Haunting me

Some of you may remember a few months ago I shared one of my less-than-glorious parenting moments. Something involving Cheetos and a toilet bowl? (If you missed it, you can view it here .)

Well, yesterday, Ben and I were on a solo trip to the grocery store when Ben spied a big bag of Cheetos. "Mom, we need some of those."

I wasn't really paying much attention, and I said, "Go ahead and grab a bag."

He picked up the bag and as he placed it in the cart he continued, "Because you flushed the last ones down the toilet."

Right. I was sort of hoping he'd forgetten that one. Nope.

Flight of the Dodo

If you're looking for a book that will take you to new heights, look no further than this amazing book for young children. Particularly your sons, who may be around 3, 7, or 33, will enjoy this whopper of a tale that involves plenty of references to projectile target pooping. We laughed, we cried, it moved us. Seriously funny read.

And by the way, we were talking about the book tonight and I mentioned I should include a reference to it in my blog. Todd's comment? "Do it mom. You always get lots of compliments when you blog about poop."

So bring on the "compliments" my loyal readers. It will make Todd happy.

Grateful

I'm sitting here in the stillness of my post-bedtime house grateful for a good life. Really. Maybe that sounds trite or silly, but often I find myself neglecting basic gratitude for how blessed I really am. Sundays, especially, have not often been great days for gratitude lately, but today was a good day. So, here's a short list of the things that I am grateful for this week.

• Ryan was home today by 4:45--and didn't have to go anywhere else for Sunday night meetings. This is the first Sunday night we've had together at home in over two months. Granted, he is asleep on the couch right now, but, hey.



• I built Lego castle structures with the boys for 2.5 hours this afternoon. Literally. It's way easier to build those puppies right out the package than to dig through an entire Rubbermaid looking for exactly the right linking swiveling thingamajig. We had a delightful afternoon, virtually tease-free.



• Ben has not had one accident all week long. I hesitate to share this publicly, as this has heretofore been a sure portent for disaster, but this was a really good week. He is even going all by himself. I no longer have to sniff for gas to detect when he needs to go #2. He voluntarily admits that he needs to relieve himself. Oh, happy day.



• I love my boys. It is super-duper extraordinarily fun being a mother to boys. They are fun and silly and affectionate and wild and crazy. I love it. This was definitely the family meant for me.



• This sweet older couple who used to live next door to us in NC sent the boys rock collections in the mail this week. We sent them an annual Christmas letter, and they were so thrilled that they wrote us a personal note back the next week and then sent the rocks this last week. So very sweet. (rock collection pictured here)



• I hosted a party for 18 pregnant or recently delivered mothers in our ward on Friday night. We had a great time. And I did so happily and without any tears whatsoever. There was a time when this would not have been so. But, I'm finally at a great place in my life and trust in a greater plan than mine. If Heavenly Father wants to send us another child, we would love it. But if not, we are so happy with what we have been blessed with.



• Ben fell asleep twice this week in the most random places--something he rarely does. It is so cute to see his sweet little face all relaxed in sleep. (and his body all contorted in the most completely uncomfortable position imaginable).



• I finished a super cute bag for my sister-in-law, Lucy. I love it when a bag comes together.



• I also made a super cute bag for the above-mentioned party.



• I love home schooling. Some days are better than others, some days are definitely not good. But I have seen this amazing little seven year old learn and grow and shed some of the frustration he'd been carrying about school. He's fun to be around. Have we missed some things? I'm sure. Have we got some things that other kids haven't? Definitely. It's a work in progress.



• Ryan got stuck in a meeting after I had arranged a baby sitter for our date night on Thursday. But we still got in an hour of our date and had a great time. 5 years ago I probably would have ranted and raved and blamed him for something totally beyond his control. But I'm grateful that I've grown up a little bit. I spent two hours getting the house cleaned all by myself and then I had a nice quick dinner with my husband. Nothing better than that.



• We cleaned our garage out on Saturday. It was a beautiful, sunny, spring-like day (around 70, I think). Gorgeous. The boys rode bikes and rollerblades out front while we de-junked. This last week has reminded me of the up-side of living in Vegas. Gorgeous weather in the winter.



• I finally started diving into my 1300 page novel for book club next month, and I'm loving it.



• I had a good hair day more than once last week.

So many great things happening in our life. I'm grateful. Funny, though, I clearly remember one day about 2.6 years ago telling Ryan how great I thought our life was. We ended up moving a month later. So, this post could be the beginning of my life thrown into chaos. But I'd like to think that it's just a grateful moment in a good life. Hope you can find gratitude in the simple things around you as well.

Anatomically Correct

The boys consider a day complete when they can get a "short show," "one quick game on the computer," or "just a little bit of playstation" before bed. So, as usual, they made their request the other night, "Mom, just one short show?"
I replied, "That's up to you guys. You need to use the bathroom, get jammied up, and brush your teeth. Whatever time you have left before bed time you can watch a show."
To which Ben replied, "I don't need to go potty. My penis isn't dancing."
And there you have it. Can't argue with that.
But, oh, can you laugh.

Identity issues?

It's a bird, it's a plane, it's Pumpkin/Bat/Spider/Buzz-Man Ben . . .and his crazy big brother, Todd

Hello again

It's been a while since I've blogged.  I get into this vicious cyle of feeling like I have a million things to post but not enough time to sit down and really do any of them justice or to post pictures.  So then I don't blog.  Then I have even more things to blog about.  And less time.  And more guilt-laden anxiety  about blogging. . .and on. . .and on. . .and on.

So I'm doing a random bit o' blogging.

We had a great Christmas in Boise.  It was an on again off again kind of trip, but I'm glad that in the end we went.  It was fun to be with my parents.  We were the only ones there, so it was also fun for Todd and Ben to have some quality time time with Grandma and Grandpa.  We had many hours of quiet time at the house.  Todd was in heaven because he got to play Age of Empires on the computer for hours every day--this is not something that home-school nazi mom usually permits.  The boys got legos, legos, legos for Christmas.  I love Legos.  Granted, they do have a million small pieces which can get spread all over the house.  But my boys will sit down and play with them for hours.  Their creativity astounds me.  Once I just gave up and let them have an entire corner of the living room devoted entirely to Legos that never get picked up, they became the happiest toy on earth.  Seriously.  There are some serious advantages to not having any children under the age of three.  (But, I digress.  This is not a post about legos.  Back to our trip).

It started snowing about 2 hours after we arrived, so we woke up to a beautiful white Christmas.  I am a  Montana girl at heart, and that was exactly perfect for me.  Ryan still isn't convinced.  We got to play in the snow on Christmas day.  Grandpa, Ryan, and myself helped Todd build a sweet snow fort out of 5 gallon bucket molds.  The next day it snowed some more and Ryan buried Todd entirely in the snow with the exception of a little circle around his face.

We did a few fun, even slightly cultural things while there.  We went to the Warhawk museum in Nampa, Idaho.  It's a WWII museum with airplanes, uniforms, and all sorts of museum-y things.  The boys actually enjoyed it quite a bit.  I learned some things I hadn't known before.  The coolest thing I saw was a map made out of playing cards.  THe Red Cross was allowed to distribute care packages to POW's in the camps.  One of the things they included was a pack of playing cards with false backs.  When the back was peeled off and the cards were assembled in the correct order, it became a map of various escape routes.  How cool is that?  People really sacrificed during the war.  I am humbled and grateful when I consider it.

One day, Ryan and my dad took the boys to the Discovery Center while Mom and I went shopping and lunching.  Great day for both groups.  I needed a little break from my day to day.  Todd said the best part was laying on a bed of nails--very cool for a seven year old.   

Ryan played technical genius while we were there and fixed up Mom and Dad's computer systems.  He's a great son-in-law.

We saw Grammy--she's looking great at 97.  I told Ben that Grammy had already celebrated Christmas 94 times more than he had.  Isn't that a crazy thought!   We hope that she can come to Todd's baptism in April.  Ben was loving playing catch with her with a little Teddy Bear.  I love that my boys always seem to know that they need to be on their best behavior for Grammy.  They are always so ready to give her a hug or talk to her, usually without being prompted.

We also got to see Grandma Kay and Grandpa Bob, Uncle Eric and family and Aunt Bonnie and Uncle David.  It was nice to see family.

On New Year's Eve, Kyle and Lizzie arrived to play with Ben and Todd.  They brought the rest of their family along for the ride.  The kids had a fun night.  Then we adults stayed up for Nertz and  chip dip.  We sure missed Chris and Julie et al., especially when we found some stinkin sweet photos of Chris during his childhood--were those shorts pink, Chris?

We played on the New Year's day and then stayed up way too late talking. 

The next day, we made the 12-hour trek home.  It only took 12.5 hours, even with the 1 hour detour when I missed the turn in Idaho and headed for Pocatello instead of Ogden.  It wasn't one of my best moments.  But I did apologize for throwing a tantrum like a three-year-old.  It's good I have a forgiving family.  

By the time we got home, we were glad to be back.  That's the beauty of vacation.  It gives you a wonderful break from the norm, and then makes you appreciate the norm a little more when you get back.  Thanks, Mom and Dad, for a great week.