McKinley's First Field Trip

Before we arrived at school for her first field trip, today, she informed me that, "Mommy, I don't want you to sit with me on the bus. I only want to sit with my friends. You can sit with my teacher." Um...isn't this the attitude that is supposed to be revealed in around 7th or 8th grade? Embarrased of me already? Too good to sit with mommy? WOW...she sure is growing up fast. That being said she LOVED going on the bus. They took a tour of a local grocery store and even got to practice scanning items at the register. She thought she was way cool!! I'm glad I got to be there as her little legs got exhausted after an hour and a half of walking through the store and wanted to be carried. After all, she KNOWS she's still my 'little' girl.

"Reach for the Stars"

Kinley has a new catch phrase..."Reach for the stars". Ok that alone is not what is so funny. She says it a voice like "EEEEE.TTTTTT. Phhhhhhoooooonnnnneeeeee hoooooomeeeee". (if you can recall that sqeaky little voice that E.T. had in the movie) NOT only that she strikes a pose. (see pix) We have no idea where she got this from.

Our Mexican Siesta Photos

Notice no pix of Erich and I...we be too fat right now...tee hee!!

Lesson Learned

Apparently, if you let a 3 year old put herself to sleep at 5pm she will wake you up at 4am saying, "Mommy, I'm all done sleeping now. Time to get up." I really wish I drank coffee...it's 7am and I've already been up for 3 hours. The only good thing to come out of this: My kitchen is cleaned, laundry has been started, kids have been fed and I got Reagan's party invites filled out and addressed. The challenge for me today is to see if I can stay up past 5pm.

Reality Check

Well we made it back from Cancun in one piece. What a great vacation!! A much needed vacation. It rained the first two days were were there but it didn't deter Erich from golfing or me from enjoying a massage. Home Depot sure does know how to treat their employees, I'll tell you. We stayed at an all inclusive 'couples only' (read adults only) resort. I had forgotten what peace and quiet sounded like...the silence of not having children around is so foreign to me that I didn't know what to do with myself!! The third day we were there we took a catermaran out to see and did some snorkeling. While the snorkling was nice, Hawaii's underwater life is much more vibrant and beautiful. No big loss though, as Home Depot paid for the trip. The last full day we were there we just hung out by the pool and did a little shopping. We really had a wonderful time but I was actually missing Reagan and McKinley so it was great to see them when we got home. (plus Mi-Mi and Papa were really exhausted and ready for them to leave) So while I'm glad to be home with my children I sure could use another vacation already. It didn't take long to get back into the swing of the kids fighting, the house being messy, meals to cook and laundry to be done. Ah...the good life. I'll post pix later today.

"I'm aleaving on a jet plane...."

HOLA! Well we're off to Wisconsin tomorrow. Ok not so much on a plane but in a car. (that is provided I can get all of our belongings together) We are dropping the kids off at Mimi's and Papas and we're staying there until Sunday morning when we leave at 4am for O'Hare. (granted, I'll be sleeping the whole way there) The kids are pretty excited about staying at Mimi's because they get to see their cousins and stay over night at their best friends' house one night. Mommy and Daddy are excited because we get to escape to a tropical region in Mexico for a few days to enjoy some much needed r&r and maybe rejuvinate ourselves. I'm pretty nervous about leaving our little ones while we are so far away. They won't even notice we're gone but I know they will be on my mind the whole time. Ok, maybe not the WHOLE time ... I mean, c'mon who wants to be thinking/worring about kids while enjoying a facial and massage?? So this is adios until next week....

Birthday Smirthday....

My sister said it perfectly: "Why do we expect so much on our birthday? It's always a let down." So true. So very true!! Don't get me started about how unbelievably cranky my family was on my actual birthday. My kids, however, did manage to bake me a cake with Erich's help. Can you believe the kids chose a CARROT cake? What kind of 3 and 5 yr old choses a CARROT cake? MINE!! That being said I LOVE carrot cake..so at the very least this was the highlight of my birthday. For some unknown reason, it seems every holiday, birthday or any 'special' occasion my husband just seems to be so pissy on those days. I don't get it!? It's as if he doesn't know how to show/share happiness in someone elses happiness. I really killed me when he walked away from McKinley's birthday party, while she was opening her presents, because he was (in his words) 'irritated with how that party was going'. How friggin selfish is that? I don't know. Maybe there was something in his past that makes him like that. I wish I could get inside his head. On my birthday he told me to take the day off and go out by myself and go shopping. THEN I get home and he's pissed because he never gets any time to HIMSELF to do anything because he's always 'watching the kids'. WTH?????? THEN he gets all weird because I didn't stay out longer and go to Champaign. ARRRRG!!! I love him with all my heart but OMG sometimes I could just strangle him.

OOOPPS I guess I just went off on a complete tangent from what my post was supposed to be about. Needless to say I'm happy not to have to celebrate anything for another month until Reagan's birthday!!

Look What Kinley Did I Was In The Shower

Now that the kids are 3 and 5 years old I mildly trust them to play well while I get ready in the morning. It's the one time of the day that I get any peace and quiet so I really take advantage of it. I take a longer shower but I do stop the water occasionally to listen for screaming, hitting or 'too much quiet'. (any mom knows that if it's TOO quiet all hell is probably breaking loose) Today when I stepped out of the shower it was all a bit too quiet. I quickly grabbed my camera just incase it was anything worth noting. Well as you can see it IS worth noting. I have NO idea where Kinley found nail polish! It's not like I'm one of 'those' moms who are opposed to playing with makeup WITH the kids...however, I am opposed to my THREE year old playing with nail polish all by herself in her nice clothes. That being said, she actally did NOT make a mess. As you can see she put down a towel and really took her time polishing her nails careful not to spill it!! She is such a girly girl it just cracks me up. She told me when she was finished that I needed my nails filed and painted and that she did a better job so I should "make an appointment". Silly girl!!

36 years old? Could it REALLY Be??

As I sit here 4 days away from the 'big 36' ( I think everything beyond 35 deserves 'the BIG' in front of it) I wonder where the heck has the time gone? It seems like just yesterday I was turning 21 learning the hard lessons of a long night of drunken debotchery and regretting the next morning whatever it was that I couldn't remember from the night before. (Lynn or Rita, if you are reading this I *know* YOU know what I'm talking about) Now where I am 15 years later, married, 2 kids, trying to dig outa debt and finding myself contemplating a boob job. Yeah, I said it...a boob job. (Erich said for my 40th I could get one) Who knew that having two kids would do this to my once perky chest??? Oh, ok, ya'll did!!?? Nobody told me! (Admittedly, though, it was worth it when I look at Reagan and Kinley's quirky little grins.) It seem so strange to me that I am so close to the 'big 40'. I don't feel that old nor do I think I look that old. (well except my boobs, perhaps) Anyways I decided to make a list of things that Kristen needs to do while 36 years old and they are as follows:
*Learn and Practice Patience
*Work out 3-5 Times per Week
*Lose That Weight
*Keep Up with Laundry
*Teach Kids to Read
*Teach Kids to Make Beds
*Get up BEFORE Kids
*Read More Books
*Be Kinder to Erich
*Take Kids to YMCA 3x per Week
*Clean My Car Out Weekly
*Catch Up on Kids' Scrapbooks

Ok that was all I could come up with off the cuff but I'm going to try to do these things and update my list as I see fit.

So as I blow out my 36 candles on Sunday I will be praying for the energy and strength to keep up with all my new goals.

Our New Dog... Well kind of....

We've been really bad about getting the dogs groomed since we moved here so I decided it was high time to get at least one of the dogs groomed. Augie, our fluffy American Eskimo, needed the worst. Upon dropping him off at the new groomer I left with the instructions to, "Trim him up or do what was needed." Um, yeahhhhh, they did 'what was needed'. (see before and after pix) Our dog looks like a pathetic wimpy dog now. Even my girlfriend's son, who is 2 and usually a bit apprehensive about the dog, was CRACKING up when he saw Augie. Scootch didn't know WHAT to think. Although, upon smelling his butt he figured out it was all cool!

Post Below..

Um yeah..my experiement didn't work. I didn't take into consideration that my kids could get into the fridge by theirselves everytime I was in the bathroom, changing laundry, brushing my teeth, taking out the trash, changing the channels on the t.v. ect.

Belly of the Beasts

Every morning my little darling girls awaken me with the same request, "Mommy, we're hungry. Can you make us breakfast?" Some days I simply tell them to go downstairs, get a juice box and I'll be down to make breakfast in a minute. (giving myself a chance to have my eyes adjust to the pre morning light) Some days that answer simply is not an option for my little ones so I have to stumble out of bed and tumble to the kitchen. (hey, wasn't that a Dolly Parton song from the '80s?) Usually for breakfast we will have cereal and fruit or blueberry pancakes or on real lazy days I will let them have cereal. So they will eat a few bites of whatever that mornings 'special' is and then run away to play. I assume they are done so I clean up their plates and continue on with my morning chores. About 10 minutes later, like clockwork, they track me down whining, "Mommy, we're hungry. We want a snack." I ususally reply, "Ok girls go get an apple, banana or granola bar" to this they usually reply, "But MOOOOMMMMMMMYYYY we want a snack!!" (apparently this is NOT a snack to a 3 and 5 yr old) Yes, at 7:30 am my kids think it completly appropriate to eat cheetos, ice cream, popcorn or anything that ISN'T fruit, veggies or healthy in the least bit. Needless to say be lunch time, we've had this argument at least 5 or 6 times, so I'm thrilled to be able to stop the cycle by offering lunch....to which they want cheetos, ice cream, popcorn or anything that does NOT resemble appropriate lunch food. So what is it in my beautiful, wonderful, HUNGRY little girls that makes them starving all the time?? Tape worm? Maybe. Boredom? I don't think so since they have so many toys to play with. Growing? I just don't understand. So, today I'm conducting an experiment. NO SNACKS AT ALL, ALL DAY. Yeah I know...what a mean mom. But hell if they are hungry enough they WILL, I'm convinced, eat good food, eat all their meals and not be starving all day long. Wish me luck!

My Baby Started School

Well my youngest, McKinley started school yesterday. I cannot believe she is old enough to attend preschool. She had been looking forward to this for about a year. When she was two, we kept telling her she had to wait until she turned three before she could start. She had been watching Reagan go off to school for 2 years and it just broke her heart that she could not join her. When she woke up yesterday morning she was SO excited to go to school only to have us burst her bubble when we told her that she didn't start until 12:30. (of course she couldn't understand why it wasn't 12:30 'right now') Anyways she went, had a great day and can't wait to go back next week. Her teacher told us, "it was like she'd been going here all her life...she did great!" I'm so happy for her and I'm looking forward to having some one on one time with Reagan while she's at school!!

Happy New Year!!

New Years 2008...what fun!! We had some friends of ours over for a night of eating and games. Our friends have 5 yr old and 2 yr old boys so the kids all play very well together. The kids had a BALL. My kids, who usually are in bed by 8:30, were up until about 11:00pm!! It didn't seem possible but they got up the next morning at 6:30am. (poor mommy, I didn't even go to bed until our guests left around 3am) Needless to say I am still, 3 days later, trying to catch up on my sleep!! Anyways happy new year to all!!