Easter "Eks"

Easter 2016 was a hit! I love Easter. I mean, what's not to love: Jesus rose from the dead, bunnies, chocolate (Cadburry mini eggs!), egg hunts. If we can just figure out a way to sneak Diet Dr. Pepper and a long luxurious bath in there (maybe next year on the latter), Easter would be the best thing ever!

This year the kids really got to fine tune their egg hunting skills- they had four egg hunts! That's what happens when you live close to both sides of your family (you have to allow each set of grandparents the opportunity to watch their grandkids run through the grass in search of brightly color eggs!) and when your mom is a sucker for all things festive and celebratory.

Our first hunt was on Saturday at our community park. As we're still relatively new in town, I had no idea what to expect. None of the parents I knew were going so I thought maybe it wasn't that popular of an event. Ha! We arrived 15 minutes early to a line of cars parking in crazy places (ditches!) just to get within lengthy walking distance of the park. I almost turned around and drove home but a backseat full of expectant children, desperately clutching their Easter baskets convinced me to tough it out. And I'm so glad we did! It was hectic but the park had it ALL figured out! Each kid could pick up six treat-filled eggs. As kids were picking up eggs, volunteers were recycling the eggs, filling them with more treats, and throwing them back on the grass. This ensured that every single kid in the entire city would have the chance to collect their six eggs.

After you get your eggs, you get in line to recycle your eggshells. In exchange for the empty eggs, each kid gets to select a prize from the prize table. It was so well done and so well organized. The only complaint from our end was that Jacob felt that six eggs was just too little. He told me very matter-of-factly that if he found opened eggs on the grass he could take the candy without breaking the six-egg rule because there's no limit on candy. I swear, when he grows up, he's either going to be a lawyer, or a criminal!

Jon's first egg hunt! Quickly learning all about Easter egg hunting:

When I told Jon to put eggs in his basket, he assumed this was like basket ball (new obsession, we have a mini hoop for him at home and he screams repeated "bah-ball!" every time he sees a hoop of any kind) and he cheered for himself each time he "made a basket."

Ryan was too shy to find eggs by himself, even though they were literally THROWN at our feet. He made me come with him and help him pick up every single one of his eggs. Which I actually didn't mind because I have no friends and this makes me feel needed/loved.

My baby!

This picture sums them up perfectly. I love my guys. Even though they're total (but cute) jerks sometimes.

FINALLY! I caught Jon's infamously photo-elusive smile!

Saturday night we colored Easter eggs. I had colored eggs with the kids earlier in the week but my hard boiled eggs turned out mushy and the kids were not impressed. The boys ended up coloring the first batch before we discovered the mushy problem, but the neighbor boy who was visiting used a white crayon to write potty words all over the eggs when no one was looking (before they were dyed). Examples of what I discovered on the freshly dyed eggs: "Fart 41," "poop stick," and "pee licker." Trying not to laugh my face off, I made him take half the eggs home so his mom could see what he was up to. On further reflection, that was probably a bad idea. She probably just thinks I did a bad job supervising to allow that to happen. Meh. It was funny as f*$%.

When you have all boys, you tend to be lacking in pink colored eggs. Not a one to be found!

After the kids went to bed, I went to great lengths to fill a million plastic eggs with quarters and the occasional candy, strategically hid them in just the right spots for three different skill levels, and then meticulously filled and hid three Easter egg baskets. Holidays are really the highlight of parenting. I live for them! As much fun as it was to be on the receiving end of the Easter Bunny and Santa Clause, it's simply a thrill to take on those roles and relive the excitement through your own kids.

The kids woke up early Sunday morning and Jacob was very displeased about the Easter rule: no touching any eggs or baskets until everyone is awake. Last year he found ALL the eggs before anyone else was awake! When we all finally woke up the kids proceeded to fight over who was finding the most eggs before securing their Easter baskets and taking inventory.

Found his basket!

"Mama, eks?"

Jon woke up after the big kids did their thing and was very excited to find that his basket was brimming with more "eks" (eggs) filled with jelly beans.

Off to church we went, where we had to fight the twice-a-year church goers (annoying!) to find a parking spot and then were stuck in the back of the church, standing next to the bathroom stalls, for all of Mass (to the pleasure of my kids who then had an excuse to roam and whose Circle of Bickering had expanded three-fold as a result).

We came back home only to pile back into the car for an hour drive to my grandma's house for our third egg hunt with family.

Easter family photo (with Ryan's new signature move)

Hunting for eggs with daddy

The Move again.

Then we wrapped up our Easter Sunday celebration by driving another hour to my father-in-law's house for dinner and our final egg hunt of the day, with cousins.

We discovered that Ryan's inability to find anything is not just conveniently limited to jackets and TV remotes. It applies equally to eggs filled with candy.

"Ryan, you missed an egg!"

"It's right behind you!"

"I give up."

Jon's grandpa took his hand and helped him find all the "eks" in plain sight on the grass. He thought it was the best thing ever! Also, don't you love his Mister Rodger's sweater? I die!

As you can tell, our Easter was very busy and fun-filled. My head is still reeling, trying to process what just happened. I can't believe how fast it all went!

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, Pikachu, and Poop

Our sweet across-the-street neighbor gave us a pumpkin last week. She grew it in her own garden! That totally amazes me because two months ago I bought an office plant that says "only water once a week" and I STILL managed to kill it. In my defense, when you only have to do something once a week, it's much easier to slip from your mind. From now on, I will only grow children. They make noise when they need something.

When I first saw the pumpkin I thought it was way too early to decorate for Halloween. Then I looked at my calendar and realized October was almost half over. Yikes! How did that even happen? So, we went right to town.

I got all the supplies together and assembled a Pumpkin Carving Task Force. One member of the task force was fairly helpful at scooping out the pumpkin guts. One wanted to wave the knife around in circles. And the other ate pine needles. I'll leave it to your imagine as to who did what.

After we gutted the pumpkin, Jacob grabbed some paper and sketched out a pumpkin face design. I vetoed his first choice of an elaborate vampire with fang teeth and blood in front of a full moon. There was some negotiating back and forth but we ultimately ended up with this:

Jacob carved the weirdo eyebrows.

Jon's all like, "oh hey, something bright is in here. I'll just reach my hand in and touch it."

My weirdos.

Jon is practicing to be the next Vanna White. 

Jon will not be contained. "Let me go! I see rock! Must.put.in.mouth!"

Jon's been taking steps like crazy today. We just put him down and watch him go! I love to see how many steps he can take before he loses balance and crashes on his butt. I'm sure he would tell me that the whole diaper bulge really throws him off. 

It's so weird to see him upright. He's like a whole new person! Watch out world, here comes little human. If our life was a movie, this would be a good cover. I think the film would be called "The Freaky Alien House Guests That Never Leave."

Jon is just way too much fun right now. I want to take him everywhere and be with him all the time. He is just learning to express himself in a way that is NOT crying and he is starting to interact more. He's my little buddy. And his cuteness KILLS me. KILLS. 

Lately, he grabs his shoes and tries to put them on his feet. This is so freaking adorable. He knows where they go, but he doesn't know how to get them there. He just puts them right on top of his foot and smiles pleasantly to himself. When he moves his foot and the shoe falls off, he gets really frustrated and tries again. 

When I feed him, he opens his mouth wide and says "ahhhh" when he wants another bite. All of his meals sound like this: "Ahhh!" (silence) "Ahhhh!" (silence) "Ahhhh!" (silence). When he does it, we all chime in. Dinner is pretty much a chorus of "ahhhhs." 

Jon also pants like a dog whenever he sees a dog (or cat, or squirrel, or stuffed animal). If we make panting noises, he frantically looks around to find the dog (or cat, or squirrel) that must be looming nearby. 

I swear, racing wheeled objects across the ground is pure instinct. 

He loves to crawl under things. If I'm just sitting on the floor (feet on the ground, knees bent) he will crawl under the tunnel of my legs, come out the other side, giggle, turn around and do it again and again and again. The other day I had the brilliant idea of taking him into a dressing room with me. The second I was stripped down to my undies....

"Bye mom!"

In other Jon news, Jon said his first word. From his high chair, he threw scrambled eggs forceful onto the floor and cried, "Uh-oh!" So, yes. This is a new game that we play at every meal. My floor is now "textured."

Jon is going to turn one this month and I'm incredibly, incredibly sad about this. He does not have my permission to grow up. For the past seven years it seems like I've always been "that person with the baby." Having a baby in the house seems like such a strong part of my identity now. I'm not ready to NOT have a baby in the house. Basically, I want another baby. Or five. 

"I'm too cute to go to bed!"

The other day I took the three of them to Target (ha!) and we passed by a rack of clothing. The kids saw some sweatshirts and begged and begged for them. I was about to say no when I looked down at Ryan the Pikachu and had a cuteness stroke. 

So naturally, we left Target like this:

I'll admit my story telling abilities are fizzling out here a bit. So, here's a picture of Ryan with the makeover I gave him Saturday morning. As I was getting ready to run errands, I put some eyeliner and mascara on (I don't wear much makeup but I NEVER leave the house without eyeliner and mascara) and Ryan asked if he could have some. I told him no and that it was for grown ups and he was NOT HAPPY. I gave in and we had a make up party. He loved it and was very pleased and was so angry when I made him wipe it off five minutes later when it was smeared all over his face. 

What can I say, he DOES look really pretty.

And here are some random photos of pre-bed weirdness:

I have no caption for this. Yeah...

And finally, based upon the title of this blogpost, I'm sure you were waiting expectantly for some story about poop. So I will now present you with the gift my cat left in my shower this evening. I don't care HOW many layers are between me and it, I never want to know the texture of cat poop ever again.

DOES THIS LOOK LIKE A LITTER BOX TO YOU?