Ella's first real BooBoo

My poor little girl was attacked by a dining room chair! She pulled it over backwards and hit her head and her eye! And where was Mommy? About 5 feet away in the kitchen! I felt so bad. Her little eye lid got a small cut and bled a little bit which freaked me out! I called the nurse line and they cleared her after asking me a list of questions. So I'm glad to say she's absolutely fine... she'll just look like a prize fighter for a few days! :o)

I am so excited... we finally got a new computer! It is a Dell and we got it at Sams today. I really like it so far. I am getting used to Vista but I think I like it. While at Sams, we stopped for a slice of pizza (Anson's favorite). As we were eating, Anson put his little arm around me and said "Don't worry Mommy, I'll protect you. See? You don't have to be scared!" I don't know where that came from but It was pretty cute. Just think, he will be the head of his own family someday! We have to prepare him well!!!! Well, I hope you have a Happy Labor Day!

Ella's New Tricks!

Tonight at dinner Ella learned how to make a funny sound by putting her hand over her mouth while saying "ahhhhh"! She was very happy with her new discovery! I thought it was very creative on her part...none of us taught her how to do it!

And this is Ella performing her new baby sign for light! It's a montage of her new sound, her sign, and unashamedly clapping for herself!

Hope you have a great night!

Weekend Visitors

4 Generations...Toto, Dusty and Ella, Papaw, and Anson

Papaw and Lillian

Papaw and Ella

We had a great visit this weekend with Dusty's Mom, or as she is known to her grand kids, Toto! She took her father, "Papaw", and his friend Lillian on a trip to Indiana to see some family and they stopped here on their way back to FL. Megan went along too and had a very exciting time "with the old people" - her quotes exactly! She was the designated driver and drove the whole way! What a gal! Papaw had a great time reminiscing and we heard lots of neat stories from earlier years and listened to World War II era music. You would never be able to tell that he is 90 years old! Anson ate up all the attention and was quite excited to see everyone! And Ella had fun showing off her new skills, such as standing, waving, clapping, doing the baby sign for light, and... wait for it...

She took her first step! Yea! Ella took a step toward Toto! Toto said "Did she just take a step?" and I said, "I guess she did!" So that was fun! Then she did it again walking toward Dusty. She's getting the hang of it now so I'm sure she'll be taking off soon. And like I said above, she now knows her first sign. We have been trying to teach her "light" for a while now and she finally did it a few days ago! (Open and closing fingers) We are all at the table and Dusty said "Look Ella, light!" She looked up at the light and, with a huge smile, did the sign with her hand. Well, Anson and Dusty and I all clapped and carried on and made her do it over and over. So now every time she does the sign for light, she smiles and claps! It's so cute. I'll have to video her. Lastly, Here is a cute video of Anson waiting for his Daddy to get home. After taking this video, he ran to the window to watch for Dusty and said "Mommy, I will call him Dusty and you call him Daddy, OK?" What a kid.

Happy Friday!

Back yard play area after the big clean-up and pressure wash!

Our un-welcome visitor!!

Anson, hard at work!

She finally has enough hair to have bed-head!

Her adorable new dress! Thanks Roxanna!!

We did a lot of work around the house this week...actually outside the house. We cleaned out the garage and pressure washed the back driveway and play area. While cleaning out the garage, Dusty found a small nest of Black widow spiders! He killed a mommy and baby and showed me so I would know where they were and what they looked like. Yuk! Well, the next day I was out front turning on the hose and there was another black widow right in the corner by the front door!!!! So of course I ran in to get my camera (the kids were sleeping) and took his picture before our "come to Jesus" meeting with my shoe! I have thoroughly sprayed the perimeter and every nook and cranny so I hope we don't see any more!

Anson enjoyed the outside time this week, playing ball, digging in his sand box and playing with his bulldozer. We have had such mild weather compared to all of you in Florida!!! We are just now getting some "Fay action" with some strong breezes and some clouds. In fact, when the brunt of the storm was in central Florida, we were at the pool with sunny skies! Weird that we're only a few hours away yet drastically different weather. I'm glad to hear that all of our family and friend are OK!

Oh, Ella took her first step...In the pool!!! Does that count? She was holding onto the side, turned to see me and took a step forward! So far she has not taken one on dry land, so we're still waiting for the official first step. I think it will be soon!

Well, I hope you have a great weekend!

Don't be deceived...pass it on!

You are probably way ahead of me in current events... Since we don't have a TV at home and I am always listening to kids CD's in the car, I rarely hear news and I'm always behind on what's new in the world. It usually doesn't bother me much, to tell you the truth. But yesterday I heard about a book that has become a huge hit and I had not even heard of it. Maybe you have... The Shack. Evidently it was on Oprah's big list (warning #1!!) and the New York Times Best Seller list etc. It was written by William P. Young and if you want to read about him just Google his name. But this is the deceiving part...it is supposedly a novel about God's grace and mercy and written to answer the age old question "Why does God allow bad things to happen and suffering to take place?" He tries to explain the Holy Trinity in human terms and ends up portraying God the Father as an African American woman who morphs into a white haired man,(trying to prove that God is both man and woman) Jesus the son as a middle eastern man, and the Holy Spirit as an Asian woman. Despite the pure heresy, many Christians have been deceived by their emotions(because it is a very emotional story line) into thinking that this book is some great work of theology! The author may have been raised as a Christian missionary kid but he is now a Christian Universalist who believes that Jesus is a way, not THE way to God. Even Eugene Peterson, who has written his own very widely used version of the Bible (The Message) has endorsed this book and has called it "This generation's Pilgrim's Progress"... very disturbing! People are buying this book by the case and giving it away because they think it is "better than the Bible". Everything I have just written came from our Pastor, Dr. Michael Youssef. He took the time to preach on this subject yesterday because so many Christians are being deceived by this book. If you want to hear more, listen to his sermon in entirety by clicking here, then click "On Demand 24/7" ... then "The Shack Uncovered" under archives. He explains it much better that I do in 30 mintes! I just wanted to share this with you and hopefully you can share it with someone else. Also, let me know what you think by posting a comment!

Take time to smell the hydrangeas...

No, they don't really have a smell in case you were wondering! But Anson and Ella had fun smelling them anyway. Our hydrangea bush was rather sparse this year, I think because of the fall/winter drought. But with the rain we've been having recently we had a few more blooms appear.

Here is a recent video of Ella "talking" and smiling and waving and just being her normal cute self! :o)

Have a great weekend!

My reader...

I just happenned to catch Anson in a still, quiet moment! I had to capture this on film (or in pixels) because it was so cute to me... his little feet together, perched on top of the couch cushions "reading" Dick and Jane. He must have sat there for 10 whole minutes! I just know he's going to love to read. Now Ella, on the other hand, still tries to eat the books when I read to her! :o)

She's still standing...

On Sunday we took our dinner to the park and had a picnic! Anson loves having picnics so we brought a big sheet to sit on and sat down by a little lake and a fountain. Anson and I had sandwiches and fruit and Ella had... peas! She loves eating peas as a finger food so that kept her busy for a few minutes. When she was done with her peas she crawled over to the middle of the sheet and just stood up! I did not have my camera with me so I took this one on my phone (sorry it's fuzzy). She was so proud of herself, and Anson was proud too! He started clapping which made her clap. It was all so cute and sappy! And then as we were leaving, Anson heard the ice cream truck! He whipped around and said "Mommy, I heard the ice cream truck!!!! Can we pleeeeeeeease get some ice cream?" How can I resist that excitement? So we got an orange cream bar and shared it with Ella, who had it ear to ear by the end. What a fun afternoon!

Dusty got home late Sunday evening, so Monday morning I had two very excited kiddos! They love playing with Daddy! It is so cute... Ella squeals with delight every time he walks in the door, now! He could be gone for 20 minutes or 4 days and she is just as excited! She has a way of melting her Daddy's heart.

Bedtime routine is getting a little easier now that Ella and Anson can enjoy bath time together! (I figure I have a couple more months before Anson starts asking too many anatomy questions!:o) They love to splash and play together. They are becoming good little buddies!

Well, not much else going on. Oh, last night Anson had to call his grandparents and tell them that he "Went poopy in the potty... not in the living room!" And of course they were so proud! I was quite glad also! :o) But then today he peed on the couch while watching the workers out the window. I guess we've had a little regression on the potty frontier... but we'll keep going! I'm going to have to invest in a steam cleaner soon. Guess we'll be renting one today. Such is life in the Rollins' home!

Have a great one!

Ironies...

Anxiously awaiting some ice cream from big brother,

sporting her new hair clippies from "Aunt" Keidi! Thanks!

Throwing a penny he found into the fountain

Irony of Ironies... today we went to Cold Stone Creamery with our mouths watering for ice cream, only to find a sign on the door saying "We're sorry for the inconvenience but we are unable to serve ice cream today". Can you believe it? Try explaining to your 3 year old that the ice cream store doesn't have ice cream! What I can't believe is that they were still open! All they could serve were smoothies... don't know why and didn't stick around to find out. Then on the way home (and to the OTHER ice cream store! :o) we passed a parking lot with a big truck parked in it, with tables all set up selling :

snow cones








and....................................................................................................................................








Computers! $99 special (Wonder what truck they "fell" off)
What a combo!

For those of you who know and love our neighborhood, it was the parking lot of Buffalo China, just across the street from Rubber Man Tires! :0) You just have to love Atlanta!

Well, we did find an ice cream store that was open and had ice cream! Anson and Ella enjoyed their treat (so did Mommy). And we are looking forward to Dusty coming home tomorrow! He has been in Charleston on business since Wednesday evening.

So here is the next weird thing that happenned... Tonight we were in the middle of our bedtime routine... I was finishing feeding Ella and Anson had just gotten out of the tub. I told him to go get his pull-ups on and come back into Ella's room. He disappeared for a minute and came sheepishly (still naked!) into her room and said "Mommy, I just pooped in your pretty livingroom!" To which I said, "please tell me you're joking". He said "Nope". Well, I put Ella to bed and went out to survey the the scene. I'll spare the details, but it was not as bad as I had imagined! After cleaning and sanitizing, we had a little chat about why it is important to go straight to the bathroom and not stop to play when you have to go! And of course if he had obeyed, he would have at least had his pull-ups on! :o) All the "interesting" things seem to happen when Dusty is away!

My Helper

This video was from a couple weeks ago but I just found it...
Anson was helping me feed Ella some yogurt... She apparently is very fond of it and had not had enough when Anson makes up a story as to why he should be done feeding her! He makes us laugh so much with the things he comes up with! He does love to help and he always asks to feed Ella, so this time I said yes and got the camera ready. He did the whole "airplane" thing on his own!

Savannah

John Wesley statue

Savannah City Hall

The boys and Charlotte!

Ella napping with Daddy

Charlotte, Brittany, Amber, Gavin, Dusty, Chad, Anson, Jared, Arin, and Ella

At dinner.

Anson and Ella with their Toto (grandmother) and Grandma (great-grandmother)

Ella and Charlotte exploring together!

Grandma, Pop, Dusty, Anson and Ella... 4 generations of Rollins!

Anson sharing snacks with Ella on the way home!

We had a great weekend! We arrived in Savannah Friday night and stayed in an adjoining room to Jared and Brittany and "baby Charlotte". Anson was "so excited" to see everyone! (It is really cute to see him say he's so excited! I'll try to get it in a video) Saturday morning we all went to visit Dusty's grandmother. Chad and Amber and Gavin came for the day and met us there, too! The guys did a little work around her house and the ladies talked inside. Grandma enjoyed seeing all the kids and reminisced about how much Anson is like Dusty! Anson is in his question stage and wants to know "why" for everything. But he was pretty good! (Especially when Chad and Gavin were playing with him outside! Thanks guys!) And so as to not tire Grandma out too much, we all left her house around 2:00 and went to downtown Savannah for the evening. It is such a beautiful city and even more fun with family! We wandered around and had a snack in a cafe, wandered around some more and had dinner together before Chad and Amber headed home. We tried to get into Paula Deen's restaurant, the Lady and Sons, but it was already booked for the evening. But we had a great time! Sunday we went back to Grandma's house around lunch time and Dusty's Mom and Dad and sister Megan met us there. We all had lunch together and headed home around 3:30. Before we left we took some generation pictures with Grandma. As we were leaving, Anson and Grandma had a sweet converstion I wanted to share...

A: Grandma, do you have a boo boo on your eye?

G: Yes, can you see it? (she took off her glasses)

A: Yes, do you want me to kiss it? (As he is kissing her eye)

G: Thank you! I hope you'll remember me in prayer next week during my surgery.

A: Yes, Grandma, I'll pray for you!

And he has remembered to pray for Grandma's "boo boo" ! She has a cancerous growth behind her eye that has to be removed next week. Please keep her in prayer.

Ella had fun too! She and Charlotte were fun to watch... they had fun pulling the bows out of each other's hair, playing with water bottles, getting into all the interesting things at Grandma's house, and being held by everyone! So much fun!

Above are some pics from the weekend...