Jackson

As most of you already know, our second kitty to the Billingsley family, Jackson passed away. It has been a little over a month now. I haven't had it in me to actually post this . . .  Because for some strange reason, I keep thinking he is out there somewhere.

Our neighbors behind us said that he got hit by a car and they threw him in their back yard. We didn't have it in us to go back in their yard to find / see him because at that point, it had been a little over a week since he had gotten hit. God only knows what he looked like / what had eaten him. I saw Mr. Zoe after he got hit and I think it took me a really long time to get over that . . . so, it was best for us to not look.

I like to keep thinking that he is out there somewhere chasing rabbits. And maybe he is in 'Kitty Heaven'. Rest in peace our lil 'Jacks'.

Wild Ones

Just wanted to share a couple photos of our wild monkeys for Thanksgiving. I am pretty sure the 'hype' of 'Turkey Day' had them all in a different world.

Happy Thanksgiving

Wanting to wish our blog readers a Happy Thanksgiving, from our home to yours :) Photos to come soon. Not many were taken - whoopsie. I get bad at that when it comes to busy family days.

But, the Billingsley Household wishes you all a wonderful / warm / safe Thanksgiving with lots of laughter and smiles with your families.

We love you all!

- the Billingsley's.

Red Sunday

This weekend, I had planned with Tomme Hilton (my photographer that I work with) to do some family portraits for Matt, Houston and I -- since I am always the one behind the camera, I never have any decent photos of Houston and I, much less Matt and I. So, after weeks of planning and two days worth of shopping. . . we were ready . . . and drove two hours to Summerville this Sunday. Well, us adults were . . . Houston, not so much! He wasn't too interested in 'listening' and 'the camera' . . . he was more interested in running around like the banchee that is has become. Which worked out, because Matt and I were finally able to have a 'moment' and get a few of ourselves! Take a look! OH -- and yes, we did get a few images of the three  of us. However, you can see the struggle and attempts to 'bust' out of our grips. Laugh.

Not only did Matt, Houston and I take family portraits, we drug Jess along with us for a Sassy Twin Session. Laugh. Yep, we wanted twin portraits. I have only posted a few of Jess and I . . . If you would like to see more, you can look at them in our photos on Tomme Hilton Gallery's fan page.  I will set up the link to the blog once we get more posted :) Enjoy!

Birthday Message

We used to send out special birthday blogs to those in our family who are having a birthday . . . and when we fell off the blogging wagon, we obviously didn't continue with our blog celebrations.

So, we now continue our blog birthday celebrations!

Happy Birthday to my uncle Stan. We hope that you have a wonderful day! And if we were there to blow out candles on your bonfire of a birthday cake, Houston would have blown them all out before we could make it to 'Happy Birthday'.

We love you!

Rockstar Friday

As you have seen before, Houston LOVES these Rockstar glasses . . . And so does Josie, Wes and Jessie.

Oh my. What a group of kids.

Welcome Fall

This past weekend our Billingsley household went to NC for the weekend to spend some quality time with my dad's side of the family. We had planned a nice 'vacation' -- yea right -- for a long 4 day weekend. We decided to go up Thursday, spend the night Thursday and Friday with my Uncle Stan and his wife SueSue; then spend Saturday and Sunday with my Aunt Carol and her hubs Eddie.

Well, that was our 'plan'. And all went well up until the first night. j.

Thursday:  Matt, Houston and I drove up Thursday afternoon to Raleigh, NC in hopes of H to fall asleep during his 'naptime' and sleep 2 hours of the 4 hour drive. But, why would he want to sleep on such a fun, exciting car ride! I mean really, an hour was PLENTY for him. . . pssht. In Houston's defense, we did have the TV plugged up to sit right in front of him -- and I must say, it's a LIFESAVER for long trips. We hardly heard a peep from him -- so with the TV being right there, it was too much fun for him.  He watched Cars 2 and Ice Age going up the road. But, once we arrived to our Destination - 5 hours later - it was all down hill from there.

Houston wanted to climb the stairs - up and down, up and down - then he wanted to eat in their living room - yikes! their WHITE rug! - then he wanted to jump up and down on his bed - it was an air mattress - then he didn't want to take a bath - because the stairs were way cooler - and then we stayed up A-L-L night. Yep. Bath was at 8:30 and he fought sleep till 11. Finally we got him down and he slept till 3:22am. Exactly. I woke up at 3:22 and said, 'Really Houston. Really' -- Houston sleeps thru most nights. It is VERY rare that he stays up . . . and when he does, it's HELL. I'm not used to it, Matt gets cranky and Houston is tired. Bad combo. Bad combo. -- So, after his 3:22 wake up call . . . we stayed up till 6:30. I tried everything I had. I rocked him. I gave him milk. I rode in the truck around the neighborhood at 4:30am. I let him watch cartoons. I let him cry it out. I held him down. I read him a book. You name it, I tried it. But at 6:30, he walked right up to me and put his sweet little head on my shoulder . . . and OUT. Whew. I was glad.

After our first nights sleep - if you call it that - I was ready to turn around and drive back. Honestly. It's hard to socialize / spend quality with your family when your child is experiencing devilish acts and is sleep deprived - and 'you' are too. Hell, if I wanted to be sleep deprived, I would have had another baby. wink.

On to Friday: We all decided we would do whatever it took to get H worn out. . . except it was raining. Crap. So, during his nap time we starting to discuss some neat places around the Raleigh area that he would enjoy. And SueSue mentioned a neat Museum called Marbles. Marbles is located right in downtown Raleigh - not far from their home. When H got up from his nap, we left as soon as we could! We didn't want to waste any more energy! Laugh. As soon as we walked in, he was down on the ground running. He LOVED it. It had so many neat things for kids. I would go into a long explination of what all was there . . . but it would probably need to be a seperate blog. It was HUGE and fun.

And of course I forgot my camera . . . so all my images are on our camera phones. Not the best of quality, but still cute pics!

We came back and ate dinner at a great buffet place. Now, I'm not usually big on buffets, but this place was one of those 'natural / organic / healthy eating' places. And it was SOOO Good. I think it was called Sweet Tomato. Yum. They had the best salad I have had in a while. Yummy. Yummy place.  But, while we were eating dinner, Houston looked exhausted. You could tell he was 'done'. I thought his head was going to hit the table with each bite he took. Laugh. - AH. Love when he is like that - And thankfully, we were right. He was worn out! Because he slept thru the night!  He slept so late, he didn't wake up till 9 the next morning!

With Houston's late sleeping, it put us behind for Saturday. But, Saturday: We had about an hour drive to my aunts house. And we were almost there when up behind us came . . . Blue lights. Yep. A State Trooper. DAMNIT. We didn't even see him. We didn't even know how long he was following us. Whoopsie. But, he clocked us going 69 in a 55. Hello speeding ticket. We haven't seen one of you in . . . 5 years? But, we were too busy looking for our turn, that we didn't even recognize the speed limit change. Much less, we were going down hill!! Ugh. Oh well.

So, with a little change of mind and direction . . . we headed to Carol and Eddies. Only 10 mintues or so away now. We arrived to a cold, windy welcoming from mother nature! Burrr.

Carol and Eddie had just got some new babies . . . baby cows, 3 to be exact. And Houston was in LOVE with them. He didn't want to leave them. He wanted to jump thru the electric fence and point at them all day while saying, 'boo. a boo, ma ma.' -- 'Boo' is Houston's 'Moo'. Not sure why he has it switched . . . but he does.

After a long walk to their pond, visits w. the cows, a very short nap . . . Matt and I made a decision to go home. We had already contimplated going home . . . and unfortunely that meant we would spend less time with my Aunt Carol and Uncle Eddie, but sometimes we just have to weigh the odds and make the best decision. We knew H was exhausted . . . and another house change would only make it worse.

And sure enough. On our drive home, he took an hour nap. And as soon as we arrived home . . . his eyes were so tired and heavy and red, that he slept till 9 the next morning. A full 12 hours of sleep. He even crashed that Sunday for a long nap. And slept another 12 hours the next night to catch up. He was pitiful.

So, needless to say, our 'vacation' wasn't so much of a 'vacation'. But it was a great trip to spend time with my family. We don't get to see them much, but when we do, it's so much fun.

Love yall!


*Take a look at our pretty fall pics! We loved driving and seeing the tree colors! Houston could careless . . . But, Matt and I enjoyed :) We even drove over to see my Grandma and Grandaddy's grave. Thought I'd share a picture of the pretty setting they had when we went :)

Our recent lives.

Blogging hasn't been on our minds lately. . . as we have a VERY active toddler on our hands. And, I am not afraid to admit, that our child has entered the 'terrible twos'.

I used to get comments from many people, about how good my child was . . . whether it was in the store, walking around the neighborhood, eating out, etc . . . it didn't matter. He would always behave. Sigh. Where did those days go? Now, he runs around like a banchee. A crazy kid. If he didn't look so cute, I'm not sure I would claim him. j. But, he has indeed made a deal w. the devil . . . I am just praying this 'deal' doesn't last a full year . . . or longer.

I would really like to get back into my old routine of blogging. It might help my mental state of dealing w. my devilish child. Or better, I might get some ideas on 'decipline'. Sigh. Because spankings and timeout is all we get into in our household! For instance, the other morning, my sweet devil woke up in the worst mood . . . oh wait, that is most mornings. j. He pitched the biggest fit, just to change his diaper. I was tempted to leave it on, poopy and all. Why not, right? But I didn't have it in me to leave something that smelly on him. However, I did have to spank him twice to keep from rolling over and running away . . . AND put him in timeout twice because he didn't respond to the spanking as well as continued to run as I was dressing him. Sigh. His morning routines are quite traumatic. All he wants to do is wake up and sit in my bed naked and watch TV.

I mean, I get it. It's comfortable. Why not do all the things you can't do as a grown up. Right? It only makes sense. BUT, where do you draw the line? Ya know? Let's face it, we all want to do the things we can't. Life sucks sometimes, Get over it.

Laugh. I'm awful.

On another note . . . a side my venting of my wild child . . . our lives are pretty good / normal. We have been doing the same ole thing, working and parenting. Not too many exciting things in our household. We have planned a little vacation to NC to see my dad's family . . . should be fun! We are excited to spend some quality time with them. We do not see them but maybe twice a year, so we are excited.


 Well, thanks for listening / reading my venting blog . . . I know it's been awhile since you last read about us . . . and the first thing you read in  - - um, 2 months is a venting blog - - I promise they wont all be like this.

Laugh.

Take a look at our banchee for Halloween. It was hard to even get a decent photo of him cause he was . . . well . . . running wild. DUH.