winter

Ah winter vacation...
the best part is the sleeping in. I get about an hour extra now adays. If I would have stopped at two kids. I could easily have slept into 10 am today. Q sets a daily goal on how late he can sleep in. He is so proud in the morning when he walks in full dressed and says "Guess how late I slept in today?"
K is a morning person. He wakes up early with a clear head and voice. He happily putters around alone making crafts, quizzes and experiments all without interuption from younger siblings. Last week he was in tears at 10am sobbing, "I LOOOVE morning. I don't want it to end!"
Yesterday KC started climbing, climbing, climbing. everything. As a result, he's been falling down quite a bit. Today for some reason when I went to get him from his crib, he looked more like a boy than a baby. His hair is growing out and becoming more parted and less baby like. Little man.

the jeans oh the jeans

The jeans are a lot tighter right about now.
Oh wait...the boys are screaming. I was about to write another insightful bit about my life.
But they are screaming at each other.
Santa comin+g6
n in
a couple days doesn't mean a thing to these jokers.
the mistyping is from a 14 month old that likes to grab the mouse and the keyboard while I type. This is my mental health escape. blogging4653210

He has just wandered off to eat the food from the cat's bowl.
ho ho ho

one wish

Today I helped with K's Christmas party. Since it is a public school, technically was an "international holiday party." So I did a little thing with the kids on Japanese new year.
I had the kids toss coins into a box, make a wish and clap three times. Then they picked a fortune (written by yours truly Confucius) and tied it to a small tree branch so the wind could carry the wishes away to come true.
One little girl, who was apparently new to the class said she wished for friends, and surprisingly her fortune said that her good and kind nature would bring her many friends. Her eyes lit up with her sheer excitement.
Most of the kids wished for a remote control robot, this or that kind of game. My kid wanted to go into outer space. One kid even wished that his birthday would come more than one day a year.
When I asked a little girl what she wished for she quietly told me that she wished her mommy would get better from brain cancer. This quiet little girl struck a nerve with me in the midst of the mayhem of dredels, donuts and candy poppers. I told her I would make the same wish, so I threw my coins in, clapped three times and said a prayer for her mothers health. Then the rest of the kids asked for more coins so they could wish for her mom to get better too.

look in the sky

What should I be doing the past few days, decking my halls? baking delicious holiday treats? wrapping presents? What could it be in this last week before Christmas would this mom of three be doing?
Nope, raking leaves of course. Because the weather is something like 100 degrees outside and the leaves didn't get the attention they needed a month or two ago AND because this is the south where trees take their own sweet time dropping leaves.
So I'm outside raking, while my hunka hunka honey lay inside with a bum back. Merry Christmas, I think and then start to obsess about global warming and what damage we are doing to the earth. My hyacinths are poking through the earth about two months before they should be. Buds are forming on trees. OH THE AGONY!
What is going on? Hunka says I (aka "Chicken Little") should just enjoy the 75 degree weather. La la la, how nice it is to send our children to live in a green house.
I watched the Oprah show about global warming and the "Inconvenient Truth" documentary. Let me tell you, it scared me. So now I'm carpooling with another mom and saving about three hours a week in drive time.
I'm out to get my oldest from the bus stop. Then off to rake more leaves...They just keep falling. Or is that the sky?

Circle of fuzz

I remember like it was yesterday. My mom took me to the town's fire station for a visit with Santa Claus. I wore very yellow patent leather shoes with buckles, sweater stockings which I hated with all my being, and a very 70's navy and red dress. When I saw the jolly man, it was if a celebrity had appeared. Getting close to him was like a dream. And just like a dream was his beard. All fluffy and flowing, pure white....I had to get my hands on it. So I did. And like I said it was like a dream. The picture shows me sitting on Santa's lap with the side of my face and neck snuggled into the old man's hair and my behind hanging to the side on his knee. If I were good I'd find the picture and post it here. But that is a little too much right now. But I post today because life has an amazing way of going in circles.
Notice how Santa casually grappled the little boy's hands into place.

I

Doggone it

Friends have two new puppies. So cute. They couldn't decided between the two which to pick, so they took both.

She says it is a little crazy, like too much puppiness.

I feel the same way, like I have too many kids. But don't know which one to get rid of.

cart -a what?

"cartilaginous"
This is the word my 7 year-old used on me yesterday.

I had to look it up....
–adjective
1.of or resembling cartilage.
2.having a skeleton composed either entirely or mainly of cartilage, as vertebrates of the class Chondrichthyes, which includes the sharks, rays, and skates.

Ah ok, when did he get smarter than me? Oh I see, at seven, I get it.
But then when we got out a shark book, he laughed for 15 straight minutes about two words "anal fin."

uganda be kidding me

I don't know who or why would be reading my blog in Uganda, (or at least that is the closest African country I could figure from my hit map,) but wow, or weird. What a strange little global community we live in.

I made Chicken Tortilla Soup tonight. My friend I went on the scrapbooking weekend with made it the first night we were there. I tried to recreate it from memory and a little help from the internet. The boys topped it with three or four handfuls of cheddar cheese and lots of tortilla chips.

Here's the recipe more or less

2 Poblano peppers chopped
1 onion chopped
2-3 cloves garlic
1 tea cumin
4 chopped tomatoes
3 or 4 C cooked chicken (rotisserie or canned)
1 -2 cups frozen corn or one can corn drained
2 large boxes chicken stock
2 tea worchestire sauce
salt to taste
1 C cilantro chopped
1 lime

1. cook onions, peppers, garlic and cumin in large stock pan until soft
2. add tomatoes and cook a few minutes longer
3. add the rest of the ingredients and simmer
4. squeeze lime in before serving. top with more cilantro, cheese and tortilla chips.

I love cilantro and lime together so I add more than a normal person would I think. I'm also thinking about adding black beans next time.

back to reality

Each day on my weekend, I opened my eyes and looked out the curtainless floor to ceiling windows to the tops of trees as they reached up to the sky. A small river ran through the back yard with small waterfalls.
My weekend was everything I hoped it would be, and then some.
I completed 81 12x12 pages of my scrapbooks. Over half of those pages were of a trip, my mom, sister and I took back in 1985. The magnetic album the photos were stored in had started eating away at most of the pictures. Remarkably the pictures we had developed in Japan had color and form as brilliant as 21 years ago.
The rest of the pictures were of baby's first year.
The baby got sick on Friday while I was gone. Fever and a cough that made him cry. Hunka handled it remarkably well. He talked frequently with the call nurse and took him in to be checked on Saturday. Yesterday was the first full day of him being back to his happy self. Now we just have to get him back on his sleep schedule.
In addition to massive hours spent scrapbooking, I walked daily, ate nutritious food, drank lots of diet beverages, excercised, watched movies, showered when I felt like it, took care of myself...filled up my tank.

Mountain bound

You know I couldn't leave without one more post about how thrilled I am to be going to my scrapbook extravaganza. I can't wipe the smile off my face.

I've got my aqua green sweats on with the drawstring waist. Three more pairs of sweatpants and a pair of jeans (you know. for dressing up--for going out to eat).

Hunka says he thought perhaps the rain would cause the event to be cancelled. But scrapbooking doesn't work that way, pal.

yeehaa

Seven is heaven

Here are some pictures of K on his 7th birthday. This year we decided to let him have a "friend" birthday party, so he chose four friends to go to Chuck E Cheese for the grand event.

I am not a birthday party mom. I do not have the ideas or the patience for all the party details. Chuck E was the way to go for me.

I know why now people have these crazy birthday parties for their kids. The look on that kid's face was pure joy.

Q and I left the party a little early. I took him to the doctor to look for an ear infection, turns out he had that, plus strep throat.

T-minus

It's T-minus two until the scrapbooking extravaganza. I've got a 12-pack of Diet Dr Pepper ready to go.

I'm packing my gear, my pictures....my snacks.

As this is a girls only weekend in a cabin in the woods, when I wake up at whatever time I feel like it, I'll decide then.....hmmmm should I wear the gray sweatpants or the darker gray sweatpants? Or maybe I'll just stay in PJs.

all day

Theres a new sherriff in town

Q with his new police man shirt and badge from Aunt, Uncle and Cuz in So.Cal.
He really wants me to spike his hair straight up, but his hair really wants to lay down flat.

I added this tough-guy-pose only because it shows some of the bow I went on and on about in a previous post.

My curly Q

I really do love this age. Today I asked the boys a series of questions that I save in the scrapbooks....things like....favorite color? what do you want to be when you grow up?

Q's answers haven't changed that much in the year and a half since I last asked.

His favorite person --Mama

Who does he like to play with -- Mama and KC

What makes him happy? when I see Mama the most

Often when I point out something gorgeous like a sunset or flowers in full bloom. He'll say "but Mama, it's still not as pretty as you. You are the beautifulest."

What a change from the day when he said, "mama, do you know what is special about you?...." A big fat zero

For the record here are the questions and answers for both boys

Q -age four

Fave food?
--hot dogs, pizza, macaroni and cheese and chicken

Fave drink?
-Kefir (a drink yogurt)

What do you want to be when you grow up?
- a policeman, a highway 'control' ('patrol' - like his uncle Rob), President, ambulance driver

what do you like to do?
-watch TV, play computer

fave person?
-Mama

Fave animal?
-crocodile, alligator, lion, tiger and leopard

what makes you happy?
-When I see Mama the most

Fave person to play with?
Mama and KC

If you could change your name what would it be?
still Q

What are you proud of?
-Mama and KC

Favorite color
Red


K's answers as a seven year old

1. food?
Stouffer's chicken parmesan

2. drink?
ginerale and sprite

3. Be when you grow up?
Mostly a mayor, a bus driver, a judge, an inventor

4. hobbies?
Teach, invent

5. Fave person?
himself

6. fave animal?
Gila monster (lizard)

7. what makes you happy?
doing scientific stuff

8. fave people to play with ? Matt, Alex, Andrew, and David

9. If you could change your name what would it be?
"Kaz"

10. What are you most proud of?
himself....
"Me!....inventor me, scientific me, bus driver me, mayor me, judge me!"

sunday food

We let the kids pick a restaurant when it is their birthday for a family meal.

K picked Macaroni Grill. The boys always eat everything and things are fairly healthy there for them. They eat broccoli, chicken, spaghetti and mac and cheese. There is always at least one cup of chocolate milk and a big bowl of ice cream with fudge at the end.

Tonight there wasn't even much to put in the to-go bag.

there are still...

There are still boxes in my foyer.

I still have an annoying cough.

But I am packing my things for my scrapbooking extravaganza. hope.

The weather has been beautiful, so I just don't know why it feels like winter to me. 60 and 70 degrees is not winter, but still it feels like it.
The boys have been off sinceTuesday. Maybe that's why I'm a little stir crazy. .

Hunka comes home and wants to go to Home Depot. We decide that he will delay it until after boys are in bed. He says he has to "get out."

I look at him with glazed eyes. "Get out," I think, honey let me tell you about not getting out.

thoughts of santa

Thoughts from the oldest the seven year old about the jolly man.....all uttered today while adults tried to assemble a "self-lit" tree.

"Why would I waste my time talking to the mall Santa? The real Santa doesn't have time to sit in a mall all day. "

"Does Santa ever die?"

"Does Santa have kids? Because if he dies, one of his kids could take over."

"Does Santa Claus know what you are thinking?"

"Maybe Santa Claus will know that you have really been trying to be good, but sometimes you just make mistakes."

scrappin

I'm going scrapbooking. Three glorious days of scrapbooking. It is keeping me going, just the thought of it.

Technically it is a girls weekend in the mountains, but it is full blown scrapbooking time for me, baby.

My scrapbooking passion comes and goes depending on what is going on in my life. I'm just heading out of a scrapbooking famine, which would be also be known as labor, delivery and post partum. OK so post-partum for me equals a full year, but who's counting.