No School

Return of the half naked boys

Clayton gloating over his victory in finding where Mommy keeps the chocolate chips.

The kids have officially been home from school for one week. Lydia and I got dough nuts last Friday morning to celebrate. We did a happy dance all the way there and back.

On Craigs list, last Saturday I found a running stroller exactly like the one that had been stolen, rust and all. I had to drive about an hour away to pick it up, but I only paid $20 for it. The splurge that Bruce, the kids and I did on the way back was much more expensive. After picking my new old stroller up, we stopped and explored the BIG mall and let the kids play a bit at the arcade and the indoor playground and let them do the trampoline bungee thing. The kids also had fun looking at all the animals at Cabela's, where there was a metal bin filled with dog pillows. Lydia and I took turns flopping our upper bodies down on the stacks of dog pillows exclaiming how comfortable they were. That is until Bruce picked me up and threw me into the bin. It was pretty funny, but I made him help me out quickly before anyone at the store came over and yelled at me. By the time we left the mall, it was so late that we stopped by Burger King on the way home to feed our crew. For all the money we spent on the way home from getting my stroller, I could have bought myself a nice used running stroller, but my old one did the job just fine, and so does this one. Plus we had a good time.

In other news, Ross and Mark are both playing baseball this summer, so we have baseball games to go to nearly every night. Poor Bruce is hardly getting anytime to relax at all. As soon as he gets home from work, it's off to a ball game.

I've really been enjoying my early mornings which are now free from waking kids up to go to school. Instead I go walking or running. I love quiet mornings outside before the world is up!

Mark has convinced Justice that there are "sewer gators" in all of our drains. That's what makes the gurgling noise. Justice seems to find the sewer gators interesting, but not particularly scary.

Clayton is getting better and better and expressing his every thought and wish, though most of it is indistinguishable (Wow that's a big word! I'm going to have to remember that one for the next time that I play Book Worm Adventure.) for someone who doesn't know the language. He has lots of made up words for things. Here is a translation guide:

A va va = Cat
La = Keys (his favorite thing to play with)
Ella = Lydia
Daddon = Dad
Bom = Mom
Umm = Yummy foods like ice cream or candy
Yleahk = Mud or anything gross
Eis = Drink
Eish = Shoes (he ALWAYS wants his shoes on)
Bowl = Can I have some cereal in a bowl?
Baseball = Any kind of ball or a bat
Laden = Slide or sometimes Light

Oh, Lydia says to tell you all that John is a stupid head, and that Trent is a weirdo. Ashley is a goofball, and Todd's just strange.

And now for something completely different: Ross almost NEVER likes what I make for dinner! I think the only real food that I make that he likes is mostaccioli. (My spell check says I spelled that wrong, and maybe I did. I don't know, but it thinks maybe I am meaning molestation.) Anyway, Ross is always eating canned ravioli instead of whatever I make. There is no point in trying to entice him. What cracks me up is when I was in a hurry to go out with Bruce and I made macaroni and cheese from a box, and hot dogs, Ross gushed and carried on and on about what a wonderful dinner I had made. He did that again yesterday when I was in a hurry and reheated some left over hot dogs, hamburgers, and bacon. "Thank you, Thank you Mom! That was wonderful!" Silly boy!

On as sort of similar note, Justice was at my Mom's house a few days ago and helping her clean grime off of a table in the backyard. As they scrubbed it down, Justice exclaimed "Grandma, we always do the funnest things at your house!"

One more thing, Clayton had a particularly bad week. In one week he has had croup, pink eye, an ear infection and a heat rash. Happily, he's doing much better now.

To end on, here's an 8 second silly clip of Lydia and Ross:


Alright that's enough for now. Have a good one! Love, Renae