Frog Droppings

The Latest Silliness

2012-01-18T08:28:00.004-06:00

Last week I had Bruce take Lydia to Wednesday evening church activities. I usually take all three of our oldest kids to these things, but Ross and Mark still had homework to finish, and I wanted to stay home and clean up the ginormous mess that our house had become. However, I was tired and feeling particularly lazy, so after Bruce left I dorked around on the computer for quite a while, the boys joining me in watching stupid youtube video after stupid youtube video once their homework was done.

After quite some time, I realized that I only had about 1/2 hour left until Bruce and Lydia were due to come home. Guilt ridden and a bit panicky, I told the boys "Quick! Clean like insane people!"
After which they followed my lead in "Cleaning like insane people!" and we threw trash all over the place, tossed a box of cards into the air, and I may have even opened the fridge and hurled an egg or two across the kitchen, all the while cackling like mad. It was a real hoot! After that, we got down to business and had the house spic and span by the time Bruce and Lydia came home. I'd say it was well worth it.

The kids had the day off for MLK day ("milk day" as I like to call it), so after we all pitched in and got the house good and clean, I took the kids to the zoo. (It was a unusually beautiful, nice day out). One highlight was when one of the kids pointed out that the gorilla kind of looked like Bruce from the back. No, Bruce's back isn't overly hairy or anything; it's just rather huge and muscular. I couldn't argue. There actually was some resemblance there. Yeah, that might have been wicked, but I couldn't resist a laugh when Mark said "Alright kids, I just got home from work, I'm tired, and I'm going to sit and watch this log." Sorry Bruce, I love you!

The other highlight was the kids running out of the Reptile House waving their arms and screaming "THEY GOT OUT! THEY GOT OUT! RUN!!"

Snuggley

2012-01-12T09:32:00.000-06:00

Missing Phone

2012-01-11T15:38:00.002-06:00

When I couldn't find my phone this afternoon, and after I emailed my hubby and told him to call me, after he called me 3 times and it didn't ring, I asked my three year old and received the following confession:

"I took the battery out and I hided it under the couch."

Sure enough, it was under the couch with the battery out and the back in place.

Now if only he can tell me where Lydia's missing phone is. It's been gone for about 3 weeks.

Zombie Grandfather

2012-01-11T09:11:00.001-06:00

While Clayton (3 year old) played on the rocking horse that Bruce's grandfather made:

Bruce: Clayton, did you know that my grandpa made that rocking horse?

Clayton: Yeah. He died.

Bruce: Yeah.

Clayton: He's in the grave.

Bruce: Yeah.

Clayton: He's going to be a zombie and eat people's brains.

Conversations

2012-01-09T09:04:00.004-06:00

My missionary brother, Trent (who will be home in one month from today!!!!) and my sons, Ross and Mark have goofy email conversations where they make up dialogue for characters. Here is one that Ross started:

"Pizza

Voldemort: Darth Vader how much pizza is there left.

Darth Vader: why don't you go look?

Sefroth: don't bother I ate the last slice.

Voldemort: WHAT YOU DID NOT!

Sefroth: WHAT I DID SO.

Voldemort: RRRRRRRRRRRRRR AAAAAAAAA AVADACADAVRA!

Darth Vader: um you
know I just orderd another pizza

Voldemort: I know"

(and Trent's responsed with)

"Sephroth: HAHA you can´t kill me!! that slice was my Horcrux"

They kill me!

Anybody Want Some Chocolate Ice Cream?

2012-01-07T23:58:00.000-06:00

Home

2011-12-28T08:41:00.002-06:00

This is how I made both my parents cry for Christmas. (Yes, ANOTHER slideshow by me.)

My Castle Christmas

2011-12-19T04:46:00.005-06:00

Some of you may have read my brother's version of this story on our other blog a few years back, but it bears retelling. For our choir program this year, we were asked if any of us had any special Christmas stories that we could share in between songs. This story is immediately what I thought of, and I submitted John's version . Our choir director liked it, but said that I needed to rewrite it from my own point of view, since I would be the one telling the story. Here it is if anyone cares to read it:

As a child, our family was never what you would call wealthy. We had what we needed, enough food, clothes to wear, and a warm home, but not much in the way of extras. But even with our humble situation, we were a happy family.

There is one Christmas that sticks out in my mind above all the others. The year I turned seven had been a particularly hard one. To begin with, Mom had had yet another heartbreaking miscarriage. In September, Mom's father passed away. Dad had been laid off from his job in July, and by Christmas time, he still had not been called back, but was working two janitorial jobs instead. Money was tight to say the least.

It was just the kind of setting to either give up in despair or to hope for a miracle. As it turns out, our parents were determined to make a miracle happen. With a talent for artistic things, and a little creativity they set to work.

I remember Mom haunting the back alleys of furniture & appliance stores and pulling large boxes out of the dumpsters. I don't remember the excuse for this odd behavior, but whatever it was, it worked. There was a small unused room in the basement whose door became mysteriously locked for what seemed like the longest time. I'll bet Mom didn't sleep for a month.

Christmas morning dawned and we awoke to find our living room transformed. Giant cardboard boxes had been painstakingly cut and elaborately painted to make a city of castles complete with turrets and even a round tower. It. Was. Awesome. Magical. Hiding inside the castles were other small gifts for my brother and me. I found a homemade doll with a beautiful dress that matched my own new homemade dress. (Mom was also a talented seamstress.)

I can't imagine how much time my mother must have put into that Christmas. I wonder if they were nervous about what kind of reception a bunch of cardboard boxes for Christmas would receive. But that Christmas became The Christmas to beat all Christmases. Our cardboard boxes were the envy of the neighborhood and we played with those things till they literally fell apart.

Despite how wonderful those castles were, it isn't money or neat presents that makes up a great Christmas. Even with the best presents ever, it could not have been a good Christmas had there been an atmosphere of despair. It's the spirit of faith, of hope, and the love that makes all the difference. That Christmas was neat because our parents made awesome presents out of nothing. But what made it wonderful was that despite the hard circumstances our family was having at the time, there was not despair, there was love, and hope and faith that things would be okay. Like the Millennium Falcon, we didn't look like much, but we had it where it counted.

Fun With Vein Surgery

2011-12-08T08:03:00.002-06:00

First off there is the name:

Stab Venectomy. "Why are you in the hospital today?" "I came to get stabbed."

The thing really wasn't so bad. They knocked me about 90 percent out. I don't remember much except being jostled around and that they had Christmas music playing in the background. I thought about trying to sing along, just for laughs, but I didn't.

I remember being wheeled down the hall after the thing was over, and I was still REALLY whacked out on drugs. I felt so funky that the only thing to do was to pull faces. So I did. I screwed up my face and stuck my tongue out at nothing in particular. Then I laughed at myself. I bet it would be fun to sit around with an anesthesiologist (Holy crud! I spelled that right on the first try! I rock! Do you ever spell things wrong on purpose, just to check that your spell checker that puts red lines under the bad words is working? My spell checker thinks that I spelled venectomy wrong. I don't think I did. When I right click on it, it thinks I might have meant vasectomy. Ha ha! A "stab vasectomy" sounds really fun!) Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah. Anesthesiologists must have some funny stories to tell!

That's pretty much it. Now I just sit around with my leg up for a bit. No biggie. One thought though. I've never done drugs, nor have I ever even been drunk, so I don't really know, but is that what it feels like to be on drugs? If so, why would anyone want to do that on purpose?? It felt like I had a swimming pool inside my head. I did have to stop myself once from telling a woman that her pants were very unflattering from behind. Oh and one nurse came in for three cups of coffee inside a half an hour. She must have been getting it for patients or something. Do they let you drink coffee in the recovery room? Seems like a bad idea. I did make a comment about her lots of coffee, but either she didn't hear me, or she was just ignoring me. Dang I am rude!

Abusing my Authority

2011-12-03T08:04:00.003-06:00

As I chaperoned the dance at Ross and Lydia's middle school last night, I discovered that there is a whole new level of fun to to be had at this type of event once the title of "adult chaperone" is added. I never attended many of my own school dances as a teenager. I was shy and suffered from the inferiority complex that accompanies most teenage experiences. However, our church had teen dances once a month, which I NEVER missed. At the church dances, I felt more comfortable in my own skin and was able to relax, let my hair down, and be a complete goof ball to my heart's content. These were the highlight of my teenage existence. In fact, once I discovered that I could hop the boarder and attend the neighboring stakes' dances too, I went to a church dance nearly every other weekend. Anyway enough about that.

I was asked to help out with the chaperoning of the middle school's Christmas dance last night. (At this point, someone in charge of that thing might possibly be thinking "Who invited that freak ball?") Having long since lost my teen insecurity, I danced, acted like a goof ball, played with my kids -who actually, truly, seemed to like having their silly mom in tow. No, I'm not delusional. I would have been horrified if my mom had shown up at a school dance and acted like I did, but my kids actually encouraged me. So kudos to them for having the confidence to think their goofy mom is actually not a parasite.

So what is the "whole new level of fun to be had as an adult chaperone?" Authority. That's what. I amused my self to no end messing with those kids! I went around telling kids that "Dancing is not allowed. They are afraid that someone will get hurt." It was hilarious! I told one group of little girls this, and they all looked crest fallen. "I'm sorry," I said "but I'm going to have to ask you to go and sit in the corner now." One little girl apologized, then started walking toward the wall with a sad look on her face and her head drooping. Then of course I told them I was just kidding. She became my instant friend for the rest of the dance. I repeated this trick several times. Sometimes I'd look them in the eye and bust a goofy looking move as a way of letting them of the hook. I followed one kid around for just a bit telling him that he was in big trouble for nothing. I also had a good time going up to packs of all boys and telling them to knock off it with the PDA. Yep, I'm pretty much a dork.

Oh and to top it off, they played YMCA! Lol! I think it was some kind of rule at those stake dances that the dance was not allowed to end until they played YMCA. One difference I noticed - in my teenage days, the days before I had five kids, I was never thinking about the constitution of my bladder while I was jumping around like a lunatic.

So, I might be the world's most embarrassing mom ever. But at this point, I don't think my kids have realized it yet. The best part of the whole thing for me (Yes I do know that these dances are for the kids - not me. But I AM me, and can't I have some fun too?) The best part of the whole thing was watching both Lydia and Ross let their hair down and act like complete goof balls, in front of a whole gym full of middle school kids, and just have a great time being who they are. I never could have done that at a school dance when I was their age. Especially not with a mom like me there. Ack! The very thought! Those poor kids!

Holy Fetch! I'm Totally Losing It!!

2011-11-28T10:08:00.004-06:00

Back when I was like 20ish and had no kids, I used to scorn people who had to have planners to remember things. Did I just have no life? I don't know. I just remember thinking that writing things down in planners was just WAY too much structure. Who wants that much structure?

Fast forward about 10ish years to when my oldest kids were in early grade school. That was when I was the perfect "school mom" who always remembered to check every kid's folder every day and made sure they all had exactly what they needed. Who wrote down every single little book that the kg kid read so they could get that "Book It" award or what ever.

Now fast forward to today when I CAN'T BLOODY REMEMBER ANYTHING!!!!
1) I couldn't find Lydia's P.E. uniform that I was supposed to wash this weekend, so I had to give her $0.50 to rent one.

2) I forgot to sign Ross' permission form that was supposed to be turned in today. Never mind that he was getting it out yesterday while I was in the middle of something else, and I told him to put it away. I'd remember to sign it later. WHY THE BLOODY HECK DIDN'T I JUST SIGN IT THEN????

3) I just found Justice's kg rest towel that I was supposed to wash and send back sitting on my kitchen floor. Where did THAT come from?? That's two weeks this months that I forgot that dumb thing.

4) I called Mark's school to ask if I needed to bring Ross' permission slip in or if I could just turn it in tomorrow.

Sheesh!

There was something else that I meant to blog about a couple of days ago, but I forgot what it was.

Sicky

2011-11-18T15:54:00.000-06:00

Justice stayed home from school today. He threw up, or I'd be suspicious. He was watching the clock, and kept asking if school was over yet. As soon as I said the kids were on the bus to come home, he said "My stomach feels better now!" But a few minutes later he was complaining about his stomach hurting again. Silly boy. He was so afraid that I was going to change my mind and send him to school after all.

Justice Suffers From My Idiocy

2011-10-18T12:51:00.002-05:00

Glad to have a reason to tempt Justice out of bed this morning, as I shook his shoulder, I said cheerily, "Wake up Justice, it's wacky hair day! Do you want to go to school with green hair?!"

Well of course he did! So we had fun spiking his hair and spraying it with some green glittery hair-spray that I had left over from a Halloween costume last year. Justice was stoked about his cool, green, glittery, spiked hair!

I dismissed the little nagging worry as I dropped him off at school, and didn't see any other kids with crazy hair. "I looked at the date. It's today. Their parents just aren't as fun as I am. Besides, I only saw about 10 kids, surely that place is a buzz with crazy haired kids." I told myself, as I drove off. "It's just like when you were in grade school, and you called your fellow band member friend every time to make sure it really was the day that you were supposed to wear you band uniform to school, for a band competition. It's fine!"
Doesn't he look great! Well just to satisfy that little nagging doubt that was barely noticeable at the back of my brain, I re-checked the page. Red Ribbon week is NEXT WEEK!!!! Monday was just wear a red shirt, so we're okay there. I guess the up shot is that I noticed my mistake before I sent him to school in his pajamas tomorrow! Oh I'm a loser! I hope Justice has a good sense of "look at me, I'm cool"ness. I hope I haven't scarred him for life.

And since I'm here, who falls asleep like that?????

T

The Smelly Tail of the Mighty Huntress

2011-10-17T09:54:00.002-05:00

Yes, Bruce is SOO PROUD of his little girl! He took Ross and Lydia away for youth deer season, and Lydia made her first kill. It was actually a doe, but Bruce posed Lydia with the antlers off a different deer, so he could taunt his hunting buddies with this photo. They all hunt in the same area, and the guys are feeling a little miffed because no one has gotten a buck in several years there. So Bruce figured that it would really steam their eyebrows if a 13 year old girl bagged a buck on her first try there.

They also went to Metropolis nearby, and visited some Superman stuff.

About a day after the trio came home, I started noticing a bad smell in my kitchen. I went through all my cabinets looking for rotten potatoes or onions gone bad, all to no avail. But that smell just kept getting worse. I looked all over for the source, but I just couldn't figure it out. That is until I saw part of a plastic bag just peeking out over the top of my cabinets. Curious, I climbed up on a chair to see what it was. As I picked it up, I saw something small and furry, and wet looking through the white, plastic bag. Grossed out already, I started to open the bag up, and that's when the smell hit me. It was HORRIBLE!!!! I gagged. Someone forgot to take the tail of Lydia's deer outside in the sun to dry so that they could make a plaque with it. EWWW!!!! I got in big trouble with Lydia because I threw it in the outside trash. She cried. It has since been dug out of the trash and set to dry on the roof of my garage. I still have my doubts about that nasty thing.

At any rate, GO LYDIA the MIGHTY!!!

The Journey of a Golf Ball (also in which Renae taunts environmentalists and goes to Hell)

2011-10-16T08:13:00.004-05:00

What is up with our stuff breaking down lately? I had to get a repair man out to fix the ice maker on our 3 month old fridge. My second clothes dryer is currently out of commission. (Yes I have two washers and two dryers. It helps a lot when you have a family of seven. And before you go off on me for ruining the environment with my energy wasting by running two dryers at the same time, it's not like I do any more laundry than I would do with only one. I just get it done faster. Clothesline??? I don't know. Sure sometimes, but who has the time for all of that all the time? Drop it. Just leave me in peace with my energy sucking, Earth ruining, devil worshiping two dryers already!! I'm sure that my eternal soul will pay a heavy price for my crimes! Shall I tell you how many disposable diapers I have contributed to my ginormous environmental footprint? I can hear a mob of dirty hippies knocking down my door as we speak! Al Gore is planning is next movie based on me and how I have single-handedly managed to raise the earth's average temperature by 5 micro-degrees, obliterate a 20 foot section of the ozone layer, and melt an entire polar ice cap ALL BY MYSELF!! Me and my bad kind of light bulbs!!! Come on I've TRIED to be good. I've got several of those "good" light bulbs in my house. (Please don't ask me how many of those my kids have broken! We're probably all dieing of cancer as we speak.) ACK! Is that the ghost of Rachel Carson holding a green knife at my throat?!! Okay, enough. Bruce just spent the entire day yesterday getting our van fixed. (Yes, I own a large vehicle that runs on gasoline, AND I drive it!) The blue-ray player that we bought only 4 months ago at most, has decided not to work, and when I turned on the heater the other day, (Yes, I have the audacity to heat my home, but only when it's cold outside.) it made a HORRIBLE noise.

Here is where we get to the story that I wanted to tell. A week ago or so, I got cold and struck up the heater for its first voyage of the year. As was expected on this first session of the year, this was accompanied by that familiar smell of a summer's worth of dirt being burned up, and by the usual beep or two of the smoke alarm. What I did NOT expect was the horrible rocks-in-a-blender noise that followed. Alarmed and dismayed, I shut the thing right off, and reluctantly added another urgent item to my hubby's to-do list. Happily the cold snap went away for a week or two, giving Bruce some time to get around to it. When he finally did, he was a witness to the awful sound of potential malfunction, and high maintenance fees. But, being the wise and brave soul that he is, he did not fear to investigate the source of this dreaded noise. Upon doing so, he was able to trace the sound to the exhaust fan.

"Do you know what that sounds like?" he asked me "That sounds like a golf ball in there."

"How could a golf ball get in there?!" It's a small box thing closed except for the ... oh, the two exhaust pipes that run up the length of the machine to the basement ceiling, turn ninety degrees, and then run about 12 feet out to vent in the backyard. We have found the little kids sticking rocks in the end of it. In fact a couple of years ago, Justice put one in there large enough to block enough airflow so as to make the heater shut off entirely, and refuse to run properly. But the kids were never able to get the rocks more than an inch or two into the end of the pipe, where you could just reach in and grab them right back out.

"If it's a ball, it could just roll all the way in." answered my genius Bruce.

So Bruce, with his trusty screw driver, undid the fastenings that held the pipes to the exhaust fan, reached his hand in and found .... a golf ball.

And there was much rejoicing.

Sweetness (or Not)

2011-10-13T16:04:00.005-05:00

My kids are always stapling pages together to make homemade books. As I was cleaning up yesterday, I found two. The first one was titled "I love Mom" and had pictures of a kid hugging his mom. The second was titled "I Kill You."

My van is currently in need of some work, so for a day or two I'm hoofing it. I needed to make a trip to the Post Office today, which just happens to be about a half of a mile from my house. It's a gorgeous, autumn day, so I rather enjoyed a leisurely walk with my three year old, Clayton. We stopped and looked at a dragon fly, picked up colorful leaves and a nasty bit of rope that had been run over by about 100 cars. Clayton said it looked like a dead snake and cheerfully gave it to me to carry home.

As we were leaving, Pam, my friend who works at the Post Office handed Clayton one of those small packets with about 10 little fruit snacks inside it. Clayton looked up and said "Nakes!" in his sweet way ("nakes" is Clayton's version of "thanks" As we started home, Clayton was babbling about how he was going to share with his brothers. Back in the beautiful day, Clayton snacked and we continued collecting pretty gold and red leaves. About halfway home Clayton stopped, felt the tiny fruit snack package, and realizing that it was empty, a sad little frown crossed his face as he moaned "Oh, now I can't share with Mark! I ate dem all."

There is a First Time For Everything

2011-09-19T18:43:00.004-05:00

I have always been of the opinion that it is not good to have the "Wait till your father hears of this!" kind of dealings with my children. I don't want Bruce to have to come home from work to have to deal out punishments to his children. Plus I don't want him to have to always be the feared, mean parent who gives out the spankings. I try to deal with things myself, if I'm the parent who is there at the time.

However, after finding Justice hanging out of the second story window for the second time today, this time with his younger brother too, I decided that MY earlier spanking must not have been hard enough. For the first time ever, I told one of my children to wait while I went to fetch their father to administer the spanking. Luckily Bruce was already home from work, and more than willing to assist in the punishments.

I think I might be switching their bedrooms with Ross and Mark's (which is in the basement) tonight.

Spend My Nights With A Roll of Bubble Wrap

2011-09-19T10:48:00.002-05:00

I Am Totally The Best Stake Choir Secretary That Never Was

2011-09-12T13:31:00.003-05:00

I have just finished (well nearly) a very large project that very few people will actually get much use out of. Those few who do however will find it absolutely marvelous I believe, and I am rather proud of myself. Bruce (not I) is our stake's choir secretary. Hence we have all of the stake's music filed at our house. For some queer reason, I take an odd satisfaction in doing all of the filing myself. As Bruce ... well doesn't seem as keen as I do... it works out.

Aside - it might be useful to know that we have both been highly involved in the stake choir for about a decade now. It may make me a dork, but I absolutely LOVE it! We have an amazingly talented director, and we are actually pretty good. Choir practices are a major highlight for me every fall / Christmas season. I'm totally psyched about starting practicing again soon!

Anyway, what I was getting at was my new filing system that I came up with and did all by myself (even though I'm not actually the secretary.) The wonderful things about what I've done are:

1) It's online, so our director can look at it anytime she wants and it will always be updated.

2) It has a SEARCH ENGINE. I have taken extra pains to make the songs as searchable as possible. Each song has it's own page with the lyrics included (as many as I could find on the internet to cut and paste in. I'm totally not going to type up 200+ sets of lyrics) This makes it so that even if you can't remember the name of the song that you are looking for, you can just type in a snippet of the lyrics, and the search engine will pull it up. The songs' pages also include the composer / arranger, arrangement type (SATB, TTBB, etc.), and as many applicable topics as I could think of. This way if say you want an SSA arrangement of a song about faith, you can just type "SSA, faith" in the search engine, and bang, there is a list.

3) I also have an alphabetical list with links to each song's page.

4) And here is the REAL beauty of my plan: Most published songs are listed on the web by their publishers with a sample of the music to either look at or to listen to. I have put links on as many of the song's pages as I could find, so you have only to click, and you are taken to the publisher's listing of that song with a sample of what the song actually sounds like or a sample of the sheet music.

How awesome am I?

I still need to do a couple of things like:

1) Make a static opening page for us to list choir news, upload MIDI files where choir members can listen to their parts, and such.

2) Change the url so that it no longer has the word "stake" in it. This is because we aren't supposed to have any stake or ward websites.

These things can both be done, but I have to figure out how first.

Anyway, I think it's a totally awesome tool for our wonderful choir director. And though she and I may be the only people to ever use it, it's still a stroke of genius on my part.

Just a Thought

2011-09-08T09:23:00.002-05:00

At the beginning of the school year, Mark brought home one of those tests that helps you figure out how you learn. Curious, I took the test myself, as did Bruce. Bruce seemed to be very well rounded, and did fairly well in all of the categories. I scored very high in the musical and linguistic areas, fairly well in a few other categories and downright awful in the spacial category.

As I have lived with persons who are very smart, but in drastically different ways, I know first hand that there is no real way to pin down HOW smart a person is as compared to another person. There are just too many facets. I know some people who are geniuses certifiably so, who in a school / on paper do exceedingly well, but when it comes to real life situations, they lack somewhat. On the other hand, I am very closely linked with some people who look like complete idiots on paper, but who are in actuality very intelligent. Bruce for example can't spell to save his life, but give him a puzzle to solve, and you'd be hard pressed to find someone who could do it faster.

What I'm getting at is this: There is just NO way to pin down how smart someone is, or exactly how they learn. The brain is just too multifaceted to be able to do it with any REAL accuracy. But here is a facet that I've been thinking about: focus.

How focused is your brain power. Some people seem to have a wide focus, and others narrower. This would effect the kind of information that you take in. Think of it like a flashlight beam. A wide focus would illuminate lots of things, and take in a wide range, while a narrower focus would take in a smaller range, but with greater detail.

I think Bruce has a wide focus. He is very observant, and good at remembering general things. I on the other hand seem to have a narrower focus. The things that I pay attention to, I remember VERY well. I can memorize like nobody's business. If I actually paid attention to it, it's there for good, and I challenge you to prove me wrong. But I'm always forgetting little things. Bruce will ask me to do something while my brain is elsewhere, and I'll say "sure," then forget about it 10 minutes later. Why? It wasn't in my field of focus. I was paying attention somewhere else. If you gave Bruce and I a picture to look at and said "Study this, and in a minute I will ask you questions about it." Bruce would probably do better than I would. He would take in the whole picture, while I would probably be focused on a part or two. If you asked me about something on that part that I paid attention to, I'd tell you every single detail, but if you asked me about something outside of that sphere...??? If you asked the two of us to remember a 10 digit number, I'd beat him every time.

I don't have any autistic children, but it seems like they have a very narrow focus. They will shock you to the core with some of the things that they can remember and know, while at the same time they seem to miss a lot of other things.

I don't know. It's just a thought.

My Son the Hero

2011-09-02T19:49:00.002-05:00

That's what everyone (the principal included) is calling Ross. Yesterday at lunch, the kid across the table from Ross started choking. Ross hopped up and did the Heimlich maneuver, and was able to dislodge the food. The staff at his school are making quite the deal out of it. They are saying he saved the kid's life. Way To Go ROSS!!

Falling Down the Stairs, Cursing and Other Amusing Items

2011-08-31T08:02:00.006-05:00

This morning as I was putting breakfast on the table, Clayton was singing a little made up song called "Joggity." It goes like this:

"Joggity, joggity, joggity, joggity, joggity,

joggity, joggity, joggity, joggity, joggity,

joggity, joggity, joggity, joggity, joggity..."

Apparently Justice didn't like Clayton's little song.

Justice: "Clayton, that's a bad word."

Clayton: "Joggity, joggity, joggity..."

Justice: "That is a bad word, Clayton!"

Clayton: "joggity, joggity, joggity..."

Justice: "Mom, Clayton is saying 'joggity!'

Me: "It's not a bad word, Justice."

Clayton: "Yes it is!"

(Aside: I really don't like it when I'm blogging here on my computer and I hear the sound of eggs cracking coming from in the kitchen, and I get up to find that *sigh* I have lost another dozen eggs and I have another mess to clean up. *sigh*)

Where was I?

Amusing item #2 or I guess maybe #3 now for Mr. C. Clayton was sitting on the toilet the other day saying "Wait for it... wait for it..."

In other news, my boys have discovered a new wonderful game to play, which frankly my mother hates. Oh how I wish I'd had my camera with me at the time! We were at my parents' house after church the other day when my boys invented the fun new game called:

"Falling Down the Stairs."

Oh GOSH I wish I had caught it on tape! What you do is pretend to look at the picture at the top of the stairs, or pretend that you are a baby, or perhaps an old lady, and oops, you fall down the stairs, rolling and bumping and screaming all the way down. It's really hilarious.

The draw backs:

1) You can only play it at Grandma's house because she is the only one with heavily padded, carpeted stairs.
2) Grandmas has an especial aversion to falling since she spent some time in a wheel chair about a year and a half ago after a particularly traumatic fall. Hence, Grandma doesn't find this game very amusing.

On yet another subject, I guess other families with multiple kids have do deal with the phenomenon of "Calling things." I get so annoyed with my kids calling everything. Justice's last words nearly every night are,

"I call the computer first in the morning!"

Me: "No you don't."

We can't go ANYWHERE without every person under the age of 15 in the family yelling

"I call sitting next to Clayton, no call backs, pad-lock!"

or

"I call window seat, no call backs, pad-lock!"

Apparently all contracts are null and void if you don't say "no call-backs, pad-lock!"

Oh and if somebody sits in the seat that was called by somebody else, WWIII is surely to follow. "I CALLED that seat!"

"I didn't hear you!"

"MOM, I called window seat!"

"I don't care. Get in."

I often amuse myself imaging a world where grown ups "called" everything and you HAD to say "no call-backs, pad-lock" or it didn't count. Although come to think about it, we really are kind of like that with all the red tape - political BS that surrounds every facet of our lives. Is it really so different from "no call-backs, pad lock," but I digress...

Anyway, apparently we've reached yet another dimension of calling things. I opened the fridge to find that we seem to now be calling food too.

Ross of course hid "Lydia's orange" behind a bunch of stuff in the back of the fridge and told her that he ate it. *sigh*

Moments of Genius

2011-08-25T19:08:00.002-05:00

Have you ever talked back to your voice-mail? As in:

"No, because....."

"What happened was ..."

"It's like this..."

"Yes, well if you just..."

Aside: "I'm trying to explain the answer to your question! Why the heck won't she let me get a word in edgewise?!"

"What is going on is..."

"I'm trying to tell you..."

"Oh yeah, this is just a message. Wow, I am REALLY a moron!"

The Irony

2011-08-25T08:36:00.002-05:00

Well that completely sucked! School has been back in session for about a week and a half. Justice was really excited about starting kindergarten. The first couple of days when I dropped him off, I pitied the other mothers and fathers who's kids were clinging to them and crying. I actually thought "Oh, I am so glad that my kids never did that!" Justice was happy to be there, and that is just how the older kids seemed to feel about kindergarten too.

However after about day three, Justice started to wander just when he was going to be done with kindergarten. I think he thought it would be like the Thursday School that he had gone to: a couple of hours, one day a week.

Today I had to literally drag him out of the van and carry him kicking, screaming, and crying into the school. As we walked through the front door, he grabbed the door frame and held on for dear life, creating a traffic jam behind us, as Clayton trotted in happily about 10 paces ahead of us, holding Justice's backpack. My small three year old walking in by himself gave the duty teachers quite the poser. They weren't sure if he should be going to somebody's class, or what. He hardly looks old enough to go to kindergarten.

Once I got Justice into the building and caught up to Clayton, I just stood there in the hallway, trying to get him to calm down - to no avail- until his teacher came by with the rest of the class. Resigned to his fate, Justice walked down the hall in tears, hand in hand with his teacher. That was when I broke down into tears. I guess that's what I get for being so glad that my kids had all gone to school so happily!

The Side Kick

2011-08-19T09:04:00.002-05:00

Being the youngest, Clayton is always stuck playing the side kick. When he and Justice play Harry Potter, Clayton is always Ron. When they play Ben 10, Clayton is always Kevin Levin. If they are playing Indiana Jones, Clayton is always Indiana Jones' son. It's okay, he doesn't seem to realize or care. He's just happy to be included in the game.

This morning after he had just gotten out of the shower, the game was Superman. Since Justice was already Superman, that left:

"I am Super Girl!"

"No, you are definitely not Super girl."

"Okay, I'm Super Boy!"

At one point he was "NAKED NINJA!" Everyone laughed, and Mark and Ross immediately started plotting the new "Naked Ninja" game. Boys.

My "Renae is a Jerk" Moment of the Day

2011-08-18T12:14:00.002-05:00

I took Clayton to story time at the library today. As they were passing out the snack, the little girl across the table from us asked "Does this have any fat in it?" to which I laughed out loud. It just sounded so odd to hear that phrase coming from a three year old little girl. It struck me as funny and darn cute. I attributed it to a mother who worries about her own diet, and her daughter was picking up on it. That was until I heard her say "Good, I don't have to take my enzymes." Wow! Renae is a jerk! Her mom played it off very nicely and acted like "Yes, my daughter is cute." Which she was, but man I felt like a jerk! I am so very thankful that I have healthy kids!

Mothering

2011-08-17T12:40:00.002-05:00

Mothering is just the strangest phenomenon! It's like ... getting mauled by an overly loving, cute as a button, HUGE, disobedient puppy dog. You appreciate the love and the cuteness of it all, but at the same time, you need some space. That's not quite exactly right, but... I can't find the right words.

On the one hand I positively CRAVE solitude and quiet moments, and time to work on things that I want to learn to do. You know you might be a parent when you find yourself taking your time on the toilet, because you know that's the only time when everyone is at least supposed to leave you alone.

On the other hand, I seem to have lost the ability to truly enjoy any time away. Any time I actually DO get away, it is always tainted by a little twinge of guilt, and a small wish that the kids were there with me.

The kids just started back to school, and OH BE JOYFUL!!! I am loving having a routine back! I never feel like a good parent during the summer. I feel like all I do is yell, and tell folks to turn the darn TV / computer off. There seems to be a fight to be broken up every two seconds, and somebody needs something from me every blessed second of the day, and I NEVER have a minute to myself, the kids are BORED, and I just turn into a mean, frustrated, horrible ogress!

I love having a reason to make the kids get up and get dressed. I love having something to do. I love getting into a routine for bedtime again. I love when the kids come home from school, and we can spend some time together in the evenings. I actually feel like I have a reason for the things that I do. I love that now I have my piano time back. But most of all, I love that Clayton takes a nap, and I can have some peace and quiet!

The down side is that Justice is now in Kindergarten. I've been looking forward to when I finally get all of my kids in school, so I can go back to school. I positively ACHE to learn! I LOVE school. BUT... every time a kid starts school, I miss my little buddy! It's never quite the same again. I miss each and every one of those 3 and 4 year old kids that have left me to go to school. As much as I want to go back to school, I don't know if I can take not having a preschool kid here with me. Come to think of it, I don't want to do it at all. I don't want life to change like that. I can't believe I'm actually SAYING THAT!!! But it's true. I miss Clayton already, and I still have two more years with him home. I guess it's a good thing to realize that right now. I miss my Justice, I miss my Mark, I miss my Ross, and I miss my little Lydia. Life will definitely lose a little of it's magic when I no longer have a little one to share it with. Sigh... I'm a bit pathetic, you know.

Outings

2011-08-11T21:24:00.005-05:00

While out, I took a picture of this "Getting Along With Your Neighbors Fail." There are actually three "No Trespassing" signs running the property line between these two houses.

While Bruce's BRAVE and wonderful parents took my four oldest kids clothes shopping today, I took Clayton to the park, just the two of us. How different it is to hang out with just one child at a time. It reminded me of when Lydia was little and I used to go out with just her. It was just the most beautiful day ever. I really enjoyed hanging out with just my Mr. C.

This evening Lydia and I did some shopping, just the two of us, also a very good time. We always laugh our heads off when we are together.

These are pictures from yesterday's outing to the park with all of the kids.
I had to bribe Ross to let me take this picture, as he was trying very hard to boycott my camera. He wanted help moving a big log. Easy!

I really liked this picture of Ross until he pointed out that he looks like Gollum.

How nice when they play together. Actually they were having a spitting contest.

Quintessential Justice!

Pictures That Have Nothing To Do With The Rest Of The Post

2011-07-14T13:02:00.003-05:00

I got up with the intention to run at 6:00 this morning. (Got to get the run in before the day heats up.) As I got ready, Clayton woke up. Not wanting to leave the three year old as the only person awake in the house, I got him dressed, made him some take along breakfast, and headed out to get my running stroller out of the garage. Unfortunately, all three tires were half flat. Back inside I go to get the air pump. When I headed back outside with the pump, the dog followed me. Having lubed and aired up the tires, I realized that Miss Ally really wanted to come for a run too. So I headed back inside to fetch the leash and a poop bag. While I was inside, the Empire decided to strike back. (This is my own personal running code phrase for dumping the waste before making the jump to hyper-speed.)

FINALLY on the road and running, Ally (dog) was behaving badly. (I really need to take the time to leash train her better!) It's totally not fun to run with a dog that wants to pull, while pushing a running stroller! So after running a quarter of a mile, we came to the woodsy place where I try to get my dog to do her business when we are out walking or running, so I don't have to pick it up. I stopped running and gave her ample opportunity to take care of things. She didn't ... until about two houses after we left the woodsy area. Mess cleaned up, we are again on our way, but Ally won't stop pulling, and trying to go after cats and squirrels. Fed up, I ran back home and left that stupid dog behind.

Now sans dog, I realize that my stroller is pulling to the right. Annoyed with my kids who like to ride my running stroller, down the hill in the back yard, and into the fence, I kept on anyway. After I leave my neighborhood, and am crossing the road, I realize that my kids have also lost me one of the quick release pins that keeps my handle bar in place. So once safely off the road, I stopped for a couple of fixes. Being of the quick release variety, my pulling to the right front wheel was not too hard to straighten out. I also replaced my missing handle bar pin with a less important one, and AGAIN we were one our way (an entire HOUR after I wanted to leave).

Fortunately, I had a really good run after that. It wasn't too hot, I felt good, and I ended up doing just under six miles with a child in the running stroller. Just a rough start to a good run. Yay for perseverance!

I Always Wanted To Be The Best At Something

2011-07-12T09:33:00.003-05:00

As I was changing his stinky diaper, Clayton informs me, "Mom, you are the best wiper. Leela is the best drawer. You are the best wiper."

Oh joy. What an honor.

Vacation Week

2011-07-05T08:32:00.003-05:00

We started last week out by shopping for and replacing our fridge. Here's what poor Bruce looked like when he came home from earning all that overtime that is paying for our new fridge.

So after cleaning the house, doing all the laundry, packing everybody's stuff, cleaning out the old fridge, and installing the new one, which was just a bit taller than our old one, so we had to move a kitchen cabinet to make it fit, ANYWAY after that and a long run on sentence, we went to Santa Claus, Indiana with Bruce's family. We played all day at the water park on Wednesday, and on Thursday we played all day at the non-water part of the park. It was a good time!

Here's the good thing about traveling with boys. Ross was actually there too, but he got done and ran out of the shot right before I took this picture.

Clayton had his birthday while we were in Indiana.

Next we packed up, drove home, dropped off our dirty laundry, and headed out for Nauvoo, where we geeked out again over Vocal Point. I have more pictures just like this one, but with the different members of VP. However, you'll just have to be happy with a sample, because I don't feel like posting all of them.

Ross was way excited to take a picture with VP's Ross. All of the VP members were very nice and good sports about dorks like us who bugged them after the show for pictures. I totally love these guys!

Vocal Point
Back row left to right: Jake Hunsaker, Robert Seely, Keith Evans, Mike Christensen, Tyler Sterling, and Ross Welch
Front row, left to right: Tanner Nilssen, McKay Crockett, and Ben Murphy

We got home from our Nauvoo trip Sunday evening. My family deserves major props because they all pitched in and in less than an hour's time we had our van completely unpacked, and everything put back in it's place.

Monday morning I was up at 4:45 and off to do the 4th of July biathlon (5 mile run and 20 mile bike) with Bruce's dad. I think the clouds scared off a bunch of folks, because the turn out was not all that good. However the weather was just about as perfect as it gets for 4th of July. I did okayish. I took second in my division, but that's really only because there weren't very many people there.

Am I just old and farty? That vacation WORE me OUT!!

Pay Your Tithing Folks!

2011-06-27T10:27:00.007-05:00

We had to buy a new fridge. Boo! We did get a great deal though, and a cool "pay your tithing" lesson out of it. Our old fridge is not quite broken yet, but it's showing all the signs that the end is near soon. The outside has some really hot spots, it leaves puddles on the floor, the inside of the freezer is always frosty, and the ice cream is always half melted. We decided that we would rather avoid the whole "The-fridge-is-broken-we-need-a-new-one-NOW-cuz-all-our-food-is-spoiling-and-making-a-huge-stinky-mess." kind of problem.

We therefore spent Saturday buying a new one. I did all the consumer reports research and picked out the fridge that I thought I wanted, and hunted for the store with the best price on that particular fridge. Bruce and I headed out to Best Buy, paper in hand, and I asked the first sales person I saw to ring me up for that particular fridge. He walked us back to the fridge section, where I saw the one that I had picked out. Upon actually seeing the fridge in person, I realized that it looked rather plasticy and flimsy, and that my kids would probably rip the door off in the first week. We started looking at other fridges. We found a floor model that had a couple of minor dings in it that made them knock the price down by $700. The original price was twice the price of the one that I had gone to the store to buy, but with the dings, it was now only a couple of hundred more than the other one. When you are already committed to spend $800, really why not spend $1000 and get a MUCH nicer fridge? So that's what we did.

Here comes the tithing lesson. As you might already know, we are ALWAYS EXTREMELY stressed where the money situation is concerned, so spending $1000 dollars on a new fridge out of the blue really made me want to puke. Of course we don't have that kind of money sitting around. We had to take get a Best Buy credit card, and put it on that. It's an 18 month same as cash deal. If I budget it right, we should be able to do it. Still, it makes me want to vomit. As it turns out, this week is Bruce's week to be on call, and Anheuser Busch had a major truck scale go down in a major way. Bruce put in 11 hours of over time on it the other night. That alone should bring in $450. Earlier this week, Bruce had about four hours of over time put in on something else. With that we are over half way there to have that fridge paid off. In a completely insane twist of fate, that same truck scale that they had JUST spent so many hours of over time fixing got struck by lightening in a storm the next night. So on Bruce's last night of on call, which was Sunday when over time pays double time instead of just time and a half, Bruce got called out to work for about nine more hours on that same scale. Upon doing the math, all that over time adds up to about $1000 (the price of our new fridge). Now TELL me that paying your tithing doesn't take care of you! We certainly are not wealthy. We barely scrape by, but guess what: We always have just enough for what we need. It's rather amazing when you think about it!

A Little Laugh at Mom's Expense

2011-06-27T02:58:00.001-05:00

I scared the crud out of my mom. Always funny! Especially since I wasn't even trying to scare her. All I did was to come over unannounced with my dog. As always when I bring the dog along, I took her straight to the backyard (dogs are strictly forbidden inside my parents' house). Mom and Dad were on the other side of the yard, and didn't see or hear us enter the yard. The first thing they saw was an over excited large black furry thing that "snuck up" quick as lightening from behind and got right in their faces. They both jumped about a foot in the air, and Mom actually screamed. Oh I wish I had a video camera with me! It was hilarious!

Losing It!

2011-06-23T10:46:00.000-05:00

Is it completely unusual for folks above the age of 30 something to forget how old they are??? Or am I just seriously losing my mind waaay too soon?? I'm blaming it on the kids. I seriously had to do the math, because I couldn't remember if I was 35 or 36. Wow! I'm totally losing it!! (For the record, I'm only 35. Whew!)

Problem Solved

2011-06-18T11:52:00.002-05:00

My two youngest boys love to play "Harry Potter," which includes using a marker to draw glasses around your eyes and a scar on your forehead. You must also have a wand. This can be anything from a pencil to a screw driver or anything long and thin. Next you must run around on pretend broomsticks cursing everything in sight. On a side note, Clayton has taken to wielding his wand at me and shouting "avada kedavra!" at me when ever he is upset with me for any reason. ie:

"Clayton clean up your toys."

"Avada kedavra!"

Should I be insulted that my 3 year old is casting the killing curse at me? Probably not. I don't think he knows what it is.

Anyway as a parent, and as my MIL likes to point out to me, kids running around with sharp pointy objects is not the best idea. The current favorite wand material is the stick part that comes off of some giant bubble wands. I have actually gone to the dollar store and bought a couple of these to replace wands that have been lost.

However, when Bruce was a child he nearly died when he fell on a wooden spoon and it went into his open mouth and through his soft pallet. Hence, his mother has often told me how dangerous it is to let kids run around with toothbrushes, and she really doesn't like this wand obsession either. I can't blame her, and after all of those stories it makes me a little nervous.

Last night Clayton couldn't find his "wand" so I improvised. I found the perfect solution!! (That is if I can convince Justice and Clayton that these wands are better than the bubble wand kind.) Those extra long glue sticks! They are the perfect size, and they are completely flexible. If you fell on it, the thing totally wouldn't hurt you. Now I just have to figure out a way for the bubble wand things to disappear, and for glue sticks to seem totally cool. ????????? I'll have to think on that.

Brothers

2011-06-17T08:37:00.001-05:00

I find it sweet and amusing how every time Justice gets in trouble and sent to his room, Clayton goes with him, even if Clayton isn't in trouble.

Tattling Fail

2011-06-15T09:53:00.003-05:00

"Mom, Justice is trying to wash the shampoo out of his hair!"

Todd's Birthday Video

2011-06-14T15:56:00.004-05:00

I had trouble getting the soundtrack recorded, AND I had a MASSIVE sinus infection, so no making fun of the bad singing!!! I just took one take with a digital recorder, and yeah it sounds pretty awful, but I just got sick of waiting around and sick of messing with the entire project. Plus Todd's birthday was already past. Out of time, so here it is flaws and all.

Just a Thought

2011-06-13T14:25:00.001-05:00

You can apply this to just about anything: If you can pick it apart and find order, if it takes an intelligent person to unfold, to analyze, to find out the hows and whys of any beautiful work, any machine, any equation etc., if it takes someone intelligent to work the equation backwards, doesn't it make sense that it took someone that much more intelligent to plan the thing in the first place.

Quote of the Minute

2011-06-06T18:40:00.002-05:00

Clayton:

I am NAKED MAN!!!

The Latest Dirt

2011-05-30T16:36:00.008-05:00

So I haven't updated in a while. Here's what's been happening: That last crabby post was one day when I must have just had PMS or something. Do you other gals just have bad days when you are a roller coaster of raging mood swings? Well, that was one of those days. Since then, I've been feeling quite normal and happy to have my kiddos here with me.

What else...? Justice was getting himself dressed the other day and he told me, "I found some underwear in the laundry room. I sniffed em'. They're clean."

I did the Memorial Day Biathlon today. I had a terrible run. The heat got to me, and I had to stop and walk. I've never done that before in a race. However, once I got on the bike, I felt good and flew past quite a few folks. I made up enough time that, though I was just over a minute slower than my time last year, I still took 2nd out of 21 women in my age division.

Okay I'll talk you through my recent pictures, in reverse chronological order:

Summer time is upon us, and one of my favorite things ever is when my kids are having fun playing out in the yard. I love the next several pictures!

Here's a big spanking that Clayton earned himself. Check out that bruise on Justice's cheek. That's from a bite.

Lydia was WAY over due to clean out her backpack!! She'd been carrying around all of those old papers for a while.

Ally has a new friend. We have a new set of neighbors. Cash is their little bull dog pup. He's about the same age as Ally (just shy of a year old). The two dogs are good buddies now. The cutest thing is when they try to share toys and sticks with each other through the fence.

Here's Lydia with her last school project of the year. It's a mouse trap car that Bruce and my sister-in-law stayed up ALL NIGHT to finish. I was a party pooper and fell asleep on the couch.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot! Victory in the primary room!!! Brady (my cousin's little boy, who is in my Sunbeam class, who always pulled away from me and gave me no end of dirty looks, and always stuck his tongue out at me) Brady came up to me and gave me a hug, all on his own volition!!! Then he crawled up and sat on my lap! Yay yay yay!!!

Not a Good Sign

2011-05-25T13:04:00.002-05:00

It's the first day of summer and I have already shouted a bunch and cried. Luckily, Ross and Mark were sweeties and cheered me up by fixing me a thoughtful lunch and telling me jokes while I ate it. :)

Busy

2011-05-19T08:56:00.003-05:00

Monday: Dr. appt. 45 minutes away, two ball games at the same time. Tuesday: Muddy dog, two REALLY REALLY muddy little boys on the floor that I JUST FINISHED CLEANING, threw kids in shower while I went outside to hose off muddy clothes; shower clogged, came in with hosed off clothes which I took to the laundry room to find water from the clogged shower pouring through the ceiling, ran upstairs hollering my head off, freshly cleaned floor, walls, cabinetry COVERED in mud with a small lake to boot, boys loving splashing in the clogged shower, turn off shower, shop vac floor & shower, re-clean floor, time to get ready for older kids' band concert. Wednesday: Two ball games and church activities. Thursday: Go to Ross' school for living museum, yay for visiting Sister-in-Law!! Friday: Help with Fun Day at Ross' school. Saturday: GIRLS' NIGHT OUT!!! Sunday: Church. Monday: Help with Mark's Fun Day, two ball games.....

Life as a mom of mixed age kids: I'm there.

Happy Days With My Pre-Schoolers

2011-05-03T08:49:00.004-05:00

Okay, I really need to get out and play with my school aged kiddos more. It seems like all my posts are about the two youngest. But to be real, they are the two I see the most, since they are still at home with me. Clayton is going to miss the heck out of Justice in the fall, when Justice starts Kg!

Today I am hosting a couple of ninjas. They had Ninja Oatmeal with Ninja Eggs and Strawberry Ninja Milk for Ninja Breakfast. And when Ninja Clayton got his Ninja Spoon out of the Ninja Drawer, he cracked me up when he wielded it high in the air, with a He-man-By-the-power-of-Gray-Skull-I-have-the-POWER kind of attitude, as he cried "I have the NINJA SPOON!!" At the moment though, Ninja Clayton is having a melt down because Ninja Justice is playing with the guy that Ninja Clayton wants.

Here are yesterday's adventures:

This week is big trash pick-up. I couldn't help but give a little sigh over getting rid of the high-chair, the baby car seat, and a couple of other baby things. In the end, I decided to at least keep Justice and Clayton.

I don't know if our neighbor minds or not, but all of the good puddles are in front of his house.

Here is a cool vine to swing on across the street. After an old guy driving down the street stopped and told me that it was a poison ivy vine, I immediately took the kids in and scrubbed Justice down. However, after consideration, I think that guy must be wrong. While I do know that poison ivy does grow into vines like that one, I don't think this one can be poison ivy. I asked Justice if he had ever swung on that vine before. He said he had. Well he didn't get poison ivy then, and he didn't get it this time. I think it's probably okay.

A Rule Of Etiquette That I Never Thought I'd Have to Make

2011-04-26T19:26:00.002-05:00

No peeing at the dinner table.

So Much Stuff

2011-04-26T08:26:00.005-05:00

Quotes of the week:

1) Ross: "We boys have to be able to laugh off a certain amount of pain."

2) Justice: "He bit me twice and I only hit him on the head. Grammy, I want you to deal with it. I don't want my dad to deal with it."

The other night when we were having a chill out snuggle session on the couch, Justice and Clayton kept pushing each other out of the way so that they could snuggle with me. Poor Bruce, alone on his part of the couch says "Doesn't anyone want to snuggle with me?"

Clayton walked off and came back a minute later with his giant truck. "Here Dad," he said as he tucked the truck in to snuggle with Bruce. He then continued in the Pile on Mommy game.

Today after we dropped Ross and Mark off at school, we paused at a stop sign in front of the clinic where we had Ally spayed several months ago. Ally looked over at that place and growled. Lol! Do you think she actually remembered that place??

Okay here are the pictures from the last couple of weeks, in reverse chronological order. I don't feel like rearranging them, so deal with it.

Here we are in our Easter finery. (We are standing on a hill. I may be tall, but I don't tower over my family quite like that.) You know, it's a mean trick to give kids a bunch of candy and then dress them up in new clothes (courtesy of Grammy) and not let them touch all of that candy, lest they spoil their new duds. None-the-less, two of our boys had gum on their shirts by the time we got to church. Oh, and what does it say when your children develop bed-head while at church?

The kids left out carrots for the Easter Bunny, and they left a note saying "...there is a chocolate egg in the freezer on top of the bacon."

The Easter Bunny wrote back "Thanks, I love bacon!" When the kids checked in the morning, the egg was still there, but the bacon was all gone.

In other news, Lydia did her first triathlon this weekend. Her middle school put it on. As the youngest Zilla, she borrowed my tri-suit and did Team Godzilla proud, taking second place!

Okay, is it just me, or is she totally my daughter?Lydia is also busy doing track. Surprisingly, she ended up being a thrower as well as a runner. In spite of her thin build, she's actually pretty good at it.

Okay, I REALLY owe my sister-in-law an apology! Sorry Liz!!!! People are going to stop allowing their kids to come to our house. It seems that nobody can escape clean. I'll have to do a better job of making sure that they are wearing my kids' old, jumpin' in puddles clothes before going outside. It was too late by the time we found them, so since the damage was done, why make them stop? They were having so much fun! (For the record, I did soak that shirt in spray -n-wash and give him a shower before sending him back to Grandma's house.)

The boys are loving Justice and Clayton's new bunk beds. Ross and Mark haven't slept in their own room since we got these. (Not that they did much of that in the first place. That's why we got the full size bed on the bottom.) Gotta love a good craigslist deal!

This is a nutso hail storm. Bruce stood at the window and shouted "Oh HAIL!" Now the kids have another favorite fake swear. Sigh!

It's that time of year again, and I've been having a ball going on field trips with the kids. Ross' class went to the City Museum. It was a blast! I also went on Mark's field trip, but I left the camera at home. Poo!

Yesterday I tried making my own bubble solution and improvising my own bubble wands (we didn't have any of that stuff around). It was a total bust. I only got one stinking bubble; it started raining on us; and then when Justice and Clayton decided to dunk their heads into the bubble solution, it ended our "bubble" session real quick.

No Wonder She's So Hyper

2011-04-21T10:39:00.001-05:00

The dog found the Easter Bunny's stash.

WTFreak?!

2011-04-20T13:10:00.004-05:00

When Justice, Clayton, and myself are the only people home, finding an open bottle of crazy glue on the floor is probably not a sign of good things waiting to be discovered.

It's Official

2011-04-20T12:20:00.003-05:00

At the tender age of 35, I have just submitted a piece of music for copyright for the very first time. Ain't I big stuff!

Small Miracles

2011-04-17T18:26:00.002-05:00

I'll be honest. I struggle with a bad attitude. I spend my life taking care of young ones. There is ALWAYS a to-do list longer than my entire life. With a husband, five kids and a fixer-upper of a house, I simply can't do all of the things that need to get done around here. From time to time, it REALLY gets me down, and I feel like a failure in every single aspect of my life.

I know that really I have a great life. I have a husband who is truly my best friend, I have five healthy kids. I have my health, I have the gospel, and really what more can one person ask for. More often than not, I'm okay, but from time to time, the responsibility of it all gets to me. I have some serious ambitions of my own and almost no time to work on the things that I want to learn to do. I crave solitude and time to work on my music. Okay, I'm rambling...

Sometimes my attitude just down right sucks. One night a week ago or so, I was having a particularly bad night. My list was just weighing on me, the house was messy, the two littlest kids just wouldn't go to bed, and I was frustrated and mad, mad, mad. I was wondering if I would ever be allowed to do the things that I wanted to do with my time. I was in a bad, bad, bad state of mind, and I just could not stop feeling put out, stepped upon, unappreciated and no end used.

I went to my room in tears and not knowing any other way out, I turned to prayer. The thought "cast your burdens on the Lord" came to my mind. In tears I told the lord that I just could not stop feeling this way. I just couldn't do it on my own. As I asked for help, really wanting to stop feeling so mean inside, it was like I could literally feel those bad feelings leaving one by one. Where there had been a long list of things that I had wanted to complain about, now there was nothing. I'm sure that I could go and dredge up every one of those feelings again, and feel all of that nastiness again, and to be honest, I have from time to time. But for the time, they were just gone. It's a testament to prayer and the Lord's ability to lift burdens.

Okay fast forward to today, when I am once again a jerk. Clayton kept me up much of the night last night, I had neglected my scriptures, and I was just exhausted in every sense of the word. I can't tell you how much I depend upon church to help me feel better, to give me a new sense of perspective, to point me, and to give me the energy to keep on keepin' on. Let me diverge slightly for just a second. You always hear women in the church saying how much they love Primary (the classes for children ages 3-11). I have spent the vast majority of my adult life involved in teaching Primary in one capacity or another, and to be perfectly honest, I just haven't really felt that way. It's horrible. I stink! Maybe that's why I just keep getting called back to Primary, or maybe that's all I'm fit for, I don't know. I tend to feel like I get my fill of little people in my regular life. When I'm not in Primary, I really enjoy Relief Society (the class for women 18 and up). I feel uplifted and like I finally have a little bit of time to spend with grown up women. In R.S. the classes are geared to me, and I soak it up. In Primary, the classes are geared to little children, and to be honest, the last thing I feel like doing is dealing with more little people. It's completely horrible, I know. I shouldn't have such a bad attitude, but I really struggle with these feelings.

ANYWAY, I am SOOOO rambling today. Feel free to not read my stupidity. So when I was called away from my beloved R.S. a few months ago to teach the Sunbeams (3 year olds), I was honestly less than thrilled. (I'm so going to hell!) I go every week, and I do my best, but I just don't look forward to it. Today I was tired physically, spiritually, and I felt like I could really use a boost. I just did not want to teach my class today, and I prayed for the Lord to help me once again stop feeling that way. I begged the Lord to feed me spiritually.

On to my class I went, just wishing to be somewhere else. My lesson was about how we are thankful that Jesus made birds and insects. I just did not want to do it today. Feeling tired, I closed my manual, and took the kids outside to look for some real birds and insects. The weather was beautiful, and bam right there in the parking lot were two geese. They let us get within about six feet of them. We talked about how Jesus made the birds, we listened to bird sounds. Then we saw some real live bees collecting nectar. We talked about how the bees made honey and helped the flowers to grow. It was actually a fun lesson. I actually enjoyed my primary class!

Oh and if you actually held on through all of my drivel this long, you deserve this funny thing that happened in Primary today. As he was coloring today, Brady, one of my three year olds, decided to "write his name" on his picture. "B-R-A-T. That spells me!" he says. Lol! I told his mom (my cousin Brooke who is also in Primary), and she jokingly said "Well that's about right."

Harry Mom

2011-04-16T09:41:00.003-05:00

Clayton has reached the stage of constantly playing pretend. He is always Ben 10, Kevin Levin, Super Why, etc. Ben 10 has been his favorite for a while. When he's in Ben 10 mode everything is "Ben 10." I am his "Ben 10 Mom;" he eats "Ben 10 cereal;" he jumps on his "Ben 10 bed." You get the picture.

Lately he's been pretending to be Harry Potter a lot. But somehow this one just doesn't have the same ring. I am his "Harry Mom;" he eats "Harry Cereal"...

Oh and since we are talking about HP, in-case you missed it on FB, my kids and I can't stop watching this video:

Justice-isms

2011-04-14T07:44:00.002-05:00

Apparently it is now a requirement for J & C to wear swimming goggles in the shower.

Today as we were driving along, we passed a 'Stop' sign. Justice says, "What is that sign trying to say? I think it's saying 'Stop,' 'cause his family just won't stop talking."

I always tell my children that they are my favorite of whatever age they are. For example, when Mark had just turned five, I told him "Mark, you used to be my favorite four year old, but you aren't any more." Oh how his poor little face fell! "Now you're my favorite five year old!"

Justice has been trying to play along, but apparently he doesn't know how old I am. Last week he kept telling me that I was his favorite 15 year old. "But Justice, I'm not fifteen!"

This week I'm his favorite fifty five year old. :( For the record, I am neither fifteen nor fifty five. I'm somewhere in the middle.

Pennies From Heaven (and Other Mildly Bloggable Stuff)

2011-04-12T14:47:00.004-05:00

Apparently it's either been raining pennies from Heaven, or I have a magical dehumidifier that turns water into pennies and dimes. Either way, let it rain baby!

I am my father's daughter after all! I used to make fun of my dad because he's such a penny pincher that he has been known to cut open a tube of toothpaste to get out the last little bit. I forgot that we were almost out of toothpaste, the last time I went to the store... and alas the day came when I just couldn't squeeze any more out of that dang tube. Thanks for the idea Dad!

Here's just a cute picture of my boys eating the left over chocolate after I had finished making cake balls.

We seem to have a knack for picking out incredibly patient. Good thing too. You HAVE to be patient pets and no end tolerant to survive at our house!

Oh yeah, last week Bruce's parents took Justice and Clayton over night and then on a trip to the zoo. What a glorious day! They had a good time. When I asked them to tell me about their day, this is what I got:

"It was fun. Mom, gorillas' butts are DISGUSTING!"

(He meant baboons.) Of all the things to remember!

Springy

2011-04-03T08:41:00.001-05:00

ALL of my children are outside playing together, completely of their own accord. I love this on so many levels!

In other news, the kids and I cut up a bunch of different colored ribbons and strewed them all over the yard. Not being familiar with the habits of birds, I'm not sure of the timing of the thing, but we're hoping that they use them in their nests. It will be cool to see 1: if they use them; 2: How far will our ribbons go? Will they stay around in our immediate area? Will they travel down the street? Will they wind up around town? We'll be looking for nests with red, pink and blue ribbons woven in.

LOTR Awesomeness!!

2011-04-03T07:55:00.004-05:00

We went to Powell Symphony Hall last night with our three oldest children to see The Fellowship of the Rings with the music played live with the orchestra and a HUGE live choir. It was just the just one of the coolest things EVER!!! It was exactly like watching the movie on a big screen, but the entire soundtrack was LIVE!!! We hung around afterward showing the kids the view from the balcony. When we came down, the place was mostly cleared, and we got to see a BUNCH of REALLY cool props used in the real movie. We talked to the guy who owns them. He confirmed that they were genuine, and he let us hold Sting to take a picture. SOO Frickin' cool! One of my very favorite movies with REAL music. .... SO COOL!

Us holding the REAL Sting. SO AWESOME!!

Us with a REAL Ring Wraith Costume.

\He also had the real shards of Narcil (sp??) and the sword once it was remade. He had a pair of Hobbit's feet, a bunch of cool helmets, an orc mask, and a bunch of other cool stuff. I can't imagine how much he paid for that collection! The swords were all knotched out from being used in the movie. Okay, I'm geeking out. He had Orlando Bloom's knife / sword thing too.

April Fool's Day

2011-04-01T07:59:00.000-05:00

We barricaded the door while Bruce was out this morning.

Doopity Plop

2011-03-30T06:29:00.003-05:00

The other day Justice was crying about something, and flopped face down on the bed. Ha ha! (I think he'd been eating something chocolate.)

I met with a person from the music dept. at a university close by the other day to get a list of things to work on to prepare for auditions and going back to school. True I won't be going back till Clayton is in kg, which won't be until fall 2013, but I'm so freaking excited!!! I can't even tell you! I love school! I love learning! But most of all, I LOVE music!!!! You just have no clue how much of a geek I am about good music. I doubt there is a person alive who loves it more than I do. It may seem a bit daft, with things going the way they are right now economy-wise, to choose to go to school to study music education, but seriously, I just want to learn it all. Even if I never get a job teaching, it will be TOTALLY worth it to learn all that I can. For me, majoring in anything else is absolutely unthinkable. I only wish I had time to do a double major. I REALLY want to study music theory / comp. I'll get to take a lot of those classes too as a music ed. major, but oh the drive I have to learn to write music! Music theory has become my major geek spot. I want to learn EVERYTHING!! Anyway, I'm rambling. You get the picture.

If you missed it on FB, I just finished writing a piano duet. Instead of having one person playing high, and one person playing low, you have the more experienced piano player sitting in the middle of the piano, while a person who is fairly new to piano flits back and forth from the high to the low and back again. At one point the 2nd person entirely pushes the seated person out of the way and makes a run down nearly the entire keyboard, while the seated person gets up and walks around the back of the 2nd and then plays a similar, but more complicated run down the keyboard. I posted the music and a MIDI file (so you can hear how it sounds) here. It's called Foolishness. Got to run folks!

To Be Like a Child

2011-03-23T06:51:00.002-05:00

The next time you are with someone under the age of about 5, try doing all of the things that they do, exactly like they do them. It's pretty hilarious when you think about it. Just watch the way they jump, skip, throw their hands in the air, and dance around completely at random, expressing the utter joy they feel to be little and carefree. I love to see them at it, but grown-ups look absolutely ridiculous doing those things. I was out running errands with my sister and my two pre-schoolers the other day, and I was trying to mimic everything that they did. Ashley just about peed her pants laughing. You really should try it! Where do they get the energy?

Just a Little Venting

2011-03-21T22:08:00.003-05:00

The day went okay. The weather was great, and I enjoyed a walk with my two youngest boys. Family night was good.

But the past hour and a half... from an entire banana smeared all over the floor that I just mopped earlier today, and a cup of milk splattered on top of that, to an entire shelf of books dumped out, to Clayton (the 2 yr old) giving Ross (the 11 yr old) a fat, bloody lip, to a bunch of boys who just would NOT settle down and go to bed...

Sometimes I just wonder if I'm really cut out for this mothering stuff.

On a lighter note, earlier today when Justice, Clayton and I were out walking with the dog, Justice was pointing out all of the signs that he sees and trying to read them. He did in fact read some of them. He likes to do this kind of thing. Then he tells me all kinds of letter combinations and the words that he thinks they make. As he was doing this he asked me,

"Mom, how do you spell 'sh'?"

"S-H." I tell him, glad that for once he's out of the house, out from in front of the computer screen, and actually using his brain.

"Good. I've been trying to watch The Ultimate Showdown, but I can't spell it." was his reply.

(For those of you who don't know, The Ultimate Showdown is a rather gory cartoonized music video on youtube that Ross and Mark like to watch. Apparently he wanted to know how to spell "sh" as in "Showdown" so he could google it. Sigh!)

A Thoroughly Good Day

2011-03-19T19:53:00.002-05:00

I started the day off with the ward's Relief Society birthday brunch. Good friends, good food, good time.

Then I came home and practiced my piano for about an hour, then vegged with the kids and hubby for just a little bit.

Next we took the kids and the dog to the park. There aren't many things that make me smile more than watching my boys running around with a happy dog. We took Ally (the dog) swimming for the first time in her life. She's half lab, so she ought to like it, but she seemed a bit apprehensive about it. Bruce chucked her in a few times, but she just swam back out. When two ducks swam up by us, she really looked tempted to jump in after them, but she couldn't quite talk herself into it.

Another highlight was when all five of the kids were swinging in a big row and Bruce was running a straight line under / in front / behind them - gauntlet style. (Did that make sense to anyone?) We were all laughing our heads off. It was just fun.

Then Lydia accidentally stumbled across a geocache thing. We signed our names and put it back. We built a fire and ran races. I just love watching little boys running! Clayton was found eating a s'more, though we didn't bring any food with us. I think he found it under a picnic table. Eeewww!

Lastly, inspired by Lydia's find, we looked up the coordinates for another geocache and for the first time set out to find one. However by the time we got there, it was getting dark, and we didn't find it. We'll try it again in the daylight.

Now we are sitting around watching TV. Does life get any better than this?

It's funny, but I spend a lot of time plotting my "get aways" from the kids, but to be perfectly honest, my very favorite times ever are when we all play together. I just love hanging out with my bunch!

Two Year Olds!!!

2011-03-18T16:02:00.003-05:00

When you are having company for dinner in a couple of hours, and you have just invested a good deal of time in making dough (the hard way - withOUT the bread machine, and covering the counter in flour and bread dough grime) for some yummy rolls, and upon leaving it to rise, one does not like to come back to the kitchen to find the following:

Thought of the Day (Plus a Couple of Pictures)

2011-03-17T07:47:00.004-05:00

First the Thought of the Day:

On this St. Patrick's day, if you see an associate or a friend NOT wearing anything green, it would be kind to help them by protecting them from other people's pinches. You may do this by wearing several strings of green beads around your neck, and sharing them with your un-greenified friends, as my daughter did. However I think it would be funner and more convenient to share your boogers with the un-green.

This is me just before running in the Zilla-pede in the St. Patrick's day run. Good fun!

This is Bruce having a little accident when we were doing Ross' science project. We did a really fun experiment with Mentos and Coke.

Here is Clayton abusing some left-over dirt desert. Well, those are calories I don't have to worry about ingesting. Maybe I should thank him.

Blah!

2011-03-11T18:34:00.000-06:00

Blah, Blah, Blah!

How I LOVE My New Door!

2011-03-09T10:08:00.003-06:00

What's that saying about when God shuts a door, somewhere he opens a window? Well sometimes He opens another door that is WAY better than the one that you were contented to live in for the rest of your life. I'm still finding out about this particular door, but if what I'm feeling is really there, then I will be forever grateful for the hard knock it took for me to be diverted from that shutting door!

Something You May Not Know About Me

2011-03-01T18:37:00.001-06:00

I once bit a mentally handicapped woman in the face.

Leaky Cauldron

2011-02-28T08:05:00.014-06:00

That's my brain, a leaky cauldron. I was going to babble about something or other on here, and I unloaded my camera while I was at it. I got to remembering all of the things that I had meant to blog in the past few weeks, but never got around to doing. Now I've completely forgotten what I got on here to do in the first place. I'm getting more and more forgetful all of the time. I think there is just too much crammed up in there. I used to scorn people who had planners and had to write things down in order to remember appointments. It seemed like too much structure to me. (That was when I was like 18 or 19 years old.) Now I can't seem to remember a thing without a stinking tattoo on my face or something. I forget to look at my planner anymore.

Anyway, I'll type my way through these pictures off of my camera, in no particular order, because I'm too lazy to rearrange them. Maybe I'll remember what my original post was going to be by the time I'm done. Or not. It was probably dumb anyway.

These pics of Clayton get posted just because they're cute. Funny, it just occurred to me that they both involve cake. Happy birthdays to Justice (5) and Ross (11)! Hmm. Happy birthdays to Ross and Justice, but I'm posting pictures of Clayton. Does that make me a terrible mother? Maybe.

A couple of weeks ago Bruce took four days off of work to be there while I recovered from a minor surgical procedure, related to my varicose veins, but not typical vein surgery. It turned out that I felt mostly good post surgery, which is good, because Bruce and his dad spent the entire four days doing a major insulation project in our upstairs. It turned out that Bruce was more tired and in need of rest than I was.

They cut many holes in divers places and blew in insulation.

It was really messy. I've been busy mudding and sanding the stinking holes ever since ~ another very messy job that I dislike. I scared Clayton one day when I came downstairs covered in white dust. It was funny, but I didn't have the heart to growl or to be truly scary at him.

Mark and Ross had their pinewood derby this weekend. Ross ended his career with a perfect record. He has never been beaten. Whoop whoop!!

So here's a picture of Justice and Clayton building a snowman together. Nice right? The real story is that Justice was trying to build a family of snowmen, and Clayton kept taking the arms off and running away. Then Justice would get mad and chase him all over the yard.

Our puppy Ally is turning into a mostly good dog. She is really patient with the kids, she's had all of her shots, she is spayed, potty trained, she comes when she's called, she knows "sit," "laydown," "stay." That's the major list of requirements right? However, she's always sneaking things out of the trash, the sink, and who knows what else and hiding them in one of her two stashes. I'm always finding tasty treats hidden behind the curtains next to her bed.

She's not Chloe, but she's trying. That reminds me, my sister-in-law told me that a black dog with white feet is an omen of death. Now I guess she has a new nick name. Wouldn't it be fun to name your dog something like Omen of Death! "Justice and his dog Omen of Death." Or how about "Getem!" How awesome would that be to call your dog when they are greeting people walking down your street. "GETEM!!" Or maybe like the name ... "Pooh Paul Ready" That would be a good one when the dog gets in the neighbor's yard.

You know how I said that I've been spending lots of time mudding and sanding? Well one day last week after I had finished my mudding for the day, Clayton went up stairs and got into the mud in a large hole that I had patched up. He did some mudding of his own.

It's a good thing that mud washes off easy!

Justice continues in his MO. Before the bump on his noggin was even half gone, he fell out of the back of his dad's truck (it was parked in the driveway), and scrapped up the side of his face. Also, he broke another window last night, trying to squash a bug that was on the other side of the glass. I don't know what I'm going to do with that kid! That's two broken windows and the glass to Bruce's gun case broken by Justice in the last five months. Ugh. I guess I'm buying a couple of new windows with our tax return. Love that kid all the same!

Well, that's all I've got for today. So much for whatever I was going to post about. This will have to do instead.

Life With Little Boys

2011-02-22T15:32:00.003-06:00

Okay, two little boys watching themselves in the mirror, jumping on my bed, naked, laughing and yelling

"I'm superman, flying in the sky naked!"

"Naked, naked, naked!"

is really cute. I'd take a picture, but Justice is getting a little too old to be photographed naked. If I was Amy, I might have figured out some artistic way to take a picture of only their bare chests or feet or something, but I'm just me.

I'm not mentioning that they just got finished dumping half a bottle of shampoo on the shower floor. It all washed down the drain anyway.

I'm going to have to do a Sunday morning line up though. I got to church on Sunday to find that Ross was wearing jeans and a t-shirt under his church clothes, and Justice had two left shoes on.

Pardon My Toot!

2011-02-14T00:02:00.002-06:00

I just finished writing my very first ever (well the stuff that you do as a kid, because your teacher made you, doesn't count) short story! It's not perfect, I'm sure, but it was fun.

You see, I'm the chair person of Mark's class' Valentine's Day party (how's that for a lot of possessive " 's!") and I needed one more game to fill about 20 minutes worth. Mark's been having fun playing Madlibs, so I thought it would be fun to do a madlib kind of story with the class. I looked all over for one that was already made up, or a story that I could easily convert into a madlib, but I couldn't find anything that I really liked. So in the end, I decided that I'd try to write my own. It took me a few hours, but I am pleased with the results.

Here it is:

A Silly, Adlib, Love Story

By Renae Eldridge

February 2011

Here are the words that you will need to complete the story. Choose your own, and insert them at the appropriate places.

Noun 1

Adjective 1

Name 1

Animal

Name 2

Verb 1

Noun 2

Verb 2

Noun 3

Adjective 2

Verb 3

Verb 4

Verb 5

Adjective 3

Noun 4

Verb 6

Adjective 4

Name 3

Once upon a time, in a noun 1 far, far away, there lived a (adjective 1 princess named name 1. Every day she and her pet animal,
name 2
verb 1ed through the Enchanted Forest.

She was very happy, but she had a secret, and her greatest fear was that someday everyone would find it out. Her secret was this: When she was very small, a witch had enchanted her so that when ever anyone said the word "noun 2" in her presence, she would automatically start to verb 2. She couldn't help it, and she had to keep it up for the rest of the day! She was afraid that once people found out, they would take advantage of her, and she would be stuck verb 2ing for the rest of her life. Then her subjects would lose all respect for her. For who could love a perpetual verb 2er?

So, Princess name 1 and name 2 spent all of their free time hiding in the Enchanted Forest. If you ask me, this was not a good idea. After all, it was an enchantment that was the source of all of her troubles. So why would she spend all of her free time hiding in an Enchanted Forest? The chances are that she would only encounter more enchantments, and make her troubles all the worse. Oh well, princesses are not always known for their brains.

As luck would have it, one day, as Princess name 1 and name 2 were verb 1ing through the forest, they came across a magical noun 3. A little background information here: The magical noun 3 secretly longed for world domination. Its adjective 2 plan was to enchant all princes and princesses that it could find, leave them hidden helplessly in the forest, and then to transform itself in their likenesses and take their places as Kings and Queens. It hadn't figured out yet exactly how to be in a hundred different places at once, but every day the magical noun 3 worked on creating a spell for just that purpose.

Completely unaware of a plan to disable her, Princess

Name 1 happened along the magical noun 3's path. "Now here's luck!" thought the magical noun 3 to itself. "Dear Princess! How I would love to make your dreams come true! Tell me of your greatest joys, and I shall make them always available to you!"

"What an opportunity!" thought the princess. So without hesitation, she blurted out "I love to verb 3, verb 4, and verb 5!"

Immediately the princess began to do all of these things at once. She was could not stop herself. "Oh magical

noun 3, please tell me how to break this spell!"

Cackling madly, the magical noun 3 crowed "True love is your only hope. It alone has the power to break all enchantments. But I'd give up all hope of that, for who would ever love a verb 3ing, verb 4ing, verb 5ing) freak like you?! Aha ha ha! Aha ha ha! Aha ha haaaaa!!!!!" and the magical noun 3 disappeared in a puff of adjective 3
noun 4.

"Oh name 2!" sobbed the princess. "What am I to do?" I can never leave this forest again! I'll be stuck

verb 3ing, and verb 4ing, and verb 5ing here in this place forever!"

Just then they heard the sound of someone crashing through the bushes. "Quick, hide!" shouted the princess, afraid that someone would see her in her sad state. She verb 6ed herself behind a tree and peered out to see what the noise was.

As if drawn by a magnet, a adjective 4 young man ran right up to her in her hiding place. "noun 2!" He shouted in her face.

The princesses' first enchantment made her verb 2 him right in the nose. The young man immediately repeated "noun 2!" Again name 1
verb 2ed him in the nose.

"noun 2!" he shouted a third time and a third time she

verb 2ed him in the nose.

"What a horrible person!" thought the princess. "He's found out my secret and he followed me here to taunt me." She ran off into the woods trying to get away from him, all the while verb 3ing, verb 4ing and verb 5ing.

However the young man followed right on her heals, shouting "noun 2" at her and making her verb 2.

"Go away and leave me alone, you horrible ogre!" she shouted at him.

"I'm sorry my lady, but I can't." he replied. "A magical noun 3 has enchanted me and I am forced to always seek the things that I love most: adjective 1 and noun 2. You are so very adjective 1 that I absolutely can't leave your side. And since I don't have any noun 2 handy, I must beg for it without ceasing."

Verb 2ing, verb 3ing, verb 4ing and verb 5ing, the princess understood. "I've been enchanted by the same noun 3!" She exclaimed! "We must go and find it and make it undo our enchantments! Come with me!"

"Noun 2!" he replied. "I really don't have a choice. My name is Prince name 3, by the way. What's yours?"

"Name 1." She replied as she verb 2ed him in the face. "Let's go!"

So off they went together him shouting "noun 2" and her verb 2ing, verb 3ing, verb 4ing and verb 5ing.

It was a long and hard journey, but eventually they came upon the magical noun 3 while it was trying out its spell to be in a hundred places at once.

"Stop! Noun 2!" shouted Prince Name 3.

Princess Name 1 ran up to the magical noun 3 and

verb 2ed it in the face, right in the middle of its spell. The magical noun 3 stumbled just as he going to a hundred places at once. The spell went all wrong and he was divided into a hundred pieces. That was the end of the magical noun 3.

"Our enchanter is destroyed by its own spell!" exclaimed the princess. "Only now we have no hope of breaking these enchantments. No one could ever love a verb 2ing,

verb 3ing, verb 4ing, verb 5ing freak like me. I'm doomed!" she sobbed.

"I could" said Prince Name 3 softly. "I love your

adjective 1ness, Noun 2!"

"Really?" asked the princess through her tears.

"Yes. Noun 2" replied Prince Name 3. "I love you."

"What? Say that again!" said the Princess excitedly.

"I love you."

"No, the other thing."

"I love your adjective 1ness?"

"No!" said the princess. "Noun 2! See, I didn't verb 2! The spell is broken! I love you too! We don't need the magical noun 3 to break our enchantments! We broke them without it!

Hand in hand Prince Name 3 and Princess Name 1 left the Enchanted Forrest forever. They were married and lived happily ever after.

The End!

Noun 2

Well I Feel Sheepish

2011-02-08T09:30:00.002-06:00

Am I the only person in the world who finds the telephone a little annoying? Okay sometimes MORE than just a little, sometimes I HATE that dumb thing! Like when it beeps at me telling me that its batteries are dying, or that dumb texting beep! I HATE that dumb texting beep! I don't have texting, I don't do texting, so nobody ever texts me except an eight year old girl from Mark's school is rather besotted with him, and junk mail texts. I HATE it when it beeps at me to tell me that there is a text message! I have to quit whatever I'm doing, and go over and make that stupid thing shut the heck up, or the beeping just goes on and on and on. Above all I HATE it when you get those stupid telemarketing recordings calling you! I hate having to drop whatever I'm doing, and rush over to answer the stupid, ringing, pain in the gluteus maximus, only to find out that I was interrupted for no good reason! (Don't worry folks, you are welcome to call to talk to me about real life things. I don't mind that. I'm not a complete ogre.) Anyway, when I get junk phone calls (and I OFTEN do -and they are not even for me! Curse Nicki Northcut whoever he/she is!! I'm always getting phone calls for Nicki! I suppose he/she had my phone number before I did. He/she/it might even still be giving that number out. They sound like bill collectors. I HATE that!!) Anyway where was I? Whenever I get those automated phone people -You can't even mess with them. It takes all the joy out of telemarketing phone calls! Okay when I get these phone calls, it irritates the heck out of me! I yell rude things into the phone like "Leave me alone!!" "Go AWAY!" "Yeah, yeah, yeah!" or just a guttural "AAGHGHG!" Then I snap my phone shut and go about my merry way.

So to get to the point, I always do something like the above mentioned rudeness when I get these phone calls including the ones from Family Video telling me to return my overdue DVDs. After all they are just recordings. I never listen to the entire Family Video message. NEVER! I just hang up and often with a rude exclamation. It's my mean little secret. I've been doing it for years.

This morning I got one of those annoying phone calls from Family Video, "Hello this is Emily from Family Video, calling to remind you of..." I don't know what comes after that, because they never get any further than that before I say something rude and hang up.

After I snapped my phone shut, Bruce asked me, "Who was that?"

"Oh just Family Video, calling to tell me that those DVDs are late."

"And you hung up on them?!"

"Yeah, I always do. It's just a recording."

"No it isn't."

"Yes it is!"

"No. It isn't. I've been at Family Video and seen them make those phone calls a hundred time. It's a real person."

"No. It sounds just like a recording!"

"That's because they have to make those same phone calls all the time. They'll even tell you which videos you have out."

"It's a recording!"

"No it isn't! I've seen them do it! Is it ALWAYS a girl's voice?"

"No. I never really thought about that. REALLY?!"

"Yeah, really."

"Oh crap!"

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Crisis Averted

2011-02-07T14:40:00.004-06:00

It probably isn't a good thing when the four year old and the two year old are sneaking off, giggling with a bottle of pancake syrup, to go and play in your bedroom. Luckily, I caught them on the way there.

In other news, Justice had a bit more excitement in his weekend than I prefer. Bruce met the kids and I at the park Friday when he got off work, to do some sledding. We were having a great time! The inch of ice under the inch of snow made the hill REALLY slick and we were going so fast that Ross and Mark were having fun sledding without a sled. Justice, however preferred the sled because it was faster. He has developed quite the knack for doing a running start and then diving onto his waiting sled for maximum speed. However, the park bench at the bottom of the hill had other ideas. It gave a rather abrupt and painful stop to his maximum speed, when he ran face first into its waiting legs. He had a bloody nose and such a huge bump immediately. It was rather scary! Bruce took him straight to the E.R. in his work truck, while I took the other kids and the dog home, grabbed the insurance cards and tore off to meet him there. After a CT scan and some X-rays, they told us that he was just fine. WHEW!!!! He did get a spectacular bump on his noggin though! These pictures really don't do it justice (no pun intended). It's now Monday and other than looking a little strange, he's perfectly fine.

...Like a Weed! Two Year Edition

2011-02-05T08:19:00.003-06:00

It's been two years now since I started taking pictures of my kids by the growth chart. I'm not perfect about it, but I average one picture a week. Here are the results. Enjoy!

Stuff

2011-02-04T14:20:00.003-06:00

In getting the pictures off my camera, I found a couple of cute Clayton sleeping pictures,

and this shot that I took about a week ago. Is it just me, or do you sometimes take a peek into your closet and realize that it kind of looks like one of the Peanuts characters' closets, where all of the clothes are exactly the same?

On a totally unrelated topic, the other day I was in the basement trying to do one of the many things on my things-that-I-should-really-do-but-just-never-seem-to-fit-into-actual-real-life list. That is, I was lifting weights. Ross says inquisitively, "Mom, why are you doing that?"

My reply was something like, "so I can be more healthy and strong, and because when we get older, we lose our muscles...etc."

He let out a short breath and says as if almost relieved, "Oh. I was wondering if you were lifting weights so you could spank harder."

I wonder if that means that I am lacking in the spanking department. My husband would certainly say that I don't spank nearly enough.

Tidbits

2011-01-25T09:39:00.002-06:00

Yesterday I took Clayton with me to run some errands. As I was buckling him in his car-seat, I noticed that he had some Oreo dirt stuck on his nose. I tried rubbing it off with my finger, and when that didn't work, I licked my finger for another try. Clayton gave me a funny look and asked, "You eat my boogers Mom?!"

Shortly later we were at the grocery store and Clayton kept challenging the other people shopping there. It must be a youngest brother thing. He wasn't doing it in a mean kind of way. I think that's how he thinks you are supposed to make friends or something. We walked past this really big guy (bigger than Bruce, and that is saying something), and Clayton calls out "Hey YOU!" at the guy, shaking both of his fists at him like a boxer. It was funny.

Ross and Lydia have christened January 25th to be "Mark's a Dork Day." They kept congratulating him on having such "holiday spirit" this morning. Siblings!

Sleeping Outside in the Snow and Shocking Ourselves

2011-01-24T12:19:00.003-06:00

When Mother Nature decided to dump about 9ish inches of snow on us last week, Bruce and our older three kids decided to build a big snow fort. They covered the top with a tarp, added a removable wooden door and lined the floor with rubber mats and about a million blankets. Then they slept outside in it! Crazy folks! Being the worry wart mother that I am, I did a little sigh of relief as each child came inside the next morning. Ross slept a little later then everybody else, so I made Mark go and check on him. When Mark didn't come back inside, I went outside myself. I refused to go back inside until Mark woke Ross up and I heard Ross' voice. The kids said that they were all warm and toasty. Just goes to show that my Bruce is a good outdoors-man.

(Clayton is just here for the picture. He didn't sleep out there with them.)

You can see the fort better in the night picture.

They got more snow in the night.

Here's one day a couple of weeks ago when Clayton was "helping" me make biscuits, and turned the dog half white. It was more impressive in person.

You just can't get a shock collar for the dog and not try it out on yourselves.

Poor Kitty

2011-01-22T09:26:00.000-06:00

I feel sorry for the cat when she is the object of a three-way-tug-o-war between the dog, the two-year old, and myself.

My Brilliant Idea for the Day

2011-01-21T14:59:00.003-06:00

Well it took me HOURS to accomplish, so I hope my children find it useful! A little background for my non LDS friends. As members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, we try to hold Family Home Evening every Monday night. This is a night that we, as a family, set aside to spend time together having fun and learning about the gospel. We usually start and end with a prayer, sing songs together -some silly and fun, some spiritual, have a lesson, have some kind of fun activity, and have a treat. FHE is a great time to just enjoy being together and also a great opportunity to teach each-other about the things we believe.

Anyway, our FHEs, while fun, have not always been organized and planned as well as they could be. We've tried making assignments ahead of time, but we always forget who's turn it is to do what. So in an effort to make our FHEs more meaningful and better planned, I have spent HOURS doing the following:

I created a new background on our computer where everyone will see it everyday saying who's in charge of what for the next month and a half of FHEs. That was the easy part. Next I went through Lydia's Personal Progress book, and Ross and Mark's Faith in God books and found every requirement that could be at least partly done by teaching a FHE lesson. I included things that said "learn about" or "discuss" or "teach a lesson" etc. Then I made a folder just under our FHE chart on the desktop with about a million links to scriptures and lesson plans taken from the FHE lesson manual and the Primary manuals on the church website, and clearly marked which requirement those lessons could be used to fulfill. Now when it is their turn to teach the lesson (and they can't miss seeing it everyday), all they have to do is click on that folder to find LOTS of lesson plans and ideas perfectly suited to help them get their different awards done. Now I just have to see if they will use it.

Artful Little One

2011-01-17T11:35:00.004-06:00

When did two year olds become so artful? Clayton really wants to watch TV right now, but I have turned it off. He knows that if Mommy is playing piano, she tends to be a bit deaf.

He is standing in the living room looking wistfully at the TV. "Go pay your pano Mommy."

"Why do you want me to play the piano?"

"Betause I like it."

Yeah right! Artful one!

"Go pay your pano! I like it."

He clearly just wants me to disappear into my own world so that he can watch TV. It's cracking me up.

"Go weed you sciptrs... Go do someping else!"

"Go Mommy! I like it!"

We Ruin a Family's Trip to McDonald's

2011-01-13T07:36:00.002-06:00

As a reward for cleaning the house, I took the kids to McDonald's last night. All was going well until a family consisting of a mother, son and a rather rotund father came and sat down directly behind us. As the poor man was walking by, so close that all I could have touched him by simply leaning back in my chair, Justice (my 4 year old) sings out as if he's calling a punch buggy "Fat guy!"

Well if Justice says it, of course Clayton (the 2 year old) has to parrot it "Fat guy! Fat guy!"

I of course scolded them and told them it was very rude to say things like that. So of course Clayton had to remind me very loudly several times while we were eating "Mommy, we don't say 'fat guy.' It's not nice." I couldn't look that poor man in the face at all.

So about 15 minutes later we finished eating our food and we move our party to the play-land. In my shame, I position myself in a seat in the corner where a wall blocks me from the other family's view. A few minutes later the man's wife and son, who is bigger than Clayton, smaller than Justice, so I'd guess him to be about 3 years old, come in. For some strange reason, (geez I wonder what that could be) the man chose to keep his seat outside of the play-land.

The little boy is having fun running around and playing with Lydia and Clayton, until Clayton decides to hit him in the face. Clayton runs over and exults "I hurt him!" More scolding ensues, followed by apologies. Unfortunately the little boy is crying and the family gets up and leaves, having only played in the play land for about 10 minutes.

Oh I felt ROTTEN! Is it just a natural byproduct of being the youngest of 4 boys to be a bit on the rough side? Last night as Bruce was tucking Clayton in bed, he leaned in for a kiss and Clayton gave it, swiftly followed with a punch in the face. What the heck?!

Well, to whoever you are, I'm REALLY sorry that my boys ruined your trip to McDonald's!

Nothing like that to make you feel like a really successful parent! (heavy sarcasm)

Major Bed Head

2011-01-10T11:34:00.000-06:00

What Happens When You Mix Diaper Dust In With The Hot Cocoa

2011-01-10T09:32:00.002-06:00

Well, maybe you should check whether this stuff is toxic or not. I don't know. Actually it was that instant snow powder, which seems to me to be pretty much diaper dust (the stuff inside diapers that is mega absorbent).

Well our hot cocoa mix was down to only enough to make one last cup of hot cocoa. Someone decided they'd be funny and put their instant snow powder in the mix. I saw the white stuff in there, but that's not really unusual. I just figured it to be powdered sugar that hadn't gotten mixed in properly, or powdered milk. Whatever. So I mixed my one last cup of hot cocoa. However upon stirring it up, it became one big cup full of brown sludge. What the heck! That's when I remembered seeing the empty tube of instant snow. I wish I had taken a picture. Oh well.

I still don't know if the stuff is toxic or not, so I'm not sure if I'd recommend this prank or not. But since I didn't drink it, good one, whoever did it!

Peanuts

2011-01-10T08:15:00.001-06:00

The other day, Clayton was playing in the kitchen sink, and Lydia came and turned the water off, getting him down from the sink. He got all mad and said... Well I guess I have to explain first. The kids all made code names for each other. Ross is Peanuts.... I can't remember what the other ones are. Someone is Oatmeal. Lydia is Peaches. Anyway, if you say their code name it means that they are supposed to beat up whoever you name next. Justice is always getting mad at Mark and yelling "Peanuts Mark!" Thus, Ross is supposed to beat up Mark.

So anyway, Clayton got all mad at Lydia and complains as he's leaving the kitchen, "Lella shut the walla off." (Lydia shut the water off.) "PEANUTS LEELLA!!" Then he stalks back into the kitchen, shoots Lydia a look and says "I'll show you! Peanuts you Leella!"

Ross' reply was "Uh, I don't think so. She's too big."

Clayton was mad at me a few weeks ago about something. I don't remember what. I just remember him sitting on the stairs and quietly pouting "Peanuts Ma ma." To which I laughed.

Ha ha!

2011-01-06T08:26:00.002-06:00

Justice and Clayton spent the day at Grammy & Pa's house yesterday while mommy convalesced. As they were pulling up to McDonald's, Justice confided the following in his grandparents:

"I'm glad Mom's sick, so I can come to your house."

For the record, I'm feeling mostly better today.

Funky

2011-01-06T07:16:00.001-06:00

It feels really weird to have a swollen uvula! I keep trying to swallow the thing.

Playing Hooky

2011-01-05T10:16:00.003-06:00

Bruce and I had been planning on having a family day out all winter vacation. To accomplish this, Bruce had to be off work as well as the kids off school. The days surrounding Christmas were spent with family who came in from out of state. (We really enjoyed having you Greg and Mindy, and hope that you come again soon! Maybe we'll have our bathrooms remodeled by next time!) No problem, Bruce had Friday and Monday surrounding New Year's Eve off too, so did the kids (at least that's what I thought.) Friday and Saturday were hunting season for Bruce and Lydia, so those days were out. So we planned to go on Monday. However upon checking the actual schedule (always a good thing to do) I found out that the kids were supposed to go to school on Monday. DRAT!! We have a membership to the science center, but it expires at the end of the month. Anyway, we deliberated long about it, we prayed about it, and in the end, we pulled the kids out of school for a family day at the science center. I told the kids that this kind of thing will never happen again, so don't even ask. It's probably a good thing that we went on Monday, because I came down sick on Tuesday, and if normal family policy stands true, it will take a week or two to get it through the whole family.

Call me a bad parent if you want, but it was one of our best days ever!

There is nothing in this world better than a 2 year old hug. (Bruce says that it looks like my head is coming out of his body backwards.)

Here we are inside a nose at the grossology exhibit.

This is just a whacky picture that I found when I took the pictures off the camera this time. Check out where Clayton is sitting.

On a completely unrelated topic, we've been having problems with Ally (our 6 month old puppy) running wild when ever the front door is opened. I can't tell you how many things this dog has made me late for. No matter how hard we try, she always manages to dart out between the legs of whoever is opening the front door, and then she's off like a shot. There is NO getting her back either. It's a complete game to her. Well I got sick of playing, so I finally gave in and bought a remote controlled shock collar online. It came this morning. Upon opening the package I had a laugh. Look at how big the collar is. It would fit around a grizzly bear's neck! I'd hate to see the dog that it would fit!

Anyway I adjusted the mile long thing to fit her neck, and I couldn't resist testing it out. I set the dial to the lowest setting. I opened the front door and let her out into the yard. Off she ran; I called her and when she ignored me I pushed the button. (Unfortunately I pushed the wrong button. There is one for the stimulation setting that the dial reads, and there is a button that gives the stimulation two notches up from what the dial reads.) I pushed the button for two steps up. Oops! Well she yelped stopped. I called her and again pressed the wrong button. (Only the second time did I realize my mistake). She yelped and ran back to me. We hung out in the yard for a few minutes. Our neighbor came walking down the street. Ally ran out to greet them. I let her go to the end of the yard and told her to stop. When she continued, I gave her a little shock (this time with the right button). Amazingly, she ran right back to me. Yay for miracles! The down side is that I think she thinks she's in danger if she isn't right on my heels. She's been shadowing me ever since. I really don't think we'll need this thing for long. I just hope she isn't smart enough to figure out that it doesn't work if she's not wearing it.

Drowning in Clothes!!

2010-12-31T17:29:00.002-06:00

I just finished organizing ALL of the boy clothes that we own. Since we get hand-me-downs from a cousin 3 years older than my oldest boy, I have clothes from size 20 (like stuff too big for me) down to size 2T. That's a LOT of clothes!!!! Glad to have that done. The best thing is that everything from size 2T down, I can now get rid of. Ahh clothes actually leaving the house. Only Lydia's clothes left to do.

A Few Pictures

2010-12-23T08:29:00.004-06:00

Lydia went caroling dressed as Buddy the Elf.
One of those sleep pictures that you just can't help taking

Umm... She tried to get out of the van backwards and hands first.

It didn't really work out.

Sorry Bruce, but it was too funny not to laugh.

Yeah, he just sat down... a bit farther than he had intended.

Busy Lydia

2010-12-20T09:48:00.003-06:00

I guess I'm finding out what one part of life with teenagers is going to be like. Lydia has to go to school early twice a week for choir. She has to say two hours and fifteen minutes late 4 days a week for volleyball, and she's a band officer, which has responsibilities as well.

Today was an early choir day, plus volleyball practice, plus the Christmas concert tonight. Being a band officer, she is supposed to be there early to set up. With all of this, she was scheduled to be at school from 7:30 a.m. till about 8:30 p.m.

I emailed her coach and her band director and they are being very nice and letting her have about an hour and a half break between them to do her homework and to eat some dinner.

She is such a great gal! I love my Lydia.

Parenting Frequently Takes More Patience Than I Have At My Disposal

2010-12-17T10:48:00.002-06:00

Tree knocked over, water, pine needles, broken glass, ornaments and cereal all over the place. I hope none of these presents are damaged. Ugh!

Christmas Preview

2010-12-15T22:05:00.003-06:00

I'm Different
2010 Year End Video I

Justice and Clayton in the Shower

2010-12-15T08:05:00.000-06:00

Justice: "Don't pee on me ... Gosh Darn it!! When you have to pee, pee in the potty!"

Snow Day and Laundry

2010-12-14T08:13:00.004-06:00

Our Stake Christmas Cantata was supposed to be held on Sunday night, but it got postponed due to the snow. So instead we spent a most enjoyable evening listening to Christmas music from ranging from "The Night Santa Went Crazy" and "Oh Come All Ye Faithful" performed by Twisted Sister to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and The Cambridge Singers, etc. We FINALLY had time to get out our Christmas decorations. Now our Christmas tree is beautiful and I even put some lights up. (I cheat and hang them on the insides of the windows. They look just as beautiful from outside, but I don't have to go out in the cold to put them up.) Then my parents came over and hung out with us. It was a very enjoyable, unrushed evening.

Yesterday the kids had the day off from school. I did a lot of farting around on the computer organizing pictures for my end of the year slideshow, and looking for the perfect song. Alas, I have not a single clue this year. Anyway, but I did get my lazy rear up and make pretzels with the kids, courtesy of our pixie who sent us a kit.

Lydia made hers beautifully in the conventional way.

Ross and Mark created abstract shapes for theirs.
(After Clayton ruined one of Ross' by stepping on it, Ross changed it to an "M for MAD!"

Ross kept interfering in Mark's picture

Justice and Clayton had yet more unconventional ways of making their pretzels.

On another completely unrelated note, my husband asked me not too long ago if, when we remodel the bathrooms, I would like to have the laundry moved to the main floor, as it seems a lot of people prefer. I said "ABSOLUTELY NOT!!" I need a LARGE space in which to hide my multitude of sins from the world. Prepare yourselves to be let in on one of my dirty little secrets sssshhhhh!:

Here's a thing I meant to post last week, on one of those RARE days when you can actually see the laundry room floor because I had washed all of the laundry. (Well all of the clothes anyway. There still was a huge stack of blankets and sheets that needed washing piled up on a table just out of range of the camera.
However, here is the laundry that needed to be folded and put away (que the scary, screechy Friday the 13th violin music):
On top of this add two sets of washers and dryers full of clothes. That day was some time last week, so I now have more dirty clothes to wash and less clean clothes to fold (but only because they have been worn straight out of the baskets.) Do I hear Neicey Nash knocking on my door?

For a Change

2010-12-11T15:23:00.002-06:00

It's nice to hear happy screaming laughter coming from the other room and to go and peek my head around the corner to find that the two littlest boys are doing something neither too dangerous or too destructive.

On the other hand, it sounds like Clayton got hurt after all. Darn, I'd better go and check.

O Christmas Tree

2010-12-09T08:18:00.002-06:00

Well, we've had our Christmas tree up for most of the week. The trouble is that we can't seem to find the time to decorate it as a family. We just keep being too busy. Darn busyness! Ally (the puppy) seems to think that the Christmas tree is a wonderful thing made entirely of chewy sticks for her... in the house! "How great is that!" I would think the pine needles would poke her in the mouth, but she doesn't seem to mind. She keeps pulling off little bits of the tree to chew on. (As if the needles won't get all over the place fast enough.) Plus she gets in there and drinks the tree's water. I wonder if the pine makes it all taste better. Silly little doggy! She is turning out to be a nice little addition to the family though.

Pickle Juice

2010-12-07T11:15:00.003-06:00

I came downstairs to find Justice doing this:

I added the mattress under him.

One of Clayton's current bedtime stories is "If you give a Moose a Muffin." But every time we get to this page, he says "He pooping!" which cracks me up.
Last night I was going to the store and Ross begged me to buy something with his own dollar for him, but he didn't know what. So I bought him a Disney princess game. I tried to video his reaction, but I had the camera aimed wrong and didn't get it. I made him give me his dollar, then I handed him the pink Disney thing. He said "I hate you!" It was pretty funny. I did of course buy him something that he would actually like, but for one dollar I could afford to make a little joke.

New Couch & Sock Fights

2010-11-30T08:01:00.003-06:00

Well, it's not new, but it's reupholstered. My wonderful mommy spent a LONG time working on this for me. I helped, but she really did the lion's share. I'm very happy with the results. Wouldn't you know it though, the night we finally brought it up and put the living room all back together, Justice got up in the middle of the night and slept on it. As luck would have it, that was the night his pull-up chose to not work. I got up the next morning to find a huge wet spot on my new couch!! Luckily I seem to have chosen good fabric, because you can't even see the spot now. It has already had to endure that plus muddy dog feet, and snot. I'm afraid it's in for a rough life. However to date, it is holding up very nicely. Those dog foot prints came right off too!

I was disappointed because it rained all last evening, ruining all my plans for walking through the lights at a nearby park that goes all out for Christmas. However the impromptu sock fight in the living room was a fun family night time too.

Geographical Idiot!

2010-11-29T14:01:00.002-06:00

It takes a special kind of person to be able to drive somewhere about 25 minutes away from home, which you've been to about 5ish times in the not-so-distant past, with directions from mapquest in one hand, and a Garmin on the dashboard, and still miss your turn and arrive 15 minutes late. Yep, that's me! Oh, and for the record I would have been on time without my Magellan moments.

On another note, it's nice to come home from choir practice to find the house quiet and the kids in bed, but it's extra cute when you find three boys all snuggled into one twin sized bed.

There is a Comedian in the Family!

2010-11-27T17:34:00.001-06:00

Someone put baby powder in my hair dryer. I believe it was Lydia, but she's not talking.

What is Up?

2010-11-20T09:39:00.003-06:00

So I haven't blogged for a whole nine days? Wow, that must be a record! On the whole I feel pretty good about that. I spent entirely too much time on the computer formerly, and I'm happy to report that I'm doing better.

So what's been happening in our household? Much of the usual. Lydia is growing up, and though she has pretty much achieved the status of "teenage girl," she is still as sweet and helpful and wonderful as ever. (I'm going outside to knock on a tree now.)

Ross continues to make me laugh nearly everyday, he's been writing a comic strip. I keep meaning to post some of them, but Bruce has my camera with him, so I can't at the moment.

Mark continues to be the ladies man. I had to tell on a little girl from school, because she keeps calling here, literally 15 times a day, and texting at 11:30 at night. It's getting a bit annoying. What will we do with him when he gets older?!!

Justice continues to be his regular nut-ball self. I honestly don't know how we got that kid. I'm blaming it entirely on Bruce's genes. In the past couple of weeks, he has broken a window by throwing a shoe at his brother, who -darn him- ducked. And last Sunday he was running around like a maniac and accidentally ran headlong into Bruce's gun cabinet, breaking the glass front. It was rather scary! He was very fortunate to have walked away with just a few minor nicks and cuts. At the moment he is standing on the outside window ledge, knocking to come in. I told him to get down and come in through the door.
A few days ago, he was standing on something high, and Lydia told him that he should get down "before you fall down and break your face."

His response was, "We could just fix it with tape."

"You can't fix your face with tape."

"Okay, we'll use a hammer and some nails."

Where oh where did we get this child?!

Clayton is doing his best to follow in Justice's footsteps. But really, is there anything better than short two year old arms around your neck, with a kiss and a "I wuv you Mommy."

My blessed, wonderful, better-than-I deserve-mother has been busy reupholstering my sectional couch. I've been helping some, but she gets pretty much all of the credit. It's nearly finished. I can't wait!

I've been working on a music project that I don't want to talk too much about until it's finished. I don't know, just in-case ... what? I don't finish it? Or it turns out suckish? No, I will finish it! I've invested LOTS of time, and I think it will be cool when I finish. Let's just say that I'm working hard on it whenever I can. I'm studying theory like a fiend, and I'm trying really hard to develop a new skill. It's too early to tell it I can call it a talent. I'll never know if I don't try though, right?

So that's what is up with me. Life as usual. Living it and loving it!

Cereal

2010-11-10T13:06:00.002-06:00

Pros: Depending on which kind it is, it can be very nutritious. It is extremely quick and easy to put on the table to feed your crew.

Cons: It can also be just like eating candy for breakfast. It is not always so easily cleaned up. Occasionally you will have to wash the table, chairs, and floors twice and then bathe the dog (from one morning's breakfast) for your lack of preparing a breakfast less spillable and less enjoyable to throw. Gotta love it!

Caught in the Act

2010-11-05T13:10:00.001-05:00

I just caught Justice and Clayton in the kitchen getting crazy with the whipped cream. Now Clayton needs his fourth outfit of the day, and my kitchen needs a scrubbing down. Justice says "Just one more... no five more."