Falls x's 4

WOW! Its been an exciting few days around here. Let me start with the craziest of all 4 first.

Fall 1 &2
Thursday night, I turned my shower water on and then decided I wasn't ready to take a shower. As I walked back into the living room, I heard some commotion upstairs. I thought it was Peyton on the monitor but as I walked a few steps into the living room and headed upstairs I realized it was Clark. I heard, "Misssssssssy, Missssssssy." Of course I automatically thought, "Why is he yelling when the babies are asleep?" So I'm going upstairs whispering (in a louder whispering voice), "Hush, hush..." About half way up the stairs I started to hear him more and that's when it got scary. I walked into CJ's bathroom and saw CJ sitting on his bathroom counter, blood pouring from him nose, Clark on his knees, bloody Kleenex in hand. He said, "I think CJ just broke his nose and I'm about to pass out." I started taking care of CJ and told Clark to sit on the potty. CJ is still crying and saying, "There's blood all over me." Clark started to sit down on the potty and then for some crazy reason stood right back up. As he stood up, I thought he was just fine. Then he started to raise his arms like Frankenstein, although he was headed backwards. All of a sudden he passed out taking the shower curtain down with him, landed in the bathtub wrapped up in the shower curtain. CJ yelling, "Oh my daddy..." I unwrapped his head from the shower curtain to survey the damage...still passed out. He laid there for about 30 seconds, and then opened his eyes but was completely blank. I was talking to him but he didn't move a muscle. Finally he came completely to after the water from the faucet started dripping on his face. The bathtub in that bathroom is a regular size bathtub, he was wedged in there and I was jerking on his legs but I soon realized there was no way I could help him at all. I do have to say that when he finally woke up, I had to hold back my laughing and I wanted to say "Could you just stay like that so I can get my camera?" but I didn't! Sorry everyone, I wish you could have seen it too! When he finally got up he went into CJ's room and plopped on the floor just a giggling away as I finished cleaning up the bloody mess-cracking up!

Later, CJ said "My daddy fell and he should have been looking where he was going." Of course that's what Clark had been lecturing him on while he was cleaning up the blood after CJ had fallen and started all this commotion! CJ is fine, no broken nose!

Fall #3

Peyton is now crawling upstairs. We decided that we wouldn't keep a gate up because all the boys learned to crawl up the stairs and they need to be able to go up there and not have me lift them all day. We go up and down so much that it would be more cumbersome. I still feel that way even after today.

Mark was having a little bit of a hard day. Just cranky. He followed Peyton up the stairs and about half way up, as I turned the corner from the bedroom to watch them up the stairs Mark pushed Peyton down...boom, boom, bang, boom...whaaaaaaaaaaaa. He banged up his head pretty good but he didn't cry long. I think it just scared him more than anything.

I was hoping that was all the action for a few days.

Fall #4

Last night, right after Clark got home, Mark crawled on the table. I kept telling him to get down but of course that didn't work long. I got up to get Peyton something and that's when I heard Mark fall onto the tile floor. I did what I always do when they fall, inspect them, make sure nothing is broken. I opened up his mouth and it was full of blood. This time I got to yell for Clark. He came running in, picked Marky up and took him to the sink. No one passed out but it was close.

I'm hoping the weekend is quite!

Where did we get these names...

We're often asked, "How did you pick your boy's names?"

I started putting this post together and as we ALL searched for photos, I realized just how special this post was going to be. To have three boys, all namesakes, brought tears to my eyes.

C.J. Miller

Clark Thomas Miller, Jr. (C.J.)

We always knew that if we had a boy we would follow suit and name him after Clark because his side of the family has a tradition of naming their sons, Clark Thomas or Thomas Clark. I believe that every generation, the names would flip-flop (Thomas Clark is Poppy and then Clark Thomas is C.J.'s daddy's name). We decided to keep the order the same as Clark's but added "Jr." at the end. The name "Thomas" is also the name of my grandfather, Papaw, my dad's father! A win-win! My younger sister Michelle, actually pointed out to us that we could call him C.J. and that stuck!

Thomas Clark Miller (Poppy)

Clark Thomas Miller (Daddy)

Thomas Chambers (Great Papaw)

Mark Robert Miller

So, we had a second son and boy were we happy to be able to use two of the most important names of people on my side of the family. Mark was the name of my uncle (my mother's younger brother). Uncle Mark passed away shortly after his 23rd birthday (I was 4 years old), in a tragic boating accident. He was the only blood related uncle that we had. He was just a cool guy, an uncle that was always missed terribly. The memory I have of him the most was how much he loved his "Tiddies" sandals, those rubber sandals that were popular with those who loved boating. Also, his nickname was "Gator". We still have the light blue towels that have "Gator" embroidered on them, probably given to him from my Mimi.

Robert is my dad's first name however he goes by Steve. What an honor to be able to name one of our son's after my dad...I have all sisters so no namesakes there!

Mark Wayne Slater (1962-1985)

Robert Stephen Chambers (Pop)

Peyton Daniel Miller

Then, we had a third boy! We decided that we wanted to use a "current" name so we chose Peyton and kept the spelling the same as Peyton Manning. You wouldn't think that there would be many girl's names with the same spelling but apparently there are. Oh well, I'm sure with Peyton's size, no one will want to poke fun at his name! Then we thought it would be a perfect opportunity to use a name from Clark's mother's side of the family so we chose Daniel. Sounded perfect! Daniel is the name of Clark's mother's dad, Daniel Hartnett!

Daniel Hartnett (1921-2006)

I hope you enjoyed reading as much as I enjoyed writing about how special each of our boys' names are to us and to those that they are named after!

Odds and Ends

Marky and Peyton playing on Thursday after we got home from taking CJ to school.

SHOES

CJ complains every time I start to put on his tennis shoes. He tells me that his shoes don't feel good and his socks have to be just right. If there was such a thing as a seamless sock, that's what CJ would want! I am telling you, everything has to be just right for him to stop griping. I finally decided that generic shoes weren't going to suffice anymore. Early last week I had been planning a little trip to get CJ some new shoes, some that were really padded and ultra comfy. Today, we brought these new babies home. We also bought some new socks, some real soft ones that fit real snug. I guess I really can't blame him, its just hard sometimes when your kids are complaining and you can't feel what it is that they are complaining about. I just figured he was being picky. He put them on tonight after we got home and I think these are going to work!

Let me tell you the new eyeglasses story...

I knew I needed a new rx in my glasses but my frames had really been through a beating too. I started looking at all the "fast" eye glass places like Pearl Vision, Lenscrafters, Eyemasters etc. I had forgotten how expensive glasses were. Even after looking at several places, I still couldn't find exactly what I was looking for. I knew I wanted some with lighter brown frames around the eyes, but I also wanted some with a little bit of black...and of course, I wanted some glitz too. Well, what I wanted was going to cost around $400 and I just thought that was insane for a pair of glasses that I wouldn't be wearing everyday all day. I typically wear contacts. Framesdirect.com (based out of Houston) ended up being the answer. I found the coolest pair of glasses, exactly what I wanted for about $15o less than what I would have paid retail. Give Framesdirect.com a try next time you need new glasses! I even have a little coupon that I'd give anyone who needs it:)