Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Our little Protestant Pickle is wearing Catholic green, but she's sitting in her orange chair, so there we go!  DeeDee gave her these jammies last summer and she wore them in warmer weather and fortunately they fit still just in time for the appropriate holiday! So cute!

We had a busy St. Patrick's Day.  Emmy took in her first parade downtown, we found baby bunnies living in the backyard when Charles cut the grass, and we topped it off with her pal Clayton's 2nd birthday party.  We're such hard partiers that awhile after the party was supposed to be over we all realized it was supper time and ordered pizza. It was a fun day!

Hope that all our loved ones are enjoying the weekend!

Waiting on the parade to start

Here it comes!

The sirens and motorcycles were a little loud for this sensitive girl.

Thomas the Train cake I made for Clayton's birthday. Turned out pretty well, if I do say so myself!

Front view (with a view from the dining to the living room in the background)

Baby bunny who has been residing in our backyard.

Checking out the bunny

Neighbors! Birthday boy Clayton, Emmy, Sophie, and Evan.

The road to Kansas: Part one

Emmy and her favorite teacher, Miss Christine,
& Miss Mary Ann. Somehow, she knew she
wasn't going to see Miss Christine again.

In all our recent updates, one post I've failed to get around to is sharing photos from our adventures between our old home and our new one!

Her last day with Miss Amy & Miss Jamie

Emmy went to school a couple of extra days the week after New Year's while we had the packers and movers there.  Here are a couple of photos from her last two days of school. Her teachers also had the kids make their Brown Bear, Brown Bear books and the last pages, when you see the Teacher and Children, had photos of all her teachers and each child in the class. Such a great memory for her!

The movers packed up the truck on Friday, January 6th, which is also when Emmy came down with the stomach bug. Yuck. We were camped out at Mary Ann and Joel's during this time and they were gracious hosts and we were so glad to be on familiar turf, but it's just hard to be sick when you aren't "home."

Sick Pickle.

We still managed to make it, though, to the baptism of our godson, Henry, that Sunday.  What a special day!  I also failed to ever post anything back during my fall updates about sweet Henry's birth, so I have failed him in my blogging as his godmother. :) 


So, here are a couple of photos from our first time meeting Henry on October 19th, the day after he was born!

Meeting Henry.  Lisa is the most beautiful new mom ever! Lucas wasn't too bad looking, either. 
But of course the sweet baby was the star!

I'm one day old!

Such a good baby, he slept until he was sprinkled

Back to Henry's baptism, we headed to Greenwood to celebrate with Lucas, Lisa, Will (our first born godson), Henry, and their family. Emmy was feeling MUCH better on Sunday morning and she and Will had a lot of fun playing. Too bad they both got a little loud during the service. At least they were well behaved for the baptism itself. Except, as we were standing at the front of the church, answering all those important questions the priest asks you, Emmy looks at me and says "Mommy, I'm ready to go to the nursery now." Nice.

But then he didn't like the water.

Henry did so well!  He slept through most of the service, until he had to be handed to Nicholas for the actual baptism, and then he wasn't too fond of the water.  Isn't he the cutest thing?

After the church service there were special refreshments during the church's usual social hour so we got to spend more time with Lucas and Lisa's family and some of our other friends who made the trip.  It was a fun day! We headed back to their house afterwards to let the kids take naps but before nap time, we had Emmy and Will sit down so we could take pictures of them in their cute church clothes. They were hamming it up!

We are going to miss living only an hour away from these boys and their parents.  We won't talk about that now because it will only make me cry!
Here are a few more photos from the day, including the cute photos of Miss E and Mr. W.

After Henry's baptism, we returned to Augusta to the comforts of Mary Ann and Joel's house, where MA (at the time about 14 weeks pregnant) was stricken with the stomach bug, and a few hours later I fell as well.  Poor Emmy I think was over it, but it made her gag reflex so sensitive that she would throw up while eating so we three spent that Monday doped up on phenegren and zofran, drinking broth, eating popsicles, sleeping and praying this would go away and not infect Charles or Joel.

Charles spent lots of time at our house patching holes and getting it ready for the renters.  Time was not on our side, so in the end we hired a painter to paint the kitchen cabinets and hall, our lovely housekeeper, Patricia, came and gave it a once over, our handyman came to fix some plumping concerns that proved to be above Charles' skill level, and we hired a landscaper to do some yard clean-up we simply ran out of time to do. Whew. Good news is we left Augusta knowing a lease had been signed and renters were moving in the following week. Yay! It was very, very hard to leave, but after all we'd been through the last few days, we were just ready to be done.

We headed to Mom and Dad's and set up camp there. Emmy and I left a few hours ahead of Charles and it was a relief to be done with that part of the journey.

 The next morning we headed to Spartanburg for a visit. We had lunch with my old boss/professor/mentor and her husband and they gave us a delightful tour of some of the new areas on campus at Wofford and caught us up on what's been going on.  We walked around campus, of course let Emmy look at all the fountains, and visited with a few other folks that I used to work with and we knew from our days as students. It was a great time!

 That afternoon we headed to Eric and Erin's house. Erin was due any day with baby Nora and we stayed with Stella while she went for a haircut.  The girls had fun playing and then we all had dinner before taking our very sleepy girls to their respective beds.  Erin was having some contractions during dinner that gave her pause and I told Charles on the way home "she is having that baby tonight." Sure enough around 11 pm she texted me that they were heading to the hospital and baby Nora was born the next morning! Yahoo!  More on that later, and happy 2 month birthday today, Nora!

Unfortunately 2 year olds move too fast for a good photo, with my camera,
but these two were being so silly and playing in Stella's bed. Too cute!

The next morning (Friday, for those of you struggling to keep up, it makes me tired remembering all of this!) we got on the road for a trip through Atlanta to Rome.  We stopped at Jane and Jeremy's for lunch with Jane and the boys.   I got a decent shot of Shepherd, Emmy, and Jasper together after lunch. Aren't they adorable?  I need to get Jane's copy, because of course her fancy camera and fancy photographer skills snapped a far better shot than my iPhone!

After lunch we said our good-byes and were back on the road again, this time a short drive as we continued towards DeeDee and Granddaddy's and detoured for a very short visit with some Army friends who were in the process of moving that very day!  We stopped at their new house just to hug necks.  David was Charles' Brigade commander and he and his wife, Sharon, have been mentors to us. Their girls are wonderful and their oldest daughter, Caitlin, just graduated from Wofford last spring.  It was nice to see them, even for a few minutes.  Their beautiful youngest daughter, Grace, has been very sick the last year and they have really been through a lot.  But their faith and strength is amazing!

Then it was time to hit the road for the last leg of our trip, next stop Rome!  More to come in part two...

March comes in like a lion

Well, we started out March with a bang! Aunt Meredith came to visit and I got the flu. That's right, the real, honest to God flu, influenza A to be exact.  Just in time for Mer to arrive, lucky us!

Sadly, this means I have n'er one photo to show for the weekend, but we all loved having her here. Emmy dragged her around the house, making her play with all her toys.  I came out of my room after showering on Sunday morning and to check in on Emmy and Aunt Mer, who were playing with blocks in Emmy's room.  She said "no, Mommy, you go back in your room." Well, we know who was the favored one here!  When Emmy was sleeping we sat around (or laid around really) and talked and watched ridiculous amounts of TV. Charles and I are now enjoying the new show "Smash" and since the recent episodes are On Demand, we re-watched them with Mer and well, now we are delighted to say she is hooked too. Ha!

I am feeling much better, but let me tell you what Internet, I paid the price for forgetting to get my flu shot.  In December I meant to ask my doctor about it when I saw him one more time, and I forgot. Then I figured I'd just go get one at Walgreen's or something since our insurance would cover it, but with Christmas and moving, etc. I forgot. And so, when I woke up Thursday morning feeling achy and feverish and like I couldn't get out of bed, I thought "oh, crap."  Fortunately Mary Ann convinced me go to get a flu test and I went Friday morning, which was early enough for me to take Tamiflu, miracle invention that it is.  And guess what? Everything "they" say about the flu is the truth. It did not start with a runny nose or congestion.  In fact, I'm not really very congested at all. I had a cough that came about Wed. late and when I coughed it made my throat hurt a lot, so much I wondered if it could be strep.  But it only hurt when I coughed, so I blew it off. But then the aches and chills and fever came. And you just don't feel like you ever want to move again.

This is when it is really hard to be away from family. I can't tell you how much I wanted my Mama on Thursday and Friday (are you ever too old to miss your Mama?).  I know she would have come and helped out with Emmy.  Folks, if you are lucky enough to live near parents or family who help with your kids, consider yourself extremely lucky.  My Mama will always be at least a couple of hours away, at least for the forseeable future.    Plus, Charles is in school and not in control of his own schedule at all, which meant he couldn't, say, stay home Friday morning for a few more minutes to get Emmy to the sitter, or come home for half an hour at lunch to pick her up from the sitter and get her down for a nap.  Sigh.

Luckily, we have found a sitter, really it's someone who offers childcare in her home and has gone through all the steps to be approved by the installation's Child Development Center. And, she lives right down the street, score!  Emmy has been twice and I will probably settle on at least one, if not two, standing mornings a week to take her there for a couple of hours, just to give myself some time to run errands or clean in peace. I can be a lot more productive on my own sometimes!

We also tried out the hourly care offered at the Child Development Center and Emmy had great fun, it's just hard to get booked in there. Their offerings fill up super fast, alas.

The last few weeks have otherwise been relatively uneventful, I'm sorry to report. Hence, the lack of blogging. I know, I know, where are the house photos you say? I'm sure everyone is dying to see more, so I promise I'll work on that.  I just need to take the photos, and I'm not so good with the photography, you see, so I sort of dread it.  But I will, cross my heart.

We're nice and settled into our house, been enjoying some unusually warm weather, along with the rest of you I suspect.  But here, warm still means windy and boy, is it windy! 60 degrees can still be too cold to stay outside for long with the wind whipping. Of course the most beautiful day so far was Thursday, when I was laid up sorry on the sofa, but Emmy and Charles got to go out side and even had visit from the ice cream truck. Yay!

Oh, yes, and how could I forget, Rags wrapped up February with a hairline fracture in her back leg after jumping out of Charles' arms.  So, now that we're a 2 day drive from her grandfather the vet, we had to make a trip to a local vet and wow, sticker shock, 300 bucks.  He did not see any fractures on the x-rays but clearly she was hurting so he gave us a few days worth of pain pills and sent the films to the radiologist, who said he/she did see some green lines, indicating a fracture.  Fortunately, she is now using her foot again so hopefully we can avoid repeat x-rays tomorrow. He did check out her eyes again and put her on a new medicine since the one corneal abrasion wasn't fully healed.  Fingers crossed for a good report and cheap visit tomorrow!

So, hopefully March will go out like a lamb!  Here are a couple of random pictures from the end of the month for you.  We'll get to work on some March photos.

Emmy insisted on eating her chili with chopsticks the other night.  Still a bit of a learning curve...

I got out of the shower and found her like this. We were doing laundry and she took two clean dresses out and put them on over her pajamas...backwards. (And underneath she's also wearing a pair of madras shorts...pictured below.)

A little light reading...

Amazing multi-tasking Dad...he can iron and entertain the toddler at the same time!

Snow, snow, snow!

On Monday we had our first "big" snow.  It did snow a little bit the weekend before, but not quite an inch and was not enough to go play in. But this week, play we did!

Emmy made her first snow angels, built her first snow man, and went sledding thanks to our wonderful neighbors. (We've not bought a sled and this year she is a little big for the cookie sheet.) She had lots of fun, and so did Rags, Charles, and I.

Here are a few photos of our adventures, more in in Picasa.

We started the day with snowflake pancakes in honor of the snow.

Emmy and her new pal Sophie sledding in the driveway.

Emmy and Clayton

Building a snowman with Daddy. She was SO excited.
Of course she and Sophie knocked him down a few minutes later.

With a carrot nose and two black olive eyes...

She had to give him (yes, with a pink scarf) a kiss.
Per Joanna's advice, she named her snowman Justin.

Sledding!

Charles and Emmy and Clayton and his dad take on Clayton's mom in a snowball fight. I just took photos. :)

Happy Valentine's Day

(pre-haircut)

 Emmy says "won't you bee mine?"

Happy Valentine's Day! We hope everyone had a great day!

Frosting our strawberry cupcakes (post-haircut)

She is such a great helper in the kitchen!

Emmy, two years 9 months

Mmm...sweet tea from Pete's!

Emmy will be three years old three months from today. How did that happen? So here is a long overdue and overly informative update on The Pickle, since this IS the Pickle Jar, after all. I'll include a few photos, including a few of Emmy's new room in our house.


This age is hilarious. She is always saying something (or repeating something) that cracks us up. In a word, she's sassy. Here are a few highlights from the past few weeks (and a few from the fall that I failed to post):
To Charles after he'd shaved after having grown out his beard for a few days: "Daddy, where did your crust go?"

There was a new kid in the class named Storm. Miss Sherry said Emmy kept asking all day "what's his name again?" The kid left a little early and Emmy asked "Where's Thunder?"

Reading in her room. When she wakes up,
she turns on her light and reads for a while.

"Emmy, where does Aunt Sarah live?"
"At Aunt Sarah's house!" (Of course she does, why didn't I think of that?)

"Mommy, I'm serious."
"You're serious?"
"Yes."
"Well, what are you serious about?"
"Are you kidding me?!?"
(I figured out she will hear us say "Are you kidding me" and then "I'm serious." and she must have reversed the two. Hysterical)

When we ask her to do something (like pick up her toys) she'll sometimes reply, "Um, no thank you." (EXCUSE ME?)

Yes, it looks very much like her old room. I was going to redecorate,
but that involves a lot of furniture switching and purchasing we just
aren't ready for, so we have some things purchased for a new room
so that will happen eventually and we hope these pillows etc. will be
used for a new baby one day.

Anytime she's not ready to do something (like take a nap or get out of the bath) she'll either say "just a couple more minutes" or lately "just four more minutes", which she gets from one of her Veggie Tales videos. She'll also ask for, say, more milk and if we say no, she'll hold her fingers apart and squint her eye and whisper "just a tiny little bit of milk?" Clever, kid, but asking me in such a cute manner won't work. I'm (almost) immune to your charms. I do have to bite my tongue to keep from laughing.

To the server at a restaurant as she stopped by to check on us: "I'm fine, thanks."

Lately whenever we give her something to eat she compliments the chef, "Good job, Mom/Dad, good job!"

She wants to do everything herself, so we hear a lot of "I want to do it by.my.self" or "Can I do it?" (which sounds like "Camma do it?")

We will ask he why on occasion when she tells us something or asks for something and she'll say "because" which sounds like "p-cause".

She still loves music and singing. She knows lots of her Kindermusik songs and Rafi songs. She does an excellent rendition of "I've Been Working on the Railroad." She loves the Glee soundtrack, particularly songs sung by the Warblers, she is into Adele. The other day we were running errands and she started singing "when your heart beats, next to mine," which is a line from Madonna's "Like a Virgin," which is on one of the Glee soundtracks. HA! At least she has pretty good taste in music, if you like Madonna, Adele, Rafi and the Wiggles.

She also makes up songs. All.The.Time. I have been trying to capture some of her tunes on camera, but true to toddler form, she tends to stop singing as soon as I pick up the camera. The other morning she was singing about Christmas morning. The primary lyrics were "Christmas morning, Christmas morning," but hey, I give her props for her creativity. It is highly entertaining.

The biggest news about Emmy is she is now potty trained during the day! Yahoo! We are thrilled and just like everyone said, she just decided she was ready and it took no effort on our part. Since around Christmas she had started telling us every so often that she needed to go but it was still unpredictable. Then, seriously, the day we arrived on post, we went straight to the housing office to sign in and she told me she needed to potty so I took her and she pooped on the potty for the first time! We had a major celebration and really since then, it was like going from zero to 60. She wears big girl undies all day, even during her nap, and she only wears a pullup at night. YAHOO! Of course this means we have become familiar with the restroom in every establishment we have patronized lately.

Also, let's talk about how self-flushing toilets are a potty training toddler (and parent's) worst nightmare. Especially for Emmy, who is easily startled by loud noises. We have to warn her if we are turning on something loud to keep her from practically jumping out of skin! She's just now able to handle the garage door, poor kid.

With her best pal Emma at the zoo in October.

She definitely misses the only home she has known. When she plays, she pretends to go to school and church a lot, so I know she misses both. She asks about her friends and teachers. She was very tired when she went to bed one night last week, and a little emotional (she's her Mama's girl). She asked me "Mama, when are our friends coming to our new house." She said she was sad and cried a little bit. Another night I told her to have sweet dreams about all the things she loves and she said "like playing with Emma!" Poor girl, I know how she feels. But she has LOVED playing with our new friends next door. She and Sophie and Clayton get along very well and she loves having an older girl to admire. I know kids are adaptable and she is fine, but it makes me sad for her.

Holding Henry for the first time.

The child loves babies. Seriously, she loved, loved holding Micah and Henry, and she's really good with them. She would pat them and say "it's okay, don't fuss, you're fine," and kiss them and love them.  She told me she wanted to hold baby Nora and rock her (Nora was born to our dear friends Eric and Erin right before we headed west).  I didn't tell her that Charles and I went to see Nora because Emmy was sick and we didn't want to spread her germs.  She told me a couple of times that she had baby Nora in her tummy (um, no, pretty sure she was in Aunt Erin's!) and just tonight she told me that when she gets big she will have a baby in her tummy. I made her promise me she'd get married first. She is a good mommy to her doll babies. She changes them, feeds them, and prefers to keep them naked. We might need to work on some of her parenting skills! 

Back in October the Paci Fairy came so she has been paci free since then. If I'd known it was so easy, we've have done it ages ago! Selfishly, we just weren't ready to deal with the potential sleepless nights that we feared would be a repercussion. However, it went better than we could have hoped. First, a couple of the pacis were "broken" suddenly when we got home from our weekend in Atlanta and Rome. After a few nights of only one whole paci available, it disappeared. Seriously, we had no idea where it went so that night, she had to use on of the broken ones (we had cut off the tip). She stuck it in her mouth, pulled it out, and fell asleep holding it instead. A few nights of just wanting to hold it, and I suggested that if she was ready, she could put them in a box and the Paci Fairy would come and bring her a special toy. So she did on her own, and the Paci Fairy brought her a diaper bag for her baby (full of diapers and other accessories). Yay! She asked for her paci for a couple of nights but no tears, no fussing. I've noticed in the moving craziness and when she was sick she has asked for it a handful of times, but probably not surprising.

Emerson Elizabeth is this whole little person who is increasingly independent and smart and funny. Her hair is getting so long, diapers and pacis are a thing of the past, she's gotten taller, she looks grown up. She is hysterical, delightful, frustrating, and exasperating all in one. We are so proud to be her parents and we love her so much!