The Thomas Family

I. T. O.

2012-01-04T16:00:00.000-08:00

ITO aka Irresponsible Trampoline Owners. We just don't learn. This is our third, yes third, trampoline that we have owned and let get blown away. Glutton for punishment, we are.

The funniest part was the piece of the trampoline base still standing in its place under one of the sandbags we placed there to help prevent this from happening. You can see all the other sandbags just sitting there mocking us as we look at their failed work...

The not so funny part is the smashed corner of our house where the trampoline hit it in mid-air. I love the strong windstorms that we get, but only when something doesn't break or blow away.

The black lung

2012-01-03T16:09:00.000-08:00

Little Miss has pneumonia. Poor thing has been complaining of her side hurting and an earache. Combine that with a wicked cough and a fever and you get a doctors appointment and a prescription for some antibiotics. I'm so thankful we caught it early this time and can hopefully head off the nastiness, last time she was so sick the doctor almost admitted her. Thank heavens for modern medicine!!

Happy New Years

2012-01-01T18:57:00.001-08:00

Here is to a laid back New Year full of joy, love, peace and hope!!

For Bridget

2011-11-25T23:03:00.001-08:00

Two cute!

2010-07-12T22:06:00.000-07:00

My baby girl is toof-less!

4th of July

2010-07-09T17:13:00.001-07:00

We started the 4th of July off with a bang in our house. Poor Avery was up all night long with the pukes, and you know that means Mom is up, too. She said she felt great after a little nap and wanted to go to town for the parade. We had skipped church because she was sick, but we decided to head to the Cedars and see how it went. (all of her cousins had either been sick with this stomach bug already or exposed from siblings, so no one cared. We found out when we got there that Kolby had been up all night with the same thing, poor guy!)

Anyways, the weather was supposed to be pouring down rain and cold, so we were very pleasantly surprised when the sun actually came out just in time for the parade! It was really fun and the kids had a blast collecting hoards of candy that is now sitting on our counter calling my name daily. Here they are waiting for the parade to start:

We went home and everyone took a nap before heading back in for the annual BBQ and fireworks. I think that the kids' favorite part of the holiday is the tradition we have of staying the night in one of the rooms at the lodge. We eat too much food and then lounge around while we wait for it to get dark enough for fireworks.

Alli, Logenn and Avery loved having matching dresses!

It was a great day and Rod just had to finish off the day with a bang. He was up all night with the pukes, and seeing as how he is the LOUDEST puker known to mankind, we were all awake, too. It was super!

Fred

2010-06-25T22:40:00.001-07:00

Tonight Avery made this birthday card for her friend, Bonnie. I laugh every time I look at it...it is just too cute. I love that she is getting so big and can do so many things independently now, even if I do sneak a giggle or two in there when she isn't looking. Who knew that being a good "fred" was so important these days?!

C is for Cruise Ship

2010-05-12T10:40:00.001-07:00

So, it is that time of year again. Cruise ships, tourists, fishing guests, and a long lost husband. I am always so excited and happy for this time of year because the days are longer and we get some nice weather but it also means that I kiss my husband goodbye until fall. If we didn't have kids it would be the perfect arrangement...there would be less laundry, I wouldn't have to cook or clean, I could sleep in and take the occasional nap, and I could drive in my car and not have to listen to The Disappointed Pancake song ever again.

But, we have three of the little stinkers. This means that I get to do all the fun-filled summer activities with the kids while Rod slaves away. I'm thinking that I have the better end of the deal; however, you may want to avoid all contact with me after I venture into a solo camping trip with the rugrats.

I'm just saying.

Baseball!!

2010-04-24T16:11:00.000-07:00

This morning we had our season opener for tee-ball/coach pitch baseball. It was absolutely gorgeous weather and the kids had a blast. Avery and Brock are on the Lake Elsinore Storm team and Ethan is on the Orem Owls (go Utah!!). We are very excited for baseball season to start and to spend some time outside in the nice weather (with crossed fingers that we get nice weather, :)).

Rod

2010-04-20T14:41:00.001-07:00

My husband is just the coolest man out there. He is so talented and just plain handy! Look at what he just built for me:

A little background...I have had the same rickety nail table for over 13 years (which he bought for me back in the day) and it was just dieing a slow, painful death. Rod offered to make me a new table top out of concrete and I jumped at the chance. I bought my drawer units and then we built a template of exactly what I wanted ie size, shape, etc.. I picked the color (charcoal) and then we added the pretty semi-precious stones that you can see mixed in the color. (there is orange, jade green, and some red/wine colored slurry. The black and gray stones are natural aggregates in the concrete)
Needless to say, I love it! It is absolutely stunning and perfect and you would never guess it was made out of concrete. I love that man of mine!!

Oh, if you notice, the walls are completely bare. I painted the walls a dove gray color, but I'm not so sure I love it. The window wall is a pretty eggplant purple and I love that, but the gray just seems so cold to me. I wanted to wait until the table was in place to see how it looked with the wall color, but I still can't decide. I am leaning towards repainting it a warmer color, something like a creamy vanilla. What do you think? I need some guidance, people!

Kauai

2010-04-08T17:33:00.000-07:00

My two favorite quotes from our trip were these:

"Mom! It's sunny here every day!!" and
"Why don't we live here??!!".

I had to giggle at the first statement. My poor kids don't know what it is like to live in a place where the sun shines on a regular basis. When Rod was faced with the second question, he told Ethan that he didn't have a job, so we couldn't live there. After that Ethan tried his hardest to find a new job for Rod. He announced at dinner one night that McDonald's was hiring and why couldn't that be Rod's next big career move??

Anyways, here are some pics of our fabulous, albeit short trip to Kauai.

I don't know if you can see it, but Brock pulled off the poor lizard's tail. He was fascinated by the fact that it was still moving around on its own without being attached to the lizard.

LOVE this picture of my Ethan.

Just a little sand gymnastics!

We had such a fun time and can't wait to get back there again.

Six years ago...

2009-12-15T12:05:00.001-08:00

I looked like this:

Isn't it a beautiful site?!?! I can't believe I was so huge...it truly was a spectacular thing. I was able to stop traffic and people in the stores just by walking around in public.

Anyways, it was all so, so worth it. Look what I got in exchange:

These two are the funniest kids I know. Avery is sassy, bossy, sweet, cuddly, smart, beautiful, and the girliest girl I have ever met. She loves her new jewelry box from grandma and grandpa.

Brock is sweet, tender, silly, happy, tough, loving, and just plain funny. He has the funniest personality and it is hard to put into words just how cute he is. He was so excited to get some new Lego's from grandma and grandpa, too.

I am on my way to deliver cupcakes to their classroom and pick up the last of their presents. I still am in awe that I got two babies at one time and that they are such perfect, sweet kiddos. I have loved every second of being their mom (well, maybe their first year was touch and go)!

Happy Sixth Birthday Brock and Avery!!!

2009-12-14T15:02:00.001-08:00

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

From our house to yours

2009-12-13T17:05:00.000-08:00

I am not sure if I will get Christmas cards done and sent out this year, so consider these pictures your card!! Merry Christmas from us!!

It's great to be eight!

2009-11-23T12:25:00.001-08:00

This weekend I felt old. My first baby was baptized. How did this happen? How did I miss him growing up right before my eyes? Yesterday he was smiling his first dimply smile and saying his first words...all I did was blink and here I am with an eight year old that knows more than I do about tree worms and the life cycles of insects. I hope that I have done my job and that Ethan knows just how much he is loved and treasured.

We love our Ethan and are so proud of him for making the choice to be baptized. It was a perfect day and he felt so special. I am so thankful that I get to have this perfect little smarty pants with me forever.

Don't you love the gum in Brock's mouth?

Pictures, soccer, tooth pulling, etc..

2009-09-20T12:50:00.000-07:00

I have officially entered a new phase of life. I have all three of my children in school, all day long. Kindergarten is the same length of time as the older grades and it is a long day! On the first day of school I picked up the kids and as we were walking out to the car Brock says to me, "Mom, I'm just tired of walking." Poor dude was worn out :). They seem to be getting into a routine of sorts, but they (well, mostly Brock) are still a little shell-shocked for the first few minutes after they get home from their day. They are loving school and having a great time despite the long hours. Ethan is enjoying second grade and loves his teacher. I am fortunate enough that I can go in and spend Friday afternoons helping out in their classrooms. It has been really fun for me to see them in their classroom environment and get a glimpse at another side of them. I just hope that the teachers don't get sick of me

I realized that I was a bit behind in my blogging when I discovered that soccer began and ended since my last post. Ethan was not too into soccer this year and I think that next year he will not be playing again. At his last game he got a speeding soccer ball right in the face causing his teeth to cut open his bottom lip. Poor kid. He mostly did a lot of this at his games:

He would much rather be doing this:

Nothing like a little Pokemon on the sidelines...does anyone even understand the allure of Pokemon??

The twins were in micro soccer this year and I got to be their coach! We had a ton of fun and they were both really aggressive players. Brock thought that sliding around to block the ball was so awesome (like sliding to your base in baseball) and he tried to show off those skills often.

Avery was not afraid of the ball and was always right in there kicking the ball away from the other team. She always had a smile on her face!

Ethan had been complaining that his teeth hurt, but when we investigated and looked in his mouth we couldn't see anything that looked wrong. Finally after a week he came home from school with the right side of his lower jaw swollen and hot to the touch. We headed into the dentist the next morning with the verdict being that he had an abscessed tooth which was infected. Fabulous. We got on a waiting list with the oral surgeon who just happened to be coming to Ketchikan this weekend (He lives in Juneau) and luckily they got us in this morning to pull out that yucky tooth. It was horrible. They gave Ethan laughing gas and then asked me to leave the room. I could hear him screaming all the way in the lobby. After a few minutes the dentist came to tell me that he couldn't work on Ethan because he was freaking out too bad. He wanted to knock him all the way out. I asked if I could come back and talk to Ethan and he let me go back there. I pretty much gave Ethan some tough love and told him that we had no choice but to pull out the "sick" tooth. I held his hands and told the dentist to let 'er rip, which he did among the screams of Ethan. (I realize I sound totally insensitive, but I wasn't at all. Ethan is the kind of kid that does better with a no nonsense type of approach to things and I knew that once it was over he would be fine, and he was) We're home now and he is back to normal watching movies and bossing around Brock and Avery. Here is his tooth:

Look at the size of those roots! You can see the silver filling on the tooth...this is a tooth that had been worked on many times before: a cavity, then a root canal and finally getting abscessed and infected. Ethan has had many teeth issues and we are hoping that his permanent teeth are in better condition. This is one expensive bill for the tooth fairy!

Here are just a few random pictures of the kiddos this summer. Brock loves to ride his big wheel on our deck.

Avery LOVES to paint. Loves it!

Ethan also likes to ride the big wheels on the deck, but he is totally into multi-tasking. Nothing like reading a book while you cruise on your big wheel :).

I think I know some of these people...

2009-09-16T18:56:00.000-07:00

I wasted a good hour on this site today: www.peopleofwalmart.com

I have totally seen many of those people...I can't stop laughing! What goes through someone's head???!!!

Triathlon

2009-08-23T15:36:00.001-07:00

When the idea of participating in a triathlon was first introduced to me, I was extremely hesitant and unsure of the whole thing. I didn't sleep that first night and was plagued with thoughts of doubt and fear. I couldn't understand why my friends thought this was such a great idea and why they didn't cringe at the thought of even attempting this feat! (I later found out that my one friend in particular thought you had a few days to complete each event...after I let her know that it was everything in a row right after each other she was sufficiently scared, too.) I figured that at least there would be six of us Ketchikan girls down there and if I died along the course they could bring my body back home. So, I took the plunge and signed up for the race.

I jumped into training and didn't look back. I use the term "training" loosely because I'm certainly not a professional by any means, but I quit doing general working out and focused on the swimming, biking and running aspects. I'm not a swimmer and that was the scariest part for me, the fact that I was going to be swimming in a lake with thousands of other women. I stuck to it, though, and was able to start shaving time off of my time at the pool. I am also not a runner and anyone who ever sees me running will agree. The biking was not too bad, the worst part was going from your bike to running. Does not feel good at all.

We got to Seattle and we had to rent bikes, rent wetsuits, register for the race and stage our transition area. When we got to the building to register, we were amazed at the huge line that went around two blocks of buildings! Walt Disney would have been proud!

We waited and chatted with a nice woman who had done this race several times before. She eased our fears a little bit and helped us to relax. We got inside and got registered, got our information packets and activated our timing chips. We then had to hunt around for someone to "mark" us with our race number and they also put our age on our left calf. I have never felt so cool.

We went and got our rental items and headed to the park to stage our transition area. When we got there we were totally amazed at the amount of people who were participating in the tri. We later found out that there were 5,500 women who participated (some of them were relay teams)!!! We had some guy take our picture and we were feeling excited and almost giddy.

We racked our bikes and headed downtown to get some dinner and check into our hotel. I didn't sleep very much that night, I was up every 15 minutes checking the clock and having hot and cold flashes. I got sick that morning and was not feeling well at all the morning of the race. (Looking back, I think I had a touch of the flu and not just nerves...I was sick for the rest of the day after the race and Jen had been feeling "off" the day before, too) I forced myself to eat as we rode in our taxi to the park. We were trying to pump each other up and were laughing so hard, I'm sure the taxi driver thought we were loony.

The race actually started at 6:45, but my "wave" wasn't until 7:52 so we were able to watch the swimming for a while before it was our turn. Thankfully I had Jen in my age group, so we waited together and kept each other from running away screaming.

I thought I was prepared to do the swim portion of the race, but it was such a different experience than what I ever thought it would be. This is literally what it was like:

Mass amounts of people kicking, elbowing, splashing and basically trying to not drown themselves but inadvertently drowning you in the process. It. Was. Insane. I tried to stay with Jen but quickly realized it was not going to happen. So, I started kicking back, elbowing back and pretty much getting dirty with the swimming. I swam on top of people, I squeezed in between people when there was only 2 inches of available space, refused to be intimidated and just went for it. I loved it!! I ended up shaving two whole minutes off of my best pool time, so that was really cool.

After the swim you had to run out of the lake, find your transition area (did I mention how freaking far away our area was??!! We were literally the farthest area you could get...right next to the porta potties, which considering my morning wasn't a bad thing!) and gear up for the bike. Shoes and socks on, wetsuit off, tank top on, helmet on, sunglasses on and grab your bike and run it to the road.

The biking was a lot of fun, too. They shut down a portion of freeway and we went on the bridge that goes across Lake Washington (of which we had just conquered in the swim)and through a major tunnel (which inspired some crazy chicks to scream and yell....I'm such a quiet person that I didn't even think about yelling). It was amazing to be out there with so many women.

The running portion was next and I was dreading it. I waited at the transition area for Jen and we took off together from there. They didn't allow you to listen to ipods, so we decided to sing to each other and anyone else around us. We were laughing and singing and talking and having the best time in spite of having areas of our bodies that were numb and tingly. After about one mile we started to feel a little bit better and less numb, but we were also starting to get a little bit tired. Jen pumped me up when I was feeling tired and I did the same for her when she hit her tired moments. I'm just glad we didn't both feel tired at the same time, :). There were race officials and spectators all along the sides of the path and I swear you didn't go more than 10 feet without somebody clapping for you or cheering for you or giving you a high five. It sounds totally cheesy, but man alive it was incredible! We felt invincible and empowered and alive!

Around the 2 1/2 mile mark there was a big hill we had to run up. They had some drummers at the bottom of the hill banging out a great beat and we just dug in and gave it our all! We got to the top and wow, the burn!! Luckily the rest was flat or downhill, so we knew we could do it. We got closer and closer and the crowd got thicker and thicker until we were right at the last little bit. There were hundreds of people there lining the gates cheering for us and yelling inspiring things at us and we both totally got choked up. I am all teary eyed right now just thinking about it. It was truly an amazing experience. I grabbed Jen's hand and we crossed the finish line at the same time, which I'm sure looked as gay as can be, but WE DID IT! They took off our timing chip, gave us a bottle of water and a medal and we were done! I felt like a total bad ass!!

This was truly one of the funnest things I have ever done and I can't wait to do another one. I am so proud of my body for withstanding all of the punishment of training and for it being strong enough to carry me through the race. To have made this goal and then reach it has been awesome. I honestly had doubts that I would be able to do it, but I finished the whole thing and I did it in under two hours! Anyone up for joining us next summer?

Family Pictures

2009-08-17T19:58:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago we were fortunate enough to have our pictures taken by this awesome woman who lives in Seattle. I got the proofs emailed to me tonight and I have to share them. I am flipping out at how stinking cute they are and I want to buy every one of them. So, if you would like to please take a look and tell me your favorites I would really appreciate it. Any help narrowing the choices down is going to help me and quite possibly save my marriage. Rod doesn't appreciate the cost of purchasing such fine photography...he is such a man! Anyways, here is the link:
http://www.shutterboxphotos.com/slideshows/
The password is:
Liz456 (it is case sensitive)
Thanks for looking!!

Ethan Brae

2009-07-20T13:20:00.000-07:00

I just love this kid. He has been saying some of the funniest things lately, and I want to remember them.

The other evening we were driving home and it had been a nice, warm sunny day. When it gets really warm in the day and cools off quickly in the evening, we get fog. Well, we could see the fog rolling in off of the ocean, and the boys were so concerned about it. Here's what I hear from the front seat:

Brock: Look Ethan! The fog is coming in and it is going to get us!

Ethan: I know. I won't even be able to see anything that is a foot in front of me. I read that in a book. Fog can be really dangerous.

~pause~

Ethan: Mom, do you think we will be able to see in the morning to get to Sandy's house?

(she watches my kids when I have nail clients, and the kids love going to her house)

Me: I don't know, Ethan, we'll have to wait and see.

Brock: I don't think it will be gone, Ethan.

Ethan: I still have hope, Brock. I still have hope.

*********************************************************************************

We went for a walk around Ward Lake, and there is this huge tree that fell this past winter in a big storm. Rod took us down to the water and we climbed all around it and walked across the lake on this giant tree trunk. As we were climbing back up to the trail we were looking at the different plants and trees and stuff and Rod was pointing out all of the little holes in the tree trunk we were walking on. Rod asked the kids if they knew what had done that and Ethan gets all exasperated and says, "Duh dad. Woodpeckers!!" Little stinker was completely right! I then start wondering out loud why they poke so many holes and what the purpose it is, and he pipes up again, "They are looking for bugs and tree sap. It's what they eat!" I just stared at him for a minute and he blurts out, "What?!?! I read it in a book!". The kid has the memory of an elephant I tell you. He reads something once, and it sticks.

*********************************************************************************

We were driving by Creek Street and there were some boys fishing off of the bridge. One of the boys obviously had a fish on the line as his pole was bent over and he was reeling as fast as he could. I hear Ethan shout, "WOW! Look, that boy has a fish on the line! I bet it is a moby deck!". Brock mutters, "what the heck is moby deck?" and Ethan tells him, "It's a big whale that you can catch if you're good."

*********************************************************************************

I can't believe my baby is almost 8 years old. It truly blows my mind. He gets funnier and smarter and sweeter every day. I have loved being his mother from the second he was in my arms and I hope I have expressed to him just how much I love his guts.

Brown Bagging it!

2009-07-13T19:14:00.000-07:00

Someone please pass me a brown paper bag to hyperventilate into, I'm drowning up here! I was just informed that I have ONE MONTH until my triathlon. I was certain that I still had at least two months to train, but no it is truly only one month away. Kill me now.

Did I mention that I am working on the dock this summer, too? The job that Rod talked me into is turning out to be a heck of a lot busier than I ever dreamed it would be. I go in at 5 pm each night and I'm lucky if I get home before 1 am. There have been many, many nights when I am driving home at 3 am watching the sky get light for the day. There is something so wrong with that!! My lovely children also don't believe in sleeping in, so I get one great big party in my room every morning when they are up for the day and I have yet to hit that all so important REM sleep. Is it child abuse to force your kids to watch cartoon every morning for an hour??

There is another nail tech here in town that is moving away, and guess what? Yeppers, her clients have been calling me wanting to get in for appointments. You know, in my spare time. I am planning on expanding my nail business this fall when the kiddos are in school all day, but I'm barely able to fit in all my regular clients as it is without adding new ones to the mix. This is such fabulous timing, I say.

I can not remember the last time I vacuumed my house. Or mopped the floor for that matter. My laundry is always 4 loads behind. My kids are lucky if they get a bath every few days. Who shaves their legs, anyways!!??!! Training for a triathlon? Right. Make nutritious meals three times a day for kids...hmmm, cold cereal three times a day is healthy, right? Blogging...what's that?

My. Brain. Might. Explode. Seriously, just kill me now.

This is just for shits and giggles:

The other day I saw this car (not this particular car, but since I don't have a camera this is the lovely image you get) that had the biggest pile of bird poop on it, and I realized it was eagle bird poop. Those eagles don't mess around, I tell you what!

Peace maker

2009-07-02T12:09:00.000-07:00

So, my boys were fighting about something in the backseat of the car the other day, and like always Brock gave in first and let Ethan have his way. This is typical Brock behavior, he is just way more laid nack than the other two. I said to them, "Oh Brock, that was very nice of you. Our little peace maker." Two seconds later I hear from Ethan, "Oh yeah, Brock! Make peace of THIS!!!" As I look back there Ethan is making the ugliest face at Brock that he can possibly manage. If it hadn't been so damn funny I might have been angry at Ethan, but I couldn't help busting out in laughter. Where do they think of these things?

On a side note, I got my camera back from Nikon, unfixed. Apparently it is unable to be fixed and I am just out the $600 I spent on the thing. I am literally sick to my stomach about it. I hadn't even had that camera for a year yet! GRR! So, I am a pictureless blog for a while. I know, it sucks, but get over it.

Home Sweet Home

2009-06-23T12:36:00.000-07:00

There is just nothing that beats coming home. It used to be that I would feel that way when I would head to Utah to visit family and friends...that was my home. I'm not sure when or how it happened, but I am an Alaska girl through and through. There is just something about this place that gets into your blood and you can't get rid of it. It even smells better here. Alaska has been the best thing to happen to me and my little family. I would have never guessed in a million years that I would end up in this little tiny po-dunk town or that I would even, gasp, love it here...but surprisingly, it suits me. We had a fabulous time visiting with my family and friends, and the daily rain showers made me feel like I never even left home, :). I don't even have a single picture to document the visit, my camera is still at the Nikon place getting the salt water out of it!!! Thanks mom for letting us invade your house for a quick week, we miss you guys already!!

Too much!!

2009-06-02T17:47:00.000-07:00

I haven't updated in so long that I feel like there is too much to post about! I guess I can just say that we are done with preschool. Forever! Ethan fell on his bike and scabbed up his face. Summer weather is here and we are spending major time outside playing at the beach and the park. Only three more days of school for Ethan. We head to Utah on Saturday for a week of family fun. I fell on the rocks at the beach today and dropped my camera into the ocean. I'm hoping it will air out and work (crossing my fingers!!). I got sunburned today. I have been able to go on early morning bike rides and runs in the warm sunshine!!
So there you go, a nice and long update with a ton of pictures!

Down the drain

2009-05-17T15:35:00.000-07:00

That is where my money is going. Down the stinkin drain. Apparently it was my new shoes that caused my knees to become injured. The shoes that I spent $125 dollars on and can't return. So, I had to spend another $110 on a different pair of shoes in hopes that I can get my knees to feel better. Piece of crap.

Great news!!

2009-05-07T17:04:00.001-07:00

Piece of crap!! I've injured myself. I have hurt one of my tendons in my knee, and it hurts like no other. I am pretty sure that I have just over-done things with my "training". I have been trying to fit in as many triathlon activities as I can while the weather is nice and it ended up in an injury. I'm not very smart because I kept running on it while it was hurting (I was limping, so I should have known better) and over compensated on my other side which is now sore as well. Sigh.

Ben Gay is my new best friend.

It stinks like an old man.

Sigh.

I am hoping that it will heal fast and that I will be able to get back into being more active. I had just reached the point where I was actually enjoying and looking forward to each days exercise. Yesterday I went to class and did what I could do without hurting my knee. It sucked. I can't run my part of the relay in this weekend's half marathon. I can't bike. I can't walk without it hurting. I am swimming tonight, so hopefully that will not hurt, too. Does anyone have experience with knee pain? Any advice??

Our week

2009-05-03T22:48:00.001-07:00

Kind of a modge podge group of pics to show off our week of summer weather we just enjoyed...

Ethan got to ride to school on Dad's motorcycle. He thought he was too cool.

We had a weenie roast at grandma and grandpa's house with all the cousins.

I love the above picture! Ethan grabbed the bag of marshmallows and he and Kate were eating them as fast as they could get them in their mouths!!

Kite night at Ethan's school. The weather could not have been better!

Of course, the rain is back but after a week like this last one, no complaints will be coming from our house. Secretly I am almost relieved when the rain comes back. I feel like we have to be outside squeezing each and every last drop of sunshine into our lives while we can...and the house pretty much goes to crap in a blender. When we are forced back indoors I tend to get caught up on the household stuff.

As a side note, I just have to admit that my second long bike ride was not as bad as the first one...I didn't feel as violated after it. I did get a flat tire and have to walk my bike the last mile, but I could walk, so it's all good :).

Sunshine

2009-04-29T21:53:00.001-07:00

We have had the most glorious weather the past few days. Simply gorgeous! It has been sunny with no clouds in the sky and high 60's. It was up to 70 this afternoon! This is summer time weather for us, to get it in April is rare. So, we have been soaking it up as much as we can. Avery and Brock came inside tonight and I took one look at their mangy feet and had to take a picture. It looked a lot worse in real life, but you kind of get the idea of just how filthy they were! this is the sign of a great day, if you ask me.

With all of this incredible weather I have been outside trying to get in some actual triathlon training (not on a treadmill or a stationary bike) and it has been fabulous to run and bike along the oceanfront. I truly live in a unique, breathtakingly beautiful place. Where else could I watch seals play in the water as I jog along on the path?

I just have to say it, though....the bike and I are not friends. I hate the damn thing! Why do people do that to themselves on purpose? I like being outdoors and doing something active, don't get me wrong, but when you can't sit down for three days after there is something not right about that. I even bought a memory foam seat pad for the seat but it isn't working. A friend told me that if I rode enough I would get used to the friction and develop calluses.

Shudder.

I'm not quite sure what is worse, the being repeatedly violated by my bike seat or developing calluses down there. I still don't know if I even believe her. Calluses? There?? Really???

Grandpa's Airplane

2009-04-26T21:56:00.001-07:00

Last week Grandpa went to school with Brock and Avery as their special guest.

He brought his book and read it to the class. Avery had been counting down the days until he could go with them, and she was dancing in her seat while he was there. They pretty much think their grandpa is a super-star and love telling their friends all about his book.

Whenever the kids (not just our kids, all of his grandkids got in on it) would see a float plane fly by, they would point and shout, "There goes Grandpa!!" It didn't matter if it was him or not, they just knew it was! Anyways, for some reason or another he decided to write a children's book about that. We all shook our heads and mumbled under our breath that he was losing his mind a little bit, but it actually turned out to be extremely well done.

As luck would have it, we have a long time fishing guest who has been an illustrator for Disney for many, many years. (in fact, I am pretty sure he has retired) Of course he wanted to do the art work and so he and his artist daughter took the script and made it come to life. The pictures in this book are just so amazing. They show many, many aspects of Alaska's beautiful scenery as well as bring the airplane and other characters to life. My kids can't get enough of it!

If anyone is ever looking for a great "Alaskan" type of gift, this book is seriously great! It tells a lot about what these kind of airplanes are used for and how our way of life is different here due to the lack of roads within our island communities. If you ever want one, let me know and I can have him send a personalized one with his autograph inside it, too.

I'll quit with the infomercial now but it really is a fabulous book.

Spring!!

2009-04-23T10:17:00.000-07:00

I know Spring is finally here, and the picture above is how I know. Skunk cabbage!! Once we start seeing this we know that spring has sprung. It is a huge plant and has the odor of a skunk.

It is one of the things that the bears eat when they come out of hibernation, so we will start seeing bears sometime soon, too. Every year we have had a mama bear and one or two cubs with her, so we always wait excitedly to see if she returns. Happy Spring!!

I am so dead...

2009-04-16T12:13:00.001-07:00

This little nugget of oh so helpful information is on the course information sheet of my triathalon:

"This is a particularly narrow and technical part of the course. Participants should expect a short, difficult S-curved assent midway on the course requiring good bike handling skills.".

Yeah, I have skills alright!! Bike handling ones? Um yeah, not a chance. I was thinking that the ability to ride a two wheeler was all I needed! Apparently this is serious business to some people.

I might just go hide under the covers of my bed. Eeek!

Family Night

2009-04-14T10:24:00.001-07:00

When Rod and I were in Mexico we bought our kids some cheap little plastic toys that are Batman, Spiderman, and Barbie wanna be's attached to parachutes. They are hysterical to look at because they are so poorly made...poor Barbie has no neck and Spiderman looks a little tie-dyed because the blue and red colors are running into each other. Oh well, the kids were excited.

Anyways, last night there was some wind and no rain, so we headed out to try to fly these super hero's (and Barbie). Ethan got his helmet on for you know, just in case. Whatever, dude.

We tried to fly them at the school track, but there wasn't enough wind there so we went to the beach instead. We only got one up and flying

so we just explored and walked around for a while.

We skipped rocks...

we found shells...

and we had a great time together as a family.

Isn't he yummy?

Easter

2009-04-12T22:25:00.001-07:00

We had a fabulous Easter weekend here; the kids had a ton of fun! Yesterday we had two egg hunts: one indoor one at the mall where they use mass amounts of shredded paper for the "grass",

and the second one done by a couple in our ward at the church. It was pouring down rain, so much so that I didn't even get my camera out of the car! I was afraid it would get ruined by all the moisture. Needless to say, the kids (and most of the adults) were soaked after a few short minutes of running around in the rain. They didn't seem to care...I suppose it is just like every day normal to them. Isn't that sad? After hitting up the local Mickey-D's we headed home to color eggs. I didn't take any pictures of that either because I was constantly trying to avoid spillage at all costs. My OCD takes out all of the fun!!

This morning the kids had a blast finding eggs.

Of course, there were lots of these buggers...

followed by extreme jump-roping stunts fueled by the sugary goodness such nasty treats provide. I still don't understand the appeal of such grossness.

We went to church and then had the Sunday afternoon power naps that are tradition. The sun decided to bless us with its appearance, so we decided to take all of our plastic eggs to grandma and grandpa's house to hide outside for all the cousins.

We stuck some dollars in a few of the eggs and the kids were so excited to try and find the "golden eggs"! Avery was one of the lucky ones!

The kids had a blast and it was just pure bliss to have the kids be able to play outside for a couple of hours in the sunshine!

Peter Piper's Pecker?

2009-04-08T21:43:00.000-07:00

So, we were over at Rod's parents house the other night and Ethan was reading a book that has nursery rhymes and tongue twisters and all sorts of other great things in it. All of a sudden he starts loudly yelling out the Peter Piper rhyme, but instead of pickled peppers, Peter Piper had a pickled pecker! We were laughing so hard! My mother in law and I couldn't catch our breath, it was so hilarious. Ethan, the poor dude, had no idea that we were laughing at him so he kept saying it over and over again making us laugh even harder.

Cabo San Lucas

2009-04-04T17:47:00.000-07:00

What do you say about a little slice of heaven on earth? Our trip was just fabulous. Fabulous, I say. We slept in (how pathetic is it that we now consider sleeping until 9:00 sleeping in??) every day, meandered down to the beach when we felt like it, had the same fabulous waiter, Guillermo, every day, read some books, listened to music, swam in the ocean, ate some great food, napped, swam some more, bought Mexican wares from the locals wandering the beach, and soaked up the sun. It doesn't get any better than that.
We did go fishing one day, and it was actually a lot of fun. Rod hates to fish (he considers it to be more work) and I was afraid of getting seasick, which I did, but it was fantastic. It was sunny and gorgeous and after I got some seasick medicine in me I was having a blast. We fished for hours and hours and caught nothing (pretty sure that Rod is a bad luck charm for fishing) but we were lounging on the boat and just enjoying each others company and the great weather. The captain hauled butt to a spot and when we looked at the water, it looked like it was boiling. We were in the middle of a huge school of porpoises (they look and act like dolphins) and they were playing with the boat wake and flipping out all around us. Jen and I went out onto the bow of the boat and we were so close and were getting splashed by them, it was so cool! There were some flying fish that the porpoises were chasing, and that was one the the coolest things we saw by far. They really do fly above the water!
After a while we started to head back to the marina, with no fish to show for our day, when the captain spots a marlin! Again, he hauls butt over there and they throw out a line with a live mackerel on it and WHAM he bites. Jen hauled that huge fish in for at least 30 minutes, it put up a fight! We could see it jumping out of the water as it got closer and once it was finally in the boat we were amazed at how beautiful and huge it was! They sent us home with a piece of the fish and we took it to a restaurant where they cooked it four different ways. Rod and I ate at Hard Rock, we are so adventurous!! Brian and Jen said it was great, though...we'll take their word for it.
We spent another day at the very tip of the Baja peninsula...one side is the Sea of Cortes and the other is the Pacific Ocean. The pacific side has these huge waves and in all of about 5 seconds I was tossed back into the beach with sand in places that I shouldn't have it in. I took that as a hint and sat with Jen to watch the guys get beat down. We went back to the mellow side (called Lover's Beach) and took turns snorkeling around the rocks. We saw a huge eel swimming, tons of colorful fish, and an octopus eating a lobster! It's pretty amazing that there is a whole other world under the water.
Other than that, we laid on the beach and did a whole lot of nothing! I can't imagine a better vacation, except one in which I lose three pounds instead of gain three!! Good friends, sunny days at the beach, doing whatever we want whenever we want to....Ahh, life is good. I even got to come home with a little bit of a sun tan, my favorite souvenir!
~Once I get pics from Brian and Jen I'll post them. They had the camera on this trip!

Home Crappy Home

2009-04-01T18:13:00.000-07:00

We got back yesterday and woke up this morning to 4 inches of snow. I am still on siesta and not digging this crap weather. Snow!!

Bliss is going to Mexico with the love of your life. Yum.

2009-03-23T08:57:00.000-07:00

Happy Anniversary to Us!

2009-03-18T16:26:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow Rod and I will celebrate our TEN year wedding anniversary! Holy crap, it has flown by. I still have a hard time believing I am in my thirties, that I have three kids, and that I am now in the double digits of married years. I am just so happy that I married Rod and that we can laugh every day and enjoy being married to each other. My fun anniversary day consists of Grand Jury Duty bright and early tomorrow morning, :). Should be grand.
The kids are on Spring Break this week and we have gotten a butt load of snow. It is March for crying in the night! I was hoping we could go outside to ride bikes or explore at the beach, but it is not in the cards for us. They have been sledding a little bit, but I think they are just as over this winter weather as I am. They all wanted to have a sleepover in Ethan's room the other night and I thought it was just so sweet with them all squished in one bed.

Freight Train

2009-03-13T21:48:00.000-07:00

My kids all have colds and I went into to check on Brock (he usually gets it the worst of them all) and he is snoring like an old man! It seriously sounds like a freight train, LOL! I had to get the video camera to record him for a minute, it is too funny.

Booger wall and other nonsense.

2009-03-08T15:41:00.000-07:00

I was helping Ethan make his bed yesterday and I happened to glance at the wall above his pillows and I see all these spots there. I get really close and feel them with my hand when it dawns on me...it's his booger spot!! I asked him if he was wiping his boogers on the wall and he sheepishly admitted that he had staked a claim there on the wall each night. Gross!
I think something is very wrong with Avery. I am not joking when I say this, but her breath smells like something crawled into the back of her throat and died. Died!! It is the foulest most awful smell wafting out of her mouth every time she speaks, I literally dry heave if she gets too close to me. She is getting over a cold, so maybe there is a booger wall in the back of her throat? Whatever it is, it needs to crawl on out of there and vacate. It is so bad, words truly do not describe how bad it is.
Somehow my kids have gotten a hold of an entire stack of Pokeman cards. Ethan says that his friends at school keep giving them to him, but I am thinking that maybe this is where his lunch money has been disappearing to?! Regardless of how they came to be at our house, I am a little shocked at just how much quiet play time they have provided my boys. Hours. They will sit and quietly (did I say how quiet they are??) play with these cards until it is bed time or dinner time or whatever time. Had I known that these cards had some sort of magic in them I would have had them in the house long ago. I'm sure, like anything else, they will lose their luster and sparkle one day but for now I am loving the quiet time.
I have been "training" 6 days a week, and I use the term train loosely. I go to a fitness class 3-4 times a week that is cardio and sculpting and then I also do triathlon specific exercises the other 2-3 days. Can I just say that riding a bike sucks eggs! How does one go about riding a bike and then walk normally for the next few days? I was numb in places that you don't want numbness to occur unless you are the recipient of an epidural! This is going to be the hardest part for me, riding the bike. I can do the swimming and the running just fine, but my special parts are begging for a reprieve from the torture device AKA the bike. Too much information? You bet. However, this blog is mainly for me and my memories and I want to remember the good, the bad as well as the ugly parts. When I become the winner of the Tour de France in a few years, I want to be able to look back and remember that there was a point in my life when I beat the formidable bike into submission and that I accomplished my goals.
Yes, I am a dork.

I miss my mom.

2009-03-03T17:28:00.000-08:00

I usually do OK with the whole living away from all of my family and pretty much all of civilization thing, but after having my mom here for a few days I am feeling less than enthused about my living situation. I miss my family. I hate that my kids don't get to play with their cousins who live far away (but thank heavens they have cousins who live here to play with, that would just be awful if we had no family here at all). I really miss my mom. It was so fabulous to have her here with us for a few days, we just enjoyed having her with us while we did our every day things. She got really sick for a few days and had to rest, but other than that it was great. Thanks for coming all the way up here to the boonies, Mom! We love and miss your guts!

Sunday funnies

2009-02-22T22:33:00.000-08:00

Just some funnies that have happened in the last few days...

I keep catching Avery playing with her dolls and talking with a British accent. It is absolutley hysterical! She won't do it if I ask her to, but if she thinks I can't hear her she starts spouting out the accent like it's going out of style.

Brock is totally into doing his own hair lately. Mostly to his own detriment. Seriously, could he make it look more goofy? If I try to "fix" it for him he gets his feel-bads hurt so I mostly leave it. Last night he was brushing his teeth in just his undies and I hear all of this grunting coming from the bathroom. I look in there and he is flexing his muscles and checking himself out in the mirror. He was turning around to get a good view of each and every angle, it was adorable. Even if his undies were pulled up way past his belly button. Can you say moose knuckle?

Ethan thinks that wearing all one color at a time is seriously the coolest thing ever. Yesterday he put on his grey sweats, grey socks and grey velour sweatshirt (which he fondly refers to as his seal fur...I thought he was just saying silver in a weird way, but he meant seal fur) and asked me how I liked the color of the day. It's OK until he tries to wear 18 different shades of green together and is resembling the swamp thing. As long as he is happy, right?

My mom is coming for a visit on Tuesday and I can not wait! The one thing I hate about living here is the fact that I don't get to see my family very much. This last space of time has been one of the longest I have gone without a visit and we are just so looking forward to her coming up here.

So sad.

2009-02-19T17:31:00.000-08:00

I got a note home from school today that said Ethan was caught cheating on his spelling test this afternoon. I am just so stinking sad! He is in first grade for crying out loud! The crappy thing is is that he knows his words, I can't figure out why he thought he needed to cheat. I told him how sad I was and he told me, "I just feel so guilty".
I thought this kind of stuff was far off in the distance for us, what first grader knows how to cheat?! These are the days that I don't love being a parent. sigh. My precious, sweet, amazing son is doomed to live a very boring life for the next few days. The real bugger is that I am the one who will suffer the most.

Bite. Chew. Swallow.

2009-02-10T15:15:00.001-08:00

I may have completely lost my mind. I know that I have definetly bitten off more than I can chew, so to speak. Today I signed up to do the SheRox Seattle Triathalon in August. I'm freaking out a little bit and I am also giddily excited and thrilled to actually accomplish something like this. There are a bunch of us from here going to Seattle to do this tri, so it really is going to be fun...a lot of work, but fun.
I'm sure that I will have days that I feel discouraged and defeated, but I am hoping to push through it. (this is where positive comments are very welcome and possibly needed, please)
I can't wipe the smile off of my face. :)

Happy Birthday Rod

2009-01-27T17:53:00.001-08:00

Happy birthday to my little nugget, Rod. (do you recognize the show?)
Due to severe not-thinking-it-was-funny-at-all from my not very happy birthday boy, picture has been removed. Blah

So, apparently I'm fat!

2009-01-19T18:08:00.001-08:00

So, one of my nail clients today tells me that I would just look "spectacular" if I lost 20 pounds. Fabulous.

So, I went and bought one of these:

So, I thought about shedding a tear or two, but then I just got pissed. I know that I'm not the thinnest person on the planet, but I don't think I am so very overweight that it warrants unsolicited "advice".
Also, I had been saving Christmas and nail money to buy this particular elliptical...this comment just helped me move my big butt a little faster to the store.

Dancing Queen and Cousins

2009-01-16T19:22:00.000-08:00

Our local high school drill team had a Saturday workshop where they taught the girls some military arm positions, did some fun games, and taught them a dance that they later performed to all of the parents. Of course, Avery had to do it. I was so apprehensive to just drop her off for the day...it took me a good 20 minutes of standing by the door watching her before I left. She was happy as a lark, it was totally me that had a hard time with it. She had a fantastic time and was not one bit pleased when it was over. She loved all of the dancing and the high school girls all seemed to love her to pieces. After the girls did their performance, which was entirely too cute, they handed out a blue ribbon along with a medal to one girl from each age group who did really well. Miss Avery got the ribbon for her age group, and she thought she was in heaven!! I guess that I need to start thinking about dance classes seeing as how she has been talking about how fabulous it was since then.

Here are all of the friends and cousins afterwards...believe it or not this was the best shot of the bunch.

Showing me her blue ribbon and medal.

Doing the military arm positions for the parents. Last night they performed again during the half time show for the boys basketball game and she had a blast. I just can't get over how confident and exuberant my kiddos are. Truly, they have no fear! there was an entire gymnasium filled with people and Av didn't bat an eyelash at the thought of shaking her booty in front of them all!

OH! I forgot to add the best part! When it came time for them to perform, Avery was out there moving all the other girls out of the way so that she was front and center, :). I'm not sure whether that is endearing or not. Hilarious it is for sure.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Carter has been staying with us for the last week while R & L are out of town. My boys get upset if he doesn't sleep with them, so we had him alternating rooms each night. Last night when I went into Brock's room to check on them, this is what I found.

Aren't they the cutest things ever??

F. U. N. K.

2009-01-12T20:03:00.000-08:00

I am in a total FUNK lately. The funk of forty thousand years. Funky Cold Medina funk. Won't you take me to Funky Town funk. Obviously it is bad if I am quoting 80's music lyrics to demonstrate how funky I feel. I don't know if is the constant gray rainy weather, or the post holiday crash or what, but it sucks. Like, funky sucks. It helps that funky is pretty much the substandard "normal" around these northern parts, so at least I am in good company. All I know is that I need to SNAP out of it!!

Snow banks

2009-01-07T21:51:00.001-08:00

Here are a couple of pictures for my mom. She still thinks I got married and moved to the most po-dunk, hick, middle of nowhere, backwards, pointless town.

So far we have had an actual Alaskan winter! We don't usually get too much snow as we are right on the coast. Just lots and lots and lots of rain. If we do get some snow, it is usually melted within a day or two...we don't get snow that sticks around for days or weeks and we don't get huge snow storms that dump mass amounts of snow either. This year we have had both massive snow storms that have basically shut down the entire island as well as having it stick around for almost a month now. Because we are so terribly prepared for the huge amount of snow we have received, there are huge parking lots filled with mountains of snow as well as a mountain of snow in the center lane of our main road. It is a bit adventurous to drive...you almost feel like you are going down the luge...or like you are being chased by the abominable (sp?) snow monster.

These are of the huge snow mountain/pile of snow in the Safeway parking lot. Can you tell how big it is compared to the big van?

Here are some pictures I took while driving the luge. I know, I am one of those drivers who takes pictures while driving!!

You can't even see over the snow to see the other side of the street unless you are driving a monster truck! The best part is seeing people try to cross the street...and therefore trying to climb mount Everest in the middle of the road. Not pretty in the least. If you have to turn around you have to drive clear to the other end of town to reach a break in the snow. Yes, smart people are in charge of snow removal here.

Snowed in

2008-12-29T13:12:00.001-08:00

We are 100% snowed in at our house. I have never in the ten years that I have lived here seen this much snow at one time. It is insane! Yesterday church was canceled, the grocery store was closed, the snow plows didn't even plow the highway (we have one main road that goes from one end of the island to the other...there is no other road) until the afternoon and we have over three feet on our deck. The lovely snow plow idiots left a huge snow berm at the entrance to our subdivision that is at least 3-4 feet high and if you don't have a big truck, you are not making it through. As it is, Rod has to get going about 25 mph and then we baja it risking life and limb just to get out onto the road. In town the snowplows push all the snow into the middle of the road as opposed to pushing it off to the sides. There is a ton of street parking and they have always plowed any snow we get that way...so there is now 6 foot tall snow mountains in the middle of the street. It is really bizarre.

It is simply gorgeous but I hate that I am stuck at home due to the fact that I don't have four wheel drive. That makes me bonkers. The kids and I are about to go nutso from cabin fever. The snow is supposed to continue all week long with no end in sight. At least I can bundle them up and force them outside to play for a while, right?

The day after

2008-12-26T12:05:00.001-08:00

My house looks and feels like a bomb went off inside of it. Either that or Santa puked Christmas all over the place. If you factor in the horrible smell coming from the laundry room, it's fabulous all around. Did you know that when you clean up spilled milk with a dish towel that you should not, I repeat should NOT, leave the towel in the bottom of the hamper for a few days? Yeah, tragic error on my part.

Our Christmas was absolutely perfect. We got about a foot of snow on Christmas Eve and then Christmas day was sunny and clear. It was spectacular! Today we are getting slammed with snow again, so we are home bound for the day (I don't have 4-wheel drive and Rod is working). Maybe I will get my house clean?!

The kids got more presents than they know what to do with and I am left with the distinct challenge of finding homes for the new toys...as well as homes for all the old toys that are planning to run away in the night.

Carter got his own 4-wheeler from Santa and he took Brock for a ride. I am pretty sure that the pink helmet weighed too much for Brock...look at the poor dude. He can hardly keep his head on his body :).

My nerd. This is what he did while his brother and sister ravaged through presents. He just loves to read. He gets in trouble at night for not going to bed, he stays up late reading constantly. I love that he is so into books, reading takes you anywhere you want!

Our holiday was fabulous and I can't believe it is over already. I missed my family terribly but thank heavens for cell phones and free long distance!!

White Christmas Eve

2008-12-24T22:31:00.000-08:00

This is what we woke up to this morning. Our own winter wonderland. I don't remember the last time we had an actual white Christmas here...it is always gray and wet. We are certainly thankful for the beautiful snow and landscape that surrounds us.
The kids were outside for hours today playing in the snow and sledding. I feel like I have finally reached a huge milestone...they went outside and played by themselves! I got to stay in the warm kitchen and bake and talk on the phone with my mom while they got rid of mass amounts of energy. Heavenly.

Here are my excited kiddos in their I believe in Santa sweatshirts their auntie got them.
They got to open their traditional pajama's on Christmas Eve from Grandma and Grandpa Thomas.

I love how the lights look like they are glowing inside of the snow. It is still snowy and peaceful all around us. Merry Christmas!!

Santa and Singing

2008-12-21T16:57:00.000-08:00

On Saturday we went to see the "real" Santa at the mall. We had seen another Santa at our ward Christmas Party, but my kids could tell he wasn't the real one. Something about his beard that kept falling off.... Anyways, Mrs Claus was there, too and they were so great with the kids and my three were totally thrilled that the real guy had come down to our town at this busy time.

After we wandered the mall for five minutes (this is the amount of time it takes to wander our "mall") we dropped the kids off at the baby sitter's house while the adults all got together to do our annual Sub-for-Santa. We had a ton of fun and got some great things that will hopefully ease some of the holiday stress for some people.

We picked up our kids and headed out to Saxman, a city inside of Ketchikan that is mainly Native inhabitants, for the Monthly Grind. Once a month they hold this evening of music and songs where local talent can have a chance to perform on stage in front of whoever decides to go. It is held in the Native tribal house, so there are all sorts of cool carvings and things to look at. A woman we know was in charge of organizing this month's grind, and she asked me if my kids would perform. My kids, as many of you know first hand, are not shy. They dig being up on stage and relish the moment in the spotlight. So, of course I agreed.

There was bagpipes, a blues band and a group of bell ringers that all went before us and my kids were begging to get their turn. I am guessing that there was 200-250 people there, so it was kind of a big group. My kids marched right on up there and sang "What a Wonderful World" as well as "Jingle Bells". I think that they stole the show, but I might be a bit biased.

This isn't the greatest picture, but the dang mic's were right in front of them and I never did get a great shot of them. There were some great comical moments during their performance like when Ethan started to pick his nose while singing. He also yawned mid-sentence.
Avery kept trying to tell me something when the band was playing and I could not hear what she was trying to say. I had to keep telling her to say it louder because the music was so loud and we were in the second row. Finally she yelled as loud as she could, "THE BEAVER TOTEM POLES HAVE HEADS FOR THEIR PENIS'S!!!!!". I am very sure that the people sitting next to us (and probably anyone within three rows of us, too) appreciated her comment. However, take a look-sie...she was right!!

Five

2008-12-16T09:57:00.000-08:00

I can not get over it. My babies are no longer babies. They are pretty much self-sufficient. They have opinions on what they want to wear, how to do their hair, what they do and don't like for dinner, what their favorite color is and what the rules are according to them. They are now little people with personality galore and spunk and a light in their eyes that warms an entire room. I am so blessed to be able to call them mine and I hope that they know how much I treasure them and love them (all three of them).

When I first found out I was having twins (at 7 weeks) I started giggling hysterically and mumbling, "oh my gosh" over and over under my breath. I may have made the doctor a little nervous. I had been having dreams for the few weeks prior to my ultrasound that we were going to have twins, but actually seeing two babies on the screen just rocked my world. Shock. I was, however, extremely excited and nervous at the same time. I worried that I wouldn't be able to carry them full term and that we would end up in Seattle or they wouldn't make it. Living in a tiny community can put the fear of all that is good into your body. I was definitely being watched and blessed from above, because I had a flawless pregnancy that resulted in two healthy babies. Brock weighed 7 pounds 9 ounces and Avery was 7 pounds even. They were positively huge for twins...Brock was bigger than Ethan was when he was born. At the end of my pregnancy I was bigger around that I was tall...I was over 63 inches around. Seriously. I lost over 60 pounds in the two weeks after having them and that threw my body completely out of whack. My back and hips were so used to carrying such a heavy load that when it was suddenly gone, everything shifted. I was so out of alignment that walking caused extreme pain for a while. My body did some amazing things and for that I am very grateful.

Having twins is not like anything else in this world. Unless you have had twins, you really just don't get it. Most people think that they know so much more about twins than you do, and they are so not afraid to let you know. I got the, "are they identical?" question a ton. Don't you think that they would stop to think about that first? "Who is older?" is another great one...like it matters?! "Boy, you sure have your hands full!" while people watched me struggle in and out of places, with no offer of help became my favorite. I still get that hands full comment almost daily. My plea to you all is to NEVER say to someone that they have their hands full, they are probably aware of that fact. I got asked all sorts of fertility questions from people I had never seen before, like I was going to talk sperm with strangers?? I have learned that people are strange and if given the opportunity, they will say some doozies. No censorship.

Having twins has been such a wonderful and hard experience at the same time. I feel like I am finally at the point of really enjoying them and their individual selves, while at the beginning it was all about survival and making it through the day in one piece. I love them so very much and am so thankful that I am their mom.

OK, so I'm freaking out a little bit.

2008-12-14T22:17:00.000-08:00

My babies are going to be five tomorrow and I am just sick to my stomach about it. Five years ago I looked like this:

Try not to be too jealous. If any of you ever feel like you were huge when you are pregnant, just take a good, long look. It's a marvel.

I had been out shopping the night before for a sub-for-Santa we were doing and had gotten many comments and dumbstruck looks from everyone I passed. I remember thinking about how excited I was that my c-section was only a week away and that I could hardly wait to meet my two little ones. I wasn't too uncomfortable and I never really got miserable. Apparently I looked like I was because people told me all the time that I looked miserable. Let me tell you something, being pregnant makes people think that you want to hear all of their advice, suggestions, and random thoughts about whatever...but having twin babies with you makes it even worse (more on that tomorrow).

Anyways, we were at my in-laws house for Sunday dinner and I had a couple of contractions and started to notice the time at each one. I was having them every 15 minutes so I decided to call the doctor. I was told to go to the hospital to be checked out and I thought I was going to pee my pants because I was so excited...and because I had two very large babies kicking my bladder. We got there and I was indeed contracting regularly. I wasn't dilating very much so they decided to give me some sleeping pills and do my c-section in the morning. Baby A (Avery) was footling breech and Brock was head down. Their chins interlocked together and I was told that they were positioned in the most dangerous position of all for a vaginal delivery. (I was going to have a c-section anyways, due to having Ethan by c-section)

I couldn't sleep I was so excited. I had daydreams of who or what my babies would look like, whether they would have hair, how much they weighed, whether they were ready to be born yet (I was only 37 1/2 weeks along, but considered full term for twins), if the surgery would go OK, etc. etc.. I had no idea what was in store for us. Poor Ethan. The poor dude was barely 2 and WHAM his life was turned upside down. I still can't believe I had twins.

I'll write more tomorrow about their birthday and my thoughts. I just can't get over the fact that my babies are going to be FIVE. Five. sigh

Shop til you drop

2008-12-12T11:42:00.000-08:00

That was our motto this last weekend, and we stuck to it. I love, love, love Seattle. Every few hours I would announce to everybody, "I've said it before, but I could live here". Seriously, I love that place.
We didn't really do a whole lot other than shop all day long, eat every once in a while, go to late movies, and spend money like it was going out of style. What could possibly be better?? This is my type of vacation. If you could have seen the condo we were staying in you would have died. It looked like Santa threw up all over the place. Take 6 women who are shopping like crazy and pile up all their shopping bags and boxes and you get total mayhem. We literally were stepping over crap all weekend long.
I got almost all my shopping done, I had to get a few things online yesterday, but other than that I'm finished. It is all great and dandy until my pallet of stuff gets here on the barge and I have to wrap it all. I am such a procrastinator and always end up in a wrapping frenzy at the last minute.
My highlight of the trip was searching for Candy Cane Lane ( a little street that has been decorating their houses and street since 1949) and after getting lost several times, getting trashed from the passengers about my driving, and finally finding the place....it was not open yet. We missed it by a few days. You would have thought we would have checked to see when it started, but apparently we were all too excited.
Anyways, we had a great time and not a single picture was taken.
I still want to live there.

Seattle

2008-12-04T10:40:00.000-08:00

In the morning I am jumping on the plane and heading to Seattle for a long weekend. I am so excited to get away for a few days, you would think I had won the lottery or something. There are six of us going (Two of my SIL's and three close friends) and we are just going to play and shop and eat and shop some more! I haven't done any Christmas shopping yet, I've been saving it up for our marathon shopping trip. WOOHOO! What do you think my chances are of getting some sunny weather down there??!!

Good morning, Sunshine!

2008-12-02T13:26:00.001-08:00

The first thing I saw this morning when I opened my eyes was this:

It was way more vibrant and bright when I woke up but I lazed around in bed for a few minutes staring at it before I braved the freezing cold deck to take a picture. How many people get to see the sunrise from their bed?

He's ba-ack!

2008-11-30T21:40:00.000-08:00

Our freakishly scary elf "friend" is back. I can't say I'm thrilled because the dude is a bit freaky looking. I might even say that he could induce nightmares. I won't complain, though, because if his constant mad-eyed stare helps to keep my kids in line for a month then I am all for it! Stare away you weird midget elf man!!!!!

If you haven't heard of Elf on a Shelf, click here.

Gobble gobble!

2008-11-29T19:49:00.000-08:00

We had our annual Thanksgiving weekend at Silverking Lodge. As usual, we had entirely too much fun and ate way too much. I felt like I was a teenager again staying up until 2:30 in the morning laughing and hanging out with friends. It was fabulous until the kids woke us up at 7:00 the next morning and then we stumbled out to the main lodge and pretended to be great parents until we were fully awake. There were over 50 of us this year and I think that the kids numbered 27 or 28, so it was really loud and crazy all of the time. We had a Wii, Christmas movies, candy galore, tons of games, chips and dips, the shoot-out,

walks on the boardwalk, lots of weed...=> (I'm totally kidding, it just looks like we're stoned or something )
and many more fun memories. The kids had a great time and are having a hard time adjusting to real life now that we are home. They can't figure out why they aren't allowed to eat mass amounts of candy all the time ,watch endless tv, and basically do whatever they want whenever they want. I can't seem to get it together...I feel like a slug and can't get going. I am pretty positive I overdid it.

I am so thankful for my family up here and for the wonderful traditions we have. I look forward to this trip all year long and it never fails to be an unforgettable time. My in-laws are pretty fantastic to offer the lodge every year, but I also think they know that they might be lynched if they tried to change anything!

Most of all, I'm thankful for my family and my incredible husband. He is so amazingly talented and the best thing that ever happened to me. I enjoy his company so much and love that we can still be goofy together and laugh until we cry. Thanks for making my life a little slice of heaven, Rod...I love your guts!

Part deux and C

2008-11-25T21:21:00.001-08:00

Ethonius lost two more teeth tonight! Poor dude was in the tub and was trying to open the shampoo bottle. With his teeth. It didn't really work out that well. His other bottom one came right out and Rod helped the upper one along after he got out. I admit I don't really love the missing teeth look on kids, but it is fun to see him be so excited and hear him saying letter sounds to himself to see if there is really a difference in how they sound with out certain teeth.

And no, the shampoo bottle didn't even open after all that work!

This picture cracks me up, he just looks so frantic!! He was freaking out a little bit after Rod pulled out his second tooth.

Par-tay!

2008-11-23T16:11:00.000-08:00

Last night Rod and I went to see the new James Bond movie, yummy, and then we went to our gay hooker party. I am so immature, I literally giggle every time I say that or write it. I think it is hysterical. The scary part? Gai Hooker is a friend of ours. It is honestly her name.

She works at Safeway (the manager I think?) and her daughter is a friend of Rod's and they grew up together (and even made out a few times, my husband is such a hussy). Anyways, she is from Australia and decided to get her citizenship after being here for over 30 years. She even got to vote in this years election...what a historical election to be a part of for the first time! We see her and visit with her every time we are at the store (which is almost every day to get my Diet Pepsi fix...and to see my Latin lover) and my kids absolutely adore her.

The fact that I like her so much does not prevent me from wondering what the hell was she thinking? Seriously, American Gai Hooker Party!?!? The funny part of her whole name thing, besides when she is paged over the intercom at Safeway "Gai Hooker, you have a phone call" or "Gai Hooker, we need you up front", is the fact that she has since divorced her husband that gave her the fortunate last name of Hooker. She didn't change her name! I asked her why once (I know, but I couldn't stop myself! I had to know!) and she told me that she didn't see the point. She said that it is a great conversation starter...yeah, I bet it is! Funny lady. Anyways, we stopped by for just a few minutes and had a nice time. I was a little disappointed that there weren't any hookers there...

****************************************************************************

Avery hates to wear tights and socks. Hates it. So, I found some leg warmers the other day and bought them thinking she might like the idea of keeping her legs warm without wearing socks/tights. Oh my goodness, the girls digs them!! And seriously, could she be any cuter in them? I am thinking Santa may need to get her a couple more pairs seeing as how she has worn them every day this week!!

You're it!!

2008-11-19T14:12:00.000-08:00

So, I was tagged and am actually bored enough to follow through with it. 6 random things about me:
1~ I think that Ranch dressing (homemade, of course) should be it's own food. It makes everything taste better.
2~ I have a concealed firearms permit and I really, really like to go to the shooting range and shoot. I also really look forward to our Thanksgiving shoot-out contest we have very Thanksgiving morning out at our lodge. I'm usually out in the first round, but I still love it!
3~ I'm a little bit selfish about some things. For example, I feel like Rod should share all his money he makes, even if it is an extra odd job that he does at night. However, I never share my money I make from doing nails and am absolutely appalled if he even suggests it. I don't know why, but for some reason I'm weird like that.
4~ I dropped the f-bomb in front of my kids last week. All three were there to witness the pounding of the last nail in my coffin that will take me straight to Hell.
5~ I love sugar. I try to quit eating it all the time and I just can't do it. I have no self-control. I am destined to be chubby forever, I think.
6~ I told Rod yesterday that I needed to get a job. Being a stay-at-home mom is not my forte, I'm afraid. I was half kidding but sometimes I wonder why in the world I was trusted to be the mom to three kids...my patience, well lack of patience, is not my strong point.

Lightbulb

2008-11-15T14:58:00.000-08:00

Do you ever have those moments when normal things suddenly strike you as odd? I was driving downtown this afternoon and had one of those moments. I was looking at the glorious sunshine that had mysteriously appeared and noted that it would be a pretty sunset in about an hour. Then I looked at my clock in the car and saw that it was 12:45 pm. Then I thought to myself, that is really strange. The sun doesn't rise in the East and set in the West like it did in Utah. I actually live in Alaska. ALASKA!!!!
I have lived here for around ten years, yet it still strikes me as the most foreign, random thing ever. The sun actually changes course all year round here and it is just so odd. In the summer months it rises behind our house, moves to the front of the house, and then moves to the back of our house again before finally setting (like a big horseshoe). In the winter I can watch the sunrise and sunset from the same window in my house (It just comes up like a little half circle...it never even reaches the top of the sky). We catch our water that we use for everything. If our water tank runs out, we have to buy water. I thought Rod was pulling my leg forever about this.
Maybe I get these feelings because I never in a million years would have guessed that this is where I would end up...or maybe everyone has these moments. It seems as though life just keeps on going and every once in a while my brain pipes up and says, "Excuse me! Did you know that you have three children now and life is going to never be the same and you live in a little tiny island in Alaska and you have been married for ten years and you will never be as skinny as you were in high school and wow people ask the most strange questions and freeways are scary to drive on after driving here and I think I might be getting wrinkles and who said that it was neat to live in BFE?!?!?". It's the craziest feeling. Am I the only one??

************************************************************************************

This is completely unrelated, but I have to write it down lest I forget the awesomeness that it is. We're at the grocery store the other day and Brock yells out to Ethan, "I love PUSS! I want to be Puss!!". Yes, it is true. I am sure everyone thought I was teaching sex ed to my kids via pornos, but they were simply arguing about who they were going to pick to play on the Shrek video game later that day. Brock wanted to be Puss in Boots. He loves Puss.
I'm not sure how long I have to wait before I am allowed to set my foot back into the store without being maimed and publicly stoned.

Doin' the robot!

2008-11-12T17:48:00.000-08:00

I go to pick up the twinners from preschool today and I am met by loud, bumpin Christian Rock music (they go to a private Catholic preschool). I peer into their room, and there are 15 or so kids all dancing their little hearts out and singing as loud as humanly possible,
"Every move I make, I make for you, you make me move Jesus!!".
As they are belting out the song they are doing the Robot...as in the 80's suave dance move robot. Freaking hilarious!!
Add in hip thrusts at inopportune times, swaying jazz hands, and voices reaching decibels that should not be reached by humans and you get a fun time to be had by all.

Seven Years Ago Today....

2008-11-06T10:21:00.000-08:00

I was about to deliver my first little love nugget. I had 22 hours of labor (with no epidural! They don't have them here), pushed for two hours, and finally ended up with a c-section. The little dude wanted to come out his own way, I guess. I remember being wheeled back into my hospital room after the surgery and there was Rod holding a screaming Ethan. I started bawling and he handed me my beautiful baby. They had bathed him already and he had the most perfect round head I had ever seen. We counted toes and fingers, discovered dimples, and just were humbled by our own piece of heaven in our arms.

As a baby Ethan was a pure delight. He slept through the night by 7 weeks and was always so happy. I was always being approached by strangers to comment on how beautiful he was. I relished being a mom, something that I wasn't sure I had wanted to be until I married Rod. He made being his mom easy almost, it was never a burden, just pure happiness.

Ethan is such a sweet boy. His major love is video games and reading. He loves his brother and sister, minus the choking episode last night, and is usually a great helper. He makes my world brighter and I love hearing the thoughts that he shares with me. The last few days he has been a puppy when I pick him up from school and I love that he is using his imagination and not afraid of being himself. He doesn't care what others think of him and he tries really hard to be a good friend to everyone. When I drop him off at school there are dozens of kids who stop to say hi to Ethan; he makes friends easily.

Happy Birthday Ethan Brae!! We love you!

Ethan got to open one present this morning and he chose the one from my mom and Rob. Can you see how flippin excited he is?? This was the one thing he wanted and has been asking for... you made his day, Mom!!

Jack-O-Lantern

2008-11-05T14:13:00.000-08:00

I can't believe I forgot to post this. Sorry Mom! Anyways, Ethan lost his very first tooth last Wednesday. The kid is going to be seven years old tomorrow (gulp!) and is just starting this fun new phase. He had loosened this tooth up while we were at Disneyland by chewing on a sucker stick and had been wiggling it for a while. Finally it was barely hanging on there so I yanked it out for him. Aren't I super helpful? After the bleeding stopped, Ethan forgave me and was really excited to put his tooth under his pillow. In the morning he ran into our room filled with glee yelling that the tooth fairy really came!! I love that they believe in magic still.

Daylight Suckings

2008-11-03T21:37:00.000-08:00

OK, I admit it. I hate daylight savings. Before I moved to the Final Frontier, it didn't bother me so much, but after moving to my lovely, fabulous, spectacular town I started to get annoyed at every fall-time daylight savings time change. Yeah, it gives us an extra hour of "light" in the mornings, but you know what? I prefer to sleep through that hour of so called "light"! I would much rather have it NOT be completely dark by 4:00 pm, thank you very much. Add in some occasional, ahem...I mean daily, rain with dark clouds, and you just might not get any real "light" all fetching day! Did I mention I hate daylight suckings?!?!

Halloween

2008-10-31T22:20:00.000-07:00

I. Can't. Stop. Eating. All. My. Kids. Candy. My kids are in bed and I am rummaging their sacks to pick out the best stuff. They'll never know, right?
We actually had a fabulous Halloween here. Usually October and November are really bad months weather wise, so we are always expecting the worst. Surprisingly, there was no rain tonight! HOORAY! The forecast called for rain and strong winds, but all we got were the winds. We went to a local Trunk-or-Treat and that took a whole whopping five minutes, so Leah and I took the kids to Jackson Street. Every year the police block off vehicle access to this street and the whole town fills the road. I really feel for the poor people who live there, they must spend hundreds of dollars on candy. Which I can't stop eating. Anyways, it was really fun to let the kids run and not have to worry about them running into the street. They loved it.
There were a couple of moments in the beginning when Brock would not leave my side because he was terrified that there was "things" out to get him. Seriously, I think he was permanently traumatized from that blasted haunted house in California. We have ruined our poor, poor kid.

Remember baby Kate?? Here she is in all her fat glory as the cutest mouse ever. Look at the double chin!!
Trick-or-treating on Jackson Street.
All the kids and cousins at Ethan's school.
Leaving the Trunk-or-treat. Wasn't it so nice of Rod to get all dressed up as a homeless person?? Spooky vampires Ethan and Carter. Would you believe Carter is 6 months younger than Ethan?? I seriously think Rod and Russell are not related...one of them has got to be adopted.

Halloween Party/Pumpkins

2008-10-30T10:21:00.001-07:00

Last night we had a little Halloween party at our church. The kids have been begging and pleading to wear their costumes anywhere and everywhere, so they were thrilled to finally get to put them on. We had lots of fun playing all of the games and trick or treating...I'm tempted to skip over real trick or treating tomorrow, it is supposed to, wait for it, rain!! I'm sure we will suffer through it for a little while. Anyways, here is my vampire, bat and kitty.

A few pictures from our pumpkin carving.

Trip

2008-10-29T22:16:00.000-07:00

So, there is a slide show with a peek into our epic trip, put your feet up, it may take you a while to get through it all.
We had the best time! It was three weeks of pure fun! We had a couple of days in Utah before we headed to Powell and I got to see some of my cousins, aunts, uncles, grandparents, friends, etc, etc.. It was great to see everyone and get to visit with you all, thanks for making the effort to see us!
We drove down to the Lake and got there in the middle of the night, so we slept on the houseboat in its dry-dock. The week on the lake was fabulous. We got two days of cool, rainy weather but we're used to that! We even had our own little flash flood on the second day of rain. My mom spotted it just as it was beginning, so we got to see the whole thing, and it was really cool! I can see why people get swept away and hurt or killed, that water comes fast and hard. We were all dumb enough to play in it and ride our tubes down the canyon on the water...oh wait, only I was so dumb, oops!
The kids played in the sand and water every day and only Ethan (out of our three) really swam. The water was a bit cool, so the twinners just mostly waded in it. We tubed, jet-skiid (sp?), went wake boarding and skiing (I held the flag! woo.), went exploring, ate entirely too much crap, laughed until we couldn't laugh any longer and just basically had the greatest time ever. Usually when Rod and I are down in Utah we are the ones on vacation and everyone else still has real life to attend to (I know...how rude!!) so it was blissful to have everyone be on vacation and hanging out together. I realized that I really, really like being with my family. Not that I didn't know that before, but this was the first time we had vacationed together, every single one of us, in a really long time and I forgot how much I love to spend time with them all. All the kids had so much fun together and they all got along amazingly well. It was truly a perfect trip (minus the generator breaking down).
After Lake Powell, we had just a couple of days before we were off to California. I crammed in as much shopping as humanly possible, had lunch with Becky and Tiffany, did mass amounts of laundry and sent a couple of boxes home. Then, we were off!
We went to San Diego first and went to Sea World on our first day. So fun! The kids loved seeing all the amazing wildlife we have up here in K-town up close and personal. They were touching everything they could and loved all the shows we went to. I thought I might die of heat stroke, but amazingly survived on the $4 bottles of water they had there. (I am convinced that California has a scam involving the drinking fountain water at the amusement parks...it is like they salt it and then heat it up before piping it to the drinking fountains...you drink it once and then you don't bat an eye when you spend $24 a day buying bottles of water. I know they do it on purpose.) I teared up a little bit at the Shamu show...the music and the majestic whales and the movie they show on the screens is just too much, LOL! Rod's favorite part was the Budweiser horses. We always have to see the dang horses whenever we are at any Busch Garden's park. He is afraid of horses, though, so it is really quite funny.
The second day we went to the Wild Animal Park which is run by the San Diego Zoo. It was OK. Not fabulous, just OK. After we left there we drove back up to LA, passing one of the major fires they had while we were there. It was pretty neat to watch the planes and helicopters flying from the ocean (picking up water) to the fires, dumping their contents.
We hit Universal Studios the next day and right out of the box made a major, major mistake. Right inside the doors they had this "House of Horrors" haunted house with different movie paraphernalia and other scary stuff. Ethan and Kolby both want to go. Are they sure? Yes!! OK. Brock now wants to go. We see signs that say, "Not recommended for children under the age of 13". Yeah, they went. Avery chickened out so we waited outside the exit for them. Five minutes later three screaming, crying kids and three giggling adults come barreling out the door. Yes, my poor boys (and Kolby, too) were completely terrified. This made the next four days pretty miserable for everyone. They did NOT want to go on any other ride after that. They were convinced that everything was that scary and horrible. The rest of the day was spent with the adults forcing the shell-shocked kids onto rides and telling them, "You're going to go on this ride and you're going to like it!!". We're a bunch of sadists, I tell you what.
Disneyland was the next destination for the two following days and again, we had to push the kids onto Space Mountain and the Matterhorn and the Teacups, all the while trying not to laugh hysterically at their terrified screaming. After Space Mountain Avery was trying not to cry and she was saying "Mom! It was really fun" with a trembling chin and tears rolling down her cheeks. It might sound horrible of us, but they really did have fun. After the first day there they really got into the rides and were begging to go on all of them again.
Avery was in heaven in the fairy tale land. When she saw her first princess she was wringing her hands together and muttering Oh! Oh! to herself over and over again. I think she almost had a stroke. We finally peeled her away from there and hit all the different rides and areas. We stayed for the parade on the second night and it was a blast! All the planning and work that goes into all of that is just mind-blowing. I think the adults appreciated all of the sights as much as the kids did!
Our last day we went to Knotts Berry Farm, and there were no lines there at all. We waited in line to get our tickets longer that any of the rides, it was awesome! The kids were really into all of the Snoopy rides and roller coasters and the adults were all having a blast screaming and flying through the air on the big kid rides.
Before we headed off to the airport, we met Lindsay for breakfast and got to meet miss Sophie. It's too bad she's so ugly. Poor thing. Anyways, Lindsay lets us know that our hotel was smack in the middle of Korea town...nice. That little tid-bit helped make some of our week make more sense. :) We also met up with my grandparents for dinner one evening. They hadn't met our kids, so it was so neat to visit with them and catch up on everything. I think the kids may have worn them out...just the noise level was something else.
We had a fantastic time and I am loving that our kids are older now and that we can go on family vacations and enjoy them! We had to wait for our shrimps to be tall enough for the rides (heck, there were two year olds riding the rides...my poor kiddos are so short!), but it was nice that they walked everywhere and were old enough to enjoy it all. This trip was such a success, we may just do it again next year!

Pics

2008-10-29T22:14:00.000-07:00

test

2008-10-27T22:38:00.000-07:00

I have been trying to get my pictures uploaded from our trip...I got a new camera and am having technical difficulties (well, user difficulties).

Well, hello Angie!! I miss you! And your little kids, too!

I guess me getting it to work means an update is in order....tomorrow!

We're out!

2008-09-28T10:29:00.000-07:00

So we're leaving on a jet plane! We're headed to SLC for a couple of days, then Lake Powell for a week of houseboat bliss (with my entire immediate family...so fun!),

one day back in SLC, then to Cali for a week of Disneyland sweetness.
The kids have been counting down the days and now that it is time to get all my crap together and go, I'm scrambling. Typical procrastinator, that is what I am. See you on the flipside!

Whales, Fishies and Roe. Oh My!!

2008-09-25T18:08:00.000-07:00

I commented on my cousins blog the other day that I hate running. In any form. HATE it!! It is not fun and it is certainly not pretty...for me and anyone else who is unfortunate enough to witness the act. I loathe it. BUT, I do it. I hate every second of it, but I still do it. This morning, it was gorgeous outside, so off I went.
I was chugging along and I couldn't help but feel a ginormous amount of love for this beautiful place I call home. I passed by a fish ladder and stopped for a moment to enjoy the fish climbing their way back to their birth place. The salmon themselves were nasty and dark and humped, but in the pools of the ladder I could see the roe glimmering bright orange as it swirled in the current. The vibrant color almost glowed against the dark ocean floor. It is absolutely amazing to me that every salmon, at the end of their life cycle, makes their way back to the exact creek, stream, lake, etc. that they came from. Incredible.

As I continued jogging on the newly paved jogging/bike path, I could feel the breeze rolling off of the ocean. It smelled like salt and brine and the earth. The sun glittered and danced across the ripples of water. How cool is it that I can be inches away from both the ocean as well as the dense forest?! I couldn't stop grinning, and that did not help me to look any more "normal". I am sure that people passing by thought I was looney-tunes.
Then on my way back home, I see a mama and baby humpback whale putting on a show that is both rare and spectacular. They were breeching

and they were rolling over smacking their massive fins against the water.
It was spectacular! I haven't seen whales this active since I worked on The Love Boat. Seriously, it went on and on and on for over 20 minutes! I can't even describe how awesome it was. I finally rounded the corner to the house and lost sight of the show, but I had to get back to get kids off to school. I could have stayed and watched them for hours. They are amazing creatures and nothing can compare to their massive size.
The man that married Rod and I said an interesting thing during the ceremony. He said that he thinks of Ketchikan as "God's thumbprint on Earth". Some days I think the man has lost his marbles, but other days, like today, I can see exactly what he was talking about. There is something to be said about living in a place as special as K-town. Most days I don't "get it", but on the days that I do, I would not trade my life here for anything. It's priceless.

007

2008-09-24T15:38:00.000-07:00

Ethan is really into spy stuff and mysteries lately. He reads a ton of mystery chapter books and all that jazz. On Sunday we were out for a drive and Ethan randomly asks me, "Mom? Did you read anything suspicious in the newspaper yesterday?". I could barely answer him I was laughing so hard. He then says, "You need to let me know if you do find anything suspicious because I can solve the mystery!!". Love this age!!

2008-09-17T13:55:00.000-07:00

I have to just say that I am not creeped out by my Filipino lover of sorts. He isn't creepy...he's just goofy. I am not uncomfortable when he winks at me or smiles that snaggle-toothed smile that I have grown so fond of, if anything I am trying to not laugh at the absurdity of it all. I mean really, can he not think of anything more appropriate than "my baby"? LOL! He isn't a dirty old man, I think.

And just so you can get a glimpse into my life of attracting the weird and odd...this afternoon I was at McDonald's with Avery and Brock. I look over and there sits a local woman who has mental handicaps. She was in a bad accident years ago and is now a little, ahem, odd. She is very kind and is always happy and offering a smile along with a bad joke. I usually chat with her for a few minutes when I see her (at the grocery store, McDonald's, etc.). Anyways I ask her how she is doing and she says, "Wet!". Well, it is pouring down rain, so I automatically assume that she means that she got wet outside in the rain so I say, "Yeah, it's pretty wet out there." To which she replies, "No. I wet my pants this morning and my pants are still really wet." What the hell do you say to that? I am not making fun of her at all, bless her heart. But when someone yells accross the restaurant that she peed herself earlier that day, is the proper response "me too!" or "that stinks (literally)" or my uttered "Oh. Um...I'm sorry?". I continued to smile and nod my head as she proceeded to tell me that it has been over a year since she had her last accident and that she hopes her pants dry out soon.

Ramblings...

2008-09-16T21:21:00.000-07:00

Why is it that no matter how you eat it, Cap'n Crunch always tears up the roof of your mouth?! It doesn't matter to the Cap'n whether you are eating his regular crunch or his berries or his peanut butter crunch. It never fails that afterwards you are left running your tongue along your tattered palette feeling the inevitable hanging pieces of torn flesh. What is the stuff made of, anyways?

Can someone tell me why, oh why, the little Filipino man at the Safeway deli keeps calling me "baby"? The first time I heard it I brushed it off as a tic or a sign of tourettes or something equally excusable. The second time I smiled politley back at him and walked off with my cup the soda fountain (yes, like all addicts, I am off the wagon and loving my Diet Pepsi again. We were never meant to be apart for long). Now, I am not quite sure how to handle it. This afternoon I go in to get my "fix" (aka Big Gulps in the real world), and he rushes to the cash register and says in a deeply accented voice, "Hi, my baby" all the while he is trying his hardest to be super-suave like and then he smiles at me. He's missing a few teeth in vital areas and he was wiggling his tongue through the holes. Yummy.

Indian Summer

2008-09-07T15:38:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we had the perfect fall day, and when I say fall I do mean autumn. Living this far north ensures early autumns, long winters, and late springs. We treasure our short summer months and bottle up the sunshine we usually get to save for the rest of the year. Yesterday was sublime. The sun was shining through the cool, crisp air while the leaves were starting to fall. Ethan had a soccer game (and we played the most ghetto team ever!! Seriously, who dyes their 5 year old's hair green?!) and then we were off to the beach for exploring. We beachcombed for a while and found crabs, fishies and treasures.
Brock is very serious about hunting crabs. He kept pulling the poor things out of their shells. Gross.
Ethan playing on the breakwater...he took off his soccer cleats and was dipping his toes into the ocean.
There is a little "island" of woods that juts out from the beach that is so stinking fun. There are all sorts of paths and trees and great places to play and hide.

I can see how your imagination could run wild there...the kids absolutley love playing there. My only concern is that there could be a total lester hiding out in there, so I usually head on over with them.

We soaked up the sun and headed home to jump on the trampoline and grab some food. Add in an ice cream run and a drive with Dad and it ends a perfect day.

2008-09-07T00:06:00.000-07:00

I am a true dork. I love these kinds of things. I saw this on a friend's blog, and of course had to go on over and take the quiz. I have always thought that I had a little 80's stuck inside me that will not fade away, and now I know it is a fact of my 80's lovin' life! Picture me in my bitchin' Camaro with my crazy 80's afro hair blasting Cruel Summer...wait, wasn't that yesterday??!! ;) Um, she kind of looks like me. Freaky, no?

You Belong in 1980

Wild, over the top, and just a little bit cheesy. You're colorful at night - and successful during the day.

Someone's sleepy

2008-08-30T21:19:00.000-07:00

I had quite a lovely afternoon today. We had soccer this morning and then went and took a picnic lunch to Rod and hung out for a while. Surprisingly, it was not raining and we were able to sit outside while the kids played with their cousins for a while. The kids and I came home and they were really, really good. I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop, but they were getting along so great and playing together. The boys had already cleaned their rooms, but Avery was still working on hers. The boys were playing Chutes and Ladders and I couldn't hear anything coming from Avery's room. I went to see what she was doing because as all parents know, when it gets quiet something is definitely not right ;). Look what I found in the hallway!

My little miss sound asleep on the carpet! I don't think any of my kids have ever done anything like this and I just think it is too funny. I especially love her smooshed lips and cheeks. Precious.
I picked her up and layed her down in her bed, but as soon as I did that she sat right up and wanted to get right back to playing. sigh. I guess I should have just let her sleep in the hall comfortable or not!

Good for you, Alaska!

2008-08-29T12:39:00.000-07:00

Check this out!! I have to say it, I am flabbergasted but also excited and anxious to see what the future brings not only for our country but now for my state, too. I think Gov Palin has done a great job for our state thus far and think that McCain made a pretty smart decision in choosing his running-mate. What do you think??

First Grade!

2008-08-28T15:04:00.001-07:00

Sniff. My baby is in the first grade. Officially. I am not quite sure why this is harder for me than Kindergarten was, but I am really feeling sad about this!! I suppose that when they are in Kindergarten they are still protected and babied a little bit....but this morning I felt like I was throwing him into the path of an oncoming truck. I know, a little dramatic, but I can't help it. He has Carter in his class and Aunt Nae is his teacher, so I know he will do beautifully and have a fantastic year.

sniff.

Ethan and Carter in front of the school. Can you believe that Ethan is six months older? I think Carter is probably a good 5 inches taller and outweighs Ethan by at least 15-20 pounds. Our poor kids don't stand a chance to be anything but shorty's.
Isn't their school so cute? It is only 3 years old and less than 2 miles from our house.

Boys

2008-08-26T13:11:00.000-07:00

Brock: Huge, snarky, snotty sniffle.
Me: Do you need a tissue, Brock?
Brock: No thank you, I just wiped it on my shirt (as he proceeds to smear snot all over his once clean shirt sleeve).
Me: Hmm.
Brock: Or I can just sniff it all the way up. Another huge sniffle ensues.
Me: ......
Brock: Mom? I'm sorry that I wiped my nose on your bed. You can snuggle with me tonight if you want to.

Lovely.

I can't really blame the poor kid, he's feeling pretty rotten. He has a virus that causes cold sores all over his tongue, the inside of his mouth and cheeks, and all down his throat. Add to this a rash on his butt and you have the makings for a crappy few days. Avery has it as well, but not nearly as bad. Poor babies.

Boring Saturday blues

2008-08-23T19:52:00.000-07:00

It is the kind of day that makes you want to never leave the comfort and warmth of your bed. We went to our soccer game, got haircuts, went school supply shopping and then spent our afternoon twiddling our thumbs and watching movies. I am ready for school to start and get back into an actual routine. I had such high hopes for a wonderful sun-filled summer and am feeling blue that it never happened. This is the first summer that I did not go to Utah to visit, thinking that I would rather stay here for the good summer weather.

Living in Ketchikan has been an adjustment on many levels, tolerating s**tty weather being a major one. Normally I am OK with all the rain, as I know that summer is usually gorgeous and sunny and a time to dry out and actually enjoy this unique place we call home...but alas, we were stiffed this year! So, now I am so over it and just want it to actually be September so that I can politely excuse the weather as just crappy fall storms. Typical, drenching, cold, windy fall weather.

If you want to see something depressing, check out thishttp://www.wunderground.com/cgi-bin/findweather/getForecast?query=99901 loveliness that is my weather forecast. Make sure not to miss the entire weeks worth of upcoming rain!!

If you want to laugh at the expense of other idiots, check this out http://cakewrecks.blogspot.com/. I am not sure why this is so hysterically funny to me, but I admit to laughing until I almost peed.

~If anyone has a second, can you fill me in on how to do a link where there is a word that you click and not the entire link sitting there? I don't even know what it is called, but by golly, I want to figure it out!! (don't make fun of the computer retarded)

HOORAY!

2008-08-21T21:19:00.001-07:00

Today I got this beauty in the mail:

When I opened the box I heard bells ringing and angels singing! I can not wait to use it tomorrow. WOOHOO!

~By the way, it is a fancy schmancy wheat grinder.

FAIL!

2008-08-20T15:41:00.000-07:00

Have you ever seen this fail blog? Oh my heavens, I have been laughing hysterically at some of these! Be prepared to waste some time laughing your butt off... http://failblog.org/

Soccer mom and Birthday Parties

2008-08-17T15:29:00.000-07:00

I signed Ethan up for soccer this year, and don't ask me how it quite went down, but I ended up being the coach. Of the whole team. Maybe this doesn't sound funny or odd, but it is so NOT me. I didn't even know the difference between offense and defense (in any given sport) until I was a cheerleader in high school. Even then, it took all of football season and some of basketball season for the concept to sink in. This is why I liked wrestling.

I knew that the soccer league here was all volunteer based, but come on! We're scraping the bottom of the barrel here with me as a coach, and I can easily admit my lack of soccer super-star skills. Really the only thing going for me is two things: they gave me an instructional video on how to coach (seriously), and the kids are 5 and 6 years old and are almost as clueless as me.

We have had two games now, and I have to say...I am actually loving every minute of it! We have so much fun and these kids are hysterical! I even had a parent from the other team come up to me after Saturday's game and tell me that I was doing a fabulous job of coaching! At first I thought she was kidding around, but after I gave her a look that must have said, "Please don't tease me about my slacker soccer abilities" she squeezed my arm and said she truly meant that I was great. Apparently I really am a soccer super-star in disguise!!

After our game we went out on the boat with Brian and Jen to go to Vallenar Bay. Our friends have a cabin out there and their daughter and her two friends were having a combined birthday party.

It was a blast! The bugs were eating us alive for a while, but I think we coated ourselves with so much bug spray that they eventually went elsewhere for some fresh meat. We ate, visited, beach-combed and laughed all evening. The kids got to hit a pinata (Ethan was the muscle that finally burst Hannah Montana's bubble, I mean pinata)

and ate entirely way too much junk.

Who needs utensils??

I love the fact that we can take a boat out onto the ocean and within 15 minutes all civilization is gone. I live in a truly spectacular place...even if we are having the single most crappy, rainy, cold, miserable summer ever!!

A blurry shot of the cabin as we were leaving.
Avery, Brock, and Carter on the boat ride back home.
Leaving nature to go back to real life.

I like the way you work it.....

2008-08-13T19:40:00.001-07:00

So, I got a new ipod and I have been importing each and every CD I own into my itunes. It has been interesting to see all the different types of music I have. I have the ones that make me cringe (Kriss Kross, Color me Badd, Vanilla Ice, Milli Vanilli, etc), I have tons of the 80's CD's (which I love, so don't knock them!!), more NOW! CD's than I would like to admit (seriously, they're good!), along with many other different genres. This afternoon I played the song No Diggity from my college days. Oh. My. Gosh. I was dancing around and doubling over with laughter at the same time. If you know the story behind that song, then you know that there is no explanation necessary. All I can say is, What the hell was he thinking??!!

Summer came...and went!

2008-08-11T20:37:00.000-07:00

Last week we had summer. It was what summer should be but hasn't this year. Rod tells me that this is the absolute worst summer he can ever recall. It's been rough. Well, last week we had a change in weather, and it was spectacular! It was in the 70's (which feels a heck of a lot warmer with our high humidity) and blue skies and all around perfect. We tried to fit all of our outdoor summer plans in that short time, because we knew the rains were a comin.

The weekend was our town's annual Blueberry Festival. Fried foods, cotton candy, blueberry anything and everything, slug races, handmade goodies and wares, live music, and games for the kids. It was a great day.

On Monday night we went out to Clover Pass to have a bonfire on the beach. Check out Brock...he is my very own personal Pigpen. The kid is always dirty. Always.
The kids were all fighting over a certain stick. I guess this stick was just too cool or something because all the kids decided that it was theirs. They were trying to make "fire sticks" so that they could light their way into the forest. It made me remember hours spent poking at the huge bonfires we would have at our cabin in the Unitas when I was a kid. My cousins and I would spend hours in the woods "tree branch knocking" and running wild. I am so thankful that my kids live in a place that enables them to play in the woods and run wild every day, if they wanted to. I think they prefer the not-very-wild-stay-indoors-and-dry days when it is raining, though. Some of my family was here, so we visited with them for a bit and then headed home for much needed baths. On Tuesday, Rod took his once a summer six-hours-off-in-a-row (because a full day off would be sacrilege) time and we headed up to the lake. We took the two jet-skis and had a blast! There was not a single soul up there and we played hard. The kids loved riding the jet-skis, but they had even more fun playing with the salamanders we found and kept for the afternoon. Avery kept calling them "meat-eaters" and "scalmadders", making me giggle.

Check out Brock's wind-blown look!

Trips to the beach and the park followed throughout the week, and we are still recovering from all our play time.

The rains have returned, and eerily enough, I am relieved. I feel such urgency when it is sunny to get outside and do everything. I don't spend any time on my house or chores of any sort. My focus is on getting everything needed for a day of outdoor fun and squeezing each and every drop of daylight time into our days. Now I can sit back and relax...and maybe get something done around my house.

For my cousins...

2008-08-06T21:36:00.000-07:00

Just so you gals can see that we are forcing your good guys to work for their fish, lol!! We had them put a new roof on a house we bought at a foreclosure auction last week...they didn't know they were going to end up working while on vacation!!! If you note, Uncle Mark isn't in this picture....the poor guy was still nailing shingles while everyone else had a dinner break. Thanks guys!!

What the crap?

2008-08-04T14:49:00.001-07:00

Yes, I do believe the sun does exist!! We have a few days of sunshine to soak up and I have some family in town to do some major fishing...pictures to come!

Flashback

2008-07-23T15:51:00.000-07:00

Do you ever have a moment in time when something (sound, smell, scene, etc) small hits you smack in the face and takes you back in time? I was driving into town the other day and I was listening to our local am radio station (yes, we are that cool) when the song "Strut" by Sheena Easton came on. Does anyone even remember Sheena E?? How could you forget?! I mean, da-yum! Look at that hair!!

I was instantly back in middle school and shopping at Raspberry Records across the street from the Cottonwood Mall. It was the first cassette I ever bought myself. I was so happy and excited to be grown up enough to buy a tape, and Sheena Easton at that! I remember listening to it for hours and standing in our backyard making up dances to Strut in the summer evenings. I would do my moves and then run over to the tape player to rewind the cassette back to the beginning of the song. By the time I got it back to the right place, my dance moves had changed and were different each run through. Looking back, I wonder if my parents thought I was a little bit crazy. Seriously. Who spends hours making up dances that include all sorts of Jazz hands and hip thrusts by themselves?! Hours!! Scary thing is, I would probably do the same thing now if I had the time.

Haircut

2008-07-18T19:57:00.000-07:00

Little Miss got herself a haircut! She and I had a girls date this afternoon and went to get cuts. Of course, she was thrilled to be at the salon and was having a blast. She ran straight to Angela yelling her name and jumping into her arms. I don't get that type of warm reception...what gives? Anyways, she wanted to chop it off, so we did. I took a couple before shots so you can see how blah it was. I had let it air-dry so Angela could see her natural wave (yeah, my curly hair went to one of my boys!). I think she looks adorable and so grown up! I can't for the life of me figure out what happened to my babies. sigh

Memories

2008-07-17T17:30:00.000-07:00

As a comment on my blog, leave one memory that you and I had together. It doesn't matter if you knew me a little or a lot, anything you remember! Next, re-post these instructions on your blog and see how many people leave a memory about you (if you already haven't). It's actually pretty funny to see the responses. If you leave a memory about me, I'll assume you're playing the game and I'll come to your blog and leave one about you.

Alaskan summer

2008-07-16T13:51:00.001-07:00

The summer here has been crap. We have been to the beach 3 times, and two of those times were token beach visits because it was too cold to really enjoy ourselves. Rain, wind and cool temperatures have been the norm for us thus far, and it is mid-July. Autumn starts here earlier than the lower 48, so summer better get moving on up here. Seriously. I can't take it anymore. So, in my effort to get over it and be cheerful I made my kids get dressed up (in sweatshirts and boots, nonetheless) and we headed out to pick berries. Surprise! We actually had a great time! We found tons of salmonberries
and a few blueberries and huckleberries. Even though it is in the 50's, being out in the forest picking salmonberries sure makes it feel like summertime. Brock ate his weight in berries this afternoon, so I am sure this evening he and the bathroom will be close friends.
As we were out picking berries, I was noticing all the fireweed
everywhere. I love this flower, herb actually (who knew?), and it says summer to me as well. They can get to be 8 feet tall, and when their blooms reach to the tip of the flower locals say that means that summer is reaching its end. It is gorgeous and wild and everywhere. Love it!
Another thing I love about summer here is the cruise ships. When they are leaving Ketchikan, they drive right in front of my house, and I love watching them slip by with our rugged landscape as the backdrop.
They are so huge and majestic and are a wonder to see...they are massive! The engineering of those ships is amazing. I don't know how they stay afloat. I especially love to watch them go by when it gets later in the season. As the days get shorter and darker, the cruise ships have all their lights on and they twinkle and shimmer on the ocean around them. It is almost magical.
So, as we wait ever so impatiently for summer to reach us up here in the wild frontier I am trying to get out and do as much as we can regardless of the crap weather. However, I may go postal if things don't warm up soon. Seriously.

Grease Party

2008-07-12T15:09:00.000-07:00

Did you know that Grease came out in June 1978? Well, I discovered that when I was trying to come up with a party idea for Jen's 30th birthday party. So, voila! The idea was made. We all dressed the part and came to The Frosty Palace (our house) for some burgers and fries. We listened and sang and danced to the Grease soundtrack (which I burned for each person to take home with them...you can not get enough of summer lovin!!). We ate a ton, opened presents, ate some yummy cake (which was the most awesome thing in the world...see the pic),
and laughed more than should be allowed. I spent hours the days before the party super-imposing Jen's face into different scene pictures from the movie. They were framed and placed all over the house, it was hysterical! If you can't tell, it is Jen on the cake with Danny, not Sandy.

It was a wonderful excuse to get together and enjoy each others company...and who doesn't love dressing up?
Happy 30th Birthday, Jen!!
Happy 30th Birthday Grease!!

Breakfast

2008-07-09T10:20:00.000-07:00

This morning I was slicing up a nectarine for the kids when Ethan whispers my name. He slipped me a post-it note that said...Mom. Im not in the moode for peachis.

So cute.

4th of July pics!

2008-07-05T12:59:00.001-07:00

4th of July!

2008-07-05T12:45:00.001-07:00

We had so much fun yesterday for the 4th of July. We got up and the kids decorated their bikes for the kiddie parade. We loaded up all the days necessities and went into town. We got to the parking lot for the kiddie parade (which my kids kept calling the "kitty" parade and they couldn't figure out where all the kitties were!) and of course, it starts pouring rain. The twins wimped out (and I was secretly happy to oblige them) and asked to go to the lodge. Ethan stayed and rode his scooter in the parade with Kolby. We played at the lodge for a while, ate too much junk food, and waited ever so patiently for the parade. You can see the kids with their bags waiting and waiting. When we saw the helicopter fly by with the huge American flag Avery yelled out, "It's the 4th of July now!!". Too cute. We lucked out and the rain held off for the parade for the most part. We don't mind the misting too much. The kids loved all the floats and they all got entirely way too much candy. I accidentally threw some of it away...oops!
Anyways, after the parade we walked downtown to get a corndog and snowcone for lunch. We waited in line for the booths with kids games, but after 30 minutes of waiting and not a single inch of movement forward, it started to pour. We grabbed the kids and jammed back to the lodge. We shacked up for an afternoon snappy nappy and it was glorious!
Add in mass amounts of BBQ, snacks, junk food, pop, card games, cartoons, laughing, talking, etc and you have the rest of our evening. We headed onto the dock to watch the fireworks (they were after 11pm! We have them so late because it isn't really dark until then). The kids oohed and ahhed and loved all the big booms. We decided to spend the night at the lodge, and I think it was the crappiest nights sleep I have ever had. Topped off by waking up to the sounds of my husband daintily puking his guts out in the bathroom. Yum. Who wants breakfast??