Sophia is looking at her Daddy’s leg and says “Oh no, daddy has owies, what happened daddy, what happened?” I go over to his leg to see what she is talking about and realize it is freckles she is looking at. She tells me “Look, owies. Daddy has owies.” So when I am done LMAO I explain to her that they are “freckles.” Here is the problem with that though. She has a beanie baby leopard named “Freckles.” So when I tell her they are freckles she exclaims “Oh! Daddy is a tiger!” Gotta love the logic!

Categories: Sophia, Weekly Family Update
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Sophia has diarrhea. She made a peculiar noise… that did not come from her mouth. She then exclaimed, “I have Bubble Toots!!”

Tags: sick. funny,Sophia
Categories: BJ
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Popi (as my children refer to my father) has always had a way with gift giving during Christmas time. In years past, while still living in the Atchley home, he would concoct and carry out elaborate scavenger hunts, puzzles, and tricks while presenting his children with gifts. These puzzles ranged from the esoteric clue that led to an obscure passage in a familiar book, to literally hacking into his lightly secured linux server in order to retrieve a command list and open a file containing another clue. Every Christmas you would find Dad scheming, plotting, writing, and setting up these elaborate hunts.

This year he couldn’t control the venue, and at 29 years old my preferences for gifts are either too expensive, or so specific as to be almost impossible to locate without 2 overseas contacts and a divining rod (“Yes, I would like you to get me the German HDMI stripper sold through a grey market front on ebay.” “I’ve always wanted magnetic throwing stars.”)

I ask for cash. Cash is boring. People think cash is so boring that they’re more likely to give you a gift card that you’ll never use. Cash feels impersonal and lazy. Popi, made it not lazy. I unwrapped my present only to find a Godiva chocolate box. In my family, it is well known that boxes are often reused. Instead of keeping any individual item in it’s original box, we’ve found it far more fun to change the box, so items are harder to guess. While we’re in the box we’re also likely to throw other random goods to provide either insulation from shaking, or something jingly so that shaking the box is the most innacurate way of figuring out what you’ve gotten. So I open the Godiva Chocolate box and am greeted by a $50 bill on a stack of other bills. “AHA. You think you’ve tricked me old man, I’ll not be fooled by a $50 on a stack of $1 bills.” I looked closer. Wrapped around the $50 and the other bills is what appears to be a small paper tie that reads, “$5000, Viewpoint bank.”

Wat?

I closed the Godiva box in a moment of thought, realizing that even this was fake. I also realized that is was a very good fake. Upon closer inspection it was in fact a $50 on a stack of $1 bills. The fake paper tie took Popi over an hour to make. Through trial and error and by using the paper tie on the stack of $1 bills, he had mimicked to the best of his ability what a $5000 paper tie might look like.

Good job. You got me.

Tags: christmas,gift
Categories: BJ, BJ's Life
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With the new year on the way, I’ve decided to take my contributions to our family blog in a different direction. For one, you’re likely to find far fewer political posts. I’ve pounded out and refined my political stance enough that it seems silly to continue to say the same things over and over.

Tags: blog,naasen
Categories: BJ, BJ's Life
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Grandma Atchley got Sophia a fairy outfit for Christmas. As soon as she opened it she HAD to put it on. Just this last month she discovered the Tinkerbell movie, and also really loves it and is attached to it and all things Tinkerbell now. So the fairy costume was a perfect fit for the phase she is in right now. The only time she hasn’t worn the dress is to bed or when we go out somewhere. Otherwise, that dress is on her–period!! The first night of having it I convinced her to not sleep with the wings because she would bend them, a reasonable argument she agreed with. So she slept with just the dress over her PJ’s. By the time the second night came around she had ripped the dress in 2 places and now our parental argument was that she could not sleep with the dress because we didn’t want it to rip more. She was still fussing and whining a bit over that, and so BJ in a firm, but gentle voice tells her she cannot sleep with the dress or the wings due to the aforementioned potential damages and comes up behind her, grabs the dress to stabilize it a little so he can grab the velcro on the wings and pull them off. It took her a little by surprise, but she wasn’t upset or freaking out about it. After more discussion we decided to let her sleep with the wings in the bed with her.

now I say “Poor Tinkerbell” because from my point of view the situation seemed slightly different. Here is a child–tired, whining, confused–having someone come from behind her, by surprise essentially, and rip her wings away from her and pull off her dress. It was the WAY in which it happened it really seemed like some ethical violation. She is having something she holds dear to her taken away from her by force. Upon reflection it made me think of that scene in the classic Disney Cinderella movie where the stepsisters see Cinderella wearing some of the their (abandoned) clothes and they run over to her in a vicious manner and pull all these things off of her. Cinderella is standing there swirling in a tornado of clothes and these girls spewing hateful things to her. While this is going on she is shocked and confused and ultimately she runs away crying. At least there wasn’t crying on Sophia’s part, and we weren’t saying hateful things, but tearing at her clothes might have seemed just about right from her perspective.

I know this seems like such a random thing to post about, but this stuck in my mind so much. Plus I had planned on some kind of Christmas post anyway that would have ended up including some information about this new fairy costume. So all in all, what do I want you to take from this post? My husband is a terrible person. Parents, watch out for your children if they have wings……..(edit: There are so many violations of good taste in this post. I think she’s been surfing the internet too much – BJ, wing destroyer)

Categories: Sophia, Weekly Family Update
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I truly do love the girls’ room. It has so many colors, and fun, bright colors too. I have worked very hard on it, since I was pregnant with Sophia, to make it the room it is today. Here are the pics. of her new bunk bed with new polka dot sheets, and Phoebe’s name board that I finally finished. I also made Sophia’s, but hers has painted on dots whereas Phoebe’s has buttons.

Categories: Phoebe, Sophia, Weekly Family Update
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As I have mentioned in previous posts, Sophia gets super attached to things. One week it is a beany baby, the next her Lightning McQueen stuffed car, and so on. Ever since visiting her Nana earlier this week it has been “bug”. All it is is a black head band with black and orange pipe cleaners twirled together with black fuzzballs on the end, but she LOVES it. She wears it all day and they have been to the grocery store, Granny’s house for work, and to bed. She sleeps with it on her head and I have peeked in on her sometimes to find it across her face while she is sound asleep. Luckily, I convinced her to leave it home today so we could go to church “bug” free. So far since being home from church she hasn’t asked for it, but I have a feeling “BUG!” will return!

Categories: Sophia, Weekly Family Update
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Friday morning on my way to work I had to go a different way because I had an errand to run before driving to Carrollton.
**I must make this statement before going any further with my story: I am not a dog person. I was raised with cats and prefer them, but dogs are animals too and overall, I care for animals. I have noticed over this past year so many dogs wandering our neighborhood. Some with collars, some without, but either way it has irritated me to no end seeing all these dogs roaming the streets! They could end up being a danger to our community with so many kids running around and all the cars too. I have tried to help before by calling the dogs over to me (the smaller and more friendly looking ones) while in my driveway or at the park. None have ever come to me so I have never ultimately been able to help even one of these dogs. I figure the shelter is better than the streets, right?! So I am sometimes left with wonder at what happens to these dogs—-did they ever get back home? did they go to the shelter? were they hit by a car? did someone else help?

So I am driving this different way when I come upon a little dog, wet, muddy, and in the middle of the street picking at some food that had been dropped. He had a collar on and so I thought “What the heck, I have time to stop.” With the help of a woman who was nearby walking her 2 dogs, I was able to get this dog over to me and look at his tag. I called the number on the tag and left a message for the owner to call me back ASAP to find out what I ended up being able to do with the dog. I debated on putting him in my car because he really was wet and muddy, and my 2 kids were in the back seat. However, I thought anything in my car can be wiped down or washed whereas this dog would be hard to replace and would be missed. I didn’t want an opportunity like this to pass, especially the week before Christmas, all because a non-dog person like myself didn’t want to get my car dirty. So I picked him up, shoved him in, (Sophia was estatic by the way at having a dog in the car) and I headed toward the shelter. On my way the owner called me back. She talked me through how to get to her house and the funny thing is the dog only ended up being 2 blocks from his house. No one was home at the time so she said to just lift the garage door and put him in, her son would be home from school in a few hours and could get him out. I called her when it was done and wished her Happy Holidays. I was touched that she was so trusting of a stranger to have access to her home like that, but I guess I had already gone out of my way to pick up a strange dog and do all this so I must be a good person. I am glad this family still has their pet, especially before Christmas. I haven’t had a chance to clean my car yet so I still have a few muddy dog prints on my passenger seat, but it is a reminder to me to be charitable, in ANY way possible. If it hadn’t been for this one particular morning, I would have gone my usual way to work and who knows what could have happened with that dog. I am thankful for being in the right place, at the right time, with the right heart. Now go out and do some good deeds people!!!!

Categories: Heather, Weekly Family Update
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