Charlotte and the Stick

I know I still need to post about our trip to Virginia in more detail (with photos and all), but as that post is still a work in progress, I thought I would post these since I have a couple of minutes.

On Saturday we visited Bethany, a Presbyterian church near Papa's (Beta's dad's) childhood home. Papa is buried in the little cemetery surrounding it, so we took some pictures of his grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Once we got home, I noticed something interesting in one of the photos:
Don't see it? Look a little closer at Charlotte:


Knowing she didn't have a stick in her hand when I set her there, I went back a few shots:

"Ahh, what's this?"

"I've got something in my hand"

"Excellent, everyone is looking at the camera, not me. Yummy!"

Have a happy Friday!

Patriotic Pigtail

As I was looking at the photos of Charlotte from Virginia, I thought, "Wow, her hair gets to be such a mess!" Yesterday I found the solution.

I realized that Charlotte has enough hair to fit into a pigtail. I call it a pigtail, and not a ponytail, even though there is enough hair for only one, because a such little hair would make a very sad tail on any pony.

She's pretty much a cutie pie, even if I do say so myself. Our photo session lasted until she decided that she wanted to eat the dirt surrounding her. (Don't worry, I stopped her just in time!)




Now if only I could figure out how to get a bow on there too, without her noticing.

Baby Cate

I have been following this blog for only a few days. I don't know the family personally, but was emailed a request to pray for this 7 month old baby girl who was struggling to recover from surgery for a heart defect.

Her heart never beat on its own again, but I've never felt so uplifted by such sorrow. Pull out your tissues, but it's worth the read. http://catecantrell.blogspot.com.

Christian Family Reunion

First, a little background:

Every other year for the last 30 years the Christian Family has come together for a family reunion. Thirty years ago, the party consisted of my grandfather and his siblings (he was one of 7 children), along with their spouses, and all the ensuing kids and grandkids gathered together in Yorktown, Virginia. Of the original generation, only my grandfather's sister, Aunt Evelyn, and a husband of another one of his sisters, Uncle St. John, remain. On the up side, there is a whole new generation of kiddos in the family.

The 4th Generation:

We'd planned on making this trip for a while, so we were excited to finally get under way!

Thursday morning, me with the start of a stuffy head cold, Fred, Charlotte, and I picked up Ernest from my parents house (so we could all take just two cars) and drove to the airport park and ride. We were running a little behind and although we've loved ParkingCents Park and Ride in the past, I ended up wanting to bite my nails off. In the past when we've used them, they have had a bus for each terminal at the lot where they direct everyone to park. This day, not so much. We had to wait for a shuttle and then, yes, you guessed it, we were headed to the last terminal they hit; I was all the more frustrated when the driver drove PAST our terminal to go to another one first.

Alas, we made our flight and were on our way! Charlotte was good and slept and played with a minimal amount of fussing as the plane landed. In fact, because of my head cold, I think I fussed more on the way down! One of my ears did not pop until the next day, which means I couldn't hear much for the rest of the day.

Charlotte slept the whole way as we drove from Norfolk to the Duke of York Motel on the York River in Yorktown. Every reunion that we've spent in Yorktown over the past 30 years has been at this motel. The best part of the motel? The 4th floor opens up around a big lawn on top of a hill overlooking the river. We hang out under the trees and catch up until the wee hours of the morning as we watch the boats, often big Navy ships, go by.


On Friday Fred went golfing while Charlotte and I joined my uncle and two aunts, along with my sister Michele, our two cousins and their 4 kids to visit Williamsburg. Getting there turned out be be an unexpected adventure. We first thought we could take a trolley from the hotel to historic Williamsburg. That turned into a trolley and a bus, which turned into a trolley and 3 buses.

Charlotte showed her excitement at finally arriving by promptly falling asleep.

The kids got their photo taken in the stockade!

Unfortunately, once we got there, we could not spend a lot of time checking things out, because we had to catch the last buses back before they stopped running.

Back on the lawn after our adventure, Charlotte played with Cousin Betty. (She's my first cousin, once removed, and Charlotte's cousin, twice removed, for those of you who understand these things!) Charlotte loved being the center of attention the entire weekend.

After laughing at cousin Betty, Charlotte played on the grass with some of her second cousins.

We spent Saturday playing on the lawn and swimming in the pool before heading off for the big event of the reunion in Charles City County. On the way to dinner at Yeardly on the James River, my family stopped by Bethany Presbyterian Church to visit my Grandfather's grave.

Most of his grandkids and great-grandkids took this shot at his grave. You can read more about that here.

Bethany is near Woodbourne, the home where my Grandfather grew up and my Mom spent childhood vacations. When I was little, my family still owned the plantation house, and my mother now has a couple pieces of furniture from there, but this year we could only look down the tree-lined drive to the house and glimpse little more than the roof from the road. The house has been purchased and completely restored by Ann Tyler - a descendant of President John Tyler, who owned the house before the Christians. I searched for a photo online, but without luck. Hopefully we can make arrangements to see the house at our next visit.

Dinner was very yummy, and a huge thanks to my cousins who planned it, Molly and Gordon. Another thanks to our cousins Ned and Jack, and their wives, Sharon and Peggy, for taking time to make sure everything was set up - they share ownership of Yeardly, which was once their father's home.

Charlotte in the air:

After dinner we had the Christan family meeting - to talk about things like taxes for the property we did not sell when we sold Woodbourne. The property keeps the Christian name on the property tax books - maintaining something over 300 years of recorded living in Virginia.

I love this photo just because its like a "where's waldo?" kind of shot! Where's Charlotte?

Sunday before leaving Virginia, we visited another graveyard - something we all used to complain about as my Dad drug us to them all the time as kids. This one is pretty cool though, next to a church erected in 1689, and has the gravestone of one of our ancestors on my father's side, George Read. He is the grandfather of Thomas Nelson, who fought in the Revolutionary War. I love that my roots in this country go as deep as pre-revolutionary.

Fred took this photo by the grave:

After the graveyard, we went to the Yorktown Victory Center , went through the exhibit, went through the replica farm where we learned how the farmers made linen, and saw a revolutionary soldier camp complete with a mortar demonstration. It was loud, and Charlotte did not blink.

Fred took this great shot of the tobacco crops growing:

After the Victory Center, we headed back to Norfolk and back to Houston. We all had a great time and hope to stay a little longer next time!

Shameless Plug

I entered Charlotte (against every single cute baby in the country, I am sure) in the Parents Magazine Cover contest.

Recommend her! You can recommend her photo once a day, so recommend often :-).

http://www.parents.com/app/sharemy/photoDetails.jsp?photoId=220300220

You all rock :-)

We're Back!

We just got back from a fabulous, if too short, trip to Virginia with my family for the biannual Christian Family Reunion. Christian is my Mom's maiden name, and not some religious gathering, by the way, just in case some of you were wondering.

This year actually marked 30 years since the very first reunion in 1978. When I heard that, I thought, wow, 30 years is a long time. Then I realized June 1978 was only 2.5 years before I was born; I am getting old!

Anyway, the three of us had a blast. We took hundreds of pictures that I need to sort through and post in the next day or so. As, always, though, its good to be home with our Miss Maddie!

Funny Exam Answers

This is totally NOT baby related, but, after yet another evening of struggling to get Charlotte to go to sleep (has anyone seen the good sleeper who used to live here?), Fred suggested some laughter. I did not think it could be done.

www.funnyexamanswers.com

Fred, I am sorry I doubted you. I laughed so hard that I almost needed to borrow one of Charlotte's diapers.

Pool Time

Happy Father's Day!

Dearest Fred,

First, thanks for putting up with me the first 9.5 months of Charlotte's life to make it to today, your first father's day. "They" say kids put a strain on a marriage, and while ours hasn't remained strain-less, our sweet little girl has brought us so many joys.

Since Charlotte's birth, I have watched you meet and fall in love with your daughter and watched her carefully manipulate you around her pinky finger. I love watching you together and I love our little family. Thank you for the countless things you do for both of us.


I love you.

Another Classic Charlotte Moment

This morning, Fred was playing with Charlotte in the living room while I was doing some dishes. I hear, "Charlotte, don't eat the paper!" shortly followed by, "Elizabeth, I can't get it out of her mouth!"

I hurry into the room and sternly catch Charlotte's eye as I walk over, "Charlotte, NO, we do not eat paper."

In the moment before I bend down to fish the paper out, she swallows. Sure enough, as I peek between her teeth, I cannot catch any sign of paper.

As I let her little cheeks go and pull myself back to my full hight, she sticks her little tongue out and smiles at me.

Uh-huh. We are going to have big mischief with this one...

Doing Laundry

Charlotte thought it would be fun to help Mommy with the laundry, probably she thought it would be good to help with the clean diapers since she spends so much time dirtying them.

Mommy and the camera looked more interesting than the laundry.

Drama Queen

Charlotte loves avocados. A lot.

In fact, if I pull out an uncut avocado, she whines at me until she gets some.

Today, she was crawling happily across the living room and turned into the kitchen when I asked her if she'd like some avocado. Upon seeing the avocado in my hand, so began whine and crawled into the kitchen. I pulled out the cutting board and heard her whine a little louder.

I looked down just in time to see her lay flat on the floor, (on her tummy) extend her arm straight out in front of her and then bend it at the elbow. She then buried her little head in the crook of her arm and started crying. I couldn't help but laugh - who expects such drama from their 9-month-old?

Where is a video camera when you need it?

Precious Moments

I feel the previous post needs a happy moment to balance the negative drain :-)

Night Teeth-Terrors

Can we say wow?

Last night, our precious bug woke up around 10 pm and sent us on a sleepless battle that we haven't had in months!

10:00 PM - Bug wakes up. I knew she couldn't be hungry, and she quickly fell back asleep in the glider. Or so I thought. No sooner had I put her back in her crib when she started screaming again.

Okay, she's not asleep.

10:05 PM - Now, instead of a sleepy cry, her cry is slightly hysterical. I offer to nurse her. She obviously still isn't hungry, but pacifies herself to sleep and goes limp in my arms. Or so I think. This time she starts screaming hysterically as soon as I approach the crib, but calms and closes her eyes as soon as we walk back out of the room.

10:25 PM - We rock in the glider for a few minutes, with Charlotte apparently asleep, although with me wiser. Tired, I decide to move us to my bed where we can both sleep. As soon as I get to the door to her room, even though I am walking past it, eyes still closed, Bug bursts into hysterical cries yet again. I continue on, imagining the crying will cease once she realizes the crib is not our destination. Climbing into my bed, she continues in extreme hysterics. She wont' stop crying or trying to roll over and push up on my chest.

10:30 PM - Realizing the futility of laying in bed, we trek back to the glider. She will not close her eyes and continues in hysterics. I call for Fred to bring me the Tylenol...I have no doubt her the white spots under her gums are to blame. I can hardly get the Tylenol in her; she is so upset.
10:33 PM - Finally, I flip on a baby video, and enjoy the silence. We rock, she yawns and watches the video, eyes halfway open. Slowly I turn the volume lower and lower. When the volume hits 0 but the video is still running, I get my first "ba." She squirms a little. I turn off the video all together and try to rock my now calm child to sleep. She can't quite get comfortable in my arms, usually a sign that she's ready for me to lay her in the crib where she'll go to sleep.

10:45 PM - Bingo, she goes down without a peep. I crawl into bed and cross my fingers.

10:50 PM - The hysterical crying returns. I pass her off to Fred.

11:35 PM - She cries as Fred puts her back in the crib.

Maybe she'll just cry for a minute and then go to sleep.

A minute turns into three and she's reached levels of hysteria that I can't live with, so I go pick her up.

11:45 PM - There is no calming her down.

We decide to take a midnight joy ride. A couple of dollars in gas later, she's finally out cold and hardly stirs when I move her from the car to her crib.

12:26 AM - I'm jolted awake by another bout of hysterical screaming. She nurses herself back to sleep and appears passed out in my arms. We rock for 20 minutes after she goes limp.

12:53 AM - Charlotte comes to bed with me. She squirms, sprawling herself over my half of the bed, leaving me hanging onto the edge for dear life. My arm keeps falling asleep as I struggle to get comfortable on 6 inches of mattress.

We don't co-sleep often (actually, not once since she started crawling), so I'm paranoid that a blanket will get over her face or she'll roll into Fred's or my pillow. I keep waking up to make sure none of the above has happened.

5:00 AM - I look over at Charlotte who doesn't seem to be moving and sleepily put my arm on her back. She doesn't budge. I freak out and shake her.

She moves! Yay! She's alive.

Oh crap, she's tossing around.

Whew, she seems to be drifting back to sleep.

5:45 AM - Charlotte wakes again, hungry (normal timing).

5:55 AM - Stomach full, Charlotte crawls back and forth between her (not quite) sleeping parents, using me to stand up and smacking Fred on his head.

5:57 AM - Charlotte cries for a moment as I slide her playful bum back into her own crib.

7:55 AM - A happy Bug greets me with big smiles as I go in to get her.

And the misery of the night before is all forgotten.

Well, almost ;-).

New Favorite Photo

Swimming

Who knew we had a little fish on our hands? Charlotte has NO FEAR in the watter. She did a little bounce standing on the steps and merely looked surprised when she ended up with a mouthful of water. After that, she tried to CRAWL out of my arms and into the water. She has no clue that she can't swim.

Here she is in the pool toy Beta bought for her.

I couldn't help but have a little fun with photoshop.

I think I know where we'll be spending much of our summer.

Why use the video camera?

I captured this sequence the other day of Maddie and Charlotte. Thank heavens Miss Maddie loves/tolerates Miss Charlotte:

Maddie gently taking her bone back from Charlotte:

Charlotte eyeing the bone:
Charlotte trying to take the bone back:
Charlotte wondering why Maddie did not stay:
Charlotte following Maddie:
Watch out, Maddie! She's back!

Charlotte spent a good 15 minutes chasing Miss Maddie and her rawhide strip back and forth across the room. Thankfully, Maddie gently takes it out of Charlotte's little hands and basks in the praise and attention I give her for being so gentle!