Encouragement... it's a good thing!

If you had told me, five years ago, I would be married with two beautiful children today I would of said "uh... yah right!"

But, here I am... happily married to my beautiful wife and we were lucky to have two amazing children. Mauldin just suprises me everyday! I sit on the couch and just watch him walk around, singing his version of ABC/1.2.3.... and it makes me wonder what we did to make him so perfect.

Then there is our pretty princess, Elle. She is just so happy! I have NEVER seen a little kid, a baby no-less, smile as much as she does. The amount of happiness she emits is intoxicating and you cannot help but grin from ear to ear when you see her.

Just the other day, as I was about to head up the stairs my wife let out a gasp!

"Are you okay?" I said quickly. I was standing, one foot on the beige carpet on our stairs as I had one hand tightly grasped the gray graco baby gate that was installed to keep Mauldin from falling up or should I say down that stairs.

"Yes," my wife, Laura replied. "Did you see? Good job, Mauldin!"

I look down and expect to see my son scribing his name on a pad of paper or from the sound of the gasp he may of cured cancer... I wasn't sure. I saw him sitting in the floor with a toy he got from his cousin Everett. The toy is a Red and Blue circular toy that has a yellow handle and different shaped blocks... I guess you could call it a "Shape sorter." He sat on our kitchen floor with four or five of the yellow shapes all around him.

"Watch what your son can do..." Laura said. "Go on Mauldin, put them back!"

Our son loves to put things in their place... if he has a sippy cup it must go in it's cup holder... and if it is on the floor, it must be right side up. He makes sure all the doors are closed because heaven forbid one be open. This is true about the fridge as well... you open it, he MUST close it!

Like she said, I stood there and looked at my little boy work out placing all the blocks into their place. I glaced from Mauldin to Laura to see her face beaming with immense pride.

"But, babe..." I started. "I've seen him do that before, he's been doin' that for a while!"

I headed over to my little boy and patted him on the back. "That's great, Mauldin." I interjected.

"What?" she said with a hint of shock in her voice. "Why didn't you tell me?"

"I didn't think it was a big deal." I calmly replied. "He's been doing puzzles for a while too... I just figured you knew!"

"NO!" she said while she clapped in Mauldin's direction showing her approval. "That's so amazing, Eric! That's really advanced."

"Yay!!! Yay, Mauldin!" I joined in on the clapping.

Mauldin looked up at both of us and starting clapping too! Well, that is all I needed to hear. As soon as anyone says something positive about your offspring... you just beam with pride, excitment... you know, all those good emotions.

I immediatley looked over at our little girl as she swayed back and forth in her exersaucer screaming in what seemed to be excitment for her big brother, although it could of been need for attention! I kinda felt bad we had put all that clapping and excitment into her brother so I felt the need to give Elle some encouragement and attention too! She had a paci in one hand and was grabbing onto a crunchy-sounding flower with the other. I crouched down and gave her a big grin. She responded with a high-pitch sound that could probably call some dolphins if we lived close enough to the ocean. At times we call her our little grasshopper... because of this commerical. It's really sweet actually because she always screams with a huge smile. As I went to stand up I felt something brush my side... it was Mauldin! He ran over and gave his sister a big hug... I guess he didn't want her to be left out either.

A Melancholy Pup...

The last few weekends, my wife, Laura and I have been super busy… and our weekends do not seem to be letting up anytime soon. Every weekend we seem to have plans. It looks as if we may have to schedule time to stay home! It would be nice to be able to spend one entire weekend at home resting, but, obviously, we are kind of a big deal! If we aren’t out-of-town we are helping with a garage sale, or at a birthday party, or a high school reunion or a wedding, etc… Will it never end??? Will Laura and I ever get to spend some time at home??? Our dogs seem to be noticing we are not at home as much. Our usually ever-so excited beagle, Logan, has been moping around the house in a “ho-hum” kind of way, as if she knows what is coming. I can just hear what she is thinking… “You are gonna bring something home, I can just tell! Last time you acted this way you brought home Andy…” But, of course, our feisty Westie, doesn’t seem to notice anything. He struts around like nothing is wrong… We are not sure if Logan is sick or just sad!

It all began this past weekend...it was the annual fall garage sale for our subdivision and, certainly, you do not think my sister and mom would miss that opportunity, do you? They are garage sale experts! They have garage-saling down to a fine art. Well, as Laura and I were heading out of town, to go to our nephew Drew’s 4^th birthday in South Carolina, we drove past some houses that had a lot of colorful articles outside in their driveway.

“Wow, look at all that stuff!” I said to Laura while stopped at a stop sign on Woodbridge Lane. “Look at all that baby stuff!”

“It looks brand new…What are you doing?” said Laura while she watched me pull out my phone to make a call. “Who are you..”

“Hey, mom!” I said “where are y’all?” Mandy and mom were driving down from Dalton that morning.

I went on to talk to mom about all the baby stuff at a house just down the street from ours on Woodbridge Lane, right past the home with the Prudential sign in the yard. I wanted to make sure they stopped by to look at it because if it was in good condition it would be wonderful for us to have for Baby Skates.

“What is it?” said my sister, Mandy, who I could hear in the back ground. “What does it look like?”

“I don’t know,” I said “It’s one of those baby things where the kid sits in the middle, and it’s round, and has all kinds of things to keep it occupied.”

“Oh okay,” said mom “We will look at it and let you know…”

“Alright! Thanks!” I said quickly, “I better go, gotta pay attention to the road, thanks mom!”

Fast forward, nine hours, Laura and I arrive home from Drew’s karate themed birthday party in South Carolina. (I will tell that story at another time.)

We walk inside and my mom and sister went a little overboard... the first thing we see is an adorable little wooden zebra with wheels that Baby Skates will love to ride one day... and a little Mickey & Minnie throw blanket. And, there it was... the colorful, round toy that I saw on the side of the road on Woodbridge Lane. But, there was something different about it... it was all taken a part! Apparently, it is a multi-use toy and can be used in many different stages.

After changing, checking email, and eating dinner Laura decides it is time to disinfect and put this thing together! I just smile and say "okay!" Knowing all good and well she would be doing this and I would be supervising from a distance.

As Laura pulls out the Clorox wipes from beneath the kitchen cabinet the dogs get all excited when the different colors parts of plastic are being brought down stairs. They have no idea what these things are and why are they in our house? I think they thought they were toys for them, but were not sure how to proceed.

This is when Logan begins her mop. She proceeds to walk over to Laura and look at her with a fond look of sadness. As she was saying

"Is this what is has come to? Are you going to give us up? I have been speaking to other dogs around the neighborhood and they say all the signs your body is going through is the sign of a baby... and well... I've seen Lady and the Tramp!"

Laura pats her leg and Logan plops herself right in her lap. Andy, very taken a-back from this, because he is "momma's little lap dog." I call him over to me and he sits in my lap while Laura cleans the blue, orange and green plastic pieces.

The bottom piece is round and bright green... Andy decides to investigate this and also feels this would be a nice place to sit!

Finally, Laura finishes cleaning and now it is time to piece everything together... after a forced snap here and there it's done!

We go ahead and start touching the buttons and making them do all their "sounds" because we need to go ahead and get the dogs used to these alien tones! The dogs sit on the kitchen floor looking perplexed and confused. I go ahead and pick up Logan's front paws to show her it's okay to touch, smell or even lick... although Laura has already disinfected everything! Andy follows in suit and they do a thorough investigation even CSI would be proud of.
We went ahead and put the toy, one day I will find out the technical term for this piece of baby equipment, in the den where it could sit so the pups could get used to this foregin object in our humble surroundings. Now all we need is a CD with a baby crying... I can't wait to see the look on their faces when that happens!