A Fast & Furious Post About Everything

So much is happening and I don't even have time to tell you all about it! So this quick and dirty little summary of adventures will have to do.

FIRST....Ryan turned four. Holy Moly. I always think of four year olds as babies still. I mean, someone who's only been alive for four years can't be that articulate or observant or even, well, kid-ish. Right? Gah. Then why, when I look down at my four year old, does he seem so grown up and experienced in the ways of the world? This person is no baby! He's not even a toddler. He's a straight-up legitimate person! But he's only been alive for four years. How?!

He wanted a Dinosaur Star Wars birthday party. I had no idea what that even meant. So I made it up. In case YOU ever wanted to know what a Dinosaur Star Wars ("Dino Wars") looks like, here you go (not pictured: jedi swords and dinosaur masks):

It's sharp tooths versus leaf eaters. It was getting all Land Before Time up in here:

He was VERY pleased with his cake. Especially because Darth Vader is his favorite person ever. He has no clue who Darth Vader is, but....

Obligatory family shot in the front yard:

I desperately need a haircut. I've been saying that for about two months. However, I've been so busy that I haven't had time to simply go online and book one (also because I forgot my password to the haircut salon website and the thought of having to reset it was simply too much for my over-loaded brain to consider). So you can imagine that I was SO excited when I finally booked a cut for Saturday am. Except when I got there, I learned that the haircut was actually scheduled for NEXT weekend (I'm so awesome). So Jon and I explored and went on an impromptu adventure of puddle jumping and sight seeing near the marina).

He thinks he's such a good helper. He doesn't realize that he's the sole reason we still have to cart this stroller thing around in the first place.

Can I just be weird for a second? I have an obsession with toddler legs. They are simply the cutest things in the world. Not quite baby legs but still too cute to be kid legs. They are stubby and chubby and adorable. I pinch Jon's legs ALL the time. Look: so pinchable!

Jon has a runny nose (AGAIN). I am not exaggerating in the slightest when I say that he's probably been healthy 4 entire days out of all of 2016. Running noses, ear infections, the flu, coughs. I'm so frustrated. He was coughing most of Saturday night and kept waking up crying. I finally pulled him into bed with us and was promptly displaced. So yeah, I slept pretty great Saturday night.

This morning I was exhausted and accidentally overslept and missed church. I've been working over time preparing for an upcoming trial and I also starting a new exercise program (omg, I've missed running SO much AND I'M starting to accept that I may be having a love affair with strength training and the new weights I purchased for the same). More work, less sleep = a very unsustainable condition. After sleeping in (sleeping in = 9am). I met up with a friend at the Tacoma Children's Museum. We chatted for an entire ten minutes, in between chasing after our collective five children. But it was great and I miss friendship.

Jon, doing everything Ryan can do.



After the museum, I took the kids for a walk around Tacoma. I miss having mini adventures with them. We need to get out more often with no other agenda or list of errands to accomplish.

Union Station (which is now a federal district court house and the place where I had my trial last year).

Walking adventure complete, I dropped the kids off at home and ran to Home Depot where I loaded up on vegetable and herb starts for my brand new garden! I've never had a garden before. My husband is the green thumb and dedicated landscaper/lawn care engineer. But he built me a raised garden bed and I decided to pull the trigger and actually plant something. I admittedly have NO CLUE what I'm doing. I just purchased things that didn't require 100% full sun (because: Seattle) and followed the planting instructions on the little plastic cards. I have to admit, that some of the planting instructions left me more than skeptical. Really? Cucumbers must be planted 18 inches apart? Really? I might not have followed the rules exactly (and this is probably why all my plants will die).

My brand new babies. Looking so green and beautiful!

Bringing my new babies home from the nursery! No going-home-outfit required :)

I had to run into Target after Home Depot and I sat in the parked car for half a minute wondering what I was supposed to do with all the plants. Are they like children/pets? Will they die in a hot car? I mean they ARE alive. So I left the windows open a crack for them and sprinted into the store to run my errand. Yes, they were still alive when I came back. I SO got this.

The kids helped me plant everything. And by "help" I mean "fought over the gardening tools and squirted each other with the water spritzer." I'm not a very organized person but I have to admit that seeing all these plants in beautiful little rows makes me so incredible happy.

I've been searching for a hobby. I think I may have just found it. (Unless all the plants die in a month. Then I will be back here posting about how horrible gardening is and how much I freaking hate it and make a vow to never touch dirt ever again).

But, until then....so PRETTY!

We have lemon-thyme, basil, mint, cilantro, squash, cucumbers, green bell peppers, strawberries, and a blueberry plant. We also planted some carrot and onion seeds (in the blank spaces). I asked Jacob if we should name some of the plants and he looked at me like how I imagine an exasperated teenager would look at his parents. Ok, maybe I have gone a little bit insane.

Hello Bike Season!

I was sent to work Friday morning by a very enthusiastic farewell party. The littlests were very excited to be spending the day with their awesome grandma and they always watch for me out the window as long as they possibly can. I like to think it's because they love me. But it could very well be because they know all the house rules will go out the window (and be replaced by the more favorable Grandma Rules) as soon as my taillights disappear.

Still. I love the attention they give me. Multiple hugs. Several high-fives. And at least one "Have a good day mommy!" from Ryan.

The past couple weekends I have been meeting up with one or two other moms that I know from Jacob's school to go for runs. Yay for friends! I'm pretty much desperate for female friends and I spend countless minutes overthinking my Facebook messenger responses to them: "does that sound too eager? too desperate? too lame?" At a recent school fundraiser, I saw one of the moms I run with and I could have sworn she was extending her arms out for a hug- which I eagerly gave her....but in hindsight, I've been wondering if she WASN'T inviting me in for a hug and was just making a welcoming gesture and now perhaps I've scared her off or she thinks I'm weird or she thinks I'm an over-enthusiastic hugger- I'm TOTALLY NOT, I swear.

This Saturday, my mom friends were both busy so I did something unspeakable. I grabbed my running shoes at 7am and went for a 6.6 mile run. ON A SATURDAY MORNING. I've gone on early runs the past three weekends. But only because that's the only time that worked for everyone. This Saturday I did in on my own! I'm finding that morning runs are very much growing on me. I love the serenity and quiet of the morning. And I love the sense of accomplishment that comes along with completing a semi-long run before the rest of my family has even had their breakfast.

My solo Saturday run was wonderful (if not a little lonely). It had rained the night before and the park trails smelled so fresh and woody. Stream water trickled nearby and, since I had forgotten my earbuds, I soaked in and enjoyed every little nature sound. Running is both my cure and my addiction at the same time.

The flash rainstorms and the random showers of hail that plagued us this week let up long enough for me to get outside with the kids. In fact, it was downright sunny on Saturday. So we started our morning together by playing in the front yard. I turned my back for ONE second and discovered that Jacob had rigged his bike to pull Jon's stroller with a fanny pack. Jon loved being pulled around the yard. He loved it so much that I realized that I should probably get him a bike of his own soon.



I wasn't about to let the kids have all the fun. I pulled my bike out of the garage to take it for a spin. Unfortunately, the chain got all messed up in the move. And my husband was running a long errand with my Honda Odyssey. So I packed up our 97 Subaru Legacy. First stop: the bike shop. Second stop: somewhere cool to bike.

I probably sound like a broken record but I LOVE our Subaru. On Saturday, this thing held my bike, Jacob's bike, Ryan's bike, Jon's stroller, me, and my three kids, including one grumpy dinosaur. Also, it has 292,000 miles on it!

Not sure why the grump. Actually, I'm NEVER sure why the grump. He's so easily grumped. Also, he's been wearing this dinosaur costume since Friday. Refused to take it off for anything as you'll see in the remaining pictures in this post.

We found a new park. There are no parks within walking distance of our house so we are having to explore all the drive-to parks. We used to live walking distance to five parks. It makes me so terribly sad that we don't have that anymore. I guess that's the one trade-off for moving out of the city and into the 'burbs.

Jon, who's been battling probably his FOURTH flu of the season and who's too stuffed up and coughy to take any naps, was able to be distracted from how crummy and tired he felt long enough to enjoy the park.

Throwing pine cones into the wetlands.

Wetlands. Kinda pretty, in an ugly way.

DinoRy enjoyed climbing up the slide and making Jon (who was trying to slide DOWN the slide) very angry.

This was my favorite part of the day. Watching DinoRy give Jon "underdogs." I've more aptly named them "under-dinos."



Nope. Aint nobody got time for a dino kiss. Sorry Ryan.

Sunday morning Jon was still really crummy so we took him to prompt care. Ryan insisted on tagging along, much to the amusement of every single person we ever saw.

Waiting in the clinic lobby. Dino-ing in leisure.

100% regretting his choice to tag along. Have you hugged a sad dino today?

I rewarded his extreme and utter patience (seriously, he was amazing!) with a trip to Panera for lunch. He ate his chicken noodle soup like a real, civilized human! He sat quietly and chatted with me over our meal. I was like, "who is this personable human? Excuse me, have we met?" Meanwhile. Jon was trying to eat soup out of a really shallow Panera spoon. He managed to get between 0-3% of each spoonful of soup into his mouth. The rest went on his shirt, his pants, his high chair, the table, the floor, and me. He had absolutely no idea that nothing was going into his mouth. He was just thrilled to be eating all by himself.

After lunch, Ryan was further rewarded with a trip to the grocery store to get some Oreos. If you ever want people to smile at you all day long, just bring along a pint-sized dinosaur (maybe I should start a rent-a-dino service?). It's like we were spreading happiness everywhere we went. You can't really be in a bad mood when this is walking in front of you.

Later in the day I found myself in Target. I swear, I have no idea how it happened. Target must have a magical force field that can draw unsuspecting prey into it's clutches, er, parking lots. Once there, I couldn't NOT buy a bike for Jon. And somehow we ended our long, busy weekend like this:

Jon LOVED his new ride. And I loved how much he loved it and would have willingly pushed him to the far corners of the planet if it were possible. That little boy is my baby and has this strange, unexplainable power over me- much like the Target force field. I'm sitting here trying to describe him and I simply can't. He's so funny and stubborn and affectionate. His cheeks are so pinchable and sometimes I don't know if I can trust myself not to pick him up and squeeze him as hard as I possibly can.

Just one week after I was starting to become concerned over the fact that he only knew how to say "mama" and "baba" and had worried myself into a frenzy, convinced he was going to need some kind of speech therapy, his vocabulary just exploded! The other night he brought me the book "Go Dog Go." I was folding laundry and didn't stop what I was doing to read to him (the nerve of me!). He grabbed my hand, thrust the book into it, opened the first page and exclaimed "Go Da Go!" I was shocked that he could say more than one word put together. In case, you're wondering, he won that round. Whenever I turned to the parts where the two doggies are saying goodbye to each other, Jon would shriek, "goobye! goobye! goobye!" Sidenote: why is that one dog such a flipping a--hole and always telling the other dog that he doesn't like her hat? But I guess the other dog should stop being so insecure and asking a--holes for their opinion.

Anyway, Jon pretty much owns me.... and he knows it. Here he is at the store, making me buy some cheese we don't even need. And I probably bought three.



Hibernation

I think I might start winding this blog down. It just hasn't provided the much-needed outlet that it had in the years past. Lately, I sit down to blog and it just feels like a burden. More accurately, I can't even muster up the energy or will power to log in.

Trying to capture our days and our adventures just seems like so much work, on top of all the work I already do taking care of children, holding a law job, and trying to maintain a marriage and a house. Some days are awesome and I just don't know how to capture the awesomeness into words. Other days are horrible and I similarly don't know how to capture the horribleness into words.

In addition to this, there was that scare a couple months back where some creep took photos of my oldest son and tried to pass him off as her son. I did reverse imagine google searches and found that several other of my photos had been stolen and used by other websites without my permission. That just skeeves me out. It didn't stop me from posting pictures, but ever time I hit the post button, I felt a twinge of guilt. And my oldest is going on 8. I think it's time to respect his online privacy a little more.

I may post a little bit here and there as it suits me. But for the meantime, you can probably expect me to continue this slow blogging pace.

I'll end this little post on a high note and share a bit about our last couple days.

I forced the kids to go hiking with me yesterday. We hiked all of .3 miles before everyone got too cold. They were already cranky to begin with because they were mad I was forcing them outside. And they refuse to wear jackets or proper outdoor wear. Apparently, it's better to freeze to death than do what your mom says.

Can you tell how excited Ryan is? His shoulders are hunched from the weight of all the excitement.

Ryan: hating me and nature

But despite freezing hands, Jon LOVED hiking. He was the hiking king. He wanted to lead the way, blankie and all.

We're going hiking?

Woo hoo! Let's go!

It's alright guys. I got this. 

Follow me!

I can't wait all day. 

Today was also full of outdoor fun- we finally got some snow! The kids started screaming when they saw large flakes fall from the sky. They ran outside (in short sleeves) and hollered while running up and down the street. These kids rarely ever see snow. (I was born in Alaska, so I kinda feel like I've betrayed some innate duty to connect them to the snow on a regular basis).

Flakes fell for three hours but we only got a light dusting. It was enough to keep the kids busy and ecstatic. They built (the world's saddest) snow-fort. They had snow ball fights. They played snow baseball. They had snow races. They dug and shoveled snow for HOURS. Wearing nothing but long t-shirts and crocs. I finally made Jacob put on a jacket, but Ryan refused.

Snow races

They are snow BEASTS. And they have officially earned a sledding (and maybe a ski) trip up to the mountains.

Jon Jon wasn't sure what to make of all the cold, white stuff. At first, he just stared in awe.

I LOVE this picture of Jon. That overs-sized hat kills me. A hipster in the making.

Then he toddled around excitedly, watching his feet make snow tracks and only stopped to stare up at the falling flakes.

Then he fell a couple times and was ready for it all to go away.

So we came inside and he had his first hot coa-coa. :)

Pumpkin Patch - Pacific Northwest Style!

Last week, pumpkin patch day dawned with an onslaught of rain. But like true Pacific Northwest troopers, we grabbed some rain jackets and marched onward! A little rain can't scare us away! 

While the rain didn't cause us to cancel our plans, it did make us rush through most of our picture taking. As much as I can withstand storm, and cold, and wet, and misery in order to achieve a picture perfect pose, three little kids cooped up for a long car ride most definitely CANNOT. So we rushed under a rain tent and snapped some shots. The rain tent was no where near the pumpkins. So I made the kids hold a pumpkin in their laps so we could legitimately call these photos "pumpkin patch photos."

Jon's new thing is to point at everything and exclaim "dah!" in the most excited, high pitched voice. It makes me want to squeeze his cute little head in a vice-like grip and kiss his fat cheeks. Which I do. All the time.

Spider bales! 

Jacob assured me that he could hold Jon and just as soon as I'd snapped the picture above, down Jon fell into the mud. 

Below: me holding a muddy Jon.

Ryan, unimpressed with the pumpkins all around us ("Mom, they have pumpkins at the store.") would not get out of the stroller. Jon was happy to wave and point at everything. 

"Look at these bright orange drums!"

He loved the pumpkin so much, he wanted to try to take one home. The pumpkin won.

Sometimes at the pumpkin patch, you lose your pants. It's just happens. Like when you dip an oreo into a glass of milk and the oreo dissolves from your grip and sinks to the bottom. Why fight the inevitable?

I have no idea how, but some force of magic or divine intercession convinced Ryan to get out of the stroller long enough to take a picture next to his favorite pumpkin. I swear he was only three when I snapped the picture but somehow the image depicts a little man.

Jacob wanted to pose with a spider. Even though last night he stayed up until 10:30 because he thought there was a spider somewhere in his room and just knowing this fact made the task of sleeping far too scary.

We didn't actually buy any pumpkins here (duh, there are pumpkins at the grocery store). Or eat any fun pumpkin patch food (oh my gawd, I'm the worst line-waiter in the entire world). But we did ride some go karts!

And then my squishy Mr. Grumpy No Pants took a nice long nap on the ride home.

I have to confess that I really honestly love the rain. There's nothing quite like seeing the expanses of the sky reflecting from the wet surfaces of the earth. Or sloshing through newly formed streams of water. Or the therapeutic sounds of rain pittering and pattering and clonking onto objects around you.  Everything smells so fresh and clean. It's like nature's version of a cleanse. And the best part is coming inside to warm up by the heater while the world outside is still rumbling under the weight and force of blankets of falling water.

Ha! Nice try rain. Can't scare us away!