Problem Solver

Problem in Alli's mind: Mom said I had to take a nap since Maggie and I were fighting non-stop and she was done hearing it. I kept saying I wasn't tired, I don't like the couch, and I kept whining hoping Mom would give in and let me read. Mom didn't give in. Grr. I tried to up-stage her and refuse to close my eyes..... until mom said every time she saw my eyes open she'd give me two spoon spanks- one for each eye.

Solution in Alli's mind:

G.W.

Today I was scrolling through a bunch of news articles and as the screen was rollin' down, President Bush's face popped up.

Miles go so excited and was flapping his arms up and down and then pointed at George and said "Baby! Baby!!" His eyes were wide and filled with excitement. It was so funny I couldn't stop laughing.......

I started scrolling threw more articles and decided to see if Miles' reaction would be the same if he saw George Bush's face again... and sure enough, the minute George came back on the screen Miles started flapping his arms and pointing- yelling "Baby! Baby! Baby!"

Hilarious.

I wonder what makes him think that? What's the connection?  No matter what, I don't think I'll ever see the President Bush's image again and not think "BABY!"

Curious....

When I get down in the dumps and stressed by life,  I tend to stop following blogs owned by fabulous "perfect" people..... You know the ones.....

-endless supply of money
- perfectly decorated spaces
-crafty cool beyond cool
- non-stop kiss pictures with spouse
- gag me adorable outfits
- nauseatingly  adorable children in matching outfits
- goes on awesome wild adventures
- takes tea with the Queen.....
- never takes pictures of their laundry/ironing pile.... because those trifle chores don't exist.
- actually takes time to play with their kids.

ya know... THOSE people.

I know looking from the outside in they are "perfect"... and "supposedly" they are real humans that have real problems...... but why don't they ever blog about being overwhelmed with life? Why can't they admit their humanity?



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Am I the only one that has 'perfect people' envy?
Who do you stop following??

Master Plan

I am feeling overwhelmed with the vast amount of stuff I have to do to get my home back into order. We are having our bed delivered on Friday..... and I still have to go buy a frame (ours is too small.... which is a delightful problem.)... and buy mattress covers, and sheets and blankets ....   That's just the tip of the iceberg.  Where the bed is right now we have a MOUNTAIN of black trash bags filled to the brim of toys, clothes, stuff, etc...  that had to be bagged up in order to get rid of the bed bugs. Everything in those bags needs washed/dried/treated again in order to be put away- even though they were already treated BEFORE being put into the bags, we want to be better safe than sorry.

In "Poof House" I am having TWO washers and TWO dryers. And thus it's been said, amen.

As soon as our bed gets here and set up- we will go about throwing out our current couch, chair, and piano and then have an empty living room- which we will be treating like crazy mad obsessed people, which hopefully will mean that no bed bug will exist again in this household. Eight months is long enough. Too. Dang. Long.  Then in mid-march, we will be getting our couch.. after it's all nice and built.

On top of all of that I have even more things I need to accomplish. Between dentist appointments, ENT appointments, callings, meetings, daily chores and to-do lists, etc..... ohh yeah, and actually be a mom on top of it. .... I don't know where I'll breathe. (I always find a way... no worries....)

Looking at the broad picture I'm starting to get panicked. I need a brown paper bag to breathe in.....


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On the plus side- Dexter has been extra helpful in the laundry folding department.

Dexter has helped me to discover how versatile bras really are. They can be used as helmets, capes, trains, scarfs, and neck ties. And here I have been wearing them wrong all these years.....

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 On another plus side- I was able to finish my Christmas Quilt!!  Hurray! If you don't remember, my mom gave us a quilt block (or two) of the month for Christmas when I was pregnant with the boys.... so I have had this for two years.

All I need to do is sew the backing (nice cozy flannel), package it all up nicely with a bow, and send it on to my mom to quilt. :)

One project down.... 1 million + to go.

I'm not dead.... yet.

Dear Diary,

Today is day 9 of at least one person puking per day..... some days had more than one person puking....which has certainly been super fun.

I was the one that started the trend, but I have not been the one to end it. So far everyone but Chip has gotten it. I'm thinking he probably won't escape it either, but he seems to think that his super mind-powers will make him invincible. We'll see how well that turns out, and I'll probably remind him of those words when he's hugging a toilet.

This past week hasn't been too bad though, I've gotten some time to escape the madness. Twins club this week was awesome. We had a speaker, John Mascazine - who is an expert on twins- he was really interesting and brought up things I hadn't thought about before, as far as educating the boys. It got me thinking a lot. He wrote this book:

..... I should probably purchase a copy now. It was just a really interesting evening that made me think.

I also was able to escape to go to my dear friend, Brenda's retirement party. She was the one who trained me at the bank 9 1/2 years ago.... We started off on bumpy ground (I really like asking WHY I am supposed to do XYZ..... she just wanted me to do it. lol.), but ended up being friends. It was nice to go and see all my old co-workers and have a distraction for an evening. It made me miss working! Real live people exist outside of my universe filled with little people.- incredible, huh?!

And lastly, I was able to enjoy a fun evening of Bunko with the girls. My friend Debbie throws the most awesome bunko parties. I was able to rock it, and tie as the biggest loser. :D

One of the fun things about sick kiddos, is how sweet and snuggly they are.... Maggie really likes pictures when she's a snuggle monster.

.... oh wait, I did say "lastly"...  but I lied. It's not "lastly"....

The absolute best part of the week: WE BOUGHT A BED! After 8 months without a bed, Chip and I purchased a nice big soft mattress that will be delivered on Friday! Woot!! I cannot wait! We even upgraded from a full size mattress to a queen one. I know, big step, right?!

I'm sure I'll be posting pictures on Friday. :)


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..... I'm sorry I have been MIA for a while. I just haven't had the energy to do anything creative. It's been such a long exhausting week.

"cool"

When I was in grade school, I thought the ultimate definition of "COOL" was this:

Braces and glasses. Be still my geeky heart. I'm not quite sure what I was thinking of.... but for some odd reason if you had braces AND glasses you were the bomb-diggity, fo-shizzle.




I remember BEGGING my mom to let me have glasses, and cursing my perfect vision when she said I didn't need them. Stupid rules for getting glasses, you actually had to need them according to my mom.


In 7th grade part of my vision of "cool" was fulfilled when I got to get braces. Ohh man, different colors of bands on those braces were the coolest!! I even had greasy hair..... all I was missing to be the ultra-nerd-awesome-person was glasses.


I didn't get to have those until becoming an adult.... and now that I have them, I don't wear them because they just get in the way, and well, make me look like a nerd.

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Alli has been dreaming of being "cool" lately. When she got in the car after school, she excitedly announced that the nurse took groups of kids to her office to test them for vision. With a gleam in her (going blind) eyes, she squealed "I FAILED!".... and then began the ramblings of "Can I please go get glasses now, please? Please? PLEASE???"....

"Alli, did the nurse give you a note saying that you failed your test?" I asked.
"No, but that doesn't mean I don't need glasses!" she said with sassy attitude.


Chip said he got his first pair of bug-eyed glasses (bigger than car windshields) when he was in 3rd grade. If Alli inherited her father's horrible eye sight... she just might get her wish of being uber cool.

Time will tell.
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Does anyone have a CHEAP eye doc they go to in Columbus??
Requirements: Takes my insurance and cheap.

bloggity blog post

These past few months I've found myself struggling a lot in the emotions department. I could feel myself slipping back into depression and not feeling like I could do anything about it. I have fought depression a lot in my life- from regular ol' depression to postpartum blues.. You name it, I've had it. I really have felt like my life is in such a rut of lows for the past year and I haven't been seeing many highs. It's kind of annoying- and gets old pretty darn quickly.

Two weeks ago, I decided I'm done feeling like this poo. I'm done feeling sorry for myself. I'm done. I have had to made a conscious decision to make the best of every situation. I've made the conscious decision to get out of my shell. I've had to make the conscious decision to do something that I enjoy every day.

 "We".. (aka: just Miles and Dexter) - dumped out a #10 can of dehydrated refried beans. Instead of flipping out like I would have the week before (or, like I DID the week before.... when they dumped out all the oatmeal AND beans AND rice....) I just took pictures and let them play in it.

I mean, heck- I'd have to clean it up anyway, but I had no timeline of WHEN I needed to clean it up, so why not let them play in the finger food? They were having fun.

 I've decided to slowly bring out some of the toys that have been boxed up for 8 months- stuff that the boys haven't ever played with (since they were too little to enjoy it before we boxed it up). So I took out the box of Little People. The boys LOVED it- and I loved playing with them. (except for the annoying music. I forgot about that.) I also brought out the huge buckets full of Thomas the Trains that we have. They are also a hit! Who knew I'd have so much fun being with my kids?

I've forced myself to take the boys to fun places- like story time. I have been in such a rut of just going to Giant Eagle, Target, and Choir..... and that's it. I'm sure the boys are going stir crazy. I used to take the girls to story time every week.... I used to go lots of places with the girls all the time- but with the boys, well, there is just too many of them for me to wrangle in public places. I tried going to the mall play area, but it just wasn't safe with both boys going in different directions in a public place.- Then my friend (and awesome visiting teacher) suggested we go to story time and she'd come with. So far we've gone for two weeks together. It's been a lot of fun! The boys are still not sure what to think (notice Dexter's total lack of emotions..... but his ultimate need to stand next to the story time lady like a statue), but I think they will warm up to the idea.

I also started sewing again. It's making me happy to feel crafty again. It makes me want to get all of these thousands of projects done and out of the way. (okay, maybe not thousands, but when it's a few unfinished quilts, it certainly feels like thousands. )

I'm not totally feeling myself again, but I can feel progress- and that feels nice.

One day at a time.......

motivational speakers

Growing up I suppose my mom figured that my brother and I didn't listen to a word she said, so she made it her life's mission to purchase every Christian motivational talk ever recorded onto tape- and we listened to them on car trips. (We drove to Seattle a lot. It was a 6 hour drive. That means a lot of motivational talks..... mixed with Yanni.)

I'm here to tell you, those tapes have come back to haunt me. (this means, that I obviously absorbed the talks into my brain somewhere along the way...)

You see... One of those speakers was Troy Dunn. He had a talk about this kid who was so poor that he had to dig things out of the garbage.... and everyone called him 'Garbage Digger'. The whole talk was about not making fun of others, especially those who need a hand up- blah blah blah- it was a happy ending...

So why does that talk haunt me? Well... Miles and Dexter are total garbage diggers. I find my self yelling "GARBAGE DIGGERS!" pretty much on a daily basis. 

I promise you...5 minutes before I took these picture the boys were clean.
So was my floor.
Then I went to the bathroom.
The boys instantly went to their 'happy place'... aka: the garbage can.
I should wear adult diapers during the day. They boys might not get into so much mischief.

I wonder what kinds of discussions they have. It gets pretty animated. Garbage gets exchanged between the two of them. I'm not sure what makes for a 'good' piece of garbage... ya know, the coveted bit. I try and observe and take notes. I feel almost like Jane Goodall when she studied the chimpanzees.

This picture makes me smile- This is the face that Miles does when he's been caught or knows he's been naughty. Imagine a little shrill inhale noise... and you've pretty much got it. Adorable, right?
That's why they boys are still alive. They are pretty darn adorable, even when elbows into trouble.

I don't know how much longer they will be in love with digging in garbage, tipping over garbage cans and surfing through the trash, and chowing down on what they find in the garbage....  But I'm pretty sure I'll be calling them Garbage Diggers for a while.

Birthday Boy!

 Yesterday Chip turned the big 3-4! 

I decided he was so cool he could have an 80's-ish theme party. Rubix cube cake, mini-rubix cubes, whoopie cushions, and radical glasses, and transformers hats. Lots of fun.

 We all had so much fun playing. The girls are now addicted to the whoopie cushions- or as they like to call them 'the fart thingies'. Alli even wore one of the fart thingies out from making it toot so much.

 Dexter is obsessed with those awesome glasses. He was wearing them all day today. :)

Chip got some amazing presents. He got to renew his driver's license. That's always a treat. His new picture makes him look like a frat guy. Party on, Chip. Party on. He also got a nook (although, he got it a month ago...), gift cards, and the girls gave him random objects from around the house. :)

 

 33 was a stressful year for Chip, lots of new challenges- learning how start up businesses work (or don't work quickly), dealing with bedbugs, lice, random illnesses, and just way too many things to count, I'm hoping that 34 treats him much better and a little kinder.

Chip is an amazing husband, father, friend, and pretty much everything else in the world we need him to be.

Happy Birthday Chip. I sure do love you.