A Glimpse into my Life.

Please do not kill over in shock, I am posting more pictures from Scotland since life sidetracked us pretty good and I never finished. The William Wallace Monument stands at the summit of Abbey Craig, a hilltop near Stirling. Since it is at the top of Abbey Craig, and it's Scotland in general, it was really windy. Then when you climb to the top of the Monument, and are in the open area at the top, you are almost blown over! They built the Monument near where the battle for Stirling Bridge was fought.

Here is what they believe is William Wallace's sword. They figure based on how huge this sword is, he had to have been at least 6'6" or taller. They are pretty sure it's Wallace's sword because when they write about Wallace, they talk about him towering head and shoulders over others.

Sorry Jake, at 6'3" you are just a little too short to properly wield this sword!


The William Wallace Monument was incredible for stairs. Seriously, if you want GREAT legs, just go to Scotland and visit the different monuments. You will really feel the burn after a while. First you had to go up this flight of stairs, then you got to the infamous spiral staircase. It just keeps going and going and going. Then you get to the second floor. Then you realize there are two more floors to go. There are only 246 steps in this place!



(Those red thingies are how you listen to your audio tour. Personally, I think they should have given everyone torches to light the way. Much cooler and better ambiance!)

Check out the pitch on the spiral staircase! And notice the darkened line that twists like the staircase? That's the handrail! It's on the skinny side of the step. Don't lean too far forward!

This is a statue of William Wallace on the outside of the monument. It's just on the side, nothing else by it.
If you look closely, you can see the keystone piece. The Scots were so afraid that whomever was going to put that piece in place would die, they exempted all the married men (so they wouldn't make anyone a widow) and had the single men draw lots to see who would put it in place. The keystone is the little ball you can see underneath the stone arch and just above the rail at the bottom of the picture.

The view from the very top! This is the River Forth. Somewhere down there is where they fought the Battle for Stirling Bridge, but Floolie and I can't remember where it was at. Bumpa is napping or we'd ask him.

Notice the moss on the walls of this picture. Even up this high, the air is moist enough to grow stuff!
Those little white things in this picture are sheep! They look like grains of rice, or as Jake says, maggoty little things!
And this is a tree growing there that I thought was just perfect for climbing. No I didn't, but I was sorely tempted! The whole 246 stairs up then 246 stairs down just about does you in. Then you have to walk from the top of Abbey Craig to the car park if you *just* missed the bus going down. ;)

Saturday that stupid darn cat peed in MY bed!!!!! I was laying in bed with Pink Princess and the devil cat jumped onto my bed. I didn't think anything of it until Hubby came in and just about flipped a gasket. The Devil Cat™ had peed all over my bed! She has peed on my bathroom rugs and I think if she does it again she's in more trouble than her nose getting rubbed in it!

Since things are slowing down I have a few moments to actually make a post. We are all adapting to a kitten. Pink Princess can't figure out why Spitfire runs away when she tries to maul the cat. Spitfire can't figure out why Pink Princess wants to eat her. It's great fun. Rynie is a huge helper, even if I don't quite *need* him to be. Most of the time it comes in handy though. Yesterday, he woke up from his nap before the rest of us and came into my room. He was so excited. Rynie found where Spitfire had not used her litter box! Eww! For the last couple of days, Floolie and I thought we could smell something after the litter box had been cleaned out, but we couldn't find it anywhere. Well, Pink Princess's swing was sitting in the hallway, and Spitfire thought that was a great litter box! And since Spitfire got Rynie's beanbag, we had to wash that also. I hate unstuffing the beanbag to wash it. There are so many little fluffy things, and they get static charged and stick to everything. Oh well, such is life when you have pets and small children.



Aubrey wanted more purple in her hair, so I found a bright purple to weave into her hair. Since she already had the blond and some red in, we did a little more of a reddish brown and the purple. She now has about five colors going in her hair! We also decided to put some purple in Floolie's hair. Since Floolie's hair is so dark anyway, it just gives her hair a purple cast when she is out in the sunlight. And yes, that is a metallic red table cloth in the background. Rynie saw that and had to have it. It was on clearance so I didn't mind, but wow, it's bright. He saw it in the drawer the other day so we are having to use it. What a guy. :D



The kidlets are so fun. We have been working in the yard while Hubby is at school and work. Jake came over yesterday and broke up some of the bigger weed patches in the front. He probably saved me a month's worth of work since I have to do the yard when other stuff is done and work around all the rain we've had lately.

Pink Princess has been exploring the house like crazy. She is into everything and trying to walk and stand up on her own. The standing up on her own has a better success rate than the walking though. She is one tough cookie. She falls down then picks herself up and keeps trying. Here she is trying to take the tablecloth off the table. Rynie is 'supervising' to make sure she doesn't hurt herself. And yes, Rynie did get his summer buzz cut.

Since we went to Scotland, I have had my own Knight! He trounces the 'bad guys' and saves the Princesses, including the resident Pink one. We were watching Sleeping Beauty and he had to get his gear on and help Prince Phillip. Sir Rynie the Magnificent was victorious! You can see all his vanquished foes littering the ground! We are having to watch the ending again so he can fight the bad guy and save the Princess!







My house is *almost* there being ready for Floolie to visit and dinner is in the oven just waiting for her to get here. We are having Roast Beef and mashed potatoes for dinner and I think we'll do a salad and then a pound cake with strawberries and whipped cream for dessert. I can't wait for Floolie to get here!

Pink Princess has been napping off and on today. When she's napping, I have been getting a lot of house work done. When she's awake, I ready her room for Floolie to get here. I've been packing away too little baby clothes while I am at it. It makes me sad to see her little outfits that no longer fit.

She is quite adept at chasing Spitfire! I have never seen either one of them move so fast. Pink Princess is speed crawling and Spitfire is only keeping on the earth by the tips of her toes. They are both sleeping right now. It's hard work being the hunter and the hunted!

Rynie loves Christmas music. So much so, that I have to hide my songbooks from him otherwise we do Christmas music everyday. So imagine a three year old almost following the melody, slightly off key rendition of Santa Claus is Coming to Town over and over again! Interspersed with Rudolph, Jolly Old St. Nicholas, and just about any Santa centered song you can imagine!



Last weekend, I was out pulling weeds in our front yard and something small and greyish darted off. My heart sped up and I had that momentary Oh, a mouse! reaction then saw said thing sitting about a foot in front of me. I knew a mouse wouldn't do that so I went to see what it was. We had a toad in our yard! We put it in a jar for the night so Rynie could see it in the morning. Then we went out to pull more weeds. When we came back inside, the toad was NOT in the jar. I had a toad loose in my house!!! Hubby finally found it in the family room over by the fireplace! That little toad was making good time! Rynie had a blast playing with it the next morning as he had it hop on his hands and chased it through our neighbor's grass. When we were done with it, we turned it loose in the woods behind the house!



Pink Princess is quite the mover and shaker! She has been attempting to stand on her own and it usually involved her booming down on her bum after a second or two. She has decided that she wants to eat big people food. And because my children never do things the 'normal' way, she likes to eat it off big people silverware. None of that little baby or toddler stuff, she needs her food served just like Mom and Dad. We are still working on the taking a sippy thing though. I have Frankensteined a sippy and that is working best so far. I have combined an Avent and Nuby sippy and it's working okay. The Nuby sippies are too long and she doesn't like her head tilted back that far and she doesn't like the Avent ones because it's not squishy enough to suck on. I'm hoping to make it to the store to see if they have a small Nuby one because she likes the crucial parts on that one best. She laughs and thinks she is quite the big girl.

She also loves to eat grapes and strawberries. We have to slice the grapes in half, but she sucks the middles out and leaves the skins. When we take her out of her highchair, there are all these empty grape skins sitting in her chair! She swiped this strawberry from my plate the other day.







Rynie now has red hair. Yes, you read that right. Every time he sees me do hair, he asks if he can get red hair. I was doing my cousin Aubrey's hair and thought why not? He will be getting a summer buzz cut soon so lets go for it! He thinks he is da Bomb or something!



Pink Princess is the stair master! She loves climbing up the stairs, but hasn't quite mastered the going down. She usually goes down end over end. She'll stand up on the stairs and then bounce and fall down. Pink Princess only does that when I think she's entertaining herself and I'm helping Rynie do something I can't leave, like cooking at the stove. We'll hear a thump bump and then she chews us out royally. We are working on her going down the stairs backwards so she doesn't splat anymore, and making a little progress.





We also went ahead and got Rynie a cat. The deal was he had to go six weeks without an accident. He kept going four or five weeks then he'd have one so we'd have to start over. The six weeks was actually up about two and a half weeks before we left for Scotland, but I didn't want to get a cat and then have to leave it semi-housebroke for someone else to take care of. Then, with all the craziness since we've been home, we haven't had time until this last Friday night. We went down to the animal shelter and looked at the cats. Pink Princess was enthralled with a bird there. It was whistling and she would coo back to it.

Well, Rynie finally picked out a kitten that is 6 weeks old. She is cream colored with 'lilac' points. Read: smoky grey. When we got her home, she stank like the shelter so we had to bathe her twice to get rid of the smell. Hubby asked how things were going and I said she was a little spitfire. After we dried her off, we asked Rynie what he wanted to name her. He named her Spitfire, although Rynie calls her Firespit sometimes. He loves his little kitten and she runs from all the 'love' he gives her. He is getting better at being soft though.

Pink Princess is totally enthralled with Spitfire and Spitfire with her. Neither one knows what to make of the other! She is looking for Spitfire here:



Poor cat, she is trying to hide from her adoring fans!





The other morning, I woke up to giggling. Hubby had already left to take Jake to school and so I went to investigate. This is what I found!





Jake is doing better. His 7AM class is done on Monday and then he just has a Photography class for the summer! Thank goodness, the kid needs a break.



We also got the majority of our garden put in. Yes, we had to hack it out of the weeds that are taking over our back yard, but I have herbs and strawberries planted, more herbs in pots, and a boy who loves to water plants!





Just in case anyone is wondering...Guess what is coming to my house tomorrow!!! ....Floolie!!!! Floolie is flying in tomorrow and Bump will be here a little later and we'll get to see them both! - Photo courtesy of Rynie's awesome skillz!



My sewing is coming along, slowly but surely. I'm hoping to get in some good sewing time when Floolie is here and playing with kidlets. My short stays just need to be bound and they fit so nicely!!! I am so excited to wear them. Now, I just need to remeasure myself and trace out the gowns so I can get going on them!

Since we all know I can't resist the sleeping baby pictures....A Sleeping Baby!



I hope everyone has a wonderful week this upcoming week. I am going to try to blog more often, it's too hard to catch up if I don't.

Good night, and Sweet Dreams.