After Work Adventures

I love Ben and Jerry's. It's my favorite place to have dinner. And if you think chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream in a chocolate and nut covered sugar cone doesn't qualify as dinner....we cannot be friends, my friend.

But now I love Ben and Jerry's for an entirely new reason.

Tonight, that's where Jon took his first steps!

(and I amazingly caught it on video!)

He's been unsteadily taking one and two steps at a time for a couple weeks now. But this is the first time he's taken so many steps in a row. I love how he is so proud of himself after the fact.

Ten minutes of Jon's face pressed against the ice cream cake fridge glass has confirmed that, yep, he's mine.

"I want THAT one."

Yay, it's ice cream for dinner!

For the past two weeks I've had full control of the kid duties while my husband has been slaving away at getting our old house renter ready. Seriously, he goes straight to the old house after work each day and doesn't get home until 9 or 10pm. Turns out that 8 years of living in one place with three kids can really wear a house down. There has been so much cleaning and painting and fixing to do. Plus, he's put in brand new counter tops. The new kitchen is far from magazine quality, but wow, it's a big improvement from the nastiness that used to be our kitchen.

Before (YUKO!)

After (tolerable)

I can't believe that was my kitchen for eight years. I have no idea how I handled all that expansive counter space and that flood of natural light (*cough*). But I have so many memories of rolling out cookie dough on that oven. Washing 8 years of dishes by hand in that sink. And staring out that tiny prison window at the back of the neighbor's dilapidated fence. I clearly have a hard time saying goodbye...even under the best of circumstances :)

So while my husband has been slaving away at the old place, I've been trying to entertain the kids enough to keep them from killing each other. It's been a huge test of my patience and self restraint from wanting to cause bodily harm after twenty minutes of screaming from three different sources at the same time. But! We did it!

On Monday, I pulled into the driveway and walked up to the house and was greeted by this adorable sight. Jon Jon was waiting for me at the door, banging on the windows, baring a huge grin, and emitting happy cackles. This is why parents do all the hard stuff. This is the best reward.

I wanted to take the kids out for a bike ride on our new bike path but my bike was broken. So we did a walk instead. It was fun at first. We saw new bugs. Checked out all the neighbor's houses and front yards. We chased the sounds of bullfrogs in the ditches. We laughed at the neighbors weird shaped shubbery. We imagined what life would be like to live in the insanely huge mansions down the road. And then the melt downs began. And there was a poo explosion. And a tantrum because I couldn't conjure Sponge Bob cereal from thin air (sorry Ry, still working on that one).

Tuesday was my errand day and after an insane trek through our new (to us) Costco during which I had to learn where everything was stocked in this particular branch, we came home and scarfed down some Costco poppy seed muffins (or "opium muffins" as my grandma would say). Ryan refused to eat his without dipping it in Ranch dressing. OMG. So nasty.

Then it was super late and I tucked (alligator wrestled) all the kids into their beds (unsecure cages) before sitting down to my own dinner of a yummy bleu cheese, bacon salad which I had to eat with Ryan's airplane fork because my dishwasher was completely filled with dirty silverware. So hipster. Right? 

By Wednesday I FINALLY had my bike fixed and after nearly a month at the new place we ventured out to the nearby bike trail for the very first time. I had been looking forward to this adventure since the very day we closed on the house. The bike trail is six miles of secluded pedestrian/bicycle path only. Two miles into the trail it stops at our nearby grocery store and shopping center.

With the promise of a special snack of his own choosing at the grocery store, Jacob was a very motivated biker. He only complained the entire first half of the bike ride. Loaded with snacks and refreshments, we hit the trail once again and headed home. It was so great to get out into the fresh air and do physical activity other than lifting a three year old on and off the toilet.

I LOVE pulling the babies in my bike trailer! They are strapped up with no escape and I am free to ride the open roads. It's so therapeutic!

Every day after dinner, Jacob sits down and does his spelling and math homework while I clean up the kitchen. This is really our only chance to connect during the craziness of the day. I read him his spelling words, help him with the math work instructions, and then sometimes we just do silly things. Today, Jacob wanted to draw the sentences he wrote for his spelling words. He wanted all the sentences to have a theme and he chose his pet cat as the theme. The sentences (spelling words bolded) were things like: I trained my cat to play the guitar. My cat is very popular. My cat is my companion. Below, is the illustration he came up with. He laughed and laughed and thought he was so funny and clever. I totally love it. Also, can we talk about how first graders have ridiculous beginning of the school year spelling words!? Last week his spelling words included "scurried," "country," "feast," and "subject." I distinctly remember learning to spell "cat" in first grade.

When I picked Jacob up from school today, I found him like this. I have no idea what that toy is supposed to do. It's way too high for elementary school kids. I guess it's there to give parents heart attacks. Anyway....Jacob's always pushing my last nerve and driving me insane. He physically is unable to sit still. Like ever. But he is also incredibly smart and thoughtful and is a great bear climber. 

I'm Flippin' Insane

At 11:00am, I loaded the three kids into the van and set out on a day of errands. My husband was out at the old house for the second day in a row, painting and getting things ready for our tenant.

Wearing our Seahawks blue for game day!

After 5.5 hours, I had escorted them through TWO Fred Meyers, one teriyki place (lunch), and one incredibly long and winding IKEA. Jacob walked (ran, trotted, zig-zagged through crowds), I carried Jon in the Baby Bjorn, and Ryan convinced me (i.e. screamed until my ears bled and I caved) to take him out of/put him into the shopping cart seat at least 15 times. Of the 5.5 hours, I only legitimately shopped for half that time. The other half was spent chasing children, breaking up fights, consoling, negotiating, and begging kids to stop screaming.

I will spare you the rest of the details. But I've decided that next time I have the notion to take the kids to IKEA that I'll just carry three feral cats around a lumber yard, leave empty handed, and buy an ice cream at the end. Same difference, but probably with less scratches.

My saving grace was that by the fifth hour of errand running, my kids were so tired from running away from me that they actually BEHAVED at the grocery store (our second trip to Fred Meyer). Jacob was even helpful! I told him the next ingredient on my shopping list and put him in charge of finding it. He was excellent! It was even kind of fun. He learned what a green onion was and the different between a yam and a russet potato.

At the check out counter, he told me to sit down (I was SO tired from carrying Jon in the Baby Bjorn that I squatted in the check out line and could not get back up) while he loaded all the groceries on the check out counter.

When he got home, I made Ryan and Jacob carry all the groceries inside the house while I put them away. Hmmmm.....fluke? Or maybe my efforts to train the kids are finally working?!

I tuned the TV to the Seahawks game, lit a fire, and started cooking dinner while the big boys ran free outside. We had fajita soup (I still can't figure out how it is any different from tortilla or taco soup, but it's yummy!) served with my very favorite buttery cornbread (scratch is the way to go!). If I wasn't so exhausted from our marathon errand trip, I would have really savored the task of cooking a nice fall meal in my new kitchen.

Now I'm going to put my feet up and NOT eat chocolate (sadface). Stupid chocolate budget. To distract myself from my chocolate cravings, I uploaded the pictures from Jacob's birthday:

But I still want some chocolate.

Seven Years Ago Today, The World Fit Into My Hands

What's every kid's dream? To have their seventh birthday fall on the first day of first grade...at a brand new school! Except...not.

Today was Jacob's seventh birthday. I CANNOT understand how this kid is seven. I also cannot understand how I have a seven year old. I mean, I'm only 24 years old. What?! I'm 31. WTF. How did that happen?

Amidst the craziness of getting out the door for work and school and handing the two youngest off to my mom, we managed to wish Jacob a Happy Birthday and watch him unwrap his birthday present- a new box of Legos. In the madness, I nearly forgot to feed my children breakfast. I handed them pieces of toast covered in Ranch (a new breakfast favorite around here) and Girl Scout Cookie granola bars. (SO not winning any mom points today).

Then we snapped a couple first day pictures. Sadly, I forgot to make Jacob pose with his backpack- you can't have REAL first day pictures without a backpack. Now they just look like just regular day pictures (lame).

Jacob started today at his new school. But we haven't moved yet. So, I'm having to drive him the 30 minutes to school before driving another 20 minutes to my office. It's a little hectic but we're making it work. I met my husband at the new school where we had to park four blocks away due to insane traffic. Eventually we made it TO the school where we snapped MORE pictures.

Everything was fine until we walked into the classroom. Jacob started to rub his eyes crazily and wispered, "I don't want to go to school." Then he started to cry. And this made me cry. I helped him hang up his backpack and find his seat. I sat next to him and made small talk with his tablemates all the while he just sat in his seat, holding his head and sobbing quietly. My heart just kept crumbling into tiny little raw pieces. Then an announcement came over the speaker telling all the parents to leave. I kept looking back over my shoulder at my first baby, sitting and sobbing to himself.

Seven years ago exactly, we welcomed him into this world. We cradled him and snuggled him. He was our world. Everything revolved around him. And here I was. Leaving him to cry alone in a room filled with strangers. I wanted to die. That image of him was the only thing I saw the rest of the day. What a freaking crappy birthday.

When I picked him up at 5 pm (he goes to on-site childcare after class) he was quiet and tired but, thankfully, not crying. (Last year, he did completely fine when I dropped him off at Kindergarten but he was sobbing when I picked him up because he thought he went to the wrong childcare room and that I would never find him again. Basically, we're 0 for 2 when it comes to first days.)When I asked how his day was, he said it was "good" and that he had made four new friends. His favorite part of the day was lunch. His least favorite part of the day was a long school assembly where he had to sit "criss-cross-apple-sauce" which hurt his knees. When he got home, he bounded to the door and was so excited to finally tackle his new Lego set.

My husband had band practice tonight (yes, he's nerdy and cute and in a band) so it was just me and a house full of crazy people. I tried to order pizza delivery (more mom points) but the service was down. So we ate taquitos from the freezer. Except Ryan wanted a PB&J sandwich. And wouldn't eat it unless I put frosting on the top. I fought him for two minutes until Jon started vomiting violently all over the floor, himself, and my phone (which he had been holding). I stuck him in the bath, scrubbed him down and put him in new clothes. After that, I had no strength to fight any more battles. Frosting on PB&J didn't seem so horrible anymore. Ryan, it's your lucky day. As I was setting Ryan's plate down in front of him, Jon began to vomit again.

I picked Jon up and quickly became his next target. Bath #2 for Jon. Pajama outfit #2 for Jon. Yoga pants #2 for me. As I was putting away his puke clothes I noticed the horrible stench of urine coming from the boys' room. One of them had wet their bed. And it had been sitting and soaking into the mattress all day. I cleaned the urine-covered mattress while Jon followed me around the house, pulling on my legs and crying.

The rest of the evening is a blur but somehow I managed to put all the kids to bed. Right now, the two oldest are sleeping on the floor in sleeping bags because their bed sheets are in the process of becoming urine-free.

SO. That's how we spent Jacob's birthday and first day of school around here. It sure didn't take long for the craziness of school schedules and routines to consume us once again. I just texted my husband to bring me home some chocolate. And Powerade Zero. Cause, you know, when I go crazy. I go ALL OUT INSANE!

Seven years ago today....life seemed so much simpler. And calmer. And smaller. Little did I realize, that we had set in motion a tornado of craziness. Three tornadoes to be exact. But I love every one of them.

Seven years ago today, my entire world fit into my hands.

Have You Stomped A Crab Today?

How is the weekend over? I swear it JUST started. Not cool.

The weekend had ominous beginnings. Friday my Seahawks played the Broncos in their first pre-season game. I was excited to be wearing my new favorite dress and was even happy that it was blue so I could wear some Seahawks colors for the day. And then I got to work and the first thing my Broncos-loving coworker said was, "hey, nice Bronco colors!"

Ooops. 

At least my dress was fabulous (Loveappella from Nordys). I love the pattern.

And Friday night ended with me falling asleep on the couch to a big fat Seahawks loss. At least it's just the preseason.

I've been so freaking exhausted lately. My schedule hasn't really changed (I still get the same little sleep as I have always gotten) so I don't know what that's all about. Saturday, the kids woke me up at 6:30 am and then I took Jon and rushed out the door to get my van looked at. It needed a little more work than we originally thought. I ended up trying to kill 5.5 hours (that's so much of my weekend time!) around the repair place while everything got wrapped up.

First Jon and I went for a LONG walk. Then we went grocery shopping. Jon was so happy and was charming the pants off everyone in the grocery store and pointing and grunting happily at everything. He was WAY past his naptime but was going strong and happy. It was so much fun to spent forced one on one time with my youngest (he often gets the short end of the stick when it comes to getting my attention) even if it was just in the store.

Finally my van was ready, we paid for our groceries and this happened five steps from the van:

I want his eyelashes. 

These pictures make him seem so little still. But it's a trick. He's getting so big. It both amazes me and saddens me at the same time.

Our latest project has been getting our house ready to rent out. Things are moving so quickly on the new house, I don't think we were quite ready for it to happen lightening fast. Trying to find renters has been good motivation to get to all the projects we've always said we were going to do and then never did. Like paint the nasty lime green kitchen cabinets. My husband painted the bottom cabinets grey and the top cabinets white. It looks great! I wish we had done it long ago!

A potential renter was supposed to come over today to look at the house..but she was...special. My husband texted her to see if she was interested in seeing our house. She replied and said she was crying in her yard trying to figure out where she can live. Um. Ok, then. That gave me a bad feeling about her from the beginning (drama queen?). But we said she could come over at 1 to take a look at our place and see if she was interested. She agreed to do that. Then 1 came and went. So did 1:10 and 1:15 and 1:30. She lives literally two blocks from our house. This was not acceptable. Hours later, she texted my husband and said she walked by the house. She asked how much it was for and what she could do to rent it (all this info was on the ad where she got our contact info). Um, how about SHOW UP when you say you will and not stalk us from the street? I told him not to even respond. I don't have time for dumb people.

After wasting all morning cleaning my house and waiting for the no-show, I marched the kids outside and we went for a bike ride. I'm really going to miss all these views when we move:

My gang

The first half part of our bike path

The second part of our bike path

Gorgeous

Ryan marching up to his "house"

Can you spy the ferry? And the Jon?

Lifeguarding. 

Jacob came running up to me from behind and yelled, "hey mom!" When I turned around he shoved this in my face. I screamed. A lot.

Jacob went down to play along the shoreline while I entertained Ryan and pulled rocks, shells, and dead crab legs from Jon's mouth. At one point this grandmother came up to me, she was with her grandson who looked to be about Jacob's age. She gave me a very disapproving look and said with a scolding tone, "your oldest is stomping on crabs just to see them get squished. That's probably not something he should learn."

WTF. Excuse me? They were dead crab shells. They were not live crabs. Her eye contact lingered on me as if she was waiting for me to be upset by what my son was doing. Was she suggesting that my son was going to grow up to be a serial killer? I'm pretty sure she was. I ignored her and I don't think she was pleased with my "so what" attitude. And when she left I called Jacob over.

"Where you stomping on crabs?"
"Yes."
"Why."
"Because. They're dead. It hurts them much more when we cook them alive to eat them."
"Good point. Carry on."

I seriously wanted to clock that lady. And of course it wasn't until after she left, with her nose in the air and her highly disapproving glares shooting straight at me all the way to her car that I thought of all kinds of good retorts. Why are people such assholes?

Moving-Up, Minivan, and Mommycation

Big things have been happening around here, guys!

Jacob had his "moving-up" ceremony to celebrate that he survived Kindergarten. Or did Kindergarten survive him? We arrived at the school at 9:30 and gathered in the library, waiting for the ceremony to begin. The kids filed in wearing special hand-designed tshirts signed by all their classmates. Jacob and a couple other kids stood in a separate line in front of the group. This puzzled us, until the ceremony. Jacob and the other four kids in front were specially selected to read lines from "Oh the places you'll go." 

He didn't just read his lines, he went the extra step and recited them from memory. I couldn't really hear him because a kid sitting next to me was screeching. But it was adorable and we were very proud. They sang some cute songs and then there was a photo slide show of the kids throughout the year. I was smiling and laughing at the cute faces on the slide show when the song "You'll always be my baby" came on. All of a sudden without any warning, the tears started to well up behind my eyes. 

He's such a big boy. He's smart. He's (mostly kind). He's creative. He's funny. But he WILL always be my baby. He was my first baby. It's amazing to see how his confidence has grown, how he's built relationships, and how much he's learned in just the past year. I love this guy so much. Even when he's driving me crazy (which is a lot). 

Tomorrow is Jacob's last day of school so I asked him this morning to make his teacher a nice Thank You card. I went to my room to get dressed and when I came back to check on Jacob's card-making progress, he showed me this...

It says, "dead bear on a carrot." Apparently, that is what the drawing is supposed to depict. 

Yeah.

I made him re-do the card and he was most displeased. Ha ha ha. What the heck?

Other big news: I have a fourth baby! Ta-da! It's a minivan. A 2010 Honda Odyssey to be precise. And I absolutely LOVE it. It's the most amazing vehicle ever. There is so much ROOM. There are TWO sliding doors. I can haul THREE extra people! The A/C WORKS! And the mileage is low at 50,000 miles. Well, that's low for me. My Subaru wagon has 285,000 miles on it. It doesn't take much to please me, obvi. But I seriously do love it. I find myself gazing lovingly out the window to admire its beauty and to make sure it hasn't been stolen. 

I have never looked more gangster in my life. 

The kids love it almost as much as I do. Jacob loves that he gets the back seat all to himself and can sprawl out back there. The first time we drove it somewhere, he packed a large blanket to take with us. Just because he could. Minivans change lives. Seriously. My life is changed. For the better, of course. 

We've had unusually hot weather lately, even getting up to 80 degrees. (yay for working A/C!) However, Ryan still insisted on wearing this on Tuesday:

Jon started to crawl! But he prefers to do yoga. 

He loves to go into this pose and rock back and forth violently with a wide grin. He uses this as a launch pad for crawling. 

I have my own special pose. After the kids go to bed, you can find me like this:

Putting three kids to bed is exhausting. I'm seriously drained at the end of each day. Which explains the pile of dirty dishes that keeps accumulating in my sink (maybe some day I'll get a dishwasher).

I've been working 10-13 hour days this week thanks to a big hearing scheduled for Monday. Briefing for this hearing was a little crazy. But I submitted all my briefing just in time to leave for a work conference in beautiful Lake Chelan, Washington. I got to enjoy the beautiful four hour drive by MYSELF, drink Diet Dr. Pepper, and listen to all my favorite music without having to accommodate requests from the back seat. 

For the next three days, I'm FREE. Free to sleep in. Free to take up every single milimeter of my king size bed. Free to drink wine for lunch. Free to exercize at the 24 hour fitness center any time I want. I looked out my balcony at the beautiful sandy beach and beach-side pool and felt intense pangs of guilt for leaving my kids behind. But then I saw someone wrestling four whiny, sand-covered kids across the lawn and then immediately the guilt ended. 

I have my first massage ever scheduled for tomorrow afternoon and I have a bottle of Riesling chilling in my fridge. Yay for mommycations! Yes I have to sit and listen to law related presentations...but the free all-expenses paid trip is a nice trade off.

Tonight, I enjoyed a glass of wine on the beach while watching the sun set. I was tempted to jump into the water for a swim. But the wine won.

Heart Day Adventures In Kindergarten

Today I got to step back in time about 25 years and re-experience Valentine's Day as a Kindergartner. You know what? Unlike Christmas (which is even better as an adult) Valentine's Day is pretty much best when you are a kid. No expectations. No romance drama. No gift anxiety. No worries. Just pure, innocent fun, all wrapped up in doilies and heart stickers and wonderful, scratchy Kindergarten penmanship.

For Jacob's class party (his first V-day party ever!) I thought about doing a fancy Pinterest project. But then I remembered a very strong lesson from my own elementary days. In third grade we were learning about the Oregon trail and were assigned to go home and build covered wagons. My mom pointed me to the craft supplies and I went to work. I returned to school with a flimsy shoe box creation that looked like it very well may have died of the covered-wagon equivalent of dysentery. All the other kids came to school with perfectly crafted wood-built wagons with perfectly-sewn fabric covers. One kid even had a wooden sign on the back of her wagon that said, "Oregon or bust." I didn't know what it meant, but it looked fancy.

My mom picked me up from school that day and I remember crying to her about how I was so embarrassed at how ugly my covered wagon was next to all the other kid's wagons. She looked right at me and said, "It might not be perfect but you did it all by yourself! The other kids had their parents to their project for them." I thought back on all the other fancy wagons and it occurred to me that she was right. I was suddenly proud of my shitty old shoe box covered with foil. For some reason, that is one of the lessons from elementary school that stuck with me the most all these years. It's not about being perfect. It's about being genuine and honest and trying really hard. 

That's a long way of saying... I made Jacob make his own Valentine's Day cards. I was really tempted to make something Pinteresty for him (hey, crafts aren't just for kids!). But really, what's that going to do for him? So one day last week during the car ride home from school, Jacob and I chatted and came up with a design together: a card in the shape of an Xbox controller with heart buttons and the greeting "You Win!" I helped trace the controller shape onto pieces of paper and Jacob took it from there. The perfectionist in me really REALLY wanted to jump in and "fix" up or improve a couple things. It took all my will to restrain myself. And they turned out awesome! Jacob was so proud of himself. His own little covered wagon.

This afternoon, I left work early to attend Jacob's Valentine's Day party. It was just as awesome as I remember elementary school Valentine's Day parties to be: Valentine's for everyone, lots of treats (when I was a kid the Valentine's cards with lifesavers were the most coveted!), messages from friends, self-decorated Valentine mailbox/envelope, doilies and construction paper and hearts EVERYWHERE. 

I sat at Jacob's table and chatted with his tablemates (Kindergartners are SO STINKING CUTE). Everyone kept exclaiming that it was "THE BEST DAY EVER." Then Jacob and I dug into his Valentine envelope and perused all the cards and took a nice inventory of his treats (lots of lolipops!). Valentine's Day is the best. Seriously, why don't workplaces do this?

Before we left, Jacob's teacher and her husband (who comes in every Friday to do science projects with the kids), both pulled me aside separately and told me how awesome Jacob is and how much they love him. My mommy heart swelled with pride and I tried not to let it go to my head. But you know what? He IS pretty awesome. And I have no idea how he turned out this awesome. Because he is our first baby (trial model) and we are pretty much just winging everything as we go. 

Yesterday I took all the kids down to the park to enjoy the rare 60 degree January weather. The weather man said the weather we are having now is usually the HIGH for May. WTF? No snowmageddon here. Anyway, I told the kids that if they let me snap some fun Valentine's Day pictures that I would buy them ice cream (yes, ice cream in January, that is how warm it is!). 

And they were seriously perfect.

PERFECT!

Well, mostly. 

HAPPY HEART DAY!