One of the perks of having a dad who works for the airlines, is sometimes being able to take spur of the moment flights...

to see someone's...

favorite author...

 

...who turns out to be quite the comedian, and makes all of us laugh and wishing he was coming to AZ as well.

(signing Connor's book)

Glad we could make your dream come true little man!

crazy hat day

gobble-gobble

bed time

Everyone told me, you gotta let them cry it out.

You can't sleep with them, you're setting up bad habits.

I listened,

then I did what I wanted and what I needed to get my boys to sleep when they were babies.

Setting a mattress on the floor next to my bed so little Taylor could feel close to me, then cuddling with Connor in his bed when he was ready to progress from the crib.

Do they have issues now?

If you call still liking to share a room with each other, and Connor still loving to have mom cuddle with him an issue, then yes, they have issues.

But I have great memories.  Warm cuddles, giggles in the dark, conversations with my boys that we may not have had otherwise if I hadn't have taken the time, or if I would have been more strict about them falling asleep on their own. 

At first it was desperation.  Now I just treasure it because I know it won't last forever.

weekend recap....a few days late

Last weekend Connor and I decided to take a quick trip up to Utah for my nephew's baptism.

Quick = 32 hours. 

Besides the baptism:

(apparently 1-1/2 years apart in age = 1-1/2 feet apart in height?)

There was the eating of root beer floats:

Sleeping on giant Love Sacks:

And getting up at 4:00 a.m. to make our flight:

For some reason this child loves to wake up in the middle of the night to go fly places.



No wonder I was worn out.

meet ulysses s. grant

Connor chose to be Ulysses S. Grant for his school's wax museum.  One of the reasons why he chose to be him was because of his initials U.S. (my kids are so patriotic). 

Things I learned:

Grant could have been killed along with President Lincoln because he was planning on attending the same play with Lincoln, but his wife and Lincoln's wife had argued the day before, so the Grants didn't go. 

He was concerned with the plight of African Americans and native Indian tribes, in addition to civil rights for all Americans and signed bills promoting black voting rights in 1869 and 1871. 


Connor loved this project of researching and pretending to be someone from our history. 

for some reason connor wants to go visit his utah grammy today

just another night at gramps' house

just the most awesome fish story ever

written by my favorite little writer.

Ever been fishing?  I have and it's so much fun!  Let me tell you about it.

One day I woke up so happy I fell flat on my face.  I got up and ran downstairs, luckily I didn't fall this time.  I got dressed and brushed my teeth and watched TV until it was time to go. 

I got into the truck and I was asking some questions until my brother said, "Quiet or you'll scare the fish!"  We were going to my grandparent's house because they have the boat.  To make an uninteresting (hey, I didn't even use the word boring to describe boring!  Bonus points!) 20 minute ride short, we got to their house.

We got the boat ready and hooked the boat to the back of the truck, got into the truck, and drove to the lake.  About maybe 2 or 1 hours later we got there.  We launched the boat and drove (I'm not sure what to say.  Am I supposed to say drove or swam or what?).  Anyway, we went to our fishin' spot.  I got my fishin' pole, put some bait on it (anchovies if you like specific stuff), and threw my pole but held on so just the fishin' line went out into the dark deep sea.  (Ooooh mysterious!).  My brother and my Dad did the same.

We waited a bit and I felt a tug on my line and pulled on my rod so the fish wouldn't get away.  I quickly reeled in my line while the fish was fighting like crazy.  I reeled in a little more and saw the fish.  It was the biggest fish I have ever caught.  I reeled in my line all the way and caught the fish.  I held the fish and my dad took a picture.  Later I did the same thing and caught another fish!  We took another picture and soon after my dad and my brother caught a fish.  We took pictures for both of them.  We let them all go and then we went home.  It was a fun trip.  

The End.


I can't wait to see the grade he gets on this. 

one man's vegetable is another man's treat

Another repost because my brain is on summer vacation...


The boys spent Friday night at Grammy's. They always love this because they basically get away with everything short of murder. When I picked them up on Saturday I asked them what they did the night before.


Boys: We went for a walk with the dogs.

Me: Where'd you go?

Boys: To the gas station.

Me: Really? What for?

Boys: Treats.

Me: What'd you get?

Taylor: I got a squishee, a giant Kit Kat, Icebreaker Sours, and some bubble gum.

Me: Wow.  You're spoiled.  What'd you get, Boo?

Connor: I got a squishee, a Butterfinger, some Bubble Tape and some corn.

Me: Some corn?......Candy corn?

Connor: Nope. A can of corn. I thought it looked good.
 
 
And that is just another reason why I love that kid.

it's probably against some blog rule to repost something you wrote a couple of years ago,

So I'll just tell you to click here to read this funny story from the past.

if you live in utah, please just look away. i don't want any wailing and gnashing of the teeth over my weather.

Last weekend we decided it was time to baptize Harley

and see if he liked to swim or not.

Also, we needed to see if his new life jacket fit for when we take him on the lake this summer.

The verdict? 

He can swim, the life jacket fits, but he's not sure he wants to spend his time in the water.

Also, he is really, really small when wet. 

Think wet rat.

These two, on the other hand, I couldn't keep from being in the water if I tried:

And then I was threatened at gun point and forced into the water myself.

The end.

i looked at my window at what did i see?

One dead terrorist staring at me.

the art of stripping

Perfected by Connor.
The kid can be naked in 3.2 seconds, down to his undies, without even breaking stride.

what do you do on the first day of spring?

Here in Arizona, some of us do this:





Not his mama though. She was fine to alternate between the 103 degree hot tub, and the lounge chair with her book (you know, to help keep my head from exploding).

How did you spend the first day of spring?

randoms

Connor has made himself an after school schedule. It looks like this:

4:03 - 4:35: play
4:40 - 5:20: exercise

I am thinking of adopting this schedule myself.

I've kind of given myself a time-out from all the blogging/facebooking I usually spend time on.

Instead I've been going through closets, trying to get rid of stuff.

I finally got rid of my fat clothes.

It feels good, but now I am really committed to not gaining any weight back.

Or I'll be naked.

I've also been busy helping Connor make these for the Cub Scouts 80th birthday and Blue & Gold Banquet:

{next time I will have to find out how to make the frosting more blue than gray- tips anyone? And thanks to my sister Trina for cutting out the stars and numbers for me}

On Monday Connor told me he wished he could spend all day at home laying around reading like I do. I think I've been doing it wrong.

I hesitated putting the new spring header on my blog because of her fear of birds.

I'm pretty sure I drank an entire gallon of water yesterday. Has anyone ever counted how many times they had to pee in one day? I think I peed 87 times (that was for you, Taylor. Inside joke).

Connor has run out of books and nothing the library had really interested him, so I told him he could pick a couple out on Amazon. He picked $94 worth. Needless to say, that kid likes to read (but he won't be getting them all right now). He has even discovered the joy of "bathroom reading".

It's so nice that Bill had some advice for Tiger. That just warms my heart.

It's 4:41 now so I guess it's time to go exercise.

Either that or lay around and read some more.

so random

When referring to a caller that didn't leave a message, I said that they didn't leave a comment. (Hmm....blog much?)



Connorism: Mom, will you give me goosebumps? = will I scratch his back.



My nephew, who's birthday is this month, invited me to his birthday party. Six months ago. I will most likely be making a quick weekend trip to UT soon. I'm such a sucker for a cute face.

Conversation with Connor last night:

Me: Why is this house so clean during the day, and such a disaster at night?

Connor: Well why don't you just clean it at night then instead?

I am kind of loving this post. Seriously, sometimes I want to defriend or block the friends that post status updates every 20 mins. I really don't need a play by play of your day. It's not that exciting. And I'm also wondering if I should be offended by the plastic surgeon who wants to be my FB friend, and offered his services to me. Hmm....



I kind of hate blogs that only show a portion of what they posted in my reader, because sometimes I'm too lazy to click on them to open the rest. Especially if they don't catch enough of my attention in the first few sentences. So they miss out on comments from me if I don't feel like clicking over. And sometimes I don't open them up just to spite them, because I don't like being forced to do something. So there.



I'm starting to get excited for swim weather. It's been 70 degrees here lately and I am loving it. Which brings me to another peeve (man, do I have PMS?). People are always saying, I don't know how you can stand to live there in that heat. Well, to them I say, how do you stand to live there in that cold? When it's snowy and cold, you either stay inside or you bundle up and go play in the snow right? Well, when it's hot, we either stay inside or undress and get in the pool. Hmm.....wearing tons of clothes and freezing vs. wearing not a lot and swimming....it's not hard to understand. We have air conditioning people, just as you have furnaces. And the other 7-8 months of the year it's spring/fall weather, with the exception of a couple of weeks of winter where we actually get frost. And if we want to see snow, we get in the car and drive for an hour or two, then come back home to our sunshine and nice temps. So that's how we stand to live in the heat for a couple of months.

Glad I got that off my chest.



I am kind of obsessed with doing laundry. I can't stand to have dirty clothes just sitting there. I admit, I do small loads. Thank goodness for a self adjusting water level in my washer. (I know, I'm using more electricity that way....)



I think it's a good day to hit a matinee with the Luvpilot. What do you think?

so i'm not the only speedster in the family

Saturday was the annual Pinewood Derby. It was Connor's first time to enter a car of his own. Here he is before the big race.

At the starting gate.

Ooh....it was neck and neck a couple times...

We were pretty sure his car did good, but had to patiently wait to hear the final results.


Finally, the results were in. His car not only came in first place, but it broke a few speeding laws. Uh-oh! Officer M. showed up to issue him a citation.

Thankfully it was only a warning.







Way to go Mr. Boo!!

{oh yeah, and Daddy too}

what's up with connor {journaling}

The little man had his very first den meeting the other night.
He was so excited.
In fact, he was so excited about starting cubs, that he earned his bobcat badge before his first den meeting.
It took him about 20 minutes.
And after his den meeting, he came home and read the entire Wolf book and proclaimed that he is going to earn each and every award.
He will be busy I am thinking.


Parent/teacher conferences were also last week.
His teacher told me he is reading on a 7th grade level.
{Wow.}
His sentence writing continues to amaze her.
So does his humor.


After we sat down to dinner the other night, he asked if he could please have a side salad.
Just as if we were at a restaurant.


While watching House Hunters with me, I exclaimed how I loved the house they were showing, and Connor simply said, "Meh. I've seen better."


He loves to have one on one time with his Mom.
I love it too.


I love my Boo.

(gotta love the hair. this was taken as we were speeding down the lake at dusk one night)

first week of school random recap

Connor came home the first day, full of news and exciting things to tell me.
Taylor did not.


I hate it when the transportation department tells you that bus #9 will pick up your child at 8:12am, and it really turns out to be bus #38 at 7:59am. They never give us the right info.


A girl told Taylor she hates him.
It's the same girl that he beat in the district Spelling Bee last year.
He just laughed.


I'm loving how much I can get done in the day now that I'm getting up early and not spending three hours on the computer every morning, but why must my internal alarm wake me up at 5:00am?


I fixed breakfast every day this week, got showered and dressed before taking the boys to school (well, except for today), and had time for family prayer IN the house no less instead of in the car on the way there with one eye closed. Will it last?


It's only been 3 days and already Taylor is hoping for a Swine Flu outbreak so they have to close the school. Never mind that it would mean making up days at the end of the year. He doesn't care.

I'm thinking it's time to start planning more lunch dates and movie matinees with the girls.

For some reason the boys think breakfast in bed is not only deserved, but required.

I'm back to wanting to go to bed at 8:30 every night.

Only 64 days until Fall Break!

{p.s. check out the giveaway on my sidebar}

they had faces that could stop traffic...

and they did.

Yesterday I went with Connor's class to see the play If You Give a Mouse a Cookie. It was so cute. We had such a fun time and giggled a lot. {why do I always fall in love with the leading man? even when he's a 24 yr old playing the part of a 10 yr old boy? really?}.

After the play, we ate lunch on the grass. It was the perfect day - 70 degrees, sunshine.

Our bus drive home was about a 40 minute drive, and we had to take the freeway. No problem. {Except let me say right now, that the day before, I had the thought that something may go wrong with the bus. Sometimes I am psychic. Other times just psycho}. So we're driving along playing rock, paper, scissors, and all those little hand games that first graders find so fun, when we hear a big hissing sound. It sounded just like the air being let out of a tire. So the bus driver immediately pulls over to the side of the freeway, thinking we had a flat tire.

She goes out to inspect all the tires, and finds nothing wrong, so she proceeds to pull back into the HOV lane. Except the bus won't accelerate. It will only go about 25 mph. She pulls back over, waits a minute and tries again. Same thing.

So there we are, stuck on the bus, in the middle of the freeway. Fun times. Connor was just excited that they may miss music. I was just thankful that it was only 70 degrees out so we weren't sweltering. Of course, all of a sudden every child started needing to go to the bathroom.

The bus driver called transportation and arranged for another bus to come get us, while the teachers called the highway patrol so they could come help us.

Do you know what happens when you have 40 first graders that you need to unload and load onto another bus?

They stop traffic for you of course. They bring 6 lanes of freeway traffic to a complete stop while you transfer to the other bus. Wow. Did we feel important. I can only imagine what the people in those cars were thinking as they were watching us. Glad to know they take our kids' safety seriously. And what's weird is another mom had a feeling about the bus earlier, too. Not a "we shouldn't get on this bus" feeling, just a "something's going to go wrong with the bus feeling" like I did. Wish I could channel my psychic powers all the time. That could be handy.