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What makes a grown man cry?

What makes a grown man cry?

That would be:

While we were rolling down the street the other day... having been on the road long enough for both kids to knock out (after a long day of being stuck at the house)... with the windows down and the music up and just feeling like, This is it! THIS is what we work so hard for during the week... to enjoy THIS!

In this moment Mark and I are talking about random things and on a random occasion he happened to look in the back seat at the perfect moment of a sleepy girl opening her sleepy eyes, seeing that daddy was looking at her so she gave him that pretty girl smile she gives.... hearing the music that was on (salt n peppa) raising an arm to bounce with the beat and bop her little sleepy head for just a few beats until she she couldn't take it anymore and fell right back to sleep!


That.... THAT RIGHT THERE... will make a grown man cry! 

complete and utter cuteness that oozes from his own flesh and blood... the daughter that has him pretty much wrapped around her little fingers! 


While you're here, check out our new family pictures take by tammy stayton photography (that'd be my sister) if you stop by her website tammystaytonphotography.com let her know i sent ya! 

This one we got a 20x20 canvas in... love it!

 

Boogie Woogie BRAINS

So it's been pretty crazy around the arms household - i have been so busy with my photography side job i dont have time for much else after trying to be a full time legal assistant, a mother to 2 who keep me incredibly busy and then on top of all that i still have to be a wife of SOME SORT! lol yea i have like 2 maybe 3 wifely duties that i have to keep up with.

here are the kids on easter... pardon the "cracked out" crazy messy mouths - they had chocolate for breakfast! LOL HEY DONT JUDGE ME! it was Easter damn it!

Kay is getting to big turned 18 months on Friday the 13th, the older she gets the more her little personality shows and i tell ya she has got a little "MEAN GIRL" attitude. It's just been here recently so i think she having a growth spurt or just testing the boundaries.  
Currently her favorite things to play with: SHOES and she says "she-ewws"
funny word is "KEY-KACK" that'd be Kitty Cat.
FAVORITE word is NO... and she says it often in her little sassy pants style. no no and shakes her head to reiterate! lol
Her teachers tell me how smart she is and her and one other girl in her class are already talking so well that you can carry on a conversation with them.
She does sign language also - she says more and please all the time. it's pretty cute when she thinks your not paying attention to her and as soon as she gets a glimpse of you getting ready to look at her she is swiping her chest with her hand - saying MORE MORE

BRAT!

Tre is less than a week from turning 5.. yep, i said it, FIVE!! Only 4 short months from starting REAL school and im sure that's just a whole other adventure in its self. I haven't considered him a "baby" for a long time but this whole starting school thing is really pushing my "baby button" he is just so "grown" now and its awesome at the same time as scary that he is getting ready to start school because he is very intelligent and i know he is going to ROCK it out but it's just the feeling of putting your child "out into the world" i know it's school but there are more choices and decisions he will be able to make for him self and it may sound bad but im just not sure he is will make the right choices! We have been having some issues about his decision making skills here recently so im sure the i am glad we have already had our second and final child because i would REALLY be having some baby fever right now.

I recently did some newborn shoots for my photography business and OH MY GOODNESS.... how i LOVE a new fresh baby! the tiny, squishy, warm little bodies, the newborn smell, the velvety skin the teeny tiny little toes and fingers... SWOON! <3
These types of shoots make my ovaries ache... lol i know that's a super weird thing to say but baby fever is nothing to play with. but LIKE I SAID... Kay is our final child... no more, we're DOOOONE MAN... just like those dishes (old school peeps should know what im talking about HINT: "Don't tell mom the babysitters dead")

Mark and i have been trying to work out as much as possible since December... i am pretty sure i have lost somewhere around 5 pounds or something but i know im losing inches because my pants are all fitting a little looser than they use to.

It's an everyday routine, since Tre started Karate too... I wake up, get the kids together, they go to school, i go to work, i work all day, pick the kids up, get home around 530 or so to a husband who is ready to go, i get my gym clothes on while mark gives the kids a snack, we run to the gym and by run i mean we drive! lol in time for my 6pm class, we work out for and hour and a half while the kids play on the playground/kid sitting area and then we go home and eat, take baths and go to bed.

This was the routine monday thru friday - mon, wed and fri for my classes then tues and thurs for tre's karate... ahhh the things we do for our children. But he moved up so fast in his karate class that he is already in the next class up which starts at 645 instead of six so on tues and thurs we get a little break and can eat BEFORE we go to the gym... that IS if Tre even wants to go. For a couple weeks he hasn't wanted to go he would rather play outside with his daddy... which i totally get because the weather is getting nice and it's time to be outside... maybe we'll just keep karate a winter sport. idk.  :o)

Anyway - life is good and yay for that... i hope to update more often but with things going like they have been.. idk. Im sure all FIVE of my readers are going to be terribly upset. :P

It's not the weekend!

Cuteness and monster noises have been happening at the Arms household!


Kaylin does this grr sound that is super funny only because when you repeat the sound she laughs hysterically like you just poked her rib or something. So cute... I wish I had video to share! IDEA!

So yesterday on the way to school Tre got upset with me and was pouting about something trivial and Kaylin looks over at him and "grrrrr" at first Tre just rolled his eyes, trying not to laugh and said "sissster" and looked away. she did it again and Tre said... "you wearin me out sister!" which I thought was funny n I laughed and then she did it again to him which this time made him react the way she wanted and he laughed and grrr'd back!



Just a few moments before that Tre had called his pawpaw to wish him happy birthday and he was talking and I heard him tell pawpaw it's not the weekend.. didn’t think anything of it and when I got on the phone to talk to nana she said pawpaw asked Tre if he wanted to come over for some birthday cake tonight and Tre told him no pawpaw it's not the weekend. LOL my kid is so cute with his grown up reasoning and understanding of things.



I think Tre got beat up for the first time :o(

I am very, I don’t even know the emotion I was having... at first I was like... well that's just what boys do but then when Tre told me the details of what happened I was PISSED!

I took both the kids to the gym with me last night so that Mark could work some OT and not have to worry about the kids and what they are destroying or who just fell off what. Dropped em off at the child care at the gym for a buck each and went to my cardio combat class for an hour and a half. When I came back to pick them up and go home the sitter was holding Tre's hand and walking with him while he had the other hand in his mouth crying. not just a regular old cry but a hyperventilating type of cry. So I asked him what is wrong and he said that some kid kicked him right here and pointed to his penis. I said someone kicked you right there? was it an accident? he said no so I tried to take him and calm him down and get sister at the same time and when the culprit was put in time out for his wrong doings I realized, this kid is like 4 inches smaller than Tre... what's he got, LITTLE MAN SYNDROM already!?!?! So here I am 32 years old with my two babies in my lap mean muggin a 3 or 4 year old and thinking GOOD you get what you get what you deserve you little shit head, because he was crying that he was getting a time-out. LOL ughh my life. So we leave and get in the car on the way home I am grilling him like what happened and why did he do that and what'd you do and all that jazz. He tells me he was watching a little boy play Mario cart and the boy didn’t want him to watch him and all he was doing was watching and then he got "punched" in the eye (looked more like a scratch) and he said he "turned his head" like this and hurt his neck which when demonstrated looked like he was trying to break his neck... then he kicked him in the ding ding... I mean SERIOUSLY!! All just for wanting to watch a video game... yea that just switched me over to flaming hot... I was pissed. I told Tre that if that happened again I wanted him to come back and hit him harder... he said ok mom I also said I don’t ever... EVER want him to START a fight but he better finish that crap!



on to less stressful events... Kaylin likes when you smell her feet and act like you’re going to throw up! HAHAHA her big ol belly laugh is awesome and I swear I could smell her little "popcorn butter" smelling toes for hours and she would continue to laugh hysterically! must have video of that too!

and here is my little boogie sleeping - this is my project 52 with the chic critique forms... thought i'd share :o)

Your baby can read

You know your baby can read? Yeah... we have that video system... it was too boring for Tre - by the time we got it for him he was already into Elmo and Sesame Street so that was just too drab for him to sit and watch repetitive screens and words.
BUT he is only 4 months away from being 5 and is learning to read. For the longest time he has known all the sounds that the letters make, vowels were always particularly tricky but he knew at least the short sound to most. He told me over the weekend that he could spell play. i said ok how do you spell it... he said puh, P...ell, L... aye, A... what do you think comes next? i said you tell me, you told me you could spell it, he thought for a moment or maybe he was testing me to see if i would give him the answer but then he says... im gonna think it's a Y. WOW THAT WAS AWESOME! applauded applause for my baby genius! LOL j/k
So YEAH my 4 year old spelled PLAY! whoo hoo... i was then of course quizzing him on all the words he knows how to spell and he has all the 2 letter words i could think of down pat and the 3 letter words and he gets the rhyme (change the first letter to make a new word) concept. So my boy is well on his way to actual reading!! I am so proud of him.

He is also a writing fool - he writes random things like anytime he has free time he is writing in his notebook, his name and mom and nana and more of his name and then proceeds to copy every word in sight and then comes to ask me what it says, says being with a long A sound lol i love that because he gives me that "my little baby" feel. but generally i correct him intently when he says words wrong. Like that 2 equals 2 is 4 thing... oh my gawsh that makes me nuts! but at least he is getting the fact that if you have 2 items and add a certain amount you get a new number... he is so quick to catch on to things, SMART, like his daddy.

My little boogey is 15 months today!! Friday the 13th and boogey turns 15 months, right along side my little brother who turns 15 today! but i digress.. my little kay bug is getting so big and her opinion is just as big if not bigger... she has been cutting so big teeth for a while now and make me CRAZY in the process... how come Tre cut teeth and i never even KNEW about it and when Kay does EVERYONE knows!! lol SO not like her brother, not that i expected her to be... i actually knew she was going to be more opinionated and not as laid back because 1 she is a FEMALE and 2 she is child 2! She is a mess tho - i wouldn't trade her for anything in the world. Love that squishy little eating fool to death... and those big blue eyes combined with those big kissable/punchable cheeks of hers i mean how can anyone resist her?? i think she needs to be on toddlers and tiaras, even tho we dont do pageants... my kid is BEAUTIFUL!!



PS Happy birthday bro - you will never know how much you truly mean to me.

Top 11 of 2011

 The following photos are of my family - these are the top 11 of my favs. 


11. The first photo i took of my little boy that i felt had professional quality. Obviously it's "over edited" but i was just starting out and well... i dont have to explain how NEW photogs can get when getting use to editing and learning new skills.

 


10. my family SOOC- taken at Red River Gorge - Mark and I use to make several trips a year to this area and do primitive camping, until we "almost died" while camping one memorial weekend - then we had kids! 

  


9. SOOC - i love this photo for the expression on his face, we were at the KY State fair and dad just won him this HUGEMONGOUS sword and he thought it was the coolest thing in the world, for a moment!

 


8. My babies SOOC, they were both in Cousin Stephanies wedding at Hubers in Indiana and they were just looking too darn cute and i had to snap a few photos of them all fancied up. They do a good job posing and ROCKED it out for the Photogs doing the wedding.

 


7. SOOC -The day after Thanksgiving, while getting our Christmas decor out, all Tre could talk or think about was our OVERSIZED santa hat it's about 7ft long. He was so happy when we finally got to it he ran around like a crazy man for 20 minutes after we found it.

 


6. SOOC- Tre at his finest... playing!! Love the expression on his face because you KNOW he is having a good time. I mean seriously, would you even have to ASK if he is having the time of his life?

 


5. My first mini session with my baby girl - she is 10 months old in this photo and it was the first time i really took a moment with my brand new "professional" camera and made some great photos of my baby girl. at this point, i still had no clue what i was doing with it, i was just pushing the button and hoping for the best. they turned out pretty good but i love the reaching for me that she is doing here.

 


4. The very first day i brought my new camera home... taking pictures of this one is like cat n mouse, you have to bribe or it's not going to work. but he must have known i NEEDED to shoot because he did really good and let me take at least 12 photos that day. i love this one because you can see his long lashes and for some drama i went with a black and white conversion.

  


3. My beautiful baby girl on Christmas day - this pic is a fav because she just looks so dang on BIG *cries*

 


2. SOOC- I believe this is the first family photo we have of us after the one that was taken in the hospital - this is me n my family on Kaylins special day. Being baptized!

 


1. Its interesting that i call myself a photographer and i find myself anxious at the thought of a "session" with my own kids. i can run and play and be totally understanding when clients children run and don't want to sit still, i have NO PROBLEM chasing and playing and making a game out of it. But when it comes to my OWN children... i have NO PATIENCE and it just seems like so much work. Maybe because i have to be the parent AND the photographer i dont know what the reasons are but i wish i could figure it out because being the beaming proud momma that i am i feel like i have the cutest kids in the world of course and they should be shot... LOL love the play on words but i mean shot with a camera :o)

 

They are so funny!

Couple of days ago i am in the morning routine, trying to get Tre out of his bed to get his clothes on so i can get sister dressed and we can be on our way. he is giving me trouble, because he doesn't want to go to school and he wants to stay home and he wont get out of bed and get his clothes on he just keeps laying there. so i figured I'd go get sister out of her bed who is over there just sitting in her bed like a good girl. i walk over too her and when i reach down to pick her up she grabs her blanket and covers up with it as she is throwing herself on her pillow like, 'i don't want to get up' JUST LIKE BROTHER!! omg the two of them crack me up - mark and i being only children growing up really had/have no clue what sibling interaction is like or suppose to be but every time i see them interact and enjoy each others company it does the following:
1. makes me melt
2. makes me jealous that i didn't have a brother growing up lol of course that is a normal reaction because i have only child syndrome "everything is about me" haha

i mean... look at that picture - how stinkin cute are they? This was taking this weekend trying to pull together a Christmas card photo that we can give to people... it didnt work too well. it was cold even tho the sun was out and kay was tired and had been fighting naps all day and tre was crazy cracked out on (smh) i have NO CLUE what he was cracked about but yeah it was a total of 10 minutes of chaos! lol Tripod set up marked the spot with a golf ball and how awesome, they totally move out of the spot when they all come outside so i have to reset and refocus and kaylin is getting cranky and lol it was pretty much FUNNY! im sure that if the neighbors were watching us they were laughing too. but regardless of all that it really doesn't get any cuter than the two of them!! Those are my babies right there... your looking at the reason i call myself mommy and the whole purpose of my life. LOVE!