Mommy's Little Helpers

One of the side effects I deal with while pregnant is something called pregnancy rhinitis. It sounds horrible, but all it means (and most of you might already know) is an overactive sinus system. I sneeze a lot (A LOT), my knows runs like a sieve, and I am constantly clearing my throat or coughing up something nasty. I know...TMI. It's like having a mild to sometimes moderate cold for ten months straight. Luckily, I have two very helpful little boys who are ready and waiting to run and fetch me something, like tissue, whenever I ask for it. It always strikes me as funny when they return with my tissues, but I never thought to put it on the blog until now. Mostly, I just want to remember how sweet and innocent they are and how eager to help, but how their minds work so differently from mine.

So, the other day after a sneezing fit and in desperate need I said, "Will someone go in the bathroom and get Mommy a tissue?" I hear two exuberant Yeah's as a response and off they go. First Ethan comes back, looking so proud of himself and awaiting praise. This is what he presents to me:


From this angle, it looks kind of like an origami crane. He's just so cute about it, so I tell him how good he is and how helpful. He is VERY pleased with himself. Craig comes in, then, and I think, "Oh, good. He'll actually have something I can use." Then he hands me this:


Better...at least it's almost one whole square. I tell him he's great and awesome and everything, but could he go back and get me one just a little bit bigger? He does, and this is what he brings me:


I guess it's all or nothing around here. (Who else is singing with Ado Annie in their heads right now? Tiffany? :) Who else even has a clue what I'm referring to? Extra points for you if you do, but only if you leave a comment and tell me.) I love my little helper boys. Sometimes it is really hard for me to remember that, for the most part, they are sweet, innocent, and just doing the best they can. Craig makes that REALLY hard to remember sometimes, but I worry that I expect too much from him most of the time, as far as behavior goes. I think I'm too hard on him, especially in public. I just realized the other day for the first time that the reason I'm so strict with him at the grocery store, farmer's markets, malls, etc. is because I don't want to be seen as one of "those" parents who let their kids get away with anything. But does it really matter what other people think? Of course not. It only matters what Craig thinks and feels about the way I treat him. Besides, the public is fickle. If you don't reprimand your kids in public, others think you're too easy on them. If you get on their cases all the time, people think you're too harsh. I know...I've been one of those people, before I had kids of course. So who the heck cares what they think? That's my new motto. I am resolving to try and be a more gentle, kind mother who knows how to chastise when necessary, but with love and compassion. And I don't want to make my discipline issues a public matter. I'm going to try to keep it private--let "them" think what they will.

Lastly, here's a belly shot. 33 weeks already! I am so hoping this one comes earlier rather than later and is a faster delivery. I'm counting on this being number three and the statistics showing that is sometimes the case. Keep your fingers crossed for me!

Sick little boys

Things have been pretty rough here the last few days or so. First, Ethan came down with a high fever which was controllable with medicine, but it still lasted for a couple of days. Then, just as he got over it, Craig came down with the same thing. We suffered through Friday and Saturday with him, thinking it would be over by Sunday (since Ethan's was only two days) but on Sunday morning, Craig woke up saying his mouth hurt. He wouldn't let me get a good look inside, though, the stinker. If I had been able to see his throat that morning, though, it probably would have saved us about $80. Oh well. Finally, at about 5:00pm (after a day of whining and crying and tantrums) Craig opened up nice and wide and even stuck his tongue out. That revealed all the little white bumps at the back of his throat. I took him to the urgent care instead of the CVS minute clinic (which closes early on Sundays and would have cost $80 less), and he was diagnosed with strep and given an antibiotic. It's amazing how quickly that stuff works. He took the first dose at about 9pm last night and by this morning he was noticeably better.

It all worked out, as these things do, but it has been quite exhausting. I guess we're lucky, though, that we live someplace that has late night urgent care and 24 hour pharmacies. If we were in Montana, we would have been going to the ER and spending a WHOLE lot more and waiting a lot longer, not to mention the 30 minute drive to the hospital, one way. They are on the mend and pretty soon they'll be back to their normal selves. I'll try to post something more interesting, with pictures, pretty soon.

Fungis and Fun Guys

When we first laid our sod, I was reading up on a suggested watering schedule. One person said to not water your lawn after dark because it doesn't get a chance to dry out and a fungus can grow. Instead, the best time to water is early morning, right before or at dawn. The other night, I realized (after dark) that we hadn't watered the lawn that day and since I wasn't going to get up at 4:30 in the morning, I did it then. The next morning I found this in a patch in the lawn:

Do you think this is what they could have meant by a fungus? :) Maybe if I keep them long enough, a village of little blue people will move in.

In other happenings, I took some cute pictures of Craig and Ethan while playing with the settings on my camera. This is what I captured:

Ethan was working on a bag of fruit snacks. Here he was wanting me to dig the last two stuck in the bottom out of the bag. I loosened them up and he dug them out and ate them. Then he was happy:

And then there's Craig playing a little game called "Avoid the Camera." He thought it was great.

This is the clearest picture I got of the little stinker.

Finally, we played "Chase the Kitty Under the Bed." The cat LOVES this game.

Father's Day

I have no pictures of my own from Father's Day since part of the day consisted of letting Robert lay around in his unmentionables all day and he wasn't feeling well anyway, unfortunately. But we did celebrate. I had ordered a remote control helicopter for him off of Amazon, but that turned out to no be a surprise. :( See, what happened was it came last Tuesday in the mail and I almost didn't see it because instead of putting it on the front porch, in front of the door, as the postal carrier usually does with packages, he/she put it in a much more obvious spot: in front of the car port, behind a bush, on the side where Robert parks. There's no doubt he would have come across it and brought it in the house when he got home, but that would have been very inconvenient. Luckily, I have a three year old boy who can spot a present from a mile away.

The day it came, we got out of the car and as I was walking with Ethan to the front door, Craig came running up behind me, carrying this big, long box and saying, "Hey Mom! It's a present...for me!" At this point, if I had remembered what this could have possibly been, I would have immediately told him it was for Father's Day and we would open it then. I would NOT have opened the box. However, I had ordered it about three weeks earlier and had forgotten it was coming altogether, so we opened it to see what it could be. Big mistake. Craig was bouncing off the walls with excitement about the helicopter, but more importantly, the controller. He cried and whined and threw a fit when I went into my bedroom to hide it. I got it hidden before he could see where exactly, thank goodness. I talked to him about not saying anything to Daddy about it and not talking about it when he got home. Right. I hoped that after being distracted by lunch, a two hour nap, and about another two hours of play time before Robert got home, Craig would have forgotten all about it. He never mentioned it once in all that time.

Then Robert walked in the door. The first thing out of Craig's mouth was, "Hey Dad! Let's go find your helicopter!" I lied and told Robert we had seen one outside and that's what he was talking about. Craig replied, "No, Mom, the helicopter that came from the box today." Why do children learn to talk before they develop a filter? After my several attempts to lie past Craig's revelations, Robert figured it out. Ah,well.

Plan B. Robert also needed a new clock radio. So, I went to Target and bought one along with a CD we've been wanting. I wrapped those together and gave those to him on Father's Day. He said, "Oh, that's nice" as he opened them up. A minute or two later, I pulled out the big, long wrapped box. Despite the setback, it was just as exciting as I had hoped. Robert really likes it and we played with it a lot all day Sunday.

Also for Father's Day, I made Robert's requested dinner: rib eye steak, garlic butter asparagus, and funeral potatoes. For dessert, I made angel food cake and we had it with berries and vanilla ice cream. All in all, it turned into a very nice Father's Day.

My Morning Routine

Number One

Number Two

5:00am I instinctively wake up, waiting to hear the pitter patter of little feet that will inevitably come wake me up five minutes after I fall back asleep to tell me that Number One is awake. And my right arm is deader than a doornail and somewhat painful (one of my least favorite side effects of pregnancy).

5:10am I fall back asleep after getting my right arm positioned just right so it now has a slight tingle but it usable.

5:15am Number One comes in and butts his head against my back, jarring me awake. I tell him to go play in his room until I get him at 6:00.

5:30am Number Two wakes up and I stick in an earplug. I do not "Mother" before 6:00 in the morning.

5:35am Number One comes back in to tell me that Number Two is awake. I tell him to go back to his room and not wake me up again. I remind him that I will come get him at 6:00.

5:45am Number One head butts me again to tell me that he found his train. I tell him to go back to his room. He leaves and shuts the door loudly, waking up Number Two who had just fallen back to sleep.

6:00am Robert's alarm goes off and he gets up to get ready for work. I lay in bed, trying to convince myself that even though I've been "awake" since 5:00am, I can still count that as an hour of sleep time since I never got out of bed. I count how many hours of sleep I got that night. Number Two is whimpering, Number One comes in saying, "Mommy, it's six!" and I get out of bed.

8:00am I am blogging when I realize they have been quiet for a long time. I find them in Number One's room, both naked, with a suspicious smell in the air. What adventures will this day hold?

Sometimes my life reminds me of a Dr. Seuss book.

"'I will pick up the hook.
You will see something new.
Two things. And I call them
Thing One and Thing Two.
These Things will not bite you.
They want to have fun.'
Then out of the box
Came Thing Two and Thing One."

"Then those Things ran about
With big bumps, jumps, and kicks
And with hops and big thumps
And all kinds of bad tricks."

I guess the difference here is that I can choose who my character is in the story...am I the joy-kill fish or The Cat in the Hat? If only I had one of those magical picker-upper machines, then the choice would be easy.

Acceptance and gratitude

After four months, I've finally accepted the idea that Seriously, So Blessed it NOT coming back to the blogging world and have deleted the site from my Mommy Blogs list. Will the world ever know her true identity?

Also, last Friday night we had a horrifying experience that made me ever so grateful to have my own steam cleaner--a purchase I scoffed at when my husband wanted to do it. Craig and Ethan had gotten their clothes and diapers off and spent about twenty minutes playing quietly in Craig's room behind a closed door. When I went to see what they were up to, I was hit with the last thing a mother wants to smell when opening her son's bedroom door (it will haunt me for years): poop. The time I would have spent scrubbing that carpet and STILL not getting it all out (after stripping the blankets, inspecting every toy, and disinfecting every surface in the room) was worth the cost of that steam cleaner. If you have kids--let me clarify--if you BOYS, steam cleaners are essential, in my mind. Speaking of which, where are those little stinkers now and why are they so quiet?

Oh, that's right, I gave them goldfish crackers and turned on Winnie the Pooh. They love Pooh (pun intended).

One more thing about cornbread

Remember when I did this post? It was the one about my mom's cornbread recipe that I had posted on Tasty Kitchen and had gotten a lot of reviews, all of them a full five mitt rating. That was the first week in April and at that time it had been on the Tasty Kitchen homepage as one of their five most popular recipes for a couple of weeks already. If you were to go here to the Tasty Kitchen website and scroll down to the "Popular Recipes" section, you would see it there still! Since I posted it on here about back in April, it has been all the way to the top and all the way to the bottom of that list as other recipes become more popular and then mine receives more reviews an gets bumped up. There were a couple of days about a month ago that it wasn't on the list as all, but came back and has stayed since.

The reason I am telling you about this is because about a month after my recipe was put on the most popular list, another one for buttermilk syrup appeared and has been on ever since. It has been higher on the list and, at times, lower on the list as well (like today, for example). But they've both been pretty consistent.

Today I went to The Pioneer Woman's website and saw that the buttermilk syrup recipe was not only the featured recipe on the Tasty Kitchen blog, but it also appeared on The Pioneer Woman's website because of that feature! Not that I think I should get any special recognition for a recipe that started out as one printed on a box and then slightly changed by my mom to become one of the most popular recipes on what is most likely the busiest recipe exchange website out there today, however I can't help but think...does Ree (the PW) not like cornbread? Has she even tried it yet? Maybe it's because my blog is private and I don't have some big fancy camera that takes awesome pictures like everyone else posting recipes does. But, then again, maybe I'm next. Whatever it is, I'll let you know if anything exciting happens.

P.S. As a correction to my information about the recipe that I posted with it on Tasty Kitchen, it is not EXACTLY like the old Albers cornbread recipe. My mom told me since then that she added the melted butter. I can't go in and change it, though, because if I do it has to go back through the screening process and would be unavailable to view for a day or two. That's time I can't afford to lose if I want to make it the PW homepage!

P.P.S. Hey, I just had a thought: maybe if you all go on there, make the cornbread, really like it (as I'm sure you will :)) and then post a full five mitt review (not a comment, but a review--there are two different links and they are ranked differently), that might push my recipe over the top! You don't have to if you don't want to...I'm just sayin'.

Classic Cherry Pie

I signed up to make a pie and two loaves of bread for the trek that the youth in our stake are going on this week. They wanted authentic, homemade food, so they called on the sisters in the ward. Since I hate making something and giving it away without knowing if it tastes okay, I had to make one for us to keep, too. I consulted Food Network for the base behind this recipe, but made a few revisions. I wanted to be sure it was a nice, firm, congealed pie so it would be easy to eat out in the wilderness and not too messy, but I wanted it to be good, too.

As I was searching the internet for recipes/methods for a cherry pie, I was surprised by the lack of old fashioned recipes out there. Most of them were either labeled "Easy" and used a store bought canned filling, they had some weird extra ingredients, or weren't really pies at all. There were only two classic recipes on Food Network, even, and the other one looked kind of thin and runny. Because of this, I decided it was high time more traditional, old fashioned cherry pie recipes were put out there, so that's why I'm posting it.

The last thing I want to say before getting to it is that I never used to like cherry pies or anything with cherry pie filling of any type--turnovers, doughnuts, streusal, etc.--because of the filling. Then about five years ago, someone gave me a bunch of bing cherries from their trees and I decided to make a real, homemade cherry pie. It was SO good! I've also discovered that I don't like using "pie" cherries or "tart" cherries...they have to be sweet cherries like bing or ranier. And that canned stuff is for the birds. The real thing is the only way to go.


4 c. sweet cherries, pitted (about 2 lbs)
3/4 cup sugar
4 Tbsp. cornstarch
1/4 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. almond extract
1/4 tsp. vanilla
1 1/2 tsp water
4 Tbsp. butter

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Start by pitting the cherries. This part is messy, so be prepared. I think this step is why canned cherries became popular. But it's really not that bad, pretty easy to clean up, and definitely worth it. If you don't have a cherry pitter (like me), there is another way. First, put on an apron or an old shirt (seriously). Dump the cherries onto a cutting board. One at a time, use the flat side of a large knife to gently mash each cherry then set it aside. Do this to all the cherries. Then go through and remove the stems and pits, which should be nicely loosened and easy to pull out. After that, it's simple. just dump the pitted cherries into a bowl, add the rest of the ingredients except for the butter, and mix well.

Using you favorite pie shell recipe (I used this one from the Pioneer Woman), layer a pastry into the bottom of a pie pan, pour the cherries into the pie (juice and all), dot the cherries with the butter, roll out the top layer of pastry*, place it on top of pie, cut extra dough off, seal the edge with a pinch or fork, and cut two slits (or a "C" for cherry) into the top to vent. As a garnish, I cut out two cherries from the dough then rolled some more dough to make the stems and placed them on top. Then I beat an egg and brushed the top and edges of the pie with it to give it a nice golden brown color. To finish, I sprinkled some coarse sugar on top of the egg wash before putting it into the oven. Let bake for about 30-45 minutes, or until the crust is a nice golden color. You might want to put a foil lined baking sheet on the bottom rack, just to be safe. Mine boiled over and now I have baking soda sprinkled on the bottom of my oven. Don't do that. :)

*Side note: if you didn't already know, a really easy way to transfer a pie crust from the counter top to a pie is to first, use plenty of flour. I even flip the dough over about 1/4 way through rolling it out and flour both sides. Once it's rolled out, flour the top and the rolling pin, then place the rolling pin at the edge of the crust. Roll the dough over the rolling pin, careful not to tear the dough. If it tears, just try to seal it back together. Move the rolling pin with dough over to the pie and unroll the dough into the pie pan or on top of the pie. The pie crust recipe I use is great because it's nice and flaky, but it holds up well and it's really easy to transfer like this.

Grass! (stage 3)

Well, we're almost there. Here's the yard now after the sod has been laid and about two weeks in. I've been waiting to take the "final" picture until Robert gets that last sprinkler laid in, the first mowing is done, and it's more grown in and even, but this will have to do for now. We love it. The boys have already had a great time playing out there and running in the sprinklers. I am very happy with it. I just am anxious to get the last stage finished so it's totally done, the patio is cleared off (not pictured--full of paving stones and shovels), and the sprinklers are done. Right now I still have to switch lines every 10 minutes since we don't have them on a timer yet.

I will let you know when it's totally, 100% complete!

By the way, I just want to say I am so grateful Robert is such a great handyman. He built and dug the sprinkler lines himself, with a little raking and digging help from our home teacher. It looks great!

Bumble Bee, Cleator, and Crown King

Memorial Day 2011

When I was a kid, every year it was a tradition for everyone in the ward to meet at the lake for boating, barbecuing, and games. Those days are some of the best memories from my childhood.

Since people/friends/ward families don't seem to do that kind of thing anymore (I don't get it) we decided to take a little drive north of Phoenix to visit three little "ghost" towns that I found out about online. It was a fun trip, but by my definition, these were not ghost towns at all. They were just little old towns that have been around since the 1800s but people still live there. As my mom said, though, how do you know they're actually "people"? :) Doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo (sing to the Twilight Zone theme).

Just kidding. They were rustic, for sure, but definitely among the living. The first town, Bumble Bee, was about 10 miles from the highway down a poorly graded dirt road. We didn't get out and take pictures, though, because every building (including the stage stop and the schoolhouse) have been turned into homes. We didn't want to intrude.



Thirteen miles later (through some questionable switchbacks, up the mountain, and pass an old mine--pictures above) we got to Cleator. I had to use the bathroom, so we stopped at the only public place in town: the bar with a sign that read "Last beer until Crown King". There were a lot of neat, historic things in there, though (other than the floorboards and the bartender, which were more scary than "neat"). They had what looked like an original pot bellied stove, old-style door knobs, and an Enco gas pump out front. The bathroom also had some creative signs like "Don't flush ANY paper--throw it in the trash" and "If it's yellow let it mellow, if it's brown flush it down." I suppose those were due to their water shortage, but still...everything I'd ever been taught about public hygiene screamed inside of me as I walked out, not flushing. I was just grateful the person before me had to do the opposite so I had a (relatively) clean toilet to use.


This is a neat old building in Cleator that is still being used by some local for storage or something.

Here's the old gas pump out front of the bar. I wanted to take a picture of Craig with it, but he kept saying he didn't want me to take his picture. But then he walked up to it saying, "Hey Mom, take a picture of this part." I said, "What part, Craig? Point to it again." So he stood there, pointing to it, while I took the picture. That's how I got Craig in this picture, which he still doesn't realize. Heh, heh, heh. I outsmarted a three year old! (Why do I feel so triumphant?) One last thing about the gas pump, can you see how there's only three digits in the middle? That's where it says "Total Sale" not "Price Per Gallon." I thought it was crazy that back when this thing was made, the manufacturers never even considered putting four digits, as if it would NEVER cost more than $9.99 to fill a tank.

Anywho, on to Crown King. This was about another 15 miles past Cleator, but up into some pine trees and cool weather. It was a good sized little town, actually, for being over an hour down a dirt road with switchbacks to the highway in one direction and four hours the other. There's a lake out there, somewhat nearby, which brings the tourists, I guess. We didn't make it that far, though.

Here's most of Crown King, with the only fire station for many miles, two stores, one cafe, and a saloon (the same one they used way back when, with the outside access to the upstairs brothel and everything). There is also a guest ranch, though, and a decent looking bed and breakfast.

Another interesting thing about this area, all the land is private ranch land even though the roads are county owned. Several times we passed cows roaming around. I was glad we never encountered any lounging in the middle of the road, especially when we saw this guy:


I took this right through the windshield and didn't zoom in at all. He was standing right on the side of the road. It's hard to tell from the picture, but he was literally twice the size of any of the cows around him. I was glad to get out of there--he was actually staring us down.

Well, hope you had a good Memorial Day!

Grass! (stage 2)

Stage 2 of the Backyard Improvement Project (after pulling out the paving stones and tilling) is raking the ground level and digging the trenches for the sprinkler lines. We were lucky enough to have our home teacher come by the day before Robert wanted to start work on this part. He asked us, "Is there anything I can do to help you with anything?" Unfortunately for him, we said yes! He came over two nights last week and they got most of it done and ready for the sod on Friday. There's still one section of sprinkler line they didn't get in so Robert is going to have to peel back the sod and bury that sometime this week. I will have to wait until that goes in to post the final stage of our grass installation so it's all complete.

By the way, anyone want a HUGE pile of broken paving stones?

A tangent

This morning has not been the best. I've felt a culmination of several small disappointments become wrapped up into one minor event. A less dramatic person than me would be able to push this aside, too. But on top of everything else, I was letting it overwhelm me. I had a few precious moments to myself this morning as Robert had negotiated with me to make a McDonald's breakfast run while he watched the kids. In the car, I was stewing over my plight when I decided to turn the CD up that was playing. It was the Beetles' "Let It Be." I thought it was appropriate. I listened to what was left and then waited for the CD to change and the first track of the new one to begin. I guess I was still kind of feeling sorry for myself because it was The Eagles and they were singing "Get Over It." Point taken.

Who says classic rock bands weren't inspired?

Grass! (almost)

I've mentioned our dirty, awful, no good, very bad backyard before. This is how it's been the last few months with Craig, Ethan, and Jade (the dog) playing outside:


To give you some perspective, that far corner was where I was standing in the last picture when I took it.

This is the strip along the side of the house that was all dirt, no dead grass, no paving stones (on the surface--after we got into it we found several feet of stones about three inches under the dirt along with a row of bricks making a flower border all the way down the length of the wall), no weeds...nothing.

This was last Friday. Robert got the day off of work to dig up all the stones, then we rented a rototiller (sp?) and he tilled it all up. Craig was a big help with the digging and moving of paving stones. Did I mention that the weekend before I found that wheelbarrow and shovel they're using at a garage sale for $4? That was my contribution since I couldn't do much more than sit in a camping chair and cheer them on.


While Robert was dumping a load of paving stones, I watched in amazement as my big boy picked up the shovel, stuck it under the edge of a buried stone, and pried it up. When Robert got back, Craig picked up the stone all by himself and put it in the wheelbarrow. He did that several times. At one point, he came over to rest and sit in his little camp chair. I said, kidding, "What are doing sitting down? You need to pull your own weight around here!" But then I thought about it and realized he probably already had, literally.

Ethan was like me and no help at all, really. He just entertained us by looking cute and making faces.

At one point he wanted to go inside so I let him watch T.V. for a while. (It was getting pretty warm outside.) I realized I hadn't seen him or heard him come to the door in a while, so I went to check on him. This is what happens when the big brother is occupied and the little brother is left to his himself for a long enough period of time:

It was almost nap time anyway and it had been a busy morning. :) It's just so funny to me because neither of them EVER just fall asleep like this.

Next, I'll post pictures of our progress. Today the sod is going in, so pretty soon we'll have complete before and after pictures! I'm so excited!

And so it begins

This is Craig on Sunday night, wearing his first pair of real underwear! No, he's not potty trained yet, but this is the beginning of the adventure.

He's resisted potty training for a long time and I've let it go. I figured I'd wait until he was at least three and my classes were over for the summer. That way I'd have all summer before the baby is born to get this boy potty trained. Previously, we've tried getting him interested with fun potty seats, fun underwear, M&Ms, DVDs with potty songs, and several other techniques we've been told to try. He lost interest in M&Ms (who's child is he, anyway?), he flat out refused to wear his Toy Story underwear (which he had picked out), didn't like the potty seats, and was just full of excuses. After talking to my sister who's going through something similar, I decided to just pick a day to take away the diapers and tell him he can poop and pee in his pants, go in his underwear, or use the potty. Of course, I am keeping a timer and putting him on the potty regularly.

I had planned to start this last Monday, but randomly on Sunday night he said, "Mommy, I want to wear my underwear." So, he put it on him and several times that night he would tell me he had to go and then he would go in the potty. I was encouraged, until the next morning when we started all over again. By 11:30 we had used all nine pairs of underwear. :( We washed them and started over. Since then, I've realized that Sunday night was a fluke. Not only does he still not tell me before he has to pee, but he trickles a little bit out every ten minutes or so. I've talked to him about stopping the pee before it comes out and then finishing in the potty, but when he doesn't hold it long enough to have any significant amount of pee in his body, how can he know that "I gotta go" feeling? Any suggestions would be helpful. For now, I'm just forging ahead with my plan, hoping he'll catch on.

As for #2, he painfully held it all day Monday and refused the potty until he finally went in his underwear Monday evening. He didn't go at all yesterday, so we'll see how today goes. I know this will take longer than pee, so I'm not worried, but I just thought I'd throw it out there.

Like I said, please offer any suggestions, if you have them. I am open to new ideas. I would just wait until he was a little older, but I am really trying to not have three kids in diapers.

Trains, planes, and automobiles

Craig LOVES to point out all the different types of vehicles we see on a daily/weekly basis. Police cars, fire trucks, taxis, buses (especially school buses), trains, airplanes, helicopters, UPS trucks, moving vans, and Mack (any semi that looks like Mack from the movie Cars, which is pretty much any semi). He's been able to go inside a fire truck recently and the little boy's face was struck with wonder and amazement. He stood there like a statue, looking around, afraid to touch anything. We put Ethan in, too, and Craig kept telling him, "Efan, don't touch that!" Since we live in a city full of buses and light rail trains, we decided to take Craig on a couple little rides.

I only got one picture because it was too crazy keeping the boys on the train platform or at the bus station and it was weird with so many people around and in the background of the one picture I did take. Everyone ended up looking shifty-eyed and a little angry, for some reason, even though Craig and Ethan had a blast. You'll see the picture at the end. It's pretty awkward looking.

First, I took Craig and Ethan on a bus ride while Robert drove the car behind us. Craig was totally thrilled and loved every minute. The next day, we went to the train station near a water park and rode OVER A BRIDGE (which was SO exciting for a three year old), rode a little ways, got off, took the train back, and then took a picnic lunch to the water park. It was a lot of fun and a dream come true for two little vehicle lovers.


Next we need to figure out how to get him on an airplane...

Boys do strange things sometimes...

Robert has a tendency to do strange things to Craig and Ethan with food. For example, he's been known to put corn nuts behind their ears just to see if they'll notice and how long they'll stay. I guess Craig has picked up on this because the other morning while eating Cookie Crisp, I looked over and saw this expression on his face:

To see what he was smiling at, I looked down at his feet:

The best part was telling Robert about it. He thought it was hilarious. :) And just for good measure, here's a picture of Ethan that same morning. He didn't know what I was laughing at, but thought it was funny, too.

Perks

Robert started working for a snack food company back in November that's located here in Mesa. His job is to develop new products and improve on the current ones. They make a lot of their own flavored popcorn, peanuts, and trail mix. He gets a lot of samples of things from companies from all around the country to try in his product development. Sometimes he gets things he can't really use and sometimes there's a surplus. In those cases, he can either toss the stuff (if it's something weird like xanthan gum) or brings it home. This week, we struck gold. He brought home this to begin with:

That is 8 Madagascar vanilla beans, folks! If you have ever bought these at the store, you get something three in a bottle and they cost about $15. And, according to the Food Network's Alton Brown, the Madagascar variety is the best. Then on Wednesday, he came home and gave these to me:

I didn't even know that these things existed! They are SO good. These people have figured out a way to slightly dehydrate pomegranate arils (those juicy seed things inside pomegranates) so that they maintain their nutrients but can be coated in dark chocolate. Genius!

I once had a history teacher in high school (Mr. Smith) who talked about one perk of being married to his wife was that her parents ran a travel agency so they could go pretty much anywhere for practically free. That is a pretty cool one and hard to beat, but one major perk of being married to a chef/food person is the connections to cool things in the food world. And that he values good quality kitchen appliances more than most men so I never had to negotiate when I wanted a stand mixer or food processor. Just a random thing, I guess, but this was an important part of my week! :)

A quiet moment

We have this backyard that I love/hate. I love it because the boys can spend quite a bit of time out there, all by themselves, playing with their toys, the dog, digging holes, etc. Sometimes I have to jump in and stop them from screaming because our neighbors are REALLY close (we have three outside walls and four neighbors' yards attached to them) but other than that, they love it and so do I. Here are pictures of an evening when I was tired of their whining and fighting and was trying to make dinner in a small kitchen with both of them underfoot. So, I found some bottles of bubbles that Craig got for his birthday, opened up two of them, and sent them outside.


Ah, the peace and quiet that reigned. We went through something like five bottles up bubbles. Most of them ended up spilled in the dirt, but so be it.

Why do I hate the yard, too? Because it's DIRT. It comes into the kitchen, it breeds more flies in the dog poop than grass would even when I pick it every. single. day. Sometimes twice a days, actually. The dog gets filthy so she spends all her time out there (except when she sleeps in her kennel in the living room at night). And the boys are covered in dust and mud (from the dog's water dish) on a daily basis. However, I am enjoying having cool enough whether for them to go play in and don't mind the daily baths since I know that in a few weeks or so they'll be stuck inside with me after 7:00 in the morning due to the heat.

By the way, here's how I spend time with Jade, our ever-growing Rottweiler--through the glass in the door. I love her, but not enough to let her play inside with all the dust and dirt covering her. We're working on putting in grass, needless to say.

Kissy-face

When I was pregnant with Craig, I crocheted an Eeyore stuffed animal for him using a pattern book I bought at a fabric store. Then when I was expecting Ethan, I did Piglet. This time, I decided it was time to get Pooh himself out of the book and into reality. Here are some pictures I took of Pooh with Ethan, since when Pooh's around, Ethan only puts him down long enough to eat, and sometimes not even then. I've been keeping him up on top of the bookshelf lately, just so he doesn't end up outside in the dirt or covered in spaghetti sauce. Ethan loves to kiss anything and everything with a face and to make us kiss them, too. Stuffed animals, toys, his penguin pillow pet, people, smiley face stickers. He will literally walk around, carrying Pooh, kissing him over and over again, running into walls. So, I decided to take pictures of him because this is something I want to remember about my sweet little boy.


Here he's going in for the kiss. I kept missing the moment because my camera has kind of a long delay.

Pooh's about as tall as Ethan, if he were standing up. :)


So sad. This was right after Craig had taken Pooh away from him.


Our moods change very quickly.

I love his expressions. He does this one when he's waiting to surprise you with a "boo" or anticipating a tickle or surprise from you.

Sometimes we're not affectionate, but more playful with Pooh. Like when we put him on the floor, face down, sit on his head, and spank him. (BTW, notice my sandal tan line on my foot? That's from wearing sandals 360 days out of the year....don't you wish you lived in AZ? :))

Mommy gets lots of kisses, too.


This is a horrible, but funny, picture of Craig. It doesn't really look like him at all. It's funny because he kept wanting me to take pictures of him, too, so he'd stand there smiling, waiting for the click so he would know he could relax his face. This time, though, the camera wasn't working right so by the time I got the picture taken, his smile became more of snarl.