Happy Belated Halloween

Here's a picture of our annual trek to the Pumpkin farm... notice much difference from last year?




Hayden's last football game



The kids carving pumpkins. Howie said that it was easier with a jig saw. Drill baby, Drill.



Mason dressed up as Darth Vader for Halloween. After Trick-or-Treating, we walked down to a friends house for a party. While we were walking, Mason insisted on swinging his light saber in figure "8"'s in the air. After several warnings for him to stop before he hit me with it, he hit me with it. So I took it away, with a promise to give it back when we got to the party. To which he replied " Mom,( insert way too mature tone here ) I'm not saying that you have BAD parenting skills , but I don't think you should have done that". Hmmmm.

Elise decided that she wanted to be Cinderella back in July, so she happily put her Cinderella dress on on Thursday, the day of her school parade. By Friday morning, she decided that the Cinderella dress was itchy, and she wanted to be a Witch. I never would have consented, but a friend of ours had a Witch costume, and, well, it was easier than fighting with her. But by Friday night she had figured out the Witch costume was itchy, and she found an old Elephant costume of Hayden's which she liked. This suprised me, as it wasn't pink, didn't have any beads, lace, glitter, or other "girly" stuff. But who was I to argue? Dressing her every day is a battle, so I let this one go too.

What's Up?

Too much around here, which explains why it's been forever since I've posted. Between football practice, football games and ballet lessons, there's not a whole lot of spare time. I have pics I'll post later.

I got a call a few weeks ago from Mason's teacher. She was concerned because Mason was having stomach aches during school and she didn't know what to do with him. She explained that she had sent him to the nurse's office, let him use the restroom
(TMI), let him walk around the room, and nothing helped. She thought perhaps that he should change what he ate for breakfast. After asking a few questions, I figured out that these " stomachaches" start right before math class, around 10:30, and right before recess they magically go away. So I kindly let the teacher know that Mason's stomach hurt because MATH doesn't agree with him, not his breakfast. Howie and I had a little talk with Mason about how his behavior disrupted the rest of the class, and amazingly he hasn't had a stomachache since.

Mason asked me the other morning "Mom, if you get a scholarship to a college do you HAVE to go there? " I was a little puzzled at why he would think to ask this, but responded that No, you didn't have to go to that school, but that college cost a lot of money, and it would be a shame to waste a scholarship. He looked a little troubled by that answer, but went on to catch the bus.
When he got off the bus that day, he asked the same question, and I gave the same answer. He then clarified his question . He asked " But Mom, if I got a scholarship to Michigan, would I HAVE to go there?". The look of relief on his face when I told him we would make an exception to a scholarship at Michigan was priceless!

New Glasses

I took E for her four year check up in July. They do a vision screening then, and she flunked miserably. So when the boys had their eyes checked in August, I made an appointment for her, as well. However in true E fashion, she was completely unco-operative, and we had to forgo the exam. I re-scheduled it for last week in the hopes that if I made the appointment with the female optometrist in the office, rather than the male doctor we always use, I might have better luck getting her to sit still. Well, I was partly right. She sat through about half of the exam, enough to know that she has a moderate astigmatism in both eyes. She didn't get through the part of the exam to measure near-sightedness, which she has. We just don't know how bad. So we have to go back again in a couple of months to determine what else she needs to correct her vision. Baby steps...Baby steps....

But doesn't she look SOOO cute?

First Day of School

The Bus Stop

More Vacation

The visit to this park was the perfect topper to an already very wet vacation. We were parka experts by this Saturday. However, the rain held off until the parade started at 4pm. Below, pics of the 3 kids while it was dry; E during the torrential downpour, it was too bad to even walk back to the tram, so we just kind of huddled under the canopy of a gift shop. Finally, a picture of the quickest parade in Disney history. Mickey is soaked, and a security guard near us said the record for the parade is 7 minutes in inclement weather. I think they did ours in 6 !

Dinner with Cinderella....

Disney Character breakfasts are a big deal. Not only are they expensive, they are very difficult to get a reservation for. I found out about 2 months before the trip that to have Breakfast or Lunch with Cinderella in her castle requires that you call the reservation hotline 180 DAYS before you desired day. I was able to find 1 reservation at the Grand Floridian resort with Cinderella. The reservation was for 3 people at 8:30 at night, but by golly, I was determined we were going. I was sooooo wrong to insist on this.......


You can see how much she loved Prince Charming....he was nice enough to come to our talbe 3 time to get a picture, and this was the best we could get.. doesn't she look happy to see him?

And this is my favorite picture of her with Cinderella... again, the joy on her face is priceless, and don't I look like the most patient mother in the world?


Here we finally figured out that if the characters snuck up behind her, she would get her picture taken and not know that they were there. So in both of these, the step sisters ( who were hysterical, by the way. ) were kind enough to very quietly pose behind her, and she was clueless. But the picture turned out great!







And just because I think this is funny!

Belated Vacation Pics

So we've been back for almost 2 weeks and I've neglected to post. It's taken that long to recoup from vacation, get the kids back into a schedule for school. I'm going to try and post some pics in chronological order from our trip, but no promises!



We met my old college roomate, Shae, her husband Matt, and 3 girls on the way down. We stayed in Chattanooga and they were kind enough to drive down from Murfreesboro to meet us for dinner. I hadn't seen her in about 7 years, and had lost touch for a while, so this was one of the highlights of the trip for me!

Here we are at a TGIF Friday's in Kissimmee...due to Tropical Storm Fay, we spent a lot of time indoors killing time. It's us 5, plus Howie's dad, Dan, and Step-mom Judy.





All 3 kids getting ice cream at Hollywood studios.... we were very hot, wet and tired by this time, it was the last thing we did at this park..

Donut Shoes

I was having trouble coming up with posting material. The kids are bored, we are busy with back-to-school stuff, and an evil friend of mine introduced me to Facebook, so I've been rather, well, preoccupied.

Here's me giving it my best shot.

H started tackle football conditioning. I've never heard him so quiet, so tired, so co-operative, or eating SOOOO much. Conditioning is kicking his butt. He was disappointed that boys had to weigh less than 90 lbs to be quarterback, since he weighs 94 lbs, but was consoled by the fact that he gets a chance at being a running back.



I told E that we were going to go " run some errands " last week, to which she protested loudly "I don't want to go to Aaron's!!!" Though I laughed at the time, we don't know an Aaron, so I'm not sure how she put that one together.

She also has an imaginary friend now named Alex. We don't know any Alex's, but she kept talking to what I assumed was a him. With some prodding, she explained that Alex has brown hair and brown eyes and is a lion. ( This from the movie Madagascar, but we haven't seen it in like 6 months, so she's got quite a memory if it's the same Alex.)

A neighbor girl gave us some hand-me-downs this week, and among them was a pair of white patent leather shoes with tiny black polka dots. E kept calling them "Donut Shoes". I couldn't figure this one out until Howie pointed out that they look like the white frosted donuts he brings home sometimes that have sprinkles on them.


And on a final note, we have been trying desperatly to get M to keep his voice down in the car. ( All three kids, really, but mostly M ). His first grade teacher was big on conservation and recycling this year, so he has been concerned as well. So we told him that the louder he was in the car, the more gas the car used up. ( Howie invented this great theory that the more sound waves bouncing around in the car, the faster that the gasoline evaporated, or something like that.) Anyhow, it must of made sense to his 7 year old brain, he's been soooooo quiet in the car. We really think we need to work on getting that theory published.

Paybacks..the post where I feel better because Howie had to deal with it all...

In reference to my last post about camping, though this time we weren't really camping...

Today at 2:00 M and H went to a birthday party of a little boy in the neighborhood... I was not there, I had to leave for work at 2:15.. I don't know what was served there to eat, and there is no way I could have been responsible for what M ate, because, well, I was at work.

At 5:30 Howie called me to see if maybe he should go check up on the boys, because they weren't back from the party. ( They rode their bikes. ) Umm, duh.

At 6:30 all 4 went to another party across the street. Remember, I was at work, I was not responsible for what my kids had to eat. That, unfortunately, was Howie's responsibility tonight.

At 9:30 M threw up all over the neighbor's lawn.

Guess who had to clean it up this time?

Tournament Game

Here's a couple of pics of H's last baseball tournament game.

Cedar Point

We went to Cedar Point last Sunday. I always joke that one of the reasons I married Howie is because I know he will never make me go on a roller coaster, he hates them as much as I do. Regardless, I don't think it's fair to deprive my kids of the experiece just because I am a huge chicken. So we went, and took Grandma and Grandpa, who both love roller coasters. So we thought it work out well. We were wrong. The boys first rode on the Blue Streak and they were done. They were big and tough to start out with, but quicky turned into scardy-cats like their parents. So that left us with Camp Snoopy and the Train Ride. Even E was hesitant at first to go on the kiddy rides, though you can see below she warmed up after a while.

This pic of my Dad is paybacks for some terrible ones of me he took on the kiddie swings with E.


All 4 waiting to go on the Blue Streak.



E on the kiddie motorcyles.

Happy 4th Birthday !!

So her birthday's not til Wednesday, but we celebrated today. Only a couple of near catastrophes, and everything went almost as planned. The cake ( see below ) was ridiculously time consuming from the get-go, and about half way into baking it,
( which took 4 and a half hours ) she decided that she wanted a Little Mermaid cake. We don't have a Little Mermaid Barbie, it was 9pm Saturday night, and all the decorations for the party were Cinderella. Little Mermaid wasn't happening. I showed her a few pics of cakes like hers online and she seemed OK with it after a while.




We bought her present back in December. A yellow,ride-on Corvette that we found at Big Lots while we were out Christmas shopping. It has sat in it's box until Saturday. Howie assembled it last night in the basement and charged it overnight. This morning he went to check on it and found that not only would it not charge, it had a big crack in the quarter panel. ( That will teach me to shop at Big Lots). So we were hours away from her party with no gift, not sure if Big Lots would even return our money 7 months after we purchased it, and even if we could get a refund and get somewhere to buy something else, these ride on cars take 18 hours to charge up the first time.

Thankfully, we had the receipt, and Big Lots promised to refund our money. We found a Barbie Jeep at Toys R Us ( though not the screaming deal we got on the Corvette ), and we got it together and charged long enough for her to take a couple of laps. Personally I think it was a bigger hit, because it's pink. And of course pink trumps yellow when your a 4 year old girl.

Happy 4th of July

This was the best pic of the three of them I could get. Thursday night we watched the city fireworks from a neighbors backyard. We were home by 11:00.

M, as depicted below, has been working on a loose tooth since school was practically out. He wouldn't let Howie or I touch it to yank it out. He's too smart for us. So our neighbor asked if he could see it to "dry it off". M opened right up for him, and pop, out it came no problem. M was a little stunned. Our neighbor was also kind enough to inform M that the tooth fairy now brings 5 dollar bills for front teeth. Thank you, Mr. Fonatana. Can you picture me, at 3 o'clock in the morning, trying to find this baby tooth under his pillow, replace it with $5, and not wake up either he, or his brother, because they both insist on sleeping in the same twin bed?





Parent's magazine ran a photo contest to compete for one of their covers. Of course I think that MY daughter should be the winner. ( Out of 84,000 some odd entries, I'm not holding my breath ) So anyhow, here's one of the shots I entered.

WE SOLD THE HOUSE

WE SOLD THE HOUSE. WE SOLD THE HOUSE. WE SOLD THE HOUSE. WE SOLD THE HOUSE. WE SOLD THE HOUSE. WE SOLD THE HOUSE.


* WE SOLD THE HOUSE

Camping (Post not intended for those with weak stomachs)

Not really CAMPING, but we got really close. The neighbors have an annual camp-out every year. The whole neighborhood is invited to pitch a tent, bring snacks, enjoy a bonfire, and eat donuts in the morning. I figured I could tough it out for one night, as my bathroom, toothbrush, and refrigerator were, like 10 yards away.
So I pitched the tent, bought stuff for pudgie pies, scrounged up sleeping bags. Howie even joined us for a while. I seriously considered putting the tent up in our yard and sleeping on the couch with the windows open so I could hear the boys, but decided against it.



Here is the view from H's window into tent city. It was dark by the time everyone set up, so I couldn't get a picture of it all but I think there were about 12 tents and 40 people.


Here's a picture of Howie and E by the campfire with Howie actually smiling and not making a stupid face. What a rarity.


A picture of M before all hell broke loose.

So we started about 7pm. Everyone ate dinner before hand, but brought typical camp out fare to snack on. Chips and dip, brownies, S'mores, pop, aformentioned cherry pudgie pies, goldfish crackers, pretzels, whatever.

I DID NOT POLICE HOW MUCH MY KIDS ATE.

Usually I'm sort of good about it.

I think in the end M ate about 6 S'mores, 2 Root Beers, 2 Capri Suns, Chex Mix, 2 Cherry Pies, A gallon of dip with chips, and various marshmallows that weren't attached to graham crackers or chocolate.

At 11:30 we called lights out.

At 11:32 M looked up at me from his sleeping bag and said "Mom, I feel like I'm going to puke". Which he did. All over me, him, his sleeping bag, pillow, sister and webkinz.

In those two minutes Howie had managed to sneak off to a neighbor's house with a bunch of dads who weren't camping. So it was just me, with the puke, E who was sleeping, M who was sick, and H who was ticked because his brother ruined his camp-out. I was trying really hard NOT to alert the other 36 people camping to our dilemma, but needed one of the other dads to go get Howie, which woke up all the tents on our side of the lawn. In the meantime M got sick again ( which solidified my decision to pitch the air mattress ), I got E home to bed, M in the bathtub and H in another tent so he would quit throwing a hissy fit. Howie got back just in time for the clean up. Do you know the logistics of getting a vomit soaked mattress through the opening of a very tiny tent? It can't be done. So I had to crawl on top of the thing and feel around in the dark for the air release valve, which of course was in the middle of the mess. We then took the tent down and folded it so nothing got on the neighbor's lawn. We drug the whole thing back to our driveway, where it sat til this morning and I could deal with it all in daylight.

We won't be camping again for a very long time.

Happy Father's Day

What a difference a year makes... * edited 6/6/08

Not quite a year, more like nine months....


First day of school

Last day of school

What am I going to do with them all summer?



E says....

She calls string cheese "Ringo" cheese...I think my dad secretly taught her that.

We brought a guinea pig home from pre-school. She calls it a Ta-gimme-pig.

We woke up this morning to major fog...she said it was "froggy" out.

She LOVES the Gwen Stefani song "Wind it Up"....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qHtkWyNvgU

...because of the "Sound of Music" Lyrics...She begs for it in the car and calls it the "Ley He Who" song, in reference to the yodeling....

* EDIT * This morning on the way back from the gym she was singing "How do you solve a problem like UREA " !!

So call me a obsessed mother, I still think they're funny....

Happy Mother's Day !!

Today ranked up there as one of my better Mother's Days. ( Much better than the one 4 years ago when I was pregnant with E. The one where I drove myself to the hospital so Howie could stay home with the kids. Where I was subjected to a litany of procedures and ended my stay by puking all over myself, my hospital bed, the floor, etc. That day was probably #1 on my lifetime list of most embarassing moments EVER, but I digress. ) Today we went to breakfast bright and early, came home and did nothing but read the paper, then took off to the in-laws and then my parents.

E made a suncatcher wrapped in a bag that had her hand-prints on it. H made me a card with a poem. M, well, M has had pneumonia of all things for the past 4 days. So he missed school last week when they were making Mother's Day presents. Instead he found a necklace in my room that I had never taken out of the box. He found it, and pawned it off as his own present to me. HE was fully convinced that he got it for me, even though he swiped it off my own dresser. So what is a good mom to do? OOH and AHH like I'd never seen it before and exlaim what a nice present it was, right? This was mine to begin with, so obviously I liked it. This was not like the time H spent 50 cents on me at the Santa Workshop at school and bought a gold plated eagle pendant with teal trim the size of a half dollar. Did I wear the Eagle? You bet. But I took it off as soon as we were out of his sight.

This necklace was cute. So I attempted to put it on. It barely fit around my neck. HMMM... must be a bracelet....HMMM...falling off my wrist..must be an anklet... ( I am so not an anklet person )... falling off my ankle....put back on my neck at the very last link...taken off as soon as M is out of the room. Back into the box until I can re-gift it to someone with really big ankles or a really tiny neck. JK.

I attempted to link video to the blog today. No such luck. I am brain washing E right now with "My First Little House Books" and "The Sound of Music" . (Wendy, if your reading this I know your laughing!) Anyhow, she knows " Do Re Mi " and I got it on disc.

I got H on the guitar, too. H can play realtively well enough to be able to recognize a couple of songs, enough to impress me after about 8 lessons with a not very good instructor. After about two lessons, we showed up on a Saturday morning for a lesson after a snow storm. Nobody home at the Music Store. We chalked that up to the snow, as lots of things were closed that day. A few more lessons, and at the next one the shop is closed again when we show up. No explanation. I had pre-paid for 3 more lessons, so figured I would follow through with those and then find someone else. 2 lessons go by, and then this Saturday, Howie took him once again, only to find out the guy is out of town. Left without a phone call. So needless to say I have found a new guitar instructor at a different shop. If you want the scoop on shady guitar instructor in town, let me know.

In the meantime I'll keep working on trying to post those videos.

Birthday Pictures

M's 7th Birthday Party was today. Here are a few pics...

Super Cool Go Kart that goes 12 miles per hour. I put an elephant Webkinz on the seat, when we did the "unveiling" he was more excited about the Webkinz than the Go Kart....

However he quickly figured it out and we couldn't get him off of the thing until the battery needed charged again. ( My mom bought him the helmet that goes with the Go Kart.. This pic is the only time he will be riding it without. )


Family came a little later... which is when he he opened the helmet.

All 3 "boys" got to go with friends to sit in box seats at the Mud Hens game tonight. A perfect ending to his Birthday Day!
Monday, on his actual birthday, he gets to go on a zoo field trip with his class.
Happy 7th Birthday!!

Play Ball!!!

Tuesday when it was 65 degrees out this is how the boys spent the afternoon. This was SOO cool to me, because we have waited forever for them to have friends to play with in the same neighborhood, as well as space to run. You know in our old house, not only were we cramped inside, but we had no yard to speak of and there was no way they were playing in the street.

The cul-de-sac was home plate, the stop sign first, the streetlight second and the mound in the front of our house third. Also cool was the ages ranged from 4 to 12, and they all helped little Sammy, the 4 year old, make a home run each time he was up for bat. M has the red shirt on, H is in the bright yellow.

A Moldy Revelation

My husband is a wimp. My super strong, sticks-12-inch-long-needles-in-peoples-back, benches-3-times-my-body-weight-husband, is a huge wimp.

Sunday we went to the old house. We have been paying the neighbor there to shovel snow, rake leaves, cut the grass, whatever, until the house is sold. So we went over to pay him and read the gas meter.
I went in to read the meter, but then couldn't get the front door open because the last person who showed the house put the dead bolt on. We hadn't used the deadbolt in 10 years, so it was a little stiff, and I was too weak to budge it. Howie had to come back in the house after I came out to open it. ( Get it? STRONG). He thought he smelled something odd, so took it upon himself to investigate.

His side of the story is that he opened the freezer door and encountered inch thick mold inside. He got a lungful of spores, quickly shut the door, and came out side coughing, hacking and spitting these spores to the ground. I, of course was to blame, as I defrosted the fridge, unplugged it, and forgot to prop the door open.
We left the house with him hocking out the car window and vowing to get a prescription for and antifungal the next day at work. I really thought we were going to have to take him to the ER for a chest x-ray.

I waited until yesterday morning to go back to the house. Howie brought masks home from the hospital so I wouldn't suffer the same affliction as him. I dropped E at a friends house, and stopped at Kroger to load up on bleach, paper towels, a scrub brush, latex gloves, and a new candle so the house wouldn't smell like bleach and mold to the people who were looking at the house at noon.

I thought about putting caution tape across the front door of the house. I garbed up like I was going into an isolation room at the hospital. I opened the freezer door VERRRRRRRY slowly. And laughed. Inside the freezer was an ever so faint dusting of mold. Like powdered sugar on chocolate cake. There was a tiny bit on the ice maker and the basket in the door. That was it. It wiped out easily with a paper towel. I sprayed it with bleach for good measure. It took like 10 minutes.
I'm really glad Howie made it out OK.

Happy Easter!

E being E

The Easter Bunny brought hats from what will be their High School

M in Peep Heaven.
He lives the whole year just for Peeps

Special Days...

E's preschool is a Co-Op. For all of you non-preschooler having people out there, that means that the pre-school she goes to keeps the cost of tuition down by enlisting the help of a parent each day, rather than having the cost of another teacher in the room. The day that the child's parent is designated to be in the room is considered their "Special Day". Theoretically, this is supposed to rank right up there with Christmas and Halloween in the big deal department.

Not with my daughter. On her "Special Day" she wants me to go away.. far far away.

Tuesday was her day for March. When it's your Special Day you get to wear an additional tag on your name tag. It's yellow and says "Special Day" on it. ( go figure ). She has anxiety until someone takes this tag off for her.
Then everyone gets in a circle and sings a song for the special person.
It's super catchy and goes like this:

"Hooray for ( special person name )
Hooray for (special person name )
Someone in the crowd is saying Hooray for( aformentioned person)!
1234 who ya gonna shout for?
(Special person ), That's who!"

I can e-mail you the music, if you want.

While singing, E is supposed to either shake a pom pom, or shake a tambourine.
( By the way, the pom pom is exactly like the ones I used as a cheerleader in 6th grade. It gives me flashbacks to Candies tennis shoes and Legg's pantyhose. )
Anyhow, E wants nothing to do with either the pom pom or tambourine and instead of standing in the middle of the of the circle, climbs on my lap and burys her head in my shoulder. When the song was over she asked me to go away. Several times.

The other big deal is getting to be line leader. Which she doesn't want to do. She holds my hand in the back of the line.

Here's the catch. This is not a shyness issue. She is the center of attention in the classroom when I'm not there. ( She MIGHT get this from her dad, I'm not sure. ) This is a mom's-in-the-room-and-I-am-embarrassed issue. Do you remember the christmas program in which she didn't sing? I heard SANTA was his name-O everyday in the car. She loves to sing. But not in front of a group while I'm there.
So in past Special Day's I have spent part of the day in other classrooms. Tuesday I stuck it out in hers. I need MY Special Day, after all.

Trip to the Zoo

For whatever reason E has been begging to go to the zoo. Lately, with sub zero windchills, that's been a really bad idea, but last Sunday it was nice enough that we went. ( Nice is relative, I guess ). The Zoo has their "Frozentoezen" deal going on in February. So we weren't the only crazy people there.



On a not so lighter note, I volunteered in M's class on Friday, and when I walked into the main office to sign in, found H sitting there all teary eyed. And another kid named Zane also sitting there. With a bloody nose. From my son. Seems that Zane and some other kids were calling H names, and H finally had enough and pushed Zane to the ground, which caused the bloody nose. There is a discrepency as to whether or not perhaps Zane pushed H first, but by most accounts H did the inital pushing. So I , in my naivete', finished up with what I had to do in M's class and went back to the office to talk to the principal and calm H down. Both boys were still in her office, along with a couple of witnesses, so I continued to wait. 45 minutes later, she finally called me back in her office. I really genuinely thought that we would have a nice chat about the incident, H would get a stern warning or maybe a detention. HA HA HA. He got suspended. SUSPENDED!!!! In this day and age of Zero Tolerance, there is no warning system whatsoever. Just suspension. She did let me know that it was supposed to be for three days, and she knocked it down to one. So he is home with me today, very remorseful, very sad, very upset to see the bus come pick up his brother and not him. Those of you that know him know what a great kid he is, this day is killing him. But I think he has learned his lesson.

Howie's the one on the left...

Howie got to meet Eddie George tonight at a fundraiser for Make-a-Wish. Pretty Cool.