Fall Fun

Here is a slideshow update for you...to the tune of Maddox's favorite dancing song -
ZZ Top's Sharp Dressed Man.



Have a great weekend!

Summer Catch up part....I've lost count

I know these pics are old news now, but I really want to post them...so here goes...more from our summer of craziness....

When I got back to Texas from our cruise, Mom and Kimberly had made signs for Maddox and P to hold at the airport. They were so cute. When Maddox saw me he started waving the sign back and forth and had the biggest smile I had ever seen. It melted my heart I tell ya.

Happy to be home with my little man.

Even P was excited to see me. It was the greatest welcome home I have had in a long time. (Our welcome home times from Saba were quite exciting too - airport people helping our family holding signs and eating krispy kremes as they waited for us to get off the plane. It was awesome! But back to 2008...) P started calling me Cris for some reason, and I love it because she made it up, so we go with it.
P was very excited to show off her sign. I was very excited that she was very excited. I love this girl!!
These cars were a nightly routine for P and Maddox. Ok, actually they were more like a 24/7 routine for these two. They had so much fun chasing each other around in them.
How manly can you get? A pink barbie convertible with a beautiful bouquet of flowers on the front. It was his favorite though. Once he figured out how to hold the button down instead of giving himself whiplash in 30 second increments by pushing and letting go repeatedly, he really got around!
Maddox followed P everywhere she went. By the time I got back from the cruise, there were 2 strollers in an effort to appease both parties. They were great because if Kimberly and I were trying to accomplish something we would just get out the strollers and send them on their way!
One day they were pushing strollers and we noticed it got quiet for a bit. That is never a good sign with kids unless they are in bed. Low and behold, P had uninstalled her Dora training potty and given it to Maddox to take for a stroll. Don't worry, they traded after a bit so they both got the benefit of the germs. Gross.
While I was there, Carter got to start on solid food. He didn't seem to care for it too much, but P sure loved trying to feed it to him. "I wanna do it."
Cute little Carter had to put up with A LOT of noise while we were there. I am sure he was happy for a little more peace and quiet when we left.
I don't remember how it started, but P and I would play "silly hair" every night. She would do my hair and I would do hers. Then we would make silly faces at each other. I am sure it was part of my pathetic attempt to get her to play beauty shop with me and brush my hair for hours on end. Funny that Kimberly and I used to think Mom and our Aunt Elaine were crazy when they would fight over whose turn it was at the "beauty shop" and we found ourselves doing the same thing with P.
We took CeCe out for her birthday. P and I made her some birthday cupcakes with sprinkles. We had a great time. Not sure how mom ended up taking care of both kids all throughout her birthday dinner. She claims she likes it. I don't know if she even got to eat her meal. We really tried to take them away for a bit, but those of you who know mom know that is quite impossible. Carter just chilled in his car seat the whole time.
Wearing Papa's hat and watching the olympics. Does life get any better than this?
Papa and Maddox in their matching seersucker outfits. Two of my favorite "sharp dressed men"
Watching Cricket in the backyard waiting to leave for church.
While I was in Dallas I also got to go see my dear friend and college roommate Meredith. She was such a trooper and had such a great attitude seeing that she had been stuck in that hospital room for weeks on bed rest. She has now had the babies, a little girl named Kathryn and a little boy named Garrett. To see some pics of these precious twins and read about her story you can click here. I love this girl so much and have missed her since we have been moving around so much.
Cece and her 3 bundles of joy. They flock to her. Who doesn't love Cece?
We met the Hogue side of the family at Cozumel's (I had to get my Mexican food fix) and had a great time. Great Aunt Staryme and Uncle Ronnie brought Maddox some books, one of which goes with us everywhere now he loves it so much, Nana and Pappa brought him a shrek flashlight that he was infatuated with (he still loves to stare directly into the light for some odd reason) and Grammi and Pappy brought him a cute frog slinky that ended up being oh so much help on the plane! I tell you this kid is spoiled even living so far away! We love it!


Maddox loves his Grammi and Pappyand his great Nana and Pappa. We kept trying to get some good pictures with everyone, but with his newly acquired skills, all he wanted to do was...
RUN!!!!
Enjoying some Chicken Express Sweet Tea. Man that stuff is good. So good I had to trick him into thinking it was gone by pulling the cup down so that the straw was out of the liquid. If you are thinking I am mean to not let him drink it all, let me give you one word: CAFFEINE!


Ok, only one more post to be caught up. Well with our summer at least. Then I need to catch up to present day, huh? Ha ha. Well, I am off to paint for a bit. Catch up with you soon!

summer catch up part 3...the cruise

While Maddox was chillin' in Texas, we were on a Royal Caribbean cruise to the eastern Caribbean. Ports of call - the Bahamas, St. Thomas and St. Maarten. We had a room with a balcony which was awesome. I loved sitting out on that deck and watching the waves. We had an awesome table for dinner. The first night we were stuck way in the back corner of a back room. But we loved the people we sat with. The next night we got a note saying our seating arrangement had changed and we had a new table number. Let me tell you that I talked to everyone I could to make sure we got to sit with the same people. We were sure we wouldn't get lucky twice. Funny thing is all of them were making sure they didn't get changed either. Turns out we had the same people, they just moved us to the table right next to the captain's table. I guess they thought they couldn't put such cool people so far in the back. :)

These are our dinner friends - from the left, Raul and Lisa, some weirdos in the middle, and Brad and Kris on the right. We had so much fun, ordered SO MUCH food, and even gave the waiters a run for their money a few nights.

We always went to the after dinner shows with our new friends. It was a lot of fun. One night we ended up in the karaoke show. Caisson sang some Boys II Men....it was a tear jerker....so hard to say goodbye....

And the girls did an amazing rendition of the Dixie Chicks "Goodbye Earl". We brought down the house. Well, we had a few people clapping at least.

Our first port of call - Coco Cay, Bahamas. And yes, I typed that right. It is Cay not bay. I have to say I was disappointed in this because all it was was some land that Royal Caribbean bought, shipped in some sand, chairs and water sports, and threw in an almost authentic market. We had a great day relaxing, reading our books, trying to find all the fish everyone was raving about (we did see a few, but we figured out we are snorkel/dive snobs after being at Saba) and eating quite a bit of food. I just really like to explore new islands, not fake ones. So on we go...

To St. Thomas. We had planned a BOSS excursion and it just so happened Raul and Lisa had planned the same one. BOSS stands for Breathing Observation Submersible Scooter. You can go to this website to see more about it if you want: http://www.bossusvi.com/default.aspx?name=ourtours
It was so much fun. The water was so clear and we were able to just scoot around under water for about 30 minutes.

From the left: Lisa, Raul, Caisson and Tiff

It was funny how small our heads looked inside the bubble.

Raul scootin' along...

This gives you an idea of how clear the water was. It was beautiful.

We had a beautiful ride back to the dock. I have missed this view.

Next up: St. Maarten. Despite our best efforts to go back to Saba, we were not able to find anyone who could get us back in time for the all aboard at 4:30. So we rented a 4 wheeler and went to all our old favorite spots on St. Maarten.

If you look closely in the background, just to the left of the side of the mountain, you will see the faint outline of Saba. This is as close as we got. We were so sad to be so close, be able to look at it, but not be there. We will try again someday.

This was one of our favorite beaches on St. Maarten - Orient Bay. It is beautiful, has lots of water sports, oh and our favorite sport, see how many nude people you can catch in your pictures. We kept it clean for you this time, although we did see a lot more than we wanted to of some people.

No trip to St. Maarten would be complete without a stop at the AMAZING pastry shops, or boulangerie as they say in French. It was the greatest thing when we figured out what that word on all the signs meant. Oh they are sooooooo good! My favorites - a chocolate croissant

and the fruit tarts.

This time we opted for the strawberry. YUMMY!

Oh and don't forget the Ting. This drink is so good I wish we had it in the U.S. It is a grapefruit drink, so coming from a girl who does not like to eat grapefruit, you know it is good!

The building with the red roof is one of the hotels we stayed in on one of our vacations to St. Maarten back in the day. Fun times.

We also went back to the infamous airport runway to experience the jets landing one more time. We saw it on Ripley's one time and thought we might need proof that we had done it before, so this time we took pictures and video. Surely one day they will block this off before someone gets sandblasted!

One of our favorite trees from Saba. (This is still on St. Maarten, but they were everywhere on Saba and so pretty when they were all in bloom.)

Up next...fun times in The Lone Star State...see you soon.

Summer catch up part 2

So since we last left off with Maddox at the beach.....

We move on to Spoof Night - this is where the graduating residents get a chance to make fun of all the attendings, then the attendings return the favor. It was hilarious, and I am sure even funnier for those who actually got all the inside jokes. This is Caisson in the wig pretending to be one of his attending physicians.
Then we had GRADUATION!!!!! I can't express how exciting this night was. Caisson has worked so long and so hard for this day. I am so proud of him and all that he has accomplished since the day he started college and I couldn't even get him out to get a cup of coffee with me because he was always studying. It has been a long hard road, but he has hurdled every obstacle and tackled every problem like a champion. Now we can start a more normal life! No more 36 hour call at the hospital, no more 5 year anniversary dinners in the hospital cafeteria...in fact NO MORE HOSPITAL! (Unless one of us is a patient of course)
The Hogue family was here to celebrate with us. It was so good to have them here to share in this VERY SPECIAL DAY!
The most valuable (in Hard Work and COST) papers we have ever held.
Hanging out on Shem Creek with the Hogues watching the dolphins play in front of the boats. I do love it here.
Then....we bought a house. It is a Charleston style home which I love, because then I feel better about the siding. This Texas girl just misses her brick homes. They are almost non-existant around here. We do love our new house and I am trying to pace myself with all the projects I want to do with it. When I get some decorating finished I will post pics of the inside. In July, Maddox got to have his first vacation without Mom and Dad. We went on a cruise (pics of that on the next post) and he stayed with my Mom and Dad - or as he will call them, Papa and Cece. First stop - the Smith Family Reunion. I have to say I am jealous that he got to go to this and I didn't. Maybe next year we can both go. We just couldn't figure out with everything else happening this summer how I could make that too. So he got to spend some quality time with all my extended family. There are rumors he never quit moving, spent a lot of time rolling around in the stroller, and eating all kinds of food I can never get him to touch. Here he is spending some quality time with Uncle Bud (Garrett). Sharing a chair and some tea with Presley. How cute are they? I wonder how much of this ended up in his mouth and how much was on them! By the time we got back to SC, drinking out of the "Big Boy" glass had become one of his favorite things. Well, we are about to go to the park with our new friend from down the street, so I better go get ready. There are oh so many more pics to come, so stay tuned. Cruise, wedding, 60th birthday, fun with cousins, good mexican food with the Hogues.........