Merry Christmas!!!

Merry Christmas from the Forthman family!!

"For unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given..."

Hope everyone has a blessed day!!!

Adventures in Babysitting

So I'm niece-watching for a couple of days this week due to the fact the my sister's babysitter decided to run for her life take a little Christmas vacay!!  She's my "little girl I'm never gonna have", so I don't mind her being around at all!!

Love.Her.

She came with a little somethin' extra today!!  See, she's already celebrated one Christmas with my bro-in-law's side of the family, and this is what she ended up with...

a 7-week old Shitzu named Lolli!! 

How cute is she?!?!?

Now, I don't have a problem with dogs at all!!  But today, I was really wishing this little houseshoe of a dog was not here!!  Because this is what happened!!

Hesley fell in love with Lolli...like didn't want to let her go love! So everytime he had her this is what Emma was doing...

sobbing her little eyes out...sometimes it was a blood curdling scream!!

I finally had to make them put Lollie in the laundry basket so she could rest...they had worn her out!!

In all fairness to the children, there was ONE small moment of sharing and happiness...

But don't let 'em fool ya...as soon as the camera clicked, Hesley took off with her and the fight was on!!!!

Labor of Love

I heard this song for the first time in church this morning, and it brought tears to my eyes. Hope you love it as much as I did.

Heavy Metal

No...it's not the music I'm listening to right now.

Nor am I building a skyscraper out of big pieces of steel.

It's a reference to a milestone that happened  to Hesley  this week.

Nothing major, like potty training, or first words, or even that first little gassy grin.

He got braces!!  You know, your teeth are jacked up  we want to make your smile pretty, kind of braces.

He's only 7, so we were in no way prepared to do this at such a young age, but a visit to the dentist a few weeks ago deemed it necessary.

Here he is before....

And here he is after...

And he is quite proud of his braces!!

He keeps buggin' the snot out of me tapping me on the shoulder and grinning at me to show me.  I smile back and nod giving my full support of his proudiness when what I really want to say is...

"Yes son, I know you have braces!!  I wrote the check...remember!!"

Bestest Buddies

Most of you know my "IRL" bestie, Amber (AKA Rascalraiser) !! 

You know, the one that hijacked my blog!! 

And for those of you that know her, whether it be "IRL" or through cyberspace, know that she has 3 adorable rascals!!

Today the middle of the rascals came to play!! And what fun they had!! And how it warmed my heart!!

  It wasn't their Wii playing...

 or their construction paper knight costumes they "made" for each other...

or their pretend deer hunting that warmed my heart...

Nope....it was this....

Just two bestest buddies doin' what bestest buddies do!!

Hijacked

Howdy, y'all!!

I decided to hijack Jen's blog since she has decided to neglect it so. I have a soft spot in my heart for the underdog, and it has been breaking my ticker that this blessed blog has two posts. TWO!

Poor precious blog.

So I hogtied Jennifer, wrestled her passwords out of her, and skedaddled right over to fill up some space. Because it's just not right to have all this free air in cyberspace and nobody breathing it.

I asked Jen what I could discuss over here on these parts, and she just shrugged and grinned at me.

So....I've decided to take it upon myself to just ramble for a bit. And dish a bit of Jen's dirt. (Although dirt may not be the optimum word here.) You're welcome.

First of all, Jennifer is probably the most compulsive (and the most clean) of all my friends. Did you know that she actually cleans her house on a regular basis? So impressy with her. Actually, I try not to dwell on that too long, because it can start making me feel really bad about the fishstick crumbs that are living under my table and the sour laundry that is living in my washer.

Just the other day, Jen was complaining about her house, saying that it was dirty, and actually made the comment that she was horrified with herself because she only has been vacuuming once a week. Whatchu talkin' bout, Willis? Vacuuming once a week is like turbo-cleaning at my house.

She also does laundry. And puts it away. I'm so confused. She probably even folds it. Gasp.

And she cleans her car.

And does her dishes.

And changes the sheets on the beds on a regular basis.

It's okay. If you are finding yourself irritated with her cleanliness, I understand. She's super cleany. And particular. And a self-admitted OCD-ist.

But I still love her.

And as much as she tells me not to worry about it, I do get mini-moths and micro-butterflies when she comes to my house. Because I clean...um...rarely. But I blame it on my children. Because they make me crazy.

But she did make me feel amazingly better the other night.....

Because when we were at her house for KGroup (the small home groups at our church), we spotted ceiling fan fuzz.

And it made me giddy.

Like brand new shoes on a fall day with an ice cream cone in one hand and a prepaid credit card in the other giddy.

Yes. It was THAT good.

You're welcome.


*This post written by Amber over at Raising Rascals.*

Cloudy With A Chance of Wild Things

So we had a little crazy weather 'round these parts the other night...which is not unusual for Arkansas!!


Day started out a little cloudy, sprinkled a few annoying drops of rain, then the sun came out!! No prob. Ten seconds later (okay...maybe a little longer than that), it starts!! Lightening so bright you could read a book outside, and thunder so loud that if you had a bladder control problem, you would pee your pants 'cuz you jumped everytime it boomed!!


That's what was going on outside!! Inside got just as crazy!!


I was happily watching Survivor, eagerly awaiting Grey's Anatomy, when everything went black!! Totally, completely, and utterly black!!


Then the screaming began!! Not me. (Although it's been know to happen!! ) The screaming would be my son and my 2 year old niece who were in the bathtub when said darkness occurred!! Not good!! I figured I would have two soaking wet little naked bodies come running into the living room, but they didn't, they just screamed!!


I fumbled to the bathroom, managed to bathe them by candlelight, and made it back to the living room without tripping over the 587413985 blocks that were scattered all over the floor!! Whew!!


Since I couldn't turn on a "mobie" (that's "movie" for all you non toddler speaking adults out there), we decided to do the next best thing!! We curled up in the big chair and read books!! By candlelight, of course!!


We read this...

My mind wandered to how nice it would be if we really could go outside and have our food fall from the sky!! No more spending money on groceries!! But I digress.

Then we read this...

The "wild things" wanted to get up and do the wild rumpus like the monsters do in the book!!

At the time, I thought it was such an inconveniece for the lights to be out!! I quickly realized that if they weren't out, I wouldn't be cuddled up with my two babies!! I would probably be yelling at them to "hush" so I could hear the tv!! So for just a moment I was thankful the lights were out!! Cuz who wouldn't want to hang with these "wild things"!!

Starting Over (But Not Meaning To)

So...

Something has happened to my blog. All my posts are gone and I'm not sure why!! They've just dissappeared! So I'm taking this opportunity to start over!!

I haven't been very consistent in my posting anyway, but I'm really going to try harder to keep it up this time!! I get so caught up reading everyone else's and don't take time to post on my own. Anyway...here's to second chances and opportunities for starting over!!