But, I survived and I have a feeling my moving days are not over. In fact we moved this weekend.

Except, the move wasn't filled with cardboard boxes and bubble wrap. It involved over three years worth of entries, images, and pieces of code. And as most moves go, it also involved some hand holding from a dear friend who helped me accomplish that goal.

I am giving you Crumley Blog, our new family blog. We still have to update the wallpaper, add on to the pages, and switch out three years worth of permalinks, but I think it is safe to start having visitors.

So, stop by sometime soon. Update your feed readers, your bookmarks, and whatever else you need to remember where we are now.

Our party turned into fun at the aquarium and lunch at our house. It was a good day. I took a few pictures, but they are still on the camera.

Unfortunately the day has turned sour... since it seems all of the members in our family have developed a cold. I'm glad we got out of the house today since we might be a few days before we feel up for it again.

As quite a few regional bloggers have noted, snow in our area is a big event. The news is covering it with tag team field reporters located on various roadsides around the region. Kids get their 15 seconds of fame when some random reporter pulls out his/ her cue cards filed under "Snow in Chattanooga: Big event, as rare as Big Foot." These questions may be "Do you like snow?" "Think you will have school tomorrow?" or "What do you think about all this white stuff?"

I decided to head out to the store after Fuller went to bed so if the snow is still around in the morning (rumors are it will be icy) we can just bunker down and enjoy the "winter wonderland." I bought one of last gallons of milk on the shelf, not because I think we will be stuck in the house for days, but because Fuller is out.

I really don't mind winter so much when we have excitement like this. It breaks up the monotony of biting cold and bleak landscape. I think I could stand winter for another week. Then I might start staring out the window looking for the first signs of spring and wondering when I can break out the chacos.

(To our regular readers, photrade is another photosharing site with some interesting features. Our gallery is full of pictures we have actually printed and given as gifts. It is in beta right now and I have two invites left. If you are interested leave a comment.)

We are a small little family with our little corner of the blogosphere right here. Behind this main page is really messy, so browse at your own risk. We don't mind the mess because we are moving soon, staking claim elsewhere in blogland. It is still under construction, with an official move-in date sometime in February.

If you want to check out more of my photography, you can see some over on Always, Alli (my personal blog). We had an interesting conversation on post processing digital photography the other day. I participate in Self Portrait Sunday, Best Shot Monday, and might try my hand at Photo Hunt.

We also maintain the Daily Fuller Fix, a daily (sometimes) photoblog of our son.

Hope you stick around, we love having more friends!

But it wasn't a fluke. Fuller ate five pieces of pizza.

He's decided to become a part of the clean plate club, asking for seconds with whole PBJ sandwiches for snacks. Yesterday it was four hot dogs for lunch.

He'll eat his weight in applesauce, devour clementines, gobble up broccoli and cauliflower (because who could resist eating a tree?), and never says no to a cheese. When he eats, he tells me "Go in mouth. Down throat. Into tummy. stops!" I'm not sure where he got that logic, but I sometimes wonder when the tummy will be full.

In the past, Fuller would eat only certain staple foods- chicken nuggets, PBJ, cheese, and eggs. Dinnertime he would eat what we ate, but after begging and or time outs. Sometimes tears were involved. Every so often he would eat in large quantities and then rarely eat due to other pressing activities like playing cars or building legos. It looked like he was on a binge and starve diet.

I realize we have a growing boy on our hands, but this sudden interest in eating has sent this Momma through a myriad of thoughts and emotions. I first dealt with it by giggling. Real mature, I know. I laughed as if I was watching one of those jackass shows and the kids were stuffing themselves until they were ill. Oh the hilarity!

Then I was hesitant, holding each plate in my hand wondering if Fuller would actually eat. And knowing, if he didn't it wasn't a big deal because really, he must still be using the fuel from yesterday's four PBJ sandwiches.

And now, I am scaling back by and reinforcing meal times with a specific snack time. And I'm trying to take advantage of his "will eat anything" attitude by offering him even more veggies. Last night he ate salad!

I know we are fortunate not to have a child with food issues. I just hope we can keep the fridge stocked so we can keep up with him and his never ending tummy.

Today, I'm using stickers to my advantage.

Fuller might be potty trained, but he is really lazy when it comes to independent tasks like undressing and dressing. He can do most of it, but usually stops with the complaint, "I can't!" or "Hayl-up Mommy!"

This morning I baited the hook when Fuller told me it was time to get dressed. He got a sticker for undressing and dressing himself. Later when he needed to potty, he got another sticker for undressing and dressing himself. I still have to help with small things like zippers and snaps, but I think I might be making way for a more independent kid. And stickers will help me get there.

This week our church went back to two services and having Little Lambs. We went to the 8:30 service and stayed through Sunday School. And Fuller was excellent on all accounts. We came home by 11, lunch by noon, Fuller played happily for a few hours, took a nap, ate dinner, and went to bed at a normal time.

Big sigh of happiness all around.

We really aren't the type of family who thrives on a schedule, but recognize routine and limits help keep the little guy happy. And at his age and attention span, keeping him in the 11 o'clock worship service with no little lambs was no picnic. It wasn't just the pew pains, but it extended to the afternoon and evening, just throwing it all out of whack.

And today, we got back to normal.

What a great way to start the week.

Fuller enjoys Veggie Tales, ever since we introduced him to silly songs. We gave him some of the Veggie Tales DVDs at Easter and he asks them as much as he does Cars or Nemo.

The movie was a good kids movie, full of music and action. Some witty jokes for the parents to get, and a pretty simple plot line. There may have been some spoofs I am not too sure of because I haven't seen all the Pirates of the Caribbean movies or cared about the Golden Compass, but the movie held its own, even without my knowing about those things.

Fuller's behavior during the movie was excellent and mostly involved. Since he is three and used to mainly watching his movies in our living room, I was happy he sat still in the booster and chomped away on his popcorn. He told us when he had to go to the bathroom, so he gets extra points.

On of the best parts of the movie was the Rock Monster music video at the end. It was a great spoof on Rock Lobster and made me giggle.

It was a good family outing and I'm sure the movie will end up in our DVD library some day.

All day Fuller was asking to go to the doctor, like it was a treat or something. But when we got there we had lots of tears for various reasons- not being able to hang out in the sick kid area, being measured, falling of his chair onto the floor, getting his ears checked. But tears turned to laughter when the doctor started pushing on Fuller's tummy. Our kid is very ticklish.

Fuller also had to go to the lab and have his finger pricked, which lead to some serious tears. However a Diego sticker fixed it right up, so I might stock up on those to help keep the peace around here. Stickers are magic (unless you are my coffee table).

I was looking forward to taking Fuller in for his well child because it usually ends up with good news and praise for how awesome Fuller is turning out. Today was no different. I'm pretty sure they like him because we rarely take him in, he is growing like a weed (I think we need new pants again!) and he's just so gosh darn cute.

I'm pretty sure we have a keeper.

One form of giving is to donate boats or cars to CarAngel.com. They will sell the cars or boats and use the proceeds to produce and distribute Christian videos (for free) to children all over the world. To date they have given away 2.4 million videos.

The videos feature Donkey Ollie during Bible times. Check out the video below the cut:

When I mentioned the upcoming jaunt to Fuller ("Do you want to go see Luke?") Fuller wouldn't settle for anything until we were in the car and on our way. Damon said it made sense since Fuller and Luke hadn't seen each other since the car ride to the airport. It had been almost three weeks since they had hung out, so Fuller was ready to see his buddy.

Tuesday also happened to be Ben's birthday. Remember how we all waited breathlessly while Esther spent days and holidays in bed rest? His birthday was sooner than anticipated, and he had a cozy visit in the NICU, but Ben is home and happy with his family now.

We took Ben (and others) some store bought cupcakes to celebrate in a small way on his actual birthday. Fuller picked out the only Spider-Man cupcakes in the store and and he happily gave them to Esther when we arrived. Once we got into the blowing out of the candle, Fuller and Luke each got their own candles to blow out.

What amazed me was Fuller first blowing it out and then taking the candle out of the cupcake and licking the icing off. My amazement turned to horror as Fuller started eating the wax candle. And then I started laughing because Fuller spit it out and knew he had done something yucky.

Ben brother Luke spent quite some time singing the Happy Birthday song and plugging in everyone's names as they came to him. The kid knows birthdays.

We had a good time, even if it was a short visit. Happy Birthday Ben!

Yesterday we were playing Zingo and asking him to spell the words on the tiles. Since the words were written in all lowercase he would get tripped up. I would tell him the sound of the letter and he would get it almost immediately. Our lesson plans for the week include a review of lowercase letters and phonics.

Fuller has also decided we should start exploring emotions more since he likes to announce, "I sad. I crying." And yesterday one of the Zingo tiles showed a ghost. To our recollection Fuller has never seen an illustrated (or real) ghost but Fuller announced the picture was "scared."

Watching Fuller learn has been one of the best things about being a parent. It makes me happy, another emotion Fuller likes to announce.

We were thrilled Fuller received two board games this past Christmas. Zingo and Cariboo. We played Zingo for the first time tonight, so I will save a review of that game for later after we play a few more rounds. However, we have worn down the cards on Cariboo so I think it is safe for me to give a fair and balanced accounting of the game.

Overview
There are six bouncy balls you put in one of three holes at the top of the board. The balls roll around and settle in little divots under trap doors. (Make sure the trap doors are closed first!) On the top of the board are 15 trap doors labeled with different cards. The cards contain a varied number of shapes of various colors. In each shape is a picture and below the shapes is a word.

The child picks a card and selects a trap door based on the item on the card. If it reads "A" you look for a card with a word that starts with "A." If the card is yellow then you find a corresponding trap door with the color yellow. And what do you think happens if you pull a card and it reads "3?" Yup, you look for a corresponding trap door with 3 shapes. I'll let your imagination run wild with what you should do if the kid pulls a card with a triangle.

To open each door you use a purple key (or crochet hook if you temporarily lose the key) to see what is below the door. If there is a ball, you get to pick it up and place it in another hole on the side of the board. Once the sixth ball is placed in the hole a treasure box opens and the game is over.

Ease of use
When Fuller opened the gift on Christmas (thanks Tia! thanks Tio!) he immediately got the concept of opening the trap doors with the keys. He also loved dropping the bouncy balls in the various holes. And he thought the treasure in the treasure box was his to keep, so he popped that plastic purple jewel right off. Fortunately the makers of the game knew Fuller was like that and made it easy to put back in. Cranium did not supply the speech I gave Fuller to leave the jewel in the treasure box. I made it up myself.

We let him just discover the balls under the doors for a while, since we were still opening gifts. Later that afternoon we were able to pull out the cards and start with the matchy matchy. Fuller was able to amaze the various school teachers in the room with his school'n and was really sufficient at identifying the items on the cards and matching them with the trap doors.

Fuller's Mom's Thoughts
One of the objectives of Cariboo is to support the social mores of taking turns. As a parent I highly recommend kids learning to take turns as early as possible. As the parent of an only child, I waive my right to make my kid take turns when it comes to him playing this game with me. Instead when it is "my turn" I pick the card but make him find the corresponding trap door. I do this because I am honestly bored with the game. I find great delight in watching Fuller do it, encouraging him in exploring what he has learned, so I let him do it. Since the game doesn't heavily rely on competition, it can almost be a one person game. With supervision, of course.

Yesterday something happened. Fuller started to cheat. He would reach under open trap doors to get balls under closed trap doors. He wouldn't pick up cards but just try to open any door he felt like. And that's when I decided to mix it up.

We switched to the advanced version of the game. This involved flipping over the cards on the trap doors and opening the advanced card packs. It was very easy to do. So easy a three year old could do it. Not that he did. (But later I saw he had tried to switch the trap door cards on his own.)

The advanced version of the game uses lowercase letters (something Fuller knows but stumbles on) and numbers higher than four (he didn't recognize ten written "10" but can count to 10 just fine). And it was challenging! Fuller got more into the game again and I started to pay more attention to all the turns Fuller was taking.

I hope to have a playdate soon where Fuller gets a worthy opponent and he can practice taking turns with more people (cause really, Mom and Dad can be push overs).

I highly recommend Cariboo for the younger kids who need to practice their letters, numbers, colors, and shapes. I think for our son we might have to put the timer to it since his attention span for opening doors and playing with the bouncy balls is much longer than mine.

This morning he was so eager he offered to put on his shoes before changing or eating breakfast.

It warms my heart that Fuller likes to go to church, but I have to admit I wasn't all that thrilled. Since we have only one service right now (next week we go back to two) and there is no Little Lambs, Fuller would have to sit through the entire service. And Fuller's behavior in church for the last few weeks has been less than stellar... so much so it drove me to tears one Sunday.

Today we tried a different tactic- bribery. If Fuller would sit still, stay quiet, participate in singing, then he would get a small piece of candy. We doled out an entire roll of smarties throughout the service, in exchange for making it to certain milestones. And amazingly, it worked.

He was a bit rambunctious during singing (wanting to be held, so trying to climb Damon) and he refused to entertain himself during the sermon, making it difficult for either of us to pay attention*. But besides these small infractions (he did get one spanking), for a three year old who is constantly on the move and noisy, he was a really good kid. Instead of tears this week, I was proud and beaming.

Next week we get to go back to our old routine- 8:30 service and Little Lambs after the offering. I look forward to a new year of watching Fuller grow even more in the church.

*I do however remember the three points: our identity is in Christ, our identity is in the church, and our identity is our service. Just don't ask me to expound on them. I guess I could wait until the sermon comes out online.