We Are the Champions

Gotta be doing something right when you hear this conversation from afar:
(Adam finished his homework and I told him he could play video games)
Adam: No, don't come in here.
Luke: Mumbling-stuff-I-can't-quite-hear.
Adam:  No, you can't come in here until you finish your homework.  It's not allowed.
Luke: Okay, I'll go and finish my homework.

True story - just happened.

Saturday was the boys' football tournament.  The girls did not want to go so Julie took them for the day.  I had fun hangin' with my boys.  Ethan super-loved football day.  He kept asking, "when is my game?" and he says "when I grow up, I'm gonna be a football star."

So we got up and got the girls over to Julie's place by 7:30am.  I was going to try to stop at the grocery and get something decent for breakfast, but Jack in the Box it was.  It was delicious at the time, but then after we ate McDonald's for lunch, I just felt sick for the rest of the afternoon.  Adam's team lost their games right off, and didn't get to even play for the bronze medal.  He got to be quarterback quite a few times, and pulled many a flag.  He was super upset that they lost.  He is very competitive.  I was totally thinking that Luke's team would follow suit and we'd have an early departure.  Boy was I ever wrong.  Luke's team did spectacular.  His games were very exciting, and he had a great time.  The Gold Medal game was really good.  They played against Archway Trivium, which is the school in Goodyear.  That team was very good, and the game was a close one.  It was very exciting for them to win, it being their first year playing together as a team.  They all are very excited that they won the Trophy that will be displayed at their school.  The boys will also get gold medals with their school name on it.

Go North Phoenix Argonauts, #28 and #70!

Adam in action!

The Champs!

I tried for action shots of Luke, but every time I took pictures he went behind someone, or someone got in my way.  My amazing Nikon, I think, might be out of commission.  I have pictures on there to look at so maybe I have some action shots of him.  I have some of Ethan too.  I might just need a new lens.  Every time I would zoom in everything would blur up.  It was working fine on Adam's birthday so I'm not sure what is going on with it.

They really missed you on their day, and said several times that they wished you were there.  I told them we'd get the pictures up right away for you.  And voila, I actually did it. ;o)  Love you much.

Time to Mow

Adam mowed Grandpa's lawn for $5.  He had the chance to mow the front and back, $5 each but said he got too tired after the backyard was done.

Toothless

Adam is toothless on top as of last night.  He lost the first one a few days ago, and last night the second one came out.  We had to take a picture to show you his toothless self.

First Day of School

First Day.

Happy enough looking, right?

Picture Catch-up Time.

In order of no certain importance............

Littles playing at the last swim lesson of the season.  They put holes in the hose so our awesome dive students wouldn't burn their toes waiting in line to dive.  I finally got smart the last week and let Ethan wear his suit to play in it.

 

 

 

 

I don't remember what day this was, I think a Sunday.  But this is my story and I"m sticking to it: I accidentally forgot to run the very full dishwasher.  I was feeling extremely behind, and tired, and also probably a teensy bit lazy too, and so I also had a sink-full of dishes as well as a full dishwasher.  I woke up in the morning very hungry, with starving kids biting my legs.  I went to make some delicious eggs, and coffee, and the works, and the dishes were all dirty - everywhere.  I felt like pouting, and called up my mom and sister and begged them to go to Cracker Barrel with us.  That way I didn't feel ultra guilty, or something.  They both lovingly obliged, and here is the photo of kids rockin' on our way out.

I had to make a Target run, for something or another, and made Jenna try these cute glasses on.

....and Ethan had to try them on too, of course.  He also had the matching shirt on already.

Haircuts for everyone.  Jenna and Liv went to a salon, a door down from Great Clips.  Great Clips had a $7.99 promotion.  The next day I saw a commercial for free haircuts at JC Penney.  Nice.  I cut Ethan's.  I kept walking back and forth between Great Clips and Salon to make sure kids were okay everywhere.  The people probably thought I was crazy.  Also, the salon smelled horribly and constantly of fake nail perfume.  I think we all have lung cancer.  Sorry about that.

Pictures

The kids played in the snow the other day when I shoveled the driveway.  Livea climbed the huge hill and was so proud of herself so I had to take a picture.

The boys played too.  Jenna was in the house...so there aren't any pictures of her this time.  I will have to get plenty of her in Colorado!

I was doing laundry last night and I asked Livea to fold her diapers up.  She loves helping with any kind of work around the house so I knew she would love to help.

All done!  Look what a great job she did!  I did not help her at all!
Love ya and miss ya!

hackjob

Adam and Livea decided Livea needed a new haircut. I was reading to Jenna and Luke (school stuff) and the little ones went upstairs. They do this often, so it isn't something I worry about. They play together really well. Well................................!! Adam hacked the heck outta her hair. Livea helped somewhat, but Adam did most of it. I could not even bring myself to take a picture of her hair. The image burned into my memory is bad enough. I was really anxious the entire day about it. Christina's has a friend that does hair in her home, and I called her up and she let me come over at 4:15. Her hair doesn't look so bad in this picture - it's pretty cute actually, but this morning when she woke up, all the too-short hairs were standing straight up on the top of her head. Aye! There really isn't anything I can do with her hair now, I have tried ponies, and clips....it is just going to have to grow for a while. I was very upset with them. Poor Livea - she just cried and cried. Adam cried because I spanked him. Livea cried just because I was so upset with her. Later I asked her what she thought Daddy would think when she told him Adam cut her hair, and she said "Daddy will love it! Daddy will say he loves my new haircut when he comes home from Iwack!" So here it is. We wuv you and miss you vewwy much. ;o)

From Drop Box

Adam's Black Belt Birthday Party

Ben has uploaded some of Adam's party. He recorded more, but it takes a while to upload, so I think there is more coming. I'll post them in this same entry when they come. Love you and miss you too!!

Adam's 5th Birthday

Well, Adam had a good birthday yesterday. Here he is at lunch with his requested meal. He wanted peanut butter & jelly, banana sandwiches. He saw it on TV, and told me exactly how to make them, and so we did!
He's actually posing here - he said "take a picture of me eating!" but he was just sitting there like that waiting for me to take the picture.

I forgot to take a picture of him opening his present with my camera on my phone, so I can't put any of those pics on here. I did tell him that it was your idea to buy them the automatic baseball pitcher - that he calls the "batter-batter-baseballer", and I am not sure why. But the kids went and out and played for quite some time yesterday and good thing because it began storming in the middle of the night and is supposed to rain all day today too. Everything is completely soaked out there. Jenna batted and hit me in the jaw with a ball, and then not 5 minutes later she hit Adam in the head with the bat (it's plastic). I told her she had to have a break because she wanted being careful....but in all honesty, her hitting me in the face with the ball (IT HURT) wasn't really her fault. I was standing there staring at her and it was a really good hit, and I didn't duck or try to catch it or anything. I must have been spacing it. It was probably funny if you weren't me... just to see me starving right at it and it hitting me square in the jaw. Ouch. Anyway, they had tons of fun with it. I hope it stays warm and stops raining so they can go play with it again.

Adam wanted "baby" burgers and macaroni and cheese for dinner. I know this is horrible, but I did not feel like making mac n cheese, so I just bought some Kraft! LOL. You know how often that happens, so I don't feel bad (except that it was his birthday, I should have been more up to making it homemade). I also didn't make the baby burgers -and bought frozen ones - just not a cooking sort of day for me. No one cared, and the burgers seriously tasted exactly like McDonald's cheeseburgers so the kids liked them.
I was feeling pretty lazy lately I think. I didn't clean the kitchen at all last night. I left everything on the counter, and just LEFT it. How often do I do that too??? I just didn't want to!! So I didn't. I felt much more positive about it this morning, and got it all done. The kids are upstairs cleaning right now. It's almost lunchtime and we haven't even started school yet today. But they have been getting everything done super fast lately.

So last night my sister called me and while I am blabbing away on the phone the kids were playing in the school room and I could hear them, they were coloring and cuttting and having fun. Welll..............this is what happens when you're not paying close enough attention to your 2.5 year old:
Uhhhh, oops. She had put almost an entire bottle of glue on that red paper at the back of the table and then dumped glitter all over it. It was very messy. She was covered in glue and glitter - and she had already taken a bath. The glitter somehow was bleeding it's green color from being wet with glue and she had green smears and glitter on her face, and legs, and her hands were completely covered in glitter.

So.....it was a long day of catering to Adam, but it was a good day. At one point when I was on the phone with my sister, Adam came in crying saying "it's my birthday and no one will even play with me!!!" :o( It was almost bedtime and he was tired, but it was cute and sad.

We all love you and we missed you on Adam's special day!!

you're caught/plans/schedule

I accidentally told on you about the Tyra-snake-incident. So expect retaliation. Sorry!! He didn't know who did it until I spilled the beans.

There is a coffee tonight at Mrs. Crossman's house. I'm making delicious Southwestern Eggrolls to bring and share the recipe also (which I still have to print out sometime today!!). It should be fun. I am going to try to sneak out early to get Adam his birthday present. I found a Major League pitching machine for him online, but it says it isn't available in the stores. Jenna has an ortho appointment in Topeka tomorrow, but I don't have time to go to Toys R Us because they have Taekwondo at 5:30; her appointment is at 3:20. Even if I did have time, I'd have Adam with me!! So anyway, I may just leave and try Target anyway.

So Taekwondo is now on Tuesday's and Friday's. Tiny Tigers beings at 5:30pm, and Advanced is from 6-6:45pm. It is only 15 minutes difference, but it seems like a lot to me. I still haven't sewn the boys' cheetah patches on, and will probably do it tomorrow just because I don't know if I'll have time today.

Ben brought a giant ham over that the hotel gave him for organizing the DMOR ball. Well, he brought half over. But it's a ton, and since we don't really even eat ham all that much, it is hard for me to figure out how to use. I am going to make scalloped potatoes with ham for dinner tonight for the kids and Alexis and Karsen. Luke won't be extraordinarily happy about that though, so I may just let him have some ham and salad. But I have to make that, and I have to make the eggrolls (I made the filling last night, but I have to fill, roll and fry still), I have to finish school (the kids are waiting for me on the couch right now), I have to clean up, get myself ready......... whew. Now I'm tired thinking of it all. ;o)

Well the kids are already hungry and we have about 45 minutes of work left to do before lunch so I better get to it.
Miss ya. Love ya.

lotta nothin'

It was so nice talking to you last night. Of course it always is, but I was just really glad to talk to you last night for some reason. I am so thankful that you take the time to call me, I really am. I know not everyone does that for their wives, and I feel very blessed that you wake up extra early some days just to call me. I can't say I'd do the same, you know how me and Sleep are best friends, so it means a lot to me.

We went to Target last night for invitations for Adam's birthday party. $177 later, we walked out without invitations. But the kids have warm clothes now!! I guess Walmart would have been good enough for invitations. Target was out of a lot.


Adam wanted to start school right away, so of course Livea did too. See their new long undies? Courtesy the Target trip. Adam said "Mommy, I used to be really good at school when I was in Hawaii!!" Hmmmmm.

Jenna is in our bed reading Mitch and Amy, one of her Beverly Cleary's that she's never read. I think she's reading it finally because she's read everything else. She finished that Percy Jackson series about a week ago. Luke is in front of the television eating some yogurt.

So last night the 2:00am alarm thing worked! I woke up and heard Adam's fighting voice. Only for a split second, and then nothing. I think I heard them getting back into bed. I really fought with myself not to go up there and check on them. Most parents probably would have not expected an almost-5 and almost-7-year-old to be responsible enough to wake up at 2:00am to an alarm clock, turn it off, go pee, and get back into bed for themselves. But they did it. And I stayed put - mostly thinking that if I get up this first night to help them, they'll expect me to always.

So this morning, I heard Luke in his drawers. Ugh. I thought for sure they just got up and turned the alarm off. Luke came downstairs dressed in his brand new long undies. So cute. I asked him if he peed in his bed, and he said "NO, I didn't!!" I asked him if they got up for their alarm and went pee. He said that they did, and that he and Adam both didn't pee in the bed. I asked him why he changed his clothing then, and he said "because I waned to wear my new clothes!" I believe him too. The reason he didn't wear the long undies to bed, he said, was because he didn't want to pee in them!! I am so proud of them for waking up and going to the bathroom. I am going to set the alarm for them every night for a while. Hopefully they won't ever get a hint to wake up and turn it off without going. I thought for sure that the alarm would just go off and they wouldn't get up, they'd just let it keep going, it's not a very loud alarm.

It's raining this morning. It must not be too cold though, since it's rain and not snow. It looks cold enough that I don't want to go out there though!!

Miss you. =( I am ready for winter to be over. It seems like that is the hurdle to get past, and then you'll be home soon.
Love you tons.