Loop, swoop and pull.

I want to brag on Madalynn today.

Madalynn learned how to tie her shoes in five minutes, with Travis's help! Madalynn is left-handed like Travis. I am no help to Madalynn with lefty things at all. I'm just not coordinated enought to make my left hand do what my brain tells it! Anyway, Madalynn was getting her tennis shoes on to go ride her bike and asked Travis to help. He said, "Why don't you try?" Madalynn said okay, watched him do it a couple of times, then did it herself on the first try! I was impressed. We "tested" her on it later, and she did it again and again, with no mistakes.

The other thing Madalynn has been working very hard at is recognizing all of her numbers 1-100. Numbers were especially hard for her to learn because of her vision tracking problem and her left-handedness. See, she transposes numbers. I tell her to write 31 and she'll write 13. It's complicated to explain, but her eyes have trouble doing what her mind tells them to, therefore what she writes or reads often comes out backward. We went on a hike at the state park we went to today and she read almost all of the trail-marking numbers correctly the first time, which were all two digits. We were all so excited for her, and so was she!

She's growing up so fast. I am so excited that both Travis and I get to see our "big girl" experience her firsts and work with her to help her overcome her obstacles.

In the mind of a little boy

Justis and Dawson have both said some hilarious things in the last two days. I had to sit and type this out before I forget!

Last night, Justis and the rest of his siblings were doing the nightly before-bed tidy up. Justis was supposed to have finished all of his responsibilities before proceeding to anything else. I walked over two pairs of his dirty underwear as I was on my way to put away clean clothes in Madalynn's room.

I said, "Justis, there are two pairs of underwear I just stepped over. You are getting spanked because you didn't do it the first time I asked and before playing." He happened to already be playing in the living room and had totally forgotten the underwear.

He snapped back, "Well, MOM, I didn't see them there!"

I replied, "Justis, I told you to take care of ALL of your things. Now do it and quit being a smart alec."

Justis snapped back, "Well, I didn't see them there, and my name's not Alec!"

He got his butt popped for smarting off, but I was laughing inside. He has a friend from preschool named Alec. He thought I had gone looney by calling him by the wrong name!

Tonight in the car, Justis and Madalynn were getting loud and sarcastic with one another in the back seat. Madalynn was frustrated because Justis was yelling at her to get her leg on HER side of the seat, and Justis was getting onto her for yelling at him. Before too long...

"Moooooom. Justis is mad because I am yelling at him, but I asked him in a nice voice once and he wouldn't stop, so I had to yell at him and now he's mad because I'm yelling at him." Did you catch all of that? If you didn't, that's okay. It's as hard for me to understand what she's saying in person.

I said, "Madalynn, the way you respond is your choice. You may talk in a normal voice to him, even if he chooses to yell at you. No matter how much he yells at you, you don't have to yell back. Don't let him get your goat."

Madalynn replied, "Okay."

Dawson listened to the advice I gave Maddie and has just learned to speak in sentences. Most of his sentences are still pretty mushy, but from the middle seat, just as plain as day, Dawson said, "Goat! What goat, mom!?

Apparently Dawson was interested in seeing the goat that she wasn't going to let Justis get. :)

Baby Jesus

My children just crack me up. I really enjoy watching them play together and imagine all kinds of make-believe to play. Here they are playing "Baby Jesus." Their journey to Bethlehem consists of moving from Madalynn's room to the living room. Baby Jesus (Jillian) gets the royal treatment. She rides, swaddled in pretty blankets, in the clothes basket!

Home is where the heart is.

Many people have asked us what our new house is like, so I think I'll take today to take you on a written "tour" of our new home. I'll put on some pictures of the inside and backyard when I'm finished decorating. :)

We live in rural Ponchatoula, Louisiana. We are about three miles from Poncahtoula, and only about six miles from Hammond, Louisiana. Living in the "country" here is a little different from living in the country in Kansas. We live three miles from town, but we have at least seven houses on our street that is about 3/4 of a mile long, and there is a house on almost every acre from here to town. The natives consider this the country. We don't necessarily feel like we live in the country, but it's peaceful, nonetheless.

Our big yard is probably our favorite part of our new home. We live on .87 acres, which is very similar in size to the beautiful, big yard we enjoyed at our home in Hutchinson. We have lots of different kinds of trees, including a sweet gum, which is one of my favorites. When you pick a leaf from a sweet gum and squish it up in your hand, your hand will smell like peppermint gum. We moved the kids' swingset that Santa gave them for Christmas and they are really enjoying it here. A long concrete drive (which would be directly to the left of the photographer in the above picture), goes around to the back of our house to a two-car carport. This long drive is a dream-come-true for our children and they enjoy riding their bikes and tricycles up and down that drive. The backyard is totally fenced in (we have to drive through a double gate to get to our carport), which makes a nice play place for my children and our dogs.

Our home is also nice and has a smart layout. We have four bedrooms, three of which we use as bedrooms and are located on the right side of the house. We use the fourth room as a playroom/computer room/guest room and it is located on the opposite side of the house. We have a nice master bathroom, which I really like, and another full bathroom for the kids. The dining/kitchen/living space is right in the middle and back of the house. The three rooms are visually separated by a bar/island that divides the kitchen and living room and creates a "boundary" for the dining area. I like the way the main area works, because I like experiencing my family while cooking meals. I can wash my dishes while watching my kids in the living room! A sitting room is at the front of the house by the foyer, where we keep our piano, my sewing machine and bookshelves. I have a laundry room with plenty of room for storage, too. Windows are also plentiful, and we can look out and see what our kids or doing or enjoy seeing the beautiful outdoors. We do, thankfully, have an attic. People don't have basements here, period, because the water table is too high. We have a pull-down ladder leading up to the attic for easy access.

That's our home. I do want to say, we have learned an important thing by owning five houses. The family memories made in a house is what makes it a home, not the physical structure itself. Sure, we make practical decisions about making sure we have enough square feet for practical needs and we decide whether we want to take the time on a fixer-upper or not. In the end, a house is a house. We are thankful for every house God has allowed us to enjoy, but we're even more thankful for being together as a family.

What's BUGGING me?

Bugs, that's what! You all know I hate creepy crawly insects. They give me the hebee jebees! I also run and flail when I think I am being buzzed by a bee or wasp. Louisiana is the wrong place to live for me, because there are bugs everywhere. Even my bug enthusiast, Madalynn, has gotten the shivers a couple of times because of a few bugs she's laid her eyes on. Let me introduce you to some of our new "neighbors."

There's the dragonfly. Now these I can handle. I never knew there were so many different types of dragonflies. They come in almost all colors, and they have either double wings or single. So how can a dragonfly scare someone? Well, Travis and I had to do some teamwork in getting a dog fence up so Dixie and Cotton only have about 1/6 of the yard to destroy and poop on. My senses were already heightened, because I was outside and didn't know what to expect to fall on me, crawl on me or buzz me. So, every time a dragonfly got within ten feet I would freak out. That's right. I would drop whatever I was helping Travis with and then run and flail. To me, the dragonflies sounded like BIG wasps or bees, and that didn't FLY with me. :) I have since developed a discerning ear and know how to tell the buzz of a dragonfly to that of a wasp or bee. I like the green ones, because they're friendly and will land on me so I can get a closer look. Now I only run and flail if it's a wasp or bee.

Speaking of wasps and bees, I've been stung by two wasps in my lifetime and I never wish to be stung again. I also do not want to find out if my children are allergic to their stings. Justis is our only child who has been stung and he didn't have a reaction. There are wasps and bees all over the place here. I kept finding wasps flying around the house and I couldn't figure out why. I finally realized there was a HUGE wasp nest up inside our porch light and every time someone would open the front door a couple would come in. Wasps are more stupid than bees, too. They just kind of haphazardly buzz around, running into things. The pest control man told me that if you stand still, wasps are less likely to sting you because their sensory skills aren't very good. They can't detect you if you're not moving. I haven't practiced this yet. It's fight or flight. I choose flight. The pest control man said he sprayed about nine wasp nests around our house!

What about fire ants? I don't think I really knew what a fire ant was until I moved here. I remember picking up "fire ants" on a stick as a child, but they didn't look the same as these fire ants here. I was weeding my flowerbed the first day we were here because it was horribly overgrown. As I was dodging the bees and wasps (dragonflies), I felt a really painful sting on my left pinkie finger. I looked and there was nothing there and no mark. I thought a small bee stung me, but since there was no mark there I figured a sticky weed poked my pinkie. Later that night I looked down and saw a huge white puss-filled bump in the spot I felt the sting. I used the Internet as a resource and found that fire ants actually qualify as flying insects. They bite and sting! They first bite your skin with their pinchers to hang on and then raise their back ends up (that have the stinger) and pivot on their pinchers, stinging in a circle. There is no mistaking the bite of a fire ant because of the pussy-looking bumps they leave on your skin. Poor Dawson had fire ant bites all over him the first week we were here. He would just stand there in them, making them mad and they'd bite him all over. We've got the ants under control now and the kids know how to watch for them.

The HUGE brown "tree roaches" I've seen here just give me the creeps. They're harmless, but they look disgusting. Enough said about that.

Lastly, I'm going to talk about the fellow above. I was on the riding lawnmower one day (maybe I ought to just stay off the mower) and I caught something out of the corner of my eye as I was driving by the chain link fence. I looked over and saw this Goliath-sized black grasshopper slowly moving it's legs. I just about fell off the mower because I was so startled. I kept it together enough to rationalize through things and realize it wouldn't kill me. I looked this one up on the Internet, too, and it's called an eastern lubber. It is very destructive to plants (I should've killed it) and is poisonous to birds and opossums. I'll remind my kids not to eat them! :)

Father's Day with Daddy Long-Legs

I prayed about what to get Travis for Father's Day this year. I wanted something that would bless him, not just another "thing." God answered my prayers through my children. I asked them what THEY wanted to do with Daddy for Father's Day and they said they wanted to go camping! That settled it.

The kids and I went to Wal Mart without Travis to pick his gifts. I allowed the kids to pick a tent. They chose the one that looked the most fun, of course. The tent they chose had a large dome tent in the middle with two smaller dome tents on both sides of the center tent that can connect by zipping tunnels between the tents. Each one also got Travis their own smaller, personal gift. The boys chose lanterns (Dawson insisted on the same gift Justis chose), and Madalynn chose a combination fan/light that magnetically stuck to the very top of the tent for Daddy's comfort. :)

So, on Saturday the 16th we gave Travis his presents. He was thrilled. We then stuffed our minivan full and headed to Percy Quinn state park near McComb, Mississippi. Percy Quinn is about 45 minutes north of our house.

We got to Percy Quinn near supper time, so we arrived and set up our new tent, then Travis started a fire. I had to go find the nearest Wal Mart. I had packed the family and had forgotten probably one of the most essential things; Jillian's formula and bottles. Thankfully McComb had a Wal Mart.

We cooked supper when I got back and put Jillian in her porta-crib in the tent for the night. We left the door open so she could see us, and she played until she couldn't play anymore and fell asleep. S'mores were then cooked and the kids (especially Justis) were ready to check in for the night.

We all climbed in our respective tents. Madalynn, Justis and Dawson slept together in one of the side tents and Jillian, Travis and I all slept in the middle tent. All of the sudden Madalynn and Justis started talking. "DAAAAAD....There's a daddy long-legs in here!" Travis was already snoozing and told them to go to sleep and that they were just imagining thngs. They insisted he check, so he ended up getting out of the tent and going over to check for the daddy long-legs about three times before he convinced them there was no spider. We then fell asleep. Oh, and I have to say THANK GOD for the fan Madalynn bought Travis. There is no wind and much humidity here, so it made our sleep-out more bearable.

We woke in the morning to Maddie, Justis and Dawson having a spirited conversation about the daddy long-legs again. Before too long, "DAAAAAAAAAD!!!!" and a bunch of rustling came from the tent. "There's a daddy long-legs on the tent!" Maddie screamed. I'm sure it was about 6:30 a.m., and we were waking up the whole campground! Travis again went over repeatedly (losing patience) and, lo and behold...there he was. The daddy long-legs wanted to celebrate Father's Day with our children, too! The kids decided our tent was safer, so they all got up and came into the big tent with us.

We cooked breakfast, took in the BEAUTIFUL scenery, the kids and Travis swam in the lake and we finally went home exhuasted. Travis and I both agree it was a Father's Day we will never forget!

Taking a bath in rotten eggs

The first time I turned on the water in our home here in Louisiana it stunk. I figured the water was just a little bit stagnant since nobody had lived here for a while. I left the kitchen faucet on to run for several minutes while I did some other things to "get the smell out." I came back and it actually smelled worse!

Turns out, the water here in this part of Louisiana has a high concentration of sulfur, which ends up acting like a gas in water. It's like when someone toots in the tub and makes the bubbles stink. All of the little air bubbles in the water that is brought up from our well and goes through the pipes carry those little air pockets of sulfer and the water that comes out of the faucets smells like rotten eggs. The water is totally safe to drink, but it just stinks.

I was TOTALLY turned off by our foul-smelling water. Madalynn wanted a drink and helped herself to some tap water. She no more than got the glass up to her nose before she decided she didn't want to drink what smelled like rotten eggs. She said, "Eeeeew, Mom. This smells gross!"

I asked our neighbors about this, figuring there was some way to get the smell out that we just didn't know about. Both neighbors I asked about it affectionately called it, "egg water," and went on to explain that, "I've drank it and bathed in it all my life, so I don't even notice the smell." No kidding.

Well, I'm not used to smelling rotten eggs or drinking rotten eggs, so we have to find a solution.
The filter on our refrigerator gives us fresh-smelling water to drink and for Jillian's bottles, in the meantime. I made a call to a well/water company and the guy said the problem could be fixed either with a new water holding tank for our well or a whole-house carbon filter. Travis and I have to go to the showroom to decide what's best. Travis knows enough about wells and pumps to be dangerous, so he'll probably decide what we need and fix it up for us.

I was so excited to take a bath in the whirlpool tub in our master bathroom for the first time. I ran some water, got in and turned on the jets. Needless to say, I didn't stay in for very long. The comfort and relaxation of a whirlpool bath is ruined when the water smells like rotten eggs! And, no, I wasn't tooting!

Hillbillified

Have you ever seen the Beverly Hillbillies? I have. I specifically remember the father puttering up to a mansion in an old car overloaded with family and belongings. That was amusing.

You know what's more amusing? The way we looked when we made the long journey from Hugoton to our new home. The trip took a total of five days, but we stopped for 1 1/2 days in Wichita for Memorial Weekend. As if a family of six being displaced from home five days isn't challenging enough, add two dogs and a u-haul trailor to a van with an air conditioner going on the brink.

We looked into shipping our dogs Cotton, an 82 lb. golden retreiver, and Dixie, a 62 lb. chocolate lab by airplane to Louisiana. I quickly found out that Cotton exceeds the 70 lb. pet shipping weight limit. We decided, with much arguing, that we would put a hitch on the minivan (see where the hillbilly is coming in?) and rent an open U-Haul trailor so we could put the dog kennels on the trailor. Travis spent a whole afternoon saying words I can't repeat while trying to get the hitch on our minivan and wiring for brake lights. He's my superhero, though, and, like always, he pulled through.

Have you ever been embarrased to ride in a vehicle? I hadn't been until the van was hillbillified and people would pass us on the highway and gawk. We get enough looks when people see we have four kids so young, but this put us over the edge of the "crazy" cliff. There we were. All six of us were packed in a minivan pulling a trailor with what looked to be two bird dogs and a lot of "junk" (actually valuable to us) that was haphazardly stuffed in cardboard boxes. Each time we stopped for ANYTHING it took us at least a full 30 minutes. We drove through one heavy downpour after another in northwest Texas, so our cardboard boxes were all mushy and falling apart.

The smell was another thing. Put six people in a minivan on a hot, humid day and have two of them repeatedly poop their pants and another repeatedly need to make sure he didn't poop his. I changed about three of Jillian's dirty diapers while we were chugging down the highway, just so we wouldn't have to stop AGAIN. No matter how quickly we would change diapers and stop at a trash can to throw them out, the smell still lingered.

Travis and I splurged and got the kids those portable dvd players, which were worth every penny we paid for them. Dawson has a new love for the old Disney movie "Chitty, Chitty, Bang-Bang." I think I have the songs memorized because his little earphones were too big to fit into his ears.

We pulled up to our closing for our new house ten minutes late and a dirty diaper fell out of the car just as our realtor came out to greet us. By then I wasn't embarrassed. Just happy to be "home."

A ride in the poop water.

I decided to begin my stories with one about myself. I want to prove that I do really stupid things more than probably all of my other family members put together. When I write about their cute and silly things, please remember that I am the queen of "silly things"!

Last Saturday I volunteered to mow the front yard while Travis went to Wal Mart to see about getting a tire fixed.

I got on the mower and did all of the front yard except the part furthest away from our house, which is where the "poop water" ditch is. Let me explain. All of the houses in this area have their own septic systems equipped with some kind of purification system that filters 90% of the poop out of the water (or so "they" say), spitting the 90% clean water out through pipes to this ditch that runs in front of our houses. That's why it's the "poop water" ditch.

I decided to go ahead and finish the yard up since Travis wasn't home yet. I put the mower in it's LOWEST and SLOWEST gear so I could remain in complete control of it while maneuvering close to the poop water. I got the yardside of the ditch done, then started mowing the streetside.

All of the sudden the mower started leaning WAY over toward the poop water. I tried to lean back the other way, but it wasn't working. I jumped off quickly and stepped back. The mower was still in drive with the blades spinning and doing a wheelie on it's back wheels! I grabbed the steering wheel hoping to bring it back down so I could reach over and turn it off before it fell in the ditch. I pulled it down, but it went right back up. I let go, and there it went. It rolled over into the poop water.

I stood there in silence, wondering what I could do. The mower was still running, blades and all, with black smoke starting to putter out of the exhaust pipe. I then ran AROUND the ditch, still avoiding the poop water, to see if I could turn the key off without getting down in the muck. The key was right there in the poop mud. I slid down into the yucky muck in my croc flops and turned the key off, while getting sprayed with the poop water the blade was catching and flinging in all directions.

I stepped back and marveled at my "handiwork" and wondered what had caused the mower to develop a mind of its own. Then I saw it. I had forgotten the bagging attachment was on the back of the mower. The bagging attachment caught on our mailbox, causing the mower to veer toward the ditch, pop wheelies and turn over into the ditch. I went inside, shaking my head.

I wondered what Travis would say when he got home. He didn't say much and asked me to come help him get it out. Our neighbor helped, too. The mower seems unphased by the accident and still runs fine.

When I walked back up to the house Justis said in a very concerned voice, "Uh, Mom. Daddy said he was going to kill you when we saw the mower in the ditch and you weren't in the car." I just smiled and said, "Honey, Daddy didn't really mean that." Travis later explained to Justis that he shouldn't have said that and he didn't really mean it that and he loved Mommy and wasn't going to kill her. :)

Introducing the Davis Dish!



Hello! We miss all of our friends and family in Kansas and everywhere else so much we wanted to make a way to "keep in touch." I always find myself wanting to write down and share the peculiar and funny things that I encounter everyday, so I decided a blog would help us share what's going on with us as well as be a creative outlet for me and a record for my children to look back on.



Our computer is getting VERY old and I am not equipped with a digital camera, so this will probably not be a fancy blog. I will still try to get Travis to take pictures with his digital camera from work so I can post up-to-date pictures of my growing kids. I do not have enough time to sit and wait on the computer to "think" when it's overloaded, so I'm going to keep the layout simple as well. The other thing I'm going to try REALLY HARD to do is keep my entries short. I am the first to stop reading something that is boring and redundant! :)



So, welcome to our blog, and please feel free to check back as often as you want. I'm learning at this, so I'll be adding things as I go. Please note that I'm sending this blog by invitation only to keep online predators away from my family. However, if you know someone who would like to receive this, please let me know and we can add them to the list.



God Bless!

Jae



P.S. Tomorrow's story will be about me having a little "accident" on the riding mower. You won't want to miss this one! :)