June 30, 2008

Weekend in Fast Forward

Friday:
Wake up, log in, work from home (just a little), feed Reesie (a lot), coax Henry into eating, pack up, peanut butter, knife, drive thru gas station, water, suckers (two please!), play date.


Park, shade, relax, fancy sandwiches, slippery slide, peeing on trees.


Go home, get kids settled, get kids up, drive, traffic, meet parents, delicious food, birthday envy, pull one over on server, faux birthday, happy boy, tired girl.


Saturday:
Wake up....get up, stand up, people put your hands up (sorry, I got carried away), shower, shave, breakfast, ride four-wheeler on front lawn, ride bicycle on front lawn, Heritage Days, hot, people watching, blow $40 in two hours on children's activities.


Cute girl, tiki bounce house, Spongebob bounce house, pumpkin bounce house, Spiderman obsticale course, Super obsticale course.


Tired boy, get drinks, tractor train, bull ride, FUNNEL CAKE, tired girl, hot boy, hotter parents.More tractor train, skateboarders, excited boy.


Drive, purchase mass quantities of soda pop, visit Jeremy's parents, Reese wears a dress, eat delicious ribs, eat lots of potato salad, pants on head, Spiderwick, caveman cock blocking, boob sloobing, shim shammin.


More driving, packing up, car shuffling, urban hike, Henry's not-so-secret crush, the Shafers, more urban hiking, fireworks.


Whew! That's it. For more photos of our Heritage Days adventures, click here. To just see more photos of our family, go here.

June 25, 2008

Sometimes You're Thirty Three

Sometimes you wake up and it's your birthday. This makes you happy, but kind of sad too. When you hit your thirties (or a few more years into them in this case) your clothes kind of give way. Witness Jeremy's boxers that have the elastic blown out in them.


This is sad, just sad. To make it up to you on your birthday, your spouse suggests taking you and the childrens out to breakfast. You agree because eggs always make you forget your underwear woes.

While at breakfast, you all decide to have a staring contest to see who can hold out the longest without smiling.

You start out all strong. You think to yourself, "It's my birthday and I'm gonna win."


Reesie is stoic even though she doesn't know what a staring contest is.


Henry tries to cheat by wearing glasses to disguise himself.


Mom stares at him intently. She's going to break the Little Man down.


Busted. Henners is no good at these things.

Oh. Now you're starting to crack too. You quickly divert your eyes away so you don't smile. This is a risky move because it blows your concentration completely.


Reesie goes in for the kill. She has really picked it up and the momentum seems to be tipping in her favor.


Yep. An eight month old totally broke you down, dude. You SO smiled first.


A quick glance at Henners shows he is STILL smiling.


Oh, well. Joke's on the rest of the family, you guess. After all, it IS your birthday and you're NOT wearing any underwear.

Educational Wiz

Turns out I'm a whiz with the cheese wiz stuff.

Lately, we've been teaching Henry his letters by squirting canned cheese on to crackers. Mom of the year, I know. I actually thought that I was sort of clever working learning into a fun activity until my dear friend Julee told me about her sister/friend, Penny. Apparently super-mom Penny takes her children on field trips to places that begin with a certain letter to drive home the learning experience. For example, if the letter is 'K', the kids go on an excursion to Krispy Kreme.

I saw Penny last night and complimented her on her creativity. She was all, "Whatever! I would have never thought of using Cheeze Wiz!"

Thanks for trying to be nice, Penny. Well, maybe when you get to the letter 'C' you can use my cheese and crackers idea. Or when you get to 'P' for processed, or 'U' for unhealthy.

I say, canned cheese and crackers are easier and they make Henners happy. Maybe in the fall I'll do the field trip thing, but for now, the boy gets a processed non-dairy product on a Ritz.

Anyhoo, (did I just type anyhoo?) Henry loves to shout out letters that he wants me to draw on these little crackers. His favorites include 'H', 'O', and 'M'. But lately his requests have become a little more demanding and complicated.

Witness the canned cheese 'Star'.


Here's the canned cheese 'Spongebob'.


Here's Henry eating the canned cheese 'Spongebob'.


Now, just where do you think Penny's going to take her kids to demonstrate THAT lesson? Thanks for having me over last night, Penny. I had fun. I can't wait to see my new purse!

June 24, 2008

I Would Have Never Predicted...

Sunday was my birthday and the first thing Jeremy asked me was, “What do you want to do today?”

There is no way I could have predicted that hours later my response to that question would be, “Why don’t we go to Nickelcade in Ogden?” Whoa. Where did that come from?

Let me back up. Before the whole Nickelcade event, we were cruising the streets of Ogden killing some time waiting for lunch. As usual, Henry started asking us if we would navigate in certain directions. After a few turns, we realized he was steering us directly to Fatcats, an arcade fun center that he loves. Henry had recognized some landmarks near the area and was on a mission.

After we sat all amazed at our little one’s street smarts and memory, we promised him that he could go to Fatcats after lunch if he had good behavior. We then headed to our favorite Mexican joint to eat some delicious, cheesy, spicy goodness. Here’s Henry pointing to the blue sun outside the front door.

You should know that Mi Rancho is smack dab in the middle of a seedy motel that rents rooms by the month, week, day or hour. Ogden. Awesome.

Also, you should know that Henry reminded us that he was behaving during lunch by loudly declaring, “I’M BEHAVING!” He also shouted that he was behaving as he threw rocks in a fountain in our dining area. He shouted “I WIN!” when one of those rocks knocked over a plastic turtle sitting atop the fountain.

After lunch, we were off to play games at the arcade. When we arrived we were impressed with ourselves at finding a stellar parking space. Once we walked closer to the building, it because obvious why we scored front row parking. Fatcats is closed on Sundays. Again, Ogden. Awesome.

Henry was distraught. He knocked on the doors and yelled through the door cracks for someone to unlock the door and let us in. He wondered why ‘that man locked him out’. He asked us for the keys. Jeremy explained to our three year old that ‘the man’ was Brigham Young and he kept the keys on Sunday. Not Awesome.

It is in this moment that this story now comes full circle. I looked at Jeremy and said, "Why don’t we go to Nickelcade in Ogden?”

So off to Nickelcade we went. Henry was thrilled that Dad had the keys to this place. Here's Henry pressed against the entry window in anticipation of all the fun he was about to have.


Henry and Jeremy headed straight for the games that had involved driving and steering.


And shootin' stuff.


I began wondering what I was doing at Nickelcade. Later, I found my purpose at Nickelcade through Dance Dance Revolution Japanese Version. Can I just tell you how awesome We Are The Chapions and We Will Rock You sound as sung by Asian pop stars?


Reese was loving all the bells and whistles of my DDR game.


Really loving them.


She was, however, a little suspicious of Big Bird.


Henry invited Reese up for a horsey ride.


Later, Henry challenged Jeremy to an air hockey match.


Grandpa Wayne decided he would try his hand at a rifle game.


Reese looked on with great anticipation.


I would have been looking on with anticipation as well, but my attention was diverted by a bag of trash sitting on top of a video game. Ogden, Awesome.


After all the game playing and trash spotting was over, we all went out to the parking lot and slathered ourselves down with antibacterial wash. We then stopped to get Henry a slush puppy with the longest straw ever.


Thanks, Nickelcade for saving our lives Sunday. Without you Henry would be so ticked at Brigham Young for locking him out of the arcade.