Closing up shop

I've come to the decision and I'm retiring my little blog...perhaps I'm just growing weary of it or perhaps I have simply just lost my mojo...I'm not sure which but I will most certainly continue to frequent and stalk all of my faves.

Who knows? Maybe I will start a new one someday.

I'm currently working on saving all of my posts and making them into a book, a book that I hope to someday give to Isabella when she leaves the nest....preferably not for at least another 48 years.
I appreciate, love and adore all of the heartfelt comments of encouragement I have received over the years, and since I'm not sure if I can save them, I am working on writing them all down in a special notebook so that someday I will come across it and they can make me smile again :)

much love,

Mary-Catherine

How to score a Christmas tree in Hawaii

First things first, ya gotta find yourself the nearest building with one of these signs hanging on it.

Then, you take your handsome husband and delectable daughter and you proceed to browse the firs....


You browse...and you browse...


And you browse some more...and then you discuss your browsing...


When you finally find just the right one...you send hubby to inspect the boughs for ultimate ornamenting perfection. Then it's off to the trunk trimmer for ole Firby!


Oh, but be sure to stop up your ears when they trim the trunk...those saws are loud!



And finally, you watch while handsome hubby struggles to tie tree to top of car...and voila! Ya got yourself a Christmas tree. In Hawaii.

Typical.

Today Isabella waited until I was deeply enthralled in TJMAXX to do a big stinky #2 for the afternoon....typical.



Grandaddy brought home a box of "boom-booms" (ice cream) and Isabella wanted that instead of dinner...typical.


Jasper kept a faithful vigil for any sort of droppings or drips...typical.



(Jasper is very thorough when it comes to droppings)



Tonight, Isabella became excessively loud and rambunctious right when I was sitting down to watch Fox News...typical.


Just now, while typing this...my sweet, sticky little dirty girl climbed up into my lap and gave me kisses then requested to be tickled...typical.


I loved every minute of it...typical.

Like mother, like daughter

I take full responsibility for the strong willed nature of this child. There's really no way out of this one for me.

Cousin of the canine sort

Meet my little brother, Jasper. He is my mother's baby.

Isabella and Jasper go way back.

Like the time he chewed the tips off of all her bottle nipples? Good times, good times...or the time he ate her pacifiers...not such good times. Jasper is also inclined to enjoy a poopy diaper or two if they are left within snouting distance.

*wretch*

These two have a great partnership...Isabella follows him around because he's furry and he allows her to do all manner of things to him.

For example, last night he was a great sport when she painted his entire coat with pink glitter, pulled on his jowels and gave him a noogie.

Jasper follows Isabella around because inevitably, she will be dropping edibles of some sort.

Please, can I keep her? I promise I'll take real good care of her....


I can't figure out who considers who the pet...but I know one thing...

It's love.

This Vs. That

Last week when Hubby was here, we spent lot of time just soaking up the view.




In my humble opinion, there really is just no comparison....

This




Will always be more beautiful than that...







But nothing...nothing can compare to this view.



Lordy...I'm having to fan myself over here...I married myself a hunk of burnin' love.

*Swoon*

Leaf peekin'

I'm back in my old stomping grounds of East Tennessee...and I love, love, love. My parents called a while back...they asked if Isabella and I would care to come home to enjoy some fall foliage? And I said, Why yes, yes we would. They're always doing things like that, my parents. Bringing me home when they know I'm homesick.

You see, I'm a Fall-Foliagophile...a lover of fall foliage. I made that up.



I love my parental units.

It had been over a year since I had been home, and except for my dearest sister who is sporting an adorable basketball of a pregnant belly, nothing has really changed. It's both relieving and sad to come home to find things exactly as you remember and miss them...

Something about being back in the South makes me want to tease my hair higher...and wear more eyeliner...Isabella has got to be confused, she's wondering why her hair bows have ridiculously graduated in size, but as the sweet little old lady working at The Bow Show said; "Oh, honey...the bigger the better."

I love the South.

Isabella is a foliagophile too.

Happiness is a color.

Perhaps more than any one non-Isabella/Hubby thing in the world, I would say I love color the most. Yes, most definitely color. I cannot imagine my life without a palette of vivid and wild colors.

I like to tell myself that I was destined in some way to eventually end up here in Hawaii, this being one of the few places where you're treated (almost daily) to God's magnificent gift of the rainbow. I just never grow tired of those things...some are more magnificent than others...and a few are double, maybe even triple rainbows! My eyes just gobble it all up like a big ole greedy ogre. This beaut. greeted me when I walked out of my door Sunday evening.





There are so many glorious colors swirling around in my world right now...most of them are happy, very few are not. I feel nervous, the pessimist I am, I'm so full of contentment and happiness that my soul is almost tentative to allow myself any enjoyment...I keep asking myself,

"Is it okay to be this happy? Does this mean something bad is going to happen soon? Should I be worried?"









It's very unhealthy to think like that I'm told. So I've been on a personal mission to stop this negative, unhealthy behavior and instead just allow myself to wallow in the joy of my many, many blessings.

Oh, I'm wallowin' alright. You betcha.



I have so much to wallow in.

Time, the tricky little sucker.

How did an entire two months pass me by so quickly?!?! Lordy, it's been so long I hardly know where to start...did ya give up on me? I did.


I did indeed receive my new laptop and we made love. Isabella? Well, I don't really know what's going on with her in this picture, but I apparently have morning face and Isabella looks a little forlorn ...and it appears she has chocolate milk spilled down her shirt. Just peg me Mommy of The Year.



Hubby came home from deployment! I have no pictures of homecoming because I fail as a Navy wife...actually, that's a funny story, really. I'll have to tell you that one later.

We've been spending a lot of time at the beach-of course.





Love those two...



Hubby lost a lot of weight on deployment...I've been busy cookin' him up some good ole country food...put some meat on them bones.

Isabella got a modeling contract at Vogue.

Just kidding, but this really cracked me up.


Got out my fall decor....more on that later.


Isabella grew boobies!!!

Er, sorry. Really mature mom, who's the two year old here?



We went out on a boat.


Hey, you stole my seat, ornery sailor.

The view? Oh man, the view...it was spectacular...



Absolutely spectacular...right down to the grimace on hubby's face.


I love my little Cheeto-faced vampire girl.

Poop

This is exactly what my laptop did last week...took a big ole dump and pooped out on me with a moan and a flicker of the screen...poor guy didn't even se it coming. But the good news is, my new candy pink Dell should be in the mail sometime on Monday-yay!-I've been DYING without my intenet.

Be back soon!

My sisters are going to kill me for this one.

Going on 23 years ago, I made my debut into their lives. It's funny, how our personalities are prevalent so early on in our lives. I was a screamer. Unhappy. I wanted to be one of the "big girls" from the second I came out of the womb. My sister's tolerated me as best as an 8 year old and a 4 year old could.

But time marches on...I grew out of it...sorta. I still scream when I'm angry, but anywho, we spent a bit of time doing this

Primping was our forte...My middle sister, Brittainy (the one on the far right) taught me how to apply my make-up, she helped me choose my clothes, taught me about style and gave me my first maxi-pads when I was 13 and too embarrassed to ask my mom (I'm sorry if my mention of maxi-pads embarrassed you, momma, "just keepin' it real")

But with three girls, there must have been cat fights, right? Oh, there were cat fights alright. There was drama. There were tears...oh buddy, was there ever drama. (and still is)

But more than any of that, there was laughter. Lots and lots of laughter. I am the goofy one. Can you tell? I often suckered my sisters into participating in all kinds of antics with me. They enjoyed it, I don't care what they say.




They were usually pretty good natured. But most of the time, I was the loud, obnoxious, bird-legged shrimp following them around, clamoring for their attention, poking my nose into their bedrooms and generally just annoying the dookie out of 'em.

I was in a constant state of melancholy when they both left for college. That's the bad thing about being the baby, you're always the last to go. And I was VERY impatient to "go"

We go through pretty much everything together, and at least one of us will be there for the other one.

Pregnancies.


Bootcamp.


New experiences...and things we don't care to ever do again.




Hasty courthouse marriages. (notice Tyler and I are the only ones that look genuinely happy?)




And even though we may disagree (which we do quite often) and we fight, and we hurt each other, and we say things we don't mean, and one of us isn't speaking to the other...one thing still remains, and it always will whether we like it (or choose to accept it) or not....



We're sisters, and aint nothin' none of us can do 'bout it.

:)