Update on the Gallaways

After going to work full-time this Fall many things have taken a back seat due to time and the craziness of working, taking care of kids, never ending housework, etc.... You get the idea! Unfortunately blogging or any other kind of journaling happenend to be one of the greatest losses. I have now settled into working five days a week and count my blessings that I only have to work while the boys are in school. I get to pick them up each day and I try to remember to have fun with them for an hour or so before getting to everything else. I have really enjoyed all the new faces and fresh ideas from the other three small school districts I picked up this year.

Thomas has continued to do well in school. He has had a hard time getting back into it since Christmas. He still really wants to be a little boy that plays hard outside and creates whatever is in his mind not sitting in a chair, doing worksheets, learning to read, and following rules. He says that is no fun (but he still loves his teacher and the million other Tarver staff members)! Oh well, that's life! On the other hand we have loved watching him learn to read. He reads so many sight words and simple books now. He could really take off with it if he found it more interesting. I'm hoping that will come soon. Right now I'm praying that he will enjoy school! He still loves his music and his little brother. He tends to want to stay home and play more than anything. I think school has definitely made him more appreciative of that free time at home. Trey and I have been trying to have special time with him after we put Trent to bed. This gives us a chance to play those games that Trent would want to be in the middle of but just couldn't play yet. This past week he has loved Alfredo's Food Fight, Don't Cut the Cheese, Go Fish, and Operation. I love those 15 minutes each night with just him. He is growing up so fast!

Trent is now officially potty-trained! He is doing great with pee and poop! We still have some accidents at night but really that has gone better than I expected too. Santa brought some Thomas the Train underwear for his stocking. Trent wanted to wear them immediately. We had to convince him that he could wear them later. So the next week we stayed home a couple of days to work on potty training. I thought Trent was a little young, but he kept asking to go potty at school. With the end of diapers I feel like I truly have no baby. :( And NO it's not time for another one!

He is counting to 13 (but consistently leaves out the number 2). He is known as Ms. Kim's rat at his preschool. I think he keeps her on her toes and laughing too! This past week was kinda a hard week (at home). I have decided that Trent has hit the terrible 2 stage. He dumps out all the toys, runs instead of comes when called, and loves to test you for a reaction. He has officially been introduced to the naughty chair now. On the other hand, we still love all his giggles and smiles. He is such a happy boy!

I am still amazed and thankful for the tremendous love that Thomas and Trent have for each other. The smiles and hugs that they give each other when I pick Thomas up each day melt my heart! Thomas and Trent now have a favorite game, Bull! Trey is the bucking bull. It is quite a sight. They also love to build forts and tents to hide out in together.

Christmas was so much fun this year! Both of the boys had a great time and for once I felt half relaxed even with all the rushing around and many places we go. Like Thomas I had a very hard time going back to school in January. The big hits for Christmas were playdough and GeoTrax for Trent. Really hard when all he wanted was the $10 playdough set! And Thomas loved his new CD player and MP3 player.

Trey and I celebrated our 11 year anniversary in December as well. I can honestly say that this has been a stressful year with all of our undertakings but a very happy year in our marriage. I love him more each day! Ok, enough of that mushy stuff!

I will try to post more journal entries in 2009 but no guarantees! I'm not sure why I always have difficulty uploading images to blogger but you probably won't see many. Sorry!

Happenings in the Gallaway Household....

I really needed to write everything from this past week before I forgot it. I seem to be doing that a lot lately. So I thought I would share it with you so you could empathize, laugh, or be horrified depending on your personality and experiences!

Last weekend Trent was not feeling so great. He was so congested and was drooling buckets! On Monday, his teacher at MDO called to see if I had any suggestions because he wouldn't take a nap. I just thought he was not feeling too great and went to get him. She assured him that he didn't seem sick but was trying to wake up all his classmates. She even put him in time-out but couldn't get him to stop talking. I took him to see Melody that afternoon. She did say he had a sore throat but not strep. Thank goodness. So after the annual flu shot and a bunch of tears we left. When we got home I started doing laundry but stopped midways thru to get some laundry from upstairs and of course got side tracked! Well, a few minutes later Trent came to get me. He had squeezed the trigger in his mouth and downed half a bottle of OxiClean Stain Remover that I had left out while doing the laundry. So after a couple of panicky minutes beating myself up as the worst mother ever, the very nice lady at the Poison control center assured me he would be fine. She even called to check up on him later. That was my first call to poison control. Thomas never put things in his mouth like Trent.

Thomas is still enjoying school. We have his first parent teacher conference tomorrow. I'm anxious to see how he is doing. On Wednesday night at church, my friends Barry and Tiffany informed me that Cade had told them that Thomas had kissed a girl at school. When I asked Thomas about it he said it was true and that he really likes Hana (he said that's how she spells her name) and that he is going to marry her! Oh my! Thomas has always liked Trey's stepbrother's (Richard) girlfriend but hasn't really said much about girls his age. Now I'm ready to go to a school party so I can meet Hana. Oh, and we did have the talk about not kissing people at school!

There are few dull moments in our house!

Moody Cotton Festival

This weekend the boys and I were supposed to go to Dallas and go to the State Fair with my sister and nephew. Unfortunately my nephew got sick Friday evening and we had to stay home or risk catching a stomach virus. Thomas was so upset when he got up Saturday morning. After pleading with me about staying in a hotel room and just us going to the Fair I finally convinced him that we could go to the Moody Cotton Festival and parade instead. I know it was a big stretch but hey he's 5 and it worked. Guess what? They loved it! And were so good. I was secretly dreading the whole day at the Fair without backup (aka Trey or my mom), but I was still willing to go for their experience and the fact that I personally like the fair. The Moody hometown parade was wonderful. I didn't realize how much I miss hometown parades and the good memories I have from them. You know the kind where the kids load up on candy thrown from the homemade floats with the local band playing. Every kid that left had a bag loaded with candy, flags, key rings, just great junk that kids love!

Here are a couple of pictures. Ok. So only one, I think Blogger has it in for me. It took one hour to upload this one picture. And I think it's not one of the cutest. Oh well.

Growing, growing, growing!

Thomas is still enjoying school. He thinks his teacher walks on water and whatever she says is the law. He now has color charts for all of us at home too. He is so funny! If Trey and I get into a "discussion" and Thomas thinks we are too loud or rude he changes our colors. Trent also gets his color changed for whining sometimes. If apologize then we can get back to green. So glad that our 5 year old is keeping us in line. He continues to rave about the cafeteria food and wants to eat breakfast there too. We do good to get to school on time so I'm not sure about getting there early for breakfast.



Trent knows his colors! He is learning so much right now, and it is so fun! Thomas reads Brown Bear, Brown Bear to him each night. Thomas has it memorized. He is not reading yet but knows lots of sight words. Trent likes his teacher, Ms. Kim. He comes home dirty everyday with a proud smile of whatever he painted. This week he painted with dog bones, sponge painted cats and dogs, and painted a cat with sandy paint. What a brave teacher. Two year olds and paints can be very messy!



We are all loving the cooler weather. I have taken the boys to the park several days this week. The only downfall is that Thomas has wanted to wear pants in the morning and he has outgrown nearly all of his pants. Some of them still have tags on them. He is going to be like me. I always had such a hard time finding pants that fit. I guess I need to be like my mom and find the brand that fits him and buy all they have in his size. The problem is that he is a horrible shopper and even worse about trying stuff on.

Trent has started school again!

Last week every time Trent and I would drop Thomas off at school he would cry and say, "no bubba, no school." Well, today it was his turn and I was wondering how this would go. It actually went pretty smoothly. After a quick run to Wal-Mart to pick up another treasured blanket (I forgot his on the first day! Yikes!), he went into school without too many tears. He quickly found some other kid's dad and that man held Trent until I could get out of the room. Why does he like men so much more than women? He is such a daddy's boy. Jill, his preschool director, said he did fine even after that poor gentleman had to leave. His teacher reported that he had a great day, eat all his lunch and some extra from the girl sitting next to him, and didn't want to wake up from nap. It was so sad to leave him. I'm feeling pretty guilty/upset about working extra this year; however, it was so nice to not have to worry about him being cared for and loved today.

Sorry still no pics.

Thomas is off to Kindergarten!

In case you are wondering I'm trying to catch this up since it is supposed to be my journal for the boys. Maybe one day I'll get all the pictures uploaded too.

Thomas went into the school without any problems. No tears from him or mommy. I had a hard time the day of meet the teacher and by the first day I was just ready to get it over with and see how it the day went. His teacher seems very nice. He really likes her. He has two friends in his class, one from church and one that was in his preschool class. I think the familiar faces really helped. He wanted Daddy to pick him up so I worked late since it was my first official day at work. And it was a busy one! We didn't get a lot of information out of him except that he was upset that his class has to play on the small playground, he got pink milk at lunch, and he likes the cafeteria food. He was so proud to get a green dot too. He wanted to make sure we all saw it.

His second day was good too. He told me that he didn't know kindergarten was going to be so fun. His teacher is very nice. And that he enjoyed reading books today. He has now made up his own traffic light signal for his room. This is the method his teacher uses for behavior. Today her comment was that he had lots of smiles. I'm sure he was half asleep the first day. My kids are not early risers. It is a relief to us that he is enjoying school.

Trent is 2!

Trent has been such a joy! He keeps us laughing all the time. His Papa Terry calls him the clown. He is not a baby anymore. He is two!! Hard to believe how time goes by so quickly. He talks all the time, usually in full sentences. He realizes that colors are different and gets the basics right occasionally but still likes to say everything is green. He loves tractors and Blue's Clues. He will do anything his big brother (aka his hero) will do. He is not content to watch others. He wants to be in the action! For his 2nd birthday we had a family pony and tractor party. He had a great time with his cousins!