Time Flies (especially when you are sitting on your butt watching 24)

I know I know. It has been far too long. I wake up thinking I will have all this time to update the old blog and before I know it I am wondering where the day went and praying that my kids will pass out from exhaustion soon. I have begun to type several times but, where much is given, much is required and I want to make sure that the 4 people who actually read this blog will not feel like the 10 minutes they wasted on me were not the biggest wasted 10 minutes they spent all day. You know what I mean?

The problem is that I blinked and all the sudden it is June. The good thing about that is that I managed to tivo the entire 7th season of the action paced, tension riddle, must see event of the fall television season , 24 (I LOVE THIS SHOW). The down side is that I have spent the last 2 and a half days watching 26 solid hours of television (I included the 2 hour movie event: 24 Redemption and I include the time I had to pause the show so I could yell at the kiddos to quiet down and leave me alone. I so need to cancel cable. It might make me a better mother.) and we are now smack dab in the middle of summer vacation.

So much has happened and I can barely remember the details of any of it. This year has passed in a blur so far and I only have about 2500 pictures to remind me of my life for the past 3 or 4 months. It is nice to know that I was actually there for the time but now I have to scrapbook those pictures (and there goes another big chunk of my life).

The sad thing is that not much really has happened to me personally but, with so many people around me, a ton has happened. So I am going to throw in an update: Karen Roberts style.

Temple Trip – Oklahoma City





Visit the Chairs – Oklahoma National Memorial



Bug Had a Birthday – The Big 08

We Had a Nephew

We Had a Baptism

Family Visit – We had family in town for the baptism and Easter



Hole in the Wall – Ahhh, family harmony.


Tubbs Had a Birthday – The Big 01

Magoo Had a Birthday – The Big 04

We Went for a Jog – The Hawker Beech Craft Health and Wellness Fair

We Won a Cruise – Alaska Here We Come

Dan Kept His Job – There have been layoffs 3 times in the 7 months Danny worked here.
Danny made it through the “Final” layoff for the next year and a half.

We made an offer on a house

Another Layoff Announced

We pulled an Offer on a House

The Outdoor Pools opened – This is OUR YMCA



We Had a Nephew

We Had A Niece

I know that for all intents and purposes this is not the most interesting blog ever written but I at least feel like I have done what I can to keep you posted on my “real life.” I have also been toying with the idea to do something fun for myself (although if you ask my husband he would tell you that almost everything I do is super fun and for myself but what does he know? He is always at work talking to grown ups and all involved in trying to keep his job and stuff.)

Maybe when I get another moment (in a month or 2) I will unveil my ideas for how to mix things up in my life. Right now I have a giant to do list that I have to get to if I ever want to be able to relax and enjoy my summer.

1. Watch my kiddos mess up the house while yelling idol threats and then tell my husband I was so busy all day.
2. Visit Texas (I will be there the 10th through the 19th. I am going to see Wicked!!!!)
3. Cause contention within my family (I have already done what I can for the month within my own family so this month I will be concentrating on my husbands family).
4. Applying Sunscreen.
5. Complaining that I am so white and overweight (but doing as little as
possible to remedy either of those conditions)
6. Applying more sunscreen.
7. Chilling with my kiddos at the pool (did you see our totally awesome YMCA
pools?).
8. Blogging about how I didn’t do anything all summer and where the time went
while being overly excited that my kids are back in school while my husband
is hopefully still employed and looking into making another offer on a new
house.

Big Plans. Big Plans.
Happy Summer Everyone (and by everyone, I mean the 3 to 5 people that actually read my blog).

Cold Found Me - I don't know how but it found me.

We had a little cold snap here. It kind of stinks that it is the end of March and we have to bundle up still. This is the plant hanger by our front door. We had to pull down the ice because as it melted it was freezing on our front step and my 3 year old fell and knocked his head.

Danny's car isn't in the garage so it was covered in ice. We tried to open the door but it was frozen shut. We did manage to free the handle.

The tire nozzle is completely covered in ice as was the tire. It is pretty neat because you can see water closer to the tire floating around under the ice.
This is the front light of Dan's car.

This is a shot of our front storm door. What is so funny about this picture is that the glass is clear. We do not have frosted glass that is all ice. We couldn't get it open. We had to go in and out through the garage.

The rest of these are some pretty pictures. I love how nature can be so destructive but so beautiful at the same time. The ice covered everything and the patterns and colors are amazing. I took the last three photos right outside on my street.

Father Time marches on - It figures he would be a man.

I don’t want to alarm anyone, but it seems to have happened. I have gotten old. Now don’t go giggling and thinking things are all funny. You are getting old too. It is one of those things that happen really slowly for a long time then all of the sudden it sneaks up behind you and kicks you in the butt right before it trips you and then repeatedly kicks you in the face while you are down. I not saying it is a bad thing, it is just a little unpleasant when you have to get up.

Most of you know that I have a gaggle of little ones (gaggle = 5+). I recently had their pictures taken (it only took me a year and a half) and I got them back. When I looked at them I received a shock. The faces in the pictures are no longer my little kiddos. My baby’s faces have been replaced by young adults (or at least pre-teens and non-toddlers).

My oldest no longer has baby fat and bed head. He is a good looking 10 ½ year old who wears deodorant and wants his hair to look good for certain occasions. He puts on clean shirts and changes his undies without being asked. Who is this child and where did mine go?

My second is 8 now. He is playing computer games and getting love notes from girls on the playground. What is even more shocking is that he can now read them on his own so I don’t always know about them. Last year he had a hard time reading other peoples handwriting, so I at least got to know what they said without having his older brother snooping for me. How do I get my baby back?

The oldest girl in my story now requires bows in her hair and earrings in her ears. She likes shoes that match her outfit. She wants to talk on the phone and brings home phone numbers of people who she simply must speak with. She also has a problem with my rule of NO make-up until she is 14. I wonder what she will say when she finds out that she can’t date until she is at least 16 (older if I can find any excuse at all to make it so).

Magoo is, as always, a gigantic handful of energy with a side of trouble. He can type in his favorite URL’s and work all of his favorite PC games all on his own. Not impressive you say? He is 3. He has also fine tuned his powers of manipulation (after all he has 2 girls to compete with). His big blue eyes are deadly weapons and he will use them. He also likes to critique my television shows. He likes American Idol but doesn’t care for anything that I have on when he wants to watch Deigo.

Then there is the baby. She is almost one and, for so long, she was content to sit still and smile for the adoring masses. Now she is mobile and gets into everything but when she gets caught, boy does she turn on the charm. You will be rendered powerless. I have yet to meet anyone who can fight her control (I doubt anyone has ever tried. She is that good.). Now she stands up on things. My baby is no longer a baby.

Then there is the hubby. As if adding insult to injury the man doesn’t age. He looks the same as he did when we got married (except for the tired eyes of an old man and the grown up hair cut). It took 11 years for me to come to terms with the fact that the man doesn’t gain weight but, as I was sitting on the bathroom counter plucking out my grey hairs, I realized he still looks young. I am the one who gains and looses (hopefully) weight. I am the one that has ruined my once perfect body (My ramblings, my opinions, and I HAD a great body) with the birthing baby after baby (after baby after baby after baby….). I am the one getting wrinkles worrying about…everything. I am the one who shows the wear and tear of day to day life and he is the one who can hide his age (until I stand next to him and “date” him). I know that life isn’t fair but someone needs to throw me a bone. In my head I think I stopped somewhere around 27 but the mirror might as well be calling me a liar to my face (or my mother’s face because it also struck me that my face is slowly morphing into my mother’s. I do hold the perpetual double chin against her and her DNA but I don’t think I helped things by dying my hair the same color as hers on accident while searching for a way to cover the aforementioned grays).

I know that aging is unavoidable but does it have to happen so quickly? Go ahead people, laugh at my pain and suffering, but be careful. Your day will come and I might just be there with my walker to get in a kick or 2 as long as you are already on the ground. Then afterwards we can leave the kids with dad and go party like a couple of wild and crazy ladies that have another few weeks before they are due to take their Boneiva pill again (it’s a pill taken once a month to combat osteoporosis. If you didn’t know that, I’m not sure we can still be friends)

I have a rumbly in my tummy...(and a marble, 2 screws, and about 57 cents in change. Were you hungry, 'cause there is plenty to go around. I promise)

HELLO!!! It has been a while and it’s lovely to see you again. Time has flown by and here all of the sudden it is March. Not only March, but March of 2009. Where has all the time gone?

My baby is finally crawling, and any of you who have kids know what that means….You have to actually vacuum the floor regularly. So I have that to keep me busy.


It really is amazing what this kid finds in the floor. I have found things ranging from a grain of rice (though how she managed to gag herself on that particular item is beyond me. It is tiny and yet, she’ll go ahead and try to choke on it anyway) to the head of a Littlest Pet Shop dog (though in my defense, the body that the head was originally attached to is entirely too large to choke on. How was I to know that my 3 year old has graduated from cutting doll hair to popping the bobble heads off of annoyingly sweet fake animals? What mom can see that progression shaping up?).

She tends to favor things that are clear and/or shiny, and that is just aces for my 3 year old. He has discovered the joy of scissors, (I did mention the doll hair right? Those dolls, for some reason are always sans apparel, therefore destined for the garbage anyway. They are just getting there a piece at a time.) and he leaves me little reminders that I own too many pairs of scissors daily. His favorite thing to cut up is the wrappers of fruit snacks, which fit into both the clear (semi-transparent) and shiny categories.

My new favorite thing to watch is someone trying to retrieve these items from her mouth (I watch the Amazing Race as well but that is only Sunday nights at 7pm on CBS so this takes up all the empty moments).

When she sees us coming, she knows right away what it is for. First, she smiles (to throw us off or distract us from our necessary purpose). When she sees that we will not be deterred, she clamps down tighter then a 10 month old should be able to. It is like a vise grip and if your fingers get caught in those razor sharp teeth, you may have to fish those finger tips out of there as well.

Then, if that isn’t enough to deal with, she throws her head backwards and emits the distress call. The call brings every person in the vicinity that in not already involved in the struggle, to the scene instantly so that they have the opportunity to both coo over the baby and completely misinterpret the situation. All they see is this baby thrashing and unhappy with your fingers in her mouth and you gripping her head in an abusive looking manner (you have to because the “head bucking” (as I call it) is quite unpredictable and could cause her to hurt herself if you don’t grab her fast in anyway you can. If you can hold on for longer then 8 seconds you are promoted to “professional” status.)

Once the crowd has gathered, if you are not terrified at the chance she might actually swallow, you get to explain to people who think that offering advise (such as “you might want to vacuum more often” or “you should have your kids pick up after themselves a little better.”) or asking every other second WHAT she swallowed (if I knew that I wouldn’t be digging for gold) or if you got it yet (I would remove my fingers if I had, in fact gotten “it”) actually helps. She continues to wow the crowd by gagging on you fingers every now and again to keep them riveted.

When you finally retrieve the offensive mouthful and, if you are my husband, have flicked it back onto the floor so it keeps on giving. She cutely rubs her nose and begs to be picked up and held (which I suspect was the whole purpose of the charade from the beginning) which someone inevitable does. Sucker!


What is so funny is that, for a bright kid (if I do say so myself and I do), she has yet to figure out how to be stealth enough to keep the treasures in her mouth (if that is in fact what she wants). She sticks something in there and then begins to chew quite animatedly. It could be applesauce (which I do not regularly keep on my floor but, with 5 kids, I can’t say it has never happened) and the kid will chew on it for about 5 minutes. When will she learn; you’ve got to make noise (so no one comes looking for you) and suck but don’t chew. Even with all the eating of random things off the dirty floor she really is a great and very happy baby.

So basically nothing much is going on here. What’s new with you? Don’t stay away so long next time. I miss you.

Young mom, 'cause you're in a new town, You can stay there, and I'm sure you will find Many ways to have a good time. ................................

It has been a while but I am back. I am now coming to you from the fun and exciting state of Kansas. It is cold here. I guess, living in Arizona for so long, I forgot that there were places on Earth that freeze and turn white. People around here tell me that it is a beautiful place to live but I haven’t really seen it yet. The grass is muddy and brown (when it isn’t white and icy), the trees are bare and wholly unsuitable for climbing (I could climb a tree. I am not so old as to not still have wild ideas completely unsuitable for my age and most definitely detrimental to my health if I ever followed through with them. I could climb a tree), and there are no flowers or color anywhere. I will give it a few more months before I render my final verdict. I do miss the Arizona winters.

I have filled up my days utterly avoiding the mess that is my house. It seems like every piece of furniture that I liked was damaged in the move and the crap that I should have thrown out before we loaded the truck made it through in the same shape as before. So, needless to say, I have quit unpacking boxes. It depresses me. It is cold outside and with 2 kids not in school, I have had to find a suitable warm place to spend my days where I don’t have to look at the chaos that surrounds me at home. The trick is to only have to get in and out of the car once (because that is another hassle. The baby needs a coat when the wind blows but freaks out when I strap her into her car seat with the coat on because it is tight. The same goes for my 3 year old, only he has managed to figure out how to unstrap himself, which is a whole different kind of fun).

My first instinct was the mall. Makes sense right? Many stores, indoor playground, the pretzel place, and lots to do. That was not a good idea. After spending hundreds of dollars on stuff I didn’t need (and that was just at the pretzel place), chasing my 3 year old around, and trying to breast feed in front of Subway (where the tables and chairs are) I realized that I was not in Mesa anymore (lots of nursing mothers with little kids). I was doomed to stay in my small house watching the Backyardagans forever. That’s what I thought until I discovered……….. the YMCA.

I thought this place was the stuff of early 80’s gay rock; made up for the purpose of getting preteens on the dance floor at the middle school dances across the country, but no. It is a real and very magical place where dreams come true. We joined the “Y” (as it is referred to by the locals) and IT began.

For less then $50 a month I have discovered freedom. I walk in the front door and a smiling face greets me to take away my children for 2 solid hours of peace. Alone. Once my children have been sequestered in a place that rivals any McDonald’s playground I have ever seen, I have my choice of activities. They offer pools, saunas, spas, a full gym including cardio and weights, group fitness classes, a full gymnastics area (where my idea for being able to climb trees originated), a track, basketball courts, Wii’s, and (my favorite) Ultimate Dance Revolution games. It is a cornucopia of stimulation. If you want to exercise they have it all, but if you don’t, they have many other options as well. If I want to just sit and read, they do that. If I want to watch TV, they do that (cable on several large flat screens through out). If I want to shower and get ready for the day without having a child walking in to ask me for food or to fix the TV or computer for them, I can do that. It is bliss. I have 2 hours to do nothing or everything, everyday.

On top of the freedom and peace I have discovered there, more treasures have made themselves known unto me. I have busy kids. In Mesa I didn’t like having to drive all over the planet: Karate here, dance there, it was not worth it. Here, they are all in the same place at the same time. Where? You guessed it. The YMCA. For $120 a month my kids are in Karate, Gymnastics, swimming, dance, soccer, and cheer. Anything and everything you can think of is at the Y. One trip to one place and I don’t have to stay in the room if I don’t want to (or if my kids don’t want me too. I do have a 10 year old).

I have not only satisfied my desire to not clean or unpack my house, I have discovered the perfect way to do it so that my husband can’t even complain about it. I love the YMCA. It has done wonders to make my stay here in Wichita so much more enjoyable then it could be, and I have lost weight to boot.

So you can keep your warm winter days and trips to the park. I choose my fully staffed kids play place and lap pool any day (everyday actually). If any of you would like to pop in and visit I will take you over and show you around. If you are in the mood, I will school you in the beginner footing of either Funky Town or Girls Just Want to Have Fun and join you in a lap around the track (or 2). You might have to stay in a hotel because my house id full of boxes and almost completely uninhabitable but how is that really different form what it was in AZ?

I hope that everyone is doing well and missing us as much as we miss them. Take care and keep in touch.

Ice Skating

We went ice skating with Hawker at the Wichita Ice Center. None of the kids have ever been ice skating before so it was an adventure. The big boys were off as soon as they hit the ice I just wish I had taken a picture of the brusies that appeared the next day). The 2 little ones had to have me and Dan "help" them. I got quite a workout and a sore back (form carring the kid's weight not from falling). I will definately go again.

My girl. Near the end she was out on the ice on her own and she started to get the hang of it.

This one makes me tired but he is so cute. The scab is from a scuffle with his big sister. She won.

One big. One little. All Pink.

Danny in the Mix.

This is how the little ones got around.

This is my intimidating muscle flex pose. I'm scary aren't I?

Semi-Pro.

This is Dan and Trouble. I love this picture because the blury kid on the ground was on his feet when I pushed the button. It is bug man.

I grow them really cute.