Idaho Becky

Today

2012-01-24T16:49:00.000-07:00

Today was a day of firsts.

The first time I've been left alone with all three --yes THREE!-- of my children. (Everyone is still alive)
The first day since CJ and I came home that I've taken a walk (Half mile in 2o minutes less than three weeks after her crazy birth. I count that a success even though I'm used to going a mile or two in that amount of time.)
And today is the first day I've done anything in the kitchen more involved than oatmeal since I've had three kids. (Six loaves of banana bread. It's really not more difficult than one loaf, and you can give away more.)

I'm exhausted! We looked it up and it'll take roughly 90-120 days to build my blood back up to pre-hemorrhage levels. I think until then, it's a good excuse to nap.

Things I Miss (and Don't) About Pregnancy

2012-01-21T21:08:00.000-07:00

Things I will miss about pregnancy:

stretchy waist bands
sleeping more than two hours at a time
not having night sweats
the baby kicking (CJ never was much of a kicker, and I kind of missed this even while pregnant)
eating whatever I darn well pleased (as long as it didn't contain nitrates or raw egg)
the built in excuse for not running
non-leaky boobs
2nd trimester "couple time" Laws but it's amazing. Almost a reason to get pregnant again, right there

Things I will NOT miss about pregnancy:

peeing every five seconds
having to pee right after having peed (as in, haven't even washed my hands yet)
waddling
heartburn
people asking me retarded questions (to be fair, this hasn't really stopped because the world in general refuses to quit being idiotic but at least the lame questions aren't all pregnancy related. I do find myself saying quite often "my baby is a GIRL" even when she's in pink frills and has a bow)

What about you? Anything you miss or don't miss about being pregnant?

The Week After

2012-01-20T20:56:00.000-07:00

This blog is meant, in part, to journal for my family. (It's also supposed to be informative, amusing and bombastic in turns but today it's a journal.) So here's what happened after the very dramatic entrance of CJ.

We stayed in the hospital for the better part of a week. My older kids got passed around quite a bit so Husband could work and save his paid time off for when I'd REALLY need help.

The recovery has been wickedly hard. Harder than an surgery I've had. I'm sure the two liters of blood loss didn't help. (Yes, two liters like a 2L soda pop bottle, two liters. It's a lot.)

We were ready to go home by Sunday afternoon, though. CJ had already regained her birth weight, or come awfully close, I can't remember now. That night we went to family dinner like usual, only this time, there were FIVE of us!

When we got home I noticed CJ's eye was pretty swollen. We called the nurse hotline and decided to watch it. At the 3am feed n' diaper change, it had gotten red and was leaking goopy goo.

Monday morning Husband dropped CJ and I at the doctors without an appointment (something they don't really love but what were they going to do?) and then he took the older kids to his sister-in-law's house for the day.
The doctor was pretty concerned, what with her only being 5 days old and all. He gave us a prescription and told us to come back that afternoon to have it looked at again.

So we went to Costco Pharmacy. I should have waited in the car but instead I wandered around the store with my new baby. When we went back to the doctor, he didn't think her eye was enough improved to watch at home over night so he sent us the children's hospital were CJ was admitted to the NICU for monitoring and IV antibiotics. She got two kinds of IV antibiotics and a topical antibiotic every few hours. The fear was that her eye would turn from periorbital cellulitis into orbital cellulitis or meningitis. We spent two days in NICU (which ended up being overkill of epic proportions) before FINALLY coming home.

My mom had arrived while I was annoying the NICU nurses with requests for discharge papers. She stayed a week and it was LOVELY. I laid around and slept and didn't do my hair and the dishes and laundry still got done and my children were clean and fed and played with. My mom is a marvel and we were so blessed to have her here.

Mom wasn't gone TWO DAYS before The Boy decided that he'd get himself into some powered cement. Now I don't know if you know this about powdered cement, but you really shouldn't put it in your eyes. The Boy wasn't aware of this, or even that it WAS powdered cement. He thought it was sand. Not that you should throw sand either, but my kids still haven't learned that lesson. Two showers and lots of screaming later, his eyes still looked horrid so we called poison control. Yeah. They weren't super thrilled with my kid, either.

After much discussion, we loaded The Boy and my nursling into Kate the Van and I drove to Phoenix Children's ER for evaluation. They washed his eyes out yet again, dyed them a funky orange color and diagnosed him with corneal scratches. Just that took over three hours. Yippee. The Boy was NOT thrilled with the process, even though he got an otter pop and a new toy car out of the deal. I just got another trip to Costco Pharmacy. Frankly, I'm super glad the lye in the cement didn't burn or permanently damage his eyes. Scratches on the cornea we can deal with.

That pretty much catches us up to now. I think everyone is healing or healed. It'll take a few months for me to build back my blood and feel 100%.

CJ has gained one pound one ounce and between one and three inches, depending on whose measurements you believe, since her birth.

I've lost probably close to 30 pounds since the birth and that, my friend, is reason enough for celebration. So I'm going to go break out the chocolate peanut butter ice cream and celebrate.

Cute Kid Stuff

2012-01-14T16:17:00.000-07:00

I've been collecting things my kids say that are adorable. It's time to put them here before the kids erase them from my phone. :)

The Boy:

I know a great recipe for mud. Dirt and water. I know how to make salty mud, too! Dirt, salt, and water.

Mom, I want to play a board game. Why? Because I'm bored!

With my new bike I can totally win first place in the slow motion bike race!

Zsa Zsa:

I say Zsa Zsa in Dutch. Zsa Zsa in Dutch. I DID it!

I was reading the Ensign (church magazine). Zsa comes up and says, "That's Jesus! Does he say, 'behold'?"

I think the baby is gonna pop out and do a funny dance like this! (funny dance commences complete with jazz hands)

Aunt Nancy asked Zsa what our new baby's name would be. She paused and seriously considered before stating, Sleeping Beauty.

CJ:

Smiled while she was awake. :D

God Knows Our Every Desire

2012-01-08T21:33:00.002-07:00

I am amazed at the love of God for each of his children, but I am particularly amazed today at His love for me. Amazed He cares enough about my heart to carefully orchestrate the perfect set of circumstances wherein I have a healthy baby and a healing birth; despite the fact that, once again, the baby came into the world via surgery. I hadn't known it was possible to have a healing birth via cesarean but I shouldn't be surprised. All things are possible with God.

Before we decided to have a third child, Husband and I prayed and prayed and prayed. We prayed for a normal birth. We prayed for a healthy baby. We prayed to know when the right time to have a baby would be and then we prayed some more. We both felt that a home birth would be the wisest course. So many people were very worried we'd made a bad choice. They were concerned for my safety and that of our baby. We understood their fears but chose not to let it affect our choices and I am so glad we trusted God to take care of us. Not only did He allow us a healthy baby, but He also allowed me the space and time I needed to heal from my previous experiences.

Emotional wounds don't scab over and heal in 10-14 days like skin. They stay raw-- sometimes for years. Even with the liberal application of therapy, an event or comment or something I read could re-open the slice in my heart. The Physician of my soul understands this and He understood how best to heal it.

My soul was in tatters after the birth of my first daughter. Words can't explain how I checked out from life for the first six months of hers. I have no pictures from that time in her life. My husband had a mighty work ahead of him helping me pick up the pieces and move on. Those six months were the reason it took me so long to talk him into having another child. He didn't want to lose me to that dark place again. He needed the assurance from God that this time would be better.

With Heavenly clearance at every turn, we made our plans. We found a midwife for my peace of mind, even though Husband felt from the start an unassisted birth would be fine. I sought intensive therapy to make sure a mental roadblock from Zsa Zsa's birth wouldn't derail this birth. All along I knew that the birth wouldn't go exactly according to plan, but I didn't know what that bit would be. I thought when the midwife fired me that might be it but when I felt that first little gush of blood, I knew we wouldn't have the baby at home.

I labored off and on for 30 hours. Sometimes I would bleed too much for me to be comfortable with and labor would slow down and so would the bleeding. We checked baby's heart tones often to make sure they were sounding great. The entire time I had a feeling of being watched over but also of expectation. Like the Lord was waiting for me to realize it was time to know I'd done all I could do to attempt delivery. To know in my heart that I'd done my part and now the safety of our baby was more important.

On the afternoon of the 3rd, I went to acupuncture to see if we couldn't get things moving along and over with. I was exhausted. Husband was tired. After my treatment, I stood up and gushed blood. That was when my heart sank and also when I felt peace with the idea of going to the hospital. I knew in the very depths of my soul God was watching and that everything would be OK. I felt as though my mission was over. On the drive home the bleeding seemed to stop, but once we were home, it started up again with a vengeance. I filled a Depends brand disposable undergarment every two contractions. Husband gave me another blessing and the bleeding stopped on our 20 minute drive to the hospital. The whole way there he was having such a hard time coming to grips with our God-approved plan being tossed out the window. I was holding out hope that upon arrival I'd be a complete and they'd let me deliver my baby vaginally but I felt such peace with any outcome the method of delivery was no longer important.

Checking in took forever. ER triage, on to registration, and then OB triage. Time started to drag and I began to feel faint.

Our triage nurse was an angel. I don’t remember exactly what happened or the order of things. I know I lost time because it seems like it wasn’t very long from when we checked in to when our baby was born, but in reality it was hours. They took some blood and did an ultrasound. I remember the contractions got significantly more painful. Because the baby was looking awesome on the monitors and the ultrasound came back clean, our nurse didn’t call the backup doc (Dr V), she waited for the on call doc (Dr A) to come in because she knew we didn’t like the backup doctor. This was yet another miracle. We hadn’t ever met Dr A but I talked to her on the phone before we went to the hospital. She seemed so calm and not the type to jump into the OR just because she liked surgery. Dr V had made it abundantly clear she thought I was an idiot for even wanting a trial of labor and vaginal birth. She was the reason we’d decided not to go back to the doctor or to the hospital for this delivery. Being cared for by Dr A was just more proof God was in control of the situation. If we’d come in the previous day, Dr V would have been our doctor, regardless.

When Dr A arrived, she was so calm and patient. Her exam produced cups of blood (yes, cups). She listened to our concerns. She explained hers and we agreed to the surgery. At the time I thought it was the anxiety of the inevitable surgery that caused my pain to increase so dramatically at this point but looking back, I think this is when the placenta really started to separate from the uterus. God had allowed me the space and time I needed to be mentally OK with another surgical birth, and now that I was in a safe place and the decision had been made, the situation devolved rather quickly.

We had enough time to visit with the nursery staff and the anesthesiologist before they took me back to surgery.

In surgery the anesthetist started the spinal. I was so thankful for it because I was really ready to be done with the pain. I was shaking so much at that point I had a very hard time holding still while the spinal was placed.

Husband and a good friend were then let into the room. I’m sure the surgery itself was the same as any cesarean except before Dr A had even gotten to the baby she said, “OK. I know what’s causing the bleeding. You have quite a few clots in here. Your placenta has started to abrupt.” Later on, she said a quarter of the placenta had separated from the uterus and I’d made the right choice to have the surgery.

As soon as Dr A pulled baby out, she held her up and Husband announced we had a GIRL! Oh, were we shocked! All this time I had known it was boy. I just KNEW.

Right away they brought her around and laid her on my chest, per our request. The nursery nurses aren’t used to that, and I could tell one of them in particular was a little put out that I’d made her job deviate from the norm.

Words cannot describe the joy of being the first to meet your own baby. Of course other people touched her on her way to me, but that doesn’t matter. I got to discover the little crinkly fold in her right ear. I got to discover that her eyebrows are different shapes and her hair and eyes are dark. I claimed her from her very first moments and it has made all the difference in our first week together.

Her newborn assessment was done on my chest while Dr A finished making sure I wasn’t going to bleed to death and put me back together. Baby girl stayed with me on our ride to the recovery room. She stayed with me every minute of my six days in the hospital and every minute was beautiful.

I won’t be going to that dark place that swallowed me after my second surgical birth. There’s no need. I was respected as a person of worth and my daughter was treated as an individual with needs that were also to be respected. I wish I could explain why that matters so much. Maybe it’s because of the heightened hormonal state that surrounds birth or maybe it’s something else all together. All I know is, being treated like a human being with feelings and a mind of my own was a very nice change.

I am so thankful to my Heavenly Father for creating a situation which resulted in a healthy baby. I am grateful to know He cares for me so much that not only are my physical needs met, but my emotional ones, as well. I am thankful that the right people were in the right place at the right time. And I am thankful for the prayers and fasting offered in my family’s behalf over the last few months. My heart is so full and my cup is certainly running over.

NOTE: The placental abruption had absolutely nothing to do with the previous cesareans or the fact that I labored at home. It's just a random RARE complication of pregnancy.

My Head

2012-01-01T11:34:00.000-07:00

Is not in a good place.

I cussed inside it all through church today. I'm pretty sure that means I'm going directly to hell. I may have also cursed out loud in the presence of small children that did not belong to me. At church. (that's so a one-way ticket south)

Clearly, I'm losing it.

You see, ever since we learned about when Baby would arrive, I've had on my calendar that January 1 was his/her birthday. I woke up pregnant on January 1 AFTER having been up in the night THREE TIMES with contractions strong enough to wake me. THREE TIMES! What the hell, baby? What the hell?!?! (in for a penny in for a pound, right?)

On top of that, a quick check showed that all that hard work I did last night changed nothing in the general area of the baby exit. Oh for the love of chocolate. I give up! I will still be pregnant tomorrow, and next week and at the second coming of Christ. And maybe I'm to the point that I just don't give a rat's ass.
Pregnancy is a great excuse to eat other people's food, get your feet rubbed and take as many naps as you like. I'm gonna go lay down now. Trying to get sent to hell is exhausting.

Meet the Newest Addition to Our Family

2011-12-31T21:32:00.000-07:00

This is Kate. We are all in love.

(actually this is a picture of Kate's sister I took off the internet. It was too dark when we got home to take a picture of Kate.)
She's a 2006 Toyota Sienna XLE and she's got enough space for every member of our entire family.
We are so very happy to be done minivan shopping. :)

Kate has power sliding doors. You can't know how cool that is unless you've got kids too small to open car doors on their own. Did I mention there are TWO of them? She also has leather seats (easy to clean with kids) and for being such an old gal, has barely any miles on her at all.

When The Boy figured out we wouldn't be coming home with Jane (our Camry) he hugged the bumper and cried. But he got over it quick when we brought Kate home.

The Boy is in love with all of Kate's buttons. And really, she's got quite a few. We don't even know what all of them do yet but I do know her heated seat buttons are adjustable. As in, you can adjust exactly how hot you want your behind to be. That's just nifty. I'm also loving the power hatch in back. When it comes time for a road trip, the DVD player will be handy. I'm also looking forward to the wireless headphones for the DVD player. (Mom and Dad don't have to listen to Jungle Book three times in a row!) And there's an AC power outlet in back. I have no idea what for, but it's there.

When we called the insurance company to switch stuff over, we actually ended up saving $160 a year on car insurance. How cool is that?

But do you want to know the best part about Kate? She's paid for. I can't tell you how much Dave Ramsey has changed our lives. It's amazing what a little planning, a little foresight and some saving can do for a person's bank account. I'm not gonna lie, though. That's the biggest check I've ever written and it was PAINFUL. It took us weeks to work up the courage to sign a check that big. It's also why we waited until the last day of the year to buy. Saved ourselves about $5k buying today vs a couple weeks ago.

I'm so happy that tonight I can sleep knowing that whenever baby comes, we have a vehicle big enough to fit three car seats in and all my children can ride safely.

Want to know what's going on?

2011-12-30T22:55:00.000-07:00

http://www.haveyouhadthatbabyyet.com/

Post Dates

2011-12-30T21:49:00.001-07:00

It turns out being past your due date feels exactly like being pregnant before your due date. Who knew?
Based on how everyone acts about it, I thought for sure one or the other of us would've exploded or something by now.
Well, I did kind of explode on Facebook at all the people "checking to see how I am". Oops.

Anyway, today the kids and I went to the park and made a Costco run. A nice old couple wished me luck on my upcoming delivery, which was a nice change from, "are you STILL pregnant?" Like it's my fault or something for not having given birth yet. Seriously. If I were in charge of this show, little dude would be at least a month old right now.
After dinner, the boy and I headed for the next town over to visit a friend.
When we got home I cleaned the bathrooms and kitchen and did some laundry because it turns out having just had company is a lot like right before you have company except that instead of planning the cleaning out and doing it in stages, it all needs done at once because your house is trashed.

I keep thinking I need to tackle the master closet. It seems like a project for a weekend, being roughly the size of Rhode Island. Why anybody would waste that much space on a closet escapes me until I realize our house has pretty much zero storage elsewhere, which explains why the rest of the closets were easy-peazy in relation. Anyway, the end result of having a closet that big is that everything gets dumped in there and it's not really designed to store anything except clothes. If FEMA saw it, I'm pretty sure I would get disaster funding to clean it up. Maybe I should send pictures...

Husband has come down with a cold. I'm glad I'm not in labor tonight so he can get some good sleep. Heaven knows I won't sleep through the coughing he's doing.

PS It's sort of entertaining watching my kid flip from one side of my uterus to the other. Disturbing in an Alien kind of way, but entertaining.

The Due Date

2011-12-29T15:39:00.000-07:00

I woke up at 4:45 to pee and couldn't go back to sleep. So instead I woke up my husband. What? Why should I be the only one awake deciding between a Toyota and a Honda?

We got ready for the day, made breakfast and managed to pile my sisters and mom into the car by 7:02am for the drive to the airport.

I kept hoping the whole way there my uterus would spontaneously start to expel the baby so my mom would stay. No such luck. They boarded the plane and headed back home. :(

I drove to yet another dealership to look at a minivan (because when you have the third baby, you need a minivan, apparently). Then I came home and instantly fell into a two hour coma while my children continued to watch TV.

Upon waking I had this overwhelming urge for Carrot Halwa, so I started grating carrots and reducing milk before I needed to leave for acupuncture. (If you haven't eaten this Punjabi slice of awesomeness I highly encourage you to do so at once. You haven't lived until you've experienced Halwa.)

Can I just say that acupuncture is the BEST $45 I spend EVER? I always leave feeling AWESOME. I'm not saying every acupuncturist is this great, but mine sure is. :)

Then I came home to kids still watching TV, finished the hulwa and shopped online some more for cars.

We drove our kids to the in-laws while we went to test drive some cars.

And that's how I spent my due date. Good thing the baby didn't like, explode or anything from not coming out on the medically prescribed totally irrelevant guess date. THAT woulda sucked.

Depressing

2011-12-28T16:52:00.000-07:00

Guess what's more depressing than still being pregnant?

Getting 47 million texts, IMs and emails asking if I've had a baby yet.

Ferills, people. Chill.

Due dates are not expiration dates. They are a GUESS. If I pass the due date, baby won't poof into non-existence or anything. I swear, it's still in there. Also, nobody wants baby to come out more than me. I can offer a 100% money-back guarantee on that.

Plus, you're making me cry. Or throw giant hissy fits. Neither is pretty at this point.

Indian

2011-12-27T16:05:00.000-07:00

OK, maybe life isn't SO bad. My mama just offered to take me out for Indian tonight.

I <3 my mama. :)

PS Still Pregnant.

Tick Tock

2011-12-27T12:15:00.000-07:00

It's two days until my (medically (ir)relevant) due date.

I'm still pregnant.

Watch this space for updates.

PS Pray I don't loose my ever-loving mind in the mean time, mkay?

PPS Bah Humbug. YOU try being happy with a twelve pound bowling ball sitting on YOUR nether regions.

Steaming Pile of Excrement

2011-12-20T12:38:00.001-07:00

This will come as no surprise to those who know me, but I've gotten my self into a hot mess.
I blame boredom.
Really, I should stick to knitting, sleeping, or something equally harmless when I'm all antsy and have nothing else to do.

Yesterday I went to see a hospital based midwife. It's kind of a long story how I got there. I'll try to be brief.

1. Home birth midwife fired me.
2. Family found out, then freaked out.
3. The freak-out lasted for quite a number of days and affected me enough I started to question stuff, like the lie of the baby. (This is where I start to blame boredom. If I'd had something to DO through it all, I probably wouldn't have cared as much.)
4. I knew of exactly ONE hospital based provider I'd trust. Several mama's I know have used her and I've seen her and had enough conversations with her at Birth Circles and the like to feel that she was a reasonable individual. Plus, I needed a prescription, so I made an appointment.
5. Hospital Midwife was NOT pleased that I waited until 38 and a half weeks to seek care.
6. Bottom line: she really, REALLY wants me to birth in hospital. Well, duh. That's kind of the general consensus amongst folks who work in them. *I've* even held that opinion. Look where it got me. Hacked to bits with emotional scarring to boot and several years of intense therapy. That's where.
7. All that ~~expensive~~ fancy EMDR therapy I did makes it so I don't totally loathe and fear hospitals anymore. Now it's more of an icky taste on the back of my tongue. Kind of a "if it's necessary I can choke it down but I'd really rather spit it out" kind of taste. One would think that would make my choice easier, but really it's just made it harder because now I don't know what I want or what I should do.

Hospital Pros There’s a one in three chance I get the midwife I want (part of a practice, she’s not on call every day) IF something happens, I can be cared for quickly Logically the safest place IF people leave me alone	Hospital Cons Continuous Monitoring. I don’t want to be hooked up to a machine the entire time I’m there. The machine that goes ping is over rated. Which nurse you get is kind of a crap shoot. I could end up with someone awesome or someone horrid. I’d rather have more control over my team. I’m on a clock, and must deliver on their schedule. No access to shower/tub for pain relief during labor I have to drive there. In labor. Unless you’ve driven somewhere in extreme discomfort, you can’t know how annoying that is. Emotionally challenging location with baggage. I’m a little scared I can’t do this with people watching me, or at all. Astronomically Expensive.

Home Birth Pros Being in my own environment will likely shorten labor time and definitely reduces the risk of infection for me and baby I don’t need to change locations when things start to get intense Not on a clock I control who is and is not invited in the room Not tied to a monitor/room/bed Can access the shower or tub without anyone else’s say so. Baby never leaves my arms. No need to fight off interventions for baby. Cheap.	Home Birth Cons IF something goes south, it would take a while to get help. IF the southbound train is a complete rupture, baby and I are pretty much both dead. I’m in charge of the clean up. No chance of help from an official midwife I’m a little scared I can’t do this on my own, or at all

There are probably plenty of things wrong with me, and even with my brain. At least one of them isn't a brain-eating amoeba.

Argh! Or Calling the Cops On My Four Year Old

2011-12-16T20:07:00.000-07:00

STOMP! made an appearance at The Children's Museum today, and since our year pass was about to expire it seemed like a good time to make one last trip. These things always seem like a good idea in theory. Upon arrival we saw FIVE full size school buses. Yes, FIVE. And a news van. Hoo Boy.

Well, we went inside and got ourselves settled for the show. It turns out our bit of carpet was vacant for a reason; the sun was particularly blinding in that location. Oh well. I figured that fact fit in with the five full sized school buses out front. The Boy was so excited to see STOMP! since I'd been showing him YouTube clips. While we were discussing this, Zsa Zsa managed to sneak off. Museum staff were alerted of her disappearance and after a few minutes we located her, 5 feet from where I'd been sitting. Obviously she wasn't there the whole time but I was glad to have her back, at any rate, regardless of where she'd been.

The kids and I had a repeat of the conversation in the car on the drive over; namely if you can't see Mom, Mom can't see you and THAT IS NOT OK. Stay where you can see Mom or when you are found, we will all leave immediately! If only I'd left with them after that mini-disappearance. It was but a foreshadowing of things to come. (dum dum DUMMMM!)

After the show (which kind of sucked, by the way. Even the STOMP! guy said so...) we went upstairs to play. AGAIN I said, "if you'd like to leave this room, come tell Mommy first!" The kids did pretty well at first, but when it was time to move to a different exhibit, The Boy said he'd like to go to the bathroom. Well, that's just fine, let me get your sister and we'll go. By the time I got her collected, The Boy was no where in site. I figured he REALLY had to go and had high tailed it to the restroom so Zsa and I made our (laborious) way there. No Boy. Hmmm. Well I'm like 40 million months pregnant and I was standing IN the restroom so it's not like I could pass up the opportunity and Zsa, regardless of the fact that she's back in diapers, likes using the mini potty and sink so she needed to go, too. She also felt the need to strip from the waist down, including her socks so it took a while to get her put back together. The Boy was still missing.

Zsa and I combed the third floor looking for my missing spawn. We alerted museum staff. Nothing. More nothing. On a hunch I took Zsa and we looked through every exhibit on all three floors. We checked back in with museum staff. Nothing. I walked the entire museum AGAIN. More nothing. At this point it had been 30 full minutes since I'd seen him last.

Now, we go to the Children's Museum almost weekly. My kids are VERY comfortable with that building and go missing regularly, but I'm usually able to locate them within two or three minutes, and they have NEVER strayed from the floor on which I first lost sight of them. They have their favorite exhibits and it's easy to find them. Until today.

When we reached the 30 minute mark I told the employee in charge of the search that it was time to call the police. I'm not an alarmist when it comes to my missing children. I know they are usually playing somewhere completely oblivious to my searching for them. But half an hour in a rapidly emptying museum? That was pushing it, even for me. The employee said that I could talk to his supervisor about calling in extra help. My response to that?
"You can call whomever you like to talk it over, I'm calling the police NOW. It's been 30 minutes." I had my finger hoovering over the second 1 in 9-1-1 when his radio crackled and the freaking gift shop reported having found my son.

He was THREE ever loving stories away from where he'd first disappeared. In the year we've been attending the museum, we have NEVER EVEN ENTERED the gift shop. That's a can of over-priced worms I haven't felt the need to open.

You might imagine that I felt all kinds of relieved to have found my son but the only emotion I've felt since the whole thing started is anger. I'm so MAD at my kids. "Stay where you can see Mom" is simple. It's direct. There's not a lot of ambiguity with that statement. Both kids are totally capable of following it. Both kids completely ignored me and made me waddle all over this freaking museum we only go to because I'm trying to be a good mom. I have a pair of THE most ungrateful children on planet earth and I'm really REALLY sick of being their mother. How did I end up being totally taken for granted by my kids?

Anyway, it turns out The Boy had taken the elevator to the first floor to use the bathroom we normally use on our way in, and then had decided to stay down there and browse the gift shop without his mother. I am glad we didn't have to call the cops and issue an Amber Alert, but Sheez Louise. If I don't have an extra three gray hairs from this experience, it's not because my kids didn't try.

My Birthday

2011-12-14T21:55:00.001-07:00

To be perfectly honest, I kinda thought having a birthday at 38 weeks pregnant would pretty much suck. I was all set to write a whiny post about all the things I WOULD have done, had I not been enormous and awkward. (Horseback riding, four wheeling, bowling, roller blading, deep sea diving... OK not deep sea diving. That last one sounds more like a punishment.) Imagine my surprise when my birthday actually turned out amazing!

Most of the credit for the totally awesome birthday goes to my wonderful husband. First, I woke up to waffles. Now, The Hubs normally (always) ruins waffles but today he actually read AND followed the recipe and not only were they edible, they were really yummy. The kids gave me finger-painted cards. The best bit was when Zsa Zsa told me what I thought was a flower stem was, in fact, her sharp SHARP teeth. Awesome Sauce. Husband surprised me with a gift for a deep tissue massage. I'm holding on to that puppy until AFTER the baby arrives.

One of my besties came over with a bag full of kitchen gadgets I totally needed AND I got to shower alone. Woo Hoo!

Then the kids and I went to the monthly home school PE activity at Xtreme Air. This place is pretty awesome. There's a football field sized room with wall to wall trampolines. We all bounced and bounced for two hours. I tried to bounce my baby out, but it didn't work. I did end up a tad sore, though.

We stopped at Chick-Fil-A for lunch on our way home and then I laid down and had contractions for three hours because, hello, I'd just irritated the living daylights out of my uterus by bouncing all over with a giant baby in my belly. Another friend dropped off some flowers to pretty up my house.

When Husband was done working, we jumped in the car and headed to the chiropractor. The bun in my oven had turned transverse so we needed to get that changed before the weekend, just in case. A few adjustments later and I'm happy to report that baby is now head down. I'm hoping that lasts through the night, just in case.

Then we dropped the kids at my sister in law's house. She kindly offered to watch them so Husband and I could go out. We went to Joe's Farm Grill, because the food is A-MAZ-ING. There's a reason it's been on TV. A quick trip to the mall for some eyebrow beautification and slice of Cheesecake Factory's Chocolate Peanut Butter Cheesecake rounded out my perfect day.

I know it sounds totally lame, but it was exactly what I needed. Thank you husband, for walking slowly through the mall with me, waiting patiently while I used every bathroom we passed, and changing a poopy kid when it wasn't your turn because it WAS my birthday. You are amazing. I am so blessed to have you in my life. Mwah!

PS My kids were pretty certain I needed a cake. Apparently it's not a birthday if there's not a cake with FIRE on top!

Morning Routine

2011-12-09T21:00:00.000-07:00

When I wake up the first thing I do is check to see if the baby fell out of my uterus during the night. (Hey, it could happen.) Then I check in with my brain to see if, while sleeping, I've had an epiphany and can finally attach a moniker to the parasite currently inhabiting my womb.
We are having a devil of a time even coming up with a list of names for this baby. Hubs keeps shooting down all the good ones like Howard, Cedric, and Pedro. Names that end in 'S' are out and recently I learned about this thing called a sibset or sibling set. Apparently you have to choose names for your children that "go together". Whatever. That would have been useful information to have BEFORE I started naming little people.

Then I make my kids' breakfast. No matter what I make, The Boy will complain or ask why he didn't get "a hundred of it".

Then I explain to Zsa Zsa how it's not "an accident, mama" if you did it repeatedly and on purpose. You'd think that conversation wouldn't be a daily morning occurrence, but only if you didn't know my daughter. Today it was in regards to slamming the silverware drawer. Over.and.over.and.over.again.

I get about 10 minutes of alone time in the shower while the kids watch Sesame Street before someone is mean to someone else or uses a "language word" the other kid feels mom needs to know about. At this point I'm lucky if that's long enough to shampoo and shave one leg.

Being a mom is super glamorous. Especially first thing in the morning.

Zsa Zsa's Third Birthday and Party

2011-12-04T22:43:00.000-07:00

In a stark contrast with last year, I did not spend the night before Zsa Zsa's birthday sobbing in my mother's arms. I did not spend it sobbing, at all, in fact.

I think this is evidence that EMDR Therapy is working. It should be, at $140 a session. Holy Toledo.

We all (except the Boy) had a great day celebrating Zsa Zsa's 3rd birthday.

She chose green pancakes for breakfast (whole wheat blender pancakes with a handful of spinach added in) and we ate them happily (except for The Boy).

Then we took baths (happily, except for The Boy) and got dressed. The Birthday Girl got to wear a super cute princess dress. :)

Then we headed out to run errands. While at Costco, I let her look at the cakes. I was half thinking I'd copycat which ever design she chose and half thinking of ordering the cake, because I'm seriously, seriously pregnant. Plus, clearly we needed a cake that feeds 48 since the invite list had a total of 6 kids on it. From ALL the cake designs she could have chosen, the winner was...

Blue Dinosaur.

I'm serious. She could have had a princess, a clown, flowers, balloons...but no. Blue Dinosaur was the clear winner. So much so, in fact, that there was a fight between The Boy and Zsa about who got to have Blue Dinosaur Cake for their birthday. We finally decided both of them could. Phew. Disaster averted.

A few days later we had her party. With The Boy's 3rd birthday I kind of went over the top. Like, rented a bouncy house and invited everyone we knew, over the top. Because we only do parties on odd years, Zsa's party was the first one we've had since then. I have learned that 3 year old's don't need bouncy houses. (Husband and the accounting gods are doing a happy dance.)

3 year old's don't even need formal invitations. I texted four moms whose kids play with us frequently.
We met at the park and ate cake and ice cream and played on the toys. Best.Idea.Ever.

Can we agree I got the important part on video? Keeping the candles lit in the wind was enough of a challenge...

Who wants cake?

Notice the happy grin...and my extremely gravid uterus atop spindly legs...

If you are my daughter, happiness is a park, chocolate cake and not holding your pee while playing in the sand.

Happy Birthday, my sweet Energizer Bunny.

Pomegranate Pancakes and Apple Cider Syrup

2011-12-03T18:56:00.000-07:00

I had this awesome idea to do green and red pancakes for Christmas morning. Because really, how cool would that be? The other day we added spinach to our normal blender pancake recipe and it was, while not awesome (because hello, spinach) it was edible (thank you, syrup). The kids thought green pancakes were fun.

Tonight I tried to make red pancakes but here's the deal, I used pomegranates. At first I only added 1/2 the pomegranate seeds and the batter ended up gray. Gray is not really an appetizing food color. In fact, I won't eat Mexican gray squash simply because of the name. So I added the other half of the seeds and ended up with purple batter, which makes sense, since pomegranate juice is purple. Clearly, this was a well thought out experiment. The pancakes tasted fine and cooked up pancake colored, but what really made the meal awesome was this syrup from One Perfect Bite. YUM.
I think maybe beet juice would make red, or at the least pink, pancakes. I'll give it a try and report back.

Here are the recipes:

Whole Wheat Blender Pancakes From Make a Treat With Wheat ( I think. The recipe is copied from my mom's house and I'm pretty sure it was in that cook book, which is now out of print.)

1 cup wheat berries
1 cup milk
blend on high for 2 minutes in a regular blender or 30 seconds in a commercial grade blender.
Add
1/2 cup additional milk blend additional 2 minutes or 30 seconds, depending on blender
1 egg
1/2 cup oil or applesauce
2 T sugar (optional)
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp baking powder
Blend until combined

VARIATIONS
Green Pancakes
Add a handful of spinach to the wheat and milk blending, reduce 1/2 cup milk to 1/4 cup or 1/3 cup depending on the spinach amount ( you want the batter to poor but not to be watery)

Pomegranate Pancakes
Add seeds from one pomegranate to
1 1/3 cup wheat berries
reduce total milk volume to 1 cup
may omit sugar, depending on sweetness of seeds

Apple Cider Syrup from One Perfect Bite
One Perfect Bite Syrup
1/4 cup sugar
2 teaspoons cornstarch
1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 cup apple cider
1/2 cup water
2 tablespoons butter, cubed
1 tablespoon lemon juice
Whisk together dry ingredients, add wet stuff and bring to a boil. Stir while it's boiling until thickened and bubbly, about 5 minutes. Reduce heat to low and stir for an additional 2 minutes.

Answers to Common Pregnancy Questions (It's not what you think)

2011-11-27T20:44:00.000-07:00

Wow! It looks like you're about done with being pregnant! Are you? No, you freaking moron. I LOVE having a watermelon that kicks displacing all my internal organs for months on end. I especially love the handstands on my bladder and the fact that my hips have spread far enough apart to making walking through a doorway squarely a near thing. It's AWESOME! Five weeks is seriously an eternity at this point. Thanks for bringing it up. Now I'm going to spend the rest of the day moping. Good job.
You know what causes that, right? Yes. Whipped cream and handcuffs.
What are you having? Well, I'm a human and so is my spouse, so I'm going to go with "human baby". Have you had experiences that would lead you to believe I should be expecting something different? Although a Time Lord would be cool...
Is there anything I can do to help? Probably. But I'm going to say "No, I'm fine" because you haven't talked to me in almost a year/I barely know you/I think you're a moron/I have a hard time excepting help from others (pick one). However if you show up to take one or more of my other kids one day or drop by a healthy meal around 4 or 5pm, I might just dissolve into tears of gratitude. Delivering a cup of crushed ice would probably net similar results.
How many kids do you have? Two. Wow. I heard three is really the breaking point for so many people. I mean, you only have two arms. What are you going to do? Giving my crankiest child to you has crossed my mind.

Poop, Pits, Presents, Parents, and Parties

2011-11-17T21:48:00.002-07:00

Zsa Zsa calls Pinocchio "Dokey-Doke" which is just about as adorable as she gets, these days. Between the stained clothing, the food messes she makes on the carpet, and the poop accidents it's a pretty good thing she can come up with cuteness once in a while or she'd be cut from the family team. Plus, she's apparently the only one who loves me right now (see #4).
My arm pits are undergoing scientific experimentation. You see, one of the side effects of being a freaking hormonal train wreck is, in my case, itchy pits. Today I shaved one and the other is on day four of shaggnastyness. One pit is sporting Degree and the other is slathered in Tom's of Maine. This is after four days of no pit juice stopper at all so, you know, you're welcome for that. I seriously hope my underarms and I can come to some kind of understanding BEFORE the baby gets here, because it we don't I may seriously scratch them clean off. I wake up digging around in there, which is clearly not good for the 'ol manicure.
The UPS guy came today. We call him the present man, because that's what I've been calling him since I was four. Today the box contained legs for our Sleep Number Bed. We've had this bed for just over three years. It didn't come with legs. Why a bed would come without legs is beyond me, but in any case, Sleep Number got an extra $98 out of us so I hope they're happy. I'm hoping the added elevation makes it easier to roll out of bed and into the bathroom. Time is of the essence, people.
For the last week, The Boy has been lamenting the fact that he is not yet grown up. Today he came up with this little gem, "I super wish I didn't have parents anymore. Then I could do everything for myself!" Oh. I can SO make that happen, little dude. Tomorrow when you want me to turn on a show, I'm not gonna do it because you are all grown up and can do it on your own. I'm also not fixing you any food, taking you anywhere or cleaning anything. Rent is due at the first of the month. Put that in your grown up pipe and smoke it, you ungrateful little turd. I'm kinda over the whole being taken for granted thing, anyway. You can pay me for the time and effort I put into your well being. Plus, and I may have mentioned this, HoRmoNaL TrAiN wReCk.
Number 4 is because SOMEONE let him watch Jimmy Neutron. Repeatedly. I know he's just parroting a show, but it seriously doesn't make it hurt any less. See above for details on why. Something about trains...
We are on the downward slope toward Zsa Zsa's third birthday. I have no idea what we are doing for it, but people have been invited, so clearly we will be doing something even if that something is sitting around staring at each other. Perhaps we can sit around the training potty and chant "poop, Zsa Zsa! Poop!" This could potentially solve part of the problem in #1. I'm working madly on her present; a felt playhouse that fits over the card table I bought especially for this purpose. How we managed 7 years of married life without a card table, I'll never know.

The Post Wherein I Insult People of Nominal Intelligence and Large Bank Accounts

2011-11-14T16:28:00.000-07:00

I'm kinda grumpy. It could just be the hormones, but I sort of want to punch Santa in the face for being at the mall before Thanksgiving has even had a chance to get here.
It feels like the stores are telling me to HURRY UP AND BUY CRAP!!!! FORGET ABOUT BEING THANKFUL!!!

Thanksgiving is my second favorite holiday. Partly because it's an excuse to eat as much pumpkin pie as I can possibly fit in my tummy-guilt free, and partly because it's not about STUFF; it's about being grateful. Easter is my favorite holiday for nearly the same reasons, except you can sub Cadbury mini eggs for pie. I also like that I have an entire day devoted to feeling grateful for my Savior. How cool is that? (Also, if someone can explain how colored eggs and a bunny fits in with the Resurrection, I'm all ears.)

Anyway, back to wanting to punch Santa in the face.

Today I read about this thing called a Baby Planner or Baby Consultant. Yes, these are real people. They apparently help you buy the best gear for your little Smurf or Smurfette. I'll admit my first thought upon hearing about this was, what is F-ing WRONG with people? My second thought was, how can I take advantage of these morons?"

Seriously, if you have THAT much money, and no common sense, don't I have a moral obligation to relieve you of your excess Benjamins? Someone should and it may as well be me, since I actually know how to use money, unlike the flakes who hire a Baby Consultant.

Here's a little piece of free advice that includes all the things you MUST have to care for your new baby: baby carrier, diapers, wipes, some clothes, and if you want to obey the law-a car seat. If you're feeling particularly daring, might I suggest you go get a BRAIN as well?
Holy Toledo. If you need any more help, I'd be happy to consult for you. I won't even insult you (to your face). My fee starts at $500 an hour. Trust me, I'm VERY worth it. I'm so full of opinions, I needed a blog to spout them all.

PS Bill, this one was for you.

Chemical Romance? Or Not

2011-11-14T08:52:00.001-07:00

I have this four year old, and it's really easy for me to forget how GOOD he is, compared to other kids his age. I guess I needed a reminder that really, he's fantastically behaved most of the time.

Cue creepy music

That is, until yesterday.
Our normal Sunday evening consists of going to Grandma and Grandpa's house for dinner. While there, The Boy always finds time to go to the barn and sit on the quads. He loves the quads. He loves imagining himself driving the quads. Everyone is fine with this arrangement. At least, we were until yesterday.

About 7pm a younger cousin comes in crying and waving his arms about. Cousin smells strongly of chemicals. Older cousins come in carrying a container of metal cutting fluid called Tap Magic. The eye wash makes an appearance and cousin gets his eyes rinsed and then gets thrown in the shower for an extended scrubbing.
About this time, The Boy wanders in. Oh my. He smells like Tap Magic. He has a chemical burn coming up on his face and the back of his neck.
After washing and some extensive questioning during which we promise no one will get in trouble, we just need to know EXACTLY what happened, we learn the following~
The Boy and Cousin actually found TWO bottles of Tap. They thought it would be fun to squirt them all over the barn, themselves, and each other. In the process, they also got the quads and the motorcycles.
Hubs and I went to the barn to investigate the damage. Who knew two six ounce cans could go so far?

We had an intense and prolonged conversation about NOT PLAYING WITH CHEMICALS EVER.

Fast forward to this morning. We woke up to The Boy in the upper reaches of the laundry room cupboards, spraying chemicals and a mysterious white power all over the entire room, my hall and himself.

In a bit I'm running to the store for zip ties. From now on, a certain little boy is getting cuffed to his bed at night to preempt his mama getting any more grey hairs. And Grandpa has promised to lock the barn for the next few weeks before The Boy comes to visit.

I am NOT in love with this behavior.

Note: after a visit with the doctor today, it turns out he's got an ear infection. That kind of explains the rash of nasty behavior he's been having. Acting out when he doesn't feel well is kinda par for the course with this kid, as is not actually TELLING us what's WRONG and expecting us to read minds.

A Whole New Level of Crazy

2011-11-08T10:42:00.000-07:00

So I woke up last Wednesday knowing my mama's birthday was a couple days away. I also knew all my sisters were going home to surprise her and I'd be the only one stuck in a different state singing "Happy Birthday" via Skype. So I did what any completely neurotic person would do: I looked up flights home.

Guess what?

I found one. For $35 each, round trip. Yeah. The only catch was, the plane left from Vegas at 8am the next day.

Here's the part where I prove I'm a neurotic pregnant person: I drove to the airport (to avoid online booking fees) waited in line for two and a half hours with my squirrelly kids, and BOUGHT THE TICKETS.

Then I raced home to pack my family. We left at 4pm that same day. I did mention I'm completely neurotic right now, didn't I? OK, then. We stayed the night with my sister's husband's uncle and aunt. No, we've never met them before. Yes, they live in a castle. We had our own wing for the 6 hours we were there.

We got up at 5am to catch our flight, managed it (just) and arrived in gloriously cool Idaho right before lunch. My sister picked me up and dropped me at the school where my mom works. Here's the video of her being totally surprised by my children. :D

I spent the ENTIRE weekend recovering from getting there. Seriously. I didn't even have the energy to make my mom a real birthday dinner two days later. We bought pizza.

Sunday my son comes into my room absolutely BEGGING to stay at Grandma's for "a real long long long time". I'd have said yes in a heartbeat but as it was, our car was sitting in the Vegas Airport Economy lot accruing fees at a staggering rate for some place called 'economy' and if we didn't go back and free it soon, we'd never be able to afford to. Honestly, parking cost more than one of the tickets. It was obscene.

The flight home was delayed, which just made the six hour drive home in the rain that much more enjoyable. Luckily I'd packed some Preparation H for the drive home (oh, the things nobody tells you about pregnancy...)

It's been cool and glorious since we've gotten home, but I haven't been able to rest because Recipe Club is at my house today. It turns out when you decide to travel, and then leave the same day, your housekeeping suffers. I've spent the last day and a half just putting things back together. I have no idea how (clean) kid underwear ended up in the fruit drawer of the fridge.
I'm super glad our plane didn't crash because then people (my in laws) would have seen my house like this, and they might actually think it was NORMAL for us. Gah! The embarrassment!

In other news, you shouldn't let your kids pack any part of their own luggage without at least checking it over first. I asked The Boy to get his Sunday shoes and put them in the bag. It wasn't until church on Sunday that we found he'd packed a non-matching pair. At least there was a left and right shoe...

I'd be a super crappy wife if I didn't mention that Husband was incredibly nice to let me haul my family across the country last minute. While he didn't enjoy the getting there, he did have a fun time surprising my mom. The weekend was kind of hectic for him, as he was moving all his software to different servers for work and had to stay up most of Saturday night with the rest of the Geeks from work to get it done. Luckily, he could do it from anywhere. Plus, it was cold enough in Idaho to warrant hot chocolate, and that always makes him happy.

Mad, in a Completely Irrational Way

2011-11-01T11:08:00.000-07:00

So last night we visited some relatives, because isn't Halloween like, a relative holiday or something?
Seriously. It's Christmas-Light.
While there, I was accosted YET AGAIN by a relative who knows only that I'm not exactly going to have my baby in a hospital. Probably. Whatever. Like it's any of their business what I do with my va-jay-jay, or where I take it, right? Personal autonomy means NOTHING when you are pregnant with progeny, apparently.
(I'm thinking of getting a shirt that says, "Don't Mind Me, I'm Just the Incubator".)
So I shrug off the encounter which included the relative telling me that I was discussed with ANOTHER relative who's a pediatrician. And they both think I'm a raging lunatic. Never mind the fact that that relative hasn't ever MET me.

Sweet.

(At some point I'm going to have to explain why I have trust issues with doctors. When you've worked with them as closely as I have, and seen their personnel files/law suits/incident reports the rose colored glasses tend to come off.)

Granted, I probably didn't handle the entire conversation with any sort of grace or tact, but I super felt bombarded. If I'm going to have the kind of conversation that includes someone essentially calling me a moron, I'd at least like to come to it prepared with relevant statistics or a baseball bat.

Anyway, I tried to maintain my "bubble of peace" but I woke up steaming mad at 1am. Here's the thing, I was MOST upset with my husband. Isn't he supposed to protect me from this kind of crap? No matter that he wasn't even in the room when it occurred. (That's the irrational part of this.) I tried to go back to sleep, but ended up yelling at The Hubs via email instead. THEN I went back to sleep. (Don't worry, I apologized in the email AND in the AM for being completely neurotic.)

So in the end I wished that I had the kind of yap that could stay shut and keep my business to my self, but deep down I'm super insecure and need lots of people to tell me what a great idea all my plans are and how awesome everything sounds. Or at the very least, to have them just nod and smile. I'm really quite needy.

This kind of situation is exactly why we didn't tell anyone we were pregnant for like, ever. (That, and because I have this irrational fear that a blog stalker will find out where I live and steal my baby out of my belly. Pregnancy turns me into a crazy person.) But at this point it's getting a little hard to disguise the bowling ball the proceeds me everywhere I go.

So until the baby comes I'm seriously considering avoiding all family gatherings. It seems safer.
What would you do?

Halloween Part 1

2011-10-29T21:54:00.000-07:00

We should first get out in the open the fact that I think Halloween is the most pointless "holiday" ever.

I think it should be renamed "punish the moms day" because that's what it really is.

That being said, some awesome things did happen tonight.

At our ward party I volunteered for the cake walk, which was totally micromanaged. I just had to sit back and laugh. What type of person thinks a cakewalk needs that level of oversight? The worst that could possibly happen is the seven year olds mob the cake table and suddenly you're out of cake. And really, isn't that a GOOD thing because then nobody has to run the game, right? Anyway.

The Trunk R Treat part made me giggle, too. I handed out glow sticks and pencils. (Just trying to do my part to support China.)

Did you know kids these days don't even say "trick r treat!"? They just hold out their bags. And if you aren't fast enough, they shake them at you. Seriously? Who is raising these hooligans?

I ignored the kids who did this until they either went away or spoke the magic words.

After I ran out of glow sticks and just had pencils, kids were trying to take my $20 vanilla scented flameless candles and LED balloons. Um, no. Those are my trunk decorations. I'm kinda surprised nobody tried to walk off with the pumpkins.

After our ward's totally lame party, we went to the ward party hosted by my in-laws. These people know how to throw a party. There was a bounce house, cotton candy, train rides, and a REAL haunted house. Plus, it was all outside (except for the haunted house, which was in the barn) and there wasn't any lame music too loud to talk over. Also, the people who go to my in-laws ward are WAY more friendly than the people in my own ward.

While I was there I fell into conversation with a woman who was wearing her baby. Clearly, we had loads in common. At some point her husband comes up to us and randomly joins the conversation with this,

"and if you have a hysterectomy, you can't have the big orgasms any more. You can still have the small ones, but not the big ones". At which point MY husband walks up and wants to know why I just said, "oh wow".

Some people can't tell the difference between first and second date material. That was CLEARLY second date territory. Alternately, I could have gone my whole life without hearing about female orgasms from a man I've never met. But it was totally the highlight of my evening, because I got to come home and tell you. You're welcome.

PS I will get the kids' costume pictures, I promise. My "good" camera was out of batteries tonight and I didn't have time to get them replaced, what with running to the costume store 30 minutes before our party started. I super don't recommend that. The line for checkout was INSANE.

Pumpkin Pie Oatmeal

2011-10-28T16:25:00.000-07:00

I've invented something.

I don't think it will come as any great shock that this something contains food. After all, I'm assuming you read the title of the post.

This morning my son was trying to talk me into "Whole Cream of Wheat" yet again. I have a rule: Cream of Wheat is OK every other day, not every day. On non-cream of wheat days, breakfast is a battle.

I offered eggs. I offered smoothies. I offered cold cereal, oatmeal, even apple PIE oatmeal. All I got was a lot of pouting until I figured that if I could make apple pie oatmeal, I could probably also figure out pumpkin pie oatmeal.

He said yes. Thank the heavens.

Granted, this recipe makes enough food to feed my family for two mornings. I consider that an added bonus. Now I don't have to come up with a breakfast he won't sneer at the day-after-tomorrow. Score.

5 cups water
1 cup whole milk
sprinkle of salt (maybe 1/2 tsp for this amount of oats?)
2 1/2 cups oats (I like old fashioned but mostly have quick right now)
3/4 to 1 cup pumpkin puree (not pumpkin pie mix)
1/3-1/2 cup brown sugar (SOME members of my family don't know that breakfast doesn't have to result in a sugar coma...those people added yet more sugar to their bowls. Cretins. Or maybe I should call them pre-diabetics?)
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ginger
1 tsp cloves

Mix it all up and cook at boil on the stove for 2ish minutes. Take off the heat, throw the lid on for another few minutes to let the oats finish softening. Enjoy.

Clearly, this would be better with whipped cream on top, but then, what isn't?

Honesty and a Surprise (may be a Trigger for some)

2011-10-24T10:47:00.000-07:00

I've been debating when, exactly, to tell blog land what is going on in my life. I've put it off because I'm not interested in other people's opinions about what I should or shouldn't do, and I haven't been interested in the drama that might ensue when I detail exactly how I plan to go about life over the next few weeks.

But what I really need right now is some honesty and I figure the best place to start is to be honest with myself. So here goes:

In about 66 days, I'm going to have a baby.

Surprise.

Now here's the thing; when I get pregnant, I also get super emotional. It's called antipartum depression, and it sucks. This pregnancy I chose to go un-medicated for a number of reasons I'm not getting into here. Bottom line, when I'm depressed I get needy (and kinda snarky), and being needy/snarky has a tendency to alienate pretty much everyone.
Hubs even wrote me a strongly worded email yesterday. That's kind of huge for him.
It's like 9 months of the world's worst PMS. Shocked we're still married? Me too. Even more shocked Hubs let me get pregnant again? Ditto.

Have you noticed that when people ask how you are, and you actually tell them, they look at you funny? I never get tired of that. "How are you?" "Well, you know. Fat, tired, and generally ticked off at the world." dead silence
You should try it. It's the bright spot in my day. I do feel a little sorry for the cashier at the gas station, though. I'm pretty sure the correct response to that isn't in the employee handbook.

Anyway, lots of crap happening here, most of it related to gestating, but pretty much life currently feels like a giant cl*ster f*ck.

I've also been struggling with some MAJOR trust issues (more on this later) that are making life...interesting.

So to sum up; I'm hormonal, moody, stressed, my clothes don't fit, everybody hates me, I trust no one, and I'm having a baby.

I can't say I'd trade places with anyone, because I have some very dear friends who'd put up with all this crap just to have a baby. To be honest, this kid wasn't that easy to get earth-side. I am thankful for this new little life.

I am not thankful for the PTSD I have from my last birth that's haunting me in a MAJOR way on an hourly basis as this birth grows nearer. I'm not thankful for being so hormonal my family feels like they're walking on egg shells. I'm not thankful for the lack of a health care provider I can trust.
I just wish there were an easier way to get through this.

Luckily I'm married to the most patient man on earth and my kids are mostly cute most of the time. Otherwise, I probably would have run away by now. Unlike other life problems, it's rather difficult to run from an ever expanding belly.

So now you know why I've been a major witch lately and haven't been posting much. Feel free to unfollow me or whatever. :/
Alternately, you could send me some positive vibes. That'd be cool, too.

The point of this over-share was to relieve some pent up negative energy and give my poor husband a break. He thanks you. So do I.

Yesterday: The Day I Had a Brilliant Parenting Moment

2011-10-23T11:32:00.000-07:00

My kids have been craving one-on-one mom time, so yesterday I made it happen.

First, The Boy and I drove to a pumpkin patch were he was allowed to choose any pumpkin he could carry. We ended up with a pie pumpkin, which is just fine with me, I like pie from scratch. In fact, I bought a hand-mill for that exact purpose a few years back. :D

Then we made a quick stop to pick up potty training incentives for Zsa.

Back home to pick up Dad and Zsa Zsa. Dad and The Boy went to the soccer game (did I mention Dad is helping coach the team? Yeah, I thought it was funny, too).

Then Zsa Zsa and Mommy went to the produce store where she promptly picked THREE pumpkins. But, altogether they were cheaper than at the patch, so I let her get them. She also helped pick our apples and generally charmed the rest of the clientele with her booming voice, hilarious commentary, and princess cape. (Two year olds are the bomb)

We met up with the guys at the park and watched the end of the game. After a quick lunch at home, The Boy decided he needed ANOTHER Mom Date, so we went to Costco. I let him wander without a time limit in the toys section, which was so fun.

At the end of our trip I had a BRILLIANT idea. Seriously. It's Saturday at Costco in Arizona during snowbird season. The store was packed. The checkout lines were long. The Boy had a practice to get to, AND he wanted ice cream. So while I waited in line to check out, I sent him and two dollars to wait in line at the food court. You remember he's four, right?

So he waited patiently, got to the window and ordered his OWN chocolate ice cream in a cup and paid all while I watched from the checkout stand. He was so proud. *I* was so proud. Also, we saved enough time that we made it to his practice without being late.

Beside getting his own ice cream I think he was most pleased with the change and receipt in his pocket, which is kinda funny. Nobody can say I'm not doing my best to raise a self-sufficient kid. Or one whose good at reasoning. When I asked for my change back, he said "Well Mom, it's in MY pocket, so that means it's MINE." All right then. Just this once you can keep it. But 10% is going in your mission jar.

Funny Girl

2011-10-19T22:10:00.000-07:00

In the elevator (or alligator, if you're Zsa Zsa) my little girl turned toward the only other child in the car and said, "Guess what? I'm your BEST friend!" with such genuine enthusiasm and heart-felt truth behind it, I couldn't help but bust up laughing. The child's dad said, "good to know". I thought he was a good sport.

At dinner, she said, "my brudder's O-gurt has eighty-saurus on it! My plate has eighty-saurus, too!" It turns out, eighty-saurus means writing, which I did not know, and I'm guessing neither did you.

I love two-year-olds. They make the best comediennes, and for the most part, have no idea how funny they are. :)

PS The Boy did exactly zero cute things today. Four year olds are less cute than questiony. He definitely asked his 437 allowable questions today. And all before we even left the house. His current favorites start with, "mom have you ever?" For the record I've not ever eaten alligator, been to Mars or seen a space alien in REAL LIFE. Nor have I been to the bottom of the ocean or heard of people eating jelly fish while they are swimming. I have, however, eaten Swedish fish while swimming. But then, I'm just crazy like that.

The Boy's First Story

2011-10-15T16:17:00.000-07:00

For school this week, The Boy wrote his first story. I thought I'd share. (Daddy was the transcriptionist.)

October 14, 2011

There was a little boy that was called *Jim, and there was a big tractor. And Jim had a little car. And he drove it to the big tractor.
The big tractor was a crane and it picked his car up with him in it. And it turned and put him down, down, down, down, down, into the trash dump.
And he was trying to get out before he reached the fire. And he got out when a magnet picked him and his car up. And he told the magnet to drop him. Then the crane came again, and it was looking for him. It looked everywhere and it's gas ran out, and it couldn't move any more. The End. **Twelve Bucks.
*Of course The Boy named the main character after himself, so I've changed the name here.
**Do you know who Brian Regan is?

Barring the fact that he borrowed quite liberally from Toy Story 3, it's pretty good for his first story ever, no? We will have to work on his over-usage of conjunctions, but maybe we will wait for a few months before explaining the parts of speech. :D

Bragging

2011-10-11T09:33:00.000-07:00

It's totally bragging, and I don't even care.

My four year old is just a few requirements shy of passing Kindergarten according to the Arizona State Standards. We worked on one of them today. He totally aced it in 5 minutes.

The rest I think he doesn't have the brain development for yet, so we'll try again in a few weeks.

Until then, I think we will play with math and writing stories. We might also ~~blow some stuff up~~ do a little science.

LOVE LOVE LOVE teaching my own child. :D

PS My little girl is pretty much the best at puzzles. She especially loves those geo blocks which you can manipulate into your own picture.

Holy Smokes. Home Schooling is awesome. =D
We are done with school by 9am and can play for the rest of the day. How cool is that? Seriously. And how neat is it that I can delay a skill he's not ready for, or add in ones that wouldn't be "allowed" if he were taught in a group? I'm not gonna lie, it takes a good part of my brain power coming up with ways to teach him, since I'm not a teacher by nature, but it's so much FUN I don't really mind.

I'm sure we will have more speed bumps in the near future but for now, it's fantastic!

The Boy and Zsa Zsa

2011-10-07T20:29:00.000-07:00

I'm seriously considering renaming this blog, "Brilliant Things My Son Did".
He's getting to the clever stage and I'm constantly amazed.

For instance, the other night he didn't want to go to bed, so he formed a coherent argument instead of just whining like he'd normally do. "But Mom! Some people are NOCTURNAL." Upon recounting this conversation the next day to my friend within his hearing, she asked, "Well, The Boy, do you know what nocturnal means?"

Accompanied with a sigh and eye roll worthy of any teen he replied, "nocturnal is when you're awake at night and sleep during the day." We were both impressed. I was less impressed when I found out he learned the word from TV. I'm trying so hard to get rid of that thing, I hate when it has redeeming qualities.

Another argument he made this week was early in the morning. Like 5:30 in the morning. He came into the parental unit's room and said, "Since you're still really tired and sleeping, can I watch TV?" (I told you I hated that thing, right?)

Also this week we were working on math sentences, specifically the concept of "greater than".
He decided he wanted to write his own sentence to go along with our manipulative math lesson so he wrote this: "10>5?"
When asked about the question mark he said, "They go at the end of sentences!"
Thus began our lesson on punctuation. He was fascinated, I swear. =)

Zsa Zsa continues to be a bright spot in my day. She's so eager to agree to anything I propose, it's such a refreshing change from some other children I could name. I dread the day she figures out doing the dishes, or pretty much anything Mom suggests, isn't really all that fun. "Mom, I want to play a game wiss you." "OK! Let's play 'Clean the Oven'!" "YAY!"

I also love her little half lisp. I kind of hope she doesn't lose it for a while because it's so endearing.
"Mama, I want to snuggle wiss you" is my favorite thing to hear.

She's my naturally optimistic child, and I get a kick out of her sunny disposition. It makes me all warm and fuzzy on the inside. :)

Zsa Zsa is a perfect study in how modern toys aren't any better for us than the sticks our multiple great grandparents had. Her current favorite toy is a shoe lace. Yes, I'm totally serious. Sometimes she uses it with the lacing card horse it came with, and sometimes she uses it without, but it's in her hand nearly the entire day any time we're home. Battles ensue at bedtime when mama (wisely) insists strings do not make good bedtime toys. She is awfully stubborn, though. I can't think where she gets it...

Monday Madness

2011-09-28T16:32:00.000-07:00

(I some how forgot to post this a couple weeks or so ago. Oops!)

Today was the first day of school at home. We got off to a rocky start. The case of organic nectarines I got on Saturday went moldy overnight and I found it right as we were supposed to start school.
I spent an hour cutting the rotten and moldy bits off and freezing the unripe parts that hadn't molded in the hopes they'd be OK for smoothies. I lost 1/2 my case to mold. Grrrrr. While I was doing that, my kids watched Sesame Street. I have nothing against PBS, but my kids aren't exactly attentive when they've just spent a solid hour in front of the boob tube.

I'd say the most successful bit was music time. We listened to the Typewriter Song by the American composer, Leroy Anderson. Tracing 'a' also went over well. Aardvarks? Not so much. I'm hoping the routine of school will help my oldest not be so bratty. I'm giving it a week before I start seriously considering the implementation of corporal punishment into our school day.

In other news, during drawing time, The Boy drew spikes all around his daddy figure. I asked what they were, was told spikes, and upon further clarification found out it was whiskers. Daddy happened to walk in the room toward the end of that conversation. I'm pretty sure he snorted part of the apple he was eating from laughing so hard.

Zsa just likes coloring, which I totally expected and am completely fine with. Her African Animal, the zebra, ended up rainbow colored. Again, totally fine with that.

Here's a little homeschool FYI, they make washable dry erase markers. The regular kind does NOT come out of clothes. The washable version costs aproximately the same amount as my morgage, but it's SO worth it. The last time I gave Zsa a Vis-a-Vis, she totally ruined a smocked dress I'd made her.

Fashion Stuff I Don't Get

2011-09-28T16:14:00.001-07:00

I know that I'm old and for the most part leave the house wearing old tee shirts and no makeup and that I rarely do my hair.
But I can still tell what's hip, fashionable and what's SO last season.

Which is why I need somebody to PLEASE tell me what I'm missing with the following trends?

1. Chevron EVERYTHING: rugs, mugs, fabric, wall paint design. Seriously? A Chevron is a military insignia or a gas station, not a fashion statement.

2. Non edible items that look like sushi. Maybe I would understand this more if I liked something sushi-ish besides California rolls, but Dudes, man mastered fire and the 90 second Electrolux boil which means meat can (and should) now be COOKED!

(this is a sushi pillow)

(This seemingly edible child is just wrong on so many levels.

Also, what does a banana have to do with sushi?)

I get it with bacon, though. Non edible plush bacon is just cute!

see?

To sum up:

Wrong

Right.

3. Crafts using paint chips. Seriously?

And those are my fashion quandaries for September, 2011.
(images courtesy of Pinterest and ThinkGeek.com)

PS For the record, I'm very on board with steam punk. In fact, I've thought it was cool since at least 2008 so clearly, I'm trending WAY before the curve. ;)

Random Funny One-Liners and Convos from Today

2011-09-28T12:33:00.000-07:00

Zsa Zsa is playing with a 3-D Nativity puzzle. Her commentary goes like this, "beHOLD! beHOLD! beHOLD!" "Dee red guy goes next to de blue guy. Dee blue guy is next to de guy with de lamb..."

Talking with The Boy about our day I mentioned that we would be going out to the bank.
"But I don't LIKE the bank!"
"Really? Abby (our banker) always gives you candy".
"Oh yeah! I like that place!"

"Mom. I want a hanguber with chicken and salad in it."
"OK, you want a chicken sandwich."
"No! A hanguber with chicken and salad in a bun."
"A hamburger has brown meat, a chicken sandwich has chicken. Do you want a hamburger or chicken?"
"I want a hangabur with chicken!"
<mom orders Chick-Fil-A chicken sandwich. Boy is happy.>

Frustrated and Driving Illegally

2011-09-20T20:44:00.000-07:00

I am probably the most frustrated I've ever been in my entire life. More frustrated than when ISU told The Hubs that no, he couldn't really graduate because they'd added a couple requirements to his program without bothering to tell him, so he'd need to do yet another semester. More frustrated than when I came home too early from the hospital after The Boy was born and I couldn't sit up on my own or roll over or nurse or get my baby to stop crying or pee.

I have lots of reasons for being this frustrated, but the one I can share on Facebook is that my mail is delivered by Newman.

Remember him?

Yeah.

So I knew that our postman was complete idiot. That is why before our summer migration to Idaho, I drove to the post office, filled out the forward mail form and turned it in. I figured there was no way a guy with the same intelligence as a fence post could figure out what to do with that piece of paper. Oh, I was SO right.

While in Idaho, our bank called to say they got mail back. But by golly, I was getting my Martha Stewart magazine, so I figured the bank thing was just a fluke. It wasn't until we got home I found out my doctor tried to send us a bill. Twice. It got returned. Twice.
After getting that mess straightened out, I get a letter from the great state of Arizona saying they have no record of our car insurance, and if we don't get that cleared up, they'd suspend our license plates. That note came two days before the scheduled date for plate suspension. (NEWMAN!!!!!!!)

Of course the first person I call is my insurance agent. Guess what? They sent the renewal notice while we were gone. It never made it to Idaho.
They cancelled my insurance.
So I've been driving uninsured since mid JULY.
We drove the whole western United States, including the entire length of California COMPLETELY uninsured.
Oh, I'm livid.
Not only that, but it's been so long, our insurance company wants nothing to do with us. They won't backdate the policy. The only companies I can find that will insure us now want TWICE the premiums we were paying previously.
If it were legal to do so, I'd drive down to the post office and file a formal complaint. Alas, I can't go anywhere until this hot mess is straightened out.

I'm also a little ticked that what was supposed to be a year policy turned out to only be six months, despite what it says on the card in my glove box.

I'm gonna go eat some Nutella and Whipped Cream and fantasize about laying in wait for the postman with my imaginary shot gun.

Reading?

2011-09-15T23:23:00.000-07:00

It turns out The Boy can read.
Yeah, I am at LEAST as surprised as you are, considering nobody actively taught him.
Here's how I found out.

Today was our Let's Play Music class. We were going over the solfege notes in some of the cords. The Boy READ the notes in the cords. Another mom leaned over to me and said, "He can read?" My flabbergasted response was, "I guess". Yes, I'm witty and brilliant pretty much all of the time.

This evening I was on the laptop and The Boy came up behind me to see what I was doing.
"Mom, that word says off" he says while pointing to a banner ad. My goodness, yes. It does.

So that's the story of how I learned The Boy could read. Sorta wish I could take the credit for this. :)
I don't think he's ready for Cicero, but maybe we could check out some Dick and Jane books or something.

A Better (No Tears) Day

2011-09-14T18:15:00.000-07:00

My kids were WAY better today. Holy smokes.

Everyone should have children, if for no other reason than the entertainment value. I'm not saying they're cheaper than RedBox, but they are infinitely more amusing.

Today I was trying to figure out a tricky (to me) sewing project from just a picture while talking to Hubs and lamenting over my poor skills and need for help. The Boy jumped in and said, "I know how to do that! Just cut HERE!" Oh, I nearly peed myself.

A few minutes later during dinner, Zsa Zsa wanted some water, but she hadn't asked nicely. We asked her to use the magic word. She burst out with her answer of, "FOUR!" as the magic word.

You can see how she thinks four is magic. When you are four, you get to go to friend's houses and music class on your OWN! You can open the fridge and get your own snacks. You are pretty much the boss when you are four.

It wasn't all sunshine and lollipops today, but I didn't seriously consider dropping my kids off at one of those "Safe Place" places, unlike yesterday. So I'm calling that a giant step in the right direction.
It also helped I didn't have anywhere I absolutely had to be or anything pressing that needed doing, so I just got to work on Halloween costumes and read a book. We even went to the park. Yay for restful days!

Ugh

2011-09-13T15:09:00.000-07:00

Today I kinda want to curl up in a little ball and cry. (Post Script: I did actually curl up and cry)
I'm 96% sure the devil is possessing my children.
The fighting and whining have reached epic proportions. I think I could handle it if the whining had actual words. Both my kids are perfectly capable of articulating, but they find the wordless whine to be more to their liking.
My sweet, wonderful friend took them for a couple hours so I could run some errands. When it was time to go pick them up, I cried.
I hate that.
I don't want to be the mom that cries at the thought of picking up her children.
So I've banned TV for the remainder of the week. Depending on how that goes, I may throw the stupid thing in the trash. TV is evil. I'm pretty sure that's how the devil got IN my kids.
Stink'n Sesame Street...Gateway to Hell covered in a candy coating, that's what you are!

Pre School, Gearing Up

2011-09-11T09:57:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow is the first day of our schooled at home preschool.
Our letter is going to be 'A'. (It seemed appropriate.)

So at 7am today the children and I made "acorns" to take for dessert to family dinner.
Because we live in Arizona, my kids had no idea what an acorn was, which kinda proves the point that you're always learning. It wasn't even a school day and we got to have a conversation on where acorns come from and what their purpose is. Fun times!

The original instructions call for doughnut holes, but Fry's didn't have any so I got cream puffs instead. I know, giant improvement!
Anyway, you dip the end of the cream puff in nutella and then in chocolate sprinkles. The stem is 1/2 a pretzel stick. You could cut your sticks in thirds but I'm really lazy so I just shoved the 1/2 stick in further.

Because I'm so awesome, I also made waffles for breakfast and let the kids eat them with nutella on top. They were having a hard time not licking the acorns. Maybe we should have made breakfast first?

Seven Years? Really?

2011-09-09T12:40:00.000-07:00

Hubs and I passed our seventh anniversary last weekend. We totally celebrated, by which I mean we went camping with his family. That would be 11 other adults and 27 kids. In the woods. We slept in a tent with our children, skipped showers and peed in a dilapidated outhouse. What? Isn't that how EVERYONE celebrates their seventh anniversary? Hubs also bought himself an enormous board game. I got flowers. From Wal-Mart. The day after our anniversary.

But don't worry. Hubs is totally making up for it this weekend. We're going to eat at Fudruckers and play mini golf. Hey, there are trade offs for KNOWING your husband will never cheat on you.

Luckily, he's married to me. I've totally remedied this situation. I'm taking us to the batting cages.
Now I just have to figure out a gift that will signify how amazing a wife I've been for the last seven years. I'm debating between legs for our bed and a can opener.

PS In case you think this post is how I really feel there's a disclaimer at the bottom.

DISCLAIMER: I totally love The Hubs. He's perfect for me. He lets me make fun of his still-awkward dating. What could be better than that? And if I *REALLY* cared, I'd plan the date, right?
Exactly. So this was a work of satire.

My New (old) Job

2011-09-08T13:53:00.000-07:00

was stressing me out. I didn't have time for a massage or time to get my nails done or ANYTHING! Seriously. It was bad.
I know that all new jobs have a learning curve, but usually there's someone there to give you a bit of guidance and maybe some policy and procedure manuals to pretend to read.
Not this job.
Because I'm kinda made it up as I went along.
Ferills.
I was hired as a personal wellness chef for a family facing some pretty hefty health challenges. Like, 8% survival rate type health challenges.
My job was to make food that would most benefit the family using Traditional Chinese Medicine principals AND the guidelines from the various doctors for members of the family. Things like, low sodium, low carb, no sugar (NO SUGAR! WHO DOES THAT!?!?!) and no dairy. Also, everything, including the fruit had to be cooked. Yeah. It's pretty much impossible.

BUT, I did it. AND I did it well.

The problem was, the food didn't taste like it came from McJacky'sChicken. Of COURSE it didn't! It was fresh! home cooked! and actual FOOD! I cooked the same stuff for my family and they ate it. I have toddlers for pete's sake. Talk about a picky group of eaters. (My kids, not the family. Although clearly the same label applies, you won't find ME saying it.)

Anyway, it didn't work out. But I learned a lot of stuff and got some material for the book I've been meaning to write for years but probably never will, because isn't that what everyone is doing?
I thought so.

Clearly, I didn't have enough to do if I thought taking on a job wherein I cooked two fresh meals five days a week was a good idea. I don't even do that for MY family. There's a reason I double every recipe. I do love to cook, though. And it was fun to prepare meals in such a gorgeous kitchen. Fun for the two weeks it lasted.

Pre-School

2011-09-07T13:13:00.001-07:00

I've spent the day running between WalHomeStaplEt and my computer. You see, I've finally decided for sure what I'm going to do when it comes to educating my children. For the rest of this year, at least and probably next year.

The Boy is 20 months older than Zsa Zsa. Plus, he's a boy. The way I figure it, I can teach them both the same thing at the same time if I hold him back a bit and push her a little. We did a little test run today, and I think I can modify all our activities just enough that both kids will be challenged adequately. This year, we are doing a preschool. I know it's a little early for Zsa, she's not quite three. BUT she's also super stubborn and wants to do everything The Boy wants to do, so...I thought I'd let her. What ever she picks up and accomplishes, yay. If all she does is color this year, we'll both be happy.

Can I just say that homeschooling is totally and completely 100% overwhelming? Just thinking about it makes me want to vomit. Luckily, I have some super stellar cousins and a couple bloggy friends that have been a tremendous support. The best advice I've gotten is, "just give them time and materials. The learning will happen." Oh. You mean I don't have to buy an entire program and stick to it? Cool!

Hopefully this will workout like breastfeeding; it was super hard, but I knew I wanted to do it, so I stuck with it and then suddenly it wasn't so hard and I couldn't figure out why everybody didn't do it because in the end, it seemed SO much easier than bottles. I mean really, who wants to sterilize their pencil boxes and crayons?

Random Facts, Unrelated Items and Other Miscellany

2011-09-02T14:19:00.000-07:00

Tip Of The Day: Did you know if you live in Arizona and your water heater is in the garage, you can turn it down to low, or even vacation, for like, the ENTIRE summer and still have hot water? If you do this, please send 1/2 your savings to my PayPal account. Seriously folks, that's at LEAST four months, and probably closer to five of free hot water. Plus, who wants to take a hot shower in Arizona in August? Ferills.

I quit my job. <happy dance> I quit before I even had a chance to tell you about it. That's saying something. Today is my last day. <more happy dancing> (I swear, I'll totally blog it...eventually)

I suck at volleyball, except when I don't

Camping is SO not the cheapest vacation. Whoever said that CLEARLY didn't have access to hotwire.com and a Costco. Every time we go, I spend at least $200 at Wal Mart.

I hate Wal Mart

Forty years ago, my mother in law paid cash (no insurance) for her baby. The total bill for a 5 day hospital stay AND the delivery was ~$400. NOW who doesn't think insurance has skewed the proper price of health care?

Albertson's sells a store brand of the shampoo T-Gel. It's twice the size and half the cost of T-Gel. Husband will be so happy.

Vacation: Lake Tahoe Coming Home

2011-08-27T11:18:00.000-07:00

Did you know it's 13.5 hours of driving time between Lake Tahoe and our house? This doesn't count the gas and meal breaks. Because we were coming home on Sunday, we stopped for church, as well.

Did you also know there are pretty places in Nevada? I'm seriously not joking. I drive through Nevada frequently, and I've never seen a place like this. Just over the mountain from Tahoe is this little place called Carson Valley and it is GORGEOUS. We almost didn't leave. Especially after we found out the ward we attended had been fasting and praying for new families to move in.
Oh my goodness. The valley is mostly ranch land. GREEN IN AUGUST ranch land. The town we were in was clean and small (with a Thai place) and the people were super duper nice. The only thing wrong with this place is that it's in Nevada, so there were also a couple small casinos. I hate gambling. It's just taxes for people bad at math. Sadly, people who are bad at math are pretty much the last people who should be gambling. It's 8 hours from my mama, and 12ish from The Hubs parents. Those are both totally doable one day driving distances. I may be thinking moving thoughts.

Also on the way home, we stopped for dinner in California somewhere at a Denny's. Zsa Zsa is two, right? So imagine our surprise when she stabbed dinner with her fork in one hand and started using the knife in the other to cut between the tines. Clearly, she's going to be a brain surgeon. Also, she now has no excuse for eating rice with her hands the night before.

We got home about 1:30am Monday morning. Our whole family was glad Hubs had taken Monday off from work, as well.

Oh, and our first week back, Phoenix has been setting record highs. Who came back to early? <raises hand>

Vacation: Lake Tahoe Day Four

2011-08-27T11:08:00.000-07:00

Saturday the kids and I kept it low key. We rode the trolley to the Rainbow Trail, which is where I hiked approximately forty thousand miles while holding a toddler who wouldn't let me carry her on my back. We went to the stream profile room, which was SO cool, we took Daddy back with us later that afternoon when he got home from his meetings. (But after we had some so-so Thai food in a restaurant rated the best Thai in Tahoe. SO glad we didn't go to that other Thai place.)

The Profile room is an underground room right next to a creek (if you're from Idaho, creek is pronounced crick, trust me). One wall of the room is glass AND it also makes up a part of the stream so you can see the fish that are swimming in the creek and the craw-fish and all the other cool stream-stuff. My kids ADORED this place. It was pretty cool, but to be honest, the best bit was being able to sit in the dark while my kids quit whining for slightly longer than 4.2 nanoseconds. By Saturday, we were ALL pretty much done with this trip.

It turns out a small person inherited her mother's proclivity for travelling poorly. Sorry, honey. Really I am. For both of us.

On our way back to the condo, we stopped to get ice cream. The kids both REALLY wanted rainbow sherbet, so that's what we got them. Zsa Zsa took a couple licks of hers and then stole my pistachio ice cream. And she wouldn't give it back. So I stole Hubs hot fudge. But I gave his back, because I'm awesome like that. Rainbow sherbet is kind of nasty. I guess I can't blame her, but from now on, she's going to get whatever I'm having. This stealing of mommy's food has gotten to be quite a habit the last few weeks.

Things I Learned This Week

2011-08-27T10:53:00.000-07:00

You're supposed to vacuum as many times in the week as you have people living in the house. Did y'all know this? WHY didn't someone tell me I'm only vacuuming HALF as much as I should be? I thought I was being all proactive getting out the Bissell twice a week. Pish.
My son can spell his name...and send texts and emails from my phone. This means people I haven't talked to in oh, forever, are getting text messages from me that say only The Boy's name.

Just because you CAN make a tutu without a pattern doesn't mean you SHOULD. Unless you want to do it over three or so times. Seriously, use a pattern. :D I will say it was super a lot more easy to do with my new sewing machine, courtesy of my mama.
Cooking three dinners in one night, day after day can get a little old, and your personal family may starve.
Job's Tears (croix beans) are good for colon cancer.

If you let your kids read Dr Seuss, they are bound to Box with Socks. At least they weren't boxing foxes.

Vacation: Lake Tahoe Day Three

2011-08-19T16:50:00.000-07:00

Today I sorta forgot what day is was. Not just the date, the day of the week. Yup. More than anything my life resembles the movie Ground Hog Day.

Hubs didn't come home last night. He stayed with a friend in Reno so he could get his after party on with a bunch of other (published) authors. Guess what they did? Played card games. Not like Uno or Whist , we're talking geek card games. I can't even give you an example, because I'm not that geeky. If I were invited to an after party, it wouldn't be the kind with card games. Just say'n. (Mama's still got game.)

Anyhoo, I spent four hours last night holding an overly tired, screaming Zsa. By the time I finally rolled into bed, it was today. And the kids got up at 5. That would be am, in case you need clarification.

Luckily my super awesome cousin, Marge, lives a couple hours away AND likes Tahoe so she came up today with her two super cute cutie pie boys and we played on the beach all afternoon. She literally saved my sanity. Plus, she brought me a nectarine. I was in serious need of a pit fruit. Serious, serious need.

Can I just say, Marge and I were pretty good friends growing up, because we were the same age and all our cousins were lots older (or in the case of my sisters, lots younger) but since we've hit adulthood, we never manage to be in the same part of the country at the same time, so it was really great to get to visit and relax with her. She's pretty much da bomb.

The kids had a great time, got burned in random places and generally filled every bodily crevasse with sand.

Supposedly Hubs will be coming home tonight, though he said he'd be here around 5 and I just got a text saying he found a class at 5 he wants to attend, so who knows. All I know for sure is, he's not authorized to purchase any more clothing. He bought a new shirt today so nobody would see him in the same thing two days in a row. I'm pretty sure that's the first time in his entire life he's been concerned about that. Ferills.
At least if he doesn't buy any more clothes, he has to come back at some point, right?

Vacation: Lake Tahoe Day Two Point One

2011-08-18T23:05:00.001-07:00

You know how Hubs is at Geek Convention TM? Well, he's there partly to have fun, but more to make connections and today he was part of a writer's panel. His work was reviewed by some professionals in the field and later he met with some famous authors and went to dinner with said authors. That was AFTER he was invited to attend a party tonight being hosted by a publishing house. You have no idea how hard a time I am having not tossing around names here. Let's just say this particular house is one of two, maybe three companies that publish the bulk of the type of writing Hubs does. This house is the Babe Ruth of publishing and it's the top of the top in his genre.
This has the potential to be a freaking huge deal. Especially because we're only on day two of Geek Convention TM. But it also means Hubs did not come home tonight. We all make sacrifices for greatness, right? Slowly going bonkers for lack of adult conversation is my sacrifice. Not only is Hubs gone while I'm awake, I have spotty cell coverage. I'm good for texting, and that's about it.
Anyway, I hurriedly ordered some business cards for Hubs since he forgot his, and he picked them up before the party. Hopefully (fingers crossed) he meets the right people. Hopefully he actually talks to people and doesn't spend the whole night in his typical wall flower pose. Hopefully, he channel a little me tonight. (Or really, a little anyone who isn't half agoraphobe.)
Later: I just found out Hubs isn't going to come home at ALL tonight. Which means he won't be here in the morning. Which means I get to explain that to my kids. Super. It also means I will have been on single parent duty for 48 hours by the time he makes an appearance and it ALSO means, I don't get a nectarine. I could kill for a good nectarine about now. Seriously.

PS It took me FOUR HOURS to put Zsa Zsa to bed. No lie. I thought we'd both go crazy before she passed out. This child needs confined and defined space like no one I've ever met.

Vacation: Lake Tahoe Day Two

2011-08-18T23:00:00.001-07:00

Today was stellar on LOTS of levels.
First, Hubs was here when the kids got up so he made everyone breakfast. Score. :)
Housekeeping came by while the children and I were getting our gear together for the morning's excursion. We ended up leaving in kind of a hurry since like, 8 people came to clean our one bedroom condo and it was a touch crowded. (and PS how do I tip for that at the end of our stay?)
We took the shuttle up to the Gondola. Sadly, the camera was in the car with The Hubs, so I made due with The Boy's Camera (which the kids fought over) and my iPhone camera. We waited FOREVER for the shuttle to pick us up, but once it did, the driver was super nice and gave us lots of tips on stuff to do while in the area.

We arrived an hour before the Gondola started accepting customers so we killed time with bathroom breaks, badly done photo ops with kids as shooters and a mini cinnamon roll. Zsa finished hers in a hurry and wanted to start in on The Boy's, but I held her off with left over frosting.
Then another great thing happened; we found out that not only would it be free for Zsa Zsa to ride up, but The Boy was free, too! Stellar! Instant $20 savings. THEN we found out for just $4 more on my ticket, we could get a $15 voucher for the restaurants at the top of the mountain. A ride AND lunch!

The way up was simply terrifying. I'm glad I didn't think on it too hard before we loaded up. It's so quiet in the car, it's eerie. The kids had a blast taking (blurry) pictures and generally enjoying the 17 minute ride. We gained something like 3000ft so our ears were popping, also. We got off midway and looked through some telescopes and went potty before loading up again.
At the top we goofed off for a bit and then headed to the restaurant for grub.
Both kids wanted mac n cheese.

What I did not know until we paid was that it cost $4.50 each for a tiny tub of it. I tasted it, and it was worth $4.50 a tub. Still. For mac n cheese? And that's when I figured out going to "the top of the world" had pretty much the same exchange rate as going to Europe.
At this point, a certain member of our party was in full-on melt down, but I couldn't really blame her since it was close to nap time and she was all oxygen deprived and stuff, so we headed down mountain.

Since I'd tipped the shuttle so well on the ride in, we didn't have to wait long to get picked up. (See Sandy? I listen to you.)
The kids laid down for 4.2 nanoseconds, and then we walked The Boy down to the beach house for the activities hosted by the resort. (Do you tip for that?) Zsa and I headed back to the condo where I laid down, and Zsa Zsa colored and ate a cookie. Then she laid down too, and went to sleep. I ran to the beach to pick up The Boy without Zsa, since she was sleeping, and I'm sure that act cost me 2 years of my life. I've never left a sleeping kid alone. I actually did it twice today, since I went to check on The Boy once mid-activity. So there's 4 years, at least. I was only gone 8 minutes each time, but it was a harrowing 8 minutes. If you've ever met Zsa you know it's totally possible I'd have come back to a building on fire or at the very least, newly decorated walls.
Here's what I found instead. Just like I left her.

We just chilled for a while after naps, waiting for Hubs and his friend to show up for dinner, which is when the next cool thing happened.
To Be Continued...
And PS, if your gallbladder hates you, give it Lecithin. Holy Toledo. That stuff WORKS. I ate real food and didn't vomit. My shoulder didn't ache and I pretty much felt normal. YAY! Thanks for the advice, Whitney. :)

Vacation: Lake Tahoe Day One

2011-08-18T20:45:00.001-07:00

We made it. The first day was NOT stellar, but really, any day that starts with vomit before breakfast just isn't destined for greatness, so I shouldn't have been surprised.

After my gallbladder forced my stomach to evacuate it's paltry contents (during family prayer), we loaded up the kids and said our goodbyes to Idaho.

Once in Reno, the kids and I dropped Dad off at the hotel for his Geek Convention TM and headed over to Costco. Did you know at the Reno Costco they make you show your card before you can use the BATHROOM? Did you also know that while you're digging the card out from the cheerios on the bottom of your purse, they will close the bathroom and laugh at you and your two small children doing the potty dance until another (female) employee takes pity on the three of you and makes the bathroom guy let you in? True story. I would not make up a tale about potty dances.

The kids and I shopped a week's worth of groceries and then drove on out to the condo at lake Tahoe. Which is when we found out the condo boasted a MINI fridge. Oh yeah, baby.
Here's what I bought:
pizza
whole chicken
2 gallons of milk
tub of salad mix
2.5 lbs cheese
1/2 flat raspberries
2 lb blueberries
2 dozen eggs
jam
ranch
veggie tray
watermelon
tortillas
lunch meat
Um yeah. It all fit. (not)
The first night I cooked the pizza and it touched both edges of the oven, because the fridge isn't the only mini thing about this condo. It's kinda like living in Japan. Diminutive.
Oh, and the fire alarm went off when I opened the oven to get the pizza out. It wasn't even crispy yet, let alone burnt.

I took the kids swimming, Zsa Zsa got a bloody nose when the car door ran into her face and that about sums up the first day. Luckily, Day two was better.

Random Boy

2011-08-16T10:10:00.000-07:00

Yesterday the kids and I were running errands. Zsa Zsa, upon getting buckled into her seat, told me she was going to sleep. The Boy handed out this little gem:

"Mom, I'm not sleepable right now. When I *am* sleepable, I'll go to sleep, OK?"
"OK"
"I want to be a fireman with a fire HAT and fire BOOTS and a fire JACKET and ALL that stuff!"

What can I say? He can't help being that random. It's genetic.

First Ever Placenta Encapsulation (no pictures)

2011-08-15T14:00:00.000-07:00

Alright folks, I just finished the steaming/slicing portion of my first ever placenta encapsulation, and I have to say, that was a lot grosser than I'd expected. Those suckers are bloody. And slippery.

I can see why moms hire other people to encapsulate for them. I would, if I'd just had a baby.

Wow. It's nasty.

That being said, I'd do it again for the $200 fee folks charge for the service. It's maybe 30 minutes of stomach churning work for two Benjamins. I think I can handle that. :)

This time, however, I did it for free.

Never. Again. Not even if I love you. (OK, I MIGHT do it again if you're related to me. Maybe. But I'd also have to like you and there are not too many people who fall under both categories.)

Recipe Review: Costa Vida Sweet Pork Salad

2011-08-05T19:04:00.003-07:00

I should probably preface this post with a disclaimer: I don't eat pork, and I hate the scent of cilantro. When I say "hate" I mean, if I chop it, I'll vomit. I'm not a puker under any circumstances but it's that gross.

Mom thawed some pork the other day when I said I wanted meat. Sadly, pork is not meat. It's a dead pig. Pigs don't get any cuter upon death and they weren't exactly gorgeous to start with.

So here's the recipe I chose from the Picky Palate via Pinterest. Obviously, my palate is picky-er. Just say'n. Here it is copied and pasted in case you're too lazy to to click through.

(Obviously, I'm too lazy to take my own picture.)

Y'all know I don't DO recipes that require bottles of this and boxes of that, but I figured since I wasn't going to be eating it, it didn't really matter. Am I right? OK then.

Sweet Pork Salad with Cilantro Dressing

2-4 lb pork roast
1 ½ Cups Coca Cola (seriously, not joking. Talk about something I don't have laying about the house)
Salt, Pepper, Garlic Seasoning Salt

Sauce:
1 Cup Coca Cola
1 Cup ketchup (I used my organic HFCS free ketchup. What a waste of perfectly good product)

Dressing:
1 jar Herdez Salsa Verde (mild tomatillo salsa, I get it at Walmart, any size)
Equal amount of prepared ranch dressing (Hidden Valley)
1 Bunch Cilantro (ew. EW. EW! I did it, and I barfed but I was trying to be true to the recipe)

10 inch wheat or flour tortillas
Shredded green leaf lettuce
Black beans, I just used canned
Cilantro lime rice (steamed rice with chopped cilantro leaves and fresh lime juice, as much as desired)
Diced tomatoes, cheese, guacamole….etc
Crispy Tortilla Strips (flour tortillas cut into thin strips and fried in vegetable oil until browned)

Place roast in crockpot with Coke; season with salt, pepper and garlic seasoning. Cook on low overnight, until tender.Remove roast from crockpot, discard juices. Shred pork into bite size pieces and place back into pot on low.
Place Cola and ketchup in a small saucepan over medium heat, stirring often. Heat to a low boil. Pour over shredded roast. Cook on low until ready to serve. (oops. I just saw this step. I was supposed to COOK it?)
For dressing, place equal parts salsa verde and ranch dressing into food processor or blender. Add Cilantro leaves and process until smooth. Refrigerate until ready to serve.
To serve: Place tortilla onto a large bowl or plate. Layer with lettuce, beans, rice, pork, dressing and tomatoes, cheese and guacamole. Cheese, guacamole and crispy tortilla strips not pictured, but really good in it!

VERDICT:

Obviously, it was totally gross. I made a cheese crisp and ate outside. I think the rest of the family ate it, but this could be because I didn't make lunch, either. Hello, there was pork in the kitchen. Like I'd go in there willingly?

Best Snack EVER

2011-08-05T10:04:00.000-07:00

Holy Pizza Sauce, IB Nation.
My sister has discovered the secret to snacking.

It's salty, fast and HEALTHY.
I KNOW!!!!!! I'm excited, too!

Ready? OK.

Get a small zucchini. Slice it in thin strips or thin rounds. Zap in microwave for 30 seconds. Now get out your Costco container of shredded Parmesan. Oh, I know you have one! Hurry now.
Sprinkle the cheese over the zukes and zap for another 30ish seconds.
Devour.
Repeat.
I'd have taken a picture but every time we make it, there's no time before it's gone again. We kinda ran out of zucchinis. Seriously. Without putting them in unlocked cars.

Sewing Machine Saga

2011-07-28T17:20:00.001-07:00

Sew I have this friend who very generously gifted me her grandmother's sewing machine.
(I know, TOTALLY sweet).

But it didn't work.
My other awesome friend, who sews for a living, offered to take it and make it work.
But she couldn't.
Sew then I took it to a place that repairs such things and they charged me $180 and I got back a working machine. That is, until I started to sew on it. Something was off. We packed up for Idaho and I took it to the sewing center here and they repaired it. I started sewing again, and it broke again. Back to the shop. The one gear the original repair shop DIDN'T replace totally broke all to heck.
This is the part where I started to cry.
You see, I WANT to love sewing. My mama is SEW good at it, she made my wedding dress. I know. As I said, a totally awesome seamstress. And she likes it, to boot. Sewing that is. Probably she liked my dress, too.
Mama and I went to the repair guy, and he said my poor, poor machine had bit the dust but for $100 he could get it running again. However, there was no guarantee of how long the new gears would last.
There was some more crying in there somewhere.
My sweet wonderful mama offered to buy me a new machine that comes with lessons.
You see, she wants me to like sewing, too. Or at least to be proficient at it.
Husband and I talked it over that night and agreed we couldn't let her buy a machine, but that a new machine would be best.
So the next day mama and I headed back to the sewing machine store.
And we came home with this:

Which I totally didn't buy because I don't believe in committing violence against one's mama, and that's the only way I could have beat her to the cash register. I'm going to pay her back somehow. Probably not in home-sewn goods, since even with a decent machine it turns out my hems aren't all that straight. :)
Ah well. At least now I can practice without my machine falling all to pieces.

PS HOW did I live without the needle threading option? I have NO idea. It's amazing.

Edgar, Allen, and Poe

2011-07-23T22:39:00.000-07:00

The kids got a book from the library this week called Edgar, Allen, and Poe and the Tell-Tale Beets. It's a children's spoof on Edgar Allen Poe's Tell-Tale Heart, made palatable for young children.

The Boy, in particular, is in love with this book. So, like any good mom, I made beets for dinner tonight. The Boy ate LOADS of beets. Before bed, we got a little reminder of what, exactly, beets do to a person who eats them in large quantities: it turns your pee pink. The Boy loves beets even more now. I can't wait to see what happens tomorrow when he sees what beets do to other, eh hem, waste products.

PS The Boy was quite disappointed when I wouldn't tell him the REAL Tell-Tale Heart, but I like our status quo where the children sleep through the night in their own beds. Call me crazy. (hehehe)

I Need Inspiration

2011-07-21T22:03:00.000-07:00

Do you ever hate cooking in the summer? Even if you LOVE cooking? Yeah. That.
This week we've had pizza, pancakes, leftovers and chips and dip.
I need some serious inspiration.
If you've tried something new recently, or have a summer dinner-time favorite,
please PLEASE PLEASE share!

Randomness From The Week

2011-07-16T20:59:00.000-07:00

"Boy, please take your sister to the slide." I NOT a SISTER!!!! I a ZSA ZSA!" She was so sure about this, that I couldn't help but laugh. It's three days later, and I'm still laughing.
I ruined some perfectly good junk food when I ran out of butter and subbed applesauce. Huge mistake.
The kids have been running outside every three seconds to check if Grandma Cathy is home yet. She lives next door, but works during the day. It's pretty funny because they won't believe me when I tell them she's not home, they have to check.
Zsa Zsa said a marshmallow would make her owies feel better.
Zsa Zsa, against a direct order to stop doing so, was jumping on an air mattress. She fell and face planted on the deck. When she came inside to cry to me and show me her goose-egged forehead and smashed and bleeding nose, I couldn't help but say, "And momma called the doctor and the doctor said, no more monkeys jumping on the bed!" For the rest of the week, any time someone new came to the house, Zsa Zsa would tell them, "my mom called the doctor and the doctor said, no more MONKEYS jumping on the bed!" I think she learned her lesson. Poor thing.
Also this week, Zsa Zsa was petting a kitty. This particular kitty is scared of people, and in particular the pint-sized versions. The de-clawed kitty took a swipe at her head, and so she came crying that "The kitty hit me!" which was kinda funny.

More Camping Pictures

2011-07-16T20:50:00.000-07:00

These are cows. Husband took the picture from a moving car. We thought it would be nice to show his dad that cows can be raised in such a beautiful area, as well as in Arizona. (wink, wink) Even though I KNOW Husband's family will never move, I can dream, can't I?

Seriously. Who WOULDN'T want to live here?

And one more of my seriously cute babies.

Camping 2.0

2011-07-16T19:09:00.001-07:00

My sister talked me into going camping with her family this weekend. You know, because it went so well the last time. Briefly, here's how the last time went; I had a less than 18 month old, was hugely pregnant, and it rained. The whole time. Our tent nearly floated away. Yes, really. The boy cried the entire night so we packed up camp at two am and drove home. It was pretty much the worst camping experience ever.

Needless to say, I was reluctant to try camping again. Really reluctant. But my sister had an ace up her sleeve; flushy toilets. In my opinion, flushy toilets can make or break a camping trip.

Here it is, in pictures. Pictures I took with a REAL camera, no less! Be impressed.

Yeah, nobody said I was GOOD at taking pictures.

Just that I can occasionally use a half way decent actual camera. :P

Red Fish Beach

Paddle Boat Ride

The View. Honestly, I fell in love with Idaho again on this trip.

On the way home we stopped at Smilie Creek Lodge

Someone did NOT want their picture taken.

The Grumps had set in.

And the sleepies.

If that's not the most tired you can be while still eating ice cream, it's close.

Idaho Summers

2011-07-08T13:28:00.000-07:00

Idaho in the summer is AWESOME.

I can get into my car and not die of a heat stroke. Popsicles don't melt on the way home from the store, even in the afternoon. We can go to the park any time we want. And best of all, we can sleep with the windows open.

Now if only we could adjust those gloomy winter days, you'd really have something, Idaho. You'd be California, but without the crime, crappy politics or fairies. Wait...you'd be Washington State.

Independence Day 2011

2011-07-06T07:56:00.001-07:00

We started out the morning with Red White and Blue pancakes. (recipe to follow) It just seemed like the thing to do on the Fourth of July. The Hubs even volunteered to run to the store first thing to grab the fruit we needed.

Then we waited around for my sister and her husband to show up for our planned 8:30am walk around the lake. At 9:30 I called. At 10:30 we gave up and drove to the lake ourselves. At the end of the trail we ran into them coming the other direction. Zsa Zsa walked at least half of it on her own.

She was fascinated by dragon flies, and thought they might eat her.

The Boy is simply not as ambitious as my baby girl, and ended up being carried for quite a bit of the hike. We're working on effort with that kid. He's not internally motivated. Like, at all.

The children both took glorious three hour naps during which the adults played cards. It was AWESOME. I can't remember the last time my oldest took a nap intentionally. We told him he had to rest if he wanted to go see the fireworks that night. I think it helped that we wore them out on our hike. :)

After dinner, I cleaned up the mess and collapsed into bed. Hubs and a couple sisters took the wee ones to the city fireworks display.

Happy Birthday, America. I hope you're still around when my kids are having kids, and that you're worth living in. It's kinda sketchy right now, to be honest.

Blender Pancakes
1 Cup whole grain stuff (I used oat groats and wheat berries)
1 1/2 cup milk
1 egg
1/2 cup oil or some oil/applesauce combo
2 Tbls sugar
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp baking powder
Blend whole grain and one cup milk on high, three minutes. Add remainder of milk and blend two more minutes (you can just blend for 20 seconds if you have a Vitamix) add the rest of the ingredients and blend. Cook per usual.
Topping
1 lb strawberries, sliced
1 clam shell blue berries
2 bananas sliced
toss gently with a tablespoon or two of sugar or agave

Northern Migration

2011-07-06T07:44:00.000-07:00

Well, we made it to Idaho. In a fit of stupidity, Hubs and I decided to try the trek from Arizona to Idaho all in one go. Again. Because it went so well the last time.
This trip the children did beautifully. They played nicely, napped, and only watched one movie for the entire 17-18 hour trip.

Hubs and I both stayed awake the entire journey. I started out this trip in slightly less than stellar condition. I'd tweaked my back (no doubt doing something stupid) and sitting for that long didn't improve things. In fact, I walked like an old woman every time we got out of the car. I'm sure I gained all sorts of sympathy from strangers with my beautiful children and my hunched over, gimpy gait. :/
Luckily, my awesome chiropractor was able to see my Friday, and by the time I left his office I was again walking in the full upright position, albeit still rather sore overall.

Playing In Pioche, NV.

Here are some awesome Boy quotes from the trip.
"Zsa Zsa damaged her toe on the bathroom door".

On Las Vegas: "This is a funny sort of place for a town".

And some Zsa Zsa quotes
"The bugs! They eat me!" followed by a full-on melt down. And the bugs? Gnats. To be fair, she did walk into a swarm and I don't think she's experienced gnats before.

Saturday The Hubs and I got back in the car and drove an additional 4 hours to Driggs, Idaho for the Huntsman Family Celebrate America shindig. We rather enjoyed our free time, ate funnel cakes and square ice cream and generally goofed off. The speeches by Huntsman Sr and Glenn Beck were both fabulous; focusing on the wonder that is America, and our God-given right of freedom. I may have to write up the speech at some point.

My cell phone camera doesn't zoom, but there's snow on those mountains. In July. Just say'n.

We watched the start of the fireworks and then drove to Idaho Falls where we stayed in THE crappiest motel IF has to offer. Seriously. It rivaled the by-the-hour hotel we stayed in during our honeymoon to San Diego, solidifying my theory that poor people shouldn't travel. :)

Both coming and going we got to visit with wonderful friends from our years in Idaho Falls. We wished we'd had time to see more of you. We also wished Bajio Restaurant hadn't closed. Ferills. That place is da bomb.

Ovens and Hammers, and Banana Muffins

2011-06-25T15:37:00.001-07:00

This morning I needed to bake two dozen banana muffins for the blood drive.
So I turned on my oven and started mixing.
Then my oven turned itself off.
And wouldn't turn back on again.
<insert cuss words>
I did what any rational person faced with a time crunch and weeks of sub-optimal oven operations would do: I went to the tool box and got the hammer.

Then I beat the tar out of the oven control panel.

My oven started working again.

I think it's scared of me.
What? You already know The Hubs has said we're getting a new one. As soon as he can show me the money, I'll go get it. Until then we are eating soup, stir fry and anything else I can make on the stove top.
Crisis one, averted.

Banana Muffin Recipe

2 1/2 cups flour

1 cup white sugar

1/3 cup brown sugar

1/2 tsp salt

2 t baking powder

1/4 tsp baking soda

2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 cup sour cream

1 1/2 cups smashed bananas

1/2 cup milk (maybe, I eyeballed it)

1/2 cup oil

2 eggs

THREE.DAYS.

2011-06-23T21:04:00.000-07:00

Swimming lessons are over, thank heaven. During the second week, The Boy would.not.get.in.the.water.

It took him three days and losing the privilege of going to Cars2 on the second day to tell me why. He didn't like it when the teacher let go of him. SERIOUSLY!?!?! THREE.DAYS.

Tonight at dinner was more of the same. He was refusing dinner until I guessed that he wanted me to cut up his burrito. He was going to skip dinner, rather than tell me he'd prefer it if I cut it up for him.

We had a big fat discussion about how you get what you want faster, if you come out and SAY IT.

Shades of his father, coming through. I may try sticking my head in the still-broken oven again. Seriously.
At least The Hubs is learning. The Boy still has a ways to go.

This week he also said stuff like, "When is the world going to be over?" and "I'm ready for the world to be over". Talk about giving a mom a heart attack. He said it so solemnly, I'm considering taking him seriously...and to a child psychologist.

In happier news, Zsa Zsa has turned into quite the little fish. She's so daring and adventurous it's a little nerve-wracking. Every once and a while she scares herself and gets less (much less) adventurous for a while.
The Boy seems to really be enjoying tumbling. I'm not sure what I'm paying for since the first day I asked what he learned, and he said, "jumping over a pillow". Every time we drop him off and drive away, Zsa Zsa says, "I lost my brother!" Once, she was sleeping at home when I dropped him off and when she woke up, she said, "Where my brother go!? Get my The Boy!" She's started to refuse afternoon naps because she's afraid he'll leave without her, which is kind of cute. MUCH cuter than making Mom guess what might possibly be wrong. Equally cute is how fast they both went to sleep tonight. The Boy was snoring before Daddy finished stories. That never happens. Thank you swimming, going to the movies and tumbling all in one da...zzzzzzzzzzz.

Nostalgia in Dinner Planning

2011-06-21T17:29:00.000-07:00

I grew up in a home with no air conditioning. In the summer, sometimes it was just too darn hot to fire up the oven and cook. (We also didn't have a microwave until the 1990's, but that's a different post.) My mother was awesome at finding cool meals for us to eat and a frequent summer staple was Bush's Baked Beans and buttered toast (from homemade bread). Eating cold beans had the added effect of cooling us down, as well.

I adore Bush's Baked Beans to this day. I can't stand any other brand (again, a topic deserving it's own post). When the temperature topped 108 today, I slipped a can of Bush's into the fridge for dinner tonight. This being Arizona, the cans don't stay as cool as they did in Idaho (especially after we added on to the house and got a basement storage room for canned goods).

Come dinner time, I heated up Husband's plate of beans (because he didn't grow up eating them the right way-cold), toasted some bread and sliced the tomatoes. Then I called the family for dinner.

When Husband saw what was for dinner, he looked as though I'd kicked his puppy. Beans for dinner? And that's it?

Normally, Husband raves over my cooking. Not so much tonight. It turns out he thinks beans and toast are a snack, not a meal. My response? "Well, I can open another can."

It's seriously too hot to cook. And I even own a microwave.

What Kind of Day?

2011-06-20T12:55:00.000-07:00

Do you ever judge how good a day you had based on the number of times you had to use your kids' middle names?

How about by how much of you screaming, "GET OUT OF MY ROOM RIGHT THIS INSTANT!" got caught on the phone message you were leaving for a new sister on your visiting teaching route?

Do you ever judge your day based on the amount of chocolate/apple pie/sugar you ate to keep you from killing your offspring?

Yeah, me either. Just wondering.

Reading the Constructions, and Other Fun Stuff My Kids Say

2011-06-19T12:33:00.000-07:00

The Boy is obsessed with pictographs. He's just certain he knows what everything says if there's a picture with the instructions. "Mom! I'm reading the constructions!" "OK, babe.

This past week was our first week of swimming lessons. One morning while putting on his suit, The Boy examined the clothing label, which had a pineapple on it. "Mom! This swimsuit makes it so you can EAT under water!"

He thinks he knows what all the traffic signs mean. He's nearly never right. Also, he's obsessed with no smoking signs and people who light up. He likes to tell me about the people smoking and how bad cigarettes are and how funny they smell WHILE we are walking right past the people smoking. Ferills. It's SUPER embarrassing.
The Hubs thinks it's great. Kind of like a public service, but I see this behavior spilling over into other areas of life. He talks about blind people and people who look different than us right in front of those people ALL THE TIME! Regardless of how often I tell him it's not nice. I can't tell you how I live in dread of the first time he realizes people come in different colors. There's nothing like a four-year-old to promote humility in a parent.

Zsa Zsa has spent the ~~week~~ month, potty training. Yesterday she left the house for the first time without a diaper or pull up. Not only did she stay dry, she went potty at Great Grandma's house! I can't tell you how happy we were. I'm still bringing pull ups on our Great Northern Migration, next month. I may be brave, but I'm not stupid.

Zsa Zsa's also full of creative sayings. The other day she and I were running errands alone. I kept telling her how wonderful and sweet and clever she was, and she kept saying, "I not sweet. I ZSA ZSA!" "I not smart! I Zsa Zsa. Daddy smart, Sammy smart, I Zsa Zsa." That last one kinda broke my heart.
Then the next day, she hit someone else in the car, and I used her real name to let her know that wasn't nice. She said, I not ________, I a GIRL!" Then I think maybe she's figuring out adjectives are not nouns and more than one word can describe a person.

This morning she was galloping around the house saying, "Hi Daddy Forsey*, Hi Momma Forsey!" We would say, "Hi Zsa Zsa Forsey!" Her reply? "I not a forsey, I a Zsa Zsa!" So maybe not.

Two-year-olds are highly entertaining, and I wish my little girl would stop growing up so fast. I feel like I'm missing it.
*Forsey is Zsa Zsa for horsey, in case you don't speak Zsa Zsa.

Fresh Apricot Coffee Cake (Quick)

2011-06-12T20:33:00.001-07:00

I bought a case of apricots from Bountiful Baskets a week ago. 24 pounds. I had every intention of preserving these apricots, but I didn't like the results of my dried fruit attempt, and I'm too lazy/busy/tired to try fruit leather, which had been my original intent. So I've been eating mounds of apricots. My family refuses to join me. In an effort to force the issue, today I made cake for breakfast. Apricot Cake.

Everyone ate apricots today. :) <Dance of happiness>

So here's what I did.

Basic Quick Coffee Cake Recipe for 9x13 pan.
(Feel free to halve the recipe and put it in a 9x9)
3 cups whole wheat flour
1 cup sugar (it IS a cake, after all)
1 tsp salt
4 tsp baking powder

2 eggs
1 1/3 cup milk
3 Tbls melted shortening or oil (the flavor is different, texture is similar)

Mix dry ingredients. Add wet ingredients and mix just until dry ingredients are fully incorporated.
Dump out into a greased (Pam-ed) 9x13.
Wash fresh apricots. Cut in half and pit. Layer top of cake with apricots. I did four halves to a row width-wise and probably 6 or 7 rows.

Make a crumb topping of melted butter, cinnamon and brown sugar. I also added sliced almonds. Sprinkle over the top. Bake at 425 for roughly 25 minutes. I make no guarantees as to the amount of time this will take to bake. Currently my oven is having trouble maintaining a temp over 340 so I baked it at temps vacillating between to 310-340 for at least 40 or 50 minutes. It was extremely frustrating.

It's super crumbly because it's 100% whole wheat.

Also, I dished it super hot because we were starving.

A new oven is coming to the IdahoBecky Kitchen in the very near future. Heaven knows we need to make bread. It's been WEEKS since I've made bread. Seriously. I had to actually go to the store and buy it Saturday. My kids were begging for PBJ's, if you can believe. About broke my heart because I know that cellophane wrapped stuff tastes like cardboard. I don't know how people can stand it on a regular basis. Blech. Plus, my loaves cost about 75 cents to make and a decent loaf of bread costs over two bucks to buy!

PS I'm posting this instead of the open letter I wrote to my neighbors. The letter is MUCH more entertaining and informative. If you'd like to read it, let me know. The Hubs was worried they might somehow find out I blog, read the letter and be offended. Whatever.

Alexander Kind of Day

2011-06-10T20:20:00.000-07:00

You know the book, Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day?

That, but for moms.

I was going to give you a blow by blow, and then I was going to do bullets, but both were too depressing so instead I'll just tell you how my day ended.

I dropped off (underdone but dried out) dinner to a friend who'd JUST had a baby. I dropped it off in my frumpy clothes and ball cap.
My friend had her hair and makeup done, her kids were neat (all of them) AND her house was clean. Not just the front room, THE WHOLE THING.

I had just come from my kitchen counter covered in dinner making muck, kitchen table and chairs covered in Zsa Zsa muck, and newly steamed kitchen floor covered in apricot muck tracked about by kids who don't even belong to me. My whole house looks like goblins live here, because if we're being totally honest, two of them do. It stinks like pee regardless of the fact I just steamed all the floors in an attempt to erase the smell. It's a good thing we don't have a dog, or I'd have kicked it. I think there are laws about kicking you children, though, and they are the only other possible source. I can pretty much guarantee neither The Hubs nor I would choose squatting in a corner over the porcelain throne.

Clearly, I'm failing at life. I'd go stick my head in the oven, but it's not currently working. I'd probably just end up giving myself a tan. (See above statement about dinner)

Cars 2 Event

2011-06-07T15:35:00.001-07:00

We heard Tempe Marketplace was hosting an event, for Cars 2: Agents On A Mission.
Since one of The Boy's fondest wishes in life is to drive Lightening McQueen, we piled our family plus a little girl I was watching into our teeny car and drove across town to "see" Lightening and Mater.

When we got there, we saw a line. While The Hubs stood in the line, the kids and I checked out what it was about. We didn't want to stand in line if it was just for bathrooms. :D
We found out you had to make your way through this line just to get inside. Nobody knew for sure what was in there, once you got inside, but they were all willing to stand in the line for it. Idiot Morons. (I can say that, because we did it, too.)
The other bit of info I gleaned was that the wait was about 2 hours. Yes. 2 hours. I did mention I forgot to put my brain in that morning, right? Luckily, I did not forget to bring sun screen and water.
We stood in this line, taking turns chasing kids and making potty stops. At one point, I even left the line to get some dinner for the starving babies. We are SUCH suckers. Really. I can not, in any way, express with the written word the inaneness of this event.
FINALLY we made it to the front of the line, right before the kid with the bloody nose. Oh, it was a special, special time.
Then my kids collected a poster, a key chain, a coloring page, and had their pictures "professionally" taken in front of each of the three cars.

Yep. That's going to make a great Christmas card.

Am I ever, as in ever EVER going to put myself through this again?

NO.

I may send The Hubs, though.

PS I had better win that d@m car.

Beefy Broccoli Squares

2011-06-04T06:09:00.001-07:00

This is a recipe I believe my mom invented, and if she didn't that's how I remember it, so that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

RECIPE:
One recipe 12 stroke biscuits (recipe to follow)
one pound ground beef, browned and drained
1/3 cup sautéed onions ( I use a whole onion)
2 cups lightly steamed broccoli (because who likes overdone trees?)
2 cups shredded cheese (I used motz)
4 eggs
1/2 cup milk
1 tsp. salt
pepper

Make biscuit recipe and flatten in bottom of greased 9x13 dish. Build up the sides about 1/2 inch.
Brown ground beef and drain. Sauté onions. Steam broccoli. Layer these ingredients over the raw biscuit dough. Sprinkle cheese on top.
Mix eggs, milk, salt and pepper until well combined. Poor over the other ingredients. Bake at 400 degrees for 30-40 minutes, or until set. If it's runny, it ain't done yet.

12 STROKE BISCUIT RECIPE
2 cups flour
4 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 cup milk powder (not instant) (if you don't have milk powder, sub 3/4 cup milk for the powder and water
3/4 cup water (only if using milk powder, otherwise, see note above)
1/4 cup oil
Whisk dry ingredients together. Add liquid all at once, using big motions (strokes) mix dough 12 times, until just combined. Over mixing makes for a tough dough, but it takes practice to get all the ingredients combined in 12 strokes. :)
You can also add two tsp of sugar to the above recipe for "Rich Biscuits" which can be used for cobblers, poor man's short cake, etc.
I made this dinner last night, and accidentally added a whole teaspoon of salt instead of a half, so I just doubled the recipe and used half for dinner. I added a little powdered sugar to the remaining dough and then made peach cobbler for dessert. :)

Groundhog Day

2011-06-03T08:05:00.003-07:00

Lest you think this is another poorly timed movie review, let me assure you the title of this post has nothing to do with the actual movie, and more to do with my life at present.

My life is SO boring, so the same these days, I start thinking things like this: Exactly how much Vicodin would one have to take before "falling" onto a branding iron and cauterizing their own hemorrhoids?

I write witty/acerbic/snarky responses to other people's Facebook Posts and the delete them (usually) before I hit publish, because I don't actually want people to unfriend me, even if my witty/acerbic/snarky reply is spot-on. (Which it usually is)

I write witty/acerbic/snarky FB posts 15 million times a day I never post, see reason above.

I've started trolling the medical blogs so that I can write my witty/acerbic/snarky comments on the blogs of people who will appreciate them. We have a different sense of humor, those of us who've worked in medicine and particularly paramedicine (for the 3.4 seconds I did that job). Because really, you have to be able to find the humor in the guy so mashed up from the MVA that he fits in less than half the body bag. Otherwise, it would be impossible to go to work every day.

Along those lines, I've been looking for a job. I found the perfect one. Pretty much I'd fly all over the country harvesting non-transplantable organs from nearly dead people to use in demonstrations at medical conferences wherein we show the latest surgical techniques. Doesn't that sound like its EXACTLY up my alley? Let's count the pros:
1. The patients are already dead (mostly), but not yet smelly
2. I get to pretend I'm a doctor whilst carving up said dead people
3. I get paid for it.
4. Mostly on the weekends, so I don't have to get a sitter

Cons:
1. None
It's brilliant. Also, it has the added advantage of not being what I do every day currently. As I said, it's brilliant.

Movie Reviews: Gnomeo and Juliet

2011-06-01T15:08:00.001-07:00

Because this movie is already out on video, I'm just going to give you the lowdown: Red Box it if you must.

The story has been done to death. Putting it in the context of Garden Gnomes did not, in any way, take away the stench of overdone-ness. It also wasn't worth the extra money for 3D.
The only positive thing I have to say about this movie is, at least the 3D didn't make me sick.

The war between the owners of the two gardens was by far the most entertaining part of the entire thing. Catching the Shakespeare references also helped pass the time.

My friend and I took two ten-year-olds, two four-year-olds, a two year-old and a one-year-old to this movie.

The older kids sat through it, but didn't have much to say on the way home. My four-year-old liked it, because the pictures moved and talked! (He's easily entertained. Also, he likes Dora and Diego so maybe his tastes aren't the most discerning.) The other four-year-old was all over the place, but that's just kinda her general reaction to the world at large.
The two-year-old sat through it fine, and the baby had the most honest opinion: she kept trying to get up and leave.

Lane Bryant

2011-05-28T21:36:00.000-07:00

I don't need to shop at Lane Bryant any more, but sometimes I go in there just to look around and remember how fat I used to be.
So while I was in there tonight, the lady behind the counter asked if she could help me. We started talking about if Lane Bryant still carries maternity in the store, because I got the CUTEST maternity wear there back when I still needed to shop in fat people stores.
At the end of the convo the lady called me fat. Ferills.

As we left the store, The Hubs turned to me and said, "Wow. I'm so glad you didn't beat that lady up, because it's time to go get the kids." See, even Mr Socially Oblivious knew this lady was outta line.

Now, I don't like to be mean or anything, but Lane Bryant has a minimum size requirement for their employees. It may be a size 18. This girl fully filled that requirement and then some. Her badonkadonk was so big it ended in the next county. I can't be sure, but it may have needed it's own zip code.

I was JUST in that store, so I KNOW it has mirrors. Maybe the mouthy employee needs to glance at one occasionally. Otherwise she may find herself in need of a new jaw and the teeth to go in it.
Not that I'm sensitive or anything. (W@#*#&$(@#*$@#($*#(@#*$(#*$&@(##*$&

Movie Reviews: Thor

2011-05-22T07:30:00.000-07:00

In case you looked at Thor and thought, "eh" can I just say, you should reconsider? We went in to this movie not expecting much. After all, it's a superhero movie following arguably the worst Marvel Comic Hero of all time. By worst, I mean most boring AND stupidest costume.

Luckily, Kenneth Branagh decided to direct it, so of COURSE it was fabulous.

In case you don't know, Kenneth is a classically trained at the Royal Academy for Dramatic Art. That's movie speak for: a good actor who may or may not be nice to look at. In his case, he falls into the former category. Personally, I think he looks a little like The Hubs. I digress. He's also directed a decent number of quality films.

Back to the movie.

Thor is visually stunning. The CG is incredibly well done and relevant to the plot.
The story arc is reasonably decent. Better than a Thor comic, not as visceral as say, an X-Men movie.
The acting is also well done. Anthony Hopkins plays Odin All-Father. He was a little hard to recognize under all that hair and bulky armor, but WOW is he a good actor. I believe he's another RADA graduate.

The title lead, Chris Hemsworth, wasn't someone I've run across before, but I can assure you the scene wherein he goes shirtless is totally worth the cost of admission.
Also, his portrayal of Thor was decent.

Natalie Portman was Natalie Portman. In her defense, she didn't have much to work with. Her character didn't have any development.

All in all, I say it's worth seeing in Theater to support a well done movie that doesn't depend on sex or poor language to sell it.
No cussing, no nudity (other than our shirtless hero) and the costumes covered the females. I thought the addition of classy costumes that weren't slutty was really a breath of needed fresh air in mainstream Hollywood. Thanks, Kenneth, for making a quality movie worth seeing and not selling out for T&A, which you totally could have done, considering the target audience.
Seriously, go see this movie. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised.

Hello.

2011-05-21T14:45:00.000-07:00

1. Throughout the years I've gone to the occasional yoga class. I enjoy yoga, especially when I'm stressed. Just so we're clear, this would not be the same as saying I look good while doing yoga. Yesterday I went to a yoga class at the gym. Admittedly, I was a little concerned when I walked in to class and almost every woman was a size zero and warming up with their lower limbs wrapped around their necks while standing on their heads. Reassurance was given when the instructor asked if anyone was new to yoga and a few hands went up.
That reassurance was gone about twenty minutes into class when I found myself in a position that resembled a human pretzel and was not in the least restful or invigorating. I was also dripping sweat. This morning I woke up, stood to walk to the next room, and found myself unable to sit without extreme discomfort. I think I have to go back next Friday. How out of shape do I have to be to have my trash kicked by YOGA?

2. My sister called earlier in the week and said she missed my babies, so I let her come over and babysit while The Hubs and I went to a late-ish movie. It was awesome, because she also gave us the movie tickets. What a sister! I'll review the movie next post.

3. After shelling out major bucks to get both my children re-shod, we were climbing into the car when my son said, "Mom, I'm turning my nice off." Um, say what? "Nobody helps ME be nice, so I'm turning it off!" Hmmm. Luckily a raspberry kiss behind the ear turned his nice back on, but what a kid!

4. And speaking of shoes, every year when the weather gets warm, my kids' feet sprout. You'd think at some point I would remember and budget for that. Sheez! Both kids were in shoes a size and a half too small.

Bodybuilding

2011-05-18T15:30:00.001-07:00

My Bean

2011-05-17T12:37:00.000-07:00

...is growing up. For my own records, I'm going to take a moment and record some of her cute, two-year-old-self.

Leaving the house last night to run errands, Zsa Zsa was talking to me. "I love daddy. I love brother. I love beans....I Love Leesa, I love Ab-ee, I love DOODLES."
She has a knit blanket my mom made her when she was born. This blanket goes everywhere with her. Since she's getting bigger, this has been something of a challenge, since she has other things she'd like her hands to be doing. Luckily, my inventive daughter has come up with a solution. She now stuffs the blanket under her shirt, thus allowing for blanket closeness AND hand freedom.
I held my sleeping girl in my arms at church today, and noticed she got her first freckle. It's right between her eyes on the bridge of her nose. The Boy's first freckle was on his leg.
She's a pack rat. How many toys can she take with us in the car? As many as will fit in her arms, plus one. That's how many.

Fighting Over Prayer

2011-05-15T09:22:00.000-07:00

I love my children. I love their little hearts and their enthusiasm for prayer. I do not love that every family or meal prayer contains a fight over who gets to voice the prayer.
There are typically three prayers in the day we say as a whole family. There are four of us. Daddy is pretty good at putting people in rotation, but of necessity, SOMEONE is bound to get left out on a certain day. Usually it's a parent. Yesterday it was The Boy, and he was heartbroken. I tried to explain, but he felt so left out of our family that it made me so sad.

How do I help these little people understand that prayer is special? That it's a chance for us to visit with our Father in Heaven and be thankful for our many blessings? It's not a popularity contest, it's not something to be fought over?

Needless to say, the Spirit has be lacking in our home at prayer time for a while now. This is not helped by a two year old who doesn't see the need to maintain prayer manners if she's not the one saying the prayer.

I'm at my wit's end. Advice? PLEASE?

A Conversation with A Two Year Old

2011-05-09T20:12:00.000-07:00

Daddy: Zsa Zsa! What's the matter?

Zsa Zsa: I not MADDER!

Daddy: Zsa Zsa? What's the matter?

Zsa Zsa: I NOT madder! I ZSA ZSA! I upset!

Probably the highlight of my day, right there folks. It's been a doozy!

Luckily, I'm not the only one. Earlier this evening I read this by Mommamita, and it made me feel better about the whole weekend and motherhood in general, which I have not been holding in very high esteem of late.

Thanks, Alison. :)

Father and Sons: The Update

2011-05-07T09:40:00.000-07:00

I woke up early to get ready for a training meeting this morning so I was in the shower at 5:45am when I heard, "Hello? Is anyone home?" It's a good thing I was in the shower, because otherwise I'd have peed my pants.

It turned out the guys came back early. Really early. The Boy started to vomit about 3am and didn't want to snuggle in Daddy's vomit-free sleeping bag, so they got in the car, but then he didn't want to sleep, so they broke camp and came home early.

At first I thought The Boy had just eaten too many marshmallows, but now, I'm not so sure. He ate a few bites of banana this morning, but that's all so maybe he does have a touch of the gastro.

Poor, poor Hubs! I'm going to do my level best to make sure he gets a nap today. Also, poor Mom. What a reward! I get to clean vomit from camping gear today. That's just super.

Movie Reviews: I Am Number Four

2011-05-06T18:10:00.002-07:00

I Am Number Four:

Terrible plot, worse acting. I actually had to get up in the middle and leave for a few moments because it was SO bad. I went to the bathroom and texted everyone I knew to warn them away from this motion picture horror.

Bottom line: if you're drunk, and someone else is paying, you can Redbox it. Just be drunk enough not to remember it the next day or you may want to poke your eyes out with a sharp stick. I get the feeling the book is better. It can't be worse.

Movie Reviews: The King's Speech

2011-05-06T18:09:00.000-07:00

The King's Speech

I saw the PG-13 version in which some F bombs were omitted.

I saw this movie without The Hubs, because he categorically refused to see it with me. His loss, because this movie was AWESOME.

I love Colin Firth. Not only is he an excellent actor, but because hello, I have two X chromosomes and he's a fine representation of the male specimen. <fans self> This movie ALSO had Jennifer Ehle, and if I could have changed one thing in the movie, it would be to have Jennifer play the Queen opposite Collin, instead of the wife of the speech therapist. There's no such thing as too much Jennifer Ehle in any movie. (WHY she hasn't been in much I can stand to watch since Pride and Prejudice I'll never know, but for your own Sanity, never rent Chamomile Lawn. I turned it off 10 minutes in.)

(see? even the stars use Glamor Shots)

This movie instantly connected you to it's characters, was solid in all it's acting and dialog, had plenty of moments in which to laugh if you're paying attention, and gave a supremely uplifting message: if you try hard enough, you can overcome most anything.

Bottom Line: If you don't care about ratings or can find it in PG-13, it's worth owning, and not just because Collin's in it. I would put it in my collection next to Sea Biscuit.

Movie Reviews: HANNA

2011-05-06T18:07:00.000-07:00

HANNA
Hanna is movie about a girl who is trained from birth to be a killer. There is quite a lot of imagery and generalized angst and suspense. It would have been a great show...if they'd done the ending a tad differently. And maybe skipped the part with the nice guy hanging upside down, shot through with several arrows. I can't say more without giving away the entire plot.

The new girl, Saoirse Ronan does a great job, as does Kate Blanchett. The acting is not the weak part of this film, it's all plot. It tries to be Borne Identity but it doesn't have Robert Ludlum to develop the story line. They did do a really nice job with over-the-top and in-your-face imagery, though. The circular ice flow at the beginning kinda gives away the ending. Just say'n. Obvious from the start, even though you spend the entire movie hoping for a different outcome.
Bottom Line:2 1/2 stars. Wait for it to show up in NetFlix Instant Play.

Father and Sons, a Mom's Perspective

2011-05-06T17:37:00.001-07:00

This weekend is our church Father and Sons camp out. The Boy has been practically apoplectic with excitement for a good week now. This morning I did some last minute shopping for things like buns and s'more fixn'ns. The Boy REALLY wanted to come shopping with me, but not enough to stop watching a movie and get dressed in the 90 minute window I gave him. He was kinda pathetic running down the drive in his super hero undies and pj top with tears and snot dripping down his otherwise handsome face.
So sad that he has to suffer the consequences of his actions, isn't it? I know. I win the Best Mother Award.
(Just so no one calls CPS, The Hubs works from home and was on board to take over if he didn't get dressed in time.)
When it came time for the guys to leave on their trip, Zsa Zsa was just so sure she'd be going, too. And why not? She always gets to go when Daddy leaves!
As she snuggled me on the couch in tears I asked her if she thought she was a girl or a boy, and with out missing a beat, she said, "I a BOY!" This statement was made just that much more hilarious by the pink and frilly tutu around her waist.
So I've done my best to make our girl time special. We watched Gone With The Wind and Caillou and I made exactly what she requested for dinner, "eggies and straw-babies". Later, she gets to take a spa bath and have her nails painted. And maybe, if she's a very good kid, I'll play trucks with her before bed. But only if we get to wear our pink tutus.

PS: I have to say, if I had all boys I'd really look forward to Father and Sons all year long; but if I had all girls, like my mother, I'd dread it. How awful to have to stay home with FIVE girls and no help! Sorry, Mom.

Idaho

2011-05-03T17:46:00.000-07:00

Monday was wash day (and bread day and watch the kids day and make rocket ships out of cardboard boxes day, but those aren't relevant).
Every once in a while, I think I'm starting to get used to Arizona and it's brownness. I even got excited to see the pale green of my Palo Verde tree this week. But since Monday was laundry day and I had all my shirts hanging in the laundry at the same time, I realized something;

I wore green EVERY DAY last week, which obviously means I'm missing green. Or that I'm stuck in the movie Ground Hog Day and the holiday that was repeating happened to be St. Patrick's.
Either Way...
People who live in "my" part of Idaho will laugh that I'm calling it green, but trust me peeps, it's more green than here. MUCH more. Especially the South Hills. And The Sawtooth Range. And a little bit the Rockies. I miss Alturas Lake and Red Fish Lake and pretty much the entire state of Idaho.
Luckily, we're coming to visit! Soon! When we can't afford the air conditioning here any more.

Photo by Art Hale. I took it from the internet. I hope Art, whoever he is, doesn't mind. Thanks, Art. The people of Arizona thank your for your ability to capture the color green. And lakes.

Santa VS Jesus

2011-05-02T13:54:00.000-07:00

Had an interesting conversation with The Boy today. It made me question the efficacy of all the religious indoctrination we've been practicing around here of late. It went something like this:

"Mom, why does Jesus have a white beard?"
"Well, I suppose that's the color he likes it."
"No, Mom! It's because the snow at the North Pole is white!"
"Son, Santa and Jesus are not the same person."
"They AREN'T?!? How COME, Mom!"
< silence >
<more silence>
"er."
<yet more silence>
"Because they aren't. Jesus loves us all the time. Santa only loves us once a year. Or something."
Seriously, people. I had nothing.
It's possible I'm not cut out for this parenting thing.

Granola Bars

2011-04-29T14:44:00.000-07:00

Carolina, this post is for you. :D
I made some granola bars. Not super impressed with them, but that didn't stop me from eating four so far today.

Here's the basic recipe:
1/2 cup peanut butter
1/2 cup honey
melt in microwave until runny. Add:
1 cup rolled oats
1 cup puffed cereal (I used Kamut®, feel free to use puffed wheat or rice)
1/2 cup chopped nuts
1/2 cup dried fruit
Mix together and put in a 8x8 plastic-lined pan and tamp down. Cut into 16 parts.
I felt these were too sweet. In fact, they made me a tad ill.

Here's my first modification:
1/2 cup peanut butter
1/2 cup honey
1 1/2 cups oats
1 1/2 cups puffed cereal
1/2 cup chopped nuts
I did this in an 8x10 because of the added volume.

These didn't stick together as well, and were still too sweet. I think maybe just a cup of the rolled oats? How do I get it less sweet and still have it stick together? Butter? Coconut oil? This could get dangerous...

Easter Hats and Other Randomness

2011-04-26T14:45:00.000-07:00

You know how this last Sunday was Easter? And how the most important part of the entire Easter worship service is the hats ladies wear?
I totally tricked out my head in a fancy topper and sashayed my sassy self into church on Sunday and do you know what I found?
Not ONE other lady in a hat of any type.

Clearly, I live among heathens.

Not only was I the ONLY person of any generation in an Easter Hat, other people had the nerve to sneer at my incredibly gorgeous millinery confection. No lie. Ladies actually elbowed their husbands and pointed with their snooty noses in my general direction. Smirking ensued. And THIS after I studiously studied Emily Post and her copious rules for headgear ~~all those years~~ a few short years ago in finishing school. Lady Emily said NOTHING about it being appropriate for lookers on to smirk.

Just kidding, by the way. I didn't go to a real finishing school. I grew up in Idaho, remember? Our finishing schools consisted of potato carving class and very lady-like competitions wherein we raced to see who could render down a vat of sugar beets the fastest. No. Really.

But you know what? I didn't even care about those snooty people, because d@m, I look good in a hat.

(PS That's not me under the hat. It's my wood floor...)

HypnoBirthing, Part Two

2011-04-24T16:42:00.000-07:00

This is part two of a series. To see part one, click here.

About the time The Hubs and I hung up, Mom was moseying toward her room, glass of ice in hand and dressed in nothing but a green negligee and a knowing smile. I hit the button requesting access to the ward and zipped down the hall after her.

When I arrived in the room, Mom was on the floor next to the bed on all fours. Midwife and nurse were next to her, asking her kindly to get on the bed so they could hook up the machine-that-goes-ping also known as a fetal heart monitor.

Mom's response? "You want me to MOVE!?! I have to push."

It would be helpful for you to know that in triage, she was 8cm open and 100% thin (or effaced). The fact that the baby stayed in on her stroll down the hall to the room is really a miracle. Seriously.

The midwife replied that no she didn't, being only 8 centimeters.

This is the point I started to PANIC because the video camera said "read error" WHAT THE CRAP!!! All that and I'm still going to miss taping this birth?!?!? Holy pete. Dad and I had a conversation in terse tones wherein we both cursed technology. Dad got the camera working JUST in time for me to catch the next bit on film (or digital media, whatever).

Mom did manage to move to the bed in the same position she'd been in on the floor.

The midwife was thinking about gloving up (I saw her unwrap the gloves, look at them, look at mom, look at the gloves and then decide to wait) when Mom said, "I have to pee". Dad immediately moved to the foot of the bed, took a quick peak and said, "we have a crown. That's the head" and before you even knew what was going on, the baby landed in dad's hands, slick as anything. The midwife took baby and passed baby to mom.

The nurse never did get the fetal heart monitor going, which proves that yes, you can have a healthy baby with out any of the following:

nurses
doctors
hospitals
machines that go ping
screaming
drugs
birthing pools (Since we never even got a chance to set up Mom's)

The rest of the evening was totally awesome. Mom and Dad snuggled with baby. Everyone waited for the placenta to be delivered (scroll down to "The Baby, The Cord, and Active Management) before the cord was clamped and cut. Mom nursed. The midwife finally gloved up and then checked out mom for tears (one tiny skid mark) and we all stood in awe of the power of HypnoBirthing and drug-free birthing. Baby was alert, happy, didn't cry and nursed like a champ from the word go.

This experience has changed my views of birth. I knew it could be powerful, wonderful, amazing. I did not know it could be awe inspiring. I did not know birth could leave me speechless. That it could be done without pain.

I have another post to go along with this series where we can talk about it more.

Story posted with permission. All contents copywrited.

Hypnobirthing, Part One

2011-04-23T13:38:00.000-07:00

cdr4A good friend asked me to videotape her most recent birth. This is probably because I don't have a problem looking at other people's naked selves, and because pretty much the only thing I talk about are my kids and birthing. There are not a lot of people I know who are totally comfortable hanging out with naked people for hours on end. Lets not talk about what that says about me. Let's talk about the birth!

About 8pm the day of the birth I got a call from my friend, asking me to come over. Her husband was gone and she felt like she might be in labor. I'd been expecting this call since about 4pm when she called and said the world was fuzzy during her contractions, but she didn't know if it was "real" labor.
Between the 8pm phone call and my getting there, her water broke.

At this point you need to know a few things. First, HypnoBirthing mommas birth FAST because they aren't scared. Second, this was not this particular momma's first time at the racetrack. Third, I live maybe 5 minutes away.

When I got there, she was talking normally to me, but about every 5-7 minutes, she'd stop, put her hand up, bow her head and close her eyes, shimmy her hips for 40 seconds or so, and then resume our conversation. She had me pack speakers, the birthing tub, and a few other odds and ends. We called the babysitter for the other children (a hunky 21 yo blond German who totally deserves his own post at some point) and the midwife's on call service to let them know she was coming to the hospital.

When her husband arrived, he asked if I'd been timing the contractions. Um, no. I was busy packing. But they were at that point 5-6 minutes apart. I'm guessing that was around 9pm. I had my car packed and was about to drive off to the hospital ahead of mom and dad when I decided to go back in the house for one last interaction. I said a quick little prayer to calm down because I was getting antsy. Not being sure we'd make it in time, and all. Last I'd checked, mom was still in the bathroom. Upon entering the house, I find out she hasn't left the bathroom.

Uh oh. Admittedly, I started to get worried at this point and decided to stick close in case we didn't make it clear to the hospital. She did come out and get into her car and I followed them to the hospital. I could tell when she was having contractions because the car would speed up. This happened four or five times.
In the parking lot of the ER (this hospital makes you check into the ER, which is totally stupid) we all pile out and she says, "I just finished a contraction." "Great, lets get inside before you have another one." Um, no again.
Mom has TWO more contractions before we make it to the entrance of the ER. During the second one, I headed inside to try to check her in while Dad (who was acting as doula, which is SO cool) stayed with Mom.
I told the ER nurse, "There's a multiparous mother with ruptured membranes just outside. Her contractions are two minutes apart. Can we get her upstairs?"
"No. We have to check her in."
"She's pre-registered. Her name is ___________"
"When is she due?"
"In a week, roughly. Although I'd say she's due in about 40 minutes."
"When is her birthday?"
"Tomorrow."
"What year?"
"I have no idea."
"Who are you, exactly? We can't check her in without this information."
I left. Went back outside and dad and I switched places. This didn't seem to help. The ER nurses wanted her to SIT DOWN inside and talk to them.
Um, no yet again. Hypno-mommas in transition don't SIT and they sure as heck aren't very willing to talk. Mom tried to come inside, but the thought of 50 people (the ER was PACKED) watching her contract on hands and knees did not appeal. Strange, I know. She walked back outside and I walked with. This is when I videoed the only tape we have of her fully clothed and having contractions.
Then the transport guy came out with a wheelchair.
"Let's get you upstairs" he says.
"In that!?! I'm NOT sitting in a wheel chair" mom replies.
I chime in with, "This would go faster if you let her walk upstairs. She really does not want to sit."
The crabby ER nurse says "It's hospital policy. We can't have you deliver standing up in the hall."
Mom turns to me and says, "If they talk to me like that upstairs, we are LEAVING!"
I'm thinking, Yeah. Right. Like we have time to get back home! I guess we could deliver in the car, if you're serious, though.
I asked if we could use the stretcher that was sitting right there and wheel her up kneeling on the stretcher. That idea was also shot down as "Unsafe". More unsafe than delivering a baby outside the front doors of an ER? OK. Whatever.
Through this entire encounter, Mom is cool as cucumber through the contractions and only gets testy when the hospital staff say unreasonable things, like "sit" or "wait".
Finally mom agrees to sit if they promise to take her directly to the OB floor.
Dad is still checking Mom in, so I go with her. At the elevator, Dad missed making it onto the car by a nanosecond. I just was not fast enough pressing the Open Door button, which I still feel bad about. Instead of taking Mom to a room, they dump her in triage at 10pm. I tried again to let them know exactly how close she is to having a baby.
"Mom is mulitparous, membranes have been ruptured for two hours, and she's a fast birther. Her contractions are stacking. Are you sure we can't go to a room?"
"Who are you?"
"The videographer."
"Let me show you to the waiting room."
I've since learned it's best just to say I'm the sister. Sisters don't get kicked out near so often.
Pacing outside the (locked) entrance to labor and delivery, I call The Hubs and have a very testy conversation wherein I lament the fact that I'm going to miss the birth and this will be the only birth Mom doesn't have on tape because of stupid nurses and even more stupid hospital rules.
To Be Continued

The Saga of the Binky Continues

2011-04-17T21:36:00.000-07:00

To preface: I hate pacifiers. Hate them. We weren't going to use any with Zsa Zsa, but then one night a few weeks after we got home from the hospital, she was just so fussy and didn't want boob so I caved and gave her a binky. It totally worked and I got hours of blessed sleep.
At 18 months, she seemed ready to give it up, but then I was in school and she started needing the binky more and more.
When Zsa Zsa turned two, I REALLY wanted to take it away and just be done with the stupid thing. But we were getting ready to move. Again. So I didn't.
Now she's 29 months and A.D.D.I.C.T.E.D.
So today, we told her she's a big girl now, and we're happy to let her have the binky in bed or in the car. She's not the kind of kid who will just leave her binky in the crib, so The Hubs tied it to her bed. (We also tied one to the car seat.)
Is so doing, we've inadvertently solved another of our Zsa Zsa parenting woes, the fighting of the nap.

Zsa Zsa spent the morning going from the bed to the great room. Finally when we called her for morning devotional, she wouldn't come. I checked on her a few minutes later and found this.

At 11am. It made going to make 1pm church SO much more tolerable. :D

Pudding Pops

2011-04-17T11:47:00.001-07:00

We are doing a Two Week Easter Countdown with the children. Each day there is a planned devotional and an activity that teaches the lesson. Easter is my favorite holiday, and now I can share the deeper meanings with my little lovelies. :D Today The Boy asked me what the Easter Bunny was, so maybe I'm not doing too bad a job at teaching Easter on my own, huh?

One of the activities focused on miracles. The theme for the day was rainbows, so of COURSE we had to make rainbow pudding pops. Also of course, I had no pre-packaged pudding in the house. I also didn't have corn starch. Who doesn't keep corn starch on hand? Ferills.

Luckily, I wasn't out of money for the month, so we were able to get our supples and the next day we made pudding and then these super cute rainbow pudding pops.

Step One: Make pudding
Step Two: Divide pudding

Step Three: Dye pudding
Step Four: carefully spoon into paper or plastic cups
Step Five: Stick a fork in it (that's what I had, feel free to get sticks)
Step Six: Freeze
Step Seven: Set the cup in some warm water to loosen the pop
Step Eight: Eat your protein on a stick (because momma's on a low carb diet, we made sugar free pudding)

I do have one little tip for this activity: If you don't want lumpy pudding, it's best not to turn over the whisking to your four-year-old. In this case, I felt the lumpy pudding was a reasonable cost for quality Boy time. :D

The Insanity Continues

2011-04-15T13:57:00.000-07:00

Holy potatoes, Farm People. I'm insane. You'd think after yesterday, I'd have learned my lesson, but no.

Today I inflicted the same torture on myself, except this time I decided to skip the stroller. Because obviously, that's easier, right? I figured the kids would enjoy the chance to ride the mall "alligator" up to the second floor. I was right, they did enjoy it. I did not enjoy chasing down my two-year-old as she barreled headlong toward the down-escalator. (Shouldn't the down escalator be a de-escalator or something?)

I ended up bribing my children. The deal was, if they were good, we could get a treat on our way out. We bought some jewelry to go with my new dress (the one I bought yesterday after Dad came on duty) and then we proceeded to check out a couple shoe stores. When I sensed the kids were done, I told them how brilliant they'd been and how I'd appreciated their good behavior. Then I gave The Boy a choice and it all went downhill like a de-escalator on steroids.

I asked if he'd like a treat from the candy store or from the ice cream store. (You Idaho people would not BELIEVE the malls here. They have entire stores dedicated to sugar. It's amazing.) Here is our conversation. You can trust that this is a verbatim exchange because I brought along my stenographer, Ethel. Or it's an argument we have on a regular basis. One of those.
"Boy, would you like a treat from the candy store or from the ice cream store?"
"Um...I choose BOTH!"
"You cannot have both. You need to choose one."
"I want THREE choices."
"OK. You can choose candy, you can choose ice cream or you can choose nothing and we'll just go home."
Cue meltdown.
"But MOM!!!!! I just really want BOTH!"
"That's OK. You can want both. However you can only choose one."
Massive amounts of gut-wrenching sobbing commences. Mom and sweet little girl get on the de-escaltor. Pouting boy follows. At the bottom of the de-escalator the conversation resumes.
"Mom! I really want a treat!"
"I'd love to get you a treat. Would you like candy or ice cream?"
"MOM! I WANT BOTH!" Hysteria sets in.
"Son, I'd love to get you a treat, but now you've lost the privilege."
Mom walks through the entirety of JC Penney holding a toddler and towing a preschooler who has somehow managed to attach himself to Mom's leg. Occasionally he tries to get in front of Mom to halt her progress and otherwise makes a scene. Old people who should by rights be dead or moved back to Indiana by now look on with sympathy and amusement.

One would think getting to the parking lot might end such a poor display of mall manners, but oh no. Not for my child. I was forced to carry two children to the car. Once there, I tried again to reason with my son-turned-Banshee, to no avail.
Then he had the nerve to keep unbuckling his seatbelt and opening the car door. That would never do, strictly from a safety standpoint, so I did want any other hick from the backwater would do when pushed beyond limits and worried for the safety of her offspring: I spanked him. Oh, don't look at me like that. I didn't spank him because I was mad. I wasn't mad at all! In fact, I was happy to help him with this learning experience. I just wish I'd gotten a pair of shoes out of it, is all. I honestly could not think of another way to keep him safe on the way home that didn't involve candy AND ice cream. Or CPS.

The Boy is having a TERRIBLE time making choices. When he has to choose between two good things, he just can't. He chooses both. He can't have both. He needs to learn. Can you imagine if we just kept giving him two good things? He'd have to move to Boulder City, CO so he could have two wives.

The fit continued until 45 minutes after we got home. He had to spend that time in his room, because by then, I had a headache.

I'm kind of at a loss here, so I'm turning to you, Blogghers (and hims). How do you teach your child to make a choice?

Frumptastic

2011-04-14T14:07:00.000-07:00

We have an afternoon outdoor wedding coming up. I was looking forward to seeing the family and generally participating in the merry-making, until IT occurred to me. The tiny fact that I've been a stay-at-home-mom for over four years now. This means several things, but the list starts out something like this:

I have nothing to wear that can't be worn pregnant or nursing. You know, other than MY wedding dress, but somehow I can't see that as being appropriate attire for a guest
It's been two years since I purchased new mascara. TWO YEARS!
My other makeup is almost gone AND older than both my children combined
I need new shoes to match the dress I haven't bought yet
My recent weight-loss has affected the size of my... well. I need new underthings. New underthings that correct my sagging-boob disorder. (It's a medical diagnosis, look it up.)

Also I spent all, and by all I mean all and then some, of our discretionary funds putting in a garden the first week of the month so I really have no way to rectify my frumptastic situation unless I feed the family beans and rice for two weeks. Make no mistake, by the end of the month, my kids are going to be fluent in Spanish cooking, but I'll feel guilty about it. Maybe not so guilty since I just realized they get to go to the candy-themed reception followed the next week by a massive Easter breakfast and dinner.

Yesterday I packed my children with me on a little jaunt to the mall. Obviously, I was struck by psychosis, thinking it would be a good idea to take them along while I tried on dresses. The Boy did make himself useful zipping zippers, though.
Have you noticed that dresses these days are either not long enough, or if they are, the top half is lacking in coverage? It's like dress makers forgot the appropriate amount of fabric required to make an article of clothing. This phenomenon is exacerbated by my freakishly tall self. I'm sure a person even two inches shorter would not have as much of a problem finding something that covered their bits.

And do you know what I realized next? No? OK, I'll tell you. The Hubs is coming to the wedding, too. Which means he'll have to wear something. Luckily his geek-a-licious self looks good in just about anything, assuming he remembers not to mix brown and black or white socks with dress shoes. (Seriously. I have to watch out for those kinds of shenanigans.) My shopping trip netted me one new tie for The Hubs. I'm going out again later to shop for dresses. And maybe a bra that actually fits. :D

HypnoBirthing

2011-04-11T19:33:00.000-07:00

I'm so excited to start a new series on HypnoBirthing and to share what I've learned with you. (yippee!)

Recently I had the chance to attend a HypnoBirth, and I was blown away. You can check out the program's statistics here.
The series will start with the birth story from my point of view, and continue with some of the HypnoBirthing highlights and what I took away from the experience and the book.
The story is written and Mom has already agreed to share her story, but I'm waiting for t's and i's. :)

In case you don't know or forgot, I had two surgical births 20 months apart. Neither were planned or at all what I was looking/hoping for. You may or may not have read my Letter To A Bastard that goes a bit more into detail about the second birth. I don't think anyone doubts my level of obsession when it comes to birth. I've read and seen so much in the four years since that first cesarean, that running across something which moved me on such a visceral plane was shocking. I hope that you'll be equally surprised and blessed.

Stay tuned!

Scripture Study with Small Children

2011-04-10T10:40:00.000-07:00

As you may know, we have two smallish children in our home. You may also know we are religious people, and as such, we feel a need to study the scriptures as a family regularly. We also want to instill within our children the same belief systems we have. We want them to grow up to be good people and share the same beliefs we feel guide and shape our lives.
OK, that being said, have you ever tried to read the bible to a four-year-old? It's not exactly attention-grabbing for that age group. Also, even if you manage to get them to sit still and quiet long enough to read a chapter aloud, it's not like they are going to get anything out if, right?
So we kind of gave up for a while, until a more child friendly approach occurred to me.

Here's what we do: At the beginning of the week, The Hubs and I will pick one or two scriptures that meet one or more of the following criteria.

addresses a particular issue our family is facing that week, like faith or obedience
teach a basic tenet of our faith, like tithing or charity
is at most two verses long (this will change as our kids get older)
can be discussed and explained to toddlers/preschoolers

The next trick was to find a consistent time in the day to do our scripture study. Right before bed was DEFINITELY not it. We hit apon breakfast. The children are eager to talk with us first thing in the morning, they are willing to stay in one place, since there's food in front of them, and they are fresh and chipper from a full night's sleep.

After we have our morning prayer and dish out the meal, I say something along the lines of "OK, now it's SCRIPTURE time!" I will recite the verse, ask the children if they know the meaning of certain words, explain the lesson behind the scripture, ask for questions, and then we teach the scripture to the children. Throughout the day, such as in the car, or before naps, I will recite the scripture again and the children will then get a chance to take turns reciting it. When we feel they are getting bored with a particular verse or have mastered it, we move on to the next verse, usually doing two a week. Occasionally we will review scriptures we've already learned.

This has been the most meaningful our scripture study as a family has ever been. I'm sure as our children grow and change our methods will change, but for now, this is what's working for us. :)

Happy Sabbath.