I Swear I Won't Complain When It's 105 Degrees!

Aaah warm weather. So dreamy to think about. It was so nice out last week that I got all excited and couldn't shake the idea of new patio furniture. Robby said he wanted a Wii and I said not until I get new patio furniture. He said go buy some patio furniture then. So that was my in...and sneakily his too. I did some research and found a set at Walmart that people were CRAZY for, but I cannot handle the Walmart experience so I thought I'd give my beloved Target a shot and true to form, they pulled through and saved the day. I didn't have to go to Walmart and most importantly, the table's box fit in the hatchback of my car...what else can a girl ask for in a patio table? Can the box fit in a Civic hatchback? I'll take it!

So I buy the patio furniture on Friday afternoon and in typical Utah fashion, it was cold and windy on Saturday and flat out crappy and dreary on Sunday, leading into a snowy Monday morning. So that's why you're not seeing a picture of our new patio set...it's covered in about 3 inches of snow.

To go right along with the dreary Sunday, I got a bit of the bug from the boys and spent much of Sunday afternoon in bed. I was able to be nauseous in bed thanks to my mom, Gigi (Grandma Gwen) coming over to lend a hand. She made the boys homemade, from scratch, mac-n-cheese. It's her direct path to pleasing them. I thought about that last night and figured that's how I ended up with extra junk in my trunk...a mother who doesn't skimp on the butter-based sauces!

Anyway, when Gigi was getting ready to leave last night the boys climbed in bed with me to try to cheer me up and we started chatting. Charlie seems especially interested in the seasons these days and he gave me the run down of how the seasons work: pumpkins live in the fall, snowmen live in the snow, flowers live in the spring and WATER BALLOONS live in the summer! I can see it now...sitting on the front porch with Robby while he sips whiskey and carefully fills and ties water balloons. Sounds great...except for the hideous whiskey part...and the contstant balloon filling. I prefer the sitting part and watching the kids splat each other with water balloons...now that's where it's at.

Clever Boy

A conversation with Charlie yesterday afternoon -
Charlie: [whacks me with a toy banana]
Me: Charlie, you don’t hit Mommy.
Charlie: [preparing to hit me again with said banana...smiling]
Me: Charlie, I don’t think you want to test me.
Charlie: Will I get a spanking if I test you?
Me: Yes.
Charlie: Okay, I won’t test you.
Me: That's what I thought.

Double Trouble

Update: okay, I was three glasses of wine in when I wrote this last night. :) I might have opened a can of worms by challenging the world to a crazy-off.
Spent another unfortunately sobering night of helping a kid learn to make it to the toilet before tossing his cookies. Turns out Eli's technique for making it to the toilet is to wake up, yell frantically MOMMY and run like crazy into the bathroom. Hoping to get him to just run like crazy and forget the yelling part.

Have I mentioned we have two..TWO...count 'em ahhhhh TWO almost-four-year olds...living in our house? LIVING there. Day in, day out. Energy is an understatement. Seriously folks, even total strangers will say they hope for a (as in SINGULAR) girl after brief encounters with my boys. Now I know girls can be wild too, but I challenge you to a crazy-off with Charlie and Eli. I will win. I will. Hands down.

Easter Day!

The boys were so excited for Easter. Eli would say "after I nap, and then nap again, and then nap again...then will it be Easter Day?" They must have been talking about Easter at school because I wasn't placing any special emphasis on it and was confused by their enthusiasm. It was the candy in the eggs that sealed the deal...someone told them there would be candy.

Anyway, the boys loved the egg hunt so much. After the first hunt they reminisced about where they'd found each egg. "Remember how (10 minutes ago) I found a yellow egg in the strawberry plants...remember that?" Noooo. Let's do a recap of where each egg was. So they did. I hid all the eggs a second time later in the day and Eli was actually hassling me about why I didn't hide eggs in places where he'd found them the first go around. Sheesh kid! I can't win for winning.

So here's a picture of the boys from Easter. It is not a good picture. I just cannot believe how big they look here. In fact, Eli already looks like a mopey adolescent. Their hair is getting all crazy. If all the sassing and misbehaving wasn't a sign that my babies are no longer babies, this picture sure raised a flag for me.

And because I'm almost always the one behind the camera I asked Robby to take pictures so I could actually be in some. Robby said there was shade on my face after he took them, but I didn't think too much about it and figured I wouldn't be squinting. My face is TOTALLY shaded...but I'm in the picture and so are the boys so I technically got what I asked for.

And that's a new shirt. I love it! I feel like a stick of gum in it. If I had my Birks on I'd totally be Peppermint Patty!

Layta...

Spring and Hind Legs are in the Air

It's bee so nice out the last few days and we've been spending a lot of time outside in the garden and going on walks. The boys have been acting like crazy fools over the last couple of weeks and outside activity tends to distract them from what always gets them in trouble...each other!

Today on our after nap/work walk we decided to distract the boys by walking up to our friend Tom's house.  He wasn't home, but turns out his block is where the action is.  Literally. Instead of Tom, we ran into two little Chihuahua dogs going at it right in the middle of the sidewalk. The boy part of the equation was shorter than the girl so his hind legs were just dangling around in mid-air, while he was, you know...but believe me it wasn't slowin' him down one bit! We stood and flat out watched.  Turns out it's hard to peel your eyes away from two tiny dogs living it up in plain sight.

Begin the Begin

I'm in the blogger universe now and it's exactly what I thought it would be like. I've clammed up with nothing to say, thinking I should have stuck to adding witty remarks to my friends' blogs. I'm funny over there. Here...well, we'll see.

I decided I just need to sign up for a blog partly due to a personal analysis survey I took at work. Through the survey I learned that I am:

1- exactly like my friend Annalyn
2- Annalyn and I have some real problems!

Seriously, it was quite telling and many of the assessments about me ring true and I accept full responsibility for not liking to 'dive into the unknown alone' or disliking 'sudden changes in operating direction' or 'blunt, fact-oriented people'...what? Ummm...I thought I was one of those blunt people. I guess I don't like people to reciprocate that behavior.

Anyway, I'm blogging for better or worse. And I'm finding myself impressed with people who do this all the time and find a way to make the every day happenings of their life sound really interesting. Something to aspire to.