A Light Dusting–(This post was written in part in 2013 and in part today and yesterday)

THIS IS A SCATTERED POST!

That is all it really takes to cancel school around here.  I have been begging for the day to come when we had a break from school and I made it down to the last day… that is until they canceled school.  Doesn’t the school district realize that for the first time in my life we had teacher gifts ready to go to school today?  Homemade teacher gifts of lip balm and vanilla, complete with handmade cards by the kids that will now sit in little bags until January 6th.  I also wish the district would know how excited I was that we completed optional homework and it was packed up and ready to go in Owen’s backpack.  It was packed up the night before, this is big news around here.  We made it to the last day before winter break and we were ahead of the game… and now we are home.  I am cursing this day enough now and rest assured, when the end of June comes and we add that extra make-up day, I will curse it more. 

So what now? Well, I can’t be awake at 6:00 for nothing, so my blog at least deserved a post, especially considering I only have 11 days to remember 2013 as something other than the worst blogging year of my life.  I find with each child I have less room in my head to remember anything.  As new tasks and memories enter my head, old ones leave.  It is sort of like my head is full and something has to leave to make room for something else.  So thank you snow day for making me write stuff down…

Things worth remembering:

* Autumn loves eating “ficken” and “feese” and I adore making her say both.  Chicken and cheese sound so much better when they start with an f.

* Some words are cute when they start with an f, other words are a tad more dangerous.  For example: Chocolate Milk.  Out of Autumn’s mouth, it sounds a little like – fockit milk.  And yes, if you say that out loud, it sounds like you think it might.

* Owen made me mad this week last week and I lost all ability to parent nicely.  He was mean to me and wouldn’t practice piano.  He told me it was too hard and that we give up when things are hard.  It was late, I was tired. I transferred $60.00 out of his account into mine to pay for his lesson.  Sometimes you have to do what you have to do.

* Ivy is so competitive and loves to be perfect.  Evan did soccer this summer and after watching his first game, Ivy announced “You did good Evan, but you didn’t score any goals”.  And then there was the time Lyla couldn’t wait to tell Ivy that she learned how to buckle herself in her car seat.  Ivy looked at her and said very seriously, “Good Lyla, but can you unbuckle yourself?”.  She has good intentions, she just has has a heart of gold with high expectations.  Her poor little cousins.  She is taking gymnastics, swimming, piano, dance, and can’t wait for T-ball. 

* Greg is probably started a new job in Seattle.  I was very scared about the commute, but it is turning out ok.  He has to leave about an hour earlier than he used to and he rides the bus, which he says he actually doesn’t mind.  His work will reimburse him for the bus pass each month, which makes the commute almost free.  Greg seems happy at the new job and I am pleased to say we are settling in to the changes. 

* It is time to dust off the yoga mat…. teaching yoga starts started again on January 4th.  I cannot lie, it has been harder than I thought.  Having your own life with kids is not the easiest of tasks.  In fact, after we started teaching, Ivy moved to a two day a week gymnastics class that ends at the same time yoga starts.  Greg started working in Seattle instead of down the street.  We signed up Evan, Ivy, and Owen for T-ball and baseball and I signed up Greg to coach both of my kids’ teams and truth be told,  we have no idea how that will work! Everyday is a work in progress and thought. 

* Autumn needs a stylist.  Her clothes are awful and most days they are jammies.  The night before last she picked out yellow pajama pants with frogs on it, pink work out type shorts over the top, a blue shirt with a monkey on it, topped with a little pink hooded vest.  She wore that to bed, for her clothes yesterday, and last night.  We are hoping she gets dressed today, but really, that is up to her.  I don’t force the issue, I have places to go and trust me, we would not go if I intervened with her dressing plans. 

* Every single pair of Ivy’s pants has a hole in the knee, even the same knee. 

* Ivy and I got our hair trimmed the other day (Autumn invited herself in for a haircut as well and I am pretty sure she cut nothing off…it is hard to cut nothing off nothing) and Ivy is obsessed with it. 

* The kids are all still sleeping in my bed. (Owen comes and goes…comes when I let him, goes when he is in trouble)

* The kids love to “hip hip hooray” for things.  For example, “Mom, I earned a Frog Pride at school, we should give me 5 hip hip hoorays”.  And then we do that.  Autumn is my favorite…”Mom, my coughs are gone, let’s hip hip hooray for me”.  And then she throws her arms in the air, jumps up and down and cheers, hip hip hooray. 

* Owen wanted one thing more for Christmas than anything else…a suit.  My dad gave him a three piece suit complete with a pocket watch. 

* And finally, the kids went to the dentist the other day and had no cavities.  In fact, the older two have places we were watching and then dentist said the trouble spots were gone.  I almost died a little. 

And for the sake of finally posting.. the end. 

Long overdue pictures (and not enough)

Tea Party

Crazy Hair Day!

New Year's Eve!

A group of babies asleep on the stairs

Mystery phone selfies

George

Autumn loves watching Peppa Pig. They have Mommy Pig, Daddy Pig, Peppa, and George. 

The other night in bed, lying in the dark, Autumn said: "you are Mommy Pig, ok? and I am Vorv, and you can actually call me Vorv". 

"Ok, that is fine but you have to go to sleep Auttie."

"Call me Vorv."

"George, please go to sleep."

"Ok Mommy Pig."

"Do you need your blanket George?"

And in the dark of the night, I continued to be required to commit 100% to calling her George. 

George finally fell asleep, but continues to be George at least two or three times a day. 

A new year

Here we are, 2014. 

I entered the new year wondering if I should set any yearly goals and then quickly decided against it and here is why: I have to have a certain number of CLE hours to keep practicing law, 45 hours every three years to be exact. On December 27 I realized that my hours were due this year by December 31st and after further investigation, it became clear that I needed 31 hours of CLE in 5 days. Those 5 days were beyond sucky. 

So what does this have to do with a 2014 goal? Well, I envisioned myself cramming for my goals similarly to the mass watching of online CLE hours. I realized if I committed to running 4 5k races, I would be setting up a line and a cheering squad for myself outside my house. I would be handing out to myself a t-shirt that I made and pinning my homemade bib on. And not only would I do this, but I would do it 4 times- on December 31st. 

Or perhaps if I set a goal to learn 5 sentences in Spanish, I would be bunkered down with my Rosetta Stone and my headphones while the rest of the world gleefully screamed and shouted, Happy New Year!! 

I know myself. Year goals are not for me. I need something a little more attainable. I think I do better with monthly goals ( so what if I do those on the last day of the month all year). 

As of now, I plan to run a 5k per month (I dread that goal already, I mean, have you ever peed while you run? It is less than awesome and may be enough to cause me to abandon my goal. We shall see how things go early on). 

I plan to do another round of monthly adventures. 

I also plan to make sure I do at least 2 personal training sessions per month. 

If all goes well in January, I may even add something to that list.  I need to see if I can be trusted with these goals first. 

I may have to run to my personal training session on the last day of the month. 

Here's to a great year, procrastination and all!!!

A million tomorrows later

I made some lame declaration that the day following my last post there would be another post.  Whatever, I try. 

ANYWAY… the change I am seeing….

Owen’s school just implemented “table washers” during lunch.  Originally the kids ate lunch, cleaned up their own place, and went to line up for lunch; however, after many failed attempts at the clean up your own place part, it was time for official TABLE WASHERS.  The job description of a table washer is to wipe down the table after everyone else is done for one week before they change to someone else.  Owen is dreading the task because he says kids are gross when they eat and even went so far as to say that he often packs up his lunch early because too many kids have gross food and the way they eat it bothers him.  (I know, he could possibly need therapy in the future). 

Owen had told me about the table washers when they started and then he told me this:

O: “Mom, you will never believe this, the table washers get a cookie on Fridays!!!”

J: “How lame!!!”

O: “I know, they announced it today and everyone was like, whoooo, whoooo and started cheering.  Not me, I was like, boooo.”

J: “Really?”

O: “Yes, mom, I even went up to two of the recess teachers after and I told them that they should not be handing out cookies to the kids for washing the tables and they should give them Frog Prides instead (a frog pride is a ticket for doing something good, all of the staff at school hand them out and it enters the kids into a drawing for a weekly toy).

J: “You really did that? What did they say?”

O: “They said that I can have a Frog Pride when I am a table washer and they said they would take my concerns to Mr. Golden (the principal).” 

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I am still over the moon about this. 

I can’t believe how often our children are rewarding for doing something they should do anyway.  As parents, we are not doing our children any favors by constantly rewarding them to exist.  It makes it impossible for children to develop their own sense of accomplishment, learn what is important to them, and teach them to do a good job because it feels good.  We send them conflicting messages when we reward them after soccer games, baseball games or music class with a treat and this starts when they are really really young.  We assign them a job - give them a cookie for doing it; do a random desk check -  give them a jelly bean when it is clean; tell them to run around and exercise at T-ball in order to be healthy – follow it up with a pack of Oreos and a juice box; have your name forgotten by a teacher - get a Skittle.  The more I am aware of it, the more I notice it EVERYWHERE. 

Although, I do agree that if you have to wash gross food from gross kids off the tables you should get a reward, but it would be nice if the reward could be something more than another cookie. 

My neighbor said that she doesn’t know what Owen will do when he is older, but she feels that he will change something.  I hope she is right.   

Maddening

The votes are still being counted, but Initiative 522 is trailing. While I am not really surprised, I am dumbfounded that we are here. 

The cost of food will go up if we label foods that contain GMO ingredients. ....

How does this statement make any sense? Companies change labels ALL the time and there are no cost changes. 

I don't remember a major uprising when the FDA required foods to be labeled for trans fat in 2006. 

I definitely didn't read anything about energy drinks costing more when they changed their label a few months ago to replace the word supplement with nutrition. 

The same company that posted a $1.48 Billion profit this year, donated $6 million to defeat the initiative, and I am supposed to believe they are protecting the consumer from rising costs. I am quite sure they do not care about my costs. They care about their costs and how those bottom lines are affected if GMOs are labeled.  

It is actually a bit maddening. 

The only saving grace? My kids are learning and listening.  

(I would elaborate except I cannot trust what I might say if i drifted off to 

Sleep....and that is happening. )

Therefore, tomorrow's  post: How I am making a difference.

One Day

In the future, I am going to wish I had this blog to look back on to remember my life.  Owen asked me a question the other day about something he used to do as a baby, and I realized I have mom brain and could remember nothing.  If I spent half as much time writing about my life as I do reading about other people’s lives, I would have a pretty good history to look back on.   

The problem with getting behind on writing is that there is no good way to start again.  I have SO many pictures, SO many things to talk about, and SO many things going on in my head.  Where do I begin?

Today:

I spent the day cleaning the house.  I decided to let our housecleaner go at the beginning of the summer and I remembered quickly why we hired her.  But, with the kids getting a little older, it was harder to justify keeping her (well that and the fact that I owe Angie a ton of money and I am sure I am capable of cleaning my own house).  I cleaned for hours and didn’t even finish.  I am not sure if other people struggle so much with keeping a clean house or if I am just raising a bunch of baby pigs.  I think I have 4 pigs living here, and yes, I still have three kids and no, I do not include myself in that figure. 

We spent the night at a “trunk-or-treat” collecting a lot of crap.  There are a few times when I wish I could unlearn what I know about food.  Without a doubt, Halloween would be at the top.  I see them all with their little buckets full of candy and their little smiling faces and sparkling eyes, and I know that I have no choice other than to let them eat it.  I try to smile back and look excited, but it is really hard.  Luckily, for Halloween they are very excited to leave their candy out for the Great Pumpkin to take during the night in exchange for toys and presents the next day.  The Great Pumpkin will then store our candy until December when it is time to make gingerbread houses.  The only problem with this plan is their plan about the amazingness of what is coming.

Tonight:

The girls are upstairs asleep and Owen and Greg are watching football together.  I can only imagine how excited this makes Greg.  He is calm on the surface, the kind of calm where you act all cool and collected so as not to put any added pressure on the wonderfulness occurring in front of your eyes, but on the inside he is dancing, cheering, jumping, and most importantly: praying that this does not end.  Owen loves to use his imagination, he can’t have too many stuffed animals, he can often be found in a costume of some sort, he loves to play school, he says he is never playing baseball again, and he does not like football, that is, until a few weeks ago.  Owen just ran upstairs to put on a jersey, and now I hear him yelling at a player, asking questions, and has just informed me that the only thing better than watching Iowa football with his dad would be for me to join them and bring some popcorn with me. 

His newfound love for football stems from an amazing program Owen participated in this year.  Owen is a Bruin Buddy, a little buddy to one of the football players on the high school football team.  The school pairs up the football players with an elementary student, and the little buddy gets to run down on the field before the home games, join their buddy in the locker room after the games, join in one of the practices, have their buddy come to the school at recess and lunch, and attend classes at the high school with their buddy.  Greg is absolutely obsessed with the program, and I am sure even more now considering he is watching football with his son and they spent the night last night throwing the football and practicing tackling.  If we had a life savings, Greg would probably give it to Owen’s buddy to show his gratitude.  Good thing we don’t.

Tomorrow night the little buddies and their players are going roller-skating!

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There it is, candy and football, I guess that is where I start…..