"No Follow Me"

On Wednesday last week, Darwin had to pick Amie up from school right after lunch to take her to a doctor appointment.
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I typically tell her about these type of unexpected changes that morning. Because if I tell her too far in advance, she will obsess and drive me crazy....but I know she needs to know about it sometime before it occurs, so she can get adapted to the change.....Well - I messed up and didn't tell her.
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So, Darwin gets there & she looks up and sees him and says, "No, you go home." Darwin tells her that she has an appointment and that they need to leave. She argued with him a bit and finally realized she was not going to win. She reluctantly got her stuff and began walking out of the building at which time she says to Darwin. "Amie really angry." "No follow me"
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Not sure what she thought she was going to do when she got to the truck if Darwin didn't follow her to the truck!
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She told him this many times that day. She told me that night. And on Friday when I told her that I would be picking her up early.....she told me the story again.
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"Amie really angry" "Amie tell my Daddy, No follow me"!!
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LOL!! Oh Miss Amie - I love your stories!!

Night of chuckles!

Sooooooo a few nights ago, after Amie was in bed......and here is what we found!!

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She could have at least let him have some privacy!! :)

The end of summer...

The look of the end of summer........

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Crop Circle??

Nope - where the pool was - pool season....over!

Labor Day 2010

I was honored to have two of my cousins at our house on Labor Day!! I have only seen David a handful of times outside of funerals over the past decade or so!! And I got to meet his beautiful wife too!

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So David and Tiara tried to play "Minute to Win It"......move a cookie from your forehead to your mouth only using your facial muscles.

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Well.....

Ok - So David failed.....How did Tiara do?

She did no better....but isn't that a LOVELY picture!!! :)

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In the background is the Lovely Olga - as always - I didn't do a great job of getting pictures of everyone.....must be my yakking muscles too busy... :)

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Amie and Kylee wore out after swimming (and it was a bit nippy)

Grandma Hays, Justin and Janet....that's all that made it onto film....

It was a beautiful day! The weather couldn't have been better (just the water a little warmer and a little less windy)! Everyone had a nice time & no fights broke out!! :)

Milestone is MileHigh!

The new Milestone building at OSF St. Francis Medical Center in Peoria has some really cool new features!! Not only is there a kid center gift shop (Amie of course wanted everything in it).

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But there was a SUPER COOL kids play area that had three circles on the ground that would change color and design as the kids walked over them!! They were projectors from above, and as the light was intersected, the design would change.

They didn't have these cool things when I was a kid!!

When you're tired...

Baby Girl was so tired (and it's only Wednesday) - this is what I saw in the back of our truck!

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She turned her jacket into some type of Little Red Riding Hood thing & out she went!

Kindergarten is hard work!!

Out of the Mouth of Babes....

"Amie - what did you draw there?"
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"Daddy"
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"What's Daddy doing?" (noticing the lines in the middle of the body - thinking it was maybe his arms holding something....)
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"That Daddy tooting"!
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PRICELESS!!!

The color of guilt is......blue!

Amie.................why do you look so.......guilty??

Oh - I see we've had fun!

Anyone seen a blue yard before?

"Amie Love Baby Cat"

We have two cats that we've had since they were kittens. They are about 13 years old now.
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They are sisters & they are opposites. Scooter lives upstairs with us & Darwin is his favorite person. She is tempremental & finicky. She doesn't like to be held and only likes to be petted on her terms. Nicki is much larger (almost twice the size of Scooter), she lives with Tim. Tim is her favorite person. She's not crazy about being held either - but she's much more "sweet" - especially to Tim.
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Well - Amie wants a cat she can waller with - like Grandma's cat. She calls Scooter, "Amie Baby Cat" because she's smaller. And when Scooter is slow enough to not run off when Amie comes by - she gets lugged all over the place!
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"Amie Love Baby Cat" ---- too bad it's not a reciprocal relationship!

"Ogres have layers"

So - you all know how much Amie loves to repeat certain sentences that she hears. One that she repeats often is, "You have layers" from Shrek.
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The background is that Donkey is talking about how Ogres have layers like onions.
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So quite often, Amie will pop up with, "You have layers" & we'll say, "No - you have layers" & then she says, "No - Ogres have layers". This plays out multiple times a week!
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A funny connection to this was while I was cutting up onions a week or so ago, she started in with it. And after we went back and forth a few times - she made this look we see often (mouth cock-eyed to the side & open on the other side) & then talks something that she is almost not wanting us to hear. So I had to ask her a few times what she was saying - then she pointed at the onions I was cutting & said, "Amie like that".
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I laughed & said - I don't think Amie likes onions. "Yeah Amie do". So - I said, you want a piece & she said "yeah yeah yeah!"
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So I gave her a piece & she took a bite and and made a face. I said, how is it. She said "Amie like"

She went to the living room to show Daddy - but soon after she told me "Amie done". I told her it was ok to not like it.

I know she didn't "really" like it - but she wouldn't admit it!!

"Amie like frossing"

What can you say when you walk back into the sun room and see this?

Not much of anything.....except get the camera! LOL

Happy Birthday Darwin - 64 years old??

WOW - Your 64 years old this year??? I didn't realize you were that much older then me! After all - I'm like 32 years old!!

Amie picked out his cake again! It took everything I could do to keep her from getting him Princesses, Ariel, Dora or such!! She settled on Star Wars!

Blowing out the candles - hey is someone helping?

We ordered it as a cupcake cake - so that Darwin could share it with his co-workers, since we had to celebrate the day before his birthday.....but he forgot to take it with -- so we had no choice but to eat the rest of it!!

Soooooo tempting!!

After a fun filled romp in the pool.....it is so tempting to play in the sand!!

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I didn't catch her this particular time - I looked out and instead of playing on her play house - she was playing in the sand!

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Oh what a lovely mess!! This was my view out the window...

I came outside & she realizes she's been caught...

And goes right back to it!!

Her ultimate goal.....you guessed it - to get the blue sand stuck all over herself!!

Oh how proud she is!!

Ya know those little sugar things.

Ya know those little sugar things.......the ones where you like on a sucker and then dip the wet sucker into a container of colored sugar? Ya - well Amie had to have a little blue one (no surprise on the color) & then thought it was hysterical that she turned blue!!

And of course she wanted to take a picture of me - so I had to do a tongue sticking out picture don't ya know!!

A bracelet....

Amie made me a bracelet the other day.....................it's stickers!

Imaginations are wonderful!

Imaging Department Mission 2010

The imaging department did a magnificent job once again in gathering school supplies for area schools and children in need!!

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As you can see - we had a huge amount of supplies that were donated....

And we also gave another $600 check!!

Hopefully this will allow more of our most needy kids concentrate on their school work, not on how they are going to get paper, pencils, etc!!