Personality

I have an awesome new neighbor. We love the whole family! Four kids, 2 cats, a dog...crazy house just like ours. We borrow things from each other all the time, feel comfortable sending our kids over to each others houses, and have great chats. On top of all that she's a professional photographer and offered to take our family Christmas photo. However, with both our busy schedules and the rain, we've been unable to connect. Finally on Sunday the planets aligned and it stopped raining for an hour so we quickly gathered everyone up after church and tried to take some pics. Now, this isn't the one I used for my Christmas card - but I have to say it is my FAVORITE picture she took because it captured everyone's personality in my family perfectly!
It probably isn't noticeable to the common eye but I can see everyone's true self just spilling out from the picture. Let me interpret for you.

Emma - Crazy, vivacious, always laughing (when she's not crying), loves life, never stops until her head hits the pillow kind of girl.

Jacob - shy but sneaky. Loves to play practical jokes on people. Is kind of shy and quiet but thinks he is totally funny. Comes up with the funniest comments ever.

Ben - SOOO mischievous. Doesn't that look just scream "Yeah I'm a troublemaker but I'm so cute how can you resit?"

Dave - hates getting his photo taken and being made by his wife to sit in a photo shoot. See that little crooked smirk on his face - it's saying "how much longer do I have to sit through this torture"?.

Me - I can't believe we are all sitting here at the same time and nobody is whining, yelling, or hitting anyone else. Wearing the "boring-white-shirt-because-I-didn't-have-time-to-find- myself-something-cute-to-wear-with-the-getting-everybody-else-ready" outfit. Thinking - good thing this is right after church so I already had makeup on and my hair semi brushed.

I just laugh to myself when I see this picture. Here are some more for your viewing enjoyment:

A little late

That's me this Christmas...a little late on everything. Actually, that's me this whole YEAR! I feel like I'm always two steps behind trying to catch up. I noticed I still have a Halloween picture as the last entry on the blog and it's almost Christmas! No mention of Thanksgiving and thankfulness or upcoming Christmas fun. Two steps behind...I don't even have a tree yet! Can you believe it! I usually get my tree as soon as the the turkey is gone and the leftover cranberries are washed down the sink. I got sick the day after thanksgiving this year and that put me down for a week. On top of that my house has been partly under construction by my dad and it's been rainingn so it's just been hard to get out and get a tree. Now I'm four steps behind on Christmas and two steps on the rest of life. Oh well...

I sent Dave to get a tree with the kids last night and they came home empty handed. Apparently if you wait until a week before Christmas all they have left are 3 ft trees or 9 ft trees. And since I asked him to get a 5 or 6 ft tree he came home with none since he NEVER deviates from what I tell him to do. Honestly at this point I would have been happy with a 3 footer. I'm taking an easy approach to Christmas this year. Since it's a sort duration my tree will actually be up now I wouldn't mind a little one.

I've been enjoying all the Christmas cards immensly - thank you to all of you who are way more on top of things than myself and already mailed them. I may get mine out next week sometime. I do have them...I just have to mail them. It's so fun catching up at least once year with those who live far away. One thing I love about Christmas. Rekindling old friendships. I also love Christmas movies - we've been watching one a day thanks to TIVO and ABC family. I love Christmas crafts - we've also been doing one a day. It's actually cold here right now and we've had several days of rain so it feels even more like Christmas! We actually had hot chocolate the other day and have to wear sweaters and shoes to go outside! I love it! I love decorating for Christmas. I love it so much I've just been doing a little bit each day. Usually I do one day of decorating with the tree, the house etc. Since I don't have a tree yet that hasn't happened. I still have Pumpkins on my porch and a scarecrow out front underneath the Christmas lights (which I did get put up all by myself thank you very much). I plan on stashing away the rest of the Thanksgiving stuff today and going out on a hunt for the perfect-whatever-is-left-on-the-lot tree. I have to say - it's been a little nice going slow this season.

I don't know if I'll be back before Christmas or not so if not - Merry Christmas friends!

Randomness

The ants attacked the Halloween candy this morning. Thank goodness I can feel good about throwing that all away today!

The pumpkin shortage is over...that's the good news. Thanks everyone for the tips on where to buy it. Funny enough I stocked up on pumpkin yet I've been buying pumpkin pies from places like Costco and Trader Joe's because they are oh so yummy. I'll save my pumpkin cans for the next shortage.

Sometimes I just feel an overwhelming urge to just hang on to my kids so tight and never let them go. Of course they wriggle free before I can smother them with kisses but those few minutes they are snuggled up in my arms is so wonderful. Ben is the best at this. He loves giving me kisses and hugs and will just come up to me at random times during the day, give me a kiss, and say "I love you mom".

If it's true what they say that the way your child acts at 2, 4, 6 correlates with how they will act at 12, 14, 16 etc... I'm taking offers now to house a 16 year old in 10 years. Any takers?

Happy Fall Ya'all

Okay that's so cliche but I couldn't help it. I love Fall! Who doesn't right? Scarecrows on the front porch, pumpkins by the front door begging to be carved, and actually being able to pull the sweaters out of the closet (here in SoCal that only last for a few days so we really take advantage). Can't you just smell that pumpkin pie cooking in the oven...or maybe not!

One of my favorite Fall traditions is making my favorite Pumpkin Bars recipe courtesy of our long lost blogger friend Annie. I love these things! I make them every year - several times in fact. I love giving them out to neighbors and taking them to any Fall Festivities we might be attending. Imagine my surprise when I went to Vons last week to stock up on my canned pumpkin for the season only to find out there is a NATIONWIDE CANNED PUMPKIN SHORTAGE! Whaaat? At first I thought the teenage clerk helping me just didn't know what aisle the pumpkin was on (I couldn't find it anywhere) and was trying to brush me off. But after he confirmed with his manager that the shelves were empty and he didn't know when any would be coming in - I was shocked. One more thing to add to my food storage - canned pumpkin. Who would have thought.

I looked it up on the Internet when I got home and sure enough there is a shortage. "They" say not to worry, production will catch up but I'm not taking any chances. I bought the last three cans they had a Stater Brothers and I'm keeping my eyes open for more. Have you tried to pie canned pumpkin this year? Am I being punked or is there really a shortage?

Trees

Remember the age old question "If a tree falls in the forest, and there is nobody around to hear it, does it still make a sound?

A favorite song around here is

Trick or treat
Smell my feet
Give me something good to eat
If you don't, I don't care...

And then the line is supposed to say I'll pull down your underwear.

Being the mean mom that I am I don't allow my kids to say the line about pulling down underwear. To get around that they've been creative about inserting different silly things like "I'll knock down your silly door" or "I'll take your rocket for a week or two" (they make no sense) This song is sung any time of year whether it's Halloween or not. On occasion I have heard them whispering into friends ears what the forbidden line is and everybody giggles.

Tonight Emma was walking into the kitchen singing the song and caught herself before belting out the line about underwear. She quickly inserted some silly phrase about rockets for the sake of her mother who was listening (me). Then she asked "mom, if I sing it to a tree than is it okay since they don't wear underwear anyway?" I gave her a funny look and said "huh?" She replied "If I sing to a tree, and nobody is standing by me, than is it okay since the trees don't have underwear ?"

So...the question isn't whether a tree falling in the forest makes a sound. The real question is: if you sing to a tree about pulling down it's underwear does it really count as something naughty since trees don't wear underwear?

Why I Love This Kid

Tonight at bedtime:
I start tucking Jacob in, but then he remembered he forgot to brush his teeth. We go and do that and on the way back to his room I say "why don't you go kneel down and say your prayers and I'll just watch by the door" (I usually kneel down with him but I was oh so tired tonight and trying to take a shortcut.) I mentioned the fact that he was getting older and could start doing that on his own. His response "but mom, I'm the same years old as I was before so I still want you to come in". How can I argue with that.

During his prayer:
"Please bless everyone that they will sleep good tonight, except the robbers and the bad guys, don't bless them to sleep good, but bless the good guys that they will sleep good. Bless the poor people that might have to sleep on the ground because it's hard, please bless that they can sleep good and make the ground not so hard for them".

Daily Recap

Favorite Moments Today:

Playing iphone light sabers with Ben - me on my iphone and he on my dad's. Swinging iphones at each other and watching his face saying "I got you!" all to the background sound of Star Wars and Light Sabers - best App I've downloaded yet!

Picking cherry tomatoes off the vine and popping them in my mouth while out enjoying the backyard. Watching the kids pick beans and tomatoes off the vine and popping them in their mouths.

Dumbest thing I did today:

Turned on the Rotisserie to cook the Rotisserie chicken but forgot to turn on the heat. It was spinning round and round but not getting cooked. Delayed dinner by one hour. Had to turn on Dinotrain for the kids to watch to appease the wait. Have you seen Dinotrain? PBS. My kids love it.

What I didn't get done today:

Finish the laundry
Mop the floor
Plant my fall garden
clean my room
*sigh*

What I did get done today:

Went on a walk with a friend
Played Thomas cards with Jacob (thanks Wendy)
Fixed some sprinkler heads
Checked Facebook
Practiced the Piano
Finished my Visiting Teaching

Signing In

Back to School, Back to early bedtimes, Back to the blog. Wow it's been a long time. So long it took me a few tries to find the right password to log in. I feel a little rusty at this but I'm sure it will all come flowing back to me just like riding a bike, which I have been doing lately and I haven't fallen off yet. There is so much to say I couldn't possibly say it all so I'll just start with the present. This will be a little bit of a boring catch up about which each of my kids are doing, more for my record keeping than for yours but if your interested keep reading.

The first few weeks of first grade were rough! Not at school. Emma's doing great at school. It's not until she gets home that the explosions happen. I think sitting in a classroom all day on her best behavior just about took it all out of her. She comes home and throws tantrums reminiscent of her three's and four's. My patience was all but got and things have finally settled down. She really likes her teacher, she loves recess, and has done the monkey bars so much she has blisters all over both hands. I so remember those days! Monkey bar blisters, tether ball bruises on the pinky - oh the memories.

Jacob is in "pre-k" as they call it at his school instead of preschool and he just thinks he's so cool being in "pre-k" this year. He has a really great teacher. He's gotten this really crazy streak lately which is new for him and quite honestly I hope it doesn't last long because I can only handle one crazy kid and stay sane. For those of you who know my kids know which one I'm talking about! I need my mellow middle child to stay mellow.

Ben is just such a funny kid! He loves life and lives it large. He has a great vocabulary and keeps us laughing. He's starting to hit that "I don't want to take a nap stage" and my brain is screaming "noooooo" I'm not ready for that yet!

All my favorite Fall shows have started and I even have missed the first episode of most of them. Usually I"m on pins and needles and Fall line up doesn't start soon enough for me. But this year I was like "what??? it's already Fall and I've missed my shows?" I swear summer flew by. I loved summer this year. We traveled, we relaxed, we swam, we slept in sometimes (by sleep in I mean 7:30), and we stayed up late. I didn't stress about bedtime or dinnertime and all that. We just lived Joi de Vivre and it was great. I was sad to see it come to an end. I guess since it was our first real school year it was our first real summer. When you're a mom of little ones seasons don't really mean a whole lot except for the holidays. (especially in So Cal where the weather doesn't even change). You don't have to plan vacations by a calender or schedule dr. appt's for after school hours. It's so nice. It takes getting used to have school age kids - the whole ballgame changes. Now I have to plan vacations at the same time everyone else does.
At first I was really bummed for school to be starting, having to run a routine again, run kids here and there, and lose the carefree - ness of summer. But now that we're in the swing of things I'm actually starting to enjoy start of a new season. So Happy Yom Kippur (we got it off school), Columbus Day, Halloween, and Thanksgiving and here's to a Fall full of joy and laughter. What are you going to be for Halloween this year?

Too Busy to Blog

You'll have to excuse my absence this summer, we've been too busy to blog...


Taking road trips...



Playing at the beach...


Swimming in the pool.


Going to baseball games


Watching our Monarch Catepillars grow and build cacoons




Harvesting the garden.


Enjoying our new pets.

See you in the Fall!

Summer Mornings

Can I just say...I love Summer mornings! Kids sleeping in a little from all they partying the day before (sleeping in means 7:00am), laying in bed contemplating what I'm going to do when I get up and none of it involves carpooling or packing lunches, watching the kids stumble to the couch with bushy hair and sleepy eyes (usually in their underwear as we've been on a summer pajama strike) giving me snuggles before they move on to their morning activities. *sigh* Summer is half over and I'm already not looking forward to going back to school. I didn't really differentiate between summer and any other season (except for the weather) until I had two kids in school last year. All the hustle and bustle of getting kids out the door in the morning is not missed around here. Although I guess if we didn't have that hustle and bustle I wouldn't appreciate these relaxed summer mornings as much. I'm sure as the kids get older and the craziness gets crazier - I'll appreciate even more these lazy summer mornings with nothing to do, nowhere to be, no people to see.

Where to start

I'm one of those people who instead of tackling a big job one piece at a time just gives up because the task looks too big to accomplish. Then I procrastinate doing said job until it's out of control and then I kick myself for not having done it. Does that make sense? Anyway, that's kind of how the blog is right now. I have sooo much to talk about I always think it's too big of a task for right now so I'll do it later. In the meantime things keep happening and it just adds to my list of things I want to blog about until I don't even know where to start! So I'll start right here, right now with a quick rundown of the summer. We had a great time on our trip and my next post will be pictures from our adventure. The kids did great traveling and it was a great way to start off summer.

We have 2 chickens - Lu lu & Bellamara (Betsy had to be returned because she was too loud) and yesterday we got a new kitten - Brownie - while we were returning Betsy to the fed store. We have been swimming like crazy in the pool since we got home from Texas. Ben is almost completely swimming now and loves to jump off the diving board - he is such a crazy 2 year old! We've pretty much been staying in our pj's until we put on our swim suits. Then we come in all tired out, Ben goes down for a nap and the kids watch a movie and we have a nice quiet late afternoon until dinner. I'm trying to potty train Ben so he's been commando for the last couple of days. They jury is still out on if I'm going to continue with it or give up...

Anyway, lots of pictures forthcoming - stay tuned!

Road Trip Day One

We left Friday around 2:00pm headed towards Paulden, AZ - my second home growing up. I used to spend the summers here with my grandparents and it always feels like coming home when I'm here. They live in the middle of nowhere and it's so quiet here it let's your soul relax from the chaos of the world.

We made it to the Walmart parking lot in Kingman Arizona on Friday around 10:00pm and decided to sleep there for the night (we are traveling in my dad's 5th wheel). Jacob and Emma were in the same bed and they kept bugging each other - the old "he's touching me" or "she's breathing on me!" routine. I finally got up and threatened them with life and limb if they didn't settle down and go to sleep. As I crawled back in bed they both started crying because I "hurt their feelings". My first thought was "be quiet or I will give you something to cry about!" but then I chuckled under my breath because we were all just so tired it was comical. I got a few hours of sleep between sweating to death and the yellow flashing lights of the Walmart security guard truck until Ben woke up at 4:00 am and decided he was ready for the day. He and I hung out in the cab of my dad's truck so he didn't wake up everyone else and then at 6:00 am we headed over to Walmart for something to do and so I didn't have to keep hiding my dad's pack of Tums from Ben. I felt like a piece of work walking around Walmart at 6:00am in my pj's with a baby in his shirt and a diaper only. Nice.

We headed off in the morning to my grandparents and have spent the last few days here relaxing, eating homemade ice cream, and crushing rocks. Yes the poor rocks here dread when they hear us approaching for a visit. Jacob's favorite thing to do here is crush rocks on a vice my grandpa has mounted outside.

Last night was the first night I got a full nights sleep as Ben decided to have more midnight escapades on Saturday night. I was looking forward to a bleak vacation with no sleep but I think we've turned a corner. ((fingers crossed))

Today we are headed off to Tucson to visit great friends of ours who moved out there this year, and then on to New Mexico to explore Carlsbad Caverns. The kids are being pretty good so far, let's hope it lasts. I'm trying to teach them to be patient and in the car I said to them "hold your horses!" as they were all barraging me at the same time for something. Jacob started looking around and said "what horses?" Such a funny kid.

The End of an Era, The Beginning of a Journey

Saturday night we threw a little shin-dig to celebrate Ben & Dave's June birthdays. Come nap time, Ben saw that festivities were about to happen and decided he was way too grown up for nap time anymore. He decided instead it would be a good time to learn how to climb out of his crib. As I was standing in my room blowing up balloons and he came waltzing in binky & blankie in hand like it was perfectly normal for him to get out of bed, my heart sank at the bad news. I'm not ready for my third to give up naps quite yet! My other two didn't learn to get out much later than this and they really liked being in their cribs. He's never really been a fan in the first place so I could see we were going to have a struggle on our hands! I quickly put him back in bed and assured him the party wouldn't be starting until after he took a nap but he was having none of it! He proceeded to climb out three or four more times until he finally conked out and hour or so later - hooray!

Luckily the last few days he has still been going to bed and naps fine and just getting himself up when he's done sleeping - until yesterday. Two hours! Two hours I tried to get him to take a nap. I'd put him in bed and a few minutes later I'd find him in my closet sneaking into something or playing underneath Jacob's bed. I tried the super nanny method of not saying anything to him - just lifting him up and placing him back in bed. After two hours I gave up. I let him go watch t.v. with Emma while I worked on packing for our trip. I walked out into the family room and Ben was asleep on the floor in front of the t.v.

He slept for 2.5 hours in the middle of the family room like this with us making noise around him and everything. What a little stinker. Hopefully the nap time battles don't continue because we are leaving on Friday for a big trip!

We are taking a 2 week road trip through Arizona, New Mexico, and final destination is Texas to visit my brother and his family in Round Rock. I usually don't announce when I'm leaving on the Internet but don't worry robbers - I have an alarm that works great (see here) and will be on. And my husband will still be her so don't get any ideas about breaking in while I"m gone. Plus I have these new attack chickens that will peck you to death if you try anything funny.

Anyway, we are visting friends and family in various locations on the way and staying at a few campgrounds in the middle of Timbuktu (because that's all there is between here and Texas - a bunch of nothing!) We are going in my dad's 5th wheel (my dad being the chauffeur of course) and I'm hoping it's lot of fun. (hope, hope, hope!) I think the kids are going to like it.

As always, I've packed 100 things to do into a very short time frame for getting ready to leave for our trip. I always do that! So although I'd like to blog I still need to pack my suitcase, plant a flowerbed, and finish my irrigation system on the garden so Happy Summer all and I'll be back!

Busy Builder

I haven't blogged for a couple of days because I've been busy building a Chicken Tractor. If you're wondering what that is you can see one here. Mine's a 5x8 A frame and it's taken me 3 days to build it. As soon as I"m completely finished (which will be in the next hour because I'm picking up Sally and Betty, our new hens, at 11:30) I will post some pics.

Happy St. Patrick's Day

Okay - so I know it's June... not March. But we had a fun St. Patrick's Day this year that I never blogged about and since I haven't scrapbooked in uh...over 2 years (cringe cringe) I wanted to record it for posterity sake.

Emma learned in Kindergarten about little green guys named Leprechauns...heard of them? Well, apparently they come during the night and cause all kinds of mischief. Emma was so excited about them coming she made a trap to catch them:



In case you can't read her writing it says Welcome Leprechauns and there are little gold coins glued inside to lure them in. She spent quite a bit of time on this so of course the little green guys had to show up.

I ran to Walmart that night after the kiddos were sleeping and grabbed lucky charms, gold coins (which I think I actually ended up getting at CVS and were NOT easy to find), and green shirts. I wrote a few letters from the "leprechauns". The first one was left in Emma's bedroom by the trap and said something along the lines of 'Ha ha ha, you can't catch us but follow the shamrocks to a special surprise". When Emma woke up she not only found the note but found her room to be turned upside down and she was wearing a green shirt that I slipped on her during the night. She ran into my bedroom to show me the note and was so excited. Jacob soon followed - in his green shirt as well and they both followed the shamrocks down the hallway and into the kitchen:

On the table was another note with this:

Chocolate gold coins, crayons & scissors to make more crafty things like leprechaun traps, lucky charms and a note that said the milk in the fridge was green.

The kids were so ecstatic and it was fun to see their excitement. They were especially in awe of how those sneaky leprechauns got them in green shirts while they were sleeping. Emma has vowed to make a souped up trap next year that will catch the leprechauns for sure.

She got to have green hair at school that day so I found this wig on clearance at Target which was much easier than trying to paint her hair green. She was a little shy to wear it at first and wanted to take it off until kids in the first grade class next to hers said "awesome!" as she walked by. Then she thought she was cool stuff.


Oh, and Ben wore his St. Patty's day shirt all of 5 minutes as he decided to help himself to some peanut butter for breakfast:


Overall it was a pretty fun day!

Happy Birthday Baby!

(This pic was taken in March 09)

I can't believe my baby is turning 2! Two years have flown by and I can hardly remember them. This is going to be one of those indulgent posts where I go on and on celebrating his first two years so if you care to listen, read on. If not, that's okay...this is for my Benji to read in the future anyway.

Poor Benji is sick today so the celebration wasn't that grand. It started early at 4:00 am while he and I laid on the couch together bemoaning our sickly state. First I got it, now he has it only worse. It's so sad when the little guys get sick and there is nothing you can do to fix it. We snuggled for about an hour and his coughs subsided so I placed him back in bed and tried to sleep before the sun started peeking through my window which unfortunately was not long.

We did frost some cupcakes together and I do have pictures. (yeah for mom, remembered the camera) I don't have a card reader at the moment so those will have to wait. Even in all his snot and sickness he gave me some cute smiles. We would wish him happy birthday and he would wish it back. I don't know that he quite got it but he did enjoy singing the happy birthday song and we taught him to say "I'm two".

So who is Benjamin, Benji, Benji wa-wa, Baby Ben? He is my baby. He's cute, smiley, a real jokster, and loves to be the center of attention since he has 2 older siblings that laugh at everything he does. He's cuddly, snugly, and likes to stick his hand up my sleeve (or sometimes down the front of my shirt) when I'm carrying him. He reminds me of a little monkey. He's so smart and picks up on EVERYTHING! We went to a nursery the other morning and the guy there gave him a sucker. We had to go back later that evening and the first thing he said when he saw the guy again was "sucker?" He has a real bad sweet tooth! He loves to be tickled, play song games like Patti Cakes and Itsy Bitsy Spider. He is a true boy - he loves balls, dirt, cars and destruction in it's finest form. He will sit outside and dig in any dirt he can find. We call him the troublemaker which is funny because that's what I've been called quite a few times over the years (although it's not true...I never cause trouble). He gets into everything which my other 2 never did. If my house is too quiet I know he's somewhere squeezing lotion all over the floor or he's found the hidden candy stash in my closet. I probably treat him the most babyish of all three at his age,knowing that he may be my last. But he's probably the sharpest and smartest of all three at his age and definitely has a wider vocabulary like poo-poo head and Stop It.

Sometimes I feel bad because being the third child he hasn't gotten the benefit of having as much mommy time as the other two. Then I watch the three of them together (when they are actually playing nicely on rare occasion) and I realized he hasn't missed out at all. He has not just mommy & daddy but an older brother and sister that would bend over backwards for him. Even if at times they treat him like a plush toy and drag him around everywhere.

He's been a good sport thus far in life. From being dragged around as a newborn back and forth from preschool (it was always during feeding time and he was always screaming) to being picked up and carried down the hallway or around the grass by big brother and sister. He's one tough kid and we love him. Happy Birthday Baby Ben.

Mom's Weekend Stay-In

Most mom's go on get-a-way's to relax for the weekend right? I did the opposite - I stayed home and sent my family away and it was AWESOME! So relaxing and I actually had a clean house for the weekend.

Friday night I sponsored the Girl's Night at my house for our church group so Dave took the kids down to his parents. He decided since he was out of town for mother's day this would be his opportunity to make it up to me by staying there for the weekend. I quickly agreed.

After the girl's night which lasted into the morning hours I watched Bride Wars on PPV and finally fell asleep on the couch at 3:30 am.

Saturday morning I planned to go garage sailing with a friend so she knocked on my door at 7:00 am and we were off. We found a few good treasures and had fun looking and then she dropped me off home around 9:00 am.

I had plans to go back to sleep but the thought of having free time and not doing anything with it just ate away at me so I hopped in the car and drove down to the "old town" area of the new city we moved to in September. I've been wanting to go down there forever, but it's a cute little Main Street USA area with quaint antique shops and quirky stores...not a place to visit with small children with sticky hands and loud voices.

My first stop was the Flying Geese Quilt shop (which was right next door the The Swing Door bar). Ohhhhh the fabrics and the quilts in there. I was salivating and I'm not even good at quilting. Then I walked across the street to a Bill's Hobby shop full of model plans, trains, kites and random little trinkets covered in a layer of dust. Then there was a room dedicated to Irish looking stuff and St. Patrick's day decorations. It was really quite odd. Next door was Bill's Suit Shop which I hope for his sake gets more business than his hobby shop. Next I stopped at Aunt Bee's Antiques which also houses the city post office. I'm loving it...LOVING IT! I live in the middle of the "OC" full of countless strip malls and upscale retail centers and yet my city still has the small town feeling of yesteryear.

I stopped in for breakfast at Quinn's Pub (another Irish theme) and had the most delish Veggie Omelet and hash browns ever! That place is on my list of places to go back to. I was at a table and as I sat there people kept walking in and would sit up at the bar to order breakfast. I felt like I was on a scene from Cheers because everyone knew each other and the waitresses called everyone by name. My waitresses name was Suzi and she called me Jenny every time she helped me. Seriously - small town feeling. LOVING IT!

I walked across the street to the Thrift store and found a few good bargains and then meandered through a few more shops like The Native American Black Crow Relaxation Center and an old house converted to an antique store. I'm telling you - this is my kind of town.

I thought of a few projects I need to do at home so I headed over to Home Depot, then to Lowe's, then to a local guy selling plants on his driveway for 2.00, then to a local nursery...I have a serious plant addiction right now! I spent the rest of the evening at home working on the yard and then picked up dinner at a Chinese restaurant and a movie from Blockbuster - The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. I totally fell asleep 1/3 of the way through because it was SOOO boring! I don't know what the hype is on that movie?

Dave and the kids met me at church this morning and it's really nice to have everyone home again although I have to say - having a clean and quiet house all weekend was a pretty nice treat. I never had to sweep the floor once! Now I'm ready for summer and the 2 week road trip I'm going to take the kids on through Arizona New Mexico and Texas.

If you've never had a Weekend Stay-In I highly recommend it!

My Baby

I can't believe how fast Benji is growing up. Tonight the older two kids were in bed, dad was out, and just Ben and I were hanging out playing. I was laying on the couch and he was standing next to me feeding me dessert out of the play dishes. He was laughing and talking (in his two word sentences) I just looked at him and thought "wow! where have the last 2 years gone?" I can't believe it.

Since he's the third child he's definitely gotten less of my time than the other two did. We were having a special little moment together and sadly I realized how few of those we have since the older two are always around. Of course he has the benefit of having siblings to play with so it's not like he's neglected, but we don't get a lot of one on one time together to play.

I looked at him and said "Benji, you are so grown up. Where is my baby? Where did my baby go?" He looked at me and said "Baby!" and crawled up on me, snuggled down and gave me a kiss as if he were saying "I'm right here mommy, I'm still your baby" Oh my, it just melted my heart. I had to blog this because I never want to forget it, it was such a sweet moment.

Happy Kids Day

Emma informed me that this coming up Monday is Happy Kids Day so I have to get up in the night when they are sleeping and surprise them with Happy Kids Day stuff that says I love you and Happy Kids Day.

Mom: Oh, who told you about Happy Kids Day?
Emma: I just made it up but if you don't want to do it Monday while we're sleeping you can do it Thursday while we are at school.
Mom: Ok. Maybe I'll do it Thursday so I don't have to get up in the middle of the night and not get any sleep, then I'd be grouchy and I wouldn't have very happy kids.
Emma: Good Idea. Then Thursday while we are at school make us crafts and fun things that say Happy Kids Day and I Love you and then surprise us.
Mom: Ok...
Emma: (runs down the hallway towards the bedrooms) Jake - she said she'll do it! she said she'll do it! Yeah! (and the hug and celebrate the upcoming Happy Kids Day celebration).

I guess with Happy Mother's Day and Happy Father's Day she was feeling kind of left out that there wasn't a holiday to celebrate kids! I bet Halmark would love to hire her - one more holiday to sell lots of cards and presents.

So if anyone wants to celebrate Happy Kids Day with us - Thursday is the day.

A Little Slice of Heaven in Sin City

Got to sneak away to the Ritz Carlton at Lake Las Vegas for a few days thanks to two sets of generous grandparents (aka newly certified taxi drivers), my husband's fine choice of a conference presentation location, and a free airline ticket (read: my only expense all weekend was my food - if there is anything better than a getaway, it's an almost free one!) Here is a photo essay of my day on Tuesday:

8am: Sleeping. Duh. Shawn is working on a lounge chair on our porch overlooking the Florentine gardens. If you HAVE to be working, it's better than the office!

9am: Room Service. Yum.

10am: Gym. Sorry, no self-portraits of me on the bike.

11am-2pm: Poolside. After being escorted to my chair by the lifeguard, I read my book all afternoon, sipping on mango smoothie samples and frozen cherries.

2pm: Relaxing at the spa

3pm: Biking with Shawn on his short break from the conference. Darn, I left my camera in the locker room, spectacular views of the lake.

4pm: Poolside again. Two sets of feet are better than one.

5pm: Checking out the waterfalls, white sand beach and views of the hotel.

It was truly a little slice of heaven for a mom of 3 rambunctious puppies and flying "through" San Francisco gave me the opportunity to think about the first few months of our marriage we spent there nine years ago. We had so much fun exploring the city together, but boy were we dumb kids. Was the dumbest thing we did 1) Drive into the city on the Saturday morning before starting new jobs on Monday without a place to live? We actually spent 5 minutes on a PAY PHONE until we realized we had stopped right in the heart of the castro district! 2) Spend the entire summer without a phone in our apartment? It was outrageously expensive and we spent Sundays trying to have conversations with our parents over the wind on the apartment complex pay phone! or 3) Actually sit on our $1 couch we bought at the Haight-Ashbury goodwill store without a cover? We vacuumed and Febreezed, but oooooohhh it makes me sick to think of the germies!

I forced Shawn into a little relaxation since he usually doesn't make time to enjoy the luxuries during his business trips and I definitely filled my relaxation cup all the way to the top! While I am happy to never see the strip again, I would definitely repeat this trip!

PS. I forgot to mention that we grabbed some In-N-Out both on our way "in" to town and "out". While I was really looking forward to it, and the burger definitely did not dissapoint, Shawn and I feel that 5 Guys definitely takes the prize when it comes to burgers AND fries!

A Little More Sugar Baby

Before I had kids, I truly thought I would be a Mary Poppins style mom - feeding my kids spoonfuls of sugar and taking them on wild field trips where barbershop quartets serenade us while dancing with the singing penguins.

However, many days I roll into bed at night feeling like I'm Cruella DaVille and 101 puppies have run circles around me all day long. Somewhere along the line reality set in and I found out that Mary Poppins had a few things I don't have - makeup artists, food service people, and probably a trailer on the set where she could go and rest when she got tired. And at the end of the day - she walked away from it all to rest and recuperate for the next shoot.

So now I have a new reality. One that some days I love and some days I don't. One thing I like about being a modern mom is it seems that over the past several decades moms have realized it's okay to say "this is hard, some days this really stinks!". It's okay to express your feelings about motherhood without people thinking your a bad mom because you don't love every minute of the grind. Don't get me wrong - I can honestly say there is nothing in the world I would rather be doing than staying at home with my kids. There is no career I pine away for or exotic location I feel I've been robbed of seeing. I thank God every night for these 3 precious souls that have been sent my way. But somewhere in the craziness of it all I'm trying to find balance. Balance between time with the kids/time cleaning the house, balance between being too strict or not strict enough, balance between the "mom" me and the "me" me - that person before kids who actually had a brain and could form two intellectual sentances in the same breath. I'm trying to find the balanced person between Mary Poppins and Cruella DaVille whom I long to be and strive to create for myself.

Part of motherhood is giving up who you were and what your expectations were and deal with reality. And then...make sure you find that old self, the person you were before you had kids, and weave that in to the new you, the new reality.

Somewhere in the past 5 years of giving birth three times, battling breastfeeding, and learning with a new definition of sleep I've lost a little part of my old self. Most days I struggle with my brain to find words that used to come so freely. I think some people refer to it as "mommy brain". However, it's not necessarily a bad thing to lose that old person. Sure she had less wrinkles and a quicker wit, but the new me can handle emergency blow outs in a flash (and I' m not talking about tires here), and can McGyver popsicles sticks and kite string into a quality toy.

Each child brings new challenges and it always throws me for a loop, then it takes me awhile to catch my breath and figure out what I"m doing. Just when I think I have things figured out - something changes and I have to start all over again. Sometimes I get into a rut though. Things throw me for a loop and I'm not ready. It seems when that happens I kick into survival mode. Just doing the basics making sure we are all surviving - food, shelter, clothes but not a lot of fluff and fun. Mary Poppins is out the window with her carpet bag and all. I've just realized that since having the third baby I've been in that survivial mode most of the time. Just trying to manange everything and stay afloat. Having a newborn is definitely survival mode and with each child that period seems to extend longer and longer. Now that he's nearing two things are seeming to get easier (ie - I mostly get a good nights sleep which really seems to make a difference in life) and I think it's time to add a little bit more sugar to the mix. More fun around our house. More happiness, less stress.

I can completely see how my kids reactions and behavior reflect my own moods and feelings. Not to say everything they do or don't do is a result of their mother. All people, including our children have a little something called "free agency" (much to their mother's dismay) and can choose for themselves how they feel and act. If one of my kids wakes up in a grumpy mood because he/she did not get enough sleep, even the best mom in the world wouldn't be able to change that. However, even when I have grumpy kids, if I can stay cool, calm and collected I find that things go much smoother in my household and it's easier to snap them out of it. The problem is...I don't always stay cool, calm and collected. I'm striving though. It's my new goal. I want it to be my new reality. A world in which I never lose my cool, never raise my voice unless there is iminent danger, and never feel like selling my kids on Craigslist. I want to bring in a little more of Mary Poppins and shed Cruella like a bad hair day. Wish me luck.

It's that time of year again...

Looking for renters. If I haven't already sent you an email or a FB link or you saw it on Craigslist, I'm making sure you at least think for a sec if you know someone who might want to rent a great townhouse in the Kingstowne area of NOVA.

http://www.postlets.com/rts/2205442

False Alarm

I almost walked back in the house to grab my cell phone on the way out the door today. We were just headed over to Jacob's Friday playgroup to drop him off and I'd be back in 15 minutes so I thought "nevermind...I'm not going to need it" as I locked the door behind me and headed for the car.

I pulled up to the house 15 minutes later as 2 police officers were swiftly scaling my driveway with their weapons loaded and aimed at my house. Honking my horn at them to let them know I was behind them probably wasn't the smartest thing to do, but as I pulled up in the driveway they wouldn't turn around to look at me and I didn't want to them to turn and shot. It was just a little tap on the horn to say "hey...I'm right here and this is my house". They both gave me extremely dirty looks and as I explained to them I lived here they told me to stay in the car while the checked out my premises. I think I kind of blew the element of surprise they were trying to conduct with my little tap on the horn.

You see, when we bought this house "out in the country" ( that's a big overstatement but compared to where we used to live in a downtown area...this is as "country" as Orange County gets.) I wasn't used to being able to look out the window and just see nothingness. I wasn't used to not sharing a wall with another family or listening to my neighbors toilet flush from my bathroom. We've always lived in an apartment or condo and living in a free standing house was a bit, well, scary. It was really weird having to actually walk down a driveway and across the street to reach the neighbor's house. So...I insisted that we put in a burglar alarm for all those late nights during tax season when I'm all alone with black staring back at me from the windows.

The thing is, I hardly ever use the dumb alarm because every time I do I set it off, not remembering that it's on! It doesn't make any sound at the house when it goes off...just at the alarm company. So until they call me and say "your alarm is going off is everything all right at your house and what's your password - I don't even remember that it's on in the morning when we wake up.

Well, of course I set the alarm last night because Dave was out of town, and of course I forgot to turn it off as we rushed out the door this morning, and of course I didn't listen to that little voice that said grab your cell phone as I rushed out the door. If I had my phone I would have received the call from the alarm company and wouldn't have to return to 2 police officers with loaded guns walking up to my front door.

After they "secured the perimeter" they let me go back in the house after taking my name and birth date, and giving me a lecture about not honking next time in case someone is inside my house and I let the "perpetrator" in on the secret that the police are approaching. I didn't tell them I had just left and tripped the alarm myself. Something about the guns they were holding made me really nervous.

Dang! There goes my one freebie false alarm. Next time the alarm company whacks me with a big fine. I better start leaving big notes for myself reminding me that the alarm is on!

Almost a Decade

Even though I've caught my husband wistfully staring out the window at the house full of college kids across the street a few times during our beach trip, mumbling something about sleeping in and not having to change dirty diapers, I am still pretty sure he loves the little family we've created over the last nine years. We celebrated our anniversary today, amidst chaos and fun with our friends like we have the last four years. I received a funny card from Shawn, where he wrote that his only mistake was not marrying me sooner. That would have been illegal, so I'm glad it all worked out how it did. Looking forward to many more adventures.

Good Morning

The toilet flooded (not just overflowed...FLOODED!) Why is it the only bathroom we have with wood floors is the one that keeps flooding? And to add to the grossness of it all...I was sitting on the toilet when it began to overflow. Luckily it was just water and t.p. in the toilet.

I had to make chocolate dipped strawberries and 2 boquets of flowers from the garden for teacher appreciation week. I burnt the white chocolate as I was clipping roses outside. Sometimes I have to learn not to multitask. Sorry teachers...only dark choco on your strawberries this time. The flowers came out quite nice though.

We forgot Jacob was "Star of the week" and we had to bring a poster with pictures and stickers of things he liked on it by 9:00am. Jacob woke up at 8:30.

We got to school with Jacob's Star of the week poster but left his lunchbox at home. I had to run home and get it quickly so I could finish the flowers, strawberries and get Emma to school on time.

Ben decided to get into my makeup, spill my BareEssentials everywhere and paint himself red with fingernail polish.

I'm out of milk - no cereal for breakfast today!

All by 10:00 am...How was your morning?

Sayings as of Late

We were at the local "farm" watching the ducks in their yard. Two ducks jumped in the water and one of the ducks jumped on top of the other and they starting "wrestling". At first I thought it was going to be one of those moments I would have to explain nature at its finest to my kids. Then it looked as if they ducks were really just playing as they jumped on each other, grabbed each others necks, and dove under the water. Jacob said" now that's what I call duck, duck, goose.

Last week at church the kids Sunday School lesson was on The Word of Wisdom. (for our non mormon readers that is the health code Mormons live by). At dinner that night the kids were questioning me on what alcohol is and what it does to us. I told them it makes us not be able to think straight. "oh..." Emma said. "So if somebody had alcohol then they would think things like 2+1=0?" And she started laughing and laughing at the thought of someone actually thinking 2+1=0. Jacob was cracking up to and they thought it was the funniest thing ever!

Ben is just full of words lately and is having a great time learning to communicate for what he wants. He is a total copycat and since he has 2 older sibling to copy...some of his finest moments are: Dancing around in his bedroom singing "poopy face, poopy face" (even though he doesn't know what that means). Saying "ewww, gwoss" (gross) when I put his dinner down in front of him, and of course the favorite word of the day is no, No, NO! He is such a cute little guy he's hard to resist. Especially when he says "sowry" (sorry) or "I wuv you".

We are having a huge, HUGE problem lately with arguing and bickering. Does anyone have any suggestions? Please...PLEASE? I'm dying. I'm about ready to sell my eldest two offspring, for really, really cheap...free even. Right now I can't even contemplate a summer ahead full of constant fighting so I need some help and fast!

Relaxing in the Hammock Part 2

The hammock is not always a relaxing place to be. But fun nonetheless.

No, this is not the start of a community bike race. This is the crew, minus me-the-photographer, heading out for a bike ride. That would be six adults, four kids on bikes, and six children in three trailers. After the most amazing Thai feast ever, we ventured out on a ride as the sun was setting over the sound and came home to rest our sore bums while eating sticky rice with mango.

Our Mother's Day celebration extended into Monday as the moms got to spend a few hours at the Sanderling Spa, getting massages, relaxing in the steam room, and giggling over a cup of herbal tea. This is our fourth year celebrating Mother's Day at the beach and the three dads really know how to make it relaxing and special. I came home and found Shawn and Gavin asleep downstairs and Ryan and his girl Holly crashed on the couch - the dads do a good job wearing the kids out.

We had some rain today but the rest of the week looks sunny!

Blogging from a Hammock in OBX

Happy Mother's Day to me. After a scrumptious breakfast of crepes with too many delicious toppings to list, I enjoyed a LONG, QUIET nap on a hammock, listening to the waves crash and seagulls squawk on a picture-perfect day in the Outer Banks, NC. Life is definitely good, but you should know me and my kids better by now if you thought we also had a quiet, peaceful drive down here from NOVA.

UGH! I am already plotting a car-swap for our trip down here in June with my parents and some extended family because Nick is definitely not riding with me! He is the biggest whiner I know. But why are two out of your three children mostly naked in the photo below, you might ask? We stopped for some Pierce's famous BBQ in Williamsburg (and note-to-self, I'm not really sure why it's so famous) and Nicholas slid into a huge mud puddle. Of course his bag of clothes were buried so we stripped him down and he spent the second half of the ride in his undies. But the most embarrassing moment definitely goes to Gavin. See, he's been having some major blowouts thanks to his antibiotics (if you haven't heard, we spent all of last week down with strep). So the poor guy had one in the Sonic parking lot and it was just a disaster. I'm talking shoulders to heels, stuck on like glue. Shawn hit our call button and asked for a cup of ice, but after only a few minutes of pouring ice-cold water all over our child in the grass, we realized that 1) we were torturing him and 2) it was not effective. I have been in a lot of embarrassing situations with my kids, but it was definitely one of my finest, picking up a naked, poo-covered kid and haul him past the drive-thru line into the bathroom for an impromptu bath in the sink. Disgusting.

But we finally made it in time to check out the beach before dark and then swim in the pool until way past bedtime. Enter hammock-snuggling and blogging on a picture perfect afternoon. Worth the embarrassment and whining for sure. Impromptu poo bath at Sonic still debatable.

New Post

Whew, it's been a long time since I've hit that button (the "NEW POST"). Life has a way of getting away from me lately. I blog all the time in my head, now if I could just download my brain to the computer things would be so much easier.

I've been doing great things with my time though. My garden boxes are in and growing. I'm anxiously awaiting my first crop. I think the tomatoes will be first. Can I just tell you - the miracle of watching things grow is just amazing! I love planting seeds and seeing the little plants come up. Or watching my bear root roses bloom into beautiful rose bushes. And best of all seeing the bulbs come up in beautiful purples and yellows. I have to say it's near close to the miracle of birth watching little seeds and plants turn into God's beautiful creations. I'm addicted and in a really bad way.My favorite spot to sit right now is here


Right outside my bedroom door watching my garden grow.

My favorite flowers in bloom right now are my hydrengeas:


And I'm loving they way my rose garden is coming in. These were almost all bare root roses when I bought them which means nothing but a stick and a root. This pic was last week, there are actually a lot more blooms now. Hopefully soon there will be enough to cover my neighbors ugly fence.


We've had fun with friends and family visiting as we always do. Here is the only picture I got at the beach on our earth day celebration.

DWTS Fort

One of my favorite traditions lately has been watching Monday night's DWTS with my older boys while Shawn is teaching on Tuesdays. Nick is mostly just excited to stay up past bedtime, but Ryan is just the biggest fan, commenting on all of the costumes, cheering for "Jueyanne", and giggling and asking for translations during Bruno's commentary. I didn't have a chance to watch the results show, so yesterday afternoon we built a TV fort, popped some popcorn, and snuggled together for oh, twenty minutes? or so until the moment was ruined by a destroyed fort, unwilling popcorn sharers, and a few kicks to someone's face. But for a few minutes, I had a kid in each arm and one on my lap and felt like the happiest mom in the world!