Super Hero Zip Line

I'm thankful for a husband who takes my crazy ideas I see on other people's blogs and implements them for our children's pleasure!

Yahoo!

Thankful for her sense of style. I think.

Being thankful

This is my favorite time of year. I pretty much love Halloween through Christmas. It would be nice if the weather would cooperate. Although I am saving a lot of money this fall by not going to Starbucks for pumpkin spice lattes because it is just too hot to drink them. I tried an iced one a few weeks ago and let me tell you that was not a good idea.

Although I love this time of year, I have to say I hate this point in Mike's schooling. We are six weeks away from the end of this semester and it cannot come too soon. He's tired. I'm tired. We're testy with each other. We lose patience with the kids. And all of a sudden, I find it hard to be thankful at the time of year we're supposed to be the most thankful! But, wait! I have a blog. And I can make it my thankfulness journal. We'll try this through November and see how it goes.

I can be thankful for the comic relief in our life that is a five year old boy. On our way to get donuts yesterday he started talking about farts. I don't know why little boys think this is such a hilarious subject but they just do. So he was in the back talking about his friend at school named Marlin. Apparently, Marlin has some stinky farts. And every time he farts it makes Jake and two of his friends laugh hysterically. But then Mrs. Ware gets Marlin "in really big trouble" and then everyone stops laughing. And that "is really weird." You know what I think is weird? I thought it was weird last week when Jake said this to me after dinner. "Mama?" Yes, babe. "I love my weiner." Go tell your daddy what you just said. "Hey daddy! I love my weiner!" And then I just hear hilarious laughter from both of them. Really? So then I looked at my sweet little Emma Mae sitting there licking ranch dressing off of her plate and I was just thankful for another girl in the house.

Halloween 2012

How is it November already? And why does our neighbor across the street already have up her Christmas decorations? Why can't I stop eating the children's Halloween candy? It's not even that good! These are the questions keeping me up right now.

Let's start with Halloween. Our friends Eva and John brought their girls over again this year to go trick or treating with us. We also tagged along with some of our neighbors. Trick or treating is always fun in our neighborhood! Jake opted to dress up as Bat Man this year rather than Spiderman. Emma Mae finally settled on being a witch after flirting with being Captain America for awhile. They both looked really cute.

They decorated pumpkins before we headed out.

My parents sent them these adorable monogrammed candy baskets to use.

Then we went out into the night to join the rest of the spooks and goblins.

7 Years!

Mike and I celebrated our 7th wedding anniversary on Tuesday. He had the day off which was nice since he only gets one day off a week. We pretty much just stayed around the house because Emma Mae had been sick and we were half expecting her to have a fever at some point. Mike took her with him to wash his car so I could go to HEB all by myself. Because nothing says I love you like giving your poor wife an hour of solitude in the grocery store. It was heaven.

After that we all went up to Jake's school to have lunch with him. I am loving lunch time with Kindergarteners. This time I met a cute little one named Emma who managed to finagle some of my potato chips from me (but only after I made her eat some applesauce.) Emma is a character. She reminded me of our little Emma. In fact, the two of them spent some time together under the table doing everything but eating their food.

That afternoon I made an apple pie because I know the way to my husband's heart is through his stomach. I carved a little heart with our initials in it on the crust but they kind of faded during baking. It's the thought that counts, right?

 

 

We ended up ordering food from Chili's for dinner. It was pretty good, but I'm still holding out hope that we'll get to go out to celebrate sometimes soon. Jake took our picture to commemorate the evening.

Once the kids were in bed we decided to cuddle up on the couch and watch an episode of The Walking Dead. Very romantic, don't you think? After that it was on to a Daily Show episode. Not ten minutes into that show, our power went out. The house was black. That's a little freaky after watching zombies. So we sat on the couch for a couple minutes waiting for it to come back on. But it didn't. So I looked in Mike's general direction and said "um, should we be concerned?" And he was like "it's no big deal, sometimes the power goes off". And I was thinking "yeah, the power goes off when the zombies attack or the ax murderer is in your house or the terrorists are here." Because nothing can stifle my imagination.

So Mike got up and headed to the front of the house which I thought was a big mistake because there is a lot of space between our couch and our front door for a boogeyman to be hiding after he cuts the power off in your house. So I got up and walked the three feet it takes to get to the back door and looked outside. The entire neighborhood was black. It was so weird. I was pretty confident it was the terrorists by this point. We ended up in the front yard yelling over to our neighbors who were also outside and were freaking out because they had been watching Revolution when the lights went out. Just as we decided that somebody better call someone, the lights came back on. And just like that our fears were relieved. And I knew I wouldn't have to associate our 7 year anniversary with the night the Chinese or the Russians or the whoever's took out the power in small town USA and invaded the country.

MIA

We have spent the past three and a half weeks with one sick child or another. First Jake battled a sinus infection from which he is still harboring a stubborn cough. Then little sister tried to one up him and came down with pneumonia. So we have pretty much been staying around the house and Emma and I are going stir CRAZY. We've had to miss work/school for a week now since she has been running a fever for a solid week. Tonight the poor little thing looked at me and said "mama, when is this supposed to be over?" I felt so sorry for her. And I feel like the answer is NOW. This is supposed to be over now. So, we may be going back to see the doctor in the morning.

The morning, which will be my 7th wedding anniversary to beloved hubby by the way. I was planning to have the neighbors babysit the kids so we could go have dinner at some cool restaurant in Austin we've never been to before. But now it looks like we might just have to get something from the Chili's to go menu and dine in tomorrow evening. I don't know many people who are going to jump at the offer to come babysit a three year old with pneumonia! Oh well. We'll make it through.

At any rate, our lives have been pretty dull so I haven't had much to write about. Unless you want to hear about how I've had a headache for three days now. And how this morning I went to take two ibuprofin for it and then had a sneaking suspicion that I had already just taken two ibuprofin for it but I couldn't be one hundred percent sure because I have lost my ever loving mind. So I took two just in case I hadn't already taken them and thought what could be better than two ibuprofin? Four ibuprofin.

Or maybe you would like to know how my neighbor/friend Misty and I stood out in my driveway today for fifteen minutes talking about something her daughter found in the dog's poop. She thought it was a leech. So she brought it over in a jar for me to look at. Then she screamed every time I took the lid off the jar to get a closer look. Because really, this is the most interesting thing I've seen in a week. We both freaked out for awhile about how a dog could have swallowed a leech and pooped it out and the thing could still be alive. Then we talked about how gross leeches are. Then I looked really close at the thing and saw the two cutest little antennae sticking out of its head. Then I determined it was a slug that was probably just trying to eat the dog poop. Case closed.

Speaking of poop, you know things are less than exciting in your life when you hear your five year old boy shout from the bathroom "mom! you got to come see this poop!" And you go. Even though you know it's gonna be gross and it can in no way enrich your life to look upon such a sight. But really, what else do you have to do? Nothing. Except maybe go take some more ibuprofin.

Gems of the Day

I have two thoughts to leave you with this evening. Both of them are direct quotes from our children.

The first occurred this morning as I was getting out of the shower and Emma Mae came into the bathroom (shocking!) to see (bother) me. She looked me straight in the eye and said "mommy?" So I said "yes, baby?" And she said "I promise I won't ever laugh at you when I see you naked." And I went and wrote her into the will.

The second happened this evening as I was sitting on the couch with Jake and Emma. We were doing our before bed reading time. Emma was sitting on one side of me and Jake on the other. All cuddled up. Listening intently to my every word. Then I felt Jake poke me in the tummy. Then I heard him say "looks like you might have a baby in there." And I went and wrote him out of the will. The end.

My new bandwagon

I am completely hooked on this blog right now. I've been flirting with giving up or at least cutting back on sugar and white flour for awhile now. The problem is that I really love sugar. And sugar goes really well with white flour. Also, whole wheat flour just tastes weird to me when you put it in baked goods. And I love to bake. It's my therapy.

Anyhow, I've been reading the 100 Days of Unprocessed Food blog and she has some really great ideas and lots of menus to give you ideas about how to eat whole, real, unprocessed foods. So I told the family that we were going to try this out for a week to see how it goes. And Mike was like "um, ok, I might cheat when you're not around." And Jake was like "Yeah! I want to eat healthy! Do you have any cookies?" And Emma Mae was like "these pants are itching me!" And I was like "whatever. you guys will eat what I cook."

So we started on Monday. I made these delicious whole wheat cinammon waffles. Everyone ate them but Jake. Then for dinner that night I made whole wheat crust pizza. And Jake said it tasted funny. Apparently his taste buds are highly sensitive to the whole wheat flour thing. He hasn't been happy with anything I've made where I've had to substitute it for white flour. Very frustrating. Then today I made Emma Mae some mac and cheese with whole wheat pasta and she totally rebelled. Hmm. So far I feel like this is not going so well.

I actually don't think it's that bad. I made it sugar free/ white flour free all day Monday and Tuesday. And guess what? I lost two pounds! I also didn't feel the need to take a nap at noon! Then on Wednesday, I cheated and had a piece of Papa John's pizza at work and then one of the mom's in our class brought Jana and I a big chocolate frosted brownie as a treat. I was totally sabatoged. Sure, I could have given Jana the whole brownie and not said anything to the mom. But do you really think I'm strong enough to turn down a frosted brownie? The answer is no. My flesh is so weak. And that brownie was so good. Alas, I gained back the two pounds. And I had to lay down for awhile when I got home from work.

I was really hoping to see if the lack of sugar would make it easier for the kids to focus. Unfortunately, Emma Mae was given Goldfish crackers at a play date and Jake's class got rewarded for good behavior yesterday with ice cream sandwiches. Why do we reward ourselves in our society with sugar filled  processed goods? Oh yeah, because they taste good. But we are going to try to make it through four more days of cleaner eating. And then we will probably reward ourselves with a trip to the ice cream shop.  

The Wonder Years

Well, we spent the last four days with a sick boy and an overly emotional little girl. It's been wonderful. It's times like these when I look back at my young, idealistic, completely unrealistic twenty something year old self and I laugh at her. In the face. Because that girl thought that having small children was gonna be so much fun! Every day! Because we were going to spend the mornings together coloring pictures, blowing bubbles and possibly having pillow fights. Then we would go to Chick Fil A for lunch and come home and take naps. Long naps. Every single day. Then the kids would play nicely together or with their imaginary friends while I made dinner from scratch. Every single night. Then after dinner they would sit at my feet and read books while I watched reruns of The Cosby Show on TV. Oh, twenty something self. What were you thinking??

That girl had no idea she would be in a full body sweat first thing in the morning after spending 45 minutes trying to get that cute little angel dressed. Because Emma Mae cannot pick out her own clothes (it's too hard!) (and her legs don't work!) (and she's so tired!) But she also cannot wear anything we pick out because those clothes are too long! or too tight! or too loose! or, and this is my favorite, too itchy!

That girl didn't know she would still be getting up three or four times a night with sick little ones who are coughing and/or are afraid of the dark all of a sudden. Of course, that girl didn't know how much she could love those two little munchkins she would have someday either. So I guess that's the trade off.

Last week in school Jake was chosen to be the Star Leader. So that meant we got to make a poster board all about him and he got to take something for show and tell every day. Unfortunately, he had to miss school on Friday because he was sick so he didn't get to show off his beloved Shamu. He saved the best for last. (Don't worry, he opened with Crabby). He also was at risk for not being able to bring home this guy the last day. The Star Leader gets to bring home their class mascot for the weekend. Isn't Kindergarten fun?? I want to go! It's kind of how I pictured parenting would be back when I didn't have a clue what it would really be like.

So even though Jake wasn't feeling great we went to the school to pick up Skippy Jon so we could take him on some adventures so we would have pictures for the journal that Jake (and I totally mean I) had to fill out to take back to school tomorrow. We went to a pumpkin patch.

I'm pretty sure in each of these pictures that Emma Mae's saying "I'm itchy!" "These pants are itching me!"

Conference time

On Tuesday Mike and I went up to Jake's school to have our first parent/teacher conference of the year. I got my hair done that morning so I could make a good impression. I was excited and a wee bit nervous to hear what his sweet teacher would say about him. Basically, it seems that he is pretty much on track with the average Kindergartener but time management may be a concern in the future. I can totally understand this considering it takes him about three hours to clean up his room because he gets distracted by things like playing with the toys he is supposed to be picking up and shiny objects and things he can stuff down his pants.

I was relieved to hear her say that he is a sweet boy who doesn't have a mean bone in his body because you may remember he had some aggression issues in pre-school. She also confirmed our suspicions that he and another sweet boy at his table may think it is their mission in life to crack people up. They may find themselves sitting at different tables in a few weeks. The word "firecracker" was used several times in reference to our boy. I can totally understand that too. Mike and I both said something to the effect of "wait till you meet his little sister in two years, she's a stick of dynamite." Emma Mae's reputation may precede her to Kindergarten.

His teacher told us one other thing that had me cracking up. But now that it has been pointed out I can totally understand it as well. She said that the other Kinder teachers and first grade teachers call Jake "little Matthew McConaughey". Without the bongo's of course. What do you think? Ok, maybe when Jake's hair is a little longer and the curls are going wild. Still cute.

Camping for everyone

Over the weekend we took the kids on our second family camping trip. Our neighbors invited us to join them at their campsite at Inks Lake State Park. It was so much fun! The weather was beautiful and we discovered that camping with friends is even more fun than camping by yourselves! The kids always had someone to play with and the adults always had someone to talk to. Or eat with. Whatever.

As soon as we got there we broke out the peanut butter sandwiches for lunch. Because nothing says camping like peanut butter. After lunch we headed straight for the lake and jumped in our neighbors canoe that they rented. This was Emma Mae's first time in a canoe and she loved it. She also enjoyed swimming in the lake. For some reason Jake wasn't so sure about this adventure. He was scared to get in the canoe at first even though he had done it before and he was scared to get in the water even though he is a fish. I'm gonna chalk it up to being tired from Kindergarten. Eventually everyone got in and had a good time. Mike even took our neighbor's older daughter and her friend to go jump off some rocks called Devil's Hole. Because nothing says responsible adult like taking kids to jump to their death. I kid. They were perfectly safe. And they had a blast. Of course my camera was nowhere in sight.

We made some burgers for dinner and had brownies for desert. Then the kids loaded themselves down with glow sticks and played while the older crowd sat around the camp fire and played Catch Phrase. So. Much. Fun.

The next morning we got up, made pancakes, packed up camp and headed out for a hike before leaving the park. Jake is like a spider monkey. Or Spider man. He is obsessed with climbing things and finally I had to just stop watching him and trust that Mike wouldn't let him fall. The kid makes my anxiety levels reach new heights every day. Also, he broke the towel rack in his bathroom last night hanging from it like Spiderman. Totally unrelated to the trip but it had to be said. Anyway, we can't wait to go on our next camping adventure. Only 72 more state parks in Texas to go!

Dolly's and Piggy's

This morning Emma Mae and I got to watch my friend's little girl, Dolly. We had so much fun! It was nice to catch up with my girl Eva also. Emma Mae thought it was great to have someone a little bit younger here that she could try to boss around. Dolly wasn't really having it though.

Jake decided he wanted to ride the bus home from school today. He ran off the bus carrying a backpack I didn't recognize screaming "that was so much fun!" As soon as he got in the house I started questioning him about the class snack time today. It was our turn to bring snack and you can bet I wasn't going to do the purple grape thing again. But I also didn't want to go out and buy Goldfish crackers or anything. They don't really fit into my vision of us not eating processed food right now. So yesterday I decided to make mini muffins for the kids. And yes, sugar and white flour are processed, but Rome wasn't built in a day. This is a work in progress. Plus, I don't know how to make things taste good without sugar. Anyhow, yesterday I baked three different types of mini muffins. I knew the kids would probably like the banana chocolate chip and the blueberry ones. But I wasn't sure if they would give the pumpkin oat bran muffins a chance. Because those muffins were ugly with a capital UG. So I told Jake to talk them up and I wrote the teacher a note assuring her that they were really good.

Well. When I asked Jake if the muffins were a hit at snacktime he said "well, there was one person who liked the pumpkin ones." And I was like "only one?" And he said "yes." And I said, "was it you?" And he said it was his friend Cason. Cason totally rocks. You know I couldn't let it go. So I asked him if everybody else liked the other muffins. And he was like "my favorite color is green." Or something like that. He totally changed the subject. So then I asked him if the kids at least liked the cute little monster baggies I put the muffins in and he said "oh yeah!" So, in short, I'm glad I was so caught up in providing a semi-healthy non highly processed snack for the children today that I spent hours of my time yesterday baking up a storm. Also, when am I going to get it through my head that Kindergarten is not about me already? Still, sometimes I really wish I could go to school with Jake for a day so I could see what's really going on up there. Maybe I could put a hidden camera in Jake's backpack. But that would probably violate someones civil rights. Or maybe I could go ahead and get my own life now.

Oh. Let's get back to the extra backpack that Jake was carrying when he ran off the bus. He got chosen by his PE teacher today (for good behavior!) to bring home a backpack with a special stuffed pig and a bunch of games and activities Jake is supposed to do with this pig over the weekend. Then we have to record all of the fun in a journal and give everything back on Monday. They also said that pictures of the student with the pig would be great. So, Jake comes out of his room tonight with this poor little pink toy pig stuffed all the way down his pants with just it's head poking out over the top. And he wants me to take his picture. For the journal. And I was like "honey, I don't think that's the kind of picture your teacher was talking about." Now, let's take the pig out of your pants. And possibly give it a bath. Then he posed for a more appropriate picture of him with Piggy Wiggy.

We're going camping tomorrow for one night and we will be taking Piggy with us. Hopefully we can get some pictures of them together with Jake fully clothed.

I'm all out of lame post titles

Well, it's been forever since I wrote. I have a huge headache so I think I'll just do a list to catch up on things.

1.) I've been replaced by another woman in my son's life. And although I'm glad he loves his Kindergarten teacher I about came unglued last week when he told me that he has learned more from Mrs. Ware in three weeks than he ever learned from me. Really? Did she teach you how to, oh I don't know, talk? Go to the bathroom in something other than a diaper? Sing your ABC's? Use the word regenerate correctly in a sentence? That killer whales are really a big dolphin? Not that I'm bitter or anything.

2.) I can't let it go. He also told me that Mrs. Ware didn't think anything about him was crazy when I informed him the striped shirt and camoflauge shorts he picked out to wear last week looked crazy together. Whatever.

3.) On the bright side he did tell me that I was a "kind woman" when I got him some water the other day. I'll always have that.

4.) I don't remember the exact conversation but a few days ago Emma Mae came up to me and said we needed "to do some investigating." So proud of her and her five syllable words.

5.) Awkward moment number one: As we were driving home last week Jake said from the back seat "mama? I wanna know what love is." I was all "okay, love is the way you feel when you want someone else to be happy and you would do anything in the world to make them happy." And he goes "I want you to show me." And I go "well, when we give you hugs that is showing love." And he goes "I want to feel what love is". And I was all "you feel love when you do nice things for other people or when they do nice things for you." And he was all "I know you can show me." And then I realized that Foreigner was playing on the radio singing that old classic "I want to know what love is" and Jake was just repeating the words. I was slightly relieved because the conversation was starting to turn a little bit creepy.

6.) Awkward moment number two: Yesterday morning on the way to school Emma Mae and I were listening to the local Christian station. I heard the DJ say something about lots of money and then something about being the 17th caller. So I figured they were having a contest to give away money. We happened to be stopped in traffic so I called in. And I got through on the first try! And the guy that answered started taking all my info down. I was so excited. I couldn't wait to find out how much I had won. Then he asked me if he could put me down to give $29 a month or did I want to give more than that each month? And I was all "oh, uh, yeah, uh, can you hold on a minute?" Click. I so hung up on the Christian DJ guy. Turns out they were taking donations for some cause or another NOT giving money away. I totally froze and hung up on the guy. I felt like I was back in elementary school. Only back then we used to stay up late at night and call and talk to the DJ's for hours after we requested our favorite song. Probably some Air Supply or Journey or Foreigner. And looking back on it that also has a creepy factor to it.