It's Cold

We decided to have a relaxed weekend - indoors as much as possible, please! The kids decided that running around like wild banshees would be fun. I decided to edit that idea with some games and that worked for about 5 minutes.

They played some Mario games. They watched some movies. I'm not sure what I did this weekend, but it seems odd that it's over already. Oh well, two days of school and the rest of the week with kids at home - but looking forward to Thanksgiving at Grandma's house!

Here's Gabriel at the end of a particularly long weekend day.

No, he's not tired at all...

Model Reader

Logan was strutting his stuff in his new shoes/AFO's/straps. He will show off to anyone within his perimeter (he is definitely NOT shy). Here's how the little show-off looked before his first, solo trip to spend the night at Grandma/Grandpa's house (for ultimate spoiling):

Future Super Model

Krista came home and did what she loves - reading. And this is how she looks when she is thoroughly absorbed:

Total Nerd (And I love it!)

A Roundabout Day

Good morning. Wake up kids. Dress kids. Feed kids. Brush kids. Buckle Kids. Drive kids... wah, wait! What's this?! There's a weird round shaped thing in my straight-lined Lincoln streets!! What do I do?! What does it MEAN?!! Oh, the humanity!

Okay, seriously, I'm new to the "south-side" and Sheridan Blvd is my new turf. There are two roundabouts on this road about 7 blocks apart and I thought it would be awesome for traffic flow. And, maybe it is.... but, some people totally freak out at them and either: 1. Sit. And, sit. And, sit some more. or 2. Dart into the circle as fast as they can without looking or yielding. I usually end up coming across both on my daily morning commute and I've only done it for a week. I'll sit behind sitter as he/she waits for ALL of the traffic to clean from every side. Then, when I get almost around, a darter will spring right in front of me, causing me to slam the brakes. I have to take a deep breath and remember, "The peace of Christ be with you." I'm hoping that maybe these are all new drivers to the area like me and it will smooth out with time... we will see.

Also, roundabout's have a "truck apron" for larger trucks to make it around them - but, they are not a good design for trucks or trailers. These vehicles have to wait forever for a big enough opening to merge into traffic. I always end up behind a sitter and then a truck/trailer full of lawn mowing equipment. I haven't been late yet, so maybe I'm just venting a little. Just a little, tiny bit.

Here's a link on how awesome our roundabouts are:

http://lincoln.ne.gov/city/pworks/engine/roundabout/

And I love that these roundabouts are so awesome they have their own commercial!

Window to My Mouth

We've had our first week of school, woohoo! Due to the excruciating heat, the kiddo's have had early dismissal after lunch every school day. We're supposed to get A/C this year, but the project was delayed from a small fire/smoke damage in the school (during construction).

Krista is adjusting well. She was nervous and scared at first, but now that things are rolling, she seems comfortable enough. She still misses her old school, but is making friends and getting familiar with her new one.

Gabriel loves Kindergarten. After an extended first wiggly tooth period, he finally lost it during lunch at school last week. He told me that he now has a window in his mouth! The tooth fairy came to visit and left him a $1 golden coin. He was very excited.

Logan got some new AFO's and subsequently, new "huge" shoes. Normally, he wears a size 8 toddler shoe, but with the AFO's,  he wears an 11 1/2. He has boasted about his new shoes to anyone we are around and wants to show them how fast he is in them. I've been trying to adjust his straps to accommodate and it's been trial and error, they always want to pop off and unravel. I'll get a good shot of them if he ever stands still!

Howdy-Ho Here We Go

Sorry to my target audience (mom), who checks my blog every day!! I can't guarantee a regular update, but I do what I can/when I feel like it...

Summer was super-fun-lazy-time. The kids spent the time playing in their pool, at the zoo, at the library, and mostly at home. Krista and Logan both had one set of swimming lessons, but boy are those expensive. They both did great - Krista got reacquainted with the deep end, still getting her arms strong enough to go across the pool. Logan started out not even able to walk in the shallow end with his balance issues, but at the end he was able to walk independently. He loves being in the water. Gabriel was scared and refused, then recanted (too late to join the lesson) and was miserable every time we went to the pool to watch his brother and sister do their lessons. After that we decided to join the gym, we are hoping to get him used to being in the water before signing him up for lessons.

 I want to go in!

 Krista's Backfloat.

Logan's Backfloat.

Zoo Time!

Another big part of our summer included:

Ice Pops!

The kids also love their slumber parties at Grandma/Grandpa's house. Krista truly discovered her love of reading and devoured chapter book after chapter book. Logan and Gabriel bonded so much that all Logan does, while his brother is at school, is ask when we can go pick him up...

It was a great summer and Krista said it went by faster than last year - it's only the beginning, sweetie, whole years will pass by in the blink of an eye!

Flower Garden

We've discovered a myriad of flowers planted in our back garden area, as spring has fully sprung and we've had lots of moisture...

We added flower boxes on our deck with the pretty Pansies. Speaking of moisture - look at our yard during the biggest torrential downpour:

I think our sump pump has finally caught up with all the saturation, as it hasn't run in a little while. Now that it's nicer, we can't help but hang out on the deck in the evening and grill out.

Last Day of School

We've started our first full week of Summer Vacation! The kids are having fun, playing together full-time. I'll miss my quiet moments, but will love the easy mornings. Here's some pictures I took from the last day of school, the last day at Sacred Heart.

 One of Krista's last recesses.

 Going to lunch, arms raised high.

 Gabriel's now a Kindergartner!

 Last day of school at drop-off.

 The boys waiting for Krista to come out.

Krista leaving and saying goodbye. Hello to 2nd Grade adventures at a new school!

Independent 3

When you leave an independent 3-year old to his own devices for 5 minutes, this is what happens:

1. Child sees fish.
2. Child thinks fish is hungry.
3. Child attempts to feed fish.
4. Child actually dumps TWO full containers of food in tank and around tank and on floor.
5. Child walks away, satisfied that the fish is fed.
6. Child says nothing. Parent must find this, by chance, putting a pair of shoes away.
7. Parent must emergency-rescue fish from dark green water, filled with pellets.

 Something smells like tea in here... what's on the floor?

 The pig looks guilty.

 This is what it looks like when you try to feed the fish two big bottles of fish food. And this is after I got about four - five cup fulls of swollen food out.

Poor Freddy Peacock - I caught it soon enough, so I think he'll be okay.

Something New

Last weekend, Josh and I tackled a big project - new laminate wood floors in the basement office. I can only now post about it, as it took me all week to recuperate from the work. Yes, I am that much of a weakling and have no problems admitting it. Here are some of the highlights:

1. Carpet removal, pad removal and quarter-round baseboard removal were easy-peasy.

2. Not so level concrete makes me hulk-mad and it took us 3-4 (blocked out of my memory) bags of self-leveling concrete mix to made it work. We bought a drill to mix the last bag (haha - not sure why it was a great idea only on the last bag), started mixing and saw smoke and finally realized it wasn't concrete dust. The overwhelming smell of electrical fire/smoke may have clued us in. Our drill crapped out already - not even fully mixed, so we had to hand mix it the rest of the way anyhow.

3. Frustration at the boards not going together until we realized the concrete we poured had some bumps - a few quick hammer-smashes later and it was like magic.

4. 3-4 tries of cutting the wood on the wrong side - doh! I know it was early in the project, but we were tired from the concrete mess!

5. We get to the edge and realize we can't put our tapping board in to get the joint tight... what? Back to Menard's for like the 10th trip. I love you Google - needed a pull-bar, they weren't by the pry-bars and the girl working in "tools" thought we made it up; but did suggest to look in the flooring section - Bingo! The new tool is beautiful and helps us throughout the process, to tap everything together nice and tight.

6. Finally finished and now have to install the laminate "T" threshold between the laminate and carpeting. Bought a NEW drill from Menards, not a hammer drill - the same girl as above said it would work, but would just take longer to get the holes in the concrete. That girl is a liar. Good thing my partner-in-crime remembered the neighbor talking about having concrete tools. Thanks, Mr. Parker, for letting us borrow the super-awesome Bosch Hammer Drill that took 2 seconds vs. the 2 hours we had been trying with our dorky drill. We love our neighbors!

7. Re-install the quarter-round moulding. Should be easy, right? Well.. it wasn't too bad, except for the part where I got a bleeding skull and Josh got a bleeding hand - the only injuries the whole project! Side Note: Don't pick up long, thin pieces of trim at one end and not expect them to snap in half. Those things can kill!

8. I was giving in to the "it's good enough now, right?", but got encouraged to help finish painting the baseboards. And yes, it was worth it - they look awesome.

9. Dragging all the furniture back in and setting up the computers again - oh I missed you!

It's nice to have accomplishments and I think this is a big one - time will tell on how well we did, though! I forgot to note we had some great, great helpers with the project! I really did good not swearing, except for that one time when, "shit, uh, SHOOT," came out. I doubt that replacing the swear with another word right after you say it helps, but I did say the second word a lot louder and with emphasis.

Here's some pictures of the work and finished project:

 Gabriel is ready to measure twice and cut once.

 Snap it in, big helper.

 Drawing the line for the cut.

 Measuring again.

 Logan helping blow away saw dust and carrying the squares.

 I may have suffered a concussion or brain damage, I'm not sure.

The finished floor.

Still to come - adding cool modular shelving/desks on the back wall behind the desk and on the left side.

Kristy Crusty

A conversation with Gabriel in the car, AFTER Krista has left the vehicle for school.

Gabriel: Crusty Krista, Kristy Crusty! (Gramps Laugh)
Me: What? Why are you calling your sister names, that doesn't sound very nice.
G: Kristy Crusty!! (Another Gramps Laugh)
M: Why is she crusty??!
G: BeCAUSE.... sometimes she chews her hair and it gets all crusty. Kristy Crusty!
M: That's mean, don't call your sister names.
G: Well... I can't call her that when she's IN the car. She would get mad at me!
M: (sigh)

Perfecting the Blonde Haircut

I cut the boys' hair on my own, cause I'm cheap and it grows so darn fast. Gabriel's hair is so dark that I can shave it with the #1 guard on our razor and it looks pretty cool. Logan, on the other hand, looks completely bald when we do that...

I have tried shaved it with multiple guards and it looks good when it's freshly washed.

But he hates sitting through the multiple "razings" and the next day is looks like...

Which is not cool at all, even he doesn't think so! So then I look back at his younger/longer hair and kinda miss it..

So I attempted to let him grow it out and attempted to give him a cut yesterday and ended up with...

It okay, but not a soft line at all because he only wanted "one" haircut, not "four." I shaved it pretty far up the back, so it wouldn't stick out. I never know how far back to shave it all the way - it's still a work in progress.

American Birthday

A few weeks ago we celebrated Krista's 7th Birthday. She made a request for a "United States Birthday." The following is what we came up with:

A Few Weeks of Yuck

For the past couple of weeks, we've been playing a form of Russian Roulette - opening the kids' bedroom doors to see if/which one of them has gotten sick everywhere. It started with Gabriel, who had it for quite a while after my mom's infamous (for many reasons, including Gabriel nearly choking to death and raw fish) birthday dinner. He was just starting to get over it and then we had Krista, Logan AND Nana struck down with it. They would be sick, feel fine - eat a little, eat a lot and then they would be sick quite a while later. I cleaned so many sheets, so, so many... and pillows, oh the pillows, which are now all weirdly misshapen. 

I got it and slept for almost a full day, but was not outwardly sick (of course that could still be coming). That's the thing with this virus. It's a sneaky jerk. You think you're feeling fine, you go out to eat dinner and BAM, next thing you know, you're quickly trying to get your food to go as 2/3 your kids are getting sick EVERYWHERE. No, that wasn't embarrassing at all... and the poor kids. It's terrible, and it's going around - sorry if we gave it to you - we are trying to stay IN as much as possible. The virus has great timing, too, aligning itself with one of Josh's few annual leave's. What a great vacation of waking in the middle of the night and not being able to do anything - what fun!