant,
                  Happy Leap Day! Today was Papaw's very last day of work after 41 years of hard labor. He retired today. I'll certainly miss him at work every day and I'll miss being chauffeured to work and back every day by him. I asked him if he was going to still drive me to work every day and come back to pick me up. For some reason he said that he wouldn't be doing that. That means I'll have to be putting gasoline, which is at an all time high of $3.19 per gallon now, in our own vehicles. Papaw has been in a great mood all week this past week. Sunday afternoon Becca was apparently playing with my alarm clock and ended up changing the time on it so I over slept Monday morning. Dad had to come into the bedroom to wake me up. Normally that would earn me a royal tail chewing but all he did was comment on what a good night's sleep I must have had. Dad must have been riding high all week long. Thursday we stopped at McDonald's and had breakfast in the dining room. We have never done that. It was rather nice and I enjoyed it. Mamaw figured up that over the course of his eleven years working at Irvin Industries and thirty at General Electric she had made him 10,656 lunches. That's a whole lot of lunches. Papaw was a sewing machine mechanic at Irvin where they made parachutes and seat belts. I was just a wee lad when he worked there. The earliest I can retire is in fifteen years. I have to be 55 years old with 25 years of service. I will have 36 years of service if General Electric is still there when I am 55, which I highly doubt. I know Becca and Grant are really going to enjoy Papaw in his retirement.
      I know it's been way too long since my last post. Y'all know all of my excuses for not posting more regularly so I will not go into them again nor will I make any empty promises to do better because I probably won't. Mom hasn't posted since January. She really needs to post something. Her weekend job has been wearing her down. It's hard on her working 32 hours in a 48 hour time period. She's arranged to go on second shift starting the 16th of this month so maybe she'll be a little more pleasant to all of us. Of course that means that Becca is going to have to learn some hard lessons regarding going to bed on time and staying in bed. She's been having lots and lots of problems with that for quite some time now. We have even started bribing her into staying in bed by putting on a DVD for her when she lies down. I know it's an extremely bad habit to get into but when your nerves are frazzled to their whit's end you will resort to whatever works. She will be making a little more money because she will be working more total hours but of course that extra money will all be eaten up in gasoline. At least we will all have a few weekends together per month. Becca and Grant will hopefully be staying with Mamaw & Papaw from the time Mom drops them off at around 1:00 until I get there at 4:00. Of course with summer just around the corner and the super hot job I have now at work I will be more than happy to drive down there to pick the kids up because I can take a dip in the pool while I am down there and we'll all probably be fed a good supper on occasion. I can't wait for the pool to open. Grant will be old enough to enjoy the pool by the time it opens. We do have to get him an age appropriate float though.
      Becca is so smart. One day a few weeks ago she asked us as we were driving back from Mamaw & Papaw's if we knew what happened when someone killed you. THis shocked and disturbed us to no end. How did she know about someone killing someone else? We asked her what she thought happens when someone kills you and she answered back as slick as you please that when someone kills you you die and go to Jesus. Then she started talking about how Granny was a baby angel in heaven and when she got to heaven she would be a baby angel too and how if they didn't have baby angel milk they would have to go to Kroger and buy her some. Becca is such a cute and smart girl.
      Grant's getting bigger everyday. He is such a good baby; Always smiling and happy. Last week he wasn't his normal super grinning self but he wasn't fussy. He just wasn't smiling as much. We took him to the pediatrician and it turned out that he had an ear infection in both ears. I had ear infections when I was a child and I know that they are one of the most miserable and painful experiences of childhood and he never even fussed at all.
      He's six months old now but he's wearing twelve month clothes. He can wear nine month clothes but they are way too tight on him. We ended up tossing all of the smaller stuff in the closet in anticipation of the super baby themed yard sale we plan on having this summer. I think all of the proceeds should go to their college fund because it will be their stuff that we will be selling.
      The yard sale is a Dave Ramsey Financial Peace thing from the classes we have been taking. We have been to three classes now and both Mom and I are very excited. We have a budget drawn up and I was surprised at the amount of money we had to allocate. We just never watched or planned where our money went before so it went wherever. We have lots of disposable income in the budget we have drawn up and still have some to save and some to put back for purchases down the road. Dave Ramsey says that the budget will not work in the first month and it won't do much better the second but we'll start figuring it out by the third month and then we are on our way. We're not doing it exactly how Dave Ramsey says do it because we want to pay what we owe Mamaw & Papaw before we work on our baby emergency fund of $1,000. We'll pay them off and then do our baby emergency fund. Finish paying off our debts which were primarily taken care of with our tax return we got last week. Then we have to save three to six months of living expenses to have a grown up Emergency fund. I think we are going to do $10,000 to 12,000 for an emergency fund. Then it's time to fund retirement, fund college, pay off the house and then build wealth. Both Mom and I are excited about being good stewards of our money. We have never been great in that area.
      It's time I get a drink of cool refreshing water and go to bed. Can you tell I am thirsty? Daddy loves Rebecca & Grant!

Dear Becca & Grant,
                  It snowed this past week. Becca wanted to go outside and make Frosty and a snow angel. The snow angel really didn't turn out all that well because we also had lots of freezing rain and the snow was more or less frozen and she couldn't make an impression with her little body. We did build a tiny snowman though that turned out relatively okay. I would have liked to have made a bigger one but as with the angel the snow was frozen and you really couldn't work with it. Becca and I did have some fun outside in the cold though. Becca was excited to see the snow Tuesday morning. She said she could believe her eyes. I would have loved to see the look on her face when she saw all that snow but I was at work. Schools been out all week. I think that they might have school tomorrow because the roads seem to be okay now. Tomorrow is Valentine's Day and Becca has a little party at her preschool.
      Papaw has twelve more days before he retires from General Electric with thirty years of service. He's excited to have Grantman ride the mower with him this summer and Becca is excited to get back in the pool this summer. Maybe Becca & Grantman can hang out at the pool more this summer now that Papaw will be home. I hope Grantman will enjoy the water as much as Becca does.
      Tonight Papaw took Becca and Grantman home with him. Mom & I went out to Mi Publito's or as Becca calls it, Mi Pupito's for Valentines. We would like to actually do something on Valentines but we had an opportunity and we took it. We then went to Versailles Baptist Church where we began a financial management course called Financial Peace University. It's a program they have in churches all over the country by a radio talk show host called Dave Ramsey. We had to pay sixty-five dollars for the materials but we got a bunch of stuff in the box. We got his best selling book, a class work book, the classes on CD, a CD-Rom of extra tools, his envelope system in a nice binder and some other odds and ends. Both Mom and I are excited about getting started on our way to financial freedom. Dave Ramsey's motto is "Live like no one else so later you can live like no one else", which means being very frugal so that later on in life you will have the money to have the kind of lifestyle that you want to have. We'd like for both Becca and Grant to be able to go to college and not have a huge student loan hanging over their heads. Mom wasn't really into it until we got there and now she's more gung-ho than I am.
      I'm totally recovered from my kidney stone now. I don't ever wish a kidney stone on anyone. They are probably the most painful things that can happen to a man. They tell me that kidney stones are comparable to labor pains that a woman might experience. I'm glad I'm not a woman.
      Becca spent Sunday evening and Monday with Mamaw. Becca was supposed to go to school Monday but Mamaw hurt her foot by ramming it into Grantman's bouncer so Becca and Grant just hung out with Mamaw all day Monday. Mom had the second shift Sunday and the third shift Monday so she didn't get home until after 8:00 in the morning on Monday. I had to be at work by 6:45 Monday morning so that's why they stayed with Mamaw. I think that's how we are going to do it when Mom has that schedule from now on. It's a good plan.
      Saturday I took Becca and Grant to McDonalds while Mom was at work. We actually left the house before she did. We went to the McDonalds with the nice play place in front of the Wal-Mart of Nicholasville Road. We got there at 12:30 and we ordered our food. I ate while Becca began to play. She played from 12:30 until 6:00. She only stopped occasionally to have a bite of nuggets or a sip of her orange drink. She also peed in the potty three times and pooped once. I was so proud of her. Grant was so good while we were there. He just laid in his stroller and looked around. I fed him two bottles and played with him awhile. He didn't cry at all the whole time we were there. He's as good a baby as Becca ever was and maybe even a little better. Becca was a fabulous baby and I was afraid he would be just the opposite but that's proven to not be the case. Even now while he has some little bug he is content. He doesn't smile nearly as much when he is sick but he doesn't fuss either. I am so proud of him.
      After McDonalds we went over to Wal-Mart and I spent about $82 that I probably shouldn't have. I had planned on taking Becca to get a frozen custard at Culver's and then to Toys "R" Us to look at all of the toys but she stayed at the Play Place too long so we didn't do that. We did stop at Fazoli's on our way home and got us some spaghetti to go. Becca was watching Bambi on her portable DVD player on the way home and I realized that I had never seen that movie so when we got home I took the DVD inside and ate my pasta and fed Grant and then I watched Bambi with Becca. I can't believe I've never seen Bambi. I just assumed that I had because it has characters I have always known. It reminded me a lot of another newer Disney movie called The Lion King. I enjoyed watching it with her, actually Becca was running all about being hyper like she does when she gets tired. I tried to watch the film in spite of her because I was into it. It was a good movie.
      Well, Grant is awake and I have to tend to him and then go to bed because I have to work tomorrow. Daddy loves Rebecca & Grant!

Dear Becca & Grant,
            I mentioned in my last post that I had developed a kidney stone. I had a kidney stone years ago but I passed it while I was at the emergency room so while it hurt like the devil for a short bit it was over relatively quickly. I kind of assumed this would be the same way; it wasn't. I didn't mention it before but early Tuesday morning your Mom drove me to the emergency room at St. Joseph's on Harrodsburg Road. They pumped me full of morphine and phenergin; morphine for my rather considerable pain and phenergin for nausea. Mamaw came to the house and sat with Becca and Grant. I was in rare pain. I woke poor Grantman up with my moaning and crying and when I say moaning and crying I am not exaggerating at all; I was actually moaning and crying. They gave me a prescription for a few percocets and some more phenergin which we filled at Walgreen's before we headed home.
      Mom made an appointment for me to see a doctor the next day. While I was waiting for my appointment I took a percocet without eating, I had absolutely no appetite the last few days, or taking my phenergin. Mom told me I would get nauseas but I didn't think it would happen to me so I didn't listen. I ended up running to the toilet and throwing up what little I had eaten. We to the doctor's office where Mom and the doctor wanted to admit me to the hospital. I wanted to wait a day to see if I would just go on and pass it. We made an appointment for the next morning. That night I took the doctor's advice about taking my pain meds at regular intervals to stay ahead of the pain instead of taking the pain meds just when I was in pain. I was pain free most of Tuesday night and Wednesday morning. I eventually dozed off and went past the time I was supposed to take my medicine and I ended up waking up in pain. I couldn't get this pain under control.
      We went to my Wednesday morning appointment and agreed to being admitted to the hospital. They filled me full of Morphine and phenergin and I felt pretty good. Becca and Grant were staying with Mamaw & Papaw while Mom sat with me at the hospital. I asked your Mom to watch some episodes of Dr. Who with me that I had downloaded onto the laptop. She rather enjoyed the show. I was kind of surprised that she did but I was pleased at the same time. We tried to watch the film 300 about the Spartans in the Battle of Thermopylae in ancient Greece. It was done in an action packed mythological style so it wasn't a dry old historical piece at all. Actually, I enjoy the occasional dry old historical piece but Mom doesn't so much. It was a real good movie but I had been so sleep deprived that I couldn't really follow the story. I tried to sleep while Mom finished the movie by herself. She tried to lay down on a sleeper chair there at the hospital but decided that her back couldn't handle it so she went home with my blessings. I woke up in pain but it wasn't time for my pain meds. I was miserable. Eventually it became time and I got a little relief. Just a little and I was able to sleep for about an hour or so. This went on all night. Eventually it became seven in the morning and I had a some pain medication. I asked if I could get a shower. They directed me to a room down the hall with a shower in it. I had a nice shower and walked back to my room. They served me a breakfast of a piece of toast, a scrambled egg, a sausage patty, a bowl of Cocoa Pebbles, a half pint of milk, a cup of grape juice and a cup of coffee. I ate it all. It was the first time I had had any kind of appetite at all. While my side still hurt I was feeling much better. They must have noticed because they told me they were going to be releasing me around noon. I figured out that I wasn't in there to get my kidney stone treated but to have my pain managed. I was all for that. I really needed the super powerful drugs they were able to give me in the hospital. After I was released and was waiting on Mom to come and get me I passed most of the stone. For some weird reason that made me kind of proud. It was about the size of a BB pellet, brown and hard. It was an ugly little thing. I'm surprised it didn't hurt when I passed it. I could still feel there was more there but most of it was gone and the doctor told me that I would pass the rest a little at a time.
      I got home and went straight to bed. Mamaw still had Grant so Mom took Becca out for a mommy-daughter day. Becca got the cutest little haircut at JC Penney and then Mom bought Becca some new tennis shoes and a pretzel in the mall. Becca saw some hermit crabs for sale at a kiosk there at the mall and because she had pooped in the potty earlier Mom got her one. It's an ugly little cuss in a blue painted shell with a pirate on it. Becca seems to be tickled with her crab that she named Mr.Crabs Crabby Patty.
      Last night I was still in some pain, not near as much as before but still enough to keep me awake so I ended up working on the hard copy of the blog. I still haven't gone to bed so I had better do that now. Daddy loves Rebecca & Grant!

Dear Becca & Grant,
                  I never did tell y'all what you got for Christmas this past year. I really haven't gotten to post on this blog at all much this year. I have been feeling under the weather. I had a real bad cold that took me two and a half weeks to get rid of, I had a sinus infection that developed because of the cold, I had a terrible toothache on my top left rear molar and when they went to pull it he loosened up one of my wisdom teeth so he took that one too, and now I have a kidney stone. I have missed tons and tons of work this year. I bet I've used up half my time off already and we're not even out of January yet. Your Mom's been feeling kinda yucky as well, as she mentioned in her last post.
      This past Friday Mom & I decided to take a trip out to Nicholasville so we could eat and go to Wal-Mart. Becca and Grant were with Mamaw for some reason or another and she agreed to keep them until we got back from our married people date. We went to Golden Corral, which I am liking less and less every time I go. We paid $25 for the two of us and probably didn't eat enough to justify half that price. We went to Wal-Mart next. We split up in Wal-Mart. I went and bought a DVD case for the Christmas DVD project I am planning. I downloaded from the internet and from TiVo tons of Christmas shows and I intend on burning them all to DVD before next Christmas. It's gonna be a big job but I know it will be fun. It'll probably take all year because with the kids I just don't have time for projects like I used to. I also got a Valentines shirt for you that matches a pair of Valentine pants you have. I didn't even know you had the pants when I picked out the shirt. I also got some de-icer for the car, some windshield washer fluid, a copy of my favorite magazine, Smart Computing, some rechargeable lithium AA batteries and maybe one or two other odds and ends. Your Mom went grocery shopping. Then we headed for Versailles.
      We decided to drop Mom off and unload our stuff so she could be putting it away while I went down to get the kids. When I got there Becca was ready to go and Grant really didn't care. Grant did get awful excited to see me when I came through the door though. I thought that was real sweet. I talked Becca into staying the night with Mamaw & Papaw. I brought Grant home and he was sound asleep so we just let him sleep. Mom & I finally got a chance to watch a movie; something we haven't done since we watched Night at the Museum when Mom was in the hospital recovering from her C-section with Grant. We watched Blades of Glory with Will Ferrel. It was about two figure skater guys who hate each other but end up teaming together in pair figure skating. It was real funny. It was nice to relax and watch a movie with Mom.
      The next day Mom had to go into work at 2:30 Saturday afternoon and work until 6:00 Sunday morning. Grant woke me up and I fed him and since I didn't have Becca to get in the way I finally got around to taking down the Christmas tree. It's been up way too long but for the same reason we haven't been posting is the reason the tree was still up. Mom woke up in time to go to work and she was so excited to see that the tree was down. I was glad to get it down myself. Even Becca was getting tired of it. I love Christmas trees at Christmas but not towards the end of January. I took down the outside lights long ago because people can see the outside of your house and it would have been embarrassing to still have that stuff up much past the new year. I cleaned up the living room and vacuumed up the artificial needles and then I sat down to watch some television before Becca got home. I started out with my new favorite show, Dr. Who from Great Britain. It's a sci-fi show that's been on the air since 1963. There was a ten year gap in there somewhere but they brought the show back and I love it. I had about fourteen of the shows TiVoed. I watched and watched and waited for Becca but Becca decided she wanted to stay one more night which was fine by me. I got to have a weekend in which I didn't have to watch Blue's Clues, Pinky Dinky Doo, or any other of Becca's favorite kid's shows. Those shows are driving me crazy. I probably could have posted to the blog then but I didn't even have the computer open. I did open it a time or two to get some background on the episode of Dr. Who I was watching. Anyway, I put Grant down who had been as good as gold all day long. He just sat in my lap while we played together as I watched Dr. Who.
      The next day was pretty much exactly like the day before. I got all of the Dr. Who episodes watched. Becca eventually came home around 5:00 Sunday afternoon. She got a shower/bath and we watched a few of her shows. While I didn't miss her shows I did miss her. I tried to put her to bed but she has been saying she's afraid of the dark but what I really believe it is is that she just doesn't want to go to bed. I laid down in her bed with her for five or ten minutes and when I thought she was asleep I got up to leave but she sat up and started whining again. I asked her if she wanted to sleep in Mom & Dad's big bed and she said she did. I laid down with her in my bed and we both went right to sleep. I had to wake up and feed Grant at around 10:30 that night. I knew I would though because I couldn't get him to take any of his nightly bottle. I fed him, put him back to bed and sat up awhile longer and then I went back to bed myself. I woke up for work and Mamaw came over to watch Becca & Grant until Mom got home from work.
      Monday night your Mom was still beat down by her two double shifts so I took Becca & Grant and we let Mom sleep while we went to get some fish at Long John Silvers. We ate it all up and Mom & I watched an episode of Criminal Minds, a show about FBI profilers. I couldn't believe we got all the way through it. It took us about two hours to watch the one hour show but still we got it watched which is saying something. We finished up at around 8:00 that night. I was tired so I took a shower and went to bed and straight to sleep. Then I woke up at around 3:00 Tuesday morning with the unmistakable pain of a kidney stone. I was making so much racket crying and moaning that I woke up Grant. Mamaw came and Mom took me to the emergency room at Saint Joseph's on Harrodsburg Road. I was given some morphine and something for nausea and sent home. I must have been in some absolutely serious pain because the morphine only took the edge off of the pain. It didn't do away with it like I wanted. I am still in bad pain as I sit here typing out this post. They gave me a prescription for some percocets and some nausea medication. I took a pain pill earlier today but didn't take a nausea pill because I wasn't nauseous. The pain subsided but all of a sudden I had to make a quick run for the toilet because the pain pill made me throw up. Mom made me an appointment to see a doctor later. I went and everybody wanted to put me in the hospital. I told them I wanted to wait another day to see if I can pass the stone on my own. Sounds like a nice weekend and a pretty crappy week so far.
      I was going to tell what the kids got for Christmas from everybody. Christmas Eve down at Mamaw & Papaw's Becca got a Baby Alive from Mamaw & Papaw. That was what she wanted most in the world. Even when she sat on Santa's knee all she told him was a Baby Alive. She absolutely loved it and I loved watching her reaction to it; pure Christmas joy. She also got a big towel with a pig's head, she got a T-shirt that said "Friends are forever. Boys are Whatever", a pair of jeans, a pretty long sleeved shirt, a pair of khaki slacks, I got her a Barbi Laptop computer learning toy, Mom got her a light up bear with a magic wand to make the light change colors, and extra food for her Baby Alive. Grant got clothes.
      Then it was time to go home so we could get in bed and wait for Santa. Becca woke up first and sneaked into the living room. She came running into our bedroom hollering about how Santa has been to our house and left her candy bracelets. I was in Christmas heaven when she did that. She was so excited. This is the first year that she's really been aware enough to kind of know what's going on. We got up and we all went into the living room. We woke Grant up because we wanted him to share in this Christmas magic even though he probably would have rather kept on sleeping. The milk and cookies were gone and the carrot sticks had been eaten. Becca got a big art desk with crayons, glue, water color paints, finger paints, Play-dough, markers, and a new pair of scissors. All of that was sitting out already set up and everything with Disney Princess band aids and the candy bracelets she mentioned sitting on the art desk. I just don't know how Santa has time to do it all. She also got more diapers for her Baby Alive, a Diego View Master that she at first thought was a Diego helicopter, a huge stuffed giraffe that stood up on his own, a zebra talking flashlight, a Disney Princess Enchanted Tales DVD, a set of play tools so she could, as she said, fix anything that's broken, a plastic flute, a Barbi car with two Barbi dolls, a bag of little plastic dinosaurs, a pink and white pull along puppy, toddler roller blades, a Play-dough toy, a Fisher-Price digital Camera with case, a Chutes and Ladders board game, a barrel of monkeys, a Candy Land board game, a Hungry Hungry Hippo game, some new anticavity mouth swish, a new tea set, a shopping basket full of plastic food, big girl underwear ("Santa's giving me underwear?"), a big sister and big sister furniture for her My First doll house that she got for Christmas last year, a huge tub of sidewalk chalk, a boy baby doll with a bunch of accessories, a baby doll car seat, a baby doll tub with bathing accessories, play make-up set, a Strawberry Shortcake doll, a pink doctor kit, a new Barbi electric tooth brush with Barbi tooth paste, Life Saver book, tons of candy, an apple, an orange and extra ViewMaster cards. Later when I was taking down the outdoor Christmas lights I found a brand new hulahoop on the roof that Santa must have dropped and the other day as I was taking down the tree I found a brand new twirling baton that Santa must have hidden in the Christmas Tree. All in all I think Becca made out pretty good this Christmas.
      Grant didn't do as well but of course Grant's too young to care just yet. From Santa he got different sized rings on a post,a key ring, shaped Blocks with a bucket, an animal train, a hippo walker like Becca had when she was a baby and a dinosaur shaped toy where you drop balls into different holes and they come out on bottom. He made out pretty good too to be only five months old.
      Everything Becca opened was what she had always wanted and Grant just enjoyed watching Becca having a ball opening her gifts. Christmas is getting more fun by the year. I can't wait until next year. Only 330 Days, 2 Hours and 10 Minutes left until Christmas comes again. I'm also excited about 2009 because as I was doing research into all of the different versions of Dicken's Christmas Carol I could download and burn I run up on a new version slated for 2009. It's going to star Jim Carrey as old Ebenezor Scrooge and the three Christmas ghosts. It's going to be animated in the same way that The Polar Express was done. I am all a twitter over this new version.
      Becca's still having trouble with her potty training. I don't know what it could be. I know she knows how to use the potty she just doesn't. When she poops in her pull-up she'll just say that's okay, it was just an accident. That's what we told her at first because we didn't want to make her feel bad about pooping in her pull-up but it's getting to be where it's not okay. She's three and a half and she needs to start getting trained.
      Well, I'm sure there's tons of stuff I would like to talk about but it's really been a month since I have published a decent post and I tend to forget things so all of the great little pieces of trivia dealing with Becca and Grant's childhood are now gone forever. I'm gonna close out this post. Daddy loves Rebecca & Grant!

Dear Becca and Grant,
   Hello kiddos. Mommy here. Mommy really hasn't been feeling so grand for the last few days. I want to say I am sorry because I really don't think I have been the Mother to you all that I need to be. I just haven't felt well and I went to the ER Thursday night because I was having some bad chest pains and they told me they thought it was Chostochronditis and that is inflammation of the chest wall. They gave me a bunch of medicine, kept an eye on me for a while, and sent me home. Daddy had to drag you kids out of bed to come and get me because I couldn't drive home.
I have been really tired lately and I don't know what's causing it. I do a lot I know but it has just been a constant thing and I am sorry to say that I haven't spent as much time as I should with either of you. Especially you, Becca. I promise we are going to have a Mommy/Daughter day out very, very soon. I love you so very much and you deserve it. You are my best friend; I want you to know that.
Not much else going on, I have to work all weekend and then I have orientation on Monday so I probably won't see you very much, Becca, since you will be spending the night with Mamaw tonight and I will be asleep or gone when you get home tomorrow. I am glad you finally got to stay all night with Mamaw because you haven't been wanting to and I think it was giving her a complex.
Grant you are such a happy baby. You are the light of our lives; me, Daddy, and Becca. We all three love you beyond the sun, moon, and stars. We are very happy to have you in our family. Things went badly for us between you and Becca but I am so glad to have you that it just seems like that doesn't matter that much anymore. I love you beyond words and your smile and laughter brings so much joy into my life that it melts the day's troubles away when I hold you.
Becca, you are the sweetest, meanest, most darling, most hateful girl I know. Ha, Ha. I know you are just being three and I am fine with that. You are getting your own opinions and ideas and I am proud of you. Just sometimes you need to know that Mommy's opinions and ideas are the right ones, and not yours. You are as stubborn and bull headed as I am sometimes. You got that honest. You are, however, one of the funniest kids I know. The other day we were at the chicken place buying chicken for supper and I asked the woman how she was doing and you said "Mooooooooooom, she can't under stand you, MOM, she speaks Spanish! That's why she's deaf!:
I thought I was going to have to pull over on the way home from laughing so hard. You are hilarious and you have a great sense of humor. You've also got that honest. I love you dearly, I hope you know.
Well, it's been a while since I posted and I wanted to tell you things from my angle. You put lipstick on Grantman today, Becca. Pretty purple lipstick. At first you told me you didn't, but when I told you you weren't in trouble, you admitted to doing so - just a little bit, you said. That boy has got it in for him. Well, that's all I have to say for now. Mommy loves Rebecca and Grant!

Dear Becca & Grant,
                  I would love to say Happy New Year but it feels kind of ridiculous to be saying that so late in the month. It's been a pretty hectic month for all of us. I'm just now getting to where I feel okay. I got a cold around New Years Eve and it turned into a sinus infection. I missed three days of work because of that. Then I got better and then I got worse again and missed another day. Through this whole time I had a tooth that was bothering me. Once I got over my cold/sinus infection the tooth really started hurting. I made an appointment after work last week to have it looked at by a dentist who had an office across the hall from Becca's dentist in Nicholasville. I have had teeth pulled before and while it wasn't ever any fun at least it wasn't extremely painful so I didn't anticipate any great uncomfort. I had the bad tooth pulled; it was a back molar and the dentist said that the wisdom tooth right next to it was going to give me problems shortly and he wanted to know if he could take it out now. I was numbed up pretty good so I said sure go ahead. So he pulled a back molar and a wisdom tooth. I walked out of there feeling okay. My mouth was incredibly numb. I had a prescription for some pain killers so I thought it would all be good. The numbness began to wear off and the pain like no other pain I have ever experienced in my mouth began to set it. It was so bad that I took four lortabs and two ambians and still I was in extreme pain and couldn't sleep. I couldn't be around Becca, Grant or Mom because I didn't want anyone talking tome because it seemed that that made the pain worse. I went into the bedroom but just setting in the bedroom all alone I was concentrating to heavily on how much pain I was in so I decided to trim my own hair. You have to understand that I had taken a huge dose of narcotics. I started clipping and trimming away and then Mom came in and a look of horror came over her face. Apparently I had butchered my hair worse than Becca had done some months back. So as it came about I had to sit on the toilet while Mom tried to fix my mess while Becca hovered all about. I was miserable. This all happened Thursday night. I missed work Friday and here we are Monday morning. I don't have to go to work today because of Martin Luther King Day. My teeth still are not feeling great but I can live with the pain and it's nice to be able to have a cold drink without cringing from the pain.
      Grant has started rolling over. He's getting a lot more interactive. He gets so excited to see us. He will kick and wiggle and smile like he is the happiest baby alive.
      Sorry this is so short but Mom has to work tomorrow and i have to get up with Becca and Grant. I will try to post another one real soon. Daddy loves Rebecca & Grant!

Dear Becca and Grant,
   Well, Christmas is over and things are still a bit of a mess but a joyous mess nonetheless. I had a grand time with Becca and Grant this holiday season. I think my favorite thing to do with Becca this year was take her to Southern Lights with her friends Brady and Bryson. Of course, I loved hearing Becca spout that Santa Claus had been to our house and that he had brought her a candy bracelet. She wasn't at all worried about the one thousand presents that were in here under the tree. My favorite, favorite thing with Grant was just watching his eyes light up at all the lights and paper and the many, many activities that were going on.
     After all the presents were opened on Christmas morning, Daddy and Grant took a nap and Becca and I opened up all of her new toys. Becca got a doctor's kit that she is particularly fond of; she opened it up began to play with it. I told her that I had a sore throat, and she told me that was why she was there, to help. She opened up the case and checked me out. She took a paper out of the case and told me she had to check her schedule. She really is a funny little girl.
Last night Becca did not want to go to sleep so I decided that we'd have a slumber party. We popped popcorn and had sodas and watched Bambi on her small DVD player. When the hunters were about to shoot Bambi's mother, Becca slapped her little hands over here eyes and fell back in the bed and said "Oh, NO! I don't want this to happen!" Becca is so silly. She told me that it was OK because Bambi's Mama was an angel in heaven with Granny. She told me Granny was a baby angel in heaven but she used to be a big human at her house. Becca makes me laugh on a constant basis.
      Grantman had a doctors appointment on the 21st and he wound up with a double ear infection. He never fussed a moment with it. The doctor said he was the kind of baby that the coyote would literally have to be eating him for him to cry. Grantman is a good baby; he really is. He is just as good as Becca was, except he is a little more spoiled. We got really lucky.
      We had a small hazard trip where Aunt Mary got yall both a bunch of junk that is mostly still in the back of the truck. I'll get it out eventually. Right now the house is still loaded down with five thousand other things from Christmas. We'll find a place for it all eventually.
   Speaking of finding a place for it all, Daddy made a new rule. From now on you, Becca, will get ten warnings to pick up your stuff or it will get thrown away (or if it is very expensive put up for a very long time) - but as far as you know it will be thrown away.
   Well Daddy has woken up and I am going to go see what he is trying to hunt for a snack. Mommy loves Rebecca and Grant!

Dear Becca & Grant,
                  Happy Boxing Day! Boxing Day is just not as much fun as Christmas Day; not by a long shot. I stayed up all night last night working on video from yesterday. I woke up really late and ate some pizza that Mom ordered from Pizza Hut. I uploaded some videos to YouTube this afternoon. Becca has been playing with all of her toys she got for Christmas and having a fun time. There was one time though when she came up to me with a sad little look on her face and told me that she wished it was still Christmas. I told her that I feel the same way every year. I'm already looking forward to Christmas 2008.
      Well, I took an Ambien just awhile ago and I need to get into bed. We all had a real nice Christmas. Daddy loves Rebecca & Grant!

Dear Becca & Grant,
                     Merry Christmas to one & all. It's very late in the day and all of the celebrations have concluded. Mom went to bed a long time ago, Grant followed her after a bottle and Becca got in bed after watching the Spongebob Squarepants Christmas Special for the very last time of 2007. She actually watched in twice and Elmo's Christmas Countdown Special once before bed. She was such a tired little girl. She had such a huge day today.
      The festivities began Christmas Eve when we all went to where Mom works, the Cardinal Hill Rehabilitation Unit at Samaritan Hospital so Becca could hand out candy canes. After she handed out candy canes and everyone made a huge fuss over our kids we decided to get us a peppermint blizzard from Dairy Queen and then we went home.
      Mom napped for awhile and then it was time to head on down to Mamaw & Papaw's house. We got there and had a delicious Christmas Eve dinner. We had ham, green beans, carrots, salad, sweet potato casserole, corn pudding, hashbrown casserole, cucumbers, a cinnamon Jell-O dish, bread, tea and probably some other things. It was very delicious. We then went downstairs to open gifts. We went cheap this year and I'm afraid the boys Jacob & Jon were disappointed and I feel like crap over that. I got jeans, slacks, and shirts while Mom got pots and pans. Grant got clothes and a can of Nestle Good Start. He isn't old enough to care so it wasn't important to impress him this Christmas. Becca got some nice clothes from the Hoard family individually and as a whole; she got a Barbie laptop from me, her Dad, a light up wishing bear with a magic wand to change the light up colors on the bear from her Mom, she got the book The Kissing Hand from Auntie Lynn and Uncle Rodney, and from Mamaw & Papaw she got the most beloved toy of this 2007 holiday season, Baby Alive. She's wanted tons and tons of stuff throughout the holiday season but the one constant has been Baby Alive. I think that the Christmas she had Christmas Eve would have probably been enough for just about any child. She made out like a very cute and tiny bandit. The kids were tired so it wasn't any problem getting them off to bed.

On Christmas Morning, Mama with her pillow and I in my briefs,
Were attempting to get some quick winters sleep
When what to our wondering eyes should appear
But a little blonde girl with eyes full of cheer.

She bounced round the bed from the head to the foot
Proclaiming the discovery of fresh chimney soot
Mama & Daddy! She called us by name
Look at my candy bracelet!
Santa Claus came!

Come on Mom and Come on Dad!
There's presents to opened
And breakfast to be had

She shredded the paper
Like a high tech machine
Not worried about tape
Not worried about seams

With each new discovery
We'd hear her say
It's just what I wanted
On this Christmas Day!
Except for the dinosaurs
Which weren't a big hit
And maybe the underwear
She thought they were *beep*!

But she tossed them aside
And she went back again
Shredding and tearing
And wearing a grin

And when it was over
We asked if she would
Tell us or not
If Christmas was good

Best EVER! She said
Even though she
Is little and tiny and
Has had only three.

And I heard her exclaim
As she fell asleep tonight
That Santa Claus
Really did Christmas up right.

By Kristie and Danny Lanham with inspiration provided by Becca Lanham
December 25, 2007

      Mom helped me with that little poem. Actually I started it and Mom scrapped what I had and started over more or less from scratch. Everything about that poem is the gospel truth. Becca woke us up this morning so excited. She snuck down the hall and grabbed her candy bracelets and headed back down the hall to her Mom & Dad's room and she was so excited. Her little voice hollering about Santa was a dream come true for the both of us.
      Becca got so much from Santa that I can't remember it all. I'm gonna try to list them all. Mom is sitting in here feeding Grant so maybe she can help me. From Santa Becca got a Diego View Master, additional cartridges for the View Master, Strawberry Shortcake Baby, her boy baby doll, art desk, Barbi car with two Barbies, many baby doll accessories, play make-up, hair stuff, art supplies, zebra flashlight, doctor kit, tool set, Candy Land game, Chutes and Ladders game, Hungry Hungry Hippo game, a Barrel of Monkeys, Play-do, dinosaurs, underwear, a big stuffed giraffe, a flute, Enchanted Tales Disney Princesses DVD, a real working kid's digital camera, camera case, play food, a tea set, a little pull along pink dog, lots of candy and stuff I have seen around here today but right now I can't remember what all it was. She had a huge Christmas.
      Grant didn't do quite as well. He's just a baby and doesn't want anything in particular and wanting stuff is just about all Becca did this holiday season. He got some shaped blocks with a bucket, rings on a pedestal, a toy key ring, a teething ring, a hippo riding/push toy, a big dinosaur ball thing and an animal train. Maybe he got more too but as with Becca I don't remember.
      After opening up all the presents I took a nap. I was awoken to have a brunch of french toast. Mom took a nap then. When she woke up it was time to head on over to Granny's old house where Auntie Linda is living and have a small family gathering. This is our first Christmas without Granny and it's been hard on all of us. On Christmas Eve while we were all down at Mamaw & Papaw's house Becca was asked what she's going to name her Baby Alive. She told us that her Baby Alive was named Annetta. Granny's name was Annetta. This came out of the blue with no prompting from anyone at all. Becca misses Granny just as much as any of us do. It almost brought a tear to Mamaw's eye. Anyway, all of the brothers and sisters were there with the exception of Donny. He said he just couldn't handle it. It was just snacking type foods there. It was really good though. There was ham, delicious meatballs, cheese balls, yummy spinach dip, crackers, a veggie plate, crackers and assorted desserts. I more than got my fill of good eats Christmas night.
      We came home and I got everyone to bed and here I sit. Mom woke up and she's on the phone with a friend. I enjoy tapping away on the computer while I am by myself for some reason. Mom isn't bothering me but that's the way I have always been. Now I know. I have been up and down ever since she got up. It takes me so long to write a blog that when I start I really like to keep going until I am finished. I become engrossed in activities that I enjoy. It enhances the pleasure for me. I think that that is a good trait. Total concentration is a good thing. Mom hates it because I don't hear her every time she mentions my name. It's hard to concentrate when I have to get up a dozen times an hour.
      This Christmas was so much better than last Christmas. While the holiday magic was there we had been told a few days before that we had just lost our baby. We had lost one earlier in the summer and it was crazy against the odds that we would ever be able to get pregnant again. We were blown away when we found out that we had become pregnant so soon after we had lost the other one. We were both mourning the loss of our second pregnancy of the year. Of course that pregnancy that we thought we had lost resulted in Grantman who is crying himself to sleep in his room as we speak. Mom doesn't like him to cry himself to sleep but I feel that he needs to do that every now and then or he will never be able to his self to sleep on his own.
      This has been a very joyous holiday season. Becca just this year has really clasped onto the whole Santa thing and she loves it as much as I do. Mom said that she has never been much of a Christmas fan and I can see where she's coming from with the childhood she had to endure. She said that she's enjoying Christmas more and more every year as her kids get old enough to appreciate the holiday as much as I did as a child.
      Christmas is nearly over. I always hate this time most of all. The minute after Christmas I put away all things Christmasy. The tree will be down in the next two or three days as will all of the outside lights and the other Christmas decorations dotting our abode. The music will come out of the stereo and the television shows will be deleted from the TiVo. The only thing about the days after Christmas that I enjoy will be editing our Christmas videos and this year I have been working on a project that I am kind of excited about. I have a series 2 TiVo which means that I can burn television shows I record on my TiVo onto a DVD. I have been TiVoing tons of traditional holiday shows that I would like to be able to look at every year as well as downloading rare and seldom broadcast specials from the internet. I will be editing and burning a ton of Christmas DVDs this coming week. I'm going to make three or four copies of all of the DVDs I make so if one dies on me I will still have another one that will work.
      What shows will I be burning. The 1951 Christmas Carol with Alastair Sim, the 1935 Christmas Carol with Seymour Hicks, The 1938 Christmas Carol with Reginald Owen, the 1984 Christmas Carol with George C. Scott, the 1999 Christmas Carol with Patrick Stewart, Mickey's Christmas Carol, Mickey's Once Upon a Christmas, Mickey's Twice Upon a Christmas, Mickey's Orphans from 1931, Mickey's Good Deed from 1932, Disney's Santa's Workshop from 1932, Disney's Night Before Christmas from 1933, Mickey Mouse on Ice from 1935, Disney's Cookie Carnival from 1935, Donald's Snow Fight from 1942, Pluto's Christmas Tree from 1952, two new show from this year called Shrek the Halls and Elmo's Christmas Countdown; a Charlie Brown Christmas, Dr. Suess' How the Grinch Stold Christmas, Frosty the Snowman, The Little Drummer Boy Books 1 & 2, Nestor the Long Eared Christmas Donkey, Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, Santa Claus is Coming to Town, The Year Without Santa Claus, Elf with Will Ferrell, The Polar Express, How the Grinch Stold Christmas with Jim Carrey, Spongebob Squarepants Christmas Special, Jimmy Neutron Christmas Special, a Christmas episode of the Twilight Zone, Night of the Meek; two Mystery Science Theater 3000 episodes, the 1959 stinker called Santa Claus where it's the Devil vs. Santa Claus and the 1964 disaster, Santa Claus Conquers the Martians and the classic film about a boy and his desire for a BB gun, a Christmas Story. I know editing and burning all of these shows to DVD will be a herculean task but I am looking forward to it and it will pay off in years to come when I have all of these shows at our fingertips. Some of the more obvious choices are absent from this list such as It's a Wonderful Life and Miracle on 34th Street but I already have those on DVD and I know you will be able to get another copy at any time in perpetuity. I wish I had have gotten The Muppet's Christmas Carol, the Rankin/Bass version of a Christmas Carol called The Stingiest Man in Town and Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol. I probably missed them when they come on and for one reason or another wasn't able to download them off of the internet. The Tim Allen Santa Claus films aren't on this list because I just don't like them as much as I do others on this list. I also didn't put the Dudley Moore Santa film on this list because while I liked it as a kid I really can't stand it as an adult.
      Doing my research I did run up on a Christmas movie that I am stoked about seeing. As you may have noticed from this list I absolutely love Dicken's a Christmas Carol. Well, during the holiday season of 2009, that's two years from now, a brand new high budget animated Christmas Carol will be coming out starring Jim Carrey as the ghosts of past, present and yet to come. It will be shot using the technique used for Polar Express. That will be one movie that I will be heading to the Theater to watch. Becca will be five and old enough to enjoy something like that. Grant will be two and maybe we will need a babysitter for him. Mom will be 32 and probably in just as foul a mood as she is today and I will be 42 and loving Christmas even more than I do today. I am excited about seeing that movie. I think I'll call Mamaw tomorrow and see what she's doing during the holiday season of 2009 and go ahead and line up Grant's babysitter. Oh, I am a silly Christmas goose.
      Well, I am going to maybe edit some video clips of this morning for youtube.com. Daddy loves Rebecca & Grant and wishes each of you for the very last time in 2007 a very Merry Christmas! Only 365 days until Christmas!

Dear Becca & Grant,
                  Only two days, three hours and twenty-two minutes until Christmas and Mom went off to work this morning. She left super early because she had to go to the grocery store to by Grant some Nestle Good Start formula. She dropped her cell phone in the parking lot of Kroger on her way either into or out of the store. Someone found it and called Mamaw & Papaw this morning at 5:30. I'm glad we didn't lose it for good. Mom also took both sets of keys with her when she left for work. I needed some Copenhagen and Becca wanted some more carrot chips so I got both Becca and Grant ready for a trip and then I couldn't find keys. I called Auntie Lynn, Mamaw & Papaw and I even entertained the idea of catching a ride to the store with Allison's new but incredibly serious beau, Brad. Papaw & Mamaw had some shopping to do so they came up and took us all. They took the Corolla instead of the Pathfinder and it was packed in that little car. Instead of Kroger in Versailles we went to Wal-Mart in Nicholasville. I got some baby carrots, grape tomatoes, celery, and a bag of tiny broccoli heads for Becca. She loves veggies. We then went to a bread store for some dinner rolls for Christmas Eve. Then we stopped at McDonald's over there in Nicholasville and we each had had us a burger and we split two egg nog shakes.
      We then went back to Versailles and stopped at Kroger. Allison or as she's better known to Becca, Sissy got Mom's cell phone from the service desk at Kroger for me. As y'all well know, Allison works at Kroger. Allison was on lunch when we got there. I talked to her for a minute and then she took Becca to the candy aisle. I stopped at the Starbucks there in Kroger and got myself a tall peppermint hot chocolate. It was expensive as all things are at Starbucks but it certainly was yummy. I found Becca's carrot chips there and I picked up a box of Homestyle Pop Secret Popcorn for myself. Homestyle is my favorite variety of microwave popcorn. When I got back to the Starbucks tables Allison and Becca where sharing a Reese Christmas tree. Becca saw the carrot chips and asked me to open up the bag. I opened it up and she didn't touch her candy again. She was too busy eating carrots. Mamaw & Papaw went to the Rite Aid pharmacy in a dead shopping center there in Versailles and got something; I don't know what.
      When I was a teenager in high school that shopping center was the busiest place in town. It had the K-Mart, a Hallmark store, a restaurant owned by the family of my best friend, Mathew Padgett named Stony's, a Foodtown grocery store, a Radio Shack, a nice video rental store, a hardware store, a jewelry store, a Domino's Pizza, a sporting goods store and the Rite Aid. Now all that's left is the Rite Aid and the K-Mart building is now a flea mall. It's a blighted area of our fair city. The old shopping center that housed the old Kroger store where I worked as a teenager has developed into a pretty busy little area. The building that houses the Kroger is now a hardware/furniture/home appliance store. There's a Family Dollar, an insurance company, a vacuum sales and repair shop and a five and dime type store known as Terry's.
      While we were at Wal-Mart today I got Mom a Christmas present. It's not much but at least it's something. I think she will use what I got her every day. It's always nice when a gift is used. I really wanted to get something special for Mom. I love Mom dearly but if it's possible to fall in love with someone you are already in love with I did it yesterday when we had our date. I really wanted to get Mom something that lets her know exactly what she means to me. We really need to find a way to go out on more dates because that one was one I will never forget. I can't even tell you what was so special about it. It was just the two of us hanging out and being together. Laughing and joking and flirting with each other and I absolutely loved every minute of it. Becca and Grant, know this; I am madly and deeply in love with your mother. Apart from the two of you she is my very soul and I think she's pretty daggum sexy as well.
      That's all the blogging I have in me today. I'm gonna post this and wait up for Mom because I miss her and I want to see her. Daddy loves Rebecca & Grant!

Dear Becca & Grant,
                  Only Three days, One hour and fifty-three minutes until Christmas. Mom and I went shopping today. We had planned on taking the kids to spend the day with Brady, Brycen, and the twins, Joey and Jimmy at Alicia Cowing's house. She said one of the twins was sick so we didn't want them to get sick so we decided to do daycare. Becca threw an absolute fit when she found out about going to daycare. I think that she was traumatized somehow by Glenda's Day Care. I couldn't stand to see her in that state. I knew that neither her mother or myself would have any fun at all knowing we put her somewhere she didn't want to be. I think they tried to force her to take a nap and Becca will not take naps even though she needs one on occasion. I hate it that we put her in Glenda's. I'm sure her new daycare, Loving Arms or maybe it's called Kid's Kingdom will be much better. I called Mamaw and asked her if she could look after the kids today and she agreed to. I asked Becca if she would rather go to Mamaw and Papaw's instead. She went from screaming and crying to smiling and happy right away. She thanked me for not making her go to daycare. Lord have mercy, I wish we had never heard of Glenda's Day Care. We got kind of a late start because Mamaw wasn't ready for our kids just yet so we had to give her an hour or so. We took them down there confident in the fact that they would be well taken care of and would have lots of fun.
      We started out the day by going to the social security administration office to get Grant's social security card. That took us about a half an hour but it was nice to have that done. We should be getting his card by the beginning of next year which is only about a week and a half away. We then went to the Cracker Barrel for breakfast. I wanted to eat breakfast at Cracker Barrel at breakfast time but it was nearly 11:30 by the time we ordered our food. Both Mom and I had the holiday sampler platter breakfast. It came with a piece of country or city ham, we both had the country ham, a piece of bacon, a piece of sausage, hashbrown casserole, biscuits, gravy, grits, a cinnamon biscuit, an orange slice and two eggs. I always have my eggs over medium and Mom always orders her eggs scrambled. We also both had coffee and a large orange juice. I always end up eating Mom's grits because she doesn't care much for them and I love grits smothered in butter and sugar with a little salt. I also had Mom's hashbrown casserole because she doesn't care much for potatoes. I ate everything and was absolutely stuffed when we left. We then went over to Victoria's Secret so Mom could do some Christmas shopping. Mom says that the only thing that will fit her from Victoria's Secret is the perfume. Mom is a funny lady.
      We then went to see a movie. We saw I am Legend with Will Smith. We both enjoyed the film immensely. It was nice just sitting there with my arm around my best grown girl enjoying a movie in peace. After the movie we went to another store and looked around at some of the stuff they had in this store. Much to my chagrin we didn't make any purchases in this store but I came out with a wish list. I'm not telling you what store this was. You don't need to know.
      We then went to Wal-Mart to finish up Christmas shopping and we are as of this point 99.999% finished. We may have some candy items to get and maybe some groceries for Christmas dinners but all in all we are done. I haven't had an opportunity to shop for Mom so she got herself a new slow cooker. It's a much bigger one than the one we had. We got some stuff for Fluffy the cat and then we went and picked up the kids.
      Mom went right to sleep when we got home because she has to work tomorrow. I fed Grant and watched a show both Becca and I like called Chowder. It's a freaky cartoon about a chef's assistant. I told her it was then time to go to bed. She always asks for another show and I always give in because I want to remind her how I let her stay up past her bedtime and that she needed to repay my kindness by going straight to sleep and it works out pretty well. She's a good girl. I put Grantman down and we watched Mickey's Twice Upon a Christmas and she had a snack of a banana, carrot chips and cheese. Then I put her to bed. I've been reading her a Christmas book every night for about the past month and her lullaby has been Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer. She now knows that song by heart. I will hate to see Christmas 2007 fade into the past because it's a long time to wait until Christmas 2008. I love the holiday season. My icicle lights have quit working again but it's so late in the season that I'm not going to fool with trying to fix them. My lights were all kind of weak this year. Next year I'm going to start my outside decorating the beginning of November and everything should be in pretty good shape by Thanksgiving.
      We've all taken to calling Grant by the nickname Grantman. Mom started it and it seems to have caught on. Mom usually accompanies the name with the batman theme. Grant had his four month checkup the other day even though today is his official four month birthday. He weighs seventeen pounds and even though he is a big boy he is perfectly proportioned. He had his latest round of shots and got diagnosed with a double ear infection. That blew us away because he hasn't been fussy at all. He's been his jolly if spoiled self. The doctor said that Grant seemed to be one of those kids who wouldn't fuss at all unless he was being eaten by a coyote. He certainly didn't get that from his Mom. She has absolutely no pain tolerance at all.
      Well, that's all I have to say for now. I'll close this post out now. Daddy loves Rebecca & Grant!

Dear Becca & Grant,
                  Only Four days and nineteen hours until Christmas. We went shopping like I said in my last post. We got stuff for everyone except Jon, Jacob and Allison. We took Becca over to the family dollar Saturday so she could do her Christmas shopping. She got to pick out a present for everyone that she is close to. Papaw and Papaw Lawrence each got a stick of deodorant, Auntie Lynn and Aunt Mary got some hair ties, Rodney got a noise making toy, her teacher, Ms. Dykes and the teaching assistant, Mrs. Bush each got a little ceramic bell, Sadie got a chew toy and everyone else got a nice gift from Becca as well. I think we all had fun Saturday. Mom and I plan on finishing up Friday.
      Becca and Grant are not going with us Friday because we want to spend some time together, just the two of us. We both feel that in order to maintain a healthy loving relationship we need to make time to be alone with one another from time to time. We need to date like we did before we got married or before we had children. I don't know where they will be yet but they won't be with us. We want to go out to Cracker Barrel for breakfast and then see an early showing of a movie called "I am Legend" with Will Smith. We wanted to go see it last weekend but it didn't work out that way. That film made 77 million dollars last weekend and in 2007 that's a lot of money for an opening weekend. It set a record for a December release. It has one of my favorite themes, a post apocalyptic setting and one Mom's favorite themes, zombies so we are both looking forward to seeing this movie. Then we are going to finish up our Christmas shopping. We should be done early but we don't want to be rushed so we have to decide where the best place will be keep Becca & Grant. Maybe they'll go to daycare, maybe they will stay with Mamaw or maybe we will have Alicia watch them. Becca loves visiting Alicia's many kids. Mom and I will decide later today I suppose.
      We went down to Hazard Monday after Becca got out of preschool. We really didn't leave until 1:30 or so. We stopped at Little Caesars and got us one of those cheap to-go pizzas. They used to be five dollars but they went up to five dollars and fifty-five cents. Still it's a great bargain. The pizza is not the best in the world but what do you expect for five dollars. We also bought a two liter of soda and we ate pizza and drank soda in the Explorer as we started our trip to Hazard. We got down there and Auntie Mary wanted us to exchange gifts right away. Becca really got into opening presents. That bodes well for Christmas morning. She got into it so much that when it was my turn to open up my own presents she insisted that she "help" me open mine. I absolutely love opening Christmas presents and if I didn't love Becca as much as I did she would have lost a hand when she started ripping into my packages. Auntie Mary got Becca a purse, a toy make-up kit, some toy jewelry and maybe one or two items that I don't recall. Mom got Auntie Mary a nice make-up kit, hair care products, perfume stuff and a shirt. Auntie Mary doesn't get a big Christmas from anyone except Mom. Papaw Lawrence got a heavy plaid shirt, old spice cologne, and cream drops. We usually get him a carton of cheap cigarettes but your Mom decided that she wasn't going to help Papaw Lawrence kill himself this year.
      The big gift Becca got while we were down there was a new kitty. The cat loved up on her so much and she loved up on the cat so much that Mom & I just couldn't say no. We had to go to Wal-Mart and buy a crate to haul her kitty back and food, litter and other kitty stuff. We believe the cat is male but we haven't taken the time to flip it over and check. He's certainly a friendly and lovable cat and the only cat I've ever known to be like that was my own kitty cat, Samson. I had Samson before the kids were born. We had to move into an apartment the day before Becca was born so we had to get rid of my cat. Anyway, Samson was a friendly cat and Samson was a male cat so that is what leads me to believe that Becca's cat is a male. Becca named her cat Fluffy. I would have chosen a name like Scruffy or maybe even Hazard. Hazard would have been a cool name for that cat. I hope Fluffy works out better than that foul tempered puppy named Wal-Mart. Fluffy has done okay so far. He's not supposed to be on the furniture but he's sleeping on the couch right now. Becca wants him to sleep with her. We are going to get the cat's shots done and have it checked out with a vet and then we might try to coax the cat to sleep with her. Becca gets so excited around that cat though that I am afraid that that will not work out.
      Becca had a singing thing yesterday at preschool. She wore her brand new Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer light up shirt we got at Wal-Mart. She loves her light up shirt. When she moves around Rudloph's nose lights up. Mom stayed at school today to hear the singing and she said that Becca was assaulted by the other children poking her in the chest trying to get the shirt to light up. Mom said that she told them to quit poking her that she would get it to light up on her own. It's a really cute shirt. It also has Clarissa on it as well and Becca loves Clarissa just as much if not more than Rudolph; of course she is blown away that they also have girl elves at the North Pole. I think she's going to be a girl power kind of girl and I am all for it. My daughter can and will do anything she sets her mind to.
      Yesterday after both Mom & I had a little nap we headed out to Southern Lights at the Kentucky Horse Park. We asked Mamaw if she could keep Grant because he wouldn't have had the least bit of interest in anything that went on at Southern Lights. We took him down there and then we went and picked up Alicia Cowing's two oldest boys, Brady and Brycen. Becca loves playing with those boys. Brady is five and Brycen is two. We then headed toward the Horse Park. I finally figured out the best way to mount Becca's portable DVD player in the explorer. I put bungee cords around the front seat head rest and slid the player in between the cord and the head rest. It worked like a charm. Anyway, the kids watched Rudolph on the DVD player as we drove to the park.
      We got there and Becca and Brady were absolutely blown away by the lights. They both had a fabulous time. Brycen falls asleep when riding in a vehicle and we couldn't wake him up so he slept through the drive through the lights. I wish I could have seen the look on my daughter's face as we drove through Southern Lights. After the driving tour it was time for everything else. They have a great Christmas festival type thing at Southern Lights. We first stopped by the petting zoo. We saw kangaroos, donkeys, pygmy goats, regular goats, miniature antelope, a camel, a highland cattle bull, some llamas, a porcupine and some other animals that I can't remember. Becca liked the pygmy goats and the llamas the best. She said the goats were sweet and the llamas reminded her of Linda the llama from Go Diego Go. I like that highland cattle bull. I learned last year that he loves to be scratched under his chin. He'll stretch out when you do that and act like a five hundred pound dog. None of the kids wanted anything to do with the camel because Mom was talking about how they would spit if they got upset and they didn't want to get spit on.
      Then we waited outside in the cold for the little train ride they have there. Becca loves trains. Eventually our turn came and Becca had a pretty fun ride. We then went inside. I found a giant Christmas themed coloring book. Auntie Lynn and I had a giant Christmas Carol coloring book as we were growing up. Every year we would color one page in it on Christmas Eve. I wanted the exact same book for my kids but they quit making that book in the late seventies. The book I found was Twas the Night Before Christmas and not nearly as high quality as the one from my childhood but it was the only one I have been able to locate. We bought it and now Becca and Grant can color a picture in it every year on Christmas Eve just like I did as a wee lad. Maybe I will even help them out.
      We then grabbed us a hot dog and a soda apiece and took a bathroom break. I wish we had time to do the explorium exhibit in the basement of the horse museum building. I think Becca would have had fun with that. We next went to see Santa. We waited in line forever. The Santa at Southern Lights was not anywhere near as good as the one in the Fayette Mall. Brady & Brycen got their pictures made with him and then Becca told him that she wanted a Baby Alive and a monster truck. I keep telling her that Santa has marked the monster truck off of her list because she touched the Christmas tree when she wasn't supposed to but she still says she wants it. She's not going to get it. I took a few digital shots of Becca and the Southern Lights Santa.
      It was then time to leave. On the way out we bought Becca, Brady and Brycen a light up sword thing. We decided to get us a funnel cake and split it five ways. After we had the funnel cake we headed toward the car but as we do every year we stopped and got a bag of real kettle corn for the road. We turned back on Rudolph and headed home. We dropped Brady and Brycen off and then went to Kroger so Mom could pick up a few items. Then I dropped Becca and Mom off at home and I went down to Mamaw & Papaw's to pick up Grant. I got back around 1:30 in the morning. I surfed a bit on the web and then I started this blog post and now I am finishing this blog post.
      I just finished sneezing my head off. We all have colds. I think mine is the worst cold of all but I'm sure if I asked Becca or Mom they would claim to have the worst cold. I'm sure even Grant would claim his cold to be the worst if he could talk. I'm gonna go take some medicine and lay down. Daddy loves Rebecca & Grant!

Dear Becca & Grant,
                     Only Ten days and 23 hours until Christmas. We're going cheap on everyone this year except the kids. Money seems to be super tight right now and I have no idea why. Mom has a great job making pretty decent money and we haven't had a house payment in quite a few months; we paid ahead so we wouldn't have to worry about it for awhile. I have no idea how we managed to get together that kind of cash. I'm kind of bummed out about the money thing. So as I said before and if you are reading this on the internet and expect to get a gift from us this year you can lower your expectations because while you will get a gift from us it will be cheap and shoddy. Well, maybe not shoddy but it will certainly be cheap.
      There's a huge lay off scheduled for the beginning of the year at work. I'm worried that I might not have much longer at General Electric. I've been out there over twenty years; all my adult life. Looking for a new job is not something I am looking forward to. I have no marketable skills and I am actually kind of frightened right now. Thank God, Mom has her job. Mom says I need to go to CNA school so if I do get laid off I will have something I can do to make some money until I can get a job with pay comparable to what I make now. Mom wants to go to school to become a registered nurse and they get paid great money but it's hard getting into nursing school and that takes three to four years. I would like to go get some kind of training in computers. Maybe become an IT guy or something. Right now I just don't know. There won't be any factory out there that will even come close to paying me what I earn at General Electric. Mom has access to health insurance where she works so that will be a worry off of my back at least. Maybe I can get a job where I can work in a nice office atmosphere instead of in a hot loud smelly dirty factory. I would like that but I still worry about the money.
      As a result of the lay off I am having to change jobs. I thought I was going to get one similar to the one I have now, only easier. I didn't get it. Instead I got stuck doing a job I have never done before. That bummed me out as well. I'm just in a regular bummed out mood right now. I am thankful for my two wonderful children but I want to be able to provide for those two wonderful children like they deserve. I'm sorry if this all sounds like so much of a downer during the holiday season but that's the way I feel right now.
      There are the occasional day when I will be talking to Becca and I will just marvel at how fast she is growing up. Today for instance; we were at KFC enjoying the buffet and we were talking and she seemed to be able to carry on a conversation even better than she did yesterday. I fear she's going to grow up overnight on me. And Grant, he just gets bigger and bigger every day. It won't be long until I can say the same thing about him.
      I know it's been awhile since I last posted but I have been busy on the weekends with Becca and Grant. It's like trying to do two full time jobs at once. I will be feeding Grant and Becca will tell me she wants a drink and of course she wants it right this very second. Just one of then by their self is okay but if you put both of them together it's a real chore. Even more so because I am supposed to be keeping the house in order while Mom is at work and I have failed in that regard. Mom got kind of angry at me the other day regarding this matter. I knew I wasn't doing the best job in the world but I did think that I was making steady, if slow improvement. Oh well, what are you going to do?
      We plan on going to Lexington tomorrow to do a small bit of Christmas shopping. We are going to get stuff for Auntie Mary and Deseray. Becca will be going to the Dollar Tree to do all of her Christmas shopping. Then we have a parent-teacher conference with Becca's teacher. We will be doing everyone else next Friday. That will be quite the challenge.
      I need to get in bed now. Daddy loves Rebecca & Grant!