Today's Happenings

Reed and Lola woke up and had a busy morning. They played and then they got ready to come to visit us during our lunch break.



Reed was moving really quickly, so Lola ended up getting a lot of pictures of Reed's backside!



Reed was really quiet when he visited us. He is normally pretty talkative, but today, he wasn't at all!



When they got home, they went for a walk and enjoyed looking at the leaves.



Reed, of course, had a fun time playing with his "bajoos."



He was thrilled to see me walk through the door. I think that both my group and Abbey's group got a lot of planning done today.

I have two prayer requests:

1. One of my coworkers' granddaughters is in ICU. She is 18 days old and has a heart condition and viral infection. Her name is Chloe.
2. One of my writers had a great nephew pass away today. He was 2 years old. He died from E.coli. Now, his older brother, who is 4, is in ICU, also with E.Coli. I cannot imagine what the parents are feeling.

Writers Conference: Day 1

Reed had a great day at MDO today. He had fun and when he got home, he was thrilled that Lola was here! She came to keep Reed this week while we are in Writers Conference.



I was glad to get home before Reed went to sleep tonight because I was able to get to see him for a little while. He was very sleepy though.



Reed has started calling balloons a new word. He now calls them "Bajoos".

Two Days' Recap

I know that some of you check our blog daily and yesterday you found that we did not update. Sorry about that, but we were busy yesterday.



My conference was great and I really got a lot of great information. I can't wait to get back to the office and work on writing some new conferences based on what I learned (well, maybe I CAN wait a little while!).



After I got home from my conference we headed out to Cheesecake Factory and to look around one of the malls.



On the way home, our rental car got a flat tire. I pulled over and changed the flat and then we headed back to the hotel.



I dropped Reed and Abbey off, as well as unloading the entire stash of IKEA surprises so that I could take our car to the airport and trade it for another rental.



This time, we were blessed with a Rav-4 which is quickly becoming one of my favorite cars. We were thrilled to have the extra space, but it didn't last that long!



Since we had the extra space, we were able to call Britton's mommy and tell her that we now had the space to check at Target and see if there was an ottoman that they needed.



We headed to the Target after we loaded up our car.



And you can tell, this is what friends are for. Target had not only one, but two of the ottomans that the Batson's needed. Reed said that he was willing to go the extra mile for his best friend and road snugly between the two ottomans!



Abbey only drove a small portion of the time, but she found time to take a picture of me napping!



When we got home, Reed played, played, and played some more.



We haven't been to the grocery store, so we went to eat supper.



After supper, we decided to go and check out GG and B's new house they are building. Reed loves their land! He had a blast running around on it.



Once again, he played,



and played,



and played,



and played! When it was time to go, we told Reed goodbye and got in the car. He waved and said, "bye bye!" and went to play again!



He was having such a great time, I think he would have stayed there all night!



Have we mentioned lately that we love this kid?

Sight for Sore Eyes!

Our flight left Calgary this morning at 7:00 AM. After a VERY extended line for Customs in Calgary, we barely made it to our flight before we started boarding. We were very thankful that we could go through customs in Canada because we had a VERY short layover in Dallas.



We taxied around the airport for a while in Calgary so we were about 30 minutes late to DFW, and we only had a 45 minute layover to begin with. We ran from terminal D to Terminal C and made it to the plane in time for "final boarding call." Unfortunately, that meant no lunch!



So, as is customary for flying through DFW, we were delayed once we were on the plane about 25 minutes. That meant, we could have gotten lunch, but we didn't, so we just flew hungry.



We landed in Nashville about 3:00ish and went to wait on our luggage. We were surprised that they got the luggage to the carousel very quickly, however, it didn't include even 1 stitch of our three bags! So, then we went to the AA lost luggage desk.



He said that he thought it would be on the next plane at 4:00. We were cool with it, because we just wanted to get home. Our luggage gets lost all the time, so we're pretty used to just having the courier bring our luggage to our house. Remember the time that Flat Reed got lost coming home from DFW?



We grabbed a quick burger through the drive-thru at Wendys and then headed home. We were so excited to see Reed.



Reed, on the other hand, seemed a little shocked to see us. He was pretty clingy to Lola, but he quickly warmed up to us. It didn't take him long to start playing around with us and get really excited that we were home.



Lola had to go home because she had to work tomorrow, but Pop Rox has a project that he is working on a couple of hours from our house, so he is spending the night again.




We went to eat supper and decided that we would eat at The Depot. Unfortunately, it was not open. Then, we headed to the Catfish House as an old standby.



After supper, we headed to CVS (surely, you had to know that I was going to CVS today!) because they had a two day sale that was ending tonight.

I got a good bit of stuff for $.62 out of pocket and used $10.00 ECBs, and got $16.00 ECBs back.



Then, we came home. On our way home, the courier called to let us know that he had our luggage and would be by between 9:00 and 9:30. That's great, because that means I won't have to go into the CVS ministry for toiletries for Abbey and myself.



Once home, Reed played with his bubble-blowing lawn mower that Lola and Pop Rox brought him. He likes to help mow the yard now, but he's not really good at getting the bubbles to blow.



Reed and I blew some bubbles and then Reed went back to mowing. I continued to blow bubbles, I assume as entertainment for me.



We love this kid!



Tomorrow two of our pastor's children are coming over to play with Abbey and Reed while they take their oldest son to have some tests done at the hospital. Laura is an avid blog reader and she loves Reed, so I bet she'll have fun.



Reed is very serious about his lawn mowing.



Finally, Pop Rox pushed Reed in his car and then it was time for Reed to take his bath.



He was completely exhausted, so it seems that Lola and Pop Rox must have worn him out!

Then it was my favorite time of the day, getting to rock our little guy to sleep.


"I love you buddy, I love you so much." -Daddy

A CVSly Good Day!

Okay, so I know that some of you out there are fans of Money Saving Mom, and so am I! Especially her ideas for saving money at CVS. Here's a rundown of what I bought today.

I went to CVS during lunch, and bought the following items.

1 Bottle of Excedrin ($4.24) - I had a $2.00 coupon and got $1.00 ECBs (Extra Credit Buck).
1 Box of Gas-X ($5.69) and 1 Bottle of Maalox ($6.29) and got $10.00 in ECBs.
3 Bottles of Dove Body Wash ($21.00) - I had $3.00 in coupons and was supposed to get $5.00 back in ECBs.
1 Can of Glade ($1.67) - $1.00 off coupon.

The Dove didn't ring up correctly. I paid with $17.00 in ECBs and then put 17.69 on my debit card, so I asked the clerk to return the Dove since the ECBs didn't work. He said that it was too complicated to take the coupons off, so he gave me the full price refund, so I got a $21.00 refund. So, I got a $3.00 credit to my account for the overage of what I paid originally and got $11.00 in ECBs.

I know that you are interested in pics of Reed, so keep reading for the next part of my shopping trip after this pic.



Reed and I went to Wal-Mart today when I got home from work to buy groceries. Abbey worked tonight.



Reed fell asleep on the way home from Wal-Mart, so I let him sleep until 6:00. After supper and playing in the backyard for a little while, I realized that Milk was not on the list and we had NONE, so what's a guy to do? Sounds like a trip to CVS was in order.



When Reed and I go to CVS, we patiently walk up every aisle looking for great deals. Reed also serves the part of CVS Hospitality attendant, by saying "Hey" to everyone and waving. I found a glucose monitor for $14.99 which had $14.99 in ECBS, and then I found 3 "Essence of Beauty" gift bags for ($1.49 each) with $5.00 in ECBs. So, I headed for the checkout and got the items listed for $9.00 after my ECBs from earlier. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that there is a mail-in rebate for the full-cost of the glucose monitor.



Did you notice anything missing from my list? Milk, the reason why I went to CVS! So, Reed and I went back to get the milk and I perused the "tylenol" aisle, because I remembered that they had CVS Rapid Release pain reliever for $3.99 with $3.99 in ECBs. Guess what? They didn't have them "signed" correctly, so they had a good supply. I got 4 boxes (I already had bought 1 earlier in the month and there is a limit of 5). So, with 4 boxes of pain reliever and 1 gallon of milk, my total after ECBs from the previous purchase was $0.29.



So recap my out of pocket for today.

1st CVS purchase = -$3.00
2nd CVS purchase = $9.00
3rd CVS purchase = $0.29
Total = $6.29, then after the 14.99 mail-in rebate, I will get $8.70 in cash back! for everything I got!!!!



Now, for Reed's happenings today. Reed was a very happy and busy boy as usual. He did his job of destroying the bonus room in 5 seconds flat! He worked hard on Swiffering again.



He also enjoyed a walk in the park with Mommy and then he had fun playing in the backyard.



He also had a great time playing in the dirt. I never thought that the fenced backyard would come in so handy this quickly, but with Mr. Move-It around, it's great to be able to "corral" him.

Tomorrow, Reed is going to enjoying Asian Invasion Play group and then he is going to go to some playcenter that Abbey has been wanting to check out. I am riding into work with Mrs. Trudy so that we will only have one car downtown, then we are going to Uncle Bubba's and then we are going to eat at Famous Dave's. I have coupons for Cold Stone, so that is definitely dessert!


UPDATE!!!

Someone asked about the Glucose Monitor's.

Last week, I bought the $14.99 Monitor with ECBs and a Rebate.

This week, I bought the $10.00 Monitor with ECBs and a Rebate!