What Have I Been Having So Much Fun Doing I Gave Up Sleep and Blogging???

My friend Amy found this amazing website where they will design and personalize shirts for you for FREE! All you have to do is print it off and iron it on. There are thousands of designs to choose from so I have spent hours and hours looking at all of them (and my blog has sat neglected). At about 1 a.m. Monday I finally finished them all and had to share them!

This is the one I made for everyone at Christmas (and the only one everyone knows about!):

The next day at Animal Kingdom all the kids will be wearing Mickey heads with some favorite characters. I love that the twins have Chip and Dale-twins right?

One day we princesses are going to match (Ashton is going to love us matching- she is my daughter after all :)

Then there is the day Jon and Jackson will be rocking some Star Wars shirts. Jackson's has different Star Wars characters behind each letter in his name. How funny is Darth saying "Who's your Daddy?" I'll be sure to post Jon sporting it!

Then Pop the car addict has this surprise waiting on him, hee hee:

These are Ashton's wardrobe line up:

I think this one is my favorite:

I got her some red polka dot hair bows that are going to make this outfit- it's the little things that make me happy obviously!
These are Will's choices. The twins are absolutely obsessed with Nemo and Cars so I can't wait to see their reaction to these:

And here's Wesley's:

I tried very hard to get Jackson some big boy shirts so I give you Pirates and Star Wars- perfect, huh?

I also printed labels with their names, the day of the week and different characters on each. I packed each days' outfit in a baggie so mornings will run a little smoother. I am so excited for them to wake up each morning and see what shirt I made for them. I love surprises!!! I wish I could've made them for each day but Jon said, "You are already making more shirts than we ordered for our entire baseball team last year. It's time to stop." Isn't he a party pooper?

I have had so much fun preparing for this trip! Now due to the inclement weather we are leaving Thursday at 5 pm instead of Friday at 4am! Guess I better get finished packing all my surprises!

The Big Surprise...

On Christmas morning after Santa, there was another big surprise on its way. Daddy walked in with this box wrapped in Mickey Mouse wrapping paper.

They were very surprised at the size of the box.

Imagine their surprise when 7 balloons floated out:

Attached to the strings were cards with 1 word on each balloons. They had to put it together to read "We're going to Disney World in 34 days."

Next they found wrapped gifts in the bottom of the big box, 1 for everybody. When we all opened them they contained matching shirts that said "Dodd Disney Days 2010". When I asked the kids why Nana and Pop might have shirts too, Ashton was very excited to figure out that they were going with us!

I'm so glad to have a daughter who squeals and shows all the excitement I was dreaming of (as opposed to my oldest who follows in his father's relief pitcher footsteps and doesn't show his excitement!).

We will be proudly sporting our matching shirts THIS Saturday!!!

The great part of this surprise was the week before Christmas Ashton started saying I wish we could go to Disney World in January and even called Nana and asked if she take her to Disney in January! It was so cool to be able to grant her wish!

An amazing Christmas surprise that has kept me so busy preparing that I'm just now getting around to blogging about it 20 hours before we leave- yay!!!!!

You Know You're in the Terrible Twos with Two If..." #17

You know if Will is quiet you should go look for him, especially if he has escaped and is upstairs. It helps if his sister comes screaming downstairs that "Will is in your bathroom and he has gotten into your shaving cream and he has sprayed it all over the carpet and the shower curtain and himself and you better come quick."

And you do. And he had...

And he was very pleased with himself.

And didn't seemed to be ashamed at all...

Where Have I Been?

I'm sure the entire world has been wondering why I haven't been blogging. I'm sure my entire readership of 22 people have been bereft at my lack of posts. At least I know my Mawmaw has been because she let me know at Christmas that she's been checking it every day and.... A little guilt, but at least it confirmed I have one reader anyway :)

To answer the question of where I've been I'm afraid I'll have to take you all the way back to Thanksgiving. or as I like to call it "The Thanksgiving That Began My Mental Break Down." I realize that I am beyond blessed to have my entire family close by. For example, I've never had to pay for a babysitter (although I'm ready to at this point- keep reading...). Of course, all the family means a very busy holiday. We had 4 Thanksgiving dinners (and 8 Christmases but it'll be a month before I get around to posting about those!).

Here's a list of what my 2 2 year olds accomplished in those 4 Thanksgiving get togethers:

1. Probably placed some long distance calls:

2. Flushed a yellow crayon and stopped up the potty.
3. Table danced later jumping off it:

4. Never.sat.still.for.a.minute!!!
5. Tried to flush a volleyball, yes a volleyball!
6. Laughed and enjoyed getting their hands washed after playing with the volleyball while it was in the toilet:

7. Fell and but by the grace of God blinded himself on the corner of Nana's aggregate stairs:

8. Discovered an entire container of ring pops and began trying to eat them all:

9. While everyone else was eating a healthy dinner snuck in and got into the ice cream cones:

10. And for the grand finale: got into my grandmother's hearing aids which then ended up being stepped on and broken and are going to cost us FIVE HUNDRED DOLLARS to repair. There is not a picture of that because I was too busy trying not to throw up imagining how much it was going to cost us!

As you can obviously see, life has been very busy and highly stressful for me and blogging has slipped down my list of priorities, after unstopping the toilet and contemplating going back to work and signing them up for daycare! I hope to get back on the bandwagon and will probably be going back to work part time anyway to pay for the hearing aid and plumbing damage wreaked by my Destructive Duo.

Pray for me, seriously- pray.for.me!

Nothing Beats a Happy Will...

Jon and I have this saying that nothing beats a happy Will. I have to say that Will has been our most challenging child to date. Wesley can be a bully, Ashton can be a whiner and Jackson has a mouth on him but Will is just a challenge. He can throw fits with the best of them. He is inconsolable if you don't meet his needs immediately. I honestly worry about the fact that he bangs his head when he's mad to the point of bruising it. He tends to be very prone to fit throwing especially in the mornings (if I do the unthinkable of not having his waffle ready when he awakes!). This may be due to the fact that Wesley wakes him up most mornings and maybe he doesn't get his sleep. He's like me and Jackson and requires a lot of sleep. However, at night he is the funniest most adorable child ever made. He's has fun, giggles and entertains us to no end- there's nothing better than a happy Will:

So, even though he's a challenge I adore this precious little boy. I love how he sleeps with his arms tucked under him and his little bottom in the air. I love how lately he tells everyone, "Bye, Merry Mismas!" (Merry Christmas). I love how whenever you ask him a question he says, "Nuh uhh". I love how when Wesley hurts him and I tell him to say sorry Will always says sorry to Wesley, even through his tears! I love how he will push his cars back and forth for hours. I love the feel of his sweet little body in my arms.
I love my Will even down to the little self-inflicted bump on his head- morning and night!

Taking Their Baby For a Walk...

As I said, when I am in the kitchen, I never know who or what is going to walk by. I was pleased on this day to see this lovely couple going by taking their child for a walk:

Isn't their baby a cutie?

I'm amazed at how they get him to do these things!