Well, we have narrowed down our choices for baby names!  (Insert drum roll here) They are:
FIRST NAMES:
Mallory
Lindsay
Evangeline
MIDDLE NAMES:
Autumn
Athina (or Athena as it’s usually spelled; I like the first one better)
Alexandra

We know we want a middle name that starts with an “A” because all of our girls have one.  We’re just not sure which name we like with which middle name.  If you’ve read my previous posts, especially the one called Baby Names, you can see that I’ve given up my ideal name of Frances.  Ok, it’s not my ideal name, that’s why I gave up on it, but I did want to name the baby after my late grandmother.  I just wish she had a name that was a little easier to convince my husband to name our baby and for me to WANT to name the baby.  Anyway, these are the final three so we’ll see how it turns out.  I am the one who signs the birth certificate in the hospital, so I can always sneak whatever I want on there, including Frances if I so desire…  JUST KIDDING!  I wouldn’t do that…  unless they pump me full of some crazy drugs to get through the labor…  then I can’t be held accountable for my actions.  But nothing is set in stone yet; we’re still a few months away – I will site the example of my youngest-for-now.  Her name was going to be Sydney until I was about 7 months pregnant…  then all of a sudden I said to my husband, I don’t think I like that name anymore!  I thought it was the hormones causing my sudden change of heart, but to my surprise, my husband agreed that HE didn’t like the name anymore either!  We think it might have had something to do with our other daughters calling her Cindy – they could not grasp the concept of reversing the sounds.  So anyway, these are the finalists in the name race for now, I will keep you posted on any changes!

Where they’re going. Where they’ve been.  I’ve worn lots of shoes.  I bet if I think about it real hard I could remember my first pair of shoes…   – FORREST GUMP

The preceding quote comes to mind because Disney, our youngest-for-now, got her first pair of shoes yesterday!  She loves them!  She always asks to wear them, even if it’s just for around the house.  But she always ends up just wearing one somehow and losing the other, so I wonder what Forrest Gump would think of that?  At first when she got them on, she just stood there, as if locked in cement.  Her big sister Taylor helped her learn to walk in them – it was adorable.  She was so patient with her without doing too much for her and giving in by picking her up.  Finally, Disney learned to walk in her new shoes and loves them.  Pretty soon she’ll be running around in her new shoes with me waddling behind her trying to keep up!

Seeing her “stuck” there when she thought she couldn’t walk reminded me of my other daughter Samantha, who is now almost 4.  When Sammie was learning to walk, it was summertime, and she was wearing sandals, so she’d be walking, walking, then as soon as she hit the grass – STOP!  And she’d be stuck there too, just like Disney was in her new shoes.  It’s strange how learning to walk is such a huge new experience, yet I’ve never met anyone who remembers going through it…  I think it’s much more fun being on the parent side, this time around, but then again, I can’t really name an experience that isn’t!

Took the kids to see the movie Penelope this weekend.  Unusual choice for kids, I guess, but they watched the trailers for that one and for College Road Trip, and they chose Penelope, a movie about a princess named Penelope (played by Christina Ricci) who is born with a pig nose because of a generations-old curse that is put upon her family.  I wasn’t expecting much from the movie, mainly because I hadn’t heard much about it, but also because let’s face it, the premise isn’t exactly one based in reality.  I had read one little article about Christina Ricci, and how this is her first movie in awhile, yada, yada, but I didn’t think much of a movie about a girl with a pig’s nose – until it was in our local theater and it was only rated PG.  I did not doze off during this one, and it did not bore the kids like I was expecting.  Our 8-year-old liked it, our 3-year-old fell asleep; not from boredom, she just does that a lot in the movie theater, takes after Mom, I guess 😉 and our 17-month-old was rambunctious as can be.  I think she is getting too old for movies.  You know what I mean – there is a window where kids should not be taken to movies, I guess, say between walking age and an age they can sit still and actually enjoy the movie.  Our youngest-for-now is reaching that age quickly!

So anyway, Penelope is actually quite entertaining, and it wasn’t entirely predictable like I thought.  Overall, a cute movie that kinda throws a lesson in for the kids – don’t judge a person on looks alone.  Christina Ricci is pretty good, barely recognizable, and I had trouble figuring out if it was because of her acting or her pig nose.  Catherine O’Hara was wonderful and fun to watch as always, and Reese Witherspoon was also fun to watch (surprisingly so for me, because I’m not a big fan of hers) in her equally surprisingly small role as Penelope’s newfound biker-chick friend.  Fun to watch, ok for kids…  I’d see it again. 

I received another email forward that is worth mentioning today.  It was a list of people’s first names followed by a tv show.  The idea is that you are supposed to add your name to the list along with a tv show you used to watch that’s not on tv anymore.  I was a huge fan of tv as a kid, and I watched it a lot, so it was fun to sit and think about shows that I enjoyed that aren’t on tv anymore.  Since you were only supposed to add one show after your name on the email forward, I’m going to share the other shows I was going to put in it, along with imdb links so you can learn about them if you wish:

Dolphin Cove – This is the show I included with my name in the forward.  It was originally an Australian show, but they tried it in the US, and it only aired for one season, if that.  I think there were 8 episodes.  It was about an American widower who moves to Australia with his 2 children to work with dolphins.  His daughter is mute because she is in shock after witnessing the accident that took her mother’s life.  She develops special communication skills with the dolphins.  Since I was only 10 when the show aired, I don’t remember much, I just know that I really liked it and that I was extremely disappointed when it didn’t come back on tv.  Since it was cancelled abruptly, there were some open-ended plot lines, and I waited for months hoping the show would be back.  Of course it was not.  If anyone knows how to get it tape or the internet or anything, let me know, I’d love to see it again!  Oh, and something interesting I learned from imdb – apparently the show was written by Peter Benchley, the author who wrote Jaws.  I read a book by him once called The Beast, and it was pretty scary.  Not that Dolphin Cove was scary or anything like that, it’s just a note.  I’m not sure if he wrote the concept for the show or all the episodes or both, but it doesn’t really matter much now anyway.

The Charmings – I was 9 years old when this show was on and I thought it looked stupid then, if that tells you anything.  Still, as a pre-tween girl, the intrigue of a sitcom based on a fairy tale was irresistable, so I gave it a try, and I still found it dumb.  The tagline says it all:  “Snow White and Prince Charming fell asleep in the Enchanted Forest… they woke up in Burbank!”  Unbelievably, this show actually WON a primetime Emmy and was nominated for 3 others.  True, it won the Emmy for Outstanding Lighting Direction (Electronic) for a Comedy Series, (does that one even still exist?) but still…  I guess that magic mirror was truly something to behold.  The writing and acting apparently were not however, since the show only lasted for 2 seasons, and they switched Snow Whites after only 6 episodes.

The Carol Burnett Show – I’m not talking about the well-known show that ran from 1967-1978 since I wasn’t around for that; I’m talking about the hour-long show that aired in the early ’90’s.  Each show featured a series of sketches with an awesome cast of supporting actors, and this is where I was introduced to an actor named Richard Kind, who went on to do shows such as Mad About You and Spin City.  I loved every skit he was in on The Carol Burnett Show of the ’90’s – they were my favorites.  I don’t know how long the show lasted because I was very young at this time and there is not much info on it at imdb.com, but I know that it should have lasted longer because it was true family entertainment – very funny for all ages.

Silver Spoons – Hardly anyone in my generation has forgotten this show.  Airing for 5 seasons, it made a star of a young Rick Schroder (then he was known as Ricky Schroder, a heart-throb for teen girls everywhere!) as a spoiled rich kid who lived in a mansion but faced many of the problems normal teenagers face.  His father (played by Joel Higgins, whatever happened to him?) was a toy inventor, so needless to say, their house and the gadgets inside were pretty cool and fun to watch.  It’s hard to believe this show only lasted for 5 seasons, but then again, it was rerun on so many networks in syndication, and that’s where I saw the majority of the episodes I watched.  I still remember the theme song, and no, I didn’t have to look it up first, which I guess is a little sad, but anyway: “Here we are, face to face, a couple of Silver Spoons.  Hopin to find, we’re two of a kind, making a go, making it grow, together…”  I could go on, but you get the idea.

As an avid tv watcher, of course I watched many more shows than the ones I’ve listed here.  These are just the ones that came to my mind today which I thought would make interesting conversation.  And, for extra fun, here is a copy of the forward:

How many shows can we come up with that we USED to watch that are no
> longer on TV? Add one and keep going.
> This should be fun and jog our memories. No repeats on the shows please.
> Send to all your friends and back to me.
>Lisa…………………………..Dolphin Cove
> Jamy………………….Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman
> Barb…………………..Little House on the Prairie
> Dutch…………………Dragnet
> Marilyn……………….Friday night fights!!
> Dutch…………………Dynasty
>
> Carol………………….Streets of Sanfrancisco
>
> Cheryl………………..St. Elsewhere
>
> Lisa……………………Here Comes the Brides
>
> Toni……………………Peyton Place
>
> Mary…………………..Topper
>
> Madeline……………..Friday Nite Videos
>
> Sheila…………………China Beach
>
> Twyla………………….I Remember Mama
>
> Sandy…………………Dallas
>
> Melanie……………….The Adventures Of Brisco County
>
> Ellen…………………. Sports Night
>
> Karen…………………Hawaii 5-0
>
> Pat…………………….Lucy’s Toy Shop
>
> Karma………………..Happy Days
>
> Shari…………………That Girl
>
> Bill…………………….Checkmate
>
> Judy………………….Amos ‘N Andy
>
> Peg ………………….Mickey Mouse Club
>
> Ron —————– Lucky Strike Hit Parade
>
> Paula…………………My Three Sons
>
> Cindy………………..Mary Heart Line
>
> Barb………………….I Love Lucy
>
> Glenda……………….Phil Donahue Show
>
> MARLENE…………..MY LITTLE MARGIE
>
> AJ…………………….Saturday Night Hit Parade
>
> June………………….The Naked City
>
> Jeanie………………..Danny Thomas Show
>
> Pam…………………..Bozo The Clown
>
> Kim ……………………Andy Griffith Show
>
> Cassie………………..30 something
>
> Kay……………………Saturday Night FRIGHTS (good ol scary movie night)
>
> Kaye…………………..Dick Van Dyke
>
> Karen Rust ………….Father Knows Best (way back)
>
> Kat D………………….Mama’s Family
>
> Janna…………………The Love Boat
>
> Dan……………………Night Court
>
> Maureen……………….Once and Again
>
> Michele ………………Bosom Buddies
>
> Jennifer………………..The Lawrence Welk Show
>
> Marilyn………………..Dr. Kildare
>
> Diane………………….Have Gun Will Travel
>
>Phyllis…………………Bonanza

>Sharon………………..Winky Dink

WHEW!  I didn’t mean to take a weeklong blog hiatus, but due to the kids being on spring break, that’s what happened!  We were SO busy, I haven’t really been in front of my computer…  I hope this isn’t what summer break is going to be like!  It was fun and all, but SO busy!  During the week, we did have LOTS of fun, and we got to spend lots of family time together, which gave me time to put together the following translation list of Toddler Talk.  Our youngest (until July, anyway!) is currently at one of the cutest ages there is: 17 months.  She walks around (finally!) babbling about all kinds of stuff, and she answers almost every question with a definitive “no”.  Sometimes she means it, sometimes she doesn’t.  Here is a guide to help you communicate better with Disney or any 17 month old: 

oove = move, you’re in MY way!

down = means up or down, just depends on where she is at the moment. 

yum-yum-yum-yum = can sound like mom, mom, mom, mom – is usually used very loudly to “ask” for a food she wants.

no = self-explanatory.  At this age, it’s used constantly.

DOP = STOP.  Because she has 2 older sisters, this was one of her first words.

oovie = movie.  Usually used to request a dvd in the car.

mama = actually means Grandma.  She calls Mommy “Mom”.

gink = drink.  I’m thirsty!

baa = bottle.  I know, she should not be using these anymore…  But it’s so hard to take them away when she loves them so much!

cookie? = give me a cookie or I will cry.

candy = see above.  She learned this word around the Easter holiday.

 cake you = thank you.  She says this almost every time you give her something – it’s SO cute!  I hope it doesn’t lead to her being spoiled…

ack = snack

ankey = blankie

mere = come here.  She uses this to call the dogs, or she holds out her arms and says it when she wants to be picked up.  A favorite sentence is “Mom mere.”

She says lots of things, and her vocabulary grows every day!  These are just some of the cutest things right now…  I love this age; the calm before the storm of the terrible two’s!

With 3 wonderful kids, how could we not have a good Easter?  We started by coloring eggs on Saturday afternoon, and it went so well that I even bought a spare coloring kit at the easter clearance sales today, figuring we can do it again in a few weeks.  If colored eggs will entice the kids to eat them, then coloring eggs doesn’t only have to be for Easter, I say!  Actually, we started our Easter celebration with a visit to the Easter Bunny at the mall on Friday.  There was no line, but at those prices, I can see why!  But I begged Hubby to buy me a picture of the girls with the Easter Bunny and said it could be my Mother’s Day present this year because when we went to do our community egg hunt (candy clean-up), the batteries on the camera died before we could get a picture with the Easter Bunny.  It’s just something I like to do every year along with taking pictures with Santa because it’s a good way to get them all to sit down together and track how they grow from year to year.

So anyway, back to hiding eggs…  I got so tired on Saturday night that I forgot to play Easter Bunny and hide the eggs (can hard-boiled eggs even stay out of the fridge overnight?), but I woke up a little on the way up to bed and did remember to set the alarm.  Except that when it went off Sunday morning, we heard the kids were already up, so Hubby and I scrambled downstairs and hid everything in a hurry so we wouldn’t get caught.  And we had to leave our dogs outside during the hunt, otherwise they would do some easter egg hunting of their own!  And of course – every year this happens somehow – there was the one egg that slipped away somehow only to be lost until weeks later when its rotten smell gives away its hiding place.  But, learning from the past, we counted how many eggs we had hidden and didn’t give up until the lost egg was found!  Overall, it was a GREAT Easter.  The kids did have some candy comedown, but that is to be expected.  Disney – she is 17 mos. – woke up today by asking for candy for breakfast.  I think they’ll get back to normal soon…  just in time to get candy at the summer parades coming up!  Hope everyone had a wonderful Easter and were able to share in the love of family and friends!

In case you haven’t read the comments at the end of my Mini-Golf – The Sequel! post, I talked about how much I didn’t like the new version I had posted because it was obscenely difficult.  The first version was simplistic and easy to play after some practice.  The second version I got (which was evidently the 3rd version of the game) turned out to be way too difficult, and the added complications (sandtraps, water) made the game lose part of its charm.  Unfortunately, I did not play the game before I posted the link, so that’s why I had to comment on it.  I suggest you give it a try if you like these computer mini-golf games though, I did appreciate the “bounciness” of the ball off the walls.  But, if you’re like me, and you think the second game (3rd version) I posted was way too difficult to enjoy, then give this one a try also:

 https://www.gigarcade.com/full-744-Forest-Challenge-2.html

[swf]https://www.gigarcade.com/swf/20754.swf[/swf]

It has some sand and water traps, but it also has the “bounce-back” reaction of the ball, and the slope grades are dipicted in such a way that you can actually tell the difference between them.  I think I may have noticed a scoring glitch in the game though.  If there’s no glitch, then I am very good at this and scored a 3 😉

Watch out for hole #18 – it’s a par 8, so that should tell you something!

Not that it’s anything to brag about, but I saw the new movie Shutter not once, but twice this weekend!  It was pretty good, if you like movies like The Ring and The Grudge.  There are a few other movies people say Shutter is like, but I haven’t seen them.  It did remind me a lot of The Ring – they were both super-natural ghost stories.  I should have known I’d like it, at least that I’d like it better than Doomsday, because the guy who gave Doomsday an “A” rating on movies.com gave Shutter a “D”!  I’m starting to think he’s a moron.  I gave you the quote he made about Doomsday in a previous post of mine; he talked about how great all the violence was, yada, yada, so just to prove his idiocy, here is a snippet of what he thought of Shutter:

“As unfrightening PG-13 horror films go, this unfrightening PG-13 horror film is the most unfrightening of the year. It’s even more unfrightening than The Eye, which featured such unfrightening scenes as Jessica Alba yelling into an oven. This one has unfrightening scenes of Joshua Jackson sitting in a chair. Okay, there is one jumpy moment. That happens when Joshua Jackson turns around really fast in that chair. All the 11 year-olds in the audience went, “AUUGGH!” when that part happened. So if you’re 11, then that part is really going to freak you out.”

So according to the movies.com review guy, a movie is not good or scary if it doesn’t have at least 3 decapitations, exploding animals, and some cannibalism.  Whatever.  He does have a point though – the 11-year-old in the theater with us was scared silly – which brings me to the reason we saw it twice in one day…

Grandma was in town for a visit.  Despite the impending snow storm (again), she was able to travel the 200+ miles to see her grandchildren, thank goodness.  Who would have believed that we’d have to deal with Grandma almost having to cancel her spring break trip to Ohio because of still more SNOW!  Thank you, Grandma, for taking the time and energy it took to come early to ensure the special time you were able to spend with the girls wasn’t ruined by yet another snow storm.  So anyway, with Grandma being in town, that left Hubby and I with a whole afternoon and evening to ourselves!  Snowstorm or not, we were going to make the most of it…  So we saw a matinee of Shutter, which we enjoyed.  It wasn’t scary, comes no where close to the creepiness of The Ring, but it was entertaining, and it saved itself from getting unbearably cheesy several times…  A lot of the reviewers didn’t like it, but I think they’re just sick of the whole PG13-Asian-horror-movie-remake genre.  As a side effect of the PG13 rating, during our matinee, there were obnoxious teenagers in the theater.  Their laughing and running up and down the aisles wasn’t totally obscene, but it did take away from some of the enjoyment of a horror movie.  When they left the movie at the end, they had a younger boy with them who looked scared beyond belief.  I think maybe all the laughing and whatnot was because they were actually really nervous and scared.  So, when we explained their antics to the movie theater manager, they were completely understanding and told us we could go ahead and see it again.  I didn’t really catch anything that I missed the first time (except for one itty bitty scene where I dozed yet again), but it was fun to watch a horror movie again that no one else in the theater had seen yet because it was its first day out in the theaters – you knew when the scary parts were coming and could watch the whole theater jump and gasp.

If you are a fan of the PG13-Asian-horror-movie-remake genre, I think you’ll like Shutter.  If not, it might not be what you’re looking for in a movie, unless you’re between the ages of 14-23.

Thanks to my awesome husband for finding this…  I haven’t had a chance to try it yet but I am about to, so I will post my best score…  which will probably be at least twice the score of you “experts” out there!  Oh well, they are fun…  let’s see how this one compares: https://www.gigarcade.com/full-960-MiniPutt-3.html

…is the title of an AP article I read the other day about the price of celebrity divorces, inspired by, of course, the McCartney-Mills divorce that’s been dominating the headlines lately.  I took note of this article because I was surprised that the McCartney-Mills settlement was not in the top 5 most expensive divorce settlements.  In fact, the top 5 were surprising to me; just people I would not have guessed that would have had that much money or who would have not been able to protect themselves and their assets any better.  Actually, the McCartney-Mills divorce settlement at $48.6 million equaled a little over half of # 5 on the list.  Here it is:

1.  Michael and Juanita Jordan – possibly more than $150 million settlement pending, 2006.

2.  Neil Diamond and Marcia Murphey – $150 million, 1994.

3.  Steven Spielberg and Amy Irving – $100 million, 1989.

4.  Harrison Ford and Melissa Mathison – $85 million, 2004.

5.  Kevin Costner and Cindy Silva – $80 million, 1994.

I wonder what some of these amounts would be if adjusted for inflation also.  This article would have been a little more interesting if they had included the wedding date or how long the couple was together before the divorce.  I am often amused when I look in the local newspaper and see divorces between couples who were only married a few years, some only a few months!  My dear friends are wedding photographers, and they’ve shared at least one story of a couple who was no longer together by the time their wedding photos were ready to be picked up!  It’s amusing, yet sad at the same time, especially of course any time there are children involved.  I wish people would think a little bit harder about the commitment and sacrifice involved in marriage, and I wish that more people would treat marriage like the institution it was meant to be.