McNichols' Musings

Top 10 reasons it's fun to lose power on one of the coldest days of the year...

2012-01-13T17:20:00.000-08:00

1. Hubby must have coffee and knows not to come home (from taking Seth to school) with only one cup of Starbucks.

2. No one questions the decision to lazily sit on the couch wrapped in a double fleece blanket.

3. It's too cold for meat to thaw = pizza for dinner!

4. Vacation day at the 'rents when it becomes too unbearably cold.

5. Cold babies need extra cuddles.

6. Fire in the fireplace smells good.

7. An afternoon trip to Target when its 20 degrees out seems less insane when you have no heat in your house.

8. I can't possibly take the clothes out of the dryer. Do you know how cold the air is that blows through the vent?

9. Get to look like a deer in headlights when your 5 year old asks, "What's a transformer?" [For the record, I did know enough to tell him they were not talking about Bumblebee.]

10. It's always good to test out your supply of flashlights and candles. Although in the future I would suggest doing so before you are lying in bed in the dark having a mental argument with yourself about not wanting to get up and suddenly hear all electrical powered items in your home go silent.

One little word, revisited...

2011-12-30T12:32:00.000-08:00

Some of you may remember that I chose one word for 2011. A word to inspire me and shape my year. I talked about my word, commit, here. Well, seems it might be time for a little review. To what did I want to commit? [in no particular order]

One, to my picture a day scrapbook. I am happy to report that I am still taking lots of pictures and mostly keeping up. I am working on November this afternoon and hopefully can move on to December this evening. 2011 required two books! This year was a good start, but I can see ways which I could improve. For starters, I went ahead and bought the actual kit for next year. I thought it wasn't necessary, and it's certainly not, but it will be MUCH easier to just use the kit - the journal cards and filler papers are already cut to the correct sizes so I won't need my paper cutter or adhesives for much of anything. I have a small tote with all of my extra supplies - markers, embellishments, etc. And best of all, the boys love to look through it already.
Another, to walk a half marathon. We (my sister and I) did it!! We completed the Indianapolis Womens' Half in September and are registered for the 500 Festival Mini in May. I have wanted to do the 500 mini for a long time but I kept having babies. So, I'm super excited for that! Plus, I definitely stick with a program better if I have that extra motiviation of an upcoming event.
A third, church. I am helping with one of the classes - girls, a little older than Seth. I really wanted the boys to know me in this role - not as their teacher but as someone who is involved at church. We taught for so long, but not since Seth was old enough to know/remember. It was really bothering me that Seth only knows me as a fairly uninvolved church attender, not a teacher/helper/doer. I also joined the MOPS group at our church and that has really helped. At least I recognize other moms as we all pick up our kiddos.
Finally, my kids. I know this is the most important and likely the one area I will never feel like I can commit enough. I am reaching the conclusion that it will just never feel like enough. When you really think about how blessed we are to have these three beautiful little boys to love on, care for, train up, etc. it's just overwhelming.

I am currently in search of my 2012 One Little Word. I'm tossing around some ideas, but I need to find that one word that will sum it all up. And you, do you have a word for the year?

Business as usual

2011-11-21T05:50:00.000-08:00

Or not so much. I mentioned recently that I was starting a ~~cute, tiny~~ small business. I made a couple of wreaths this last year for family decorations. Turns out, some people thought they were cute. So, I've decided to try to sell some on Etsy. I haven't sold any yet, but I just recently started listing them. So, hope on over to my Etsy shop and give it a look: http://www.etsy.com/shop/NotYourMamasWreath. And if you're on facebook, search "NotYourMamasWreath" and like my page. That's all the begging I'll do. For today.

It's been fun (and yes, that probably makes me odd) to shop around for all of the supplies (primarily online) and price things out and figure out what it all costs me and the best way to get the supplies and how many supplies to get and create some spreadsheets and all that good stuff.

However, I think David is super excited that we're having everyone here for Thanksgiving so that I am forced to take totes of wreaths and huge bags of balloons up the stairs to the office and out of the corner of the kitchen! I do think though that he is "commissioning a few pieces" as Christmas gifts so I hope he knows the kitchen corner is only getting a temporary reprieve!

24 hours...

2011-11-19T20:49:00.000-08:00

I once had someone (who was not a mom) ask me what I could possibly do all day with no job. So, I think I'll share a recent 24 hour period. Of course, this isn't the norm. But then again, there really isn't a norm. Sure, there's often a routine and certain things that need to happen at certain times, but flexibility might be the key to being a stay at home mom. So, here goes.

Friday
noon - finish cleaning Max's room - vacuum, mostly w/Max standing at his crib (outside of his crib), sucking his thumb holding onto the wrinkle in the sheet through the slats of the crib OR hanging onto my legs OR attempting to vacuum with the ball popper

12:30 - pack diaper bag with items to amuse Luke and Max; load up cake pops to take to bake sale at school; run thru drive thru and grab food for everyone; eat sandwich in car

1:00 - arrive at school; take bake sale items to bake sale person; set boys up with lunch (and attempt to convince Luke that it's a game to keep all the crumbs in one area); attempt to help with some set-up of chili supper for later in the day; talk with Seth's teacher and her assistant; attempt to keep Luke out of the class (Seth's) that is playing with playdoh in the gym/cafeteria area.

2:40 - leave school having accomplished very little; bring all three boys home; pick out clothes for the boys for the chili supper; put a very tired Max and Luke (who had been up since 5:40) in bed; let Seth stay up but negotiate a deal where he must help me pick up before he eats his leftover treat from lunch

3:15 - continue to remind Seth he's picking up, not playing; help him pick up toys just to have it done; clean up the kitchen, again (we finished making the bake sale cake pops at 11:51 Thursday night so it was still a bit of a mess); talk to my sister for a few minutes

4:45 - do happy dance when hubby comes home with bogo Starbucks; chat with him for a few minutes while Seth tries to simultaneously share all about his day; change clothes, touch up make-up, brush teeth; try to help Dave calm Luke who woke up screaming (he does this a lot); let my dad in and suggest he lay low while Dave dresses the boys so they can all come to chili supper together (mom was out of town)

5:20 - leave for chili supper (solo, thus driving the truck); nearly take a header out of truck upon arrival at school; work the PTF dues table (not nearly as painful as the other committee members had assured me it would be); greet my only family who flits by me to their table in the back

6:00 - chili supper starts

6:30 - Dad hangs out at the table with the boys; Dave is nearly next in line for food so I sneak away from table where I'm working and help him carry food for the boys to the table; finish up at my table; get myself food; try to corral kids for way too long; kiss everyone goodbye and stay to help clean up

8:45 - figure out that I'm not much help with clean up and leave; get home, help Dave finish up baths and dress boys for bed

9:15 - sit down - such a life of leisure! ha ha; realize the boys' jerseys aren't clean for their games in the morning (oops), thus, start more laundry; make Thanksgiving menu, weekly menu, grocery list, look for coupons (all w/Dave's help); get jerseys into dryer

Saturday
12:15am - collapse into bed, realizing that the contact solution that takes 6 hours to neutralize is probably not an option tonight

5:55 - wake up to two oldest boys waking each other up; sleepily beg them to stop fighting, whining, picking at each other SO early in the day; turn on television to buy a few more minutes of quiet; finally convince myself to get up and get ready

7:30 - breakfast for Seth and Luke; get jerseys out of dryer; pack diaper bag and Max's breakfast for the games; encourage/beg boys to get ready for games

8:15 - get sleepy Max up and dress him; load everyone up and drive to the games

9:00 - Seth and Luke both have practice then games, both starting at 9; Dave is co-coaching Luke's team so Max and I are outside with Seth the whole time; 45 degrees is REALLY cold when there is no sunshine and you're 18 months old and eating your dry cereal trumps the wearing of gloves/mittens

10:15 - Luke and Dave join us for Seth's trophy "ceremony;" I breathe a sigh of relief that flag football is done, at least for the time being; drive home and get grocery list, which of course, I forgot because every week I forget something (does it count that I packed a diaper bag for two kiddos, breakfast for Max, my purse and my camera, a hat for Max, and gloves and a hat for Seth?); potty breaks/diaper changes for all; load everyone into car again

11:00 - head to grocery store - all 5 of us (yes, all 5 of us the Saturday before Thanksgiving!); rip the list in half, as well as the kiddos - oh wait, just kidding! Although that also involved a strategy meeting: "Max and Luke both must ride in the cart. Thus, one person cannot take both Max and Luke and also get groceries. Who do you want? And who gets Seth?" Let's just say I took the one who partway through was sucking his thumb with his head nearly leaned on the side of the cart. Dave took the other two. And perhaps won't do it again anytime soon (don't I say that everytime??)

And that concludes our 24 hours together, well, technically 25 because we didn't finish at the store until about 1. Hope no one asks me the "what do you DO all day" question for awhile.

Record...

2011-11-05T14:58:00.000-07:00

Wow. Two blog posts in October. I think that might be a record. A record of my patheticness. I'm not too sure what happened. Life, I guess. Let me attempt to make some excuses.

Dave is working a lot. A lot a lot. It's great that he's busy. It's tough to complain as I don't contribute whatsoever to the family income. Just the opposite, in fact. ["David honey, we need this. David honey, I need that."] But, the boys are harder to manage when they are missing Daddy. I am harder to be around when my helper in the evening isn't home to be helpful. Then the things that I do while we're tag teaming in the evening still have to get done, only after the boys are in bed instead of before.

Then, I am attempting to start a very teensy tiny business. I am trying to avoid the urge right here to call it silly. It's just for fun. And, I guess, somewhat to have something that I can call "my own." I always thought moms were a little goofy when they said that, but I'm starting to understand what they mean. Just something that is mine. Something to be proud of (hopefully). Something totally independent of the rest of my world. But, in doing so, there's lots of researching - prices, quantities, buy here or order online; set up a tiny shop online; find time to make a few of the products; figure out pricing; etc. Watch for more info regarding my cute little adventure in the days to come.

And I really desire to be involved at the boys' school. Welll, right now it's just Seth's school, but at this point, it is our plan for it to be all the boys' school one day. It's not easy to be involved with two younger kiddos at home, so right now I'm on a committee that is meeting once every couple of weeks to get some events planned for the year. It's fun and it's nice to be involved and be with other parents. But, it means throwing together a dinner and running out the door some nights. One night I heard Dave turn the key in the lock and I picked up my stuff and we passed with a hello/goodbye kiss at the door.

Nevermind that our boys are young boys. It's been awhile since I've devoted a post to each of them so I'll work on that in the next few weeks. But, let's just say that a lot of work goes into parenting a 5, 3, and 1 year old. And I'm pretty sure I'm not doing something (or many somethings) right. For one minor thing, my boys seem to think that 5:45 is a perfectly fine time to get up for the day. Even though there is no need for them to be up before 7:00am. I am dreading daylight savings time tonight, when their little internal clocks don't have a button to reset and I hear them waking each other at 4:45 in the morning. Maybe I should go to bed now?

Not sure whether this turned out to be a list of excuses or just a list of upcoming posts or a bunch of whining. Either way, I'm still here, just a little overwhelmed by life at times (and I KNOW those of you with older kiddos are probably laughing at how my life is so calm compared to yours). But, it feels good to share anyway!

***On a side note, I started this post a few days ago and when I signed back in to edit today I noticed I have about 10 unpublished posts that I thought I would go back and edit. So, there may be a lot of posts over the next few days as I clean up my old posts. Or I might just delete them - if they weren't worthy of posting the first time...

Things I've learned so far today...

2011-10-05T10:16:00.000-07:00

1. Max should be worried. Very worried. He is quickly becoming the social outcast of my three boys. He ran FROM the window today when the trash truck came. As in, away and not to. This could be a serious issue.

2. The cows in the field are not preparing to nap. They are, in fact, preparing to watch the horse perform a dance routine. "You know, he has a radio/CD player, too." It could not be determined what he might dance to today.

3. Too many little wooden letters and too many colors of paint do not end well with a 3 year old and a 16 month old audience. Perhaps gray is the new turquoise?

4. No mom is cooler than the one who pulls the minivan over and lets two little boys hop out at the neighborhood pond to watch the turtle swim by.

This one is from a few days ago, but it's worth sharing: fancy boxed mac and cheese is SO much better when you mix in the cheese sauce, and not just the seasoning packet and bread crumbs for the top. Or at least, I remember it being better last time when I didn't have a shiny silver packet left over at the end of the meal!

First kindergarten field trip...

2011-10-02T18:50:00.000-07:00

I recently had the privilege of accompanying Seth's class on the first field trip of their kindergarten year. I am so thankful that David was able to take off work to be with the littler boys so I could be around some of the other moms in Seth's class and spend a little time with the teacher's assistant. I really want to be involved with the boys' school!

[Sidenote: His teacher was out of town as her daughter had quadruplets, very early. Seth's class has been praying for the mommy and her babies. I love that they are able to do this at his school. However, I am a product of public schools and am in no way knocking that choice either! Thank you for allowing me this not so brief digression].

Seth's classmates and the teacher's assistant. Or the resistance, as Seth calls her.

We got to hang out in the refrigerator - not freezer as a snowman would eventually melt. I loved their tour guide! She was a recent college graduate, with plans to attend law school so that might have elevated her a bit in my book. But, she was really good at explaining things in way that was interesting, yet easy for a 5 year old to understand. Her apple tip - keep your applies in the fridge with a damp cloth and they will keep for months. Who knew? Likely everyone except me. Ha ha.

The apple sorter, where they divide the good apples from the cider apples. Mmmm, apple cider.

The polisher. Did you know they don't grow on the trees that shiny? Okay, just kidding about that one! Well, I mean, they don't grow that pretty. But, I knew that.

We each got to pick four apples to take home with us. Luke was very appreciative, pulling up his chair, washing the apple himself, and digging in!

It's always fun to see your child interact with people outside of his family. It is funny to me that, at this age anyway, Seth's best friend is whomever is in our group on the field trip. I asked if the little guy he plays with at recess most days was there as I never saw him talk to him but Seth said, "Yeah, I just didn't want to bother him." So funny! He just hung out with the other little boy who rode in our car. And on the way back to school they made big plans to play together the following week. It all seems so easy at 5! I'm definitely looking forward to more field trips!

Blip...

2011-09-28T14:24:00.000-07:00

Since I'm dreadful about posting anything of substance (you should see the number of non-published posts I have just waiting for me to tweak them with an edit or two), maybe I should just plan to procrastinate on fixing dinner every night by sharing a little blip from our day. Here's today's...

I picked Seth up from school today. We got about 5 minutes down the road and he announced he was going to marry [little girl in his class]. Umm, okay. This is the first time he's mentioned marriage so I perked up a bit. Nevermind that generally I'm attempting my best cross examination to get any information out of him and by about this point in the trip he announces that he just needs some quiet.

So, I asked why they had decided to get married. He responded that they both had gardens at home - a generous description on Seth's part of some tomatoes and not so healthy looking onions, but I digress. Anyway, they both have gardens and liked them and figured they could be farmers. Together. If they can find each other again when they are older.

I let it go, as Seth doesn't like when I dwell on any one subject for too long.

So, once we were at home I waited awhile and braved the conversation again and asked how the two of them decided on this plan. I was just trying to figure out how we got from produce that Seth refuses to eat to a lifetime commitment. He looked at me and said, "Mom, we walked into class together." As though this meant automatic bethrothal.

So, I'm still a bit perplexed. But, Seth's not always overly nice to me. Perhaps a fiancee will soften his attitude toward his Mama?

True Story...

2011-09-26T15:17:00.000-07:00

I have a meeting for Seth's school tonight. Dave worked all day and then went to the gym on the way home. We will pretty much be passing each other at the door. I've been working finishing up a couple of little projects this afternoon. So, dinner becomes a hodge podge of, unfortunately, junk - more or less.

So, my conversation with Luke went like this...

Me: Luke, do you want chicken sticks or a corn dog for dinner.
Luke: Light orange. [Seriously, that was the answer and I have NO idea to what question!]
Me: That's not an answer to chicken sticks or corn dog. You have to choose one or the other.
Luke: One or the other.

ugh

Some days are easier than others...

2011-09-14T19:13:00.000-07:00

I know I have a great "job." I know there are many many people who envy me (well, not me, but stay at home moms in general). I have three sweet and wonderful boys; a husband who works hard so that I can be at home with these awesome little people; a house to live in; food to eat (even if I HATE the grocery store); and on and on. But, some days are just better than others. Yesterday fell into the 'not so hot' category...

It started like any other day. Got up, got the older two boys up, got their breakfast, supervised tooth brushing and dressing, got shoes on, and sent Seth off to school via the Daddy school bus. Luke watched some television while I mopped the kitchen floor and cleaned a few other things. Then I got myself ready. Next up, I cleaned out some of Luke's clothes that are too small and put them in a tote. Finally, I got Max up and fed and dressed, and eventually we headed out to pick up Seth at school.

Dave had called and said gasoline prices were going up (he'd driven by two different gas stations, one with prices about a quarter higher), so to fill up if I needed to and could still find cheaper gas on my way to get Seth. The cheaper station was on my way to get Seth so we swung by their and it had already gone up. Knew I could find another on the way home so we went on to school and got Seth.

Drove by another gas station, already the higher prices. Drove by a third - they were all basically on my way so I wasn't really insanely driving the gas out of my car to save a couple of dollars. My third and final option had the cheaper gas. And most of the southside was there filling up on gas. I pulled right up to the pump and got my gasoline. No problem. It was leaving that caused a small problem. There was a lady that really wanted my pump. But she blocked me in. So, I sat. This was no big deal - she finally moved. But, Luke's observations were hysterical. He said, "Oooh, she's grumpy." I asked why he thought that and he said, "Her mouth is gruuuuuuuuuuumpy!" And he was right - she had the biggest scowl. But, it was funny to hear a 3 year old calling her out. (well, not to her face, as that would've been rude and not amusing)

So, we head home. This is how returning home from picking Seth up goes: Every. Single. Day. I pull into the garage. Seth is in a booster seat, using a regular seat belt so he can just unstrap and jump out. Luke is in a carseat and needs help unlatching it - there's a lever on the side, etc. So, Seth jumps out of his seat and Luke puts his feet up to block Seth so that Seth can't get out first. Seth breaks through while Luke kicks and screams. Seth runs to the back of the car and checks to be sure the van is in far enough to close the garage door. Luke folds his arms across his chest and pouts (making it nearly impossible for me to unbuckle him), because HE wants to check that the car is in far enough. Every. Single. Day.

This day, after above scenario played out, we headed inside and the boys started playing. I think Seth and Luke really miss each other all morning and they are currently obsessed with the bigger lego blocks so they immediately started building. And then they both wanted one particular block, which there are probably 20 of, but the other 19 would not do. Then there was fighting and screaming and crying. I don't know who had the block first. Nor do I care as the blocks are plentiful. But, Luke (yes, the younger one) came after Seth (yes, the older one) and sent Seth into an [I'm tired because I've been at school learning and playing all morning] tailspin during which Seth announced that he would like for Luke to be sold at a garage sale. Ugh.

I threw together some lunch, clinging to the hope that everyone would just eat and then go rest peacefully. I was noticing that the earlier mopped kitchen floor was still not clean so I wanted to mop again but there are no doors to close everyone out of the the kitchen so I can't do it when everyone is up, especially not Max. So, I got the boys their lunch. Luke had his head down on the table part of the time and I let myself get all excited about how he was going to take a great nap. Max always naps and Seth plays (semi) quietly in my bedroom, so I was looking forward to some quiet mopping time. How pitiful is that that I was looking forward to mopping time?

Anyway, I got everyone settled into bed and it became apparent that Luke, who chose to go to bed in only his t-shirt and underwear, was not going to sleep. And that's okay, but we are really working on Luke staying in his room quietly for awhile. It's a good break for all of us and he can be in his room looking at books or playing quietly with cars. Luke just isn't good at staying in his room. I had to stop mopping/tidying multiple times to get him back into his room. Finally, I could hear him (there's a monitor in their room) talking and playing. I was so glad he had finally settled down and was staying put in his room.

Then I heard his door open. I went to the stairs and saw him standing at the top of the stairs. My view looking up from the bottom of the stairs? Luke. In a t-shirt and underwear. Slathered in shiny oil. Looking like a well-greased three year old body builder. Holding the bottle of Vitamin E oil. Giving me his sheepish grin and a little, "I got some on me." Uh, ya think? I told him to march back into his room. Then it occurred to me that he was going to get everything in his path greasy. I quickly ran up the stairs to his room and told him to stand still. That's when I noticed he had pulled the tote of clothes over to his dresser and stood on the tote to get the basket of band-aids and first aid supplies. He opened maybe 25 band-aids (checking out the pictures, I assume). There were at least that many more unopened all over the floor. I grabbed baby wipes and started wiping his legs - only to discover that it was doing absolutely nothing except sliding down his leg. Bathtime! I ushered him to the bathroom and got him undressed. I didn't think to take a picture until then and it wasn't appropriate so we skipped it. I bathed him and put him in my room with Seth, turned the television on and instructed the two of them NOT to move.

Next, I went down and googled how to get the oil out of the carpet. Dishwashing liquid was mentioned repeatedly so I grabbed a plastic cup, some Dawn, hot water, and an old towel. I was down on my hands and needs scrubbing the oil out of the carpet when his little face appeared in the doorway. He looked at me and very sweetly said, "I think I have poop in my underwear." WHAT?!?

Back to the bathroom to clean up again.

Back to the bedroom to finish scrubbing the carpet.

Next up was Seth's I-don't-want-your-help-with-my-homework.-I-wan't-Daddy-instead rant. Oh goodness. He's five. It's kindergarten. It's writing his name four times. What will this scene look like when it's algebra?

We made it through dinner and Seth was in an oddly agreeable mood for that. Thanked me for making dinner and raved about how great it was. He even told Luke that Luke was missing out by not eating it. It was meatloaf. Bizarre.

I was excited that it was my scheduled walking night. I'm a stress eater and the donut holes and I had had a rough afternoon. See above. We decided to do our usual - Gretch picks mom up, they drive to my house, we all walk mom a couple of miles back to her apartment, and then Gretch and I walk back to my house - usually through some neighborhoods, etc.

Gretch came in the door and said it was National Chocolate Day and we should just go for coffee. I have really been wanting another Salted Caramel Mocha since I tried it last week and the idea didn't sound half bad! I think we all wanted to, but no one wanted to be the one to opt for high calorie drinks rather than exercise. So, we set out for our walk. It seemed really dark. Darker than usual. Maybe just because it's getting darker earlier and it used to be a little light when we started. But last night it was not light at all. My neighborhood was fine. Next we have to walk on a main road. There's a little stretch with no sidewalk and I forgot my tiny flashlight. No big deal. We got over to the part with the sidewalk just fine. The sidewalk is pretty far off the road so the traffic isn't a problem. But there are not many lights on the main road. Actually, when I drive home that way I often think about how dark it is and how crazy we must look.

We were not far down the road when a car drove by and honked. We get a lot of that. Usually rusty old beat up clunker cars whose drivers must have nothing better to do than annoy people who are out exercising. But, this horn sounded odd and when it drove by it was a police car. And not a beeping horn but more of the siren/horn. We were annoyed that a police officer would honk to annoy us. And then he started shining his spotlight ahead of us on the side of the road, in the trees, on the sidewalk, etc. The dark and the police freaked us all out and we took a vote and opted to turn around, avoid the area where he was shining the light, and head back to my house. We walked 1.25 miles. Whoo hoo.

I was so mad that we got scared by a police car. And a police spotlight. And then after a little visit in my kitchen, sans coffee, my sister took my mom home, where there were multiple police cars at the entrance to my parents' apartment. So, it's back to the indoors and the treadmill for us! My parents move starts this week so we are hoping their new neighborhood might be better lit and more suitable for walking.

All that to say, some days are just easier than others!

Too good not to share

2011-09-09T05:33:00.000-07:00

I have two new favorite recipes that I feel I must share. These do not belong on a weight loss program, but rather a little splurge day. Personally, I think they're great together, but I have a serious sweet tooth - most of you would probably have that too-much-sugar toothache...

Drink
First up is iced coffee. It's insanely good and easy. With the right creamer you'll think you paid $5 for your afternoon treat. It's a Pioneer Woman recipe. I can't think of anything of hers that I have not loved! I tweaked the amounts because she makes 2 gallons at at time and even I can't drink it that fast, and I added a little flavoring...

Start with a container that will seal up nice and tight, to avoid a big mess. I use 2 cups of coffee grounds (folgers decaf for me). Put that in the container and then pour 3 quarts of cold water over the top. Seal it up and let it sit for around 10 hours. Did I mention patience is a virtue? After about 10 hours, grab a pitcher, a ladle, funnel, and a gallon jug. Strain through doubled up cheesecloth into the first pitcher. Then strain a second time by pouring through another piece of doubled up cheesecloth into the funnel and into the gallon jug. Now, put the lid on and put it in the refrigerator until it's nice and cold. Patience, patience.

While it's chilling go out and buy yourself one of those nice insulated cold cups with the screw on lid and nice heavy straw. That's the only thing I can make mine in, proportionally speaking. Once the coffee is cold, fill your cup 2/3 full of ice. Add coffee nearly to the top. Add 2 tablespoons of sweetened condensed milk and 1 generous tablespoon of your favorite liquid coffee creamer. I prefer the caramel, but that's just me. French vanilla is nice too. Give it all a good stir, send the kiddos to their rooms, and enjoy five minutes of 'me' time.

It's awesome because, while it takes a little while, there's really not much to it. AND, I have this odd mental block where sometimes I get everyone settled for an afternoon rest and I think, "ooh, now I can go get some coffee." Umm, yeah. I've never actually left them (obviously) and the thought never lasts for more than about half a second, but now I don't have to feel guilty about those little mental lapses when "go get some coffee" just means walk out into the garage!

Snack
Okay, brace yourselves. This is my new favorite snack - s'mores caramel corn. The boys love it on movie night. But it would also be fantastic in goody bags, all prettied up with ribbon and bows. Anyway, it's my favorite caramel corn recipe (thanks Jackie!) with some additional ingredients from here. Follow the caramel corn recipe, but take about 2 cups of puffcorn out of the bag before you start. You need a nibble while you're making it anyway. After the caramel corn is done (the 45 minutes of baking and stirring), remove from oven and add in 3 1/2 cups of mini marshmallows and 2 1/2 cups of golden grahams cereal. Place the pan back in the oven for 2-3 minutes. Take it out and stir. The marshmallows should get all gooey and no longer look like little round marshmallows, but rather little ribbons of marshmallowey goodness.

Rather than just spreading it out on parchment paper, line a jelly roll pan with parchment paper and then spread it out. Heat some chocolate. I prefer the Baker's cup of chocolate because it's super easy - you just pop it in the microwave in the bowl it comes in and voila. Drizzle this over the top and then stick it in the fridge for the chocolate to set (hence the jelly roll pan rather than just the parchment paper). After it's all set I store it in a big ziploc in the fridge. Not that it needs much storing between Dave and the three boys (yes, Max is a fan) and me. I'm the worst, I will confess!

So, there you have it - a snack and a drink. Or lunch as I've been known to call it on a rough day!

13.1

2011-09-06T19:55:00.000-07:00

Pre race:

Our "little" adventure started Friday afternoon when Gretchen and I headed downtown to pick up our race packets. We talked on the way about our concerns - oversleeping, the heat, and finishing last. There was no line to get our bibs (were we planning to drool? no, silly - it's the big tag with your number on it) and shirts (to wear that day? oh, no way, as they are long sleeved and it was H!O!T!). It was an all female event and they had some students from a local beauty school there doing free manis and hand massages, etc. so we took advantage of the mani. [Side note, when I got home Seth noticed my nail polish color had changed! I ALWAYS have on nail polish so for him to notice the color difference was funny to me!] We made plans to text each other at 5:15 in the morning, hoping we would worry less about oversleeping that way.

I can't recap Gretchen's night but mine wasn't what I had hoped. I didn't get dinner until almost 9pm. And I definitely didn't get to bed quite as early as I had planned. Once in bed I slept okay for awhile. Then something woke me around 4. I looked at the clock at 4:15 and then I laid there for what felt like forever, thinking of the heat, my two experiences of passing out when I was too hot (when I was much younger), and how much faster everyone else would be than me. It felt like I had been lying there forever. I checked the clock again. It was 4:20. Argh! I laid there until 5:15, never really sleeping again. At 5:15 we texted each other.

My text to her: Good morning?
Her text to me: Hello Sunshine!!

Clearly she seemed more enthused than me. Turns out she was just trying to psyche herself up! We met at my house at 6am and my dad came over to drive us downtown. Thanks, Daddy! It was great to not have to worry about parking (downtown is like one big orange barricade) and not to have an extra car to drive home after it was over.

Race:
There was an opening ceremony at 6:30, but we were too nervous and thought it was a good time to hit the bathrooms one last time. I knew there would be portable toilets along the route. I also knew that if I stopped moving completely after about the halfway point, I wouldn't be able to start walking again!

The mayor started the race at 7am. There were less than 2000 participants so they didn't divide up into runners/walkers. It was a little intimidating as all the runners ran by and I started to feel like I was already in the very back (my fear of being last). After a few blocks though it seemed that we all got a bit more spread out and we were able to pass some people, which was a little boost to the ego. The one mile mark came really quickly. And then we figured out it was the actually the one km marker for the 5k race. [Their course was different so that was the only marker that was confusing]. You can see the course map here. There were volunteers at each mile marker calling out the time and we were pleased to find that we were right on pace with where we wanted to be. We were actually pleased for the entire race. There was also water or gatorade at every mile. We started out in the dark and it was overcast for a little while but it didn't take long for the sun to come out and it to get really warm, then really hot.

We picked out some women who were jogging and walking and decided to just sort of try to keep up with them. They got pretty far ahead of us at one point so we jogged to catch up and it felt really good to use some different muscles for awhile so we kept it up for just a little longer and passed them and we never saw them again. But there were some others that we set our sights on after that and just did the same thing of trying to keep up. Toward the end someone passed us and said she'd been pacing herself off of us the whole race so that made me feel like we were doing okay.

Around mile 10 we were walking through a downtown neighborhood and some woman was standing on the side of the road passing out ice cubes. I know, don't take candy from strangers. But, I wasn't putting it in my mouth, just holding it for a moment. I'm not even sure she had anything to do with the race itself, but she was very popular!

We really felt okay most of the time. We used our energy gel around 3 miles and it made me feel a little strange for just a few minutes. It has caffeine and I get a huge headache when I drink caffeine, but usually not right away. It was more of a spinny head feeling, but only for a little while and then I was good again. We had planned to do it at 3, 6, and 9 miles but we felt good at 6 miles, knowing the halfway point was so close so we skipped it then (probably not smart on our part). We both knew we were getting some blisters on our feet. And we were really warm but took advantage of the drinks at nearly every mile (small drinks to avoid that bathroom stop). But by mile 12 we were really having to work on the mental aspect of it all. We started to count down the blocks after the 12 mile marker. At about 12.5 miles a race official was on the side of the road alerting all that the race had been black flagged and we could "continue at our own risk." I hadn't seen anyone having a real issue with the heat and my mind starting racing to "are they all passing out at the finish line?" Or, "Is it the people behind us?" And then my countdown wasn't helping much anymore. Thankfully, the finish was very near where I had worked downtown so I knew that it was about a block to the turn and then after the turn it was a really long city block and then the finish line. Gretch wasn't as familiar with where we were and at about 12.8 miles she said, "I don't want to quit but I'm not sure I can make it." HUH??? I remember praying - a lot - that she could just hang in. I was worrying about the heat and she was feeling crummy so we slowed down a bit. My goal was to cross the finish line upright, not speed, so just getting there was all I cared about. I told her if she needed to puke, just to do it! But, she said she was okay. We rounded the corner and could see the finish in the distance. About halfway down the block, Gretchen spotted Matt and the kids and I think that really helped! Then I saw Dave and our boys and they were waving and smiling. They turned the clock off on the finish line just about the time we got there (because technically the race was cancelled/black flagged) and had to scan our chips for our time, which was annoying. They gave us our medals, a rose, and a bottle of water. My hands were so swollen that I couldn't get it open and I really considered asking any random person I could find but somehow Gretchen got hers open (her hands were equally swollen) so I had her open mine too. Then we got back to Matt and Dave and all the kids and our Mom.

As it turns out, our spectators did see people having to be helped across the finish line while they were waiting for us. Selfishly, I enjoyed watching some people finish after us, just so that I could say I wasn't last!

When we started the race I felt a little teary - as they said, "go" and I thought, "wow, I am doing this!" I really thought I might cry tears of joy when we were done. Turned out I was so exhausted it didn't even occur to me. Gretchen confessed partway through that when I suggested, earlier in the year, that we do this race she thought I was crazy. But, that being there and doing it, she no longer felt that way! I didn't ask her around mile 12 as I'm guessing she was back to thinking I was insane.

Finish line!

Melting. The car thermometer read 95 degrees on the drive home. Ick.

With all the kiddos except Max, who was very content in his stroller. It was really special that our hubbies brought the kids down to see us cross the finish line!

Post Race:

I'm glad to say that other than my feet I felt okay the next day. Two toes hurt and I had one real blister. Other than that, I was sore, but not in a bad way. Dave was awesome. We had plans Saturday night so he let me/made me rest in the afternoon. Sunday we had my parents and Gretch and her family over for a little celebration lunch. Then later in the afternoon we all napped. It was rainy and cool and perfect for a nap!

Now, time to get back to it. Unfortunately, my little toes are still very sore. They hurt a lot when I wear my walking shoes. Boo!

An Open Letter

2011-09-02T05:57:00.000-07:00

Dear Miserable Heat,

Well, you've hung around all summer. You've been a tireless companion, breaking records with all of those days you wanted to love on us. You've caused me to stay inside more than I would have liked. You've likely led to a vitamin D deficiency, which has likely made me a less pleasant person. You've caused me to mutter, "It's just too hot out," more times than I care to recall. You've caused my children to be stuck in the house, learning new wrestling techniques to make me crazy (er).

I tolerated it when you insisted that you go on vacation with me. You even tagged along on my girls trip, causing me to melt five minutes after spending an hour getting all dressed up.

The electric company thanks you for the boost to their economy. The water company didn't even want to deal with you anymore, asking us to just let our grass burn to a brown crisp.

But now, I have a small request. I've been (sort of) patient. I've tried to tolerate your constant presence. However, I beg of you, SLEEP IN tomorrow morning. I know, I know - you can't just stay away, even if it is September. However, it's a small request. I need a few overcast few hours to walk a smidge over 13 miles. After that, I will likely collapse into a heap on my couch, at which time you can go back to wreaking havoc, because once again I will be hiding in the air conditioning.

Smooches, Cara

Pix

2011-08-31T10:32:00.000-07:00

Well, I officially outgrew my album for 2011. So, I now have two albums to divide it into. It's kind of exciting to me to think that I have that many memories of the year. I am already thinking of how I want to change things a little for 2012, but I am definitely going to continue the process. Unfortunately, I've been a real picture slacker this week so I need to get back on it!

Here are a few of my recent faves:

The baby elephant at the zoo. The boys and I went the day Dave left for his lake trip. It was my attempt at diverting and wearing them out.

Cherry tomatoes from our garden, cradled in sweet little hands.

S'mores caramel corn. No explanation necessary.

At the fair. Seth and Luke enjoyed touching all of the animals.

Seth's first day of school. Actually, Seth's first few minutes of kindergarten. We were asked to drop him off in the car line, but then we could meet him in his classroom for pictures. I love his sweet expression of genuine joy to be back at it.

Some days, it is just too much trouble to stay awake for lunch. I feel like, with school starting and a little schedule change here and there, we are all living life in this ready-to-crash mode. Hoping we get adjusted quickly.

My Grandma and Dad at their birthday party. Their special days are just one day apart so the whole fam went out to dinner - 17 of us. Well, 16 of us and Luke, who accounted for about 4 extra kids that night. He was in rare form and we didn't last the whole time.

Luke, waiting for the cookies to bake in the oven.

PTSD?

2011-08-26T13:40:00.000-07:00

Well, the computer has been down more than it has been up lately. I have been frustrated, annoyed, and now scared to even use it for fear of breaking it again. Argh. As a result, there are many fun things to catch up and, probably, some honest thoughts to share. But, for the moment, this is what's on my mind (or in my gut).

Six years ago Hurricane Katrina ravaged the southern portion of the US and every news story was about the death, destruction, sadness, etc. I was barely pregnant with Seth and so very sick - puking many times a day for weeks and weeks. Ick. I didn't realize how much these events were linked in my head (gut?).

But now as part of the country braces for a possible hurricane, everytime I see a hurricane related news story, I can feel that same sick feeling in my stomach. I am not (I repeat am NOT) pregnant. And I do not feel sick to the point of actually puking. It's just very very odd to me that just a news story can cause those sorts of feelings.

I am not minimizing 'real' post traumatic stress whatsoever. Actually, as long as I'm sharing...

When I worked for the prosecutor's office, one of our courtrooms was this little tiny oddly placed room. We were all in court one day. The judge sat at a long narrow table just one step up from everyone else. The bailiff sat to his right and the paralegal sat immediately to his left and I was seated the next seat over, at the end of the table. The prosecutor (not me, I was still in school) stood in front of the judge with the parties. As we sat there we could hear glass shattering. It's a busy building and that seemed odd but didn't directly affect us so we just went on. Then all of a sudden there was a loud disturbance in the room next to us. That room was accessible via a never-used door right by my chair. There was a different door that was actually used by the public to enter our courtroom. At that point, the prosecutor - a big guy - walked over to open the door and see what was going on next door. From my chair by the door I had a front row seat of a handful of deputies, guns drawn, attempting to apprehend the defendent (from a different courtroom) who had just ran through a locked glass door and was attempting to throw himself out of a closed second story window.

All that to say, for the longest time any kind of breaking glass absolutely freaked me out. And no, neither of those stories has any point, but it's my blog - I can do that, right? How about you? Any PTSD you'd like to share?

I'm here, I'm here....

2011-08-17T08:25:00.000-07:00

Yikes! I guess it's not really been that long since I last blogged. It just feels like forever because I was unable to, maybe?

See, my computer died. And while I could spend lots of time here droning on about how much I dislike the company that makes our computer or our internet provider, I'll skip that and opt to be a nicer person.

So, what have you all missed in my absence? Not much really. Dave got his little vacation/escape/guys' trip to the lake. I actually found it was MUCH easier for me to solo parent for those few days knowing that Dave had just survived the same thing. However, in addition to Dave being gone, my sister and her family went on vacation and my parents joined them for a couple of days. All of these vacations overlapped so I was completely solo for a few days. It was during that time that the computer/internet stopped working! Argh - no one to call and I couldn't even socially network. Thankfully, Lynette and her kiddos came over one day which definitely broke up the boring (thank you!!).

So, now we're up and running and I have about seven posts swirling around in my head, which will likely never be posted. Maybe written, but never posted. I do a lot of that - therapeutic writing, only to delete it later. Who knows? Maybe someday I'll get brave and post them.

But, for now, I'm just going to share some photos of a recent outing (?) that the boys enjoyed with David...

Setting up camp. Notice the extremely rustic conditions of our backyard. Hey, the boys didn't care where the tent was, just that it was a tent!

Welcome to my humbe abode...

Really? I thought dirt was required in a tent. I guess in my story it's the Prince and the Pea.

Time for bed! Please ignore that the boys are wearing Christmas pajamas. Oh, and I'm sorry I forgot to photograph myself, sitting in my bed, painting my toenails and reading while Max slept in his crib in his bedroom and Dave texted me from the tent. Guess he's not used to a 10:00 bedtime (a little late for the boys, but I guess they were all compromising).

No boys allowed!

2011-08-02T06:19:00.000-07:00

So, my honey runs away once or twice a year. No girls allowed. Usually it's a nice lake house with lots of guys or Vegas for basketball tournaments. A couple of the other guys' wives and I are good friends and usually we just complain about how the guys get to have all the fun. Well, David decided it was our turn (LOVE that he decided and that I needed to be talked into it, not the other way around). Of course, now I have to just smile and nod next time he wants to go, but I can live with that! We finally decided on Chicago as our destination and with much planning, e-mailing, and a playdate for 6 kids, found a few days that worked for the three of us girls.

We set out a little after 11 last Wednesday morning. About time to go I decided I felt sick and would just stay home - ha ha! I've never left Max overnight and I've only left Luke overnight to go to the hospital to have Max. But, I did have to leave Seth for five days when he was about 16 months old. Because of that, I knew that once I was gone and wasn't somewhere the boys had been with me, it would be okay. And I was right. But, walking out that door was ROUGH!

So, what do three moms do on vacation? Here's a brief recap:

Wednesday - leave home and drive to Chicago. Stop for a quick lunch on the way and stare at fast food menu, clueless as to how to choose our own meal rather than order it as an afterthought once the kids meals are squared away. Check into hotel. Iron clothes [this was when I realized that I don't relax well - my two friends are sitting there doing nothing and I'm ironing!]. Take a little self-guided tour of the hotel. Get cleaned up a bit. Head out to wait for a trolley to Navy Pier, stopping off at the [free] manager's reception for some snacks. ~~Melt into a puddle of sweat~~ Glisten while waiting for the trolley to Navy Pier. Ride non-air conditioned trolley to Navy Pier and ~~melt a bit more~~ consider kissing the person who invented air conditioning. Arrive at Navy Pier and marvel at how much cooler it is by the water. Shop. Enjoy dinner looking out at the boats on the water. Shop some more. Share a funnel cake. Watch really pretty fireworks over the water. Grab a cab back to the hotel. Get comfy and rent a movie. Go to bed really late. Awaken in middle of night to trash truck (?) picking up trash, outside of window, five stories down. Resist urge to yell, "Boys, it's the trash truck." Ugh. Back to sleep.

The boys on my first night away. I had recorded a book for them so I could still "read" them a bedtime story. David did the same thing for his last trip.

Thursday - sleep, glorious sleep. Enjoy complimentary (warm) breakfast at hotel. Discover that I eat a lot of ketchup. Hmm. Back to room to do nothing. I started to improve at this 'task.' We had decided to go to a play Thursday night so we spent some time researching our options, buying tickets and deciding where to eat dinner. Then we sat around and read. My super fabulous husband got me a Nook a few weeks ago so it was loaded up with books and games, plus the hotel had free wifi for the summer. The Nook is the coolest thing ever. But, I digress. Next up was a little walk/jog on the treadmill. Yes, *I* got on the treadmill on vacation. Then back to the room where I crawled into my bed - in the middle of the afternoon - to read. Did I mention it was the middle of the day? Insanity! Later, get all cleaned up and dressed up a bit and head out to the theater to see "Peter Pan." Worry a bit as we arrive at theater that it's an odd looking tent-like place. Replace worry with awe and really enjoy the production - round stage/theater, lots of flying, humorous spin on the story, etc. Take cab to dinner, reservations at 9:45 - white tablecloths and waiters in tuxes, appetizers and dinner and dessert. Mmmmm... Back to hotel to read a bit and sleep! Repeat trash truck experience from night before.

Friday - up at a reasonable time. Breakfast at the hotel again and then out shopping! Oh, with a quick stop at Starbucks. It was attached to the hotel. It had to be done. We were just two blocks from Michigan Avenue so it didn't take us long to get started. First up - Crate and Barrel. Then spent lots of time digging at Filene's Basement. Wound up with a junk jewelry bracelet and pajamas for the boys (yeah, I know how to live it up). Wandered into lots of other little places along the way. Late lunch of "real" Chicago style deep dish pizza. Offered to cut up someone's food so I didn't forget how. Both friends declined the offer. Then lots more walking so we would be hungry enough for dessert. Stand in a long (but totally worth it) line at Garrett's popcorn for caramel crisp popcorn with cashews. ~~Great dessert~~ On to Hershey's store for a peanut butter chocolate cupcake and cold glass of milk for dessert. Then a bit more shopping. Finally, after all that shopping and eating, back to the hotel room for a little resting/reading/regretting - not what I purchased, but what I didn't purchase (of course, something for the older boys). Then some room service for dinner and a trip to the hot tub for our weary legs. Watched another movie and then went to bed really really late!

Apparently I wasn't the only one indulging in food. Powdered donuts. And a smirky smile.

Saturday - up at a reasonable time. Laid in bed for awhile thinking about whether or not I still wanted to go back and get what I didn't get the day before (it's a Christmas gift so I'll just be vague). Decided I did. Got up and got ready and packed and skipped breakfast with my friends, opted instead to walk back over to Michigan Ave and grab what I wanted. Might have stopped at Starbucks again on the way back. Got back from my little excursion to hear that they had deactivated our room keys (almost 2 hours before check out time) while the others were at breakfast and they had had to hang out in the hallway waiting for someone to fix the situation. Then we headed home, stopping at McDonald's on the way home (had to ease back into the mom thing). I love vacations, but when it's time to be home I have NO patience for travelling. When it's over, I just want it to be over and be home!

I even returned home to a mostly clean house, nearly all the laundry done (except what I brought home, of course), two bouquets of flowers, and lots of hugs and kisses and cuddles.

Baby steps...

2011-07-26T07:56:00.000-07:00

Max's:
Schwoo, my sweet little bug has decided that walking might be fun. It's still that run-forward-until-you-fall-on-your-face/I'm-new-at-this/I-didn't-even-know-I-could-do-this kind of walking, but yesterday he made it to 5 or 6 steps in a row, and did it many times. And, he was standing himself up, on his own, in the middle of the room just to try it out again. I think it's official! Why the 'schwoo' you ask? NOT because I thought he had issues because he's 14 months old and just didn't seem to care. BUT, because I am leaving the boys in David's very capable hands for a couple of days and I was just sure he would pick then to walk. You see, Seth was 16 months old when he started walking, and he waited until I left town for 5 days for a work conference to do it. I sat patiently waiting for 16 months to see those first steps and missed them. When Luke came along and I was able to quit my job, I thought, 'Great, now I'll never miss another first!' And then it looked like I was going to. So, thank you Max for doing this Monday, rather than Thursday!

[Quirky side note that pretty much no one will likely care about: Seth walked at 16 months, Luke at 12, and Max at 14. Max's birth weight was also exactly between Seth and Luke's and during my pregnancy with Max the weight I gained was right between the weight I gained with Seth and Luke.]

Mine:

Luke went to VBS last week. Luke is only 3 [and never had occasion to go to daycare] so this was the first time Luke has been left "alone," without me or another family member on the premises. We don't have babysitters - just Grammy and Grampy, and sometimes Aunt G and Uncle Matt. So, for me to drop him off and walk away was a new experience for me. Leaving my child at church for VBS would have been fine, but leaving my allergy child at church to eat a snack during VBS was a whole different ballgame. There were many e-mails exchanged, a visit to the kitchen to check the labels on all the snacks, a trip to the grocery store to find substitutions for any food he couldn't eat, a batch of cupcakes made to replicate the ones the other kids were eating, and (finally and most importantly to me) a phone call with another allergy mom who was going to be on site and assured me she would look after him and have an epipen on her (he also had an epipen on the premises). Sweet Luke didn't know about much of the planning that went into. He just knew that he was having a fantastic time and learning a lot too. I'm glad I let him do it. And really glad the week went off without a hitch!

Family vacation: Day 5

2011-07-22T06:51:00.000-07:00

Friday morning we packed up and got ready to head home. Or at least that was the plan. We never made it to the pool at the hotel so we thought if we got on the road early enough and the boys slept in the car, maybe we could go to a pool once we got home. I took the boys a few weeks ago but swimming with Daddy is a rare treat for the boys. Ahh, the best laid plans...

We were packing up to leave and made the mistake of putting the cereal on the floor, within Max's reach. Yes, he did help himself.

This one was to just show how tiny the fridge was. Very thankful that my husband "permitted" us to eat out nearly every meal. "Cute" is not a word you want to describe your kitchen.

And, this was our accidental detour. As we were driving along the interstate, we were taking about the things that we had planned to do but just didn't have time. Dave was pointing out the arch to the boys as it came into view and then Luke started saying, "Mommy, that was where you wanted to go!" No one else really wanted to go up in the arch, so it seemed silly. But then Luke started saying he would go with me and we decided to detour. We were all dressed in our comfy clothes and the car was packed with all of our stuff, but we figured out how to get there, got to the parking garage, and jumped out. The stroller wasn't accessible since we weren't planning to stop anywhere on the way home so Max had to be held/carried. And the signs all said that they are likely to sell out of tickets early in the day. It was a few minutes after 11:00 and I was worried there wouldn't be any tickets until much later. But, there was a booth just outside of the parking garage and she said she could sell us tickets for 11:40 but that we had to get to the arch (it was a bit of a walk) before the ticket time.

We took off on our walk. On the way Luke managed create a person pileup and we ended up with a skinned knee and a hurting wrist. After we got the knee bandaged up, Dave told me to take Luke and get going and that he and the other two boys would just hang out. We had only bought tickets for Luke and me anyway. About a minute after we walked away, Luke managed to fall too so now his knee was bleeding. I was really regretting the decision to stop at the arch as it seemed like everyone was getting beat up by it!

There were four lines we had to stand in before we were on the tram to the top of the Arch. First was security outside. Luke made new friends, of course, in that line. After the two injuries, it was exactly 11:40 when we got through security. Then we had to stand in line inside to give them our tickets. This was a short line and then we stood in the third line. In this line they gave us all these plastic numbered tickets (Luke enjoyed playing with them, and having me take his picture). Five people can ride in each car so this was our car assignment. At the end of this line they take an overpriced photo of you and your party and release you into a little room with educational Arch info. Luke enjoyed talking on the phone. Ahem, listening on the phone to all the info about the building of the Arch.

Then came the fourth line, on these stairs. You are called by the number on your plastic card and you stand on these stairs and watch a seven minute video about the Arch. Then it's time to board the tram. At this point I was really amazed at how good Luke was being. He is a busy guy, but I think because it was just the two of us and I could focus all of my attention on him, he was really good. At this point I was also VERY thankful that Seth, and somewhat Dave, had stayed behind. I don't think Seth would've gotten into the tram and I don't think Dave would've enjoyed the closed in feeling.

It's tough to tell, but the doors are 4 feet tall and are encased in steel. Watch your head! Five people fit into the little car. The doors close and you there's a little window. However, the view is only of the stairs you would have to use should this ride malfunction. Not sure why I thought we would be able to see out on the way up, but that was definitely not the case. It's a four minute ride to the top - I was glad they told us that ahead of time, just so I knew it wouldn't go on forever. You could feel it going up and then it would rock a little - over and over. One of the passengers in our car wasn't real thrilled with the experience so I kept talking to Luke, hoping she wouldn't scare him. Apparently, Luke doesn't scare easily. Or didn't listen to her anymore than he usually listens to me! He did tell me later (actually, at bedtime) that he didn't like the ride. Made me wonder if he was thinking about it all day?

The viewing area is rather small. It just wasn't at all what I expected.

The windows are really tiny. There are 16 on either side. Luke was too short to stand on the ground so I put him on the slanted wall and he could see just fine - and loved it! He even let one of the employees know that, "We are IN the Arch!" Thankfully, the employee just played along, "OH, that's where we are?" Cute.

He was most excited about this helicopter on its little landing pad out in the water.

A view of the stadium and some of the city from the top of the Arch.

After we finished looking around, maybe 15 minutes, we headed back down the stairs to stand and wait for the tram. The ride down is only three minutes. Gravity, I guess.

Little did we know that the helicopter was also providing the entertainment for Dave and Seth (and Max). It was a sightseeing helicopter and the boys were sitting in the shade watching it take off and land - over and over.

Once we were all reunited we let the boys run for just a little while.

Two of my boys with the Arch.

One last Arch shot. It's tough to see them, but the 16 tiny viewing windows are nearly in the center of the photo. The windows are actually in the middle of the Arch, of course, but I was at an angle taking the picture.

And THEN it was time to come home. Everyone was hungry and hot and I chose to bypass the first exit with anything good to eat and then it was more than an hour before we found another exit with anything worth eating. Ugh. But, that also meant that after we ate it was only a couple more hours until home.

We got home around 8:30pm, after a quick trip to the store and car wash. We got the boys in bed [I think Max was most excited to see his own bed, but Luke was a close second.], I sorted all the laundry and started a load of it (so I had something to wear on my Saturday adventure), unpacked a few things, and collapsed onto the couch. Then at 9:30 the next morning I was up and ready to head to Ikea in Cincinnati with three of my favorite people on a girls only day trip! The perfect ending to my vacation - although I'm not sure David, who stayed home and did all the rest of the laundry and dealt with grumpy post-vacation kiddos would agree!

Thank you for coming along for our 2011 vacation recap!

Family vacation: Day 4

2011-07-21T08:55:00.000-07:00

Aaah, Day 4. The 'aaah' is for any of you still reading. *smiles* We came home on Day 5 so you've almost made it. Day 4 was probably my favorite, although for me Day 5 was a close second. Now you must come back to read tomorrow's too, huh? How'd you like that hook?

Anyway, Day 4 was Grant's Farm. Named Grant's Farm because a cabin/former home of Ulysses S. Grantis located on the property. The property was eventually purchased by the Anheuser-Busch family and is home to some commercial celebs - the Clydesdales.

Upon arriving and parking, horse shoe prints lead you to the edge of the parking lot where the security guards stop traffic and let you cross over onto a little bridge. Once across the bridge the line weaves around to the tram boarding area. And, if you are travelling with a 3 and 5 year old, as soon as you are in the front of the tram line it detours to the General Store for a potty break, and then back to the end of the tram line. Fortunately, the lines weren't too long - bathroom or tram.

The staff asked us to empty the stroller, then they whisked it away to the front of the tram and it magically appeared once the ride was over. Awesome, because most of the day was spent exploring the zoo-type exhibits, post-tram drop off.

On the (very nice) tram - not even sure what they were looking at, but I love that all four of them seem so interested. Probably the two swans on the lake.

We drove by this gate and statue on the tram. They were real antlers, found on the property and dipped in bronze. Also, this gate (tough to photgraph on the tram), is the one the Clydesdales are often seen running through in the commercials. Kinda cool.

The best of the tram ride was that it took you through all sorts of just open area with free roaming animals - deer, lots of geese, cattle, and these guys. It's such open area, in fact, that this guy was hanging around on the bridge we were supposed to drive across. The driver had to stop and honk at them for awhile so they would move. He then kindly asked us not to stick our hands out and try to touch them. Umm, fine by me.

As soon as the tram dropped us off, I noticed a show was about to start. Dave took Max and I took Seth and Luke and the three of us hurried into the show. Because I thought it was the elephant show. But it turned out to be a lot of birds. I don't love birds. Truthfully, I am really not a fan of birds. Especially not when the bird trainers are begging everyone to sit still and be quiet (and the audience is full of small rowdy children) so as not to upset the birds. Ugh.

There were a lot of interesting animals. Some of them not really "farm" animals - there were two bald eagles. They had been injured and were unable to fly so they were living here.

"Ooh, Daddy, let's feed the camels," quickly became "Daddy, you can feed the camels."

Goats were another story! The Farm had a 'fun pass' and for a discounted rate you got a snow cone, a carousel ride, and two bottles to feed the goats. I must say that watching my little boys seek out hungry goats was quite cute. They both fed them without much hesitation.

I was surprised at how much Seth enjoyed it as he's not one to do things like this often. But, he seemed to really enjoy the goats both at the zoo and here at the farm.

Seth even did some more goat brushing. I guess he figured out that it was okay at the zoo so he couldn't be so bad here.

After we finished at the animal exhibit part, we boarded the tram again and headed back to the parking lot. Just on the other side of the parking lot were the Clydesdale stables. I just thought this was a really pretty "scene" - the truck and the beautiful flowers and the white fence. Unfortunately, I couldn't convince a horse to wander into the photo. Bummer.

Luke jumped right up on the fence to put the horse. Seth alleges he also at least touched the horse. I never saw it. [The blue shirt is not mine, but I was melting and couldn't wait for him to be done to take the picture.]

Another horse. They really are huge animals - very amazing to look at.

Little Max put up with SO much on this trip. Thankfully, he really loves his stroller and loves to take in the sights (no idea where he gets that slightly nosy gene). But, to put up with anyone this close to your face when it's nearly 100 degrees outside, he deserves a medal!

Everyday we thought we would go back to the hotel and swim in the little hotel pool. Everyday we were gone longer than we planned to be. We never got to swim! But that's okay. I don't think the boys cared at all.

This night we went to Moe's for dinner. I love Moe's. Seth will eat chips and queso forever. And I know Luke can eat there without allergy incident. Funny story: I kept marvelling at the fact that there was no one else there. "Isn't this odd?" "Do people here not like Moe's?" "Do you think people know something we don't?" Yes! They know that this Moe's closed 15 minutes ago! Oops! We hurried up and finished our dinner and scooted out. Again, they were so nice about it. Anyway, then we went back, got the kids in bed, and started packing for home.

Family vacation: Day three

2011-07-20T06:22:00.000-07:00

Wednesday it cooled off to a chilly 90 degrees so we headed out to the zoo. We didn't have a lot of options as we only had two full days left and both of the remaining activities on our list were outdoor activities. We had heard their zoo was huge. That seemed to be an understatement. We spent nearly 7 hours there and still didn't see everything. Silly mommy thought Max would eventually just fall asleep in his stroller. Ha ha! Max is tooooo nosy for that! He was awake the entire time. And, he was actually really good at the zoo.

They had a nice children's portion of the zoo - some guinea pigs to pet, some tunnels to crawl around in and get better views of the animals, a little area with owls and a volunteer to tell you all about the owls, donkeys to pet, etc. Side note: there was a volunteer in a rocking chair with a possum. Gross! I acted like I didn't notice her and scooted the boys on by. Were there no bunnies available for petting? Did I mention 'ick?'

Some of my favorite animals.

A chicken on the loose in the chilren's part of the zoo. The boys didn't seem to mind sharing the sidewalk with her.

Grooming the goats. Seth really got into brushing them. He is definitely my more timid one so I was glad to see him take an interest in something hands-on.

They had a small butterfly garden.

Trying not to post too many animal pictures, but our zoo doesn't have ant eaters and these things were so different looking that I had to share. Although this picture doesn't really do it justice. I spent most of the day debating which of my two lenses to use and usually regretting whichever decision I made.

This was a younger elephant. The exhibit was set up well in that the elephants got really close to the crowd. It was so hot and they were throwing water around with their trunks. This was a fun one.

Our non-sleeper, looking very sleepy. He cuddled with both of us on the train ride, but still refused to sleep. The train actually makes five stops along the route and you can get on and off at different exhibits. However, you have to leave your stroller wherever you board the train so you end up with 20 pounds of heat to carry around. That said, we went for the round trip train ride, back to the stroller. We were able to see a lot of animals on the train ride so that was fun. Plus, it was a nice break for all of us from walking around in the heat.

Penguins!

The bear - check out those claws.

A family portrait?

Our final stop at the zoo was Build A Bear. We wanted the boys to have a special souvenir. Seth is the only one who has even been to Build A Bear. Aunt G and fam took him the day Luke was born, so Seth wasn't quite two and, obviously, doesn't remember it. Here is Seth helping to stuff his goat. After petting and brushing the goats, that's the animal he chose - I thought that was too cute!

Luke, hand on hip, assisting with the stuffing of his elephant, Bamboo.

Both boys "bathing" and brushing their new friends.

We held up a few for Max to choose from and he picked the guinea pig. This girl was so wonderful - she let both boys put hearts in Max's animal (avoiding the fight that could've been).

It didn't take long after leaving the zoo for 2/3 of the backseat to fall asleep. Lukey is loving on Bamboo.

Luke loves his new Bamboo. Max actually gets a little excited to see Sleepy (I named his because Max was so sleepy). And Seth, well, Seth loves his stuffed dog Beckley and seems to always feel guilt loving any other stuffed things. He was very excited with Grassy the goat, until he got back to the car and found Beck. For the most part, Luke just loves on Bamboo and Grassy.

For dinner this night, we went with simple food from the fridge. All Max could do was sit in the floor with his arms up and cry. Everyone was hot and tired. We got a little food in Max and bathed everyone and they were out for the night. In fact, I think this was the first night that Max went to sleep without me laying on the floor next to his bed!

Family vacation: Day two

2011-07-19T06:22:00.000-07:00

Day two the boys enjoyed a breakfast of sugar loaded cereal. Really, this picture is just to show you that Max thinks he is at least as big as the other two.

We decided to head to the St. Louis Children's Museum, or the Magic House. It was really really hot outside so apparently every citizen of and visitor to St. Louis had the same idea.

The Magic House. It was a really neat looking old house(?). It was large, but also very choppy on the inside. We found it difficult to maneuver a stroller in the smaller spaces, nevermind that it was crowded and still too hot, even inside. But, I think the boys had a great time. I don't think Luke stopped moving from the time we hit the door until we were ready to leave.

They had an "Alice in Wonderland" exhibit and the boys loved playing the mushroom drums.

We all had the cute little purple stickers. I couldn't figure out if we really had to wear them or if the first person in the door that morning just put theirs on and then everyone thought they had to follow suit.

Well, Luke stopped moving here, when he smacked his head into the glass that enclosed the trains. But, it didn't keep him down. It did make a nice little red welt, but Luke doesn't distract easily!

There were lots of little tunnels that the boys could crawl through. Some offered additional views of the exhibits and some were just for fun.

Luke looking through the kaleidoscope.

Dressing up like construction workers and playing in rocks was a huge hit.

Seth was really working hard - I think his tongue is even sticking out.

Max looked like he thought it would be fun to get out and play in the rocks too - but, he didn't fool me. I knew he just wanted to eat the rocks. Thus, he stayed in the stroller.

Playing in big machines is always a hit too.

President Luke in the oval office. [Seth refused to participate. Unfortunately, that was a bit of a theme!]

I've never seen the President quite this jubilant while addressing the nation.

Judge Luke. Again, not many of the judges I came into contact with were quite this excited. Perhaps the legal system would be a happier place...

Seth finally decided to participate. I'm pretty sure he was the defendant. Ha ha. I tried to cross exam him, but he was having none of it.

There was a cute little play area for younger kids so Max was freed from his stroller temporarily.

There were lots of little signs just randomly hanging around the museum. And yes, I did know this!

Free floating little blue balls. Unfortunately, Luke thought he was supposed to throw them and see if they would stay up. We tried to explain. Then we moved on.

The bubble organ. There was a whole room of bubble fun. However, a grandma-aged woman asked Luke to please not touch something because she was playing with it. We moved on then as I was really hot and that makes me not very nice. It was really way too crowded in that room to have much fun anyway.

Max was really interested in the handrails in the elevator. No idea why - maybe because he could reach them or because they were shiny. I didn't even notice at first, but David pointed out that he did this every time we were in the elevator.

There was a "Goodnight Moon" exhibit. And, since Luke loves the moon and I read that book about a million times when Seth was tiny, we had to see it. Using the levers, etc. you could make the old woman rock and some other parts of the story move.

Overall, it was a neat place and certainly cooler than being outside that day! But, we are definitely spoiled by our local museum!

There was a Sonic close by and I got a cranberry limeade. Is it bad that when planning a vacation I like to check the proximity of Sonic and Starbucks? It was Sonic that informed Max that cheese (a favorite of his) can be combined with bread (another favorite of his). He ate that grilled cheese faster than I could tear it into little pieces.

I neglected to take pictures at dinner. We went to a restaurant that bottles their own root beer, cream soda, etc. It was a neat looking place - and local, which is always fun to try. The food was just okay, but the cream soda was yummy, the server was really nice and the boys were pretty good.

Family vacation: Day one...

2011-07-18T09:00:00.000-07:00

We headed out nice and early (yeah, right) Monday morning. We ran a couple of errands and were on the road by 11:30 or so. I was thankful to plug the hotel address into the GPS and find it was only 4 hours, not the 5 that I thought. Funny how important just that one hour seems when travelling with small children! This was the view from the front seat - a car full of kiddos and stuff.

We decided to give the boys a small gift everyday to keep them entertained. Monday's gift was a couple of new movies. My favorite store recently had some good $5 deals so I grabbed a couple of those. We pulled out the headphones and bought ourselves a couple hours of nearly quiet driving. Max threw a huge fit the first half hour or so, but with a little reassuring he ended up taking a nice little nap. We let them eat McDonald's on the trip there, but that was the only visit with Ronald! It was by far the dirtiest, ickiest McDonald's I've seen in a loooonnnnngggg time.

NO idea why this child thought that he needed a blanket as miserably hot as it was outside, but he seemed quite content and, really, who am I to argue with content? Guess the air conditioning in the van was doing its job that day! Unfortunately, on the way there, I discovered that the same could not be said for my point and shoot camera. I also have my bigger, nicer camera, but I'm not too excited about lugging it around everywhere so I'll be asking for a new little camera for my birthday in the fall.

I took this picture while Dave was checking us into the hotel. Yikes! Maybe we won't go to the zoo tomorrow. Perhaps an indoor activity? The hotel turned out to be manageable. Not the wonderful homes we've stayed in in Florida, but we did have two bedrooms and a fridge - the essentials when traveling with kiddos - the adults didn't have to go to sleep at 8:30 and cold milk was ready at the boys' request.

We got settled in, hung up some some clothes, separated out the boys' clothes (all packed in big ziplocs by outfit) into three drawers to make life easier, set up the pack and play, and tried to get the boys to rest a little. I figured out then that most of my time in the hotel would be me begging someone to quiet down. Thankfully we didn't spend THAT much time there!

That first night we headed to the local mall and had dinner at the food court - easy to please everyone that way. Plus, the mall had a sporting goods store that Dave wanted to take the boys to see. They have LOTS of taxidermied (made up word?) animals, a big aquarium, some turtles, etc. Yes, that is a catfish. Yes, it is bigger than Luke. Yes, family vacation with small children means a trip to the mall for fun.

And because no one really slept on the way there, this is what happened on the way back to the hotel. Poor Seth. That cannot be comfortable!

And sweet Max, he looks plenty comfy. I was pretty jealous at this point. Ready for a good night's sleep.

Unfortunately, Max had other plans. The older boys' room was too small for the pack and play, so we set it up in the corner of our tiny room. We got everyone ready for bed. Seth and Luke did quite well. While they are used to sharing a room, on vacation they actually had to share a bed. I was surprised that it didn't seem to bother either of them too much. Max did not think the pack and play was a good plan. I put him down and he started crying (remember we're in a hotel and I'm already begging people to quiet down). I figured he would fuss for a few minutes and then fall asleep. After about a half hour I got him up and calmed him down. I decided I would just go to bed and maybe if I was in the room with him he'd be more content in his own bed. We moved his bed to the side of our bed and I laid down. He stood in the pack and play with his little face resting on the side and held my hand. I tried to transition my hand down further into the pack and play, hoping he would lay down and fall asleep. I closed my eyes trying not to cater to his every whil but while still staying close by. I opened one eye and found him still standing there in the corner of the pack and play, staring back at me. Poor baby! I finally ended up laying on the floor next to the pack and play. I only had to stay a few minutes and when he was out I got back into my bed! Night night...

Family "vacation:" The Where

2011-07-17T14:04:00.000-07:00

One day David said, "Where do you want to go on vacation?" I'm sure I sighed and said, "Ugh, I don't care." Because as a stay at home mom to three small children, vacation means doing pretty much the exact same thing, just without much of the things that make it easier. Nevermind all the things that do go have to be organized, packed, laundered, etc. I know, I know - spoiled sport.

Anyway, we talked about sun and sand - Seth is 5 and has been to Florida three times. But then it occurred to us that we are outnumbered, and in a few years that won't be a big deal, but this year - that was huge! Max isn't walking yet so would need to be carried at a beach. Luke is WILD and would need to be watched every second. And Seth is not very adventurous - probably he would've kept a safe distance (read 'back at the hotel if we would let him') from the water but then that's a problem when Max and Luke want to be in the water. I could go on, but I'm sure you are all either asleep or get the picture.

So, we decided to go for the family oriented outing. Dave asked some co-workers for recommendations and we settled on St. Louis. We were told (and then investigated) that they have a huge zoo, a nice children's museum, and Grant's Farm (allegedly the seventh best family attraction in the country).

Next, the issue was where to stay. Max likes his sleep - like 13 or so hours a night. To put all of us in a one room hotel would be torture - imagine trying to contain Seth and Luke for 13 solid hours so Max could sleep all that time. So, we checked some vacation rental sites and Dave found a house we could rent for the week. However, words like "cozy" and "rustic" sent me to the computer as well! I found "luxury condo" and was sold - a beautiful pool and modern looking accomodations. Dave contacted the owner, signed the contract, and asked how she would prefer payment. She contacted us about 36 hours later. To tell us she rented the condo to someone else. Ugh. Back to square one. There were no other condos available, so we ended up finding a hotel/suite with an outdoor pool. I convinced myself it was a dump so that anything better would be exciting.

And, off we went....

Daily Pix

2011-07-08T06:23:00.000-07:00

This one is not quite right. Ha ha. But, that's probably why the grandkids adore him!

Ready and waiting for a local parade.

Modeling new jammies.

Loving on Daddy.

Strawberry Festival. Sooo yummy. Seth wouldn't even try it (what? I don't get it - he loves strawberries and ice cream.) Luke ate all of his and tried to mooch off of me and my mom, too!

The boys LOVE s'mores - and they always make a huge mess. But, I love them too so I'll suffer through the mess.

Slow down, Max!

2011-07-01T06:49:00.000-07:00

It occurred to me that I kinda left you all(?) hanging re: Max and the bottles, nursing, sippy, cup, etc. Hope no one lost too much sleep over this! Sweet Max has made great progress. The seventh sippy cup we tried really seemed to appeal to him. I heard from/knew of/was told about 2 moms whose kiddos really liked a certain cup so Max and I made a special trip to the store to find it and he loved on that sippy cup all the way to the register.

I did stop nursing him. I knew it was time for me, but I also know Max is our last baby so that made it really difficult! Dave and I chatted about it and I stood in the kitchen crying while Dave took Max up to bed. I didn't want to start a bottle at bedtime that I would just feel like needed to be stopped in a few weeks so he just went to bed. And that sweet little boy never made a peep. My parents were at our house watching the boys the second night and we came home early because I didn't want my mom to have to put a crying angry baby in bed, but when we got home he was already in bed, without incident. And he's been that way ever since. He tends to sleep later in the mornings and then get a later start on naps and then nap later so many nights he stays up a half hour or so later than the older boys. It's still a nice little bit of one on one time with him. Then he loves to wave good night to Daddy and blow kisses and say "nigh'nigh'" as I take him up to bed.

He's loving eat more finger foods too. Right now, he eats nearly anything we give him. Of course, I know he'll eventually notice his super picky big brothers and start turning up his cute little nose too, but I'm going to enjoy it while it lasts! He loves chicken - grilled, breaded, anything we toss on his tray! He gobbles green beans. [And doesn't even attempt to pick the little beans out like Luke. Yet.] Cubed up cheese is another favorite. And he cries when the baby yogurt cup is empty!

Eating the bowl isn't going to work, silly boy!

A mouthful of Cheerios

Drinking like a big boy.

A work in progress...

2011-06-20T14:27:00.001-07:00

Mostly me, but the blog too. Ha ha.

I'm not done yet, but I'm working on a little blog re-do. Unfortunately, most things in my life are accomplished slowly, in 10 minute increments. I'll be back later....

I'm a plantin' me an apple tree...

2011-06-07T08:50:00.000-07:00

If there's any truth to that whole "apple a day" thing, I might prefer to nurture a tree rather than load these three up and be confined to an exam room! [Let me say though that I adore their pediatrician - that is NOT the issue.] Last Thursday they all had doctor appointments. When I made Max's 12 month appointment (at his 9 month check-up, while Seth was in school), I also asked if I could just bring Seth for his 5 year at the same time. It made sense. Because I often don't make sense. Only having to load them up once and get them there on time once seemed like a great plan. In my head I also recall thinking, Luke will be 3 months older, he'll be better able to handle this excitement. Or, perhaps, I could find someone to pass him off to for the morning? Then, as the date approached for the two check-ups, Luke developed some symptoms that I deemed worthy of being seen by the doctor (since we were going to be there anyway), and suddenly you have a package deal.

Thankfully (?) the appointments were early and Dave didn't have anything too early so he was home to help me get everyone ready. This trip required a bag change - from baby diaper bag to three kid backpack filled with soft books to occupy the time spent crammed into the tiny room. So, thanks to Dave, we got there on time. [He did go to work, not with us.] Upon entry to the office the older two boys immediately headed off for the germ infested toys. I'm not a huge germophobe, but it IS a doctor's office. Does it get much ickier germier than that? I headed to the counter to check in the boys and Max snuggled into me so as to not have anyone else in the world ever touch him.

The wait wasn't too bad and soon we were called back. They sent me and Max to an exam room with a nurse (or medical assistant, not sure, but we'll call them nurses because it's shorter to type than medical assistant). I wasn't really so sure about leaving Luke with Seth and a stranger/nurse for fear of them ganging up on her, but it was just for weighing and measuring heighth so I enjoyed my 3 minutes of quiet and odd questions about Max. I should mention that I always feel like a completely absent parent when they start asking me if the boys can do certain things - is he walking? Does he drink out of a sippy cup? Can he say 1 to 3 words? Does he stand on his head in the corner whistling a tune? I think I always just answer, "uhhhh, yeah." Except, of course, that he's not walking and he hates sippy cups (we're on #7) so I had to answer 'no.' But, never fear, Luke came bursting through the door and attempted to answer every question for me. "Yep, yep, he does."
Then they took Max to measure him. I stood beside the table. He immediately burst into tears and screamed at the top of his lungs. Then we all went (maybe not Seth?) out to weigh him. I carried him out, sat him on the scale myself and stood next to him. This one started out with the pouty lip and progressed quickly to crying. Oh, sweet Max!

Then we headed back to the exam room for more questions about the other guys and a discrete discussion of Seth's "immunizations." I hadn't really prepared him for this and the nurse didn't really tell him that was what was coming either. I knew it was inevitable, but Seth tends to overreact so waiting until the last minute seemed appropriate this time.

Then the doctor came. She was there about 2 minutes after the nurses left us. I'm thinking they went out and mentioned that if she wanted her room to be intact she might want to hurry things along!

There was one stool in the room (to get to the exam table) and Seth and Luke both wanted to sit on it. A lot of whining ensued and Luke ended up sitting on the doctor's lap. She's great with him and he adores her so it worked out. Except that he wanted to push the buttons on her computer.

She very simply explained to Seth that he would be getting a few shots because he had to have them for school. My neice and nephew are also patients and she knows my sister. She told Seth how brave his cousins were for their shots. She said it would hurt a little and he could cry if he needed to but that it would be over soon.

Once we finished up with the visit, including all of the questions I had written down on the back of a flyer that came in the mail (wow, I'm so organized), the doctor left, the two nurses came back and Seth got his shots. He was very brave and I was so proud of him. Max wasn't quite so brave. But Max is a bit younger and he doesn't get to go to school in the fall so he couldn't really be reasoned with.

The outcomes:
Luke's issue turned out to be not nearly as big a deal as I thought it might. Easily treatable and we are doing so. He weighed in at 37 pounds.

Seth weighed 43 pounds and is 3' 9.5". He is 50-75th percentile for weight and 90th for height. I didn't have any big concerns with him, just a few questions and she reassured me he's 'normal.'

Max weighed 18 pounds, 13 ounces. He is 28.5". His height is 10th percentile (I think). His weight is just under 5th percentile I am thankful these numbers aren't things the doctor gets worked up about. She laughed and said, "just under 5th percentile is better than well under 5th." But, that's consistent with where he's been the last few times so she thinks he might just be "my little guy." I can handle that. He also had a nasty bug bite that blistered up really ugly so she gave us some meds for that. That made me feel a little better.

So, over all everyone is doing well. AND they got to eat lunch with Daddy after the appointment. I was SO thankful that he called and said he was free for lunch because, all kidding aside, I was zapped from trying to corral the 3 of them at the doctor's office. Wow!

May Daily Pictures...

2011-06-04T12:37:00.000-07:00

Nothing like a frosty! It was about 90 degrees outside. Please notice Luke's choice of footwear.

My order from the craft/hobby store. They had all their page protectors 40% off. Then there was a coupon for another 10% off just for two days. I am enjoying my simple little scrapbook so much that I am going to tackle some of the boxes of unscrapped photos and make simpler books with those pictures also. So I bought page protectors with a bunch of different orientations - mostly for 4 x 6 photos. Having all boys, I know they won't care how "pretty" the books are but they already enjoy looking back at the pictures, so just having it done has become more important to me than making it beautiful. Nevermind, that if I could just feel like some things were caught up around here I could breathe easier!

Again, Luke LOVES to dress up his feet. He found these in my stuff and decided to wear them. And for a couple of hours he was meticulous about pulling them up and having them just right.

Just a sweet boy - you can't see his shirt, but it says, "I'm not small, I'm fun size!" And is he ever.

Taken close to Mother's Day. Just to prove that I do exist and I'm not a ghost blogger.

We need more sidewalks around here.

Party, party

2011-05-29T05:15:00.000-07:00

This is a picture heavy post so I'll just tell the story mostly with picture captions:
Our new balloon wreath. My mom has a bit of a wreath obsession (sorry, Mom) so I got some grief about my own potential wreath obsession with this one. But, I plan to hang it up for each of the birthdays every year. It was super easy to make (except my fingers got a little sore from pushing in the pins, but it was well worth it!). Found it here.
Then I put the cricut machine to work. I used it to cut all the ovals and the letters for the banner. I cut the triangles free hand with just a little measuring and marking. I went with different colors of ribbon for a more playful childlike feel. And I think the clothespins are just fun. This table held Max's first year scrapbook and some favors for our party guests - chocolate drizzled caramel corn. I seriously recommend you make this stuff! It's easy and so yummy. I had leftover melted chocolate from one of the desserts so I just drizzled some over the caramel corn while it was cooling on the parchment paper.

Just some of the balloons. Max loves balloons. I know Seth did NOT care for balloons at his first birthday party and I don't remember Luke's reaction, but Max loves them so we used a lot of them. I was thrilled to find these turquoise ones, quite by accident, the night before the party.

Then we had some yummy food. My mom bought these great warming trays and I think I might be the only one who's used them so far. They worked great. We made little smokies with bacon and brown sugar and baked them in the oven then transferred them to the trays and they were still really good after awhile in the warming tray. I also made little cards that said what the food was because it makes me crazy to have to answer that question over and over (just a strange quirk of mine).

I loved how a lot of the food was inspired by friends/family - a dip recipe from my oldest and closest friend, a chicken wrap recipe from my sister, a buffalo chicken dip recipe from a couple of different friends.

I made this banner with a picture of Max from each month over the last year. It was fun to see how much he has changed.

Normally, I would opt for food, then gifts, then dessert. But, I knew a few people had other places to be and I didn't want anyone to miss out on dessert so we did food, dessert, gifts this time. The dessert was cake pops and chocolate chip cookie dough truffles with a few cupcakes too.

It's tough to see the glowing candle, but it's there. I also used the cricut to cut out the balloon shapes and letters for his little high chair banner. I thought he might cry when we all started singing but he handled it pretty well.

He started out calm and rational with the cupcake - picked it up and took a bite out of it.

Then it started to crumble a bit, what with the impact of his mouth and hands. This caused a perplexed look.

Then there was a bit of angst that all this icing goo was sticking to his fingers.

Then there was the need to pick the icing goo off of his hands, which, of course, was not possible.

Then there was a bit of flinging to try to remedy the icing goo situation on his own.

Then there was the desperate plea for help.

Sure, dustbusting a person is a tad bit unconventional, but it worked (just on his shorts and shirt). Then it was wet washcloths and baby wipes in an alternating fashion until his fingers no longer felt like he would stick to the wall if he got too close to it.

Then we moved on to presents, which, of course, he had very little to do with. Seth and Luke opened pretty much everything, which was nice because at least it kept things moving!

Amazingly, I haven't seen either of the older boys try to replicate this yet.

After presents there was a lot of visiting and then everyone took their treat bags and left. I told David that I thought it was a bigger letdown than Christmas. NOT the party - I thought it was fun, just that it was over. I had spent the entire week cleaning, re-cleaning, grocery shopping, making cake balls and truffles, and then in a few hours it was just done.

Max was ready for a nap and the rest of us curled up with blankets and a movie. After Max got up we took his 12 month pictures with his last sticker (see previous post).

And then it was bedtime - at least for Seth and Luke. David had been invited to go out with some of his friends and declined the invite because it was Max's birthday, but since it was nearly Max's bedtime I didn't see why he should stay home so we decided he would go. I bathed Max, while I cried my pitiful little eyes out. Then Max got to play with his new toys for a few minutes, since the older two didn't really let him do that much when they were awake!

And that was how Max spent his first birthday - being loved on by friends and family. We love you, Max!

Twelve months, the good and the bad...

2011-05-27T18:34:00.000-07:00

This sweet boy celebrated twelve fun filled months with us this past weekend. Party pix to come soon, but first a little about Max at one year. He likes to make us smile. He has a great little smile that sometimes involves a little head tilt and touch of the chin to the chest and a little looking up with his eyes to make sure we are reacting. Sadly, only close friends and family see this precious look. I know the people at the gym and the nursery workers at church think he is a misearably sad baby, because he seems to cry nearly the whole time he is with them. I actually got pulled off the treadmill because he would not stop crying.

[Side note: she wanted to argue with me about how old he was because, I guess, she forgot to find out the name of the crying baby who needed his mommy and came only with a vague description of an eight month old. Except that he was actually just a smallish eleven month old at the time! And, I am NOT a runner - it's a lot of jogging and then walking to recover, but having to stop basically cold turkey to go retrieve a baby really makes for some aching legs the next day.]

Anyway, back to Max. He loves to eat. He still only has two teeth so he's not eating too much table food but he doesn't seem to mind. He has had some grilled chicken and loved it. And (my boy) loves the carbs - throw me some bread mama! I caught Luke feeding him spicy trail mix a couple days ago and he let that ooze back out of his mouth so he definitely has some opinions!

He is pretty good at playing on his own in the same room with Seth and Luke for quite awhile. But, then he seems to suddenly remember that the rest of us exist and he takes off crawling for us and needs to be held for a few minutes.

He has some "words" that he says. Seth and Luke tickle him a lot. They come up and tickle under his chin and say, "tickle, tickle, tickle." Well, Max has started crawling up to us and saying something that sounds just like, "tickuh, tickuh, tickuh." He also says "Ni' Da'y" ['Night Daddy] to David at bedtime. And I think he always makes the same sound when he sees Seth but it's a nonsense word. But, I do think it's consistent so it probably means something to him. He still doesn't say 'Mommy' often, but the other day he crawled right up to me, wrapped himself around my leg, and let off with a big long string of "mommmommmommmomm."

I finally let him start sleeping with a blanket in his bed because, if he went to bed without one and his laundry hamper was anywhere near his bed he would reach out his superhuman arms and snag some dirty laundry to hold in his hand while he sucked his thumb in his sleep. I really thought I was moving it far enough away from his bed, but I was starting to think he was getting out of bed to get the clothes (not really, but you know what I mean!).

He also has some mad dance moves when he hears music that he likes. He's not walking on his own but he will pull up and bounce. Or stop where he's at and just sit and dance. As far as walking goes, he does "walk" around the kitchen holding onto a kitchen chair. The walk-behind toy (with wheels) moves a little fast for him still, but he's catching on.

And that's our sweet littlest guy at one year old.

Now for the bad:

I am really struggling with this milestone and would be lying if I typed anything else. Max is our last baby and I'm having trouble letting go of him being a baby. I know he will always be the baby of our family so I might need to stress that point for a little while. I spent most of Tuesday crying. We finished the formula and he wanted nothing to do with milk, neither in a sippy cup (which he's not yet mastered) nor in a bottle. I have still been nursing him just for the last feeding before he goes to bed and planned to stop when he turned one and switched over to milk. But, since he wouldn't drink the milk, he was crying and pleading with his eyes (is that possible at just barely one?) and I was crying and it was just a mess.

So, I nursed him and put him to bed and then I laid on the couch for an hour. So what, you say? Well, here's the thing. Probably the hardest part, for me, of being a stay at home is that the job never ends. After all the kiddos are in bed there is still something that needs to be done. [Yes, my time management skills are lacking, I'm sure.] Laundry, load the dishwasher, pick something up, etc. So, I feel like I rarely sit down for that long. And definitely not lying motionless on the couch trying not to cry.

I do not remember feeling this sad about the older two turning one. This transition is rough. Truthfully, I'm typing all this out (1) because it's somewhat therapeutic for me and (2) because I hope I can look back in a few weeks and think about how silly it was for me to be so upset.

Hot dog!

2011-05-24T10:47:00.000-07:00

Okay, I was trying to come up with something cutesy as it related to 'catch up,' as in catching up on some long overdue posts. But my mind just kept wandering to ketchup and mustard and relish. Which, of course, led me to the hot dog. I think I must have Memorial Day cookouts on my mind. Although, I've been informed that we will be taking on a major landscaping project around the back deck over the long weekend so I'm not sure I will be permitted a full fledged cookout. From the looks of the forecast we may have to invest in some plastic handled yard tools to avoid being zapped by lightning. But, isn't the ground easier to dig in when it's wet anyway?

Well, that was a long and boring intro into what will likely prove to be a long and boring post. But, we did have three fun-to-us activities in the last week or two (excluding Max's birthday as that gets its own post), so here goes:

First, I took the two oldest boys downtown for the 500 festival kids' party last weekend. It was a rainy and dreary day so we decided that Max would stay home. Since he's a tad bit young to do this solo, Dave stayed home too. Other than the nearly half hour it took us to park in the parking garage, it was a good time.

The boys got to see a race car.And make pirate hats. There's a pirate cartoon that they love so this was good fun!And if you know my boys, you know that their entire world revolves around fire trucks at this point. If we leave the house they often want to know how many fire stations we will be driving by. And if you can "spot" a fire truck just out on the road, it's huge. So, standing on one with the help of a real fireman was quite the adventure! Everytime we came to a booth/display/exhibit, I would ask them, "Do you want to do this?" Without fail, Luke would nod 'yes' and Seth would shake his head 'no.' Thankfully, seeing your little brother having all the fun seems to coax an older brother into having some fun too.After all this fun, we surely needed refreshment.And this is what I brought home with me - one very sleepy pirate who fell asleep in the car and stayed that way, even after being carried inside and placed on the couch. I'm counting the day as a success if it knocked him flat!

***Next was Seth's end of year picnic for preschool. The weather was PERFECT! Rain was forecasted but it held off. Seth had a great time running and playing and eating lunch outside with his classmates. I was very fortunate this year to be able to go on nearly every field trip and attend every party. It's really important to me to be involved at his school.

We finished at the park, after an unfortunate skinned knee(s) incident, and headed home to show Dad and Luke all the bandaids. Then we decided to take Max out and see what he thought of the swing in our backyard. He is the first of my boys to enjoy the swing! Seth and Luke only just this year decided it was fun. [Thankfully, because Dave spent WAY too much time building the swingset for neither of them to enjoy it.]

***Our next big event was Seth's preschool graduation. We were invited to a party to see how much he had learned - counting to 100, writing his name, letter sounds, and some basic sounding out of words, etc. While that was fun to see, it was much more amazing to me how much he has changed physically since school started. His teacher took a picture of each student at a little 'meet the teacher' day before school started and it was shocking to me to see that the little timid four year old I had sent off to preschool (with much trepidation myself) had finished his year as a sweet and VERY social five year old who loved, quite possibly, every minute of school. When he started school, I'm not sure I was committed to going back to the same place next year but his experience was so awesome that it didn't take me long to commit. He has grown, physically, mentally, and spiritually, and I couldn't be happier!

today

2011-05-16T13:50:00.001-07:00

I got breakfast for Seth and Luke. I got Seth dressed and off to school (via Dave) and Luke dressed.

I cleaned both of the upstairs bathrooms. Little boys are gross. That is all.

I considered ordering groceries online and having them delivered to my front door.

I got Max up and gave him a bottle.

I loaded Luke and Max into the minivan.

I picked Seth up from school.

I "ran into" Target. An hour later I left with: a few groceries for Max's party (the ones that were on sale this week at Target); tissue paper for favor bags for Max's party; two little boys who had scoped out all the new Cars 2 movie propoganda; 3 pairs of shorts exchanged for Seth [must be rough to have the elastic waist pants fall off your skinny waist, huh kid?]; two little boys nearly in a fistfight, who knew Mom had nothing left to threaten them with in the checkout aisle as they had now seen the Cars 2 toys; and a three year old with very wet pants.

I drove home with a screaming baby - very uncharacteristic of this baby, and a three year old who kept insisting he needed my sweater because he was cold. This happens when your pants are too wet to wear home.

I came home, unloaded the kids, groceries, bags, wet pants, three children, and fixed a gourmet lunch of (1) snbutter and jelly, and (2) toast with jelly. Oh, and a few potato chip crumbs for me. Because I forgot I had turkey deli meat. I tried to throw away the full cup of yogurt and put the two lids I had peeled off the other yogurts into the fridge.

I changed Max's diaper - a blowout which required changing all the clothes he was wearing. Also very uncharacteristic of Max. I'm not liking where his day looks like he's heading. I'm hoping it's just more teeth looking to join the lonely two he has in his mouth. I digress. Max is now napping in his pajamas because those were the only clothes I had for him downstairs, and today i wasn't brave enough to leave the other two downstairs while I ran up for clothes for Max. I am jealous of both the nap and the pajamas.

I fed Max some fruit and cheerios.

I put two boys down for naps/rest with all of us screaming at each other because they could not follow the simplest of tasks and my fuse is short.

I gave Max another bottle and held him tight while he fell asleep in my lap. I repositioned him and put his head on my shoulder where he snuggled in and slept for awhile, before I moved him to his bed. He was so warm and cuddly that my hair that was up against his face is now curly from his sweaty little head (I am NOT complaining about this).

I took Max up to his bed and found Luke in the (clean) bathroom making a terrible mess.

I started a load of the boys' clothes. I have NO clue how two people this small can generate SO much laundry.

I listened to two little boys (in separate rooms) choose not to nap, but rather jump off beds, dump out multiple boxes of bandaids into one pile, and generally destroy two bedroom.

Now, I must go make a dinner that they will refuse to eat so that I can tuck them into bed promptly at 6pm. Because I'm pretty sure that's their bedtime for today!

Daily pix...

2011-05-04T07:07:00.000-07:00

Yes, I'm actually still at it! I cannot say enough how much I am enjoying making this book! I am working on an order of recent pictures (and a few to finish up Max's first year book which I am feverishly trying to finish before his birthday party), so I thought I'd share just a few...

Someone thinks he's a big kid.

Watching chickens hatch in their cousin's classroom via webcam. They loved this!

I think he would wear these boots to bed if I would let him!

It was muddy and Dave was grilling out so they were told not to go off the deck. I love Seth's arm on Luke's knee.

Sometimes you just have to sleep where you are.

Easter 2011

2011-05-03T07:00:00.000-07:00

Well, I think I might have finally swept up the last of that pesky Easter basket grass yesterday so I guess it's time to share our Easter day here on the blog.

But we must start with some back story. My parents sold their house (yeah for them!) so we decided to have our Easter dinner here so they could keep on packing and not have to worry about the state of their house. It was a nice 'excuse' for me to really work on cleaning the house.

Then Max and Dave both started to sound and feel crummy. Max was up for awhile Friday night (which is NOT like Max at all) and Dave was coughing and miserable. Dave was a real trooper though and helped me finish up everything Saturday. Unfortunately, this eventually meant that Max and Dave missed Easter Sunday service. We were planning to go to church with my parents so Seth and Luke and I did that, but it really made me sad to go without Dave and Max (ridiculous because obviously that's not what Easter Sunday is about). Nevermind that it was Max's first Easter and he was missing church. I was a bit of a mess on the way to church (again ridiculous), but finally decided that Max was just saving a first for me for next year.

One of my favorite (non-religious) traditions is taking family photos while everyone is all dressed up. For the first time ever I bought shirts for the boys and a dress for me almost a month ahead of time. No last minute running around or any of my usual craziness. I was ready for these pictures! Yeah, that didn't really go so well either. Seth hates having his picture taken. Dave didn't go to church so he wasn't really dressed for the photo. Luke is crazy. And Max's eyes are all red and pitiful. We don't have time to discuss all the things about me that I wasn't thrilled with but I will tell you that it rained. My hair does not like rain.

So, here are a few pictures:

Here's the more important part of this post - I made the boys listen to this song all the way to church and home and now Seth calls it "the Easter song." It's fantastic. In fact, I probably should've just posted it and skipped all the nonsense about who missed church and how I let my selfishness ruin parts of the day and why the pictures are crummy. So, just take a listen to the song!

whobody

2011-04-30T10:00:00.000-07:00

This is just one of those 'I want to remember it' posts...

*I noticed recently that, per Luke, my favorite color is now "purple." This makes me sad because only a few days ago, it was "puhpull" and, consequently, one of the cutest words ever. I would ask him multiple times a day what my favorite color was, just to hear him say it. Now, it's just another word. However, I think he's hit and miss because they are still "mushamallows." For today anyway.

*Max loves to say "da da da." He has said "ma ma ma" a few times but not with any regularity. Seems his new favorite game is to get me to pick him up (not much work involved there), then he says, "da da da." At which time I smile and say, "ma ma ma." At which time Max looks at me and laughs and says, "da da da." Nice, Max.

*We were watching a Nascar race a few weeks ago. Okay, Seth was watching and I was laughing that the announcers don't even sound like they are speaking a language that I know. Seth informed me girls can't be drivers. Dave jumped in and told him that not only could they, but there was one driving in this particular race. Seth's response? "That's ridiculous. Girls are supposed to scrapbook or something." Guess I need to take up a more dangerous hobby to introduce him to the world of well-roundedness.

*Seth has also learned the word "painful" and likes to use it. Me: Seth, could you [insert any mindless and trivial task]? Seth: This is painful.

*I asked Seth to please put his shoes in the cubby and pick his jacket up off of the floor. Seth's response? "My life would be so much easier if I didn't have to do so much work around here.

*And finally - this one is my favorite - Luke has a new word. It's "whobody." Whobody said that? Whobody was that? Whobody's coming over? LOVE three year old made-up-words!

11 months...

2011-04-24T14:07:00.001-07:00

I would be lying if I said it didn't make me a little sad to be posting the 11 month pictures. I know it's inevitable - they just grow and grow. But, I'm a little sad to not really have a baby anymore. But, oh how I love this little guy! He really is an easy baby. I'll probably pay for typing that out, right? He nearly always hangs out in his bed for quite awhile after he wakes. I can usually hear him on the monitor, chatting, but he's happy to just be there for awhile (probably because he can hear his brothers and is trying to hide from them). And he's nearly always happy and smiling when I do go in to get him.

He still only has the two teeth. And a mommy who doesn't trim his nails often enough so he scratches his own face. Actually, the nail problem is that if I try to do it while he's awake, he likes to take the clippers and pretend to trim them himself. And since he doesn't fall asleep in my arms all that often it's a struggle to get those nails trimmed!

Yes, we did change shirts mid-photo shoot. I thought it was hard to read the sticker on the blue shirt. Max looks a little like he's wonderin g if this sticker is going to be on ALL of his shirts, or what?

This month he's been eating a little more "real" food, but still mostly eats baby food. But, he loves little pieces of anything that he can feed to himself.

His little personality is really sweet. He loves to make us laugh. He'll clap or wave if we make a big deal of it. At bedtime he claps sometimes when I ask if he's ready to go to bed. He's starting to snuggle up more in unfamiliar situations or around people he doesn't know. I love that he knows to feel secure with me or Dave. If you know me you know I REALLY do not like feet. But, there's just something about baby feet and the way those toes curl all around that makes me melt. And I see those toes a lot. A. Whole. Lot. Everytime I put Max in the car he takes off his shoes and then his socks. We go to church about a mile from our house and he can strip both feet in that distance. Lately, if it's warm enough, I've just quit bothering to put the shoes and socks on until we get to our destination.

Alright, I'm off to plan a first birthday bash...

Edible Easter fun...

2011-04-21T06:49:00.000-07:00

Now that we have the candy coating issue resolved, I have really been wanting to try my hand at cake pops. Here is the process...

First, you make a cake. Cake mixes are actually preferable for this project due to their crumble-ability. Yay me! And yes, I plan to continue to make up words for this post...Next, you let your baby destroy the entire Sunday paper, just to keep him entertained. It probably would've been more entertaining for him if he had two hands to use, rather than the one hand and the long sleeved t-shirt claw. [Side note/fun fact: I HATE the Sunday paper. It's just more clutter to mess up my already too cluttered house. We only get the paper two days a week. They keep calling and offering us great deals to get it more often. NO! It's just MORE paper. Ugh. Makes me crazy.]Then, after digging paper out of Max's mouth, and after the cake is completely cooled, you destroy the cake much the same way Max destroyed the paper. There is something obnoxiously therapeutic about baking a cake only to dismantle it. You rip it into shreds. Yeah, sure, the instructions say to cut into four equal pieces. But the next step is to rub the pieces together until it crumbles all up. Why do I need four equal pieces for this?

Then you add the icing to the crumbled cake. Sorry, no picture of this. Imagine a big glass bowl with crumbed up cake and some icing being glopped in (made that one up too) and then mixed around. Oh, and I made the icing - but that's because I'm a bit addicted to my cream cheese icing and I knew I could lick the beater when the boys weren't looking. Then you make balls out of the cake. My mini ice cream/cookie scooper is the perfect size. No pictures of this either, mostly because touching my camera at this point seemed a tiny bit scary. [Remember, it's cake and icing being rolled around in my hands - messy!]

Then I got out some Peeps too, just for fun.

Next I melted some white candy coating and some chocolate. Now, for whatever reason I thought this would be a fun project with the boys. I am not sure what made me think that a 5 year old and 3 year old would be able to sit and wait for excess chocolate to drip off the peeps on a stick. However, they were good at covering the chocolate with the sprinkles. So, I set out the sprinkles.Next I fed the boys marshmallows (or musha-mawows), to keep them entertained. I should probably work on the entertainment around here, huh?

And, voila - a mere 12 hours after starting the project, we had round cake pops, egg shaped cake pops, and chocolate covered Peeps. You know, after lunch, naps, a snack, dinner, a few loads of laundry, picking up some newspaper, and a few weather warning sirens later, chocolate covered goodness. Nothing about the process was particularly difficult - just time consuming. The cake has to cool completel; the balls have to be chilled; then the chocolate needs to set, etc.

A bit of packaging - little wrappers and ribbon to pretty it all up. We took some of the chicks and bunnies to Seth's teachers and some of the prettier balls to a friend for her birthday.

Some leftovers. Whatever shall we do with these? I have to say that I'm not a huge fan of plain Peeps, but the marshmallows and the crunchy sugar coated in chocolate is a bit addictive!

The egg shaped pops didn't work quite like I had hoped. Once the chocolate is set, you are supposed to paint them with corn syrup (stripes, dots, etc.) and then sprinkle sugar on them so they look like deocrated Easter eggs. Unfortunately, the decorations just oozed off. But, now that I know I can make the regular balls, I'm looking forward to doing so for Max's birthday party treats!

Cake pops from:http://www.bakerella.com/

Peeps from:http://www.yourhomebasedmom.com/chocolate-covered-peep-bouquet-and-peep-smores/

I hate food allergies...

2011-04-20T07:18:00.000-07:00

This is not a fun, light hearted post. Feel free to hop on over to the next fun and light hearted blog which you enjoy reading. And, let me just say, that I know that Luke's allergies are part of God's plan. I'm not questioning that. And I would not trade Luke for anything in the whole world! He is crazy insane rowdy, but he's also the most loving child you are likely to ever meet. My prayer for Luke (especially as I start thinking about school for him) continues to be that his awesome personality will always outweigh the extra work that allergies can cause. But today, I'm feeling the need to vent!

Seth's birthday was a couple of weeks ago. I got a fantastic cookbook full of cake pops. Cake pops are little balls of baked cake, combined with icing, on a lollipop stick, and coated with chocolate. This is where the issue arises!

This is as far as I got:

The next step was the issue. Chocolate. Well, there were multiple issues. One issue is that I wanted to shape them like cupcakes and had the supplies to do so but it just wasn't working out. But the bigger issue was that I could NOT find chocolate to use that wasn't cross-contaminated. And yes, these were for Seth who can eat anything. But, really, would you like to come over and explain to Luke why he can't have one of Seth's birthday treats? Didn't think so.

I had a little bit of candy coating bark in my pantry, leftover from Christmas baking, that did not contain any kind of "may contain" [peanuts, tree nuts, etc.] warnings and I was comfortable using this. However, it wasn't nearly enough. Okay, that's easy then - go back to where I bought it and buy some more. I wasn't sure where I bought it but I knew there were only about three stores where I shopped for Christmas baking supplies so I was set to just re-trace my Christmas steps. Dave did some grocery shopping and checked Meijer for me. Not safe for Luke. I checked Target and Kroger one day. Not safe either.

I went home and checked the package of the leftover bark that I had and checked it out online. The information wasn't very detailed online. So, I got up on Tuesday morning and determined we were heading out to buy candy coating/chocolate. Seth did not have school this day so my entire mini-entourage got to make the tour with me. First, we went to Wal-mart. Not safe. Then we went to another Target, because you just never know. Then we went to "the pretty people Marsh." It's not as pretty as it used to be but I always think I'll find that one obscure item there. I did find milk chocolate that I could use - and it was the kind that you melt in its own bowl so that seemed easier for dipping. It was $4 so I only got two. But I really needed white so I could tint it myself. [I also bought cheese crackers and pretended they were a real lunch and fed those to the boys in the car.] Next we went to JoAnn's to see if they had any candy melts that were okay. Nope. Then we went to the Christmas Tree Shoppe, hoping they had something odd and leftover (it's a fun store but often seems to specialize in odd and leftover). They had more milk chocolate and it wasn't labelled as contaminated and I think it was a brand I had read about on some allergy blogs as being 'safe.' But, still no white.

By now, we were running out of time. Certainly for that day we were done. Max fell asleep in the car and the other two needed some rest and I was exhausted from hauling everyone in and out of the car on what felt like a cross country road trip.

So, Wednesday morning I got up, feeling defeated still, and made the cakes anyway, hoping to stretch the white chocolate I had in the pantry as far as possible. Well, once I figured out that the balls wouldn't magically shape themselves like cupcakes and I HAD to have a treat for Seth for Friday morning and, because I can't shop at a bakery for party cupcakes, we still had to make those AND ice cream, I gave up on the cupcake pops. However, I decided that I would e-mail the company that made the candy coating bark that was in my pantry. I also started investigating whether they make the little bowls of chocolate in a white chocolate. OH, and I found more of the milk chocolate bowls at Meijer for $2.50. So, I TOTALLY got ripped off at the pretty people store. Ugh.

I promise, this story ends soon... [as if anyone is still reading]

Finally, Friday afternoon I got an e-mail back. The employee stated that there were no nuts in the product and even told me where to buy it (Wal-mart, where I had already been). So, I rushed out (well, you know, 5 days later because now I already had other treats) and checked it out. I bought it, but I also came home and took a picture of the warning label on the back re: peanuts and tree nuts and e-mailed it to the employee with whom I had been corresponding. I got an e-mail back that says that it's made in a nut-free facility but then transferred to another location where there are nuts, although the products are kept completely separate. I'm very thankful for this information and very excited to attempt some more cake pops for Easter and, especially, for Max's birthday.

But NOW I'm wondering how many other things that are labelled "may contain" and that I put back on the shelf when I'm shopping really don't contain. ARGH. It's so hard to know. Reactions can occur with as little as 1/20th of a peanut. That's clearly a very tiny amount when you think of splitting a peanut into 20 pieces - small enough that you wouldn't notice if it was there. Then there are the varying answers regarding subsequent reactions. One doctor will tell you that the next reaction is likely to be similar to the first reaction - hives in our case. Then there are the doctors who will tell you that subsequent reactions are likely to be more serious than the last.

Everyone has their own comfort level. I'm sure many people think I go overboard. But, when caring for your three year old includes training on how to use an epipen, is it really overboard?

I hate that I even have to know how to use that epipen, let alone make sure it's not expired and make sure there's always a couple in my bag. I hate that I have to tell Luke he can't eat certain things. I hate that I hide food that I like that he can't have. I hate that Seth thinks it's funny to call him "peanut head." I hate that I don't trust very many people to watch him. I hate the special sticker he has to have on his nametag at church. I hate that planning a holiday dinner has to include a discussion of what's safe and what's not. I hate that I don't always get excited about going to other people's houses because it means keeping a constant eye on him and being sure he's not eating anything when I'm not looking.

But, I love my Luke.

Happy 5th birthday to Seth!

2011-04-14T06:17:00.000-07:00

Seth turned 5 on Friday the 8th. Technically not until 10:18pm, but I let him tell everyone that he was 5 all day long. Generous of me, I know. Seth had preschool until 11:45 that morning. He loves school so much that it didn't even bother me to share him with his teachers and friends that morning. I had wanted to make really adorable treats for him to take to school but there were a few issues with that plan (more to come on that in a future post, likely) so we went with chocolate chip bar cookies with some icing and sprinkles. Very festive. I took him to school myself and took him inside, rather than through car line, so that I could help him carry the treats. One of the other pre-k teachers was high fiving him and jumping up and down telling him happy birthday. No wonder he loves school! Apparently he had been letting them know (all week) how many more days until his birthday.David had the day off. So while Seth was at school, Luke and I went to the party store and bought balloons and a few decorations. Then all four of us picked Seth up at school and headed out on Seth's birthday adventure.

First was McDonald's, of course. I only wasted a few minutes trying to convince him that he should pick something better to eat. I knew it was a lost cause, and it was his birthday so I smiled and ate my lunch. Huge bonus [sarcasm alert] - the kids' meal toys make noise this time. So, at noon on Friday the place was filled with kids and their new noise making toys. Argh.

Next, we headed to the zoo. This was Seth's big request for the day. The forecast was questionable but it turned out to be an absolutely beautiful afternoon! Sunshine, not too hot, and a great time was had by all. Only small glitch was that I thought Max would fall asleep in the stroller. I took his favorite blanket and eventually laid his seat back and thought he would just drift off to sleep in the beautiful outdoors. Instead, he kept sitting straight up so as to not miss anything. He never slept there. And Luke actually fell asleep in the car on the way home before Max did!

The penguins are always a big hit.

The polar bear swam by.

Brothers! There was a cute(?) baby elephant in the background for awhile but by the time I got both the boys to sit and look in my general direction the elephant was long gone.

Train ride! Everyone was getting a little warm and tired by this point.

Not sure what Seth was looking at here. I think it's just eagles and vultures in this exhibit. Perhaps my fear of birds has worn off on him.

When we got home I put a movie on for the boys, hoping they would lay down and get some rest, and busied myself tidying for the mini party still to come. Seth wanted pancakes for dinner so the boys had pancakes for dinner. My parents and my sister and her family came over for presents and cake.

Seth was pleasantly surprised with this gift that we bought awhile ago and put away for him. He hadn't seen it in the stores lately and thought he'd missed his chance to get it. I love his surprised little face.

Cupcakes. I thought these were pretty awesome! But I have to give most of the credit to Dave. He made the cupcakes. I made the whipped cream filling. He (using an apple corer) "cored" out holes in the middle and filled them with the filling. Then I made the chocolate icing and he decorated the cupcakes. I don't get it, but he's just much better with the icing shooter than I am.

And I made ice cream - chocolate with oreos and chocolate chips, per Seth's request. Unfortunately, we learned a tough lesson on Seth's birthday. While it's fun to let them do what they want and eat what they want on their birthday, perhaps it's a bit much for a newly 5 year old. Seth had had about 2 bites of the cupcake and ice cream (that I felt like we spent days making for him), when he announced he was done. I thought he said he wanted dad. Someone else thought he said he wanted his bed. At any rate, I found him lying in a chair and we ushered him to the bathroom where he promptly threw up. All over Dave. Which promptly brought the party to an end. Poor baby. Hey, it'll be a great story when he's older, right?

Anyway, I can't believe my first baby is 5 years old. We love you big kid!

I'll take tooth troubles for $600, Alex...

2011-03-31T05:11:00.000-07:00

Picture taken first thing in the morning yesterday with glasses and no makeup to intensify the dramatic effect. Fortunately for me and, unfortunately for aforementioned dramatic effect, the swelling has gone down today so there are no "cleaned up ready to face the world" photos. Today it looks more like I have a wad of chewing tobacco shoved into my mouth. Hey, I went to a public high school. I know what it looks like.

A root canal done through your gums, rather than through your tooth. Involves cutting and stitching of the gums, follow-up appointment to have stitches removed, chewing on one side of the mouth, icepacks, pain meds, and begging your children to listen the first time so you don't have to repeat yourself. What is an apicoectomy?

Red and itchy bumps which necessitate the taking of Benadryl which necessitates the taking of a 2+ hour nap which necessitates sitting around on the couch for hours after saying, 'huh?' [perhaps I was already a little tired and thus the effects were exaggerated] What are hives, likely caused by a delayed allergic reaction to the antibiotic I had to take before the apicoectomy?

Five hours. What is the approximate time my "take every 8 hours" pain meds work.

Egg noodles w/butter and cheese. What is a soft food that I can consume with minimal pain?

A chipmunk or, in my hubby's words, a bulldog. What does my jaw resemble?

Betrayed. [insert laughter, unless your mouth hurts and then just lamely half smile] How does one feel after being asked to schedule her follow-up appointment and pay her bill before her procedure because, "you'll have an icepack and won't want to mess with it," when in reality she will be smuggled out a side door with her icepack so as not to scare all the happy people in the waiting room?

Sneezing, tilting my head back to rinse the shampoo out of my hair, bending down to pick things up off of the floor. What are painful experiences?

Ten. What is the number of times I anticipate having to mention that I had some dental work done this week while hanging with my hubby at a work function tomorrow evening? [Don't want anyone to think their banker is hurting his wife! I've debated sitting this one out, but I really want to go. Selfish, I know.]

Morning...

2011-03-30T04:19:00.000-07:00

Sunday morning Luke got up at 5:30. I will admit to being a bad parent who toted him down the stairs, to the couch, covered us both up with a blanket, turned on a kids' television channel and I nodded off for the next couple of hours. Only later did I discover the beautiful hives (on me, not him), but that's another post. Monday morning. First day of spring break. Seth and Luke got up at 6:15. Why both of them? Because if Seth gets up first he grabs his puppy, wakes Luke, and heads for our room. If Luke gets up first he grabs his favorite things from his bed (currently Koko the train, Pretty Lightning, Rescue the dog, and his moon remote - don't ask as the moon remote is completely useless separated from the moon, but he brings it along anyway), heads to my side of the bed, waits for me to pull back the covers, climbs in with all of his stuff, and cuddles with me. For approximately 3.2 seconds before he then starts chatting, elbowing, poking out my eyes, and pulling at my hair. Tuesday morning. [Well, let's begin with Monday night when Luke was SO exhausted that he couldn't sleep. That's Luke's gig. He refused to nap Monday, even after getting up early and then having a playdate. So, by Monday night he was a crying mess. But he still got up, screaming (and coughing) a couple of times during the night.] So, 6:15 he brings all his stuff and climbs into my bed. To let me know he would like for me to go to the store and buy some smoothies. Just like the ones we had last year. Pronounced 'lah-ast yay-err', as though he will momentarily be saddling up his horse and riding off to milk the cows. After a discussion of not going to the store at this early hour just for smoothies, he crawled over me to the middle of the bed so he could cuddle Daddy too. Perhaps he thought he could persuade David to head to the store? If so, he doesn't know his daddy so well! Then he started coughing. A lot. So, I said to him, "You sound awful." He sat up in the bed, tilted his head, leaned into me and said, "I'm a waffle?"

If you're wondering, this post has no meaning and is going nowhere, but instead was written with the express intent of re-reading when they are 14 and 16 and want to sleep until noon and I am trying to drag them out of their beds.

Soccer-tastic!

2011-03-27T07:43:00.000-07:00

Last Sunday we went to the sporting goods store to buy [better, aka not 'mommy-chosen'] shin guards for Seth, as well as some shoes and a soccer ball. I was helping him try on the shoes with the shin guards and he looked up at me and said, "Mom, do I look soccer-tastic?" He is so funny!

We let Luke carry the soccer ball so he didn't feel too left out while watching Seth get all this new gear. He was very excited about carrying the ball. Until he saw the football helmets. He ditched that soccer ball and took off like a crazy child. Dave helped him get a helmet on his head and then Luke found a football and he was ridiculously excited. I guess my dreams of "pretty" sports like tennis and golf are not shared by my boys!

more daily pix...

2011-03-26T06:16:00.000-07:00

The messiest baby food ever - ick!

A double rainbow - thanks for the phone call telling me to go outside Mom!

Dave's birthday cake - a day late since he felt a guys' trip was more important than celebrating with his family on his birthday. Just kidding, honey. Kinda. The boys enjoying their book recorded by Daddy, for while he was gone on his trip. They listened to it 2 or 3 times everyday.

A quick trip to the zoo on a warmer day.

One of my favorite (clearly non-healthy) meals ~ paninis and onion strings.

The boys are taking swimming lessons, and a smile rather than crying is BIG progress!

10 month old Max...

2011-03-25T07:00:00.000-07:00

It's hard to believe Max is 10 months old! I'm starting to ~~obsess~~ think about his first birthday bash as a way to distract myself from being a little sad that he's almost one. I'm thinking about skipping all the character/animal themed party supplies and just choosing a couple of colors and carrying out more of a color based theme with lots of '1's' and 'M's' everywhere. We'll see how this shapes up.

Anyway, Max has grown up so much this month. He's really taken off with the crawling. Just the other night he was up on his hands and knees, very still. He looked all around and just took off, like his plan was to see how fast he could go. It was so funny to see him look like he was planning it all out!

He has two teeth now and loves to feed himself anything that he can pinch between his finger and thumb (puffs, tiny pieces of food, dirt, lint). He's also pulling up on anything he can find. And he's into everything - especially his brothers' favorite toys. Already he's fulfilling the "littlest brother into everything" role. He really loves attention from his brothers - he smiles and laughs and reaches for them. He's a pretty good shopper, at least for a little while - hanging out in the front of the grocery cart now.

He finally said, "mamamamam." He waves a lot and says "hi" and "bye." I think he says "hi" everytime he sees the phone. I say "gentle" to him a lot and rub his face, trying to get him to be more gentle with all of us and I truly believe there's a word he says back to me that sounds A LOT like gentle - obviously, he's not saying gentle but he is mimicking the word in his own way.

He is definitely the easiest baby of my three! I think knowing how fast it all goes is really hitting home for me and I'm trying to just really take him. Happy 10 months, Max!

Things which I do not enjoy...

2011-03-09T08:30:00.000-08:00

Sick kids. Since mid-January someone has been sick in this house, nearly nonstop. Not the same someone, just everyone at different times. Ugh.

Coughing babies. I absolute cannot stand to hear Max coughing in that crib all alone. I leave him there because he's a great sleeper and I don't want to ruin that. But I have been known to sneak in after he calms down and, if he should maybe sorta almost notice me, I flee the scene like an elf on Christmas Eve!

Participating in a conversation about how my newly 3 year old sat with his older brother and older cousin on his first Sunday in the big kids' class and wasn't very well-behaved. Having to have my sister hear parts of the same conversation [There was a bad little kid who tried to sit with your son...].

Middle of the night ER visits with a screaming child whose ears hurt so badly that he can't stop screaming. Or an earache that doesn't begin until 10pm, after said child has been deposited back into his bed repeatedly.

A new computer system at the hospital with the ER that has every member of the hospital's staff angry and confused and unable to locate the information they've just gathered. THEN hearing them call for a computer support tech (at 2:30 in the morning) to figure out why the computer won't work to spit out both prescriptions, only to find out that the printer was out of paper.

Finally (!) leaving the ER to drive to the pharmacy at 3:30am and being told that they are backing up their computers and it will be at least a half hour before they can fill the prescription.

Picking up a very fussy baby in the nursery at church and asking, "was he upset the whole time?", only to have them respond, "No, he just had to be held." HAD to be held? Correction, you had the privilege of holding my baby. Okay, I suppose when the nursery is full that's unreasonable.

Hearing the words, "I do it myself" when I'm really in a hurry.

The sound of the drive thru employee screaming as I hit the gas rather than the brake, nearly taking her arm with me and spilling an entire large drink all over the drive thru lane.

Having your 4 year old tell you, "You make every day worse." And thinking he might be onto something.

Running on a treadmill in the middle of the shoe store to buy new running shoes. Yes, that's right, running shoes. In which I plan to actually run.

The grocery store. Ever. Solo. With my entourage. In the middle of the day. Late at night. I do not enjoy the grocery store. Period. In fact, I am protesting it at the moment and only cooking things that I have in my pantry or freezer. Unfortunately, we're going to run out of milk and this little experiment will have to come to and end. Because milk, that I do enjoy!

Pix and a peek...

2011-03-01T07:33:00.000-08:00

Here are a few recent pictures of the day: Max, two fisted.

Seth and Luke, post-dentist appointments

Umm, yeah - that's mold. Inside one of my very favorite treats - chocolate covered cherries. We won't discuss that any further!

The daily album is coming along quite nicely. My process goes something like this: Download pictures often - every couple of days. About once a week go through and pick each of my daily pictures for that week. Edit them and send to snapfish, shutterfly, whomever. Then journal on the card in the album while the details are still fresh. Then I just let the pictures sit in the cart on the shopping site for awhile. As long as the journalling in the book stays caught up the pictures are the easiest part. By Friday afternoons I'm ready for the weekend and need something more fun to do while the boys rest so I seem to find myself working on the book then - setting up for the next month or embellishing the couple spots for the week that need some prettying. Each month has its own theme, or at least a color scheme, so the 4 or 5 layouts for that month are very close to identical. And my parents gave me a scrapbooking diecut machine for Christmas so I'm using it quite a bit too for the layout titles, etc.

Then eventually I order the pictures. I like having them printed at the super store where I prefer to grocery shop. Snapfish is an affiliate so I order through them and then just grab them when I'm in the store. Plus, they have volume discounts so I hold off until I have enough to order that the prices are reduced. Then I get to bring them home and match them up with the journalling cards and watch the book take shape!

The whole layoutLeft side

Right side

Who is this person?

2011-02-28T07:23:00.001-08:00

So, I got some wild notion that I was into craftiness. As a FB friend told me, [paraphrasing], being my mom's daugher, there has to be some craftiness in there. However, I did not get the 'visualize' gene, which in my opinion, makes it difficult to make things. I can't imagine in my head what something will look like put together. Or I over-imagine and then am disappointed when I'm done. But, recently, a couple of food blogs I was checking out also had some crafty ideas and I really liked two of them. One was a scarf. I like scarves. They move the eye away from the body and toward the scarf. Probably just wishful thinking, but I'll continue to think it. The other was some adorable felt rosettes. The project on the blog was actually a rosette Valentine wreath. I'm planning to make the wreath in pastel colors for Easter but I thought the flowers would look cute on a pin with the scarf.

So, I set out Saturday to purchase supplies. I'm going to share this part because it was SUCH a cheap project! For the scarf I just needed a t-shirt and fabric glue. A local craft store had their plain t's on sale for $2.50. I bought an XL so I was sure to have enough material. I considered buying a yard of t-shirt type material, but it was $5.99/yard and I really wanted it to be cheaper to make this scarf than to go out and buy a scarf.

Then I bought pin backs to glue the flowers onto. [Sorry, I'm not a jewelry maker. I'm sure there's a word for these.] Here's where I messed up. I bought the biggest ones I found at the first craft store (on sale for about $1 for 10 of them) and thought they were fine so I didn't look at the jewelry stuff at the other two stores. Yes, I went to three stores, but that was part of the fun! Anyway, I need to go back and find more of a circular base on which to fit more flowers. My pin was way too tiny for my scarf. Anyway, I picked 3 colors of felt that I liked together. Two of the sheets were $0.25 each and the third was glittery so it was $0.50. I think I could get at least 8 flowers out of a sheet so they were about a nickel a flower to make (and I have plenty of felt left to make the flowers for the larger pin).

So, here's the finished product. The verdict is still out. Dave doesn't like it at all. But he's not really big into women's fashion (thankfully, I guess) so I'm not sure. I wore it to church and didn't hear anyone laughing out loud at me, but I didn't have anyone beg me to tell them where to get such a fabulous accessory either. HA! There is a second scarf that's more of a scarf/necklace that I also plan to make. Hold your breath waiting for those photos too!

Max at 9 months old...

2011-02-22T11:44:00.000-08:00

Hard to believe it was already time to stick another sticker on the front of my baby's shirt and snap those photos. Harder still to believe that there are only 3 stickers left until we are celebrating his first birthday! The stickers sit on the top of his dresser so that I always know where they are. I felt like that nine month sticker was taunting me - he's been here as long as he was growing inside of me. But man, that double digit 10 month sticker that's on top of the package now - that one might drive me crazy!

This has been another fun month! Max now has one tiny tooth poking through his gums. He has officially started crawling, but he really prefers the faster (for him anyway) dragging of himself across the floor.

He eats nearly anything but seems to get really excited about his butternut squash-applesauce-brown rice combo. And it would appear that he's a big fan of the raspberry-pear combo.

Selfishly, one of my very favorite things about Max right now is that he loves his mommy! You must understand that with my boys, the mommy obsession very early gives way to following daddy around in circles. And that's okay - I want my little boys to want to be like their daddy and to adore him. But, it's nice to be able to walk into the room and see Max's face light up and have him sort of reach for me. I'm going to love it while it lasts!

Happy 9 months old sweet Max!

Three years old?

2011-02-20T19:56:00.000-08:00

It's really hard for me to believe that my sweet little Lukey is 3 years old! We asked Luke what kind of cake and ice cream he wanted and he kept saying strawberry. He never waivered. Then I started asking what kind of decorations he wanted (or, in kid terms, 'what do you want on the plate when I hand you your cupcake?'). But he would only respond with, "stwawbewwies!"

I really want the boys' birthdays to be very special days for them. With three kiddos, there's a lot of sharing, as there should be, but I really want each one to feel special on his birthday. Dave was able to take the day off and Seth had school in the morning so just Luke and I ran some errands in the morning. We started at a bookstore, really for a book for me, but Luke managed to convince me that he might need a new book. Or two. Then we went to the party store so Luke could pick plates and napkins for his party. He chose Elmo. I really thought we'd walk out with Woody and Buzz, but he insisted on Elmo, and insisted on carrying it all to the checkout himself. I think he really just liked the matching party hats. From there we went to the store and bought another cupcake mix (the batch I made Thursday tasted burnt to me). He wanted to tell the lady at the checkout all about his 'stwawbewwy birthday.' Then we ran home, met up with Daddy and Max, made the cupcakes, fed Max, and were back out the door before noon to pick Seth up from school.

Next came the adventure for the day. Dave came up with the activity. After we picked up Seth, we were driving down the road and Seth was pointing out the bowling alley and saying that would be fun to do, maybe once Max is 'grewn up.' We confirmed with Luke that he thought it would be fun someday too and then we pulled into the parking lot. They've "bowled" on the Wii before but this was the first time for either of them to really bowl. It was truly one of the funniest things I've ever seen! Birthday boy at the bowling alley.

We started out this way - bumpers and bowling the ball himself. Dave was a bowler before we met so he was trying to share some technique with him. You can see Luke has crossed the line and is making his way down the lane.

Nevermind that the ball was going SO slow that the screen started flashing and suggesting that we resume bowling. While the ball was wandering down the lane toward the pins.

The ball return was extremely fascinating to both boys.

Very much a fashion statement, those shoes!
A bowling alley employee suddenly appeared with this strange looking thing (it looks a little like a child sized walker). He asked if we wanted to use it. I'm pretty sure I looked at him like he had two heads growing out of his neck, but it turned out to be the neatest thing. The boys put the bowling ball at the top and then it rolls down so it picks up some speed from the get-go and moves things along. I had to laugh at Dave, who kept adjusting it to try to get the best shot. He finally let go and just let them go at it for awhile.

Max was there too. Hanging out in my arms most of the time.

No trip to the bowling alley would be complete without some super greasy and yummy food. It was close to lunchtime so we just got a little something to get them through. After we left the bowling alley we got a much healthier lunch - McDonald's - and promptly deposited Luke into his bed for a little nap.

After that we had dinner. Or I guess I should say I made a (yucky) kid friendly dinner and neither of the boys touched anything on their plate. Normally this would've been an issue, but I've decided that there are three boys which means three birthdays a year and I will NOT fight with them about food on those days. [Don't tell them that.]

After dinner, Grammy and Grampy came over and brought this big ol' noisy dump truck. Clearly he is in love! All sorts of things have been dumped from the back of the the truck. We caught Luke trying to get into it himself today. Right then I made a mental note not to let Max out of my sight! Ha. Luke also got some Cars toys (because we don't have any of those around here), a new game, a fire truck shirt, a puzzle, some toy tools, a couple of books, and a moon. Luke LOVES the moon and a friend of mine (thanks Susan) told me about one that we could put in his room. It's very cool.

Blowing out the candle on his cupcake (and homemade strawberry ice cream).

The party hat and strawberry smoothie. [I love a good theme, although it did feel a little pink for a boy's party.]

The moon in his room. SO fun.

And finally, I guess I missed the memo of how life changes when you turn three. I got to sleep in Saturday morning so when I got up Dave, Seth and Luke were having breakfast. I came downstairs and sat down at the table and Luke looked at me and said, "Hi, Cara." Umm, no, being three does NOT mean you can call Mommy by her first name! Oh, that boy!

More daily pix...

2011-02-15T19:56:00.001-08:00

Just a few more pictures from my picture a day album... Indoor s'mores. Mmmm, good!
My view from the front seat, looking back.

On the way out the door for our Valentine's Day (or Saturday night) date.

Happy Valentine's Day!

My Word for 2011

2011-02-07T19:00:00.000-08:00

Commit: to carry into action deliberately; to obligate or pledge oneself. [paraphrased, taken from Miriam-Webster's online dictionary].

Let's ignore that two of the other definitions involve crimes and mental institutions and just run with it, shall we?

I love the idea of having one word that defines and shapes your year. Here is the best explanation that I've found for this concept. [Disclaimer: I've not read anything else on this website yet, just the one page to which I linked.]

So, to what do I want to commit? A lot. Some being more important than others. First, I want to commit to being here for my kids. I'm here physically, for sure. But I feel like we waste a lot of time when we're together. And maybe that's it - maybe I just need to realize that I am here and that, hopefully, that's what they will remember and that that's okay. But, I feel like I spend a lot of my day looking forward to naptime or to when Dave comes home. I think I got really off track when I was pregnant with Max and just never got things back to where I want them to be. I know there are ways to be more efficient with my time so I can get things done and still spend time with them doing fun mommy things. I just need to regroup and figure all that out.

Along those same lines I feel like I spend a lot of time thinking, "I'll do that in just a little while." But really, I just need to do it! Commit. If it needs to get done, do it now if it's at all feasible.

I am committed to doing my picture a day album for 2011. It's going really well so far. I want to try to take some pictures of the finished pages and share those. But I am committed to seeing it through. The Christmas album is only partly done and I don't want that to be the case with this one! It's easy and fun and I plan to keep it up. I'm committed.

I also want to commit to a very specific exercise goal. Me and two of my favorite people have been trying go to the gym 2 nights a week and walk/jog on the treadmill. The holidays, and then the weather, have deterred us to be sure, but those were temporary setbacks and we're back at it. I'm looking forward to the weather improving too so we can get outside. We started this in October (?) and it's been a rough winter (in terms of weather) but I'm ready to get out there and see if it's not a bit easier when there is a whole world of outdoors to explore! Plus, I'm hoping it happens much more often if I don't have to drive to the gym at 8 or 9pm. Scratch that, I'm committing to it happening more often when I can be outside.

Anyway, my exercise goal is to do this. I've wanted to do the 500 mini marathon for a long time but it always fills up or, for the last 5 years I've either been pregnant or pregnant too recently to really train. But not this year! I would love to lose some weight, but more importantly I would love to get healthy. I am worried about some hip pain. I think I have a bit of arthritis maybe(?) and my hip hurts pretty much all of the time. That or I've injured myself (you know, what with my gazelle-like form on the treadmill and all). Anyway, once I'm done breastfeeding Max I'll head to the doctor and see if there are some meds, etc. that would help with this. I just find that I'm in pain a lot of the time, and not the good "wow, that was some good exercise and I can feel it pain" but more the "it hurts to roll over on my hip even in my sleep and I'm not resting well" kind of pain. But it hurts whether I exercise or not so it seems silly not to go ahead and exercise.

And finally, I need to commit to a church and do something. Anything. I'll leave that one at that.

So, there you have it. My word - commit! My goal - not to end up being committed (re: the mental institution definition), but rather to 'deliberately carry' the above into action!

Loving me some Lukey...

2011-01-31T06:48:00.000-08:00

This post falls into the category of "just because I want to remember." It might be boring to the rest of you, but I just don't want to forget...

One night recently I was reading some books to the boys. One of the books had a leopard in it. I read about the leopard. Luke got all 'pitiful Luke' and said, "What about the cheetah?" I explained it was a leopard and that we'd just read about him. He looked at me and said, "Let me see if it's a cheetah." Then he got up closer to the book and said, "Umm, let's see. Yes, it's a cheetah."

He loves sto state the obvious. I think this is pretty normal at almost three, but it makes me laugh. Usually. Most recently, "If he's cold then he is cold." Thank you for that insight!

One night recently he kept getting out of bed. This was a first for Luke and was my biggest fear about him sleeping in a big bed. The problem with Luke is that he's just so funny. He kept coming out of his room acting like he was sneaking and then he'd bust out laughing as soon as he saw us. He has a cold though and is all sniffly snotty icky - just "off." But the second time he got up he informed us, "I can't sleep because my nose smells like boogers."

I dropped him off at for an hour or so at childcare a few weeks ago. I went to pick him up and the person working in his room told me it's like everything he says is magical. I tried to explain to her that while that's nice for him, I'm pretty sure he gets away with way too much because of it. But I think I just came off sounding like a bad mom.

And, finally, he's really bad about calling us back into his bedroom at night. When I go in and ask what he needs his answer is, "Hugs and keeeses." Who can resist that?

**On a little side note, sweet Luke's little cold progressed into bronchitis. It has made for many a sleepless night, many fights over taking his medicine (not because it's so yucky, but because he thinks it's cute to run from me), and many many meltdowns over pretty much nothing. I couldn't help but capture this look as one of my daily pictures!

8 months old...

2011-01-24T07:08:00.001-08:00

My sweet little baby is getting big (Well, not really. He's actually about to fall off the weight chart. But, he is getting older.). I know, I know, that's how it's supposed to work. He can sit up for a few seconds if I put him in that position. He is trying to get himself into that position. And he has recently discovered that he can pull himself across the floor much faster than he can roll. He can get up on all fours but he doesn't go anywhere just yet. He has started eating puffs, and is quite good at actually getting them to his mouth. He likes nearly all of the veggies he's tried, with the exception of green beans. He eats whatever fruit comes his way. He likes to watch his brothers play. He babbles like crazy - often mimicking the sounds of 'hi' when we say it to him. And his smile still lights up the room. So, without further adieu, a few shots from our 8 month photo shoot...

2011-01-17T06:16:00.000-08:00

In my never ending quest to document our life (lives? maybe singular as we're living it altogether?), I'm working on a new and simpler version of a scrapbook this year. It's this concept, only I'm cheap and I didn't LOVE either of the designs available for purchase so I bought a scrapbook, on sale of course, and some divided page protectors and I am SURE I have nearly all of the other supplies I could need already here in my still too messy office.

Anyway, it's a simple concept - take one picture everyday (or lots of pictures everyday but choose just one picture) and journal about that picture. So far I'm mostly keeping up and I love to see the book coming together so quickly.

Here are a some pictures from the first few weeks of 2011:

Happy Max, first thing in the morning.

We gathered up all of the books from both bookcases (and various other places around the house) and attempted to organize them. Wow, my life is exciting! But that's what the scrapbook is about - documenting your own life, whether it's crazy exciting or just book organizing.

One day we had a picnic lunch upstairs in my bedroom. Why? Because it's at least 10 degrees warmer upstairs. And because I get a little bored with lunch. The boys almost always want the same thing. But this day I cut their sandwiches into little shapes and served it to them on a blanket upstairs and it felt less boring.

I know I've mentioned it before but Luke LOVES the moon. We went to some friends' house to watch a football game. Dave stayed for the whole game and I brought the kids home for bed. Seth was crying because he wanted to stay and play and because Daddy wasn't coming with us. Max was crying because Seth was crying. Luke was sitting in his seat saying, "Look, it's my moon!" He seemed so oblivious to all the other screaming! So, I might love the moon too because I think if the third child had started in I might have lost it!

Max's first "finger food".

These things I know...

2011-01-12T08:00:00.000-08:00

-The older boys seem to love Max's new Christmas toys as much as their own (age appropriate ones). Max loves his socks. Off of his feet. And in his mouth.

-Every chocolate chip cookie I have ever made is flat flat flat. They taste yummy but look hideous. Thoughts?

-Cooking with Luke is hysterical. Conversation: L: If the sugar is good, the sugar is good. Me: Sugar is good, but this is flour. L: Oh, let me smell. Me: Umm, not that kind of flour/flower. L: OH, then I'll smell this one. [leans into cactus thing on the windowsill]. *A few minutes later...* L: I'll carry the eggs. Me: No, I think I'll carry the eggs. L: I LOVE eggs. [Interesting as he won't eat them scrambled or hard boiled.] Eventually, he went to dump flower into the mixer and dumped it backwards (I have NO idea how) but covered me and him and the countertop. Finally, he ended up eating "sprinkles," aka brown sugar, off the counter.

-The difference between puke and spit-up. Thanks, Max, for that clarification!

-Seth uses all of his "good" up at school and is crazy once he arrives home.

-Cleaning the office takes roughly a week (I'm hoping to complete it in the next few days anyway), when you must stop roughly every 4 minutes to referee a fight or start another movie or help find a lost toy.

-Clothes do not turn themselves right side out - not in the washer or the dryer.

-"Away in a Manger" is apparently a seasonless song that we will be listening to all year long.

Wrapping up 2010

2010-12-31T20:12:00.000-08:00

As 2010 draws to a close I find myself wanting to wrap it all up. I want to have every 2010 crumb swept off the kitchen floor. I want to have all the 2010 laundry spotted, washed, dried, and put away. I want to have every 2010 dish clean and put away. But, alas, it's not possible (it's already after 11pm on the 31st) to accomplish all of this. So, I'll get up tomorrow morning and sweep some more crumbs and do some more laundry and put away some dishes, and that will be that.

David has been on vacation from work this week and we have accomplished some good things. Most of the Christmas decorations are down and put away. It always makes me a little sad to put all the twinkly lights and glittery decorations away. This is (maybe?) a little known fact which I had to share with Seth. He was mid-tantrum while Dave was packing away the beloved Christmas train so I had to share with him that it wouldn't be special if it was out all year. And, truth be told, I think it helped me a little to say the words out loud to someone else. Plus, I really do like when it's all put away and the house looks less cluttered.

And today we hung shelves and pictures in our bathroom and bedroom. We got new bedroom furniture. Eleven months ago. So, today we finally unpacked the box that has been hiding behind the door and hung those shelves. Okay, it hasn't been there the whole 11 months. I spray painted the shelves to match the new comforter and I know I didn't do that last January, as I remember doing it outside.

But, blogging hasn't been much of a priority this week, so I never shared our Christmas pictures. So, here's a very brief recap: Christmas Eve at my parents' house with my sister and her family. Christmas morning at home with just the five of us, then my parents came by so the boys could show them their gifts. Christmas evening back at my parents' house with extended family. Seth, opening a new truck - love his expression!

Luke REALLY wanted a miguitar. I have no idea what the "mi" is about. I thought for awhile it was his way of saying "my guitar." But, he refers to other things as "my" this or that (the moon, specifically, is "my moon"), but the guitar is more of one word - miguitar. Odd, but too cute to be corrected really.

And Max, checking out a new sippy cup, Colts burp cloths (he loves his burp cloths) and a loud spinning top toy that Seth picked out for him.

And, finally, I'm not a resolutions type of person. It's just one more thing for me to fall short of finishing or accomplishing. But, I've been hearing about picking one word to be your theme for the next year. I've been thinking about this and I narrowed it down to two words. One seemed like too much of a stretch for me (that sounds wimpy but it's really just funny). The other I think I like, but I'm going to try it out for a few days before I share it. Knowing the word, I am cracking up as I type this. Of course, it's also almost midnight and I'm exhausted (no, 'exhausted' is not the word!), but exhaustion does make things funnier. On that note, Happy New Year!

7 months

2010-12-23T07:44:00.000-08:00

My sweet baby boy was seven months old on the 21st. That night we were all in the older boys' room getting them settled into bed and I looked up and Max was on his hands and knees. I wanted to run over and shove him down, but I know I need to let him grow up. It's just so hard sometimes!

Max definitely knows when he wants something and will gladly let you know if you're not getting it for him fast enough. He loves sweet potatoes and most of the fruits he has tried. He chews on anything that comes close to his mouth. And he recently started reaching out for us while he cries the most pathetic cry. Mostly he's a very pleasant baby. He likes to roll all around on the floor. He loves to watch his brothers play. And when he smiles, that smile takes over his whole face - squinted eyes, wrinkled nose, huge toothless mouth wide open - it's the best!

Jolly jolly

2010-12-22T08:30:00.000-08:00

One of my favorite holiday outings is to the Children's Museum. I think it's a favorite of the boys' too. Dave's employer is a sponsor of the Museum's Jolly Days so one night each year the Museum stays open late and all the employees and their families can come and play. Most of the regular attractions are open, plus the big slide and pretend ice fishing, etc. It's a lot of fun to be there "after hours," as it's a much small crowd, plus the added bonus of Daddy going with us! Max's first carousel ride, on a horse. I took all three boys a few weeks ago but Max had to ride in my arms while I stood that day so that I could keep track of Seth and Luke too.

Seth pretending to drive a race car. When Seth grows up he wants to be a member of a pit crew. He wanted to be a driver but he changed his mind because he doesn't want to crash. And no, I did not suggest that it was too dangerous!

Luke - ice fisherman.

Going down the big slide. It's tough to tell, but Dave and Luke are on the left and Seth is on the right, clearly winning this time. They got to go down the slide four times. I even slid with Luke one of the times. It was pretty fun.

It was snowing and all the Christmas lights were beautiful. This picture really doesn't do it justice! Sorry.

This was the same weekend we rode the train. The boys were exhausted. After we put the boys in bed I found out Seth's school was on a delay the next morning, which means he doesn't go since he's only half day. I was so happy for that extra day of rest (probably moreso for his teacher than for him!).

All Aboard!

2010-12-19T11:00:00.000-08:00

On Friday the 10th, after David brought the boys' favorite fast food home for their dinner, we told them we were going on an adventure. We had them put on their pajamas and slippers, grab blankets, and we hit the road. First stop, Grammy and Grampy's to drop Max off for a few hours. Not sure who gets more spoiled, the baby or the grandparents, but I think everyone loves when there is just one child to love on all evening.

And away we went. Off to ride... The train station was a little more than an hour from our house. Of course, it was already dark outside, Seth had his program the night before, and I think the boys were just a little tired. An hour long car ride about did them in. I think Luke was nearly asleep when we got there.

Here they are waiting in the train station. We told them on the way where we were going. But they immediately started asking questions about the movie and I was suddenly worried that the train ride couldn't compare and there would be great disappointment.

Getting ready to board the train. Mom and the boys. I feel the need to say that I had on a gray coat and dark jeans. I fear it looks a little like I was also wearing pajamas. I was not. There were adults who were. Not judging, just saying, I was not one of those parents! Thank you for allowing me that brief public service announcement!

Here is Luke, not long after we got going. I think he was noticing some Christmas lights. Or maybe the flashing train warning signs on the side of the road (?).

This was one of the events we needed our cookies for. They passed out some cookies, but between the lighting and the train's movement, and my terrible vision, I couldn't even read if they were okay for Luke. I did eat one later, but ours were better anyway. Although Seth didn't seem to think so. He insisted he only liked one color of the icing (but it was all the same icing, just food colored, not flavored). Anyway. We all got hot chocolate too, but all of those pictures seem to be of my hands balancing multiple white styrofoam cups.

They stamped tickets with the boys' initials for them. Pretty cool!

Seth looked at the book for awhile. They tell you that you must have the book. I envisioned the story being read, with great enthusiasm, over the loud speaker. Not so much. We could've lived without the book entirely, but Seth enjoyed looking at it and I enjoy looking at Seth looking at books so it was all alright.

This picture is supposed to show you all that the train did a little swaying back and forth. This will be important later.

The North Pole. Two little boys scoping out the North Pole. Santa emerged and then rode the train for a little while.

An uncharacteristically sheepish Luke. He wasn't so sure about Santa. Since then he has informed me that he doesn't want Santa to bring him presents. I asked why not. He said, "I just don't love toys." I'm wondering if the whole guy coming down the chimney thing is bothering him a bit.

This was plenty close for Luke, and that's fine with me. I'm not the biggest fan of Santa and the whole notion of it. I mean let's review - he delegates ALL of his work and yet still gets all of teh credit, takes really really long vacations after the holidays, likely will never grow up, and lacks all fashion sense.

And this, I was desperately hoping this was the look of a little boy who had had SO much excitement that he just couldn't stay awake for a moment more. Instead it was the look of a little boy who got very sick to his stomach (remember the swaying ornaments?), but did his very best to hide it. Until he threw up in the car on the way home. I kept asking and asking, 'are you sure you're okay?' and 'is your belly okay?' And he kept answering, 'I'm fine.' At one point I said, "Are you going to get sick?" He answered, "No." And that was true, he just left out the part that he had already gotten sick! He didn't confess until the next morning that he started feeling crummy on the train. So, I didn't want him to sleep in his room (also Luke's room) and further contaminate Luke if he had the stomach flu. But we have a large L-shaped couch so he slept on one end and I slept on the other end and we left the Christmas tree on all night. I've always wanted to sleep by the tree but have never been able to justify giving up the good night of sleep I would get in my bed. So, this was a good excuse. And he never got sick again, thankfully! Poor baby. Also, thankfully, he still talks about the train ride with great enthusiasm.

On the way home, Luke said, "Daddy, Wukey is tired." Then about 30 seconds later, "Daddy! Wukey is still tired!" So funny.

So, it was a good time, but not one we will probably repeat too soon, mostly because Seth apparently doesn't handle trains so well. Guess we won't be planning a cross-country via Amtrak vacation anytime soon!

An Open Letter...

2010-12-17T09:07:00.000-08:00

Dear Fellow Mall Patrons,

I am aware it is Christmastime. I am aware the mall is very crowded. Thank you , however, for affirming my deep deep desire to NOT go to the mall this holiday season. There were two items, two small items, that required a "quick" trip. Hence, I went shopping this morning. Not Saturday afternoon during peak mall time, but Friday morning.

And yes, my very old double stroller is a monstrosity. Trust me though, you would rather my 2 year old have a big ride than be roaming free at the mall. As such, I would like to let you know that the smile I flashed when you all walked in front of me, thinking I could really stop the stroller on a dime, was fake and plastered on my face. The stroller is old. The stroller is heavy. There was an infant carrier, with an infant. There was a two year old, a very strong two year old, clearly in the front of the stroller. Both were actually very well-behaved. Well, except for the brief incident where Luke got stuck half in and half out trying to slither under the tray in the front, but it was resolved quickly. Unfortunately, if I met you at the end of my whirlwind trip, I might have sighed loudly. I apologize for that.

Now, I will go and have a cup of hot cocoa and attempt to unfreeze the painful fake smile from my face.

Seriously,
Cara

Sweet shepherd boy and a cookie maker

2010-12-13T20:27:00.000-08:00

Seth's school Christmas program was last Thursday night. They were all dressed as shepherds. Unfortunately, we weren't allowed to take pictures during the program. No big deal really, since I turned my camera on after the big performance and it was dead. Thankfully, Grammy was there with her camera to save the day!
Seth did a great job - he looked like he knew the words and motions and was participating. He had been singing one of the songs at home. A lot. So much that Luke had learned it too, just listening to Seth. I thought we might've been in trouble Thursday morning when Seth asked Luke, "Luke, are you going to be quiet tonight and listen to me sing?" Luke's response? "Yes, but I want to be a rockstar like Seth." Hmmm. But, when it was time, Luke headed to the upstairs viewing area with Grammy, Grampy and Aunt G, Uncle Matt, and his cousins. They allege that he was well-behaved.

After the program, Seth was cracking me up! He was a social butterfly! He was running around, calling everyone by name and telling them goodbye. He hugged one little girl, that I hadn't even heard of, and told her he would miss her. (Uh, you have school the next morning!) But, it was really fun to see him "in his element."

Thursday morning the boys and I made sugar cookies. We had events coming up Friday night and Sunday night for which we needed "safe" Luke treats. We used store bought dough, but we still had to flour them, roll them out and cut them out. That was all we (I) could handle on Thursday. Then Friday morning while Seth was at school, Luke and I finished them off with icing and sprinkles.
Luke very much enjoyed cleaning up the plate of extra sprinkles. He was also generous with the sprinkles on the cookies. Not sure if you can tell, but this one has so many sprinkles that the icing is actually oozing off of the cookie. I really had to let go and realize that Luke was loving every minute of this mess and (1) not care that the cookies were less than perfect, and (2) not care that this was going to a massive mess to clean up in the end!

But, they turned out okay and Luke loved them. Seth wasn't much of a fan, but he's a ridiculously picky eater anyway! More to come on our fun Friday and Sunday events soon...

i love pictures...

2010-12-12T13:37:00.000-08:00

Shutterfly has a great offer to receive some free cards just by sharing my past/current experiences with their company. So, I'd like to tell you about how easy and fun it is to make special photo memories into gifts and cards. If you are my mom or dad, stop reading. Otherwise, read on...

I love to take pictures, I love to scrapbook, and I love to give pictures as gifts, especially to grandparents. It has become a tradition for us that some of the grandparents receive a calendar each year. This year I am using Shutterfly for our calendars. I absolutely fell in love with a really feminine calendar - different backgrounds for each month - many in florals and pastel colors. We all know I don't have too much girliness in my life, so I jumped on this and started loading pictures and making my calendar. Then it dawned on me that perhaps Grampy wouldn't think a pastel, flowered calendar was so great for his desk at work. So, after I finished the first one for Grammy, I saved the calendar again and just went in and changed all the backgrounds to more basic/masculine choices. It was really easy and both calendars still have all the same pictures. Here's a link that will take you to all of the calendar styles.

Last year, after I made the calendar, I also made a simple photobook for one of the other Grandmas. It was easy to use the pictures already uploaded for the calendar and just pick out some of our very favorites. Here's a link to the snapbooks. They are small, spiralbound, and I imagine fit perfectly in her purse so she can show it off at church on Sunday mornings. I try to include a lot of the sillier pictures that you don't necessarily print and hand out, but in a book with lots of pictures, they are fun to include.

And finally, Christmas cards. I love making our Christmas cards. Unfortunately, I do not always love taking the posed family photo. So, this year I think I am going to choose a layout (yes, I should probably get on this!) that allows me to use 4 or 5 photos, then I can use one picture of each of the 3 boys individually and then just pick one or two of my favorite pictures of all 3 of them from this last year. It seems so much easier to get a good picture when you're not really trying! I especially love that Shutterfly has a tab for "religious cards," after all that is why we celebrate Christmas, so it's important to me that Christ be a part of my card!

So, there you have it - fun and easy gifts, courtesy of Shutterfly. Now, I just need to go and complete all of mine!

Seven years later

2010-12-06T05:25:00.000-08:00

Once upon a time there was a banker named David, whose banker friend invited him to church. First (?), because it was a great church, and second, because there was "a girl" there that the friend thought David should meet.

That girl was away at grad school. Bummer for that girl. But there was a girl named Cara, who was also going to school, but was here in town.

After some shameless flirting (the debate will continue to rage as to who started said shameless flirting), Cara caught David's eye [or maybe the other way around; no wait, I'm writing the blog - David was completely smitten with Cara].

David's friend and his friend's wife set up a dinner outing with people at church, complete with a designated meeting place to meet and ride together to the other side of town for dinner. Cara showed up at the designated meeting place. So did David, his friend and his friend's wife. Oddly (or rather schemedly - yeah, it's not a word, but it conveys my meaning anyway), everyone else met at the restaurant, where Cara headed to the table and buried herself among some friends so as to not have to sit by David and look too "date-y" and have too many people gossip about them.

Good effort Cara. Eventually David worked up the nerve to ask Cara out on a real date - lunch at a much frumpier place than Cara would normally dine. Little did David know, Cara would've been just as happy with a slice of pizza from the food court. Thanks to law school finals, Cara and David didn't have another date for a few weeks - Christmas at the Zoo and dinner out. David alleges that he knew then that Cara was the girl for him. Cara took a little more convincing [her thought process at that time: I'm nearly done with law school. I don't have time for this nonsense.]

But David was persistent. One year to the day after their first frumpy lunch date, David proposed to Cara downtown at the canal, complete with twinkly Christmas lights and mind numbing cold temperatures.

In the next year, Cara wrote a big ugly all-consuming paper for law school, graduated law school, spent weeks at bar review, got kidnapped from bar review by her mom and sister to shop for a wedding dress, spent a week living in a hotel w/a fridge stocked full of her favorite study foods(courtesy of David - still one of the best gifts ever) to study non-stop for the bar, took the bar, passed the bar, planned a wedding, got married, and gleefully honeymooned in Cancun!

And never, never, ever, did Cara imagine that this is what life would look like 7 years later - attorney turned stay at home mom to three (!) little boys, with a wonderfully loving and supportive husband who works so hard to let her be at home (even though Cara is quite sure an attorney's salary was more what he had in mind, rather than a gluestick waving, cookie baking, minivan driving mama). But that's what this whole marriage thing is about, right? Compromise, change, growing together, and most of all - a whole lotta love!

Thank you, David, for 7 wonderful years of marriage, 3 fantastic little boys, and the promise of the rest of our lives together. I love you!

Countdown to Thanksgiving...

2010-11-25T18:18:00.000-08:00

#1 - the list. Okay, so it's cheating a little. But, I've been a little worried about what to make #1 on my thankfulness countdown - I mean I've already covered my three boys, my hubby, etc. But, then I checked out Jill's great list and thought - oooh, fun. So, here goes - a simple list of simple things for which I am so thankful...

*toothless baby smiles
*the perfect rollerball pen
*hot chocolate made with milk
*a pair of crazy comfortable casual boots
*sleeping in
*cuddles from sweet little boys
*a great bargain
*bedtime after a long day
*dark nail polish
*curling up on the couch with a book and two little boys
*parents who love my kiddos
*my oldest and dearest friend
*overpriced mochas
*a sister who makes me laugh
*chocolate, preferably dark
*a new recipe that turns out just right
*pictures
*an old movie I've seen 50 times but still love
*fuzzy slipper socks
*a new scrapbook magazine in the mail
*awesome customer service
*a shared laugh with my husband
*a big hug from an old friend
*an old song on the radio
*giving the perfect gift
*letting the boys be creative
*doing something I didn't think I could do
*saying something out loud that needed to be said
*cuddling my baby as he falls asleep
*getting dressed up

Countdown to Thanksgiving

2010-11-24T12:46:00.000-08:00

#2 - my sweet sweet Seth. I love this little guy. Sometimes I feel bad that he was the first baby to a clueless mom - but I'm pretty sure that plays into all that birth order personality thing. He's a bit high strung, like me. He likes to do what he likes to do, when he likes to do it. Maybe a little bit like me, too.

I was really worried about school because of those less than flexible characterstics, but not only does he love it, he's learning SO much. He loves to point out what letter a word starts with or show me letters on signs. He counted to 99 a couple of days ago. And he loves his teacher and the assistant and has made lots of friends.

I got to go to the Thanksigiving party at school. A teacher (other than Seth's teacher) stopped me and said he is the smiliest little boy. I keep hearing that from people at school. It makes me wonder a little if he's just so happy to be away from me? When I told Dave about the teacher stopping me, I looked at Seth and told him how happy I was that he loved school so much and that it was making him happy to be there. He looked at me and said, "Moooommmm, I smile for the ladies." HUH?

And finally, Seth loves his brothers. I love to watch him and Luke from a distance. Unfortunately, they can downward spiral into a fight in so little as a blink of an eye, but when it's good, it's adorable. I also love to see him interact with Max. If prompted, he'll tell him about his day or about his toys or whatever else pops into his head. He's very sweet to Max.

Countdown to Thanksgiving

2010-11-23T20:08:00.000-08:00

#3 - bread. Okay, after "yesterday's" more serious post, you had to know today's was going to be silly. And, I've spent my day with flour and yeast, making bread and rolls so it was a logical pick. This could have been a fairly painless experience, but for the part where, in the midst of trying to form cloverleaf dinner rolls and roll out the dough for these sweet rolls, Luke got out of his bed 7 times. It wasn't pretty. I plan these things for naptime so I can try to knock them out quickly. Luke was having none of it today! But, I digress...

Back to the thankfulness! I do love bread. I know, that's not a good thing. But, I do. It's who I am. I also love my bread machine. I was reminded of that today, as today's recipe was not a bread machine recipe. Bummer. But, I do feel a sense of accomplishment when I succeed at non-bread machine bread. This one recipe of dough made 24 dinner rolls (for Thanksgiving) and about 18 sweet rolls (for who knows what).

Rolled out, sugared and chocolated up, and ready to form into rolls. Mmm, yummy. I will tell you though, that if you decide to make these rolls, ease up on the salt. They're a bit too salty for my liking (and I like salt, too). The finished product, with some icing.

I mean, who wouldn't be thankful for these?

Countdown to Thanksgiving

2010-11-22T12:49:00.001-08:00

[Okay, so I was on such a roll of keeping up with my thankful posts (so rare for me) and then I got bogged down and started feeling more frazzled and frumpy than thankful. That said, I'm cheating and backdating this one so it looks like I still kept up.]

#4 - God's plan. I'm thankful to live where I live and have the freedoms that I am privileged to have. I could go on and on here about not taking things for granted, but this is supposed to be about thankfulness, not whining. The specific freedom I'm thinking of today is that of religious freedom. I'm thankful that we can go to church wherever we want. There was a guest speaker at church a few weeks ago and I find myself still thinking about his message.

This gentleman was from another part of the world. The thing that really struck me was how he was able to put together a timeline of his life and corresponding things that were happening here, halfway around the world, that would impact him later. I don't really remember specifics, but it was something like, when he was 3 or 4, an American couple went to Bible school with the intention of translating a portion of the Bible into his language. Of course, this couple didn't know him, but God did and had a plan.

That's the part of the message that I keep going back to. I know God knows me and has a plan for me. So, why, oh why, do I whine about certain things so much? I love love love being at home with my boys. But it's lonely and exhausting and not so glamorous. I had a very social work environment - friends I loved sharing my life with and could laugh with; lunches out; a grasp on current events. I got dressed up every day and put on makeup and nice clothes and shoes that made me feel pretty. Now, there are days where my slippers are the only shoes I wear (and some of you know how NOT pretty those are!). There's a lot of snot and spit up and raised voices and whining.

BUT, I keep remembering the message and thinking, "THIS is where God has placed me. And, knowing that, am I using this time the way that He would have me?" I'm not sure what it all means to me right now, but God keeps bringing it to my mind. And I know He has a plan for me!

Countdown to Thanksgiving

2010-11-21T16:00:00.000-08:00

#5 - Max! Today, Max is 6 months old. I won't go on and on about how time flies. Because, frankly, I want to cry each and every time I think about how fast this half of a year has gone.

So, what's Max up to these days? Eating! Max seems to really enjoy most of the food he has tried. He started with rice cereal, then green beans, later peas, some butternut squash, a little applesauce, and most recently sweet potatoes. The only one he doesn't seem to love is squash. We've been making the veggies ourselves (well, not growing them, but cooking them and blending them up and freezing them) so I'm excited to see what fun combos he might enjoy after he's tried everything individually. Max loves his thumb. It really is cute. But, I know that when he's four and still doing it, it won't be nearly as sweet. However, at 6 months old, when he puts his head on my shoulder and grabs my sweater collar and sucks his thumb, I melt. He loves to have something in his hand while he sucks his thumb - burp cloth, blanket, my shirt collar, etc. But we don't put him in bed with anything at all, so today he reached an all new level of pitiful. I went to get him up from his nap and he had managed to wad up enough of his sheet to get it into his hand while sucking his thumb.

He doesn't quite sit up on his own, but rather folds in half if we try. He does roll front to back and back to front, and has started to push himself up on his arms a little. None of my boys have enjoyed 'tummy time' so I think they're a little slow to do much once they get to their bell(ies), other than scream.

And his brothers still adore him. I think they might be asking to hold him more now than before. And Max gets so excited to see both of them too. He's a hair grabber though so we have to remind the older boys that this will happen if they get their hair too close to his little hands.

He's a perfect addition to our family, and we are all so very thankful for him.

Oooh, a tag to chew!

Countdown to Thanksgiving...

2010-11-20T16:34:00.000-08:00

#6 - Humor! Yes, you need a sense of humor to do this "job." Things I've laughed at recently:

*Lynette, calling our babies, one born in May of this year and one born in August of this year, "2010 models."

*Overheard today - My husband, "Luke, it's great that you wiped your booger on toilet paper. Next time, take that sheet off the roll and throw it in the trash."

*Luke, mostly nude, running from the bathroom, down the very short hallway and knocking Seth flat in the middle of the bedroom.

*On the way home from school recently, Seth informed me that he just "needed a break" and didn't want to answer anymore of my questions. Once we started talking again, Luke yelled, "Stop talking you two. I'm taking a break."

*Max's apparent enjoyment of sweet potatoes, which causes him to open his mouth and yelp as the spoon approaches.

Countdown to Thanksgiving

2010-11-19T04:00:00.000-08:00

#7 - Today I have guest bloggers. I asked the boys what they were thankful for a few days ago, and then again this morning.

Luke: God and Jesus. At 2, I'm pretty sure he doesn't quite understand what he's saying, but he knows we pray and he hears Seth and I talk when he comes home from school, so it's a wonderful start to helping him learn.

Seth: My dog (his favorite stuffed animal in all the world), our Baby [Max], and Daddy. Also, that I learn Bible stories at church and school.

Max: My blue fuzzy blanket, my warm sleep sacks, and my yummy thumb. And that Mommy and Daddy protect me from my crazy brothers. Okay, of course he couldn't really respond, but I'm just sure that's what he would say.

Countdown to Thanksgiving...

2010-11-18T17:00:00.000-08:00

#8 - Today I am thankful for Luke. Well, technically, I'm thankful for Luke everyday. But today Luke is 2 years and 9 months old. Two years ago today Luke cut his lip open and had to have stitches. That day definitely ranks among my top 3 scariest (post-delivery) mom stories. I only remember the day because he was exactly 9 months, to the day, when it happened. He had to be sedated in the ER so they could stitch his lip and we weren't supposed to touch him when he woke up, etc. It was crummy. But that was then... Luke is a force of nature. My prayer for him is often that his personality will outshine his food allergy. That he won't be the kid in school that teachers groan over having to have in their class because of his allergies, but that rather they will be excited to have so much enthusiasm all rolled up into one person. And he does exude enthusiasm!

He loves to play with all of the Cars movie cars and reenact movie scenes, complete with dialogue. "Fly away Stanley, be freeeeee."

He still sleeps in a crib, although we've purchased the sheets and comforter for his bigger bed. I wanted to keep him in the crib as long as possible so he was "contained." However, he figured out how to escape a few months ago so there's really no point anymore. Besides, he sleeps with two blankets (fire trucks and numbers), Rescue the dog, Pat the hammer, Rusty the wrench(?), pretty Lightning, Buzz, sometimes Woody, Cupcake the dog, and whatever else he picks up on his way to bed. It's getting a little crowded. But, he's taking steps of his own to make some room in his bed, by shedding his clothes. He has decided that he doesn't want to wear his shirt to sleep. "My bwanket will keep me warm." This is hard for a mommy who sleeps in fleece pajamas and socks to put her sweet little boy in bed in shorts and nothing else!

Luke is as loving and cuddly as he is rambunctious. He loves to be held and to cuddle on the couch or watch a movie in our bed. He loves his Baby Max. He loves to go with me to get Max up in the mornings. But he always says, as he peers over the side of Max's crib, "I can pet him." Ummm, he's not a puppy - how about if we just love on him?

And finally, I love Luke's independence. Oh, it drives me crazy, no doubt! The massive meltdown, throw-yourself-in-the-floor-pounding-your-fists-and-screaming-at-the-top-of-your-lungs, when he doesn't get to put his own straw in his cup or put his own toothbrush back in the holder makes me want to scream. And maybe sometimes I do, but I love that he wants to do his own thing and be his own person. "I do it myself" is a phrase I hear often.

So, there you have it - just a few of the reasons that I am so thankful for my little Lukey!

Countdown to Thanksgiving...

2010-11-17T05:00:00.000-08:00

#9 - I am thankful for the generosity of my husband. You see, today he is spoiling me. Today someone else is cleaning my house. I know many of you (okay, the two of you who read this) are saying to yourselves, 'HUH? She's home all day long and someone else is coming to clean her house? Insanity!' But I like to liken Lukey (say that 3 times fast) to a hurricane. The child can blow into a room and destroy things faster than I can clean them up. As such, I could not even tell you that last time my ENTIRE house was clean all at once. We are hosting Thanksgiving here again this year so my job is to keep it under control for the next week.

This has also given me a great opportunity to focus on decluttering rather than daily cleaning (sorry cleaning person, it's gotten pretty bad around here -not that she's reading my blog). I made a big list of everything that really needed tidied/decluttered and then I put all of those items on a calendar so I knew I could get it all done. I came close. However, my to do list tends to get preempted by everyone else's list - you know, hang Christmas lights while it's not freezing crazy cold outside and before it begins raining so you can bundle the kids up and take them outside in the rain in the dark and show them the lights turned on and then reassure your new neighbor that he did not move in next door to the Griswold's and you are heading inside to unplug the lights until the day after Thanksgiving. Oops, I digress. Anyway, the house is very tidy and I can't wait to come home to clean! So very thankful for the generosity of my husband today!

Countdown to Thanksgiving

2010-11-16T05:46:00.000-08:00

#10 - I am thankful for music. Truthfully, I've had this post open and sitting here on the computer for a little while this morning, just sort of wondering what would strike me for today. Then a favorite group of ours came on the television and Seth got all excited and then it hit me - music!

I love how it can turn your thoughts to worship, turn around a crummy mood, induce a good cry, or inspire you to go just a little faster on the treadmill.

I love goofy dancing to fun songs with my boys.

I love how Luke can't hear an upbeat song without grabbing his little play guitar and being "a wocking man!"

I love that I can drive for a good five minutes, alone in the car, before it hits me that I'm still listening to Veggie Tales.

I love hearing Seth sing songs from school, of course when he thinks I'm not listening. My favorite so far is one that says, "obey obey obey, obey obey." I've also heard some "Happy birthday, Jesus," likely preparing for the Christmas program.

And I love singing to my sweet little Max. He will just lie there, looking up at me while I sing and then touch my mouth with his little fingers (probably trying to silence me, but hopefully thinking, awww, that's my mommy and she loves me).

It's beginning to look a lot like...

2010-11-15T05:00:00.000-08:00

I have decided to take on a little project this Christmas season. It's a scrapbooking project and the really basic description is this: make a book ahead of time and every day of the Christmas holiday season add a picture from that day and some journaling of your day. The idea is to be present in the moment and really enjoy the season while documenting it. But by having the book already made (I started mine about 5 week ago and just have a few pages left to finish) you spend much more time making the memories and just a little time in December documenting the memories. I love to scrapbook and take pictures so it seeemed like a perfect little project. The idea comes from here.

So, I've been listening to some of this to get in the mood:

I decided mine would start November 26th, as that is the day after Thanksgiving and we always start decorating on that day. It will run through at least December 26th, maybe later if we have any holiday festivities that are later than Christmas Day. We often get together with Dave's family the weekend after Christmas and I wanted to be sure to include pictures from that time as well. It's sort of haphazardly (is that a word?) fun to put together a page (paper and embellishments anyway) having no idea what pictures will go on it. We have a few things planned so those days were a little easier to decorate for, but mostly, I am making the pages without a clue whether the pictures will be serious or silly.

Also, I decided to challenge (?) myself to only use products that I already have. I purchased the album and page protectors but all the paper and embellishments are coming from my stash of unused supplies. [I will disclose that I really want some glitter mist spray and am considering making the purchase as it could be used on other projects as well.]

There is a real trend lately toward digital scrapbooks rather than traditional scrapbooks. I know digital books are quicker and easier. I have made some myself and plan to make a few more just to catch up on some things that need scrapped but that I don't feel that I have the time for right now. But I must say that I love when a book starts to take shape and it gets all poofy with paper and pictures and chipboard and memorabilia. Can't wait!

Eureka!

2010-11-10T11:41:00.000-08:00

I feel like I spend a LOT of time whining about my trips to the grocery store. Maybe not so much here but often to my poor family and friends who have to speak to me on grocery days. So, why not continue the boringness that is sometimes my life and blog about it?

I like to plan out a menu for three weeks and buy everything I can buy ahead of time all at once. Then I have a running list for the next two weeks for produce, milk, etc. This doesn't always happen, but it's my preference. Last week I went Wednesday morning, with a list that really only covered about a week. But even then, there were three issues. One, I didn't have nearly enough time to really shop before I needed to pick Seth up at school. Two, Luke felt a burning desire to be really helpful (read insist on getting items off the shelves, even though he couldn't really reach them, and scream loudly if I did not permit him to do so). And three, I ran out of room in the cart early on. See, Luke is in the seat with the belt. Max, in his infant car seat, is in the bigger part where the groceries should go. [One day, a likely well-intentioned older woman said to me, 'OH, there's a baby under all of those groceries.' To be fair, I was very very cautious of my grocery placement and he wasn't covered up and was in no danger at anytime. You know, no infants were harmed, etc.]. Anyway, after I ran out of room last week I came home and added a few more things to my list to stretch it a few more days and ended up BACK at the store about 10pm that night, after a little time on the treadmill. It was nice to be alone. It was not nice that they were trying to put out all the Christmas items and change over for the sales that start on Thursday. There were aisles I couldn't get all the way down and had to turn around and backtrack. Then there was ONE cashier working, and he was in an express lane, which meant that I had to ring up my entire cart of groceries. Nevermind that the coupon part of self-ringing is extremely annoying to me. But, I must say the entire trip was salvaged when the poor lonely employee had no more customers in his line and came over to bag the poor exhausted woman's groceries! I was so thankful for his help!

Wow, this post has rambled on just to get to this! Yesterday I took the boys on a little walk through the neighborhood to look for leaves that we could use for a craft. I wanted Luke to walk, rather than ride in the stroller, so he could help. So, I thought, oh, I'll just get the infant carrier thing that straps to the front of me for Max. We got it, as a gift, when we had Seth. So, it's nearly 5 years old and can be a little confusing to hook a baby into. However, it worked great. Max was fine on the whole walk. This brings me to eureka! Today I got up early and got ready to leave the house. Thus, getting out of the house in time to do the shopping. AND once we got to the store I put Max in the carrier, thus freeing up the entire basket part of the cart for, wait for it, ...groceries! Luke still wanted to be my helper, but that's easier to deal with when the other two issues are out of the way. Now we can eat for the next few weeks AND we can try out the pumpkin cake recipe that I want to sample before serving it to a house full of family on Turkey Day. Yeah me! Off to bake.

Finally, if you've read all the way to the end of this painfully boring post, kudos to you. And I'm sorry it never really got too interesting. However, here's a photo of Max in the carrier before we headed out on our walk yesterday. Please notice the expression on poor little Luke's face. I think it hit me that I couldn't carry him and Max at the same time. He's a little attached. And apparently I thought Max should smile for the picture, thus the annoying 'don't you wanna smile little baby?' face. Ahhh, good times...

And I used to get paid to do this?

2010-11-08T10:00:00.000-08:00

I was practicing my cross exam skills (or lack thereof) this week. I was asking Seth about chapel at school on Wednesday. He didn't seem to be able to tell me anything about it, other than that it had taken place. So, I decided to put to use my education that we're still paying for and create a little timeline of events.

Me: Okay, so you walked into the room. Did you stand up or sit down.
Seth: We stood up for our pledges.
Me: Okay, do you know the pledges?
Seth: Yes, I do.
Me: Okay, and then what did you do?
Seth: We sang some songs.
Me: What did you sing?
Seth: We sang "Holy Holy Holy." [Sidenote here - Luke thinks the song is "Hold me Hold me Hold me."]
Me: Then what happened? Did someone talk to you or did you watch something like a movie?
Seth: She talked ot us.
Me: The principal talked to you?
Seth: MOOOOM. It's Princi"b"al.
Me: No, Seth. It's principal. Puh puh puh pal. Trust me. I know how to spell it. It's a P.
Seth. Oh, okay.
Me: So, what did she talk to you about?
Seth. She talked about stuff and things.

Honestly. That was his answer. Stuff and things. All that wandering around and questioning to get to "stuff and things." And to think, I used to get paid to do this! Yikes.

Halloween and Helmet Head

2010-11-04T17:00:00.000-07:00

We started out Halloween night taking pictures, of course, at our house. What's the point in dressing up a 5 month old if not to take pictures? I mean, he can't eat the candy or trick-or-treat so it was all about the photo opp.

Next we headed to Grammy and Grampy's for a little visit and some specially prepared treat bags, complete with all kinds of candy that was safe for Luke, some little stuffed bats and pumpkins and some stickers. On the way home Seth said, "I have a gooooood feeling. I think there's a sucker in here!" So funny!

Then we came home to trick or treat in our neighborhood. Seth lasted about 4 houses, at which time he declared he had enough candy and would like to go home. That was shortly after he decided that I should have put a coat on him because he was cold. And Luke was way more interested in whether there might be ducks in the pond that we walked by than in trick or treating.

Cutest moment: Seth refused to go up to a house but Luke went away. The sweet lady gave Luke two pieces of candy. Luke didn't put them in his pumpkin basket. Instead he walked straight down the driveway to Seth, handed him a piece of the candy, and said, "here ya go." Sweetest little guy ever!

Second cutest moment: My mom put together trick or treat bags, paying special attention to only include candy/cookies that were safe for Luke. I pulled it out Monday night and told them they could each pick one thing out of their bag. I told them how neat it was that Grammy made sure it was all safe for Luke. Seth's response, "Umm, that's because she loves us." Yes, yes it is!

***********************

There's really no great transition here, but perhaps it was all in the spirit of dressing up. Seth and Luke spent Saturday morning helping David clean out the garage. Luke attached himself to this bike helmet. He asked that I call him "Helmet." He wore it to eat lunch and even said, "Please say, 'Eat up, Helmet.'" That was funny. But, seriously, the look on Max's face was priceless.

Here's a little zoom in of the look he was giving to Luke and the helmet. I can only imagine that he was thinking, "that kid's different but this tops 'em all!" Eventually Luke had to rock out in the helmet. And not much else. This was just after dinner, where he got food all over his clothes and, thus, isn't wearing them anymore. Apparently his feet were cold (?). And this kid can turn nearly anything into a guitar. And he means business when he plays it!

And finally, Sunday morning Luke, Max, and I stayed home from church. I laid in bed most of the night listening to Luke cough most of the night. He coughed until he threw up a couple of times. I thought that warranted staying home. [I digress, but I believe it to be allergies - nothing congatious. I would not have even considered taking him to church if I thought he would contaminate others! But I thought at least he and I were too tired and pitiful to go.] Anyway, the point of the story - Luke came to me, wearing the helmet, and informed me, "We are staying home from church and I do not have to take the helmet off!" Well, alright then!