Just Because...

What Did Cullen Get For His Birthday?

Today, as you know, was Cullen's 11th birthday! We didn't have a party or anything tonight because we are having a family party tomorrow night and then a kids' party on Saturday morning. Cullen did get a very unexpected gift today!!! Anyone (not including Aunt Heather) want to take a guess??? Okay, take a look at the first photo.





Still not sure? Here's another hint...

Think you know? Here is the answer...

That's right! A broken bone!!! Cullen was getting ready to go to his first wrestling practice when an evil doorknob jumped out and bit him, breaking his pinky finger on his left hand right at the joint! We spent an "enjoyable" 3.5 hours at the Dayton Children's Hospital in the ER. Four doctors, 1 X-ray tech, 5 nurses, 2 clerks, and 2 "candy-stripers" later and Cullen has a lovely hard-as-a-rock splint that will be replaced with an actual cast early next week (once all the swelling goes down). There goes his first wrestling season. Now that's a hell of a way to celebrate your birthday!!!

Happy 11th Birthday, Cullen!!!

At 12:30pm on Wednesday, November 27, 1996, Cullen Quentin Campbell reluctantly came into the world. He was two-weeks early and a C-section baby (due to complications). (I'm grateful to have never experienced labor!) He was HUGE!!! He still is! Cullen was 9.5 pounds and 22 inches AT TWO-WEEKS EARLY!!! He looked like a toddler. He had white-blond hair and violet-blue eyes. He also had enough personality for 3 kids and energy for 10!!! Cullen's first name is Celtic and means handsome (didn't know that until a couple of years ago). His middle-name is a family name and he is the third generation to bear it.

Some photos of "little" Cullen. I will be punished for posting these!!!

Cullen this past summer. He is so handsome and grown up!

*sigh* I love this one!!! Cullen is an amazing big brother. He is so gentle, caring, loving and fun. Cullen has a huge heart and loves kids! He told our social worker during our homestudy that the adoption was his idea! Cullen told us he only wanted a little sister, little brothers were too rough. Adoption and China have a special place in his heart. The other night, Cullen told me he will adopt from China one day too.

We are so proud of Cullen. He is doing so well at school and loves everything about it (well, except the homework). Cullen chose to join the school band this year and forgo the church choir. He is Mom's boy! He has chosen percussion and focuses on the bells!!! Cullen is also active in Fall Soccer, wrestling, baseball, and swimming. He decided to give wrestling a try instead of basketball this year.

Can you tell these two are always together?! Cullen and Kieren have a special bond. They adore each other!!! Cullen can get Kieren to repeat anything he says. She can get him to do anything she says! He is Kieren's favorite person.

Happy birthday, Cullen! We love you!!! You are the perfect son for our family and we are so proud of you. I can't wait to watch you grow, but how about slowing down just a little bit? I want to treasure and savour every moment!

Silly Sunday

The Princess Of The Potty

Kieren is truly amazing! She took two weeks to get potty-trained. Two-weeks of only half-hearted trying. We didn't push her with the pooping on the potty because of her constipation issues, but Kieren has decided she will only poop on the potty now too! WooHoo!!! I hate watching how painful pooping is for her, but she has found a way to sit that seems to help a little (she sits sideways on the potty, brings her feet onto the seat, spreads her knees apart and hugs her legs). Kieren has had only a couple of accidents. Most of them are our fault. When you have a child with a severe speech delay, you have to learn all of her cues. She really tries to tell us what she needs, but with her limited speech we are sometimes too dense to get it! I'm so proud of this little sprite! Kieren is the Princess of the Potty!

Black Friday Recap (This is LONG!)

Black Friday!!!! Now that strikes fear into most men's souls! For those not in the US, Black Friday is what they call the huge shopping day following Thanksgiving Day. It is the official start of the Christmas Shopping Season. All stores have massive sales and open early.

Heather and I have a tradition of shopping together on Black Friday. We only missed one year when Andy and I took Cullen to Disney World for his 7th birthday. Some years we don't find many deals, but other years... Well, you'll see the photos! Heather and I go through the adds separately on Thanksgiving Day, and then get together that night for strategy planning. This is serious stuff!!!

This year Heather picked me up at 4:45am. We weren't very excited by the adds and figured we wouldn't get much. We had decided that Toys 'R Us didn't have anything we wanted so we switched venues this year and headed for Springfield instead of Beavercreek. We started with JC Penny. The store opened at 4am so we thought the worst would be over. WRONG!!! That place was nuts!!! The lines went on forever! I immediately got in line as Heather went to work. Heather and I are pros at this. We don't use carts (they slow you down). We work as a team. We have our lists so things go fast. I wait in line and Heather brings me things.

The line I chose didn't move at all for the first 10 minutes so I called Heather's cell. After checking out other areas, I switched to another check-out location. Things looked promising until (dum dum dummmmm...) we noticed our line was going nowhere. The woman (sorry, I can't really post what we all called her) at the front of the line was only there to get a price adjustment on all the items she bought the day before (she pre-shopped the sale)!!! Her receipt was 3 feet long - I'M NOT KIDDING!!! Each item had to be entered manually and re-adjusted. It took 40 freaking minutes!!! We were all going to kill her! After over an hour of standing in line, we were done and moving on to the next stop.

Next was Old Navy, just down the mall corridor. Let's just say that Kieren's wardrobe has been updated yet again thanks to Aunt Heather! No, these aren't for Christmas. Kieren outgrew all the great clothes Heather bought for her in September. All the gorgeous shirts were crop-tops! YIKES! We hadn't expected this huge growth spurt (shirts are now 5T or big girl's 4-5). So I will be posting photos of the Empress' New Clothes later. Moving on...

We left the mall with a couple of big bags and headed out for K-Mart. I think the last time I went to K-Mart was last year on Black Friday. The parking lot was intimidating to say the least. We had to hike in. We walked in the door and Heather put on the breaks. Things did not look good. There were two lines that went to the back of the store and another that ran the length of the store. YIKES!!! I talked Heather into looking anyway. We are so glad we did! Heather got some great stuff for the kids!!! After getting the big items, one of which was almost as tall as me, I pushed everything through the store and got in line and Heather continued to shop. Boy did I get some strange looks! LOL!!! I chose the line closest to the entrance. It was the right choice! Eventhough the line went to the back of the store, it split into two registers at the end, as did the line next to it. The fools in the line running the length of the store (it was a lot longer than the other lines) were probably still there a hour later as their line only went to one register!!! As we got within a couple of people to the cashier, the line next to us opened and we jumped into it first! WOOHOO!!! We hauled our mountain of toys to the car parked in Alaska and then we had a problem. The cashier double charged Heather for a toy. Crap! I stayed with the car and Heather hiked back to the store. Let's just say that Heather was pissed when she came back. Managers need to learn that when they work in a service industry, they need to learn what the word "service" means. Heather got her price adjustment, but it was not a pleasant experience!

Our next stop was supposed to be Target, but as we drove over the bridge and looked down into Target's parking lot, we both yelled "hell no!" and headed for Meijer. The Target parking lot was full and people were parking at restaurants across the street and hiking in. We knew that Meijer would price-match (any items not on door-buster sales). We walked into an empty Meijer. It was freaky!!! Twenty minutes later, we were headed for breakfast with friends and had more bargains in the car.

Breakfast was nice, but there was shopping to do! Our next store was Bed, Bath & Beyond. Mostly we went there to use the potty, but we did walk around (nothing worth waiting in that line for). So we ran next door to Kohl's. Again the lines went to the back of the store. Heather now has 16 place-settings of new beautiful dishes plus serving pieces and other gifts were bought. Mark and Ian came into town so we met them for lunch (they ate, we rested!).

You would think we would be ready to head home, wouldn't you?! Nope! Next stop - Lowes! It was a quick stop. We then headed for Wal-Mart. HOLY COW!!! They had some great deals!!! We filled that cart to over-flow!!! WOW!!! It was amazing! By the time we loaded the car, it was obvious we couldn't fit much more inside. So we finally called it quits. We drove into Fairborn to run an errand and visit a friend and finally FINALLY went home. We shopped for over 8 hours. Heather says she is almost done with her Christmas shopping now! Me? Well, I haven't started. Everything purchased on our adventure was Heather's. I can't shop until I get a job in and get paid. Why go? Well, for the adventure and fun, of course!!! We had a great time! I can't wait until next year!!!

Now, take a look at the damage we did in 8 hours. Pretty impressive, if I do say so myself!


This is Heather's Ford Explorer (Okay, it's really Mark's!) after our little shopping trip.

We probably could fit another couple of small items inside, but we were concerned about the windows popping out.

Rolling the side windows down for this photo was challenging. Gifts kept sliding out!!!

The inside view after our rein of terror! Let me put this into perspective. This is a big Ford Explorer. It even has that third row seating. The packages are from the floor up and from the front seats all the way back. The light yellow thing in the front is a HUGE Winnie-The-Pooh for Ian. Every time Heather would break, Pooh would get shoved into the space between us! You can just make out the top of Ian's carseat in the middle of the packages!!! Not to worry, Ian stayed home with his Daddy, but visited us for lunch and a couple of stores! Pretty impressive, huh?!

Snowing At Midnight

On Thanksgiving night, we finally got our first good snow flurries. So what's a Mom to do??? Make Cullen put on his shoes so we can go play outside!!! Dad and Kieren were snoozing away while we danced in the snow and caught the flakes on our tongues. We had a blast!!! Then we went inside and watched scary shows until 1am (Or was it 2am? I can't remember!). Of course I was back up at 4:15am to go shopping with the rest of the crazies. More on that later!

I Am So Thankful For These Two

Kieren & Cullen

How could I not be thankful for these two?! I am so blessed!!!

Waiting For Company...

Kieren "Helping"

Kieren climbed the table when I wasn't looking and redecorated. The little bugger is strong enough to pull these heavy cherry chairs across the carpet! I guess she decided Andy's decorating needed a little help!!!

How To Cook Without "Help"

Cullen got Gamecube time and Kieren got to watch Polar Express. This movie is like crack for Kieren! I was able to make all kinds of food without "help" or whining!!! Yippee!!!

Silly Sunday On Thursday!

Give Thanks...

It is time to reflect and give thanks. I believe we should give thanks everyday of our lives, not just on a certain day in November. I hold my gifts close but I will share a couple with you. I'm thankful for my family and friends. I'm thankful for Kieren's China Mommy. I'm thankful for a very forgiving hubby with a great sense of humor! I'm thankful for chocolate!!!! I'm thankful for two amazing children. I'm thankful for so many things, but I'm so thankful for you, my blogger friends! Have a Happy Thanksgiving!!!

Busy Week

It's Thanksgiving week. It's also the week before Cullen's birthday. Some years they all fall in the same week and I feel like I've been hit by a truck. But that didn't happen this year. Still, I feel like I just can't get caught up!

So I am having Thanksgiving here again this year. That means Mother, Daddy, Sean, Nikki (SIL), Matt (BIL), and MIL join us for the festivities. Oh...joy...hold me back...yippee... This is not one of my favorite holidays. I end up cooking and cleaning for days and being exhausted and short tempered with "some" people. Then I get to make a birthday cake for Cullen's family party. And finally we have the kids' party!!! I would rather skip the Thanksgiving junk and get on with the fun stuff!!! Bring on the party!

Cull's birthday is on Tuesday, November 27th. He is going to be 11. (I really don't want to think about it.) I have a very strict rule that the kids' birthdays are celebrated on that date by the family. This will be the first time I've broken that rule. Cullen has his first wrestling practice on his birthday so we will be having the family party on Monday instead. At least I have the weekend to make his family cake!

On Saturday (December 1st), we will be destroying our house with the help of 10 wild 5th-grade boys. Cullen's theme for his party this year is "The Mad Scientist!" The invites went out in test-tubes. Pops drew a great caricature of Cullen as a mad scientist for the invitation. Once I wrapped everything securely, they looked like a pile of pipe bombs! The village post office is so used to the weird things I do. They didn't even raise an eyebrow!

The party will be a blast (as always!)!!! Andy was a chemist with Dow Chemical for 7 years. He will be in his element! I am truly frightened!! We have all kinds of experiments for the boys to do and some games. They will be making their own creatures for lunch (pizza heads). I won't give details now, but I will post the photos and tell you all about it later. Let's just say that the safety glasses have been ordered and I made lab aprons for all the boys so they don't totally trash their clothes!!! I guess I will be making a giant double-layer cookie for this year's cake. More to come after the party!

Kieren had therapy today. It went unbelievably well! She repeated everything Sandra said! She named all the animals in the zoo. She named all the body parts as she put the potato-head family together. She asked for help when she needed it. It was freaky!! Sandra asked me where the real Kieren was! I guess Kieren felt she had to throw her a bone! We only have two more session with Sandra before the insurance changes and we are screwed. *sigh* We did notice a couple of physical issues Kieren is having with speech, but we can't address it right now. We are praying Kieren bombs her tests with the school in February so they will accept her and give her the help she really needs.

Well, I need to get some sleep. Tomorrow (really today) is going to be crazy. I have to sew Kieren's skirt and prep all that food. Oh, and clean (yippee). Yes, I said sew Kieren's skirt. I will post photos when I come back up for air. Off to bed...

New Tabbies on Ladybug Limbo!

Sorry! Time for another shameless plug! I have new fabrics on Ladybug Limbo! Now is the time to order for an easy Christmas gift. I just did the Dayton FCC Adoption Bazaar and some of the fabrics are in a limited quantity. If you don't see a fabric you like, just drop me a line and I will find what you are looking for! Please let me know what you are interested in so I can hold it for you!

Silly Sunday