Ok, so while we standing around under a beautiful big tree and getting a pretty decent breeze from the water, Carter was trying to skip rocks and so Kenzi was helping her daddy. And no I was not even thinking about scrapbooking a rock! Even I have my limits! Kari

Lake Lavon

So every time my mom comes to visit, she says she wants to go visit some lakes or bodies of water. And every time she has come I say OK we are going to go see a lake and never do we make it. Well this time we made it. After driving around the south side of Lake Lavon, we pulled into a camping area. We had a great time. We taught Kenzi how to throw rocks in the water. I am only hoping that listened to the council of not throwing rocks anywhere else including people! It was such a great visit with my mom and we hope that she knows that we severely miss her already! We love you mom and we look forward to seeing you again in August! Yippee!! Love ya! Kari

Sophie messed up!

Mommy: "So Kenzi how was Sophie's birthday party?"
Kenzi: "It was good."
Mommy: "What did you do?"
Kenzi: "Eat cake!"
Mommy: "Oh, was it good?"
Kenzi: "Yea, Sophie messed up! Sophie messed up!"

Happy birthday Sophie!

Underwear down the toilet...

OK, so I had to write about the underwear down the toilet comment which some of you may have caught on Carter's post. And to think, I asked for him to post on the blog!! Anyway, Kenzi had pooped in her underwear and I have been having her clean it up to hopefully help motivate her to start telling us when she needs to go before she does it in her underpants. Well, this was pretty sticky, not to get to graphic. So I left them in the toilet to soak to hopefully help the cleaning process. Well a little later she did go potty in her little seat and I emptied it into the big toilet. Kenzi likes to flush the toilet so when I emptied it I told her to flush and the underpants were hanging on the side of the toilet bowl. Well needless to say when Kenzi flushed her underwear went down the drain as well! Kenzi started balling and saying she wanted her panties back! I told her that we would have to talk to Daddy about that one. So far we have not had any plumbing issues but we will see. (Knock on wood!) Later - Kari

Happy Belated Father's Day!!

OK, so I know that I am way late but I finally got these pictures on my computer and I had to post them. I wanted to let Carter know that I think he is a phenomenal father and I am thankful for the father that you are. You are the light of Kenzi's life and she absolutely is Daddy's little girl. She is so much of a better person for having you as her Father. Thank you! I love you! Kari

...And now, for something completely different...

Hi people, Carter here. I am the striking fellow in the Green Lantern shirt above. Kari has been maintaining the blog for a while now, and has been asking me to contribute, but I just never got around to it. Something about sitting in front of a computer typing all day really takes the fun out of it, you know? Anyway, Crystal Hill came over tonight to show Kari how to do more with the blog, hence the background changes. (Thanks Crystal. You rock!) Anyway, as Kari was wrapping up she offer to invite me to contribute, so here we are. I'll try to add in my 2 cents from time to time, but I am not making any promises. Anyway, the kid and I spent some time together tonight. While Kari was working on the blog we watched an episode of "When we left Earth" that I had on the DVR. This particular episode was on the Apollo program, so I spent the time trying to teach her 2 things:

1. Neil Armstrong was the first man on the moon.
2. The Saturn V rocket took us to the moon.

Needless to say we need some practice. We'll get there. Anyway, the only other thing of note that happened today was that Kari accidentally flushed a pair of Mackenzie's panties down the toilet. I'll let her tell that one, since I did not see it first hand. So, let me take some time and space to throw out a few things that I am thankful for, since I feel it is something that I feel we should all do from time to time.

Things I am thankful for right now:

Mackenzie, and the fact that she is totally becoming her own person with her own personality. When I say , "You are being goofy!" she looks at me dead serious and says, "I'm not goofy, I'm Kenzie!".

That Amy's friend in Georgia had her baby today and both of them are fine. This was a rough one, yall...

My job and the means it provides for us, especially that it allows for Kari to stay home and be mom.

The fact that Kari's mom is coming for a visit tomorrow. Everyone likes it when Gramma Bailey comes to town.

The comedy genus of Steve Carrell. If you have never seen The Office, you are really only cheating yourself.

The fact I have 2 dogs that like to sleep on my foot. It really does wonders to help you relax when an animal sleeps on your foot.

A wife that is a goddess. Not only did she cook a great dinner tonight, but she baked cookies, kept the kid alive today, fixed the bathroom sink, looks incredible and knows who the Legion of Superheroes is. What more could a man ask for? I mean really?

In closing, here is a bonus picture of Mackenzie with a goat. Its your moment of Zen...

Superman...

OK, so I have never uploaded video before so we will see if this works. Kenzi and I were hanging out at home and she was being so cute to me that I had to get the digital camera and try and capture some of it. Of course, she calmed down a lot when I got the camera out, but she still was being cute. Mostly because she had her socks on her hands! Sometimes I just want to eat her up!! (OK, not literally!) And next time I will make sure there is better lighting! Kari

Dallas Texas Temple

Every week, I or my friend get the opportunity of going to the Temple. We have coordinated babysitting and it is a great opportunity for us. Every time I go, I tell Kenzi, "Mommy is going to the Temple. You be good for Aunt Keri, OK?" She usually says OK and off I go. Well, Lately she has been asking to go to the Temple. So Carter and I for Family Home Evening, decided we would take her down to the Dallas Temple and walk around the grounds and talk about it with her. However, The grounds were closed so we stood outside the gates and talked about what happens in the Temple and read some scriptures. I am very thankful for having a place her on earth that I can do service for my Heavenly Father and be able to communion with Him in His house! I am extremely thankful for getting sealed to Carter for All time and Eternity! He truly is my best friend! Kari

Swimming, Tickle Monster, Off, & Hulk

OK, so I think it has been a slower week even though we went and saw Mr Magorium's Wonder Emporium on Wednesday, we had Sophie over on Thursday and we went swimming on Friday. So this post is actually about yesterday or Friday. And, yes all of these events happened on the same day! So let me explain...

SWIMMING
As some of you may know it is difficult to put Kenzi down to bed every night. It is not abnormal for her to carry on for two hours before submitting to sleep. So we have tried many things to get Kenzi ready for bed including, but not limited to, singing, rocking/cuddle time, being stearn, and yes unfortunately I even tried a spanking. And to no avail it really does not matter what we do she will go to sleep however she wants. Well in another effort to help her submit to slumber, I told her Thursday night that "Tomorrow morning we are going to go swimming!" Her response: "Ha, YEA!!!!" throwing her hands up in the air. So she walks to bed and hey, she didn't give us a fight! YES! a triumph for mom and we have a peaceful evening! Thank goodness!! Yippee!! The planets have aligned... or so I thought! At 6:55 am CST (which Kenzi normally does not wake up before 8 am and many times lets me sleep until 10!) we hear a knock on her door and when we open the door she is standing in her room buck naked with her swim suit in one hand and her cover up in the other. She holds them both up and says "Time to go swimming!!"Carter explains to her that it is too early and not time yet, even trying to use the clock to help him out even though Kenzi so cannot tell time and will tell me that Daddy will be home in five minutes when it is 3 o'clock in the afternoon. Anyway, she concedes and goes to the bathroom and then when Carter goes to put her pull up on she says "No, swimming pull up!" Carter:"Honey, remember, swimming is later?" Kenzi: "No swimming pull up!" Somehow Carter gets her to be OK with the regular pull up and feeds her breakfast!

TICKLE MONSTER
After Kenzi's nap on Friday, she was a little whinny. I blame it on not enough sleep! So I started tickling her to distract her. It got to the point where all I had to do was flick my hands out like claws and wiggle my fingers she would run giggling and screaming like she was afraid all the way to the kitchen sink. Well one time when I flick my hands out and she turned to run I kept up with her as she was flailing her arms about like a great movie actress. When she got to the sink and turned around she just about jumped out of her skin and squealed so loud. Followed by the belly laugh that I LOVE so much!

OFF
OK so this one needs a little back story. We have two dogs, Dax and Georgia. When we got Dax we took her to a great trainer who helped us to set limits for the dog. Don't get me wrong they are very much apart of the family, being as how they are in the family pictures and all. Anyway, there are certain commands for certain situations. Such as, "Out" for correcting them on peeing inside the house, or having something in their mouth that they are not suppose to and "Off" for things like off the couch, off the bed, off the kitchen table (yes I had to use that one). Well Dax is about five years old and very much an inside dog. She will go out to do her business and maybe play a little with Georgia the puppy but then scrapes the door when she wants in. She has thrashed our door pretty good to the point of having to replace it some day. However I need to break her of this before I get a new door. So every time Dax does this I go to the door correct her and shut the door. I do not let her back in until she stops doing it, but I correct her every time she does it. (And the saying you can't teach an old dog new tricks... Georgia only needed to be corrected twice and now does not do it! Georgia is 8 months old.) So anyway, while Kenzi and I were playing in the living room Dax and Georgia was outside. Dax scrapes the door. Next thing I know Kenzi stands up and says "I need to talk to her!" She walks to the Kitchen. I hear her open the back door, yell "Off" to Dax and then shuts the door and locks it. She came back and sat down like nothing even happened and I asked her how she was doing and she said "I am doing good."

OK so the last topic...I know this is long, and she is not your kid, but again, her blog...

HULK
Carter and his friend Neal enjoy going to guy movies so much so that they are known to see the midnight viewing of some of those movies. Well after our date night last night Carter and Neal went to watch the new Hulk movie. I was getting Kenzi ready for bed and she heard me ask Carter bout what time the movies was. Well there was no getting her off the topic. "Daddy are you going to the movies?" Daddy are getting copcorn (AKA popcorn)?" Daddy you are seeing the Hulk movie?" After Carter left, I was putting Kenzi to bed and she asks me, "The Hulk not going to get daddy?" "No honey, the Hulk is not going to Daddy." OK so this continues to this morning... We woke Kenzi up so we could go the Museum of Nature and Science. She was dead to the world when we woke her and still asleep while Carter was helping her to sit on the potty to which she snapped out of her daze and said "Did you go see the Hulk Movie?!?!" And then a whole bunch of gibberish that we could not understand!

That is my girl! Gotta love her! Kari

Kenzi & her Friends!

OK, so I have to say that it is really easy to keep this blog updated and I even take pictures with the idea that I am going to put them on the blog!! Anyway, Kenzi's friends, Ben and Ella, came over to play today and Kenzi was able to share her house with them. They were so cute that I had to take pictures and post them. They had such a great time and were more than happy to take pictures! And yes, Kenzi is in her Pittsburgh Penguin T-shirt and no pants, She had just gotten out of bed when Ben and Ella showed up! And she insisted on wearing her shirt to bed last night. And Sorry to the Pens, the fans of the Pens, and especially my husband for their loss of the Stanley cup!

Kenzi's House

So for Kenzi's birthday, Gram Mac bought her a house. Well, we got it from Costco and it is definitely one of those you have to put together. So Carter and I commited to putting it together on Saturday. Carter first mowed where we wanted to put it, then we proceeded to lay out all of the pieces in the backyard. It took 27 steps, about 110 screws, and 5 hours to put it together. It was completely worth it to watch Kenzi play with a two walled house, then a three walled house, then a four walled house, and then a house with a roof on it. Carter and I put it together without any arguments and had a great time doing it. After we were done, we all jumped in the pool. Ok, stepped into the pool, where Kenzi, Georgia, and Dax all got baths! And of course as we are getting ready to go to bed, we realize that we needed to put cement under that thing pretty soon, otherwise, Kenzi is going to open the door and not be able to walk in, since we cannot get a lawnmower in there. And I am pretty sure the vaccuum cleaner isn't going to work. Kenzi is so happy with her house that when Keri & Neal got here the first thing she said was "Look at my house!"