So have I ever told you how ridiculously cute my niece and nephews are? Because, dang it's true.


I don't have a good picture of Miles. But he's cute too. Trust me.

McKenzie is way too smart for her own good. That little girl asks questions and expects real answers. It's a problem because a lot of the time I don't know the real answer. Like when we were driving back from the beach. Dave's GPS lost the satelite reception. Kenzie wanted to know what a satelite was. Cue long discussion. She kept asking questions until she understood. Which was hard because we didn't really understand what we were saying. Some of my favorite quotes from that conversation:

McKenzie: So, they're just floating in the sky?
Michelle: Yep. They're way high up in the sky.
McKenzie: Oh my heck. I can see them.

McKenzie: Well, what else do they do?
Michelle: Lots of things. They make your TV work (she mentioned some other things that satellites make work but I can't remember what)
McKenzie: So they just make things work? That's so not cool.

McKenzie: Well, how do they know where we are if they can't see?
Me: And now we're getting into rocket science...

McKenzie: But why didn't the box (GPS) get the messages?
Me: Sometimes the messages get stuck. Like, if we drive under a bridge, the messages might get stuck up there and not get to the box.
McKenzie: Huh? There's a bridge around here with a bunch of messages stuck on it?





And Carson is in the cutest phase right now. He has the most adorable speech impediment ever. And he is always on stage. It's so cute! Some of my favorite Carson quotes (ah, I wish I could put how he said everything into text. That was the funniest part):

During the whole GPS discussion, Carson took it upon himself to tell us everything the box said. But he could only remember part of it so it would come out something like this:
GPS: Exit left.
Carson: Daddy! Daddy! Eciz weft!

GPS: Drive point six miles then turn left.
Carson: Drive point!

GPS: Drive point nine miles then turn right.
Carson: Drive point again!\

-x-

Playing old Maid:
Brian: Okay, Kenz. You take one of my cards and hope you don't get the Old Maid. You don't know if I have it or not!
Carson: *rips card out of Brian's hand* OLD MAID!

-x-

After the kids were in bed, Lindsay made a cake. As we were taking it out of the oven, we turned around to see Carson hovering in the hallway peering shyly behind his white bangs. Lindsay went over and picked him up and asked him what was the matter. He whispered something to her and she had him tell us too.
Carson: *whispering* Can I have some cake?

-x-

We had filled the kiddy pool with water and were throwing wet things at each other. Carson was tired of playing and wanted to go inside. He told me to get out of the kiddy pool so he could dump it out. I ignored him for a while until he shouted, "I'm gunna dump this out. WITH YOU IN IT!"

-x-

After dumping the kiddy pool out, the kids started playing in the mud. Carson began piling the mud into a big lump.
Lindsay: What are you making Carson?
Carson: A pirate.
Lindsay: A pirate?
Carson: With long feet.

-x-

He had a peice of paper in front of his face.
Michelle: Where'd Carson go?
Carson: *swishing his hips back and forth* Do you see mine pants? Moving?

-x-

Kenzie said the prayer one night (the prayer itself was funny becauuse Kenz was eating as she said it). After the prayer:
Carson: Kenzie not clos-ed her eyes!
Brian: Did you close yours?
Carson: No. And I not folded mine arms either.

-x-

He's in that phase where you have to watch everything he does. All the time he goes "Watch" and you have to watch him do something or other. On Sunday his shirt was the same color as Daves.
Michelle: Carson! You and Dave match!
Carson: Watch...MATCH!
Dave: Woah, did you see it?




Miles is an adorable baby. He always has his little brow furrowed like he's mad at something. He smiled for the first time when we were on our way to the Cold Play concert. Michelle said it was because he was excited to see Cold Play.




So...now I'm in college. Weird. I'm getting tired of typing so I'll just skip to the part that's mostly on my mind now. Theatre.

Auditions for the show started on Monday. I did all the usual audition things: freak about cold reading, freak about what I was going to wear, freak about how early I should be, and freak. When I got there, I saw waaaay more kids in that audition than I was comfortable with. There are only four female parts so seeing the room so full made me nervous.
The director would call us up and have us cold read a bit. Since there were so many of us, I only got to read about half a scene. Which was discouraging. And the boy next to me wouldn't stop flirting with me. Okay, auditions are really not the time for that.

The callback list seemed to take all day to go up. I could hardly sit still through the entire day. Finally, my last class, Tap, rolled around. One of the boys who had done spectacularly the night before is in that class and after class he ran straight to the board to check. I was too nervous and wanted to look at it alone so I got a drink of water before heading over there. I ran into him coming back from the board. He told me my name was on the list.

So, callbacks came around. Thirteen girls. Still more than I was comfortable with. But I did my best. He had me read for the part of Ela several times. I started feeling pretty confident near the end that he had decided on me. He seemed to be double checking and making sure the cast he had chosen worked well together when he called me and another girl up to read one scene and stopped us almost immediatly. Then he had the other girl start another scene with a guy and stopped them almost immediatly. I was feeling cautiously optimistic when the girl next to me whispered that she thought I got the part. Then he said "Since there are so many of you, it's possible I missed something. If you want to read for a role that you haven't read for, I'll let you do that now." EVERYONE wanted to read for Ela! I don't know why they considered her such a desirable role. She doesn't even show up until half way through act II. But, unfortunatly, many of them were really good at it.

The next day I tried to convince myself that I wouldn't look until after my last class so that if I didn't make it I could just go home. The nerves were too much and I literally ended up sprinting from my first class to look. I scanned down the list and felt my heart sinking. Until I hit the very last name.

Ela Dellahay --- Amber Dodge