Patience is a Virtue

Tasty, tasty!

2012-02-12T20:55:00.003-06:00

We had a nice winter weekend. On Saturday we went to the ESU library with Mike- Lauren LOVED the stacks. I forgot how fun those used to be when I would go with my mom when I was little. Have you ever seen the bookshelves that move on rails? The space savers? Now it's all robotic, but back in my day (ha!) you could spin the wheel and crush your little brother between two shelves, which came in handy when we needed to recreate the Star Wars trash compactor scene. Now there are motion detectors that would totally ruin that game.

Today we did projects all day! We made cards for the grandmas:

Cookies for the school party:

And Lauren worked so hard on the Valentine's cards for her class! Aw! Nice work baby! She painted the cards and then painted cut out hearts and then glued it together. She has endless patience for work like this. I love watching her concentrate! The class party is tomorrow so I will be there helping for a good portion of class. It is also SNOWING! So exciting. I kind of wish it would snow tomorrow night instead since Mike has to drive to Lawrence tomorrow but snow usually doesn't listen to me.

Time to get ready for Monday morning, Hope you have a nice start to your week!

Now THIS is winter!

2012-02-11T10:56:00.001-06:00

It's 9 degrees! Finally!! We have had a fire going last night and all day today! I love love love this cozy cold weather!

Sorry little Audrey, but babies who refuse to wear a coat cannot help Daddy outside!

Watching Dad and sis bring wood for our fire.

Bedtime by the fire!

It worked! Cozy warm babies!

We had such a nice night last night! I made potato soup and pizza for the girls. I finally found a good pizza crust recipe! Here it is: Rudi's gluten free frozen crust. It's perfect! No more screwing around with yeast for me! Lots happened this week- more updates in a bit! Stay warm!

Hey, I know that dude!

2012-02-07T04:19:00.002-06:00

Kaleb is famous! http://www.omaha.com/article/20120202/LIVING/702029945/1008 Saturday Night Live picked up this story and made bad fun of him on weekend update, pretty cool! If Seth Meyers made fun of me I would probably faint from delight! Well played, Kaleb!

Our Superbowl party was awesome. As usual, once I accepted my fate and went through with the dreaded socializing it was perfectly fun. The party got wild and crazy:

What fun!

Speaking of dread, today is the day that I start my completely horrible ulcer diet again. For those of you who don't remember, it is the "no caffeine, no alcohol, no chocolate, no citrus, no fried food, no spicy food, no carbonated beverages, and take Prilosec for 6 weeks" diet. I have to do this once in a while to let my ulcer heal back up. If I were to ever actually go the whole 6 weeks I am sure it would permanently mend and we could quit talking about this altogether, but my problem is that I feel spectacular by about day 4 and by about day 10 I honestly forget that I am supposed to be doing it! I have about 3 half done packs of Prilosec from these failed attempts. This time, I WILL SUCCEED. Everyone, I am on DOUBLE SECRET PROBATION- please help me! If you see me at Sweet Granada or King Liquor or Sonic or any other den of sin, please tell me to back away and go right back home to my chamomile tea.

The other times I tried to do this I was surprised to find that caffeine was difficult to give up and pop was nearly impossible. The rest of it is pretty easy. I usually like to begin new diets with a strong dose of self-loathing, so last night I cleaned out the fridge by eating everything bad, including all of the leftover meatballs and the rest of the dip from the Superbowl party. I feel TERRIBLE right now. Don't ask why it was important for those foods to exit my house via the toilet instead of the trash can, because I don't know. It just was. So, anyway, 42 days to go. I don't want to do this again, so I want to actually do it right. No cheating!

OK, back to bed for me. I have a meeting in Wichita today so the girls and I will drive down and go visit mom and dad. Mike is in La Jolla, CA this week for a conference so we might spend the night and then come back up Wednesday morning for school. Time to get a bit more sleep and then start a long and busy day!

Trip the light fantastic

2012-02-05T08:37:00.001-06:00

Today we got all dressed up and went to the theater! Check it: http://www.corbianarts.com/ We saw the Tortoise and the Hare and the Ugly Duckling. It's supposedly geared for kids but WOW, do not miss this if you have a chance to see it.

You can't tell from the website how exceedingly cool this show was! It was a children's play done with life sized puppets. The actors operated them from inside. The puppets were made of light wires and the play was done in complete darkness so all you saw was a lit up exoskeleton of each character. No dialog, just music. It was 100% enchanting. Damn, I love humans. They think up the coolest stuff!

Lauren and Audrey both watched the entire one hour show and we all wanted to see more. I had kind of forgotten how powerful those old fables are. Lauren was very affected by them- during the Ugly Duckling she wept when the mother duck sent her ugly baby away. (Do you want to sit on my lap, Lauren? OH YES. Sweet baby. High school may be rough for her if the theme of rejection still resonates that strongly.)

PS We took this picture in the bathroom of the Emporia Granada theater!! I love how fabulous they made that place! Here are some other pictures of it: http://www.emporiagranada.com/wp/photos/views-of-the-emporia-granada/

On Friday night we drove to Topeka to eat at Jose Peppers. This would have appalled my 20-something self! You didn't know me back then, but at the height of my hipster obnoxiousness, I refused to eat at chain restaurants. Not only that, I pretended that I couldn't remember the names of any of them. I called them all Applebee's. Like Australian Applebee's, Italian Applebee's, Mexican Applebee's.... Oh, how witty. I REALLY miss knowing everything, ya'll. That was the best! Jose Peppers was perfect. Loud and fun and delicious and the girls got a balloon!

Tonight we are having a Super Bowl party. It sounded so fun last week and now I regret it intensely. This is how social events always happen for me. The second I commit to something I start wishing I hadn't and trying to worm out of it. Is everyone feeling OK? Are you sure? Neither kid is sick? Your ears feel good, Lauren? Really? Darn. Guess we are having a party. I am doing meatballs, a veggie tray, and we will order pizzas. And it's BYOB. How bad can it be? I will report back of course. And I am looking forward to the game even though Giants vs. Patriots... YAWN zzzzzzzz

I had an architect out on Thursday last week and he says that removing my kitchen wall will be an easy project. I am hoping that "easy" is directly proportional to "cheap" but that may not be true. I am awaiting those bids like Lauren waited for Santa! The suspense! See you after the party- next time remind me not to do that!

Now, in technicolor!

2012-02-03T09:21:00.002-06:00

My brain was very busy last night thinking up horrifying dreams for me to have. I repeatedly dreamed bad things and sat up all scared. In my dreams, I

1) found a mouse on the bed and had no voice to scream for Mike
2) smelled smoke
3) saw a creepy creepster looking in the window
4) found out we had a big mean dog living here
5) walked around and around and around the house looking for my keys

No super restful. At least I was not Lauren though! I let the Audrey sleep in Lauren's bed and returned later in the night to find this! What a good sport!

In other news: O glorious weather! It is FINALLY raining! A lot! And with big lightning and thunder! I want to declare a national holiday and just sit and watch the clouds all day, but we have to actually go out in it!

Also-I really really really don't like to use coupons. I know people save a lot with them, but Lauren can't eat most of the stuff they give you coupons for and the rest of us probably shouldn't! Mainly, coupons just exist to irritate me when I have to wait in line behind some extreme-couponer wannabe. However, our local Dillons just sent me about 30 coupons that are "personalized" and included almost my entire grocery list for free!! Awww, thanks Dillons! How did you know? Oh yeah, my "loyalty" card! Hooray for privacy-invading direct marketing opportunities! This week we will eat like KINGS! Free mayonnaise for everyone!

Ok, time to get Audrey ready. She was angry with me this morning for taking her out in her jammies with no shoes. "Mama! Oosh! Yocks!" :|| (Mama! Shoes! Socks! Repeat!) from the back seat the whole way to Lauren's school. And then pick-pick-pick at her clothes once we got there and had to go in. We will dress her like a princess now for Kindermusik! She was excited yesterday because I bought her pullups with Winnie the Pooh on them. (Is that funny, or am I just bored? Poo on Pooh? Yep, bored!) She kept pulling her pants down to show us, over and over again. Sooooo pretty Audrey! Hope you have a nice day and are just as pleased with your underwear as Audrey is with hers!

Fancy for the library!

2012-01-31T10:24:00.001-06:00

Lauren dressed herself!

Audrey was 100% jealous! Tutu STAT!

Today it is 63 degrees! I am getting weary of these endless perfect weather days! Snow! Rain! Do something! I am tired of watering our trees in January! We are headed to story time and then to the zoo, and then during quiet time I need to mop. Audrey spilled juice and the floor is now sticky enough to pull off your socks! Instead of dealing with the spill this morning I chose to find many activities outside the house for today. See, I plan ahead- that way I don't have to do anything right now. Tra-la-la!

Chill baby baby chill baby baby wait!

2012-01-29T21:44:00.003-06:00

Audrey woke up with a bit of a 'tude today. She was a P-I-L-L. Or worse. In a moment of exasperation I told Mike she was being a little T-U-R-D and Lauren piped up, "Audrey is TIRED? Why? She took a nap!" Thank you Lauren! I see that our days of spelling bad words are now behind us!

For example:

As you can see, I prepared my daughters a healthy little snack of sliced green pepper with a little homemade ranch to dip them in. Audrey looked at her snack, flung her peppers to the floor, and licked the plate like a bad puppy. Which isn't all that bad, but she was mad at all of us all day! She was climbing the furniture, slapping away helpful hands, taking off all her clothes, refusing to go potty and randomly pulling everything off shelves! Naughty!

It was like that all day! By bedtime? I am soooo T-U-R-D! Goodnight!

Bring your green hat!

2012-01-28T15:15:00.000-06:00

I love this picture of the girls! It makes me happy. Audrey gets to walk around the block like a big girl, but she still wants to hold her sister's hand.

Here is Lauren on her field trip to the museum. She was so excited and has been talking about it all day!

All dressed up! Professional wife mode!

Getting dressed was the best part of the night!

Prom night was nice! I mean, it was FINE, you know? It was an awards dinner and we sat through 2.5 hours of speeches. And it wasn't our normal crowd so I got none of the inside jokes and there was, oh... lots of talk about golf and stuff like that. Men younger than me teasing each other about getting so old. You know the type of event! The food was great, and there was an open bar but I was afraid I might act a fool since I was getting pretty bored, so no drinking. Not until the after party, which was cash bar. Probably a bad financial decision but that's OK. We had a really nice time together and I got to know the people that Mike works with and I loved all of them. And I am so pleased to announce that I was not the crazy lady in the dress that was cut down to below her belly button ("She's from SWEDEN" everyone kept explaining. Interesting!)

Hope you are having a nice weekend! Mom is here and we have remodeled my kitchen in our heads. I am 100% positive my plan will work for removing a wall. We just have to move a toilet and shower drain that are inside the wall that I am taking out. That's easy and practically free, am I right? Sledgehammers for everyone!

Ask no questions!

2012-01-26T10:40:00.000-06:00

I was downstairs cleaning up a breakfast mess (syrup should be illegal!) and I heard Lauren singing to Audrey up in her room. What a pretty song! What a good sister! I sneaked up the stairs to hear her. Here are the words:

"Why is there a diaper on the ceiling? I don't know! I don't know!"

Ummmm, I don't know either and I am not sure I want to!

one more quick story from today- We are on our way to the messy park (tire chips, you know what that does to their clothes!) so I dressed the girls in matching white turlenecks, jeans, ballcaps, and old tennis shoes. Audrey was unhappy but Luaren and I told her over and over again how pretty she was. When I got her shoes on she ran to her mirror and burst into tears, saying "no no no" and picking at all of her clothes. Fancy Nancy! I carried her crying to the car while she was trying to undress and we are on our way now to get a shake. That will cheer her up!

update- she finally accepted her outfit and had a great time! She even went down the baby slide 3 times by herself! Lauren was soooooo good with her, Yay!

How do it know?

2012-01-24T08:29:00.001-06:00

Lauren was outraged (outraged!) that I sent her to bed before overtime started on Sunday night. "But you said I could watch the whole GAME. Not just... (glancing at TV screen) REGULATION PLAY. Now I won't know if the red guys won." (Seriously??) She went to bed anyway and I had to tell her in the morning that the red guys lost. We had a bad football day overall, because I was hoping for a Ravens/49ers Superbowl and got neither team! But the games were great, even with me watching out of one eye while keeping the girls occupied.

We had a nice weekend- Mike was in Texas for a little bit of it, so we went down to visit Mom and Dad (again!) Lauren calls their house "Grammie home," as in "Are we going home-home or Grammie-home?" That's nice to have two places that are home! We went to the Exploration Place museum and also did some good shopping. Mike and I are going to a grownup prom this Friday. It's an annual event for the Chamber of Commerce and I haven't been able to go yet. Last year we skipped because I had just had surgery and the year before that I was on bedrest, so this year we are going! From what I hear, some women wear suits and some wear formals, so I got a conservative black dress and some killer jewelry. I am excited! It's possible the dress may not fit by then, since I have been on a bit of a ... shall we say "food vacation?" Um, could someone deliver my eating contest award? Because I am sure I have won at least honorable mention in something. It's time to straighten up though. I bought very expensive jeans a couple of months ago and they are currently in time out for shrinking. A whole bunch of my jeans are in time out, actually. My yoga pants are fine though, those are cute and I look like I might work out at any moment! Carry on then!

Last night the girls had a fancy dinner party for Wesley and Charlie. Both the dads were out of town for evening classes so the moms decided to combine dinner operations and make it a party. It was so fun! Lindsay and I cooked dinner for them while the little girls got ready in dress up clothes and then they had this very special dinner on special plates: grilled chicken, rice, and peas, with ranch on the side (that made it fancy) and cupcakes with sprinkles for dessert! Audrey was so pleased. She dipped each pea individually! In fact, she cleaned her plate and then kept on dipping her finger. I think ranch may be the secret to life for that little girl. It was fun hearing the kids chatter, I love their hilarious little conversations and power struggles. And it was so nice to have grownup company in the kitchen! I think I need to start looking for a second wife. Is there a website for that? A match.com for polygamists? No, don't tell me.

Charlie arrived late and Lauren did an ambush proposal on him. She was already dressed up in a wedding dress and asked him to marry her. He accepted, and Fish-a-roo (the stuffed penguin) officiated this blessed event in front of the fireplace. There was no kissing, because that is gross, but it was very romantic anyway. Music was provided by Wesley, who collapsed behind the happy couple and wailed, "BUT CHARLIEEEEEEE! YOU NEVER WANT TO MARRY MEEEEEEEEEE!" Sweet little Audrey watched everything with a concerned look on her face while trying on the shoes that Wesley kicked off on her way down. Her friend's misery did not affect my glowing bride Lauren, who happily announced that Charlie would now move into her bedroom. Um, game over!

Today will be nice, we have library day. Finally! We need new books and it is possible I owe them a dollar or two. Well, I owe them an amount that has led to weekly phone calls, so it is time to face the music. I am pleased to be a revenue generating patron for the library. After the library we have a playdate with Molly and Peter. I am excited. Also I am glad to be gone so the house will stay clean for at least a couple of hours. Hope you have a nice day too!

And a round of drinks for all my friends!

2012-01-18T19:45:00.001-06:00

Lauren has been "collecting" money all week. Truthfully, she has been collecting it from unauthorized places (like my purse) but I am letting it slide because she is only interested in coins right now, and she says that credit cards are "fake." How true. She asked to take her purse to ballet tonight and I let her, and after ballet was over she announced to the class that she had 17 quarters and would like to go ride the rides and everyone should come and she would pay for them to ride the rides. (You know, the mall rides? The 50 cents merry go round and stuff?) I was so surprised and touched that she decided to do that with her money. She gleefully paid for everyone to ride some little rides and then said she would like to do that every week. Fine by me! So sweet!

Here is Audrey proving that she can make jewelry out of ANYTHING! I swear, she is completely compelled to adorn herself. It is just built into her little personality! She is wearing a bagel as a bracelet here!

I made turkey and noodles today and it came out REALLY well. I think I finally have a handle on gluten free noodles.

Here is the recipe:
1 cup King Arthur gluten free all purpose flour substitute
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1 egg yolk
1 whole egg
1/4 cup water
1 teaspoon oil

mix together and knead with floured hands for 5 minutes, then flatten it out on a floured surface and let it rest for 15-20 minutes. Then roll it out super thin- like I could practically read through it. Lots of flour on rolling pin and rolling surface. Cut the noodles, put them on a floured plate and let them dry until you are ready to cook them. Delicious! I think I like them just as well as Great Grandma's!

For turkey and noodles, boil the noodles for about 5 minutes (just keep tasting them until they are done) in 4 cups of broth and then add in some of the frozen turkey that you saved from Christmas dinner. :) Or whatever.

The gluten is the stuff that binds together the bread/noodles/cakes/crackers, so gluten free stuff tends to be more crumbly. You can correct a bit of that by adding extra oil and eggs (one extra yolk is good, and an extra teaspoon of oil or even more) if the recipe calls for those. If not, just add a bit more of whatever liquid ingredients is in the recipe, because the gluten free flour needs a little bit more liquid. And dial back a tad on the sugar in the recipe, because the gluten free flour substitutes have a sweetness to them. I have been doing all my usual recipes but with slight adjustments. It's always just trial and error! Lots of error!

Funny Lauren

2012-01-17T21:44:00.000-06:00

We had a nice day- a fun play date with Molly and Peter this morning and a nice afternoon of talking and talking with my girls. Late today we went to pick up some bread from a new bakery in town* and I asked Lauren to help Audrey get her boots on. "Help her put on her black boots while I warm up the car." I said. When I came back in Audrey was crying and Lauren was exasperated. "She WON'T wear her black boots, mom! She wants to wear her ... yippie kay yay boots!" HAHAHAHA! Audrey kept insisting on her purple cowboy boots! Known from now on as her yippie kay yay boots!

For dinner we heated up some delicious roast and Lauren asked if she could skip the meat. Why, Lauren? What is wrong? Well, the meat is too "Slobbery!" Huh??? "It has slobber all over it!" That is au jus! It's good! "Oh mom, it is sooooo slobbery." Let's not order her any french dips in the future!

*Flavorlicious! Our new bakery! I am really excited. It is dairy, soy, yeast, nut, and gluten free, and he tailors your order to your specific food allergy needs. Sounds gross, right? It is SO GOOD. This is solving all of my problems with Lauren's diet. Yay!!

Lauren's little shadow

2012-01-16T19:33:00.000-06:00

She goes EVERYWHERE with her sister! See? Even in time out Lauren has company! Lauren got sent to the stairs for interrupting (we are working on listening right now) and Audrey trotted cheerfully along with her and sat by her the whole time! So funny!

She also wants to go potty like her sis, in fact she has been doing a really good job for the last couple of weeks so Lauren and I made her this little place with books and a cute rug. When Audrey saw it this morning she said "Oooooooooooooooooooh, niiiiiiiii" (Oh! Nice!) and petted the rug. Big stuff!

We had such a nice weekend! It was a three day weekend and we kind of piddled around but got a ton of stuff done- ,Mike went camping, we took leaves to the dump, cleaned the house, had a nice little pizza party, and watched my two favorite football games ever! The Niners/Saints game was so tremendously good, and I was really glad to see the Broncos gets spanked like that. And I got to watch Harry Potter 7 part 2 the whole way through! (I had seen most of it before but only in bits and pieces. It was SO much better all at once!)

(Things weren't all perfect- Audrey did not get to eat her "nom-noms" [M&M's] for dinner. She hates the word "No.")

The new closet curtains are my domestic project of the year- I was a little worried about how often the old heavy doors fell off the tracks (during our last playdate with Wesley I became worried about safety) so I hung AND hemmed AND ironed these curtains for the girls rooms! If we ever sell the house we will have to put the old doors back on but these will work for a while. I am very proud of this but Lauren told me that sometimes I was a little "grumpy" while I was working on them. Really?

Lauren isn't taking naps anymore- now she skips her nap but goes to bed at "babytime," Audrey's bedtime. (8:00) They have been going to bed together and it is working pretty well so far. A little too much laughing and talking but I don't mind!

And off we go again!

2012-01-12T07:26:00.000-06:00

Last weekend Mike went to the farm with Dad. At first I thought we were all going but then it came out that he intended to "get his deer," as all the men around here say. I don't know why he suddenly decided to provide for his family in such an old fashioned way, but hey, ok! Part of his plan involved possibly putting the deer on top of the Honda Pilot in a cartop carrier to get it home to our meat locker, but I don't know the rest of his plan because I made a few "Harry and the Hendersons" jokes and he quit talking to me. So, it was obviously a boys only environment at the farm that weekend and we stayed with mom and did some less testosterone-y activities. Like the art museum! Look what we got to see!

http://www.kmuw.org/index.php/news/supremes_dress_collection_goes_on_display_sunday/

It was AMAZING. I had no idea. No idea that the dresses were that incredible and no idea that the Supremes were such teeny little ladies! Everyone was saying that, people kept squeezing behind the displays to see if the dresses were pinned or what, but they actually were that small. Like, some of those dresses would fit Lauren! But the dresses, wow, such art! It was wonderful and I am so glad we didn't miss it! Audrey caused me a small amount of worry by launching herself at each dress and trying to grab, but I was able to stop her from touching anything, except for that one time she knocked over the "Please do not touch" sign. The highlight of her day was discovering the echo sounds caused by the marble floors and domed ceilings. There were 100 people in the room whispering and one bellowing "LA!" "BA!" "MA!" "DA!" So we really didn't get to linger over the dresses very long. But it was a perfect weekend, involving pajamas and movies and haircuts and dance parties for the little girls.

Sunday night wasn't quite as nice. We had JUST fallen asleep when Lauren woke us up by coughing. Mike got up to check on her and then called me in because she had thrown up. (She didn't even ask for help, she just went in the bathroom and took care of it!) That's weird, I thought, and put her back in bed. She threw up six more times after that and didn't fall back asleep until 7:30 in the morning. YAWN! We were tired! She was better by lunchtime but was very bummed out to miss show and tell at school. The reason I know how many times she threw up was because my little data hound counted obsessively. After each time she was sick, she announced "That's FOUR!" or "Now FIVE!" and then after the last time she croaked "seven," with her head still in the toilet. Then she burst into tears and said "I don't like tonight!" I gave her a bubble bath and washed and dried her hair and then bundled her up and she slept in the green chair with me like she did when she was a baby. It was kind of sweet. Audrey woke up about the time Lauren went down so I have been a tired lady this week!

Another quick Lauren story- yesterday she woke up from her nap but didn't get out of bed! She just stayed there and I was a little worried so I went in to check on her and she said "Don't worry mom, I am just going to lay here until the grouchies get out." Oh really? "Mom, sometimes after a nap I have a few grouchies," she explained. Oh, is that a fact, Lauren? Wow, it's so nice to meet you! Ha! (We invented the term "napshitty" when Lauren was about 2 months old- but from now on we will call it "the grouchies." Much funnier and we can say it in front of her!)

We have been working on Christmas thank you notes for a couple of days. Lauren is being quite lazy about them. I anticipated this and helped her make some stationary- we stamped "Dear______, Thank you for the _____" and made a bunch of copies so she just has to fill out the form. But even that is too long sometimes so she will start negotiations. "Instead of 'Jeanne, Mark, Matt and Jake,' can I just write 'Matt + Jake?'" Yes, that is fine. "'Grandma Sue and Grandpa G' is sooooooo many letters. I will just write 'Sue.'" Um, ask your dad on that one.

It's finally cold- I am laying here listening to the neighbors on both sides scraping their cars and feeling guilty and so glad that I don't have to go anywhere on a day when the wind chill is 0. I like our Tuesday and Thursday free days. Today is laundry day and then tonight I am making baked potatoes and we will have a fire in the fireplace, so it will be a cozy at-home day! Stay warm!

Nun-nen

2012-01-05T23:02:00.002-06:00

Audrey was talking about Nun-nen tonight for about 5 minutes before I realized that she was pointing to Lauren's room and talking about her sis. Aw! She has about 50 words if she is talking to me and about 10 that everyone else could understand. Her funniest word is "dip." She points to her plate and absolutely demands it- no matter what we are eating. My girl! Me too! Dip IS the best!

Today was so pretty! It was almost 70 degrees- I cannot believe the weather we have been having lately! My iris are 6 inches tall with little buds, and the lettuce that never died this fall is 8 inches tall and is already too big to eat! I finally took down the Christmas wreath today and there was a bird building a nest in it! It flew at my head all mean (and if it was a small wreath I would have been tempted to just let the nest happen but it was our humongous expensive prelit thing that is as tall as I am and we just can't have that shit. Sorry, bird.) Nature is REALLY confused! It's so hard to believe that last year we had a foot of snow on the ground this time. Remember, I had just had surgery and my (wonderful) aunt from Florida came to help with the baby and we didn't leave the house for over a week? Today was SO different. We had a picnic play date at lunch with Lindsay and Wesley from across the street and the kids played for 3 hours at the park. Lauren was so good. Or maybe the other kids at the park were so wild that I appreciated mine more? Tonight Wes came over again and the girls were just so cute and sweet. I tried to play with Audrey to keep her busy while the big girls played a board game but she knew what was going on and became inconsolable so I let her go in Lauren's room and then they all played dress up together. Yay, happiness!

Audrey wants to wear this every day. She does!

See Audrey doing ballet?

Movie time with Wesley!

YAWN!

2012-01-03T23:03:00.000-06:00

Happy 2012!! We had a nice little vacation during the break, we spent a few days with Mike's sis and her family in Colorado. (In Aspen! Where the beer flows like wine! Mike's sis arranged for us to house sit for one of her friends, it was really really nice!) So it was a nice combination of sledding, hot springs, family time, and lots of food! Too much driving and it was probably too much to take another trip but I am really glad we went! And Mike and I celebrated our 8 year anniversary on New Years Day! We have been hanging out for ages, huh! Sorry so boring for the first update of the year. We got home late yesterday and then today was totally exhausting. I unpacked, put everything away and did 7 loads of laundry. And I had to keep Lauren busy with no TV or toys because she started off the day so sassy. Isn't she so pretty and cute? Can you believe she said this?

(after I told her to put away her shoes)

Lauren: You always make me do EVERYTHING while you lay around!

(Note: Of course I was not laying around.)

Lauren: Daddy never makes me do stuff like this. He is sweet.

(Text to Mike: congratulations on your favored parent status!)

Lauren: (Stomping off) I am going to go talk to him at his work.

(Text to Mike: be on the lookout for a pissed off little kid in footie jammies...)

So we got a LOT done and guess who helped me with all of it? Yep. I had two little helpers, one was cheerful (Audrey!) and one was resigned and apologetic but we got it ALL done! Ha! Back to normal tomorrow. Hope you had a nice New Years and a good start to 2012! I am going to go watch some TV because I am allowed to- my reward for not sassing anyone today!

PS I did not unfriend anyone, I just deactivated my facebook account for a while! Ahhhhhh, the silence! Actually, it's a little TOO quiet! Feel free to email me out here in no man's land!

Happy Happy Christmas!

2011-12-23T22:44:00.002-06:00

Hope you are having a wonderful holiday season! It's all good here- just busy busy busy and I don't know when it will stop! We will catch up soon, but in the meantime, good wishes and good food and hope you and your loved ones are enjoying everything about this crazy and wonderful season! We have had so much going on!

So... Thanksgiving! We spent a perfect and wonderful week in Florida and I have to say that for anyone considering a holiday in Florida I would recommend going there in November and I would also recommend having fabulous relatives who take you EVERYWHERE- parks and fun restaurants and also to wonderful beach condos. Thanksgiving was perfect and fun and we met our adorable new cousin we even saw a launch. It was amazing.

Then my brother came to see us for a week and it was so much fun. Both girls call him "My Mike." (Audrey calls him "MaiMai.") We missed him the second he left.

And then our really crazy week started a few days ago- We are hosting Christmas this year (actually two separate Christmas dinners, with a Christmas eve party in between the two meals!) so it has been a big planning/cleaning/baking challenge with not nearly enough fridge space (coolers on the back porch already!) but it is going to be really fun and we are excited to spend time with everyone. We drove to Lawrence yesterday and bought all the girl's gifts at the really good toy store. Mike took them fake shopping while I made three sneaky trips out the back door of the store with santa bags that I stashed in the back of the car. I can't wait for Christmas morning! This is such a joyful time. I am grateful beyond belief for every single day. That's what it is all about. So much happy. Love to you all!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

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2011-11-20T06:32:00.001-06:00

Not a perfect palindrome but I like it anyway! Things are really good here! Busy! I hate how working interferes so much with my blogging but it's good to have jobs. I ended up getting all three of the projects I bid for but of course it was high drama waiting for those contracts to come. One customer backed out of the big "bread and butter" project that was going to pay for my babysitter all year and I had a couple of nervous days, but I dusted myself off, redid the project plan and they picked it back up so we are back in business. And now I am nervous about being too busy, ha!

If anyone is having a pampered chef party I have a suggestion for you. Invite me, and also send the web invitation on a Saturday night when I have been drinking beer and am feeling entitled. You will have a GREAT party total! I really overspent on kitchen toys recently and but am finding it all to be so vastly useful that it's impossible to feel guilty! One of the fun things I got was a potato slicer so we are making our own chips now- and the other really fun thing I got was the apple corer-peeler-slicer and I adore it. We have made 3 batches of applesauce so far! The plan is always to freeze it but we always end up eating it all.

Yesterday I walked into the living room and for half a second I thought I was seeing myself on TV. Same hair, face, etc. Then I spent the next second figuring out that I was looking at Eddie Vedder who was in drag for some reason. Nice. I always knew we were hair twins (there but for the grace of Pantene mousse go I) but I never noticed the facial resemblance before. That really put me in the mood for some flannel! See the resemblance?

I won't get a chance to blog again until after Thanksgiving, so I just want to say in honor of the holiday that I am absolutely, completely awash in gratitude for the wonderful and undeserved gifts I have been given in this life. These children, this marriage, this family, this home... love and health and everything that is wonderful and terrifying about this life. What a beautiful blessing it all is.

One more quick story: Angie and I were talking today and I told her "I thawed some meat for you!" (She is thinking about getting a side of beef and wanted to try some first.) She responded weirdly to my statement. "Oh! Um, wow, I don't really know what to say... that was nice...." This went on for a while and finally we figured out that when I said "I thawed some meat for you" she heard "I got some weed for you!" I am thankful for moments like that to spice up my day! Hilarious!

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2011-11-01T08:09:00.001-05:00

YAWN! I heard people talking all day yesterday about some "movement" to get Halloween moved to the last Saturday in October instead of on the 31st and my first reaction was scornful- yeah, lets move New Years Eve too, so it's more convenient for you. Halloween! Sometimes it is on a Monday and that sucks, and sometimes it is on a Friday and that is awesome, and sometimes it is on a Sunday and then you have a big community fight about not trick or treating on Sunday so people end up doing two nights! That is part of the fun! Shut up, big complainers!

But today I realized that Saturday Halloween is a law we should pass immediately. Halloween should never be on a Monday again. I am exhausted! And the house is a pit, with candy and bits of costume in every room, and I can't deal with that because I am getting ready for meetings tomorrow and Friday. We will be haggard all week! (Also, the law should state that if your team is on Monday night football and the game goes into overtime and is very exciting, well, that is a legal reason to call in sick on Tuesday.) Lauren just wandered in all tired and told me she is excited to eat only candy for all her meals today. Excuse me while I go burst her bubble. More later!

Howl-o-een again already!

2011-10-31T02:51:00.001-05:00

Happy Halloween! All is well here, we had a great weekend at the farm! The weather was crisp and perfect and the trees were all orange and gold- it really does not get any better than fall in Kansas! If you can live through the wretched summer here the fall will make you happy. :) After 2 perfect days we went back to mom and dad's house and then we trick-or-treated at all the grandparents' houses in Wichita (very fun, and mother-in-law was on best behavior!) Then we came back home to get ready for yet another crazy week. I spent all day shopping and doing food prep- we are going to have some great food this week! I am still getting used to the amount of planning a gluten free diet takes. (And lactose free, but we are used to that! Gluten free is definitely harder.) There really aren't a lot of eat out options! Which is fine, but I can't mess around and then decide to order a pizza, ever. I CAN mess around and then serve cereal, which happens about once a week! This week we are having chicken salad, bean soup with cornbread, beef and broccoli, turkey sandwiches, and lots of gorgeous salads and raw vegetables. I shopped this morning in Wichita (alone! no kids!) and the produce was amazing. I bought everything! Emporia really needs a serious grocery store.

I am snack mom for preschool for the Halloween party and we made the cutest cupcakes with candy corn decorations. Tomorrow will be fun! The kids at school are walking around and trick-or-treating at several places downtown and then going back to school for a party. Then home for nap and early trick-or-treating with the neighbor kids. Lauren and Audrey going to drive the barbie jeep this year, and there is much anticipation about that! Then we will pretend not to be home, because I didn't buy any candy this year! Our house must look menacing, because we usually don't get any kids, just teenagers who come at 10 pm and don't wear costumes. No thanks teenagers, if you drove here I am not giving you candy! The Chiefs are on Monday night football this week and it is a pretty big game so hopefully we get to see some of it.

The girls were precious this weekend, absolutely the cutest things ever. Lauren is the best farm kid, she loves everything about being outside and she knows so much already. She got to steer the truck again and she did well! When Dad complemented her on her driving skills, she said in total seriousness, "Well, I have been driving since I was four." Audrey was funny all weekend too. She is eating a little better lately and she now demands total control of her food. I offered her a bite of something on Sunday and she tapped her finger on her high chair tray. I put the bite right where she indicated and she looked at Grammie and nodded, like "see? that's how you get things DONE." Pictures soon, I used my new iPhone all weekend but I haven't figured out how to dump the pictures yet. Might have to break out that book after all! I still like the iPhone, but it surprises me how much it locks up and freezes. Really, mac people? You are OK with that? Our iPads do that too. I think people will put up with just about anything for pretty packaging. I know I will!

When there is no one around to impress

2011-10-20T20:53:00.001-05:00

Apparently I am not very impressive! Are you hungry? Come in! I can offer you some very stale bread, or a pickle, or some probiotics! Wait, we have apples! And lemons! And beer, which is totally food, right? Oh, I am sorry, did you hear a rumor that I cook every night? No, that isn't really true. Not unless I am showing off for Mike. If he is not here we have cereal or hot dogs from Sonic. Tonight we had popcorn and apples for supper (and we are watching Megamind, which is a surprisingly good show! Not reading library books at all....) Here's to kicking it! Cause Mike gets back tomorrow and I will have to look busy! Look- my fridge looks the same as it did in 2005- shouldn't I have grown up by now? http://jennfinch.blogspot.com/2005/01/one-in-which-i-am-very-domestic.html (still as domestic as ever!)

Baby's in Reno with the vitamin D

2011-10-20T04:20:00.000-05:00

It's already Thursday again! These weeks just fly by! It has been a busy week. Mike has been out of town and the girls have been sick (always!) Lauren is fighting a sinus infection and Audrey has strep throat. I took Audrey to the doctor on Tuesday and she was so pitiful that it broke my heart. She was so sad and cute! Sitting there in her footie pajamas, wearing 6 necklaces and sticking her little arm up in the air to keep her bracelet from falling off, just weeping with total despair because she detests getting examined so much. I think she broke everyone's heart! And she hates medicine almost as much as she hates to go to the doctor. Lauren and I have to trick her- I pretend to give it to Lauren and Lauren says "Ooooooh, YUMMY!" and then Audrey opens her mouth for a sip. We do that 4 times to get one teaspoon of medicine down. Lauren is a good sport!

I had a couple of meetings this week and I got my first signed contract! So I am officially in business now. This project will pay for our sitter for a few months, which is really nice since that is my main work expense. And I am SO happy to pay it. Mallory is amazing- she is an education major and she does the neatest things with the girls! Every time I come downstairs to peek they are working on something creative and cool! I feel like it is so enriching for them (I am a SLACKER when it comes to art- my idea of an activity is "help me sort the laundry into color piles!") that if this experience is all we ever get out of the business it is worth it! It's so good for Audrey too, she is a major mama's girl and I am so glad she took to Mallory and likes having someone else take care of her for a few hours. Happy!!

I am excited about the projects too- app programming is just fun, it's a big complicated puzzle to work out. It's hard not to work on it all the time- I am trying hard not to immerse in it- which is a different way of working for me. When I programmed before we didn't have children so I could geek out for 12 hours at a stretch and forget to eat and pee and shower and no one missed me. It's different to have to do the work in little bits here and there, so I am having to learn to work in a different way. And I got my new iPhone today! It is a lovely beautiful thing of beauty. I am surprised to love it this much- I totally forced myself to buy it because I am such a Microsoft/droid person and I need to branch out into Apple products if I am really going to do this app thing professionally. (Plus it looked really stupid to show up at a planning meeting for an app with my old samsung- I hid it in my purse!) I think next up is to bite the bullet and buy a mac computer but I will resist that until I get another contract. Spend money to make money, right?

It's fall break now so the town is quiet again. I hope I always live in a college town, I just love the rhythm of life here. Our neighbors are going to Texas this weekend for Nic's grandpa's funeral service, so we will be watching their dog. Lauren is excited to have such an important and responsible job! I am going to make a casserole and some mashed potatoes and have that in the oven when they get back Sunday night. Other than that no plans. I am looking forward to Mike coming back Friday night, but I do like our lazy girl days and hot dog dinners when it's just the girls. We have been having so much fun that I didn't even remember to watch TV! Hope you are having a nice week too.

My funny baby Audrey

2011-10-17T16:17:00.001-05:00

Two quick stories: I already mentioned how Audrey has learned from Lauren to collapse down on the floor if you are bummed about something, but that their techniques were different. Lauren swoons with despair and falls, and Audrey is calculated and careful about the whole thing. She sits, and then lays back, and then starts crying. It is so funny. Last night Audrey got in trouble for going back to the dishwasher over and over again. Getting in trouble means that Mike said "Audrey! That's a NO NO!" and her face crumpled and she was totally humiliated. She looked around the kitchen and then ran all the way to the living room for a soft floor to lay down on. It was so cute, pat pat pat pat pat running little footsteps all the way to the carpet and THEN the crying started. So funny.

Today I took her shoe shopping for the first time ever (Lauren had a lot of shoes leftover!) and she had a blast. We went to payless to get winter boots and when she saw the giant racks of SO. MANY. SHOES. she almost swooned for real! Her eyes were big and shiny. We spent half an hour trying on all the different shoes in her size and she ran to the mirror and looked at each one. In the end I picked a pair of black uggs like Laurens and Audrey became very sad when she saw my choice. This is what we ended up with:

So sweet and funny and fancy! Hope you are having a good week- so far so good here!

Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

2011-10-15T20:32:00.001-05:00

Lauren turned FIVE. Which is the craziest and most exciting thing. Five! She is now a dominoes score old! The lowest possible dominoes score but she is on the board! Meanwhile, I am the oldest, I mean highest possible dominoes score, as evidenced by the college frat boy who collected money from me and effusively thanked someone named "Ma'am" for her contribution to the cause. I called someone and complained about the college boys calling me ma'am and it was pointed out to me that they probably wouldn't appreciate being called "boys" either. Good call.

Lauren's birthday was appropriately festive, we had the Oklahoma cousins up for a very fun party. The cousins arrived Saturday morning and we had snacks and played and then went to the football game, where we tailgated and Lauren cheered on the field with the tiny cheer team for the first quarter. After the game we had a rest and then had a very fun party- spaghetti and cupcakes and wine (for the grownups) and dancing (for the kids) and it was all extremely fun. Then the kids watched Tangled while the grownups chatted and in the morning we all had a good breakfast and then went to the zoo. Monday, on her actual birthday, we had all the neighbor kids over for more cupcakes and lots of fun playing. I am pleased with her birthday and I am glad we didn't try to do a giant kid friend party. It was great and she was pleased and is still basking in all the attention! Yay, Lauren! It was fun to think about where we were five years ago. It has gone fast, no doubt, but it really does seem like five years ago that I was first home with that precious little baby.

In the history of being pregnant, no one has ever been more ready to have the baby than I was. Promise!

Look at that little grumpy baby!

Lauren is one!

Lauren is two!

Lauren is three!

Lauren is four!

Lauren is FIVE!

Wow. Wow.

I am constantly in awe that this ended up being my life. Damn.

In other news, we finally worked out the childcare situation. See that adorable cheerleader above? The one by Lauren? She is our new sitter and she is FABULOUS. She is working 12 hours a week or so, while I work at home and do meetings. It's good. I am extremely happy working, I like it. I like having grownup meetings and project plans and I am nervous about being able to get it all done but in a way I kind of like the pressure. This is nice! I have lots of projects to do and I will probably be stressed out very soon but now I am in that nice stage where we have projects planned and haven't gotten far enough into it to find the problems. Soon though! Complaining is eminent!

This weekend was homecoming, and Mike had to go early to the game set up tailgating with the faculty. The girls and I walked over to campus with the double stroller and we had the nicest party! It was so fun that the girls got tired and we had to walk back hom to rest and we missed the game! But they did have a great nap while I watched some other football on tv and got texts from Mike about the score. It's fun, we are close enough to the stadium that I hear all the sounds, so I hear the band and when bad things happen we get a low boooooo and when good things happen the cheer is like a wave of noise and then a few seconds later I get the text: touchdown! from Mike. It's fun!

Time for me to watch movies with these girls, hope all is well with you. Back in a bit!

We can't leave Audrey out of this post. She is 17 months old now, knows everything, and already thinks you are a dork. She knows so many little half words. "Bo" (for bow), "oosh" (for shoes) "Ni" for necklace, "Nie-nie" for nap, "Tee" for brush teeth, which is important to her. Her first sentence was a few days ago. I was getting her dressed and I picked her brown moccasins and she REALLY objected. "Nah! Nah! Nah, nah, nah oosh!" (No shoes!) She was pissed! I opened her closet and she walked over and picked out her pink shoes, but she was really angry for a while that I almost made her wear the wrong shoes. Audrey is doing some hilarious things. I taught Lauren that if she wanted to take something from Audrey that Audrey wasn't supposed to have she should give her something at the same time to distract her. Audrey has learned this as well, because now if she wants something that you have, she tugs it out of your hand while handing you some lesser object, something random like a plastic hammer. Then she walks away quickly with your stuff. We put a mirror in her room and now she spends a lot of time stealing Lauren's jewelry box and putting it all on while sitting in front of her little mirror. It's cute, and I can tell she is going to be a little more expensive to dress than my jeans and hoodie Lauren. Lauren's ballet started back up so now the girls have been dancing almost every night and it is just the cutest thing. Lauren is so fancy with her dancing that she gets hurt almost every night and little Audrey just turns in circles while wearing 20 necklaces. Sigh!

Time to go down for breakfast, Mike and Lauren are "surprising" me with pancakes, except that Mike keeps texting me to ask where is the vegetable oil, etc. We are still doing all gluten free and its working mostly well- more on that next time. This is a great weekend. The weather is perfect and the Chiefs have the day off so I am going to watch the Lions instead and work on writing droid apps if the girls give me a break at all! Mike is in Philly this week so I need to help him pack too. After panckes of course! Hope you are having a nice weekend too!

Don't look down

2011-10-06T03:16:00.002-05:00

I am unexpectedly sad about Steve Jobs. I had a close friend who died way too young of cancer a couple of years ago and her birthday was yesterday. I am not the type to remember birthdays but I still get the birthday alarm email for her. Sigh. Just a melancholy, thoughtful day.

In business news, it looks like my new home-based business might be a go! (Instead of taking a job, I am testing out how it would work for me to just take on individual projects. Small, custom programming projects like apps and custom databases. Kind of a boutique consulting firm. So far I have a couple of apps to do and a neat little scheduler.) I took Audrey to the meeting yesterday and she was a no-impact baby the entire time. I packed food, drink, several pairs of shoes, all of Lauren's jewelry, and about 10 little books. She sat behind me on the blanket and unpacked her bag herself and then spent over an hour trying on all the jewelry at once and paging through the books. She is amazingly good. I don't want to make a habit of taking her to meetings but I am grateful to her that it went so well. And my new dress was awesome.

The rest of the meeting was a mixed bag. I wasn't prepared for a lot of the questions they were asking me and I also wasn't prepared for how large the audience was. I had prepared for a chit-chat with one other person and instead ended up being surprised by a crowd of 9 community leaders who were expecting ballpark bids for their extremely nebulous projects and I felt like they were kind of peppering me with tech questions I was only marginally ready to answer. Hopefully I did OK- I just answered honestly and didn't pretend to know things. I am such an introvert that those kind of situations always cause me to say stupid things and then have excruciating forehead slapping shame flashbacks that I could possibly die from, but you can't get jobs without selling, and I have to just jump in if there is an opportunity. I am also worried that there are too many players in this- the whole town thinks they own it and I got to dust off all of my project management skills and lecture them about ownership and deliverables and scope creep and things like that. It's all going to be a learning experience and I am SURE I will mess up a lot but I still think this is the right thing for me to be doing professionally. It's kind of fun to be back in the tech world again! Things are pretty much right where I left them, when I started writing my first app and saw the java code I was all, "so we meet again, old friend." So anyway, I am terrified and WAY outside my comfort zone, but I am going to try this. If I go down in flames there is always beer, right?

Audrey is awake- back in a bit!

Uh oh.

2011-10-05T07:32:00.000-05:00

I have a big meeting today and (of course) my sitter cancelled. I don't know why I am trying to start a computer business here, I should set up a drop off childcare center because everyone is desperate for childcare. Anyway, I called the company to reschedule and they said to just bring the baby. I have a really bad feeling about this! I'll let you know how it goes. I have a new dress, aren't new clothes like a force field that make your day great? I think so!

With nefarious intentions

2011-10-04T03:34:00.001-05:00

Lauren did the funnest thing today: took her nap on the little couch outside on the covered porch! Sooooo exciting. It was so exciting that there was almost no nap, but she eventually fell asleep! The weather is perfect right now. I ran my errands this morning with Audrey in the jogging stroller- we went all over town doing this and that. I do love that about our little town- everything you need is about a mile from your house so in nice weather you really can walk! One of my errands was to go to the mall and buy some grownup clothes for a meeting on Wednesday (Dress obtained-success!) and the mall was totally full of mall walkers! It was hard for me not to start doing fresh air interventions: have you BEEN outside, people!

Speaking of Audrey, I found my little daughter crying beside the art cabinet earlier today. She was so frustrated. The cabinet was locked which was preventing Audrey from putting a stray paintbrush away. She is neat and tidy! Any little thing you leave out gets thrown away! Lauren's trash can is full every day of toys that Lauren leaves out and Audrey "cleans." They are 100% opposites in that way- Lauren's room looks like an F3 hit it every single day. I have tried working with her about putting away a toy before getting out another one but we aren't there yet. Maybe Audrey is on to something... just throw away things that are left out!

Audrey has started having little conversations- most recently Lauren took a book from her so she shook her little pointer finger in Lauren's face and said "No! No! No!" Lauren was delighted with this and encouraged it, so now they have a fun new game. We are calling it the "You got told" game!

We had this white chili for supper tonight http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/paula-deen/white-bean-chili-recipe/index.html and it was excellent! We will totally have that again, it was easy. I left out most of the butter and it was still great. Lauren ate it and so did Audrey! This was followed by a beer on the patio with Nic and Angie while the kids played and ate cotton candy. Ahhh.

I am tired- I ran too long today and got a little too thirsty. Tomorrow will be a take it easy day. Tuesday is our free day. I guess we will go to the library story time and also back to the zoo. I like to go out because then the house doesn't get as messy. Is that wrong?

Every single day should be today.

2011-10-02T14:39:00.003-05:00

**Updated! BEST STEAKS EVER. Like, Ruths Chris good. YUM. You will be shocked but butter was involved. I took 2 rib eyes and let them sit out for an hour or two, then I seared them in the cast iron skillet for 2 minutes per side and then put the whole thing- skillet and all- into the 450 degree oven for 9-10 minutes. Meanwhile, I sauteed onion and garlic in 1 TB of butter and then dumped the yummy all over the steaks for the last 2 minutes. Delicious!! Served with white rice and a green salad with homemade buttermilk ranch. I have a very happy husband right now! Part of the reason the steaks are so good is it is the meat we have now. We got a side of beef (side is 1/2 a cow- one side of a cow) and it is this fabulous organic grass fed and very lean. It's really nice meat- I feel good about feeding it to us. (Everyone here does this- it was confusing to me when we first moved here because the grocery stores carry very little meat- most people just have a freezer. So now we do too! When in Rome, right?)

A Sunday in fall! I LOVE it. The weather could not be more perfect, Mike is home with me all day and is currently hanging a new screen door downstairs (YAY! Fresh air!) The Chiefs are winning (thanks for being worse than us, Vikings!), I have a new pack of gummy worms, and I do not have a hangover*! On days like this I am extra glad we aren't church people. From time to time I feel like we should be doing that with the girls but I just can't ever give up half of our only family day. Pancakes with Dada- sacred stuff. We went to the zoo this morning and even the animals were happy- they were all awake and walking around and the swans were trumpeting.

Yesterday was fun- we took Mike's dad and stepmom to the ESU football game and it was another one of these perfect weather days. I think everyone had a great time. Then last night after the girls went to bed we had a big fire outside and had our neighbors over for drinks. It was a really good night.

Lauren had cheer camp yesterday and she did great! The ESU cheerleaders put it on and the head cheerleader is a redhead, so she and Lauren are super cute together. Next week Lauren gets to cheer on the field during the football game, we will take many pictures of course. Audrey will probably be a little jealous, she insists on doing everything Lauren does. K time for me to help Mike hang the door. We got an old fashioned wooden screen door, like at grandma's house. I am excited to start using it!

*I tried the new gluten-free beer last night. My hypothesis was that I have a gluten sensitivity like Lauren does and that I would have less of a hangover from gluten free beer. In order to be VERY scientifically rigorous about this experiment I drank 5 of them- which would normally cause me some problems- and I am pleased to report that I do not have a headache or any nausea today. YAY!

Gluten blah blah

2011-10-01T03:46:00.001-05:00

I know, right? Boring. But I am excited because Lauren finally liked a gluten-dairy free item. Pizza! That can be a weekly thing. Yay, her hunger strike might be over! Today Mike's dad and stepmom came up for the day and I am TIRED. No nap for the kids and for some reason that kicked my ass, plus Lauren acted extra wild just to make sure I was totally on guard for the whole day. Honestly, I am in a blogging funk. I am sorry. I want to share so much with you and I am just worn out with no words. The girls are great and I am cooking from scratch and working on some fun projects and it is football season so there are many good things happening but I am just ... blah. I might just be at capacity? I will check in soon, promise!

Busy busy!

2011-09-28T04:29:00.001-05:00

Things I cooked this week:

Gluten free Bread! It was beautiful and easy. How perfect would it have been if Lauren liked it? Ha! Her review: "It looks just like a sandwich but when I put it in my mouth I think I might throw up." So, FAIL. Fortunately, I needed gluten free bread crumbs to make

Manhattan party meatballs! (gluten free) These were so good! Mom's old recipe that everyone loves- with the apricot BBQ sauce. I made these for the school potluck. Traditionally I don't cook anything special for school potlucks, but I wanted to make sure Lauren had something fun she could eat. I am glad I did, because it was a mac and cheese paradise (gluten and dairy! no and no!)

Chocolate chip cookies- a mix from gluten free pantry. I just added an extra cup of chocolate chips. YUM. These went fast!

Beef stew- made with gluten free all purpose flour. Delicious. Lauren doesn't like it but Audrey and Mike and I are eating it all up.

Pioneer Woman's blackberry cobbler, with gluten free all purpose flour. This might be the best thing ever invented. And of course Lauren doesn't like it.

Lauren is somehow doing GREAT on this diet, and weirdly I am feeling a lot better on it too. I am doing it kind of in solidarity with her and i have noticed that most of my stomach issues have improved. Still just experimenting but I think this is working for us so far!

Things we did:

will have to wait on this one- Audrey is crying again. Teeth? back later

Spoiler alert

2011-09-19T02:18:00.001-05:00

I can't sleep tonight so I decided to finally watch "Something Borrowed," which was a book that I really liked. Wow. Did they ever screw that up in the worst way. The casting was all wrong. Dex was SO wrong- he and Rachel didn't even act like they knew each other! And Kate Hudson played Darcy like she was an alcoholic and completely lost all the charm that she had in the book. And I get combining the characters of Ethan and Hillary because they were kind of the same role but WTF about Ethan suddenly falling for Rachel? That was nonsense and obviously tacked on. And why add Dex's parents! We are smart enough to know cancelling a wedding is hard without hammering it like that. So dumb. And it killed me what they did to Marcus. They turned him into a joke. One of the reasons that the book was so good was that all the characters were so likable and complex and the movie lost that subtlety completely. It became Rachel vs Darcy = good vs. bad. For the prize of a stunted Dex. Boo! It always bugs me when movies screw up books. I know books can just straight up tell you the way it is with words, but movies have the visual element and music and people's faces, I feel like movies have so many more tools to tell the same story so why is it so hard? Are words that much more powerful than ALL the ways that a movie can tell it or do they just mess it up? Well, rant is over.

And thus concludes the meeting where I brought nothing but cleavage.

2011-09-19T00:10:00.001-05:00

A couple of years ago, Lauren ganked a doll from a playdate. She has so many cute dolls, but for some reason she fell in love with this creepy realistic newborn baby doll and took it home. When I discovered she had taken it I called the other mom and she said "yay it's gone please keep it" so we still have it. Today Audrey discovered it and spent the evening walking around the house alternately cuddling it and whacking it into the wall. "Baybay!" she said, over and over again. It was 100% adorable! She has grown up so much in the past month. It's amazing to see her change into a little girl. She really loves everything to do with getting ready. She hangs out near the bathroom to keep an eye on us and make sure that no one is brushing their teeth or putting on makeup without including her. She is quite stern about getting in on all that action. If she disappears for a minute I usually find her in the bathroom examining my makeup. She hasn't messed anything up yet, she just likes to take it all out of the bag and check it out. Girly!

This weekend was fun. My great aunt turned 90 and lots of family came from all over for her party on Saturday. We had a great time catching up with everyone and I was so pleased that the girls were both good. I really hated to miss the first home football game- especially that morning. We are close enough to campus to hear the band playing and smell all the food grilling so I had a little pouty moment where I acted slightly bad about the whole thing. As usual though- the party turned out to be extremely fun. We bounced before the big family dinner though. The girls had been so good that I thought we should leave while we were ahead. Here is Aunt Pauline. So cute, right? She's not that much bigger than Lauren!

Saturday night we had a fire with the neighbors and I was SUCH a party pooper because I went up to put Audrey to bed at 9:30 and I accidentally fell asleep holding her. Then Mike came to wake me up and I was confused about why he was bothering me and I must not have been super nice because he left me alone to sleep after that. I heard it was a fun party though! Then we had a wonderful all night thunderstorm with tons of rain. I ran this morning for an hour all over Emporia and the whole town looked cute again after its bath. Yay for rain and cooler weather! Windows open and no AC!

Tonight was tacos (carne asada again- I am in a food rut because they were very boring tonight.) We did corn tortillas because Lauren is going gluten-free for a while. Her allergies had become so severe that I took her in to a new alternative health doctor and he did a bunch of tests and diagnosed her with a severe dairy intolerance (of course) AND a gluten intolerance. That surprised me- I didn't really think about her being allergic to more than one thing. I think he is right because I can already see a huge difference. She is doing better after only one week on this diet. And gluten free eating isn't as hard as I thought it would be, there are tons of options and it's nice to have an excuse to eat potatoes again.

Remind me to tell you later about my work meeting on Friday. It was so bad, I was unprepared and didn't feel good about it at all. Then I got in my car to leave and I was muttering "that could not have sucked more" when I looked down and saw that my shirt was hanging open. !!! Oh well, good days and bad days at every job. Next time I will wear a nun's habit to make up for accidentally showing them my bra. Bedtime- lights out everyone!

Delightful and divine!

2011-09-08T17:24:00.002-05:00

Sooooo many clothes! This was my week to accomplish unpleasant things, so I started off right on Tuesday by cleaning out Lauren's big storage closet. I had 6 big tubs and 3 laundry baskets full of extra clothing left over from Lauren, and I had to sort it all by size and season and pull out the things that Audrey can use this winter. Wow. What a project that was. The girls were good but it was hard to get it done and keep them occupied. Today is the day to wash it all and it is so lovely out. What a pleasure! The whole neighborhood smells like fabric softener!

Also add to the list- wash both cars inside and out and get oil changed and tires rotated on both cars, make a bunch of phone calls and appointments, pay bills, and finally try to deal with Lauren's social security card. There is a typo on it, a little thing, and I thought I could just go to SSA and they could type in the right name. Not so fast! It's on her birth certificate too, apparently, so Mike and I have to go to court and then petition the office of vital statistics in Topeka. THEN we can deal with SSA. This could take months! Uhg! I am secretly excited though, it is called a "birth certificate amendment" which is the same thing the girls on Maury have to do after they find out the real baby daddy. I am pretending that is us. Ha!

In other news, we had a great weekend at the farm. I am 100% a product of my environment, because in hideous weather I am horrid and in wonderful weather I am very very good. This week it's all 75 so I am quite pleased with life. Hope all is well with you too.

Pedicures for everyone!

2011-08-31T23:01:00.000-05:00

Old and stank.

2011-08-31T14:16:00.000-05:00

Things I am tired of:

A hundred and anything for the temperature.
Swamp ass.
Line dried laundry that smells funky- guess why? Cause outside smells funky right now.
Little kids with BO.
The eyeball blistering sunlight.

Oh how I long for fall and clouds and chili and football and to wear my old flannel shirt which is the only thing I saved from the 1990's. And the 90s are so back! Did you notice? All the little floral dresses? It looks like 1994 again except instead of doc martins they are wearing dresses with cute cowboy boots. Or tall lace up granny boots. Or booties with scrunched socks. And my question is this: What the hell? It's August, girls. Sandals, please! My feet are reeking just thinking about how hot you must be in boots with scrunch socks!

I know this post contains a lot of references to things that stink and there is a reason for that. I just did the dumbest thing. My ears have been hurting and I am sure it is seasonal allergies. I decided to use some of the girls' hippie garlic eardrops, of which I just bought a new bottle. I saw that the teeny little font on the teeny little label said "1-2 droppers into tunnel" and I even registered that tunnel seemed like a weird way to describe your ear canal but I went ahead and put a whole dropper in my ear "tunnel" and it is a huge dropper. It went all up in my hair and then when I stood up it dripped down my neck and into my bra. Did I mention these are garlic drops? I smell like the dumpster at Olive Garden! So then I got my glasses and read the damn thing PROPERLY and discovered that you are supposed to put these drops "under tongue," not "into tunnel." Good lord. Time for a shower.

P.S. Crime wave continues: All the Elm street signs now say "ElmO." Not as awesome as "Stop. Hammertime." but I do like it.

Me too, Lauren.

2011-08-25T10:19:00.001-05:00

They don't have a place for this in the baby book so I thought I would document it here. Meet John Oliver- Lauren's first celebrity crush. I was just watching the Daily Show and Lauren walked in and said "oh good are we going to watch the news?" (The Daily Show is called the news at our house.) I said, "I can change it to a kid show if you want," and she said "no, that is OK, I am going to color. Please call me when that one guy comes on." "Which guy?" I asked. She got kind of red and said "you know which guy." And I said "yes, I think I do." Later she told me that she likes him because he sounds like Mary Poppins. Wait until I let her watch Harry Potter!!

Aw!!

2011-08-23T22:17:00.000-05:00

Beauty School Dropout

2011-08-21T21:21:00.012-05:00

One time when I was about 9 my dad got to take us to the grocery store all by himself. Without my mom! My brother and I were in kid heaven. Seriously, it was the most intoxicating shopping experience of my life. Dad had no list, no plan, no damn hippie ideas about healthy eating, and we were all shopping hungry. Beef jerky, fruit loops, root beer, bean dip, easy cheeze in a can.... It was all there. A big beautiful pile of delicious badness filling up the whole cart. It was exactly like winning the lottery.

And then the worst thing ever of all time happened. We waited in line, so excited, got up to the register, and then cashier pulled out the cash drawer and announced that it was time for her break and the line was closed. We were supposed to go to another line. Dad didn't even pause or break stride. He said "Then you can spend your break putting all this shit back," and we walked right out the door, away from the best grocery cart that has ever existed. My brother and I are still very upset about this. My point is- my father is a man who would spend an hour shopping with two little kids and then walk away from the cart with no hesitation. And call it nature or nurture but I don't have a very high tolerance for bullshit either.

Remember all that new stuff we had going on? New classes for both of us and a new job for me and teaching classes and also there are children here with school and lessons and they also keep wanting to eat and ... my ass was getting kicked and it is only AUGUST. I messed up and over-committed. Something had to be cut but I wasn't sure which thing. And then that decision was made very easy by some grade A bullshit. My class required me to take an online personality test before the first class and I ran into a couple of problems. I bought a used book and the super secret online code had already been used by the previous owner so I could not take the test. (That's right- we have now entered the era of digital rights management on printed material.) You are required to buy a new book in order to access the online test. The bookstore was sold out of new books so then I bought a kindle version (even though I have no kindle right now) and then THAT code failed. I emailed the instructor and he was kind but basically said that the only solution was for me to drive an hour each way to the nearest Barnes and Noble to pick up a fresh copy. Which would be my third purchased copy. (And at this point I actually really wanted to take the personality test because I think the result would have read that I was the fucking hulk. You wouldn't like me when I'm angry,)

So, anyway, my low bullshit tolerance teamed up with my common sense (that was already sounding alarm bells about this semester being too busy) and they talked to my bad attitude and together we all decided that I do not have to go to graduate school any more. So... there it is. I quit. Done! See ya, school! I am working and teaching and just being a mom. And that is cool for now.

Recipes

2011-08-21T21:21:00.010-05:00

Homemade noodles:
1 cup flour- sifted
2 eggs
dash of salt
mix with spoon until doughy, then roll out thin with lots of flour. Cut noodles any shape with pizza cutter and let them dry for 10-15 minutes. Cook in one carton of chicken broth for 15 minutes and if you want to add chopped chicken breast (I used a foil packet cause I was in a hurry) and the last 2 minutes add a shaken mixture of 1/4 cup milk or buttermilk and 1 tb flour. Delicious. Tastes like Grandma's but takes like 30 minutes! We loved it.

Tamales:

Tamales are filling plus masa wrapped in corn husk and steamed. Almost any variation would probably be delicious. I was surprised how easy and yummy they were! I combined several recipes but it seems pretty flexible so just do what works. This recipe makes 36 tamales if you don't make them too big.

Take a whole chicken and cook it in a crock pot with 1-2 chopped onions, 2 cloves of chopped garlic and 2 bay leafs. Cook until the meat is falling off the bones. Shred the meat and strain the broth and put it in the fridge overnight.

The next day, soak a 6 ounce packet of corn husks in hot water for 30 minutes. While they are soaking, put the shredded meat into a big skillet. scoop the fat off the broth and add the broth to the skillet (the broth will be like clear jelly) and add 1/2 cup of chili powder, 1 tsp cumin, 1 tsp salt, 1 tsp oregano, 2 cloves garlic, minced, 1 TB flour, 2 TB canola oil, cook for 30 minutes or until filling is almost dry. Now the filling is ready to go.
Now make the masa. Put 3 cups masa harina, 1 cup canola oil, 2 1/2 cups water, 1 TB chili powder, and 1 tsp of salt, and a cup of frozen corn. Mix it together.

Rinse each corn husk, and add about 2 TB of masa and 2 TB of filling. It doesn't really matter as long as the amounts are equal. It takes about an hour to put them together. Fold it all up like a burrito.
Now you steam them. If you don't have a steamer crunch up foil in the bottom of a stock pot and put the tamales on top out of the water- get some water boiling. You have to check pretty often to make sure the water isn't gone- just keep adding more. Stack the tamales up and fill the pot with them and steam for an hour to an hour and a half.

Then blow everyone's mind with your bomb ass tamales. That is the best part.

In the city...

2011-08-17T14:59:00.002-05:00

When you drive north up the Kansas turnpike (like we did yesterday to go to Lawrence) you pass a town called "Lecompton."

Yesterday Mike and I realized that during our time together we have driven on the turnpike many, many times and EVERY SINGLE time we have passed that town he has told me the little known fact that that back before Kansas was a state Lecompton was the capital of the territory- and I have rapped "Straight out of (le)Compton." I don't understand how our marriage has worked so well.

Flower girl

2011-08-17T13:10:00.001-05:00

(Lauren talks about Lily the fairy and I told her I considered naming Audrey "Lily.")

"WHAT? But her name is Audrey!"
"I know! But when she was in my tummy I thought about naming her Lily. "
"I am SO GLAD you didn't! Because I would have been SO jealous and made you change my name to Rose."
(thinking...)

"What did you almost name me?"
"Oh, I remember thinking about naming you Audrey."
"WHAT? Mama you are SILLY! You are teasing. Let's watch some TV."

Look at this stuff, isn't it neat?

2011-08-16T13:16:00.001-05:00

My little mermaid

Mom and Dad took Lauren to see the Wichita Music Theater's production of Disney's The Little Mermaid. Was that enough branding for you? Just wanted to give credit- it was so fantastic and got wonderful reviews. Babies were not allowed so Audrey and I got to stay home. Audrey definitely knew something was rotten about the whole deal and she spent some time laying on the floor crying. From watching Lauren, Audrey knows that when you are bummed out about something you should lay down and start crying. They have slightly different techniques, though. Lauren swoons and collapses into a pile, like someone cut the strings that hold her up. Audrey is deliberate about it and sits down, lays back carefully, and then proceeds to start crying. Here is Lauren all ready for the show and below that is the best thing ever: she GOT TO MEET ARIEL!

Here is Lauren getting ready for the first day of school. Lots of primping, including painting fingernails and toenails. Audrey was not about to be left out of that action!

Here is Lauren in the morning, and Audrey is pissed that she is not going with a backpack.

Lauren is like "Dude, I TOTALLY get it. I will lay down too!"

s

And just some fun cute pictures from this week:

News from the kitchen: I made tamales! They were good! And not that hard! I am excited to post the recipe- I used a combination of 3 different ones and did a little improvising so I need to write it down like TODAY before I forget, because these were good! (Aren't they cute?) Mike is so excited I thought he might propose! These will be our tailgating food this fall.

I must be in the mood for spicy food because Sunday we had carne asada tacos. I followed this marinade recipe, skillet fried the steak and then fried some corn tortillas, added the steak and cilantro and squeezed a little lime on. Bueno!

4 garlic cloves, minced
1 teaspoon cumin
1 large handful fresh cilantro
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 limes, juiced
2 tablespoons white vinegar
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1/2 cup olive oil

Rock Chalk
We are on our way to Lawrence. Mike has his KU orientation and advising meeting and we are going to support him by shopping and going to the brewery while he is otherwise occupied. Then tonight is the Emporia block party to welcome the students to ESU. Today will be fun! And my hair looks good! Yay! Hope you are having a good hair day too.

Lots and lots!

2011-08-08T14:21:00.003-05:00

This morning I hired a sitter to play with the girls so that I could get the house clean one last time before everything gets crazy. And I mean crazy! I start back at school on Monday, and I start my new job tomorrow. At the same place where I turned down that job a few weeks ago- they changed the job to a telecommuting position so I will work from home and teach one class. I don't know when I will do the work but I will find time! Lauren starts her preschool Thursday and I am excited for that. I get her one more year before kindergarten and I am glad. We have a lot of skills to work on before she starts big girl school. Like: not talking all the time, talking more quietly, not interrupting people, not humming when she can't think of something to say. Get the theme here? Noisy Lauren! Mike starts his new degree next week- he was accepted into a PhD program at KU so I guess we are all big Jayhawks now! He is excited and I am happy too. I am also pleased because now I will have regular access to growlers from Free State Brewery in Lawrence. We spent part of the weekend swimming in the farm pond and the rest of it getting ready and shopping for school clothes and supplies. I felt the need to spend money so I went to Target and Target was pleased to help me do this. New curtains for Lauren, new pots and pans for me, new clothes for everyone! Well, I need to go take a shower- tonight is the school open house and then we have to go to a city commission meeting downtown so I better attempt to clean up and look presentable. Hope you had a nice weekend and a good start to your week. Thinking of our Florida family and friends today and hoping for good news.

Extra sugar for everyone!

2011-08-03T10:33:00.000-05:00

Renewal! What a lovely vacation! We spent 5 days camping near Buena Vista, CO and then 3 days with Mike's sister and her family in Boulder. Tell me again the reason why we can't just live on vacation? Cause everything is perfect there. The girls were fun and cute and Lauren was so responsible and Mike and I got along great and there were no computers or phones. Just hiking and camp food and trail runs and 4 wheel drive roads and stream swimming and rock shops. Sigh! It was such a wonderful trip- I feel all brand new again! Well, brand new and sweaty. We got home and it was 110 here for two days. Nothing like 102 degrees at 10:30 PM to remind you that you are really not in the mountains anymore. Yesterday it was 108 by noon and I was hopeful that we would hit 115 and set the record but the temperature got to 110 and just stayed there until dark. I got 11 loads of laundry done and only ran the drier one time for Mike's shirts- the ONLY thing this weather is good for is hanging out laundry! Well, I am just not very motivated to update (so... hot... where... beer?), just wanted to say we are back and good and waiting for the awful heat to break but otherwise fine.

Let's just sit back and unwind!

2011-07-22T23:31:00.000-05:00

Too hot to blog!

2011-07-21T03:40:00.000-05:00

It's so hot here. Our trees are going into shock so it looks like autumn from all the falling leaves, and everything is all crispy. All I do is water. I ran very early a couple of times and we have gone out a few times but all activities are kind of on hold until this heat breaks- it's really too hot to put the girls in the car during the day. Movies and swimming and that is about it!

I can't take that job- the HR director told me it was a work from home situation when she offered it to me, but my direct supervisor said she needs me on-site for the whole 20 hours. And as much as I would like to do something professional-ish, I can't make the money work out if I have to pay childcare. I would end up making like 50 cents an hour and giving up all my freedom. Plus, it upset me more than I thought it would to think of having a sitter with the girls for that much time- I guess I am a control freak. Nice to meet you. So, looks like I will be kickin' it for a while longer, unless something comes up that pays a lot more!

Other than that there is no news fit to print. Just melting and waiting!

Do not pass GO. Wait, which way is GO?

2011-07-15T00:22:00.003-05:00

I am so confused right now. Lately I have been kind of craving some professional activity and I have been kicking around CRAZY* ideas in that arena. I guess the universe heard me thinking (be careful what you wish for) and I got a couple of calls about potential jobs. I interviewed for one of them and I got the offer and I think it might be a great situation. It's 20 hours a week at our local tech college (which I LOVE) and the job seems perfect. Low pay but fun and fulfilling. I would get to teach classes (yay) and help design curriculum and also do some programming. It is a great job. BUT WAIT LET ME MAKE THINGS COMPLICATED. This is the wrong time for me to take a job. Childcare is so expensive- I will be working almost for free just to hold my spot for this job- after the girls go to school it would be perfect. Do I want to do that? Or do I want to hang out with the girls for now and then see what comes up after they are in school? Next year I will be looking for this exact job and it won't be there. I can't decide what to do! I always tell people to chill, because at some point the truth becomes apparent, but I am still waiting for the right thing to present itself here.

We have been having a great time this summer. Sorry I haven't been updating, what with all the swimming and grilling and art classes and fun concerts we have been booked. Also I water my lawn for approximately 7 hours a day because it has been over 100 for the last ... month or so. It's so hot! Tonight the new Harry Potter movie came out and I am very, very depressed about it. Not as sad as when the last book came out but almost. And someone tried to break in our house. Or, open our door. It was at midnight on Monday. I was up reading in bed and I heard the screen door open and I froze, listening. Then the doorknob clicked 3 times and then someone walked off our porch and I heard the footsteps. I called 911 because of our crime wave and the police came and we all agreed it was teenage activity but seriously. This crap has to stop!

In other news, I am now making my own shampoo and my hair looks amazing. It's basically baking soda and water, and then you add in whatever essential oils you want your hair to smell like, which is my case is none. It's nice! Oh! Also I finally bought a decent cloth diaper sprayer. It actually hooks to the water supply for the toilet and you can wash the diapers off into the loo. I get excited about the weirdest things these days!

*A baby shop that sells green baby products. Cloth diapers, stuff for making your own food, locally made slings and clothes, etc. In a cute little storefront downtown. That would be insane, right? I would lose money. Why do I keep thinking of it?

In which I discover that I prefer chemical warfare to elbow grease.

2011-06-28T10:34:00.003-05:00

Dear Kaboom with Oxyclean,
Hello Lov-ah! Damn!
Love Jenn

Dear Scrubbing Bubbles,
YOU OWE ME AN APOLOGY.
Love,
Jenn

Let them eat cake!

2011-06-28T08:47:00.006-05:00

Last week I wasn't feeling tip-top: I was sooooo sleepy and had no appetite at all. In the midst of my lethargy I quit providing food for the family. I didn't go to the store, plan meals, or cook. This isn't a problem for Lauren, as she can live happily on cereal for a long time, but it was a bit of a problem for Mike because he ate too much bad fast food and developed some self loathing. Then on Saturday I perked up and decided that I would make up for my slack housewifery and I made chicken and noodles, with mashed potatoes and corn and homemade bread with butter, and brownies for dessert. It was SO good. I used a $17 free range "heritage bird" from our local farmer and got all the veggies from the farmer's market and YUM. (Then the lethargy came back because we all went into a coma for 12 hours after that meal.) For Sunday brunch I did breakfast pork chops with buttermilk scrambled eggs and toast. So yesterday I was planning my grocery store trip and Mike begged for salads. Please no more big food! He said he will need new pants soon, so this week we are doing different salads every day. Last night was grilled chicken cesar and tonight is beef and blue. I love it, so good.

Yesterday was our shopping day. First we did one of those atrocious Wal-mart trips where I had to buy all the cleaning products, all the toiletries, all the bulk items and some other random things like a life jacket for Lauren and shoes for Audrey (aren't they cute? fake baby birkenstocks! She was walking into the door and stuff because she was staring at her pretty feet!) I almost died when I saw the total- fortunately Mike didn't freak, we got home at the same time and he helped me carry it all in and complimented all the things I bought. (Note to self: he has obviously done something bad that I don't know about yet. Check Ebay account.) Then it was nap and I cleaned the inside of all the upstairs windows- I did the downstairs last week and am so happy to have that done. We used one of those squeegee tools for the outside and it doesn't do a perfect job but we are delighted. Apparently our standards are quite low anyway since we have lived here almost 3 years and it is just now occurring to us to wash the windows!* Then to the grocery store (Lauren was OUTRAGED. "MOM we already WENT to the store today! REMEMBER? DO YOU?") and home for dinner and playing outside while Mike went up on a ladder and did the high windows. Then we did a little gardening, bath, and bed. Mike is working on applying for a doctoral program at KU, so I was up proofreading for a while until my eyes crossed.

Today will be fun, I got a sitter (Lucy from next door) to come play with the girls while I do some big cleaning. Bathrooms and floors with no interruptions! Then we are getting out of the house to go see a movie. We'll see how that goes- I have never taken the girls to a movie before but it just sounds so nice on a hot day. More later!

* There are some cleaning projects that simply don't occur to me. For example, did you know that some people clean their ceiling fans regularly? Not just when the fans grow dust arms halfway to the floor? Also see: furniture vacuuming.

Brand new shoes!

2011-06-27T13:08:00.000-05:00

Oh, she is very happy indeed!

Very good!

2011-06-27T07:56:00.000-05:00

A whole week of daylillies!

The playground is finished! Yay!

And the clothesline is up!

This weekend was nice. We got a ton of projects done, hung out with friends a lot, I did some cooking and we swam at night. So fun! Too bad Monday came back around, but we have a lot to look forward to next weekend too! I have a lot to do this week. We have company coming next weekend that I am VERY excited about. Time to clean, clean, clean! More soon!

Pretty!

2011-06-24T22:27:00.000-05:00

SHOES!

2011-06-23T09:03:00.000-05:00

Audrey's favorite thing in the world is shoes. My shoes, Lauren's shoes, Mike's shoes- she will find them and put them on. And today she was mega delighted to find my dusting houseslippers because they are green and fuzzy and oh so exciting!

Bad boys bad boys!

2011-06-20T05:08:00.009-05:00

Happy fathers day to my handsome, smart, thoughtful, bacon-bringing and now fearless crime fighting husband! Remember our savages? (Some juvenile destructiveness that recently left the realm of amusing and entered the realm of insurance deductibles.) This afternoon I was hanging out some laundry and saw two teenage boys throwing fireworks on our neighbor's house. This was obviously unacceptable but I didn't want to yell out so I used white T-shirts to make the the official semaphore sign for "hooligans! that way!" Mike saw me through the window and dashed out between the houses. He startled the boys and they decided to outrun him. I can only imagine how thrilling it must have been for Mike to realize he was in a footrace with these punks. He has TRAINED for this moment! And I can only imagine how dismayed the boys were to see this old dude constantly gaining like some terminator. Eventually they gave up and tried to sneak home through the alley but Mike followed, got their address and when he got home the police had already arrived and everyone on our street was outside waiting. Yay Mike!

The police decided that a stern talking-to while sitting in the cop car would suffice for punishment for the boys. That was a slight letdown, although as the police (rightly) pointed out, the only thing we can prove is tresspass and illegal fireworks, and usually those don't get you hard time. I guess next time something bad happens at least they have a name to start with.

The rest of Father's Day weekend was fabulous- great Kansas storms, a beautiful wedding, a fun night at the zoo, a visit with Grammie and Gramps, pizza, and lots of fun with the girls. So nice!

Guess what?

2011-06-17T10:08:00.000-05:00

The yard looks great! The tree guys got rained out but most of the tree was gone by the time they left so it's mainly just a big trunk now, like in the Giving Tree (which is a book that I HATE- Lauren knows I will not read it to her and she teases me by bringing it out every night!) Anyway, the neighbors all asked if we were leaving the trunk and we told them a sculptor was going to carve it into a bear like in Colorado. Hopefully they know we are joking. We are really going to do a mermaid. Ha!

This weekend should be fun- it looks hot but we have fun plans. More soon!

Tree bye.

2011-06-16T09:57:00.002-05:00

I don't know what I read or watched as a child that gave me this impression, but I expected situations to be clear and decisions to be easy once I was all grown up and smart. Maybe that is the problem- I am grown up but still waiting on smart!

Today is a day I have kind of been dreading because the tree guys are here taking out the first big elm. Part of me thought we were being overcharged for this tree removal until I saw how hard those guys are working and just how huge that thing is once they drop it, and now I can't believe how affordable it is! I really agonized over the decision to remove the big trees- the trees are dying of dutch elm disease but are still providing shade and habitat for orioles and robins. They are also dropping huge limbs on our house every time we have a storm, and no roofer will put on our new roof under the "widowmaker" branches that are threatening the house. So it's really an easy choice but man is it hard to take out these old trees! Lauren cried this morning- in hindsight I should have gotten her out of here on a playdate or something because it is disturbingly loud in here from the chipper and the ground is really shaking as the big limbs fall on the street. I cheered her up by pretending to be a mama bird and letting her have gummy worms for breakfast instead of cheerios. (Don't tell my mom!) I didn't chew up the gummy worms for her like a real mama bird would but she allowed this substitution because we both agreed that would be pretty gross.

Anyway, a little bit of suck on an otherwise lovely rainy morning! More later~

Lovely lady lunch

2011-06-15T02:27:00.002-05:00

We had a nice day today- first we went to the library and then we had a nice picnic outside and read our books. We also played the shape game (where I draw a crazy shape and then Lauren makes it into a picture. We can play that for hours!) and watched some robins feeding the baby birds. The birds' nest was just a few feet from us but it took me like 10 minutes to get Lauren to see it. I guess she really is my daughter- I never see anything! Even at the zoo where you KNOW it is in there! Something would eat me pretty fast in the wild and I would never see it coming, so if we ever are stranded in the wilderness, don't waste food on me. Brave baby Audrey walked all over the yard! Then naps and then swimming and bath and pizza and bed. I love summer!

Hammer time.

2011-06-13T07:04:00.003-05:00

Crime wave

There are savages about. Two cars were broken into on our street this weekend- including our next door neighbors' subaru. In addition to this, someone has tagged our stop sign so it now reads "Stop. Hammer Time." Hammer time makes me laugh but the car thing makes me think about getting a fence and maybe a doberman to put in it. Our last neighborhood had a crime wave too- if you left your garage door open while you mowed the back yard some teenagers on a souped up 4-wheeler might zip over and steal your garage fridge beer. This was considered to be nearly a capital crime by the men who finished mowing in the summer and then discovered that there was no cold beer. They formed an informal posse and whenever anyone heard the 4-wheeler they would go stand in the driveway and look all menacing. This technique actually worked so we decided to form a mean mug posse here too and sit in the front yard late at night, possibly armed with a paintball gun. This sounded like a good idea but our posse had a couple of beers first and we were all fast asleep by 10. Maybe next weekend!

Projects!

Remember when Mike did the bamboo floors? Like a year and a half ago? We (we meaning he, as you know) hadn't gotten around to the finishing touch- the quarter round edging. Instead there was a 1/8 inch trench around the edges of the floor and little things like crumbs and cheerios would fall into it. I had a shop vac in the utility room because I live in mortal fear of the ants returning and I would use it to clean the trench out, and we just kind of got used to it. I guess we had a busy year but still. This weekend we (meaning he) finally cut and installed the quarter round. I will need to paint it this week but it looks great even just primed. I am pleased to have this done. He also moved, like TONS of dirt to several locations in the yard and finished up the last of the beds. Nice! Now I want a new patio but I am not going to ask about that for at least 2 weeks.

Babies

Smiley perfect Audrey is walking everywhere! No more crawling for my baby girl. She is running and climbing and laughing the whole time. The house seems small all of a sudden, because she wants to be everywhere all at once! Today is the official start to our summer non-schedule, because last week was Lauren's vacation bible school. I don't know what we are going to do! That's kind of nice. Hope you have a good week!

Should be illegal.

2011-06-06T01:56:00.005-05:00

Lauren was SUPER cute at her ballet recital! I totally cried and fell way back in love with Mike all over again. I mean, however many years ago he was just this cute nice guy at work and then we got all brave and went on a couple of dates and fast forward to these two precious little humans and the crazy life we have now. It's so nice. Who woulda thunk it?

Lauren had the best time- she got stage fright and cried a lot before the show but she was so good and now I think she is hooked on the celebrity lifestyle experience. Flowers on stage! Applause! Non stop flash photography!

Precious and good little Audrey was perfect. The rehearsal went almost 3 hours and then the show was 2 (plus getting there an hour early for seating.) Wow, was she good. That is a tough day in the auditorium for a one year old and she was fine with all of it! Mike's dad and stepmom came and my parents came of course and even though her dance was only a couple of minutes Lauren was radiant and so excited to have everyone there. After the show we all went downtown to the finish line of the Dirty Kanza and drank beer and watched the finishers come in. That is a great bike race- 200 miles on gravel roads. It's hard core. Our friends did well and I think the town really showed off. We love our race. I mean, if you want to ride 200 miles come here. We will TOTALLY get hammered at the beer garden and then ring cowbells for you at the finish line. That's just Kansas hospitality.

This morning we got up and took a Sunday drive to Teterville, which is an old abandoned oil town in the flint hills, close to Cassoday. Mom had not been there before and it was a fun trip because her father spent a summer there in the 1930's. It's the most beautiful place in Kansas besides my backyard and that is not a subjective opinion. It is a fact.

Look at that view- 360 degrees of flint hills scenery. Teterville should really be more famous, because it is lovely.

This week will be nice. Mom is staying for a couple of days and we don't really have any plans! I might clean my closet of shame, and I think there is a chicken house visit in our immediate future, but nothing major. Just some relaxing summer fun this week. And vacation bible school, which is a big event here and Lauren is finally old enough for it! Tonight was the kickoff carnival and we went down for the facepainting booth and to sing some songs about Jesus. I frequently do not recognize my life, ha!

Diet Failblog update: Um, there was a beer garden. And I was full of joy de vivre so I partook in several beers and although I did have a small stomachache in the morning I think the beers had a net positive impact on my life. Also, SOMEONE has to be the one in the beer garden with a stroller at 11 pm right? This year it was me. You're welcome.

Excited!

2011-06-03T06:09:00.001-05:00

I love our 3 day weekends! Mike's job does 4 x 10 hour days in the summer to save on cooling costs and I LOVE it because we get an extra day every week at home! He typically works way more than 10 hours anyway so for us it is real free time. Today we are going to finish up the last flowerbed and do a little more yard work. Well, he is. I am going to the store and bake some pies and do a little laundry and cleaning because we have company coming this weekend! Yay! I am so excited- Mom and Dad and maybe Mike's dad and stepmom are coming for Lauren's ballet recital. I have mixed feelings about dragging everyone all the way up here for a 2 hour event during which Lauren is on the stage for 3.5 minutes but we will just consider this an experimental year. And it happens that our big bike race is this weekend: http://www.dirtykanza200.com/ (Our meaning "our town's" big event- we have a lot of friends riding in it but we aren't doing it of course! 200 miles! In June! If I want to barf that bad I will just drink a lot, thanks!) Anyway, they turn the downtown into a big beer garden and everyone lines up along the streets to ring cowbells when the riders finally cross to the finish line. It's extremely fun. And this goes on all night- so the guys will be able to watch Lauren, sneak out the back, and go to the beer garden while Mom and I stay at the concert hall. I think this will work out to be a fun weekend.

Here is our new tree, the first of three that will eventually go in. The tree guys came by yesterday and planted it. It's a sugar maple, and eventually these trees will shade the house since we are losing our big awesome shade trees to dutch elm disease (darn it, cause I love them! Mike can hardly talk about it!) Next week they come to remove tree #1 and replace it with another sugar maple. Then we can get the new roof. I am pleased to be getting all of this done.

Here are the girls looking all cute outside!

Time for my run, I have been up since 5 waiting for it to get light enough for me to go out. Yay! Then the crazy day starts! I am ready! I'll post more pictures later of all the nice outdoor projects we are doing. It has been a really lovely week so far- I got so much done and had a really good time with the girls. Hope you have a good weekend!

The week in review!

2011-06-01T07:15:00.003-05:00

Diet: One week down on the "no fun" diet plan and I didn't do too bad. I have been almost perfect on everything but dismal on caffeine (on day two I made an executive decision to drink some every day. And here I didn't think I was that big of a coffee drinker!) The main thing is that I feel spectacular. My ulcer isn't bothering me at all, I can barely even feel where it normally hurts so bad! This is the best! Yay! That will keep me going. The doctor said it would take 6 weeks total to heal up so I have 5 weeks to go. But if I can get through Memorial Day weekend with no beer anything is possible.

Weekend: We had a great time at the farm with Mom and Dad- but we left a day early because of some high winds. Once we noticed there were whitecaps in the kids inflatable pool we decided to call it a weekend. It's no fun getting sandblasted! But we had such a great time and Audrey slept in the tent for the first time ever! She did great, I guess that means we can go camping this summer (yay?)

Apparently she can sleep in the tent!

Aren't my parents so cute?

Lauren caught SO many fish!

Audrey wants to be big!

So much fun with her Daddy!

School: Um, I FORGOT TO GO. Good lord, what is wrong with me? I signed up for a class and then kind of spaced off about it! By the time I realized classes had already started I was 4 assignments back and it was too late to catch up, so I guess we will have a redo on that one another time. But on the bright side that means even more free weekends (my class was a weekend/online class) and we save that money. I guess. I am less ashamed of this than I should be.

Family dynamics: Still no word from Mother in Law! I am sure we will hear from her eventually but for now I am loving the silent treatment. Everyone else is doing great- and my brother finally got a good job (tough times in California, we have been so worried about him!) and I am so pleased for him. Now that we know he is staying there we can plan a trip out!

House: It's getting there. I have been doing big organizing projects for the last couple of weeks and I am starting to be pleased with the house. The biggest mess I tackled so far was the kitchen cabinets but yesterday was a close second because I finally whipped our storage/laundry room into shape. These projects fit into one day because I am, like, motherfucking RUTHLESS about getting rid of stuff. The guy at Goodwill is all "hey there, Jenn!" Yesterday I made a little swimming center in the storage room, it has sunblock and flip flops and all the pool toys and towels and bags. It was nice to get that stuff out of my upstairs bathroom!

Facebook: I am enjoying it a lot more lately. I cleaned out a TON of friends- after I took MIL off I decided to go whole hog and got rid of everyone from my high school who I don't talk to in real life. That really helped- I can just wait to catch up with people at the 20 year reunion, if they are still talking to me after the great unfriending of 2011.

Today is busy- library concert series is starting so we have a juggling singer(?) at 12, lots of errands, kindermusik final class party, and laundry to do (so we don't have to have another thong day tomorrow!)

Diet Failblog

2011-05-25T23:42:00.002-05:00

I have always disliked the number 42. Generally I like multiples of 6 and hate multiples of 7*, and for some reason even though 42 is loaded with 6's (and 4+2 even equals 6!) the presence of the 7 just messes with me. Anyway, I am blaming my diet fail today on the fact that I was on 42 days to go. (We are counting down, not up, because I don't intend to be good after this ulcer diet is over.) I had coffee, chocolate, and a carbonated soda, so I was triple sucky. Tomorrow I will be better: 41 is a prime number so obviously that is good luck, right? Also now there is no junk in the house since I consumed it all today.

Lauren is funny about numbers too. She does some kind of freaky advanced math without realizing it and she cares a lot about grouping and symmetry and she has perfect recall about anything to do with numbers. She balances that out by being 100% atrocious with names. I think she is even worse than I am, and I am BAD. I am extra bad because I have trouble with names AND faces. (Possibly because I am playing stupid math games with your phone number instead of listening to your name!) Today we played with Charlie and she called him Avery so many times she finally gave up on names all together and just started saying "my friend" like a little John McCain.

Today was really nice! Mike is in Lawrence for a couple of days and I had a combination of cleaning day and free day playtime with the girls. Audrey walked around the house all day and was extremely delighted with herself. We were delighted too. Lauren is so sweet with Audrey, she encourages her and cheers her on and pays attention to all the little achievements Audrey does. They are precious. My heaven is now. It rained almost all day and we left the windows open and enjoyed the sounds and smell of spring rain all day. I got all the laundry done and during their nap I mopped, cleaned the bathrooms and dusted. If I vacuum tomorrow I am done for the weekend! We had kindermusik tonight and then Angie had a party for the teachers at her school. We didn't attend the official party, but went over after to help them eat all the party food. Yay, no cooking! Then Lauren and I watched Glee. They kept saying "ass" but I let it slide because I really wanted to watch big person TV for a change! Then I got the girls down and now I am watching Mad Men again. How great is that show! Except I think I might have to start smoking soon if I keep watching it! And drinking whiskey straight. And sleeping around. They make it all look good! Hope you are having a good night!

*Not all multiples of 7 are bad. 35 is a fine number for a couple of reasons- it is the highest score you can get with double 6 dominoes and 3+5=8 (multiples of 2 are sacred) so those features cancel out the 7.

Summer!!

2011-05-25T07:33:00.003-05:00

Lauren's last day of pre-school was yesterday! So we are starting our summer break today. I decided not to sign up for anything this summer except swim lessons, so we have just total free time and I am kind of excited about that. This weekend was so nice- we buzzed up to Iowa and visited some very dear friends and had the most wonderful time! Such a fun surprise! We have been having some crazy storms in Kansas. So far nothing severe here, just some really exciting thunder and lightning. I normally love storm season but this year the storms are so deadly and scary. Today is lovely though, just a quiet rain. I have some cleaning to do today and of course laundry, and I am starting my 6 week ulcer diet today. It's AWFUL, that is why I put it off for a couple of weeks but now I need to just get it over with. I have to take prilosec for 6 weeks and avoid trigger foods while I am on it to try to get the ulcer to heal. Guess what trigger foods are? Carbonated beverages, caffeine, chocolate, alcohol and fried food. I am very distressed because I think those are all the major food groups that I live on. And there are a couple of other restrictions like no spicy food. So who knows if I can even handle that kind of deprivation for 42(!!) days but I will do my best because this ulcer does hurt! My doctor says I got it from taking so much ibuprophen after my surgery, so lets consider this the last of the fibroid ordeal, hopefully. Ha! In other news, my mother in law thinks she is giving me the silent treatment, she doesn't realize yet that I have broken up with her. I even did the unthinkable and unfriended her on facebook! Then I decided I could not take the fallout from that so I deactivated my account for a few days to hide. But I'm back now and very strong in my faith, so get just as mad as you want to, MIL, nothing is changing on this end! I am looking forward to posting the whole story, but right now a little girl just showed up in my room with 15 books, so it looks like I have a LOT to do all of a sudden. :)

Furies!

2011-05-17T00:01:00.003-05:00

Audrey's birthday was so sweet! It was the perfect celebration.  The girls and I started off the day by going for a long run with the double jogging stroller and I felt so pleased to be able to do that on the anniversary of a time when I had been so ill, and with a surgery in between! Pretty sweet comeback if I do say so myself. Then we made cake and spaghetti and watched a great thunderstorm from our (recently furnished) screened in porch and opened presents and played with all her new toys! The most special thing about the day was that Audrey took her first real steps. On her birthday! One thing I didn't know before I had kids was how nebulous the "milestones" are. When do you count it as walking? Three steps? Ten? I think we can really say she started to walk on her birthday though, she was taking many little wobbly steps and was completely gleeful about it. Lots of clapping!

Audrey's 12 month checkup was today and she totally detested the entire experience.  She hates to be naked and she hates strangers and she REALLY hates people to mess with her, especially her mouth. That is way private. Both my girls get red eyebrows when they are mad, which is something they might hate later because they won't be able to be secretly pissed, ever. Audrey started out with two red eyebrow dots while she was being weighed, and it got worse and worse and after the doctor looked at her teeth the red went from ear to ear, a scarlet bert brow of rage. She didn't cry though, she just breathed all mad through her nose while Lauren kept handing me tissues and chirping "Mommy! Another booger is coming out of Audrey's noooooose!" When it was time for Audrey to get her shot Lauren had to wait outside the exam room. Because last time Audrey had to get a shot, Lauren cried for an hour and the whole thing got ridiculous.

After the appointment we went to the zoo with my dad for a couple of hours and had such a nice time! I think Lauren got overly tired there because she did the worst thing on the way home. It was hot and she asked to roll down her window and I said no. So she opened her door. When we were driving. I was SO angry and then she sassed me so I pulled over and told her she would have to have a spanking. (We spank only when she has done something dangerous that could hurt her. It's a rare thing and she never ever forgets it.) While I was getting her out of the car she bellowed "FINE! GO AHEAD. DO IT! I DON'T CARE!" There was a guy mowing his lawn about 30 feet away in a tank top. It was a very classy occasion, as you can imagine. When we got back in the car she started begging me not to tell her dad or her grammie, but of course we had to tell them and talk about it a little bit this evening. After her phone call with her dad she asked me if we could stop talking about what she did and not talk about it again ever. I said, "Why, are you ashamed?" And she said NO! I asked her, "do you know what ashamed means?" "No." "It means you feel sad when you think about something you did." (interrupts) "Well, yes, that then." So we will not speak of this again.

I am amused to end up with two fierce little girls who are so different from each other. We are fire and ice here, it will be interesting to see how they are as they grow up. In other news, my mother in law is angry with me again(!) over something insignificant. Another manufactured emotional crisis, yawn. That relationship has sort of left the realm of irritating and entered the realm of actually harmful. People who repeatedly diss me are sometimes surprised to learn that I can be fierce too. Enough is sometimes enough! Everything else in life is fine though- we went to my littlest cousin's high school graduation this weekend.  How joyful! I clearly remember talking when she was a baby about how she would be in the class of 2011. It seemed SO far in the future. Speaking of which, where is my flying car? Shouldn't we have those by now?

Look who is ONE!

2011-05-10T21:27:00.000-05:00

What a miracle! Happy Birthday to my precious little daughter Audrey Grace.

Unintentionally Green

2011-05-10T11:21:00.003-05:00

This morning was so cute. Audrey and I were sleeping in my bed and Lauren crawled in with us to snuggle like she does most mornings. Then she got all business-like and said what she says almost every day now: "Let's talk about our day." (My girl needs a PLAN. She keeps me organized!) So I told her that after her school she and Audrey and I would go to the store and we needed to buy ingredients to make a cake for Audrey. "Why?" she asked. And I told her that Audrey's birthday is tomorrow and she would be turning ONE! Yay, right? No! Not yay! Lauren BURST into tears, these huge heaving sobs, and I held her in my lap for 10 minutes while she weeped that she loved having a baby and now Audrey won't be a baby anymore. We had a talk about how Audrey would grow up just like Lauren but she would always be Lauren's baby sister and they would have so much fun. Then we looked online at pictures of all of Lauren's birthday parties and decided what kind of cake to make and what color of balloons. It was really sweet but I can tell Lauren will be fragile about the whole event. Such a funny little ball of emotion. Speaking of funny bugs, my baby Audrey is standing up now all the time and is starting to take a few little tentative steps, so we might be getting close to real walking! Here is Audrey being VERY pleased to color with Lauren! Both girls love the easel!

Mothers day was so lovely! It was our first hot steamy day but that was kind of nice because every flower in our yard exploded into bloom (in honor of me, of course) and it was so much fun to be outside. We worked outside all day and then went out for steak salads. We got so much done, I am really feeling happy about the outside of the house. Just two more flower beds to do and then we will be done for the spring. And I got all the laundry done even though we didn't have a dryer this weekend* by hanging it all out and that was actually kind of fun! Angie and I have decided to go halvsies on a big 5 line clothesline between our yards since we both like hanging laundry out. I can't wait! I also had to wash all of our dishes by hand (see below) so it was WAY old school around here. But not a bad way to live- kind of charming for a change.

Audrey is simply a joy. A joy and a gift. Our little surprise straight from heaven. I can't believe a year ago today we were enjoying my last day of being pregnant (ever!) Remember there was a tornado warning so we all had to go in the basement the night before she was born? Such an exciting time! And such a relief to get her on the outside and stop all the worrying. Well, switch worrying, there is never an end to the worrying with being a mom! I will post again later tonight with some fun pictures of Audrey's first year.

One branch of our famous rhododendron tree, the biggest in town! When we first moved in, a group of older ladies came over and begged us not to cut it down because it is famous around town for being so huge! So we try to take good care of it.

Audrey loves to sleep in the jogging stroller so we try to go every day for a little walk or run.

Our gorgeous iris!

Cute Audrey in the swing, and see all the laundry behind her?

*current broken appliances as this weekend included: garage door opener, dishwasher, dryer, and the fridge is acting sketchy so it is on the suspect list. I have stopped being mad about this but I did totally hold my breath when we turned on the AC yesterday. Thank goodness it worked! My hero Darryl the repairman came to fix the dryer and the dishwasher last night and I have decided that opening the garage door is a good workout so that repair can wait until another time. Add to that the trees and the roof and we are having a much more expensive year than I had planned! After last year when we replaced all the flooring ($=OMG) and painted the whole interior I wanted to take a year off from house projects. But the house apparently had these on the schedule for this year! Lauren has made up a hilarious song called "Our house is mad at us!" which she sang ALL the way through the wal-mart yesterday and made lots of people laugh.

Dance photos!

2011-05-07T09:49:00.001-05:00

Audrey wants to be big! Lauren did great- I am excited to see how the pictures turn out. Yesterday was fun- we went to Lawrence for the day because Mike had a meeting there and we shopped at the famous Toy shop for 2 hours. I spent too much but it was all educational so that is OK, right? Then we went to a BBQ last night and had big plans to sit out on the new patio furniture and have a drink after the kids went to bed. But guess what? We woke up at midnight sleeping on the couch. Guess we partied too hard. Today is running and yardwork and housework, fun! I still don't know what to do about tomorrow, it's mothers day so it's my choice. Should I go to a movie by myself? Make them help me clean the bathrooms? Go for a drive in the flint hills? I am leaning toward just going out to eat and hanging out!

Um...

2011-05-05T16:43:00.001-05:00

What a weird day. We had a great morning- kindermusik was awesome and we had a fun playdate with Charlie- he turned 5 today on 5-5. I told him it won't get any better than this until he turns 5^2 on 5-5 in 20 years. He seemed enthusiastic about that! Lauren told me that she and Charlie will be married soon so they would sleep in the same bed from now on. Luckily his mom thought that was hilarious, but maybe I need to stop watching grownup tv with her, ha! Audrey has been a grumpass all day and won't take a nap, then our dryer finally broke for real so I hung the clothes out to dry. I was just thinking how pleasant that was to hang out the clothes for a change when a crazy thunderstorm came, along with a big red blinky rainstorm, and it soaked the clothes and made them heavy so my clothesline dipped all the way to the ground. All my laundry is touching the grass! And then I get a text that apparently my husband's boss quit today. Um. And a lady cut me off with her car and she was a NUN. In a habit and everything. I just decided we are having chinese food and beer tonight! Time for ballet, got to go~!

Rainy Thursday

2011-05-05T07:25:00.000-05:00

It looks like rain again! yay! Someday maybe I will live in Portland and get to feel like this every day! The birds are so loud but is very dark. I hope it does rain, then I can skip watering!

Mike got our new patio furniture put together last night- Now I am so excited about the screened in porch! I probably shouldn't have bought that but I am SO glad I did- the girls and I will use it every day this time of year. I had planned to put it together myself- furniture that requires an allen wrench is my absolute favorite. But alas, the holes did not line up correctly and I required a man's strength and cursing ability to get it done, so Mike spent the last 2 nights doing that and moving a bunch of plants around for me. And planting all the new flowers and mulching- and we have to move some sod soon too to finish the swingset project. It's a busy time of year for projects! Everyone else must be busy- I can't even get any other tree guys to call me back about our big project. I think they are all in cahoots with each other- they don't even return a phone call? I am stuck with the expemsive one I already talked to I guess, at least he wants the job, right?

Today is busy- preschool, kindermusik, ballet, and of course it is the dreaded trash and recycle day again! And I have no underwear so it must be laundry day too. I have been avoiding laundry ever since our dryer broke. It still runs but no longer stops. The day that it broke a load of diapers ran for over 14 hours before I noticed. They are extremely soft now but I am sure that is not good for the electric bill! So I guess I need to call the appliance repairman too. I will remember to do all this because I had to wear a thong, my underwear of last resort. The laundry version of tying a string around your finger, ha! Hope you have a good day!

Perfect weather Tuesday!

2011-05-03T10:25:00.001-05:00

Today is gorgeous- the low was in the 40s and the high is in the 60's- perfect weather! I am a jeans and hoodie girl so I like weather that is a touch on the cool side. We are going to plant flowers today (maybe- if Audrey cooperates!) and if (IF!) both girls nap I will put together the patio set I bought last night. Ever since our $5 chairs broke we haven't used our covered porch so I just bought 2 new chairs and a loveseat to put out there. See, I can't figure out what to do about the trees and I am extremely worried about money, so I should shop to feel better, right? Ha! This weekend was so fun. Mom and Dad came up to stay with us and we had such a good time and I got so much done! And Saturday was fun- the wine tasting was a blast! I was the driver so instead of drinking I completely ate myself through the event (with no shame- one time my plate had chicken wings, meatballs, fudge and strawberry shortcake on it!) My outfit was perfect, and I knew that because there were a total of 4 of us wearing the same exact thing. (We need some more stores here, ya'll!) Then on Sunday we all watched the royal wedding together, which did not kill Dad but he acted like it might. Yesterday the girls and I grocery shopped and bought flowers. This year lauren picked the colors so our theme is hot pink and purple. I like it! I will post pictures soon- gotta go- Audrey is a busy lady right now! Almost one! Time to start planning her party!

Freeday

2011-04-28T23:05:00.000-05:00

I am looking forward to our Friday Freeday tomorrow! The girls and I won't leave the house, just some yard work and outdoor cleaning, and of course we will watch the wedding. Lauren wants me to wake her up when it starts, she warned me though that I will have to scream at her to wake her up. It's OK Lauren, we have DVR just for this reason! Mom is coming this weekend to watch the girls while Mike and I go on a fun date- they are doing a big wine and food tasting downtown that is apparently extremely fun because everyone talks about it all year. I would be more excited if I had something to wear that I liked. I bought a new outfit for it and later decided that I might hate it. It's a cute ruffled black empire waist dress that is just a teeny bit too short so you have to wear it with leggings. And for some reason the leggings are messing with me. I cannot wear leggings unless I am running. So I keep throwing money at this outfit- maybe some fancy shoes would help? Some chunky jewelry? I should have quit while I was ahead instead of trying to rehabilitate it because now I am so far over budget that I am stuck with it!

Today was very nice but very busy. I took Lauren to school and then Audrey had kindermusik. (She did so great- so cute! She stood and bounced the whole class!) Then I had a follow up Dr. appt about my stupid ulcer (we think we have this thing figured out now, maybe!) and then we picked up sandwiches and picked up Mike for lunch and we all headed to the zoo with every other kid in town to see the new baby swans! The black swans at the zoo have been nesting so we were all very excited to see the fuzzy babies. Then we went back home for naps and then ballet. Then to the store and home to make beef and brocolli for dinner and no one loved it so I was not pleased to spend 45 minutes cleaning up! Then taking out the trash and sorting the recycle and FINALLY some down time with the girls to read and play. I am ready for the weekend!

Wednesday whine

2011-04-27T02:28:00.003-05:00

I can't sleep tonight, and I am at that crappy stage of insomnia where I am obsessing about the time. Like, even if I fell asleep RIGHT NOW tomorrow will suck because I would only get (6 am - x am) hours. Oh well, might as well update and then try again!

Easter weekend was nice, but it was a little too busy. I felt so tired afterwards. I can't decide if it was the three grandparent visits that made it so tiring or the packing/farm/driving or just being gone from home (again!) or if it is just how crazy things have been lately that is wearing me out. After a very busy Friday (roofers and insurance guys here all day) we sped to Wichita to spend the evening with Mike's dad and stepmom, then on Saturday we went to the farm with my parents, and then we spent Easter day with Mike's mom and stepdad. It was good to see everyone and I am glad we did all that, but I feel like I can barely even remember half of it because we had to move so fast. Then we got home and unloaded and I just wanted to cry thinking about unpacking all of it (so much shit! why is there so much stuff when you travel with kids!) and getting the house back together. Mike helped me and we got it mostly done Sunday night and then Monday I finished putting things away and my big task of the day was to shop at the Walmart because we had run out of every single household product all at once and had no food.

Then yesterday morning I couldn't find anything for Lauren to wear to school, so after I dropped her off I spent 45 minutes gathering and sorting all the clothes. It takes that long because I have to pre-treat so many things right now. Baby food! Paint! Raccoon poop! (don't ask- farm incident) Then after I started the laundry I turned into a crazy person and cleaned frantically for the rest of the day. What is it about spring sunlight that just shows bad stuff? Usually I think the house looks pretty good, but all of a sudden yesterday I saw that every surface was covered with grimy fingerprints. So I used pledge on all the furniture, and then I swept and mopped the kitchen and dining room, vacuumed everything, cleaned the bathrooms, and did 7 loads of laundry. Then I cooked dinner and cleaned the kitchen all over again. Audrey made it pretty easy on me- she likes little soft books right now so I just kept giving her a new one to look at and then she and Lauren both took a 3 hour nap in the afternoon, so I took advantage of the time and got a lot done.

Things just feel a little overwhelming right now, there are no easy projects! Every single thing I touch opens a can of worms. Like our "free" new roof from the hailstorm, which leads to a giant tree removal project and all of a sudden we are spending our whole tax return on trees. So many stupid things like that are all hitting at once, and I seriously think I gave myself an stomach ulcer from worrying about it all too much! Could I complain more? God, I sound awful right now. Things will be better in the morning. Even on 3 hours of sleep, that is, if I fall asleep RIGHT NOW.

Busy Thursday!

2011-04-21T07:03:00.002-05:00

Today will be really busy- Easter party at school, Kindermusik for Audrey, ballet, and of course it is the dreaded recycle day so I will have to take out all the trash and sort it. Sometimes I want someone to do that for me. That and unload the dishwasher. Mike would do it if he was home but he works so much. I think I need a sister wife! Lots of odds and ends on my mind this morning. It might rain tonight so I might skip watering. I need to remember to stop and buy a can of frosting for Lauren's school party. And we are out of shampoo, and we are almost out of hotel shampoos, so it is getting critical. I need to pay 2 bills and buy some dark nail polish to cover up the black fingernail I have had since I slammed it in my closet door. This is my chance to be a pretend goth.

In other news, I watched Harry Potter 7 last night and it was excellent. I loved it! How do people follow it though if they didn't read the books, it went so fast! I am excited for the next one to come out. Well, that is my boring world today! I will take pictures of the Easter egg hunt and post them!

I was going to apply for a job on campus but am reconsidering. Mike's pay didn't get cut after all and I think I want to stay home a little longer. (Well, I want to stay home FOREVER but I don't think that would look very good on my resume! Ha!) Back in a bit!

Today was fun- Audrey loved kindermusik, now that she gets it she is all over it, all kinds of dancing and socializing with the other babies. Then it was back to lauren's school, where I was the only parent volunteer who showed up to hide the (8 dozen) eggs. No problem- it was fun and Audrey crawled all around playing with the big kid toys until I was done! The easter egg hunt was great- Lauren told me over and over again, "NICE ONE MOM, GOOD HIDING SPOT!" and I was all shhhhhhhhh thanks! Then home for lunch and nap an cleaning an then to ballet. On the way to ballet we stopped to get easter basket stuff at walgreens and then after ballet and dinner we put together little bags of candy for each of Laurens friends. We delived mostof them tonight. What a nice day. So fun! i am exhausted. Time to fall asleep in the chair with Audrey for a while! Goodnight!

Sleeping babies!

2011-04-20T13:22:00.001-05:00

Audrey had a rough night last night- so much crying! (I think she is teething again- or else reacting to the ice cream cake I ate the night before- oops!) So we slept in and were having a lazy day. We took a nice walk downtown and bought supplies for the Easter party at school tomorrow and went by the candy store. On the way home the warm sun put both girls to sleep, so sweet and peaceful!

Tonight is kindermusik again but we already did our homework (a sculpture of a building with blocks) so we are ready for a relaxing afternoon! Our squirrel is back again with 2 others this time. I think he was a decoy- they sent the cutest little one to make sure we would set out delicious food. Haha!

Here is Lauren getting ready for her school party tomorrow.

Still squirrely!

2011-04-19T19:26:00.000-05:00

Our little pet is still here! I thought that he was gone this morning, I was just glad there wasn't a bad murder scene for me to clean up for Lauren- but he showed back up mid morning and brought his mom! Anyway- he is alive and well and eating all the food we set out, and I have to go, Lauren just said this:

Mom, can you please not sing when we watch Glee together?

more later!

Squirrely

2011-04-18T18:03:00.004-05:00

Today was fun- the library was wonderful and the weather was so perfect that we decided to go for a little walk and have a picnic in the shade of our front yard. Sounds like a good decision, but it really wasn't- because look who decided to come to the picnic?

It's hard to get the scale from this picture, but that is an infant shoe box. This is one of the smallest squirrels I have ever seen, and it walked straight across the yard to our picnic and came on the blanket. We all stood up and screamed, and then it climbed up my shoe and up my leg! I kicked it off of me and it kept coming back over so I had Lauren grab a box and I caught it just to stop it from getting on us. I thought maybe that was a sign of illness, but after calling around a bit I learned a little one can get hungry enough to go to dogs or people or anything that it thinks can help it get food. So... being the ruthless individual that I am, we fed it, gave it some buttermilk (I know, we are supposed to go get rodent milk from the pet store but I am NOT DEALING WITH THAT.) and gave it a lined box with a hole cut in the side and some more food inside. Sigh. This derailed our day but Lauren is totally enchanted with the idea that we saved a tiny baby squirrel. I don't know what I want to happen. If it was gone in the morning I could pretend the mom came to find it. I am going to have to get up really early and go check on it to make sure there isn't a bad scene for Lauren.

This is a busy week with all the Easter stuff. We have parties at school and every activity and I need to do a few baskets for people who gave us some last year. (They probably won't this year because I didn't last year- then they can feel guilty next year and do it while I skip! It's nice to take turns!) And I guess I need to plan for a ham and stuff this weekend since we don't know what we are doing yet!

Tonight is dinner with the neighbors (BBQ takeout) and then cuddling in bed watching TV with the girls. I can't wait!

Pretty babies!

2011-04-17T23:37:00.000-05:00

I love these pictures! We were messing around with Lucy's new Ipod and she took these and a couple of really cute movies of the girls. They are so cute and happy! Today was nice, busy but fun. I am tired but awake of course because I never sleep very well when Mike is out of town. Probably because I bring both girls into bed with me and then I get kicked and crowded all night. Tomorrow is library day but other than that we have no plans, which is good and bad. Good because I like being free but bad because I have to invent things for Lauren to do! (After yesterday's fun skating party, I will add that to our list of potential activities. The skating rink was just the way I left it back in 1987, last time I went. Same brown skates, same disco ball, same dude in shorts skating backwards. They even had a cigarette machine! When we walked in "Man in the Mirror" was playing and I almost died of a time warp attack! It was really really fun and Lauren loved it. She was a great skater- no training needed!)

The yard project was good too- now instead of a scary step off the swingset we have a scary hill, which will be a much softer landing for anyone falling off. They guys cut out the sod, built up the hill, and then put the grass back on. I have to remember to water it every day for a while but it looks really nice! Well, time for bed. Or HGTV, something like that :)

Saturday flyby

2011-04-16T10:10:00.001-05:00

Today is crazy- we are volunteering at the Teddy Bear Clinic- so Lauren will get to put fake bandaids on other kids "sick" stuffed animals. (This is for her preschool.) Then to shop quickly for 2 birthday presents, one for a party this afternoon and one for a party tonight. The afternoon one is skating. For a 3 year old. I can't wait to see how this will play out. Hopefully there is a nurse there. Tonight should be more relaxing, she is 11 and wants sushi. Bueno! In the meantime, Mike is teaching a class and then home to cut the sod and see if we can get that dirt moved by tomorrow when he leaves for Chicago (again!) Wow, I am going to need a beer by tonight. Fortunately someone is delivering a growler of homebrew later so that is already taken care of. Plus I am wearing a shirt with sparkly butterflies so no matter what- today will be fun. XOXO.

Well, it was healthy at least!

2011-04-15T19:01:00.001-05:00

I have a cooking question!

Chicken asparagus spinach pasta thingy:

I sauteed chicken breast with olive oil and 3 cloves of garlic. Then I added a pound of asparagus, cut into one inch pieces, then some mushrooms and some spinach. I cooked it all for about 3 minutes, covered. Then I added a half cup of white wine and some oregano and simmered it down for a few minutes until most of the liquid was gone, and then I added chicken broth.

Meanwhile I cooked some noodles in very salty water and drained them and tossed them in olive oil. I added these to the skillet and it was beautiful. I was very excited. But it was bland. No amount of salt and pepper could fix the total lack of flavor. What would have helped it? The texture and color and doneness of the vegetables was perfect. Just no taste.

Amended: I know what would have made it good- cheese! But we are trying so hard to have as close to no cheese as possible. Lauren seems to be getting more and more allergic to stuff all the time so that is why I am working on changing some of our normal recipes.

We had a great dessert this afternoon- steamed apples. I have the cutest little steamer (thanks Z!) and we use it almost every day for rice or veggies. Today we steamed some pink lady apples and they came out tasting like candy. Better than pie! Yum!

Funny girls!

2011-04-15T08:12:00.000-05:00

Our little ballerinas on a rainy night!

Lauren has had some funny lines lately. She got refux after the wedding (too much rich food I guess?) and she was laying there saying, "OH NO MOM!" What is wrong Lauren? "There is some barf! That wants to come out! But it doesn't have enough energy to, it only comes up to here and then goes back down!" Only Lauren would come up with low energy barf!

Audrey is just as cute as can be- she crawls fast everywhere and stands up on everything, sometimes by herself for a few seconds. She has a couple of random words like "cado" for avocado and I can't write anyjore because the both woke up and that is it for the day!! Maybe catch you back at naptime!

it was a dark and stormy day!

2011-04-14T15:35:00.002-05:00

Today feels completely ominous! The air is heavy and everything is cast in a weird greenish color that means a storm is coming. Once you live here for a while you see that shade and start getting excited. There is a tornado watch and a severe weather alert for tonight, so naturally everyone I know is in a high state of... I don't know, something. The dogs are all barking like crazy and every kid is being bad, and all the parents are hanging around outside looking at the clouds and refreshing the noaa weather maps. I don't think it is supposed to hit until tonight, and maybe won't amount to much, but I do LOVE storm season in Kansas. With the exception of a few wimpy dogs and newcomers who don't get it yet, everyone I know feels the same way. Naturally, I responded to the incoming weather by cleaning. I can't fully enjoy a great weather event if my house is a mess. But it's sparkling now so the storm can come!

It's been a crazy couple of weeks! Too much to tell, so let me sum up. We had a terrible hail storm on April 3rd, I really didnt think it was all that bad, but our roof might be totalled- waiting for comfirmation on that. The old honda got dinged up too- to the tune of approximately what I thought that car was worth, so now I have to decide whether to fix it or take the money and run. (Can you tell I am a take the money and run kind of girl?) I hired a guy to trim our trees and I hired a guy to fix our garage door opener because I am sick of having to he-man that thing up every time I run an errand. I also had a dump truck load of dirt delivered to our driveway to do a little work in the backyard. (I just had to buy a huge tarp and cover that dirt in 40 mph wind gusts, speaking of he-man! Ha!) Mike responded to this encroachment into his areas of responsibility like a good union man who doesn't want someone doing a job that belongs to him, but we worked through that and I am pleased that the work is being done. My house feels clean- I love the new vacuum and I have been staying caught up on everything except of course for my old nemisis, laundry.

The main thing you missed was that we went to a gorgeous wedding. It took a week to get ready for the trip- I made a "flat family" of all of our outfits for every event. (You know- like paper dolls- this is the daddy outfit and his tie and his shoes and this is the mommy and her shoes- we had a whole family of flat outfits for each thing we had to go to.) and that prevented anyone from using the couch for a week but we got to the wedding with all the appropriate shoes and underwear so I guess that technique worked. I got to be a bridesmaid again and loved every minute of it! This was the bride's second wedding so it was really really nice. I always say it is good to do two because then you know what you want on the second one. :) The dress was so pretty- I will post pictures tonight if I have time! More on the girls too- funny babies. I have so many funny stories to tell you!

No chrome on the wheels, I'm a grownup for real!

2011-03-31T07:23:00.001-05:00

My birthday was perfect- I am VERY excited to be 35! There is a big post in my head about how much I love my age (like there is a choice, right?) and how at peace I feel with life right now. But I can't seem to find time to write anything properly these days. So I'll just tell you about our day.

Lauren had a little school project for kindermusik- we were supposed to go on a sound scavenger hunt and record the noises of our city. Historically I have hated homework, both mine and hers, because jeez, aren't we busy enough without having to do stuff like that? So lots of times I skipped it (both mine and hers!) But... she is old enough now to know and I don't want her to feel like a slacker compared to the other kids or think it is OK to skip homework! So now I suppress my impulse to underachieve and we make a big deal out of all these little assignments. So we drove all around town recording different sounds. Lauren made the list of things she wanted to record and she ran the camera. Then we went came home and put it on the computer and came up with this cute little one minute video:

She was so excited! In the afternoon both girls napped and I got the house picked up which was nice. I am not getting that done every day right now because I spend half the day spotting Audrey as she climbs up the stairs over and over again! (She is SO proud of this and always turns around several times on her way up to clap and smile at me. Audre-, focus!! Don't fall!) and then we baked my birthday cake. I did a yellow cake from scratch and it tasted just like Grandma's! Then we went to kindermusik and then Mike took us out to eat at the new chinese restaurant and then home for cake! I had a big plan for a 45 minute bath with a book but it didn't work out. Maybe this weekend? Not too bad, a nice start to my 36th trip around the sun.

This weekend there are many parties and potentially some company! I am excited. Audrey starts kindermusik today. Awwww, her first class! She is going to love it! I am going to be nerdy and take lots of pictures!

The most happy, the most joy!

2011-03-23T14:19:00.001-05:00

Happy Spring Break! Hope you are having fun! Audrey is talking- so cute and so exciting. I am astonished over and over again that she is normal! She says "mama" when she wants me and "booboo" when she is hungry. She is walking around furniture but seems to be a ways from taking a step. I bought her some shoes just in case though. :) We had a nice time in Oklahoma City visiting Nana and all the cousins, and are getting some great shopping done. Next up: spring cleaning! Yikes!

Freak out!

2011-03-16T22:04:00.002-05:00

YAWN! I love being this tired right at bedtime! Usually I poop out like this at about 2:30 when Audrey won't sleep, or when it is time to cook or something! But yay, a quick update and then sleep awaits! Today was fun, busy and long, but fun. Yesterday it was warm and perfect so the girls and I read on a blanket outside. It was so nice, and soon the neighbor kids came over, and then the grownups arrived, and then there was beer and food and we had a nice front yard party out of nowhere! It was so much fun that we decided to do it for real on Thursday night for St. Patty's day! The first annual St. Patty's Day Front Yard Picnic. I am sure it was the beer talking when I volunteered to make potato salad. (more on that later!) But anyway, it was nice. Today we were at the park with Tia and the girls and Lauren ran hard and got exhausted, and then we went to the store and during naptime I made a chicken tetrazinni casserole for Stacy & David, who just had a new little boy. Then it was time for ballet and while Lauren was in class Audrey and I shopped (ballet is at the mall, so each week class costs a LOT!) I got her the cutest thing ever- flip flops that are clear and they light up when you walk. When she came out of class I handed them to her instead of the sandals she wore in and she got SO excited. All the girls in her class loved them and then Lauren said "When Dad sees my shoes he is going to FREAK OUT!" That made us all laugh so then she listed all the other people who are going to FREAK OUT! (He did freak out, they are pretty cute shoes!) Then I went for a great run and came back home to get back in the kitchen again! We had leftover beef stew but I was still in the kitchen for an hour working on the damn potato salad! What was I thinking! That is a huge pain! But wow it is ever good. I can't wait to see how it is tomorrow after it chills! So, happy St. Patty's day tomorrow, hope you have fun! I will take pictures of all the festivites and post them Friday!

Happy, happy, joy, joy! Audrey loves her food! Funny baby. She talked ALL DAY today. Mamamama, Dadadada, I don't think she means anything by it, but lets call it talking!

This is from Lauren!

2011-03-09T19:18:00.007-06:00

I hate unloading the dishwasher. I hate it so much that I would rather clean a toilet. So I am always making up mean little songs about how bad the job is while I am doing it. I never remember them, but tonight Lauren insisted that we write this one down.

To the tune of Yankee Doodle:

Take them out and put them in.
And then do it again.
Everytime I think I'm done
It's just time to begin!

Lauren is really into language and rhyming, which is so fun. Tonight she said "I like this dish, it is delish!" So cute. I have another Lauren language story at the end of this post.

We had fun today- Mike had a meeting in Lawrence so we tagged along and played there today. I like that town so much! We went to the nature center first and then spent a couple of hours at an awesome toy store. So fun. It was hard not to spend a ton, we did get a few fun things but I could have gotten a LOT more. I have been in Emporia too long because I thought the traffic in Lawrence was really dangerous and menacing. How am I supposed to keep track of FOUR lanes!? Back to the little town with me, ha! Then tonight was Kindermusik which I always totally love. I am signing Audrey up for a class too! I was excited because I found out one of the other moms does pampered chef, so now I can order things without attending parties, yay! And I am on a big campaign to stop the texting. At first all the parents sat there on their phones and it sucked, so now I chat people up assertively. We WILL be friends, I am not going to sit there and watch you text. So far so good, because today we kind of got in trouble for talking so loud that we disturbed the kids in the classroom.

Also here is an exact quote from my oldest child today:

"Well, I guess I forgot my purse today. Shit."

Um, WHAT???

"What did you just say?"
"I said shit because I am pretty mad that I forgot my purse."
"That is a grownup word, and it isn't nice, we don't say it."
"You say it!"
"No, I do not."
"Yes, you DO."

(No, I don't.)

Panpakes!

2011-03-07T09:34:00.000-06:00

We had to make them from scratch and they turned out great! http://allrecipes.com//Recipe/easy-pancakes/Detail.aspx

Wait, what were we talking about?

2011-03-07T08:00:00.006-06:00

Everything is going along nicely here. Mike was out of town for a while (work) and now he is back.We have been having a good time! It has been a little stormy, yay for Kansas spring thunderstorms! When it isn't raining I have been having some great runs- terrific, in fact! So far so good with the barefoot shoes. Lauren talks all day except when she is asleep but I love how sweet and innocent it all is so I do my best to listen. Precious Audrey is still eating things that are not food. Little pebbles, leaves, bits of paper, etc. What is that? When you check her mouth to find whatever she ate it is hilarious because she becomes enraged and throws a fit through completely sealed lips. She hums her rage at you! We got a new vacuum cleaner that I love very very much (we needed one that sucked more, to try to get up all the stuff Audrey is finding. Hoover windtunnel to the rescue!) And... we got a free carpet cleaning and free new rugs because the electrician that I hired did THIS: (hideous grease all over our entire first floor.) That was a bad day but so far it looks like the cleaning got rid of it! It took me all day to scrub it off the bamboo floors and a couple of our rugs were goners. He had been in a diesel shop right before our house. Note to electricians: booties! shoes off! Anything other than this!

I tried a new hair straightener (the instyler, as seen on the infomercial) and it really works but I am finding I don't really know what to do with straight hair! We have been going to lots of parties and I finally accomplished my goal of starting a weekend domino game here. So, fun! I am happy if a bit overwhelmed. I forgot how much harder big babies are than tiny babies. When they are tiny it is scary but- when they are climbing/eating/pulling/going EVERYWHERE it's just exhausting! That's why no blogging right now. Lauren was in daycare all day at this age, so I have fond memories of snuggling in the evenings, instead of things like this: (She kept going but this was the last picture I took because Mike went up with her. Oh Audrey, HONEY. Please be careful!)

She's such a great baby- we are working on eating etiquette now, like how you aren't supposed to slap the spoon every time. She is kind of a chokey baby- always gagging on her food even if it is baby food. I sit right with her but she scares me every time she eats. So we are working on that all day every day. Wipe down the high chair, unload the dishwasher, load the dishwasher, wipe the floor, wipe the highchair, repeat repeat repeat.... I feel like the kitchen eats me and doesn't spit me back for half the day!

I had my last post-op appointment in Wichita last week so we stayed overnight with mom and dad and played i nWichita for a day. My appointment went great- I am free now! No more doctors appointments for 9 months unless I get sick! (Although I will miss everyone at the office, especially my doctor since we have gotten very close over the last crazy year and a half!) It was fun and so refreshing to get out of town for a couple of days!

I have a big post halfway done about being a stay at home mom. I probably won't finish it so here is a quick summary. I still feel like I am doing espionage on this side, because I think I will always see myself as a career girl just "taking a break." Last week I officially became everything I used to hate because I took Lauren to school in my pj's on a hectic morning and I started thinking about the old days when I would have cracked "Oh THAT'S nice, wonder what she is going to go home and watch?" I don't think I ever appreciated how hard it is to have the kids all day by yourself. And how hard it is to constantly manage activities that are creative and keep them busy. And how hard it is to keep the house neat when you are always home making giant (creative) messes. It is SO much harder than I thought it would be. And I still refer to my job as "kicking it" even though I never sit down, because I will always feel a teeny bit guilty about not having a salary. If I had to pick which is harder I would still probably say working, but it is a much closer thing than I ever would have thought. Audrey awake playtime over! More later!

Worry dolls!

2011-02-22T18:41:00.001-06:00

Here are my cute little babies- how fun!

Lauren is a bit of a worrier, and she is always freaking out about something. And I have NO IDEA where she got this from. ... Anyway, today she was asking me if I was ever going to die and since I believe in complete honesty with my children I told her no, never. And I suggested she appoint a "worry doll" and tell her doll her worries so the doll can worry for her. (Remember those dolls? I think I still have mine!) She picked a doll and went in her room for a while to chat with it, and then came back and said she felt better. Five minutes later Lauren was balancing on a big ball and I said, you need to put that away because I am worried you will fall off and she said, "oh, it's fine mom, if you are worried why don't you go talk to my doll?" She cracks me up!

PS Earlier Audrey was being a bit naughty (eating leaves. AUDREY- stop eating things that are not food!) and Lauren said, "wow mom I am glad you didn't have THREE babies!" Haha!

avocado!

2011-02-22T12:59:00.000-06:00

Audrey ONLY wants to feed herself. spoons are so boring!

Tuesday morning!

2011-02-22T05:25:00.003-06:00

How can all you people sleep so late- proper bedtime is 9:00 and everyone should wake up at 5:00. And what is the deal with stores that don't open until 10 am, that is practically lunchtime! And when on earth did I become my mother? Not that there is anything wrong with that!

Mike is out of town this week so I have allowed the house to get pleasantly messy- toys in every room! But all the beds are made except for mine, which has all 3 ladies in it. We are totally partying- I moved a TV in our bedroom for the week and we had PBJ for dinner last night. (I planned ahead and bought the BIG jar this week because that is our menu for every night!) For lunch we will have fast food, which we will eat in the car! I LOVE not cleaning the kitchen! One complaint though, when did McDonalds put nutritional information on its wrappers? I never noticed that before but yesterday my big mac came with some data that I didn't really want to read, right there on the box. Damn, McD- put a sticker on that shit, if I get a big mac I obviously don't care, don't interrupt me with bad news while I am getting my mac on!

After my big mac adventure I almost died from this weird gallbladderish pain that has been bothering me lately. I gave up beer and wine (mostly) about a month ago to see if that helped and I am sad to report that it did help, but apparently we need to add fast food to the list of offenders. My body does not want me to have fun, apparently. I am not ready to start seeing doctors again so home remedies only for me this year, or at least until my current stitches are dissolved. Lauren has a lot of stomach pain, LOTS, so maybe I am having sympathetic pains, or maybe she is, we should both agree to just get better!

This weekend we had a little party, kind of an impromtu gathering, and it was really fun! Unfortunately I missed most of it. I took Audrey to bed at 9:30 and rocked her to sleep in the green chair and I dozed off and missed a good portion on the party. Probably because I had been up since 5?

Something really sad happened this weekend, http://www.redding.com/news/2011/feb/20/missing-mt-shasta-snowboarder-found-dead/. My brother was on the search and rescue team that looked for him for 3 days so we followed this really closely. He ended up being the one who found the boy's body and transported him. I am so proud of him and so sorry that he had to go through that. I know it is a part of his job and training but still. And I am so sad for the family and so haunted by this poor kid's story. I was really hoping he would turn up in a snow cave, or vegas.

And... just to get political for a second, I have always been really appalled that jobs like my brother's don't come with health care. They can't provide it I guess because it is seasonal work. He works all year but at several different paramedic jobs since the need changes throughout the year. But look what he does for society- why did I deserve to be taken care of when I was rotting away in that orange cubical and he doesn't, when he is actually doing something good. (In fact, I think everyone deserves it.) Oh listen to me, I am just pissed because our costs went up again in January and it now costs me $85 every time anyone goes to the doctor. And we are on one of those state provided plans that they keep calling "cadillac" on fox news. I can't even imagine what the general public is dealing with if we have a cadillac plan. Poo.

Well, my typing is waking up my bedmates, time to try to sleep for another hour. Hope all is well with you!

72 degrees!

2011-02-17T14:34:00.003-06:00

I love Kansas! LOVE it! A week ago we were snowed in and today the farmers were on the radio bitching about how all this heat is going to mess up the harvest because everything is budding early. What an interesting place to live! Today is joyfully gorgeous, bright sun and breeze. It really does feel like spring, I don't blame that wheat for sprouting! Today has been fun, I took Lauren to school and then cleaned her room and closet while she was gone. (This needed to be an unsupervised cleaning so I could be ruthless!) I anticipated some protest over this, because I took away 2/3 of her stuffed animals and also gave one of her closets to Audrey's toys. (Lauren has more closet space than the rest of us combined- a double closet and a walk in- now all her stuff is in the walk in. Gosh, poor little princess, huh?) Then Audrey and I picked her up from school and then went to meet Tia and her three girls at the zoo for a pbj picnic. Every other mom in town had the same idea and it was hard to get a table! The kids ran around the zoo for an hour and then we headed home. Lauren wasn't mad- she was SO delighted about her clean room- she told me I was the best mommy she ever had for organizing everything for her and not making her help! Lots of hugs and kisses over that. So sweet! Now we are in the living room and Lauren is pretending to sleep. I taught her "fake it till you make it" when falling asleep and she loves that- she pretends to be asleep until she finally is and I love that! I better go- Audrey has a little toy hammer and she is tap tap tapping everything in the room, Lauren will wake up soon!

Tonight is ballet and then leftover spaghetti. I am making some fresh bread but otherwise it is a low maintenance night for me. I have been doing one household job every night while Mike plays with the girls. I used to think we needed together time but I was having trouble getting everything done (impossible to clean with both girls always needing something!) so now each night I do one thing while Mike is with the girls, like one bathroom, or dust, or the kitchen floor. It's working out well, I feel a lot more caught up and it only takes about 30 minutes each night. This might be the new plan! Also the new plan, a walk every day- Lauren loves getting out and Audrey does too! Uh oh, here comes Audrey to bang on my laptop, bye!

PS I love being in a college town in warm weather! Girls in shorts, guys in convertibles, loud music everywhere, this whole town sounds like a big party! Tonight was fun, all the neighbors were out and it was fun to see everyone!

Busy Friday!

2011-02-11T15:07:00.002-06:00

Lots of "stuff" today. Laundry, baking, packing, shopping, cleaning... and all of it while holding a teething and needy little Audrey! No time for a blog post, but here are some pictures! https://picasaweb.google.com/Jenn.Finch/LetItSnow#

Hope you are having a nice Friday!

Competitive eating

2011-02-09T19:48:00.001-06:00

I cooked very good things today! According to me, anyway!

Here is lunch- Nina's potato soup. Boil two potatoes and one onion for 20 minutes or until they are done. Drain, mash roughly, then add milk to cover potatoes. Heat and add seasoned salt and a pat of butter. Yum! Serve with sour cream, cheese, and other toppings... along with bread and butter for a big carb fest!

For supper tonight I marinated chicken breasts in the olive relish juice from the Superbowl. I grilled them on the George Foreman grill and while they were cooking I made a simple garlic butter sauce in the skillet (1/2 stick of butter and one clove of garlic, crushed, cook over medium for 5 minutes) and cooked some fettucini. I added noodles and some of the relish to the butter sauce and then added the chicken and heated it all for a couple of minutes and it was great! It tasted like something from olive garden! Yum.

Today was so much fun. I will tell you about it later because it is IMPOSSIBLE to get on the computer now! Kids!!! back soon!

15 inches of snow!

2011-02-09T09:10:00.000-06:00

So beautiful and thrilling. I LOVE it. Sparkles everywhere, and I love all the funky drifts and cornices everywhere! Every roof looks like it has meringue on it! We are having a great time watching all of it, the girls are going to get to go out later today and I am waiting for all the sledding kids to arrive in our yard.

Nothing else is going on! Just lots of eating and movies and hanging out admiring the snow! more later, lots of cute pictures! Time for breakfast!

Snow thank you!

2011-02-08T08:52:00.000-06:00

Thank goodness for Netflix! Because we are home again for another couple of days with a blizzard. We woke up today with about 2-3 fresh inches and there is a lot more to come. I kind of love it actually, but even Audrey is starting to act like she wants to get out of the house! It's so pretty though, and our house is a pretty nice place to be snowed in- it could be a lot worse! I do wish I had known this was coming, (I should watch TV!) because all we have in the house is superbowl leftovers! Dip for everyone! (I will sneak to the store over lunch break when Mike comes home so we have something for dinner.)

The doctors appointment yesterday was good. Lauren had her final injection of this series (maybe no more if it works like they think it will!) She was precious- it kind of broke my heart but I had to be all businesslike about it. Mike was holding her and she was crying and saying "Put me down. I want to go out that door and go home! Let me go out that door, I want to go out that door!" Then she said "I hate the burrito," which is when she gets bundled up for the shot, and then she just cried until it was over, which was less than a minute. Then she invited her doctor to our house to play, so I guess she doesn't hold a grudge! What a sweetie!

K- no time for the internets today. There are kids here and they want food and attention. Jeez! We are in for the day- movies and popcorn and watching the snow pile up! Fun day.

Doctor day!

2011-02-07T07:08:00.000-06:00

The superbowl party was really fun! What a great game, too. If anyone wants dip or quesadillas come get it- I have so much left over and I never want to see any of it ever again! We had a fantastic time with the neighbors, the kids got along really well and played mostly by themselves. I had the video monitor set up in Lauren's room so we could see them and hear what they were doing. (We missed a lot of the game because of all the spying! Surveillence is time consuming!) I was pleasantly surprised at how well it went! I had low expectations because Lauren was a pill yesterday but she was fine with her friends. I guess the attitude was special, just for me!

Today we are going for another followup at Lauren's dermatologist. (Remember she got burned by a sparkler on the 4th of July and her scar turned into a big keloid, sigh.) I am so, so pleased with the treatments and how well they are working. It's the most awful experience though. If you have to go to a pediatric dermatologist for keloid treatment I recommend Children's Mercy Hospital, but I really recommend just not getting hurt in the first place because the treatments suck for everyone. They have to inject the scar with steriods and even though they numb it first it's very hard on her because they wrap her in a blanket and hold her down. And now she knows what is coming so we have a bad day before and after. Hopefully today will be the last one- it's almost flat and the color has calmed way down. About the best we could hope for without a time machine to erase the whole accident!

Well, time to start the day! Hope everyone had fun last night and is not too hung over today! I still think the day after the superbowl should be a national holiday!

Super Sunday!

2011-02-06T11:10:00.001-06:00

Yay!! I am excited for the game tonight. I hope it is a good game but the packers win, and I hope the commericals are funny but a little less mysogynistic than the were last year. And I hope the kids all get along and play well together!

We are having our neighbors over tonight. The ones with the little kids, so hopefully it will be fun for everyone! I am making chicken quesadillas- the kind you make with the cool red quesadilla maker. My aunt gave it to my mom and I "borrowed" it a few months ago. Mom will have to get a new one because we use it all the time! We are going to make chicken, cheese and bean quesadillas with sour cream, guac and salsa on the side, and I made a veggie tray, a relish tray, and my two famous dips. I'll also make some cookies this afternoon for dessert. And while I am in the kitchen I am making pickled snap peas for next weekend. For drinks we are having cider and beer and coffee. (Darn, I forgot to get Baileys! Oh well! Too late now, no Sunday sales here!)

Here are my two famous dips- I am so lucky that these neighbors have not had them yet! I think they are the last people on earth to have these. I am not a woman of many recipes!

Corn dip
2 cans mexi corn
2 cups shredded cheddar
1 can diced green chilis
1 small bunch of green onions, chopped
8 oz sour cream
1 cup mayo
mix together and chill for a few hours (overnight if you are organized enough which I am usually not! it's fine immediately.)
serve with big scoop fritos

Olive relish
3 cups seeded, diced tomatos (in the winter I use canned diced tomatoes and drain them well)
1 cup sliced stuffed olives
3 tablespoons of olive oil
1 tablespoon of wine vinegar
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon pepper
2 cloves of garlic, minced

mix together and let chill several hours
serve with water crackers

Hope you all have fun tonight!

-32

2011-02-03T04:33:00.002-06:00

That was the windchill yesterday morning! We are in the middle of a huge winter storm, and Mike got a totally unheard of TWO snowdays in a row! Lauren has been asking "is tomorrow going to be ANOTHER weekend?" So cute! No, tomorrow is a normal workday but we have an appointment in Wichita (my last followup from surgery!) so we get a half day together and then it will be the real weekend! I have totally surrendered on housework, you cannot keep a house neat AND keep Lauren supplied with endless activities AND keep Audrey from hurting herself AND keep all these humans fed. The kitchen is clean (the memory of the ants keeps me honest in there) but the rest of the house needs some serious attention. There are piles of toys in every room and Lauren has constructed giant things, including a tent in the living room and a tinker toy creation that was so big she had to stand on the back of the couch to finish the top of it. (She looked at me while she climbed up there because it is usually a big no-no, and when I didn't object she told me several times "I HAD to do it this way, mommy.") We also had to tie it to the top doorstop to help support it, and I wonder how long we will leave it up? We have watched LOTS of movies and had the fire going for days and used up all the firewood. It's been fun but I am really ready to get out of the house!

Last night we watched "The Fox and the Hound, " which I rented by mistake because I was thinking "Lady and the Tramp." Preview this one before you let your kids watch it- Lauren cried three times and had big watery eyes for a lot of it. The mama fox gets shot and there is a lot of shooting and violence. She was pretty worried. I should have turned it off but she begged to keep watching it and I thought it would be more traumatic to make her wonder how it ended. The ending is happy but I don't think we will watch that one again! Audrey liked it- I had to crawl around on the floor with her to keep her out of the fireplace and we ended up playing chase which delighted her. Lots of fast crawling and squealing!

One really funny thing happened- I was really in the mood for banana bread but didn't have any bananas, so instead I baked sugar cookies with chocolate frosting and lots of decorations provided by lauren (no gummy bears though, I drew the line there!) and they were icky sweet so we sent them next door with the neighbor kids. My neighbor sent a treat back over- banana bread! Yay!!

We go to Wichita to the doctor tomorrow afternoon, I am sure my appointment will go well because I am feeling just great- he will probably clear me to resume all of my normal activities that I started doing ages ago anyway! I even carried Lauren like a baby to play at the neighbors house yesterday because the snow was too deep for her to walk through! Afterward I remembered that I am not technically supposed to do that yet but oh well! While we are in Wichita I get fitted for a bridesmaids dress. I am really excited because I like the dress and it's so fun to get to do this again! I am also going to get some new running shoes- I don't know how much running I will get to do, but my shoes are all at least 3 years old so it is time to update! Ok, I am going to try to sleep again, more later!

Funny Audrey

2011-01-31T20:21:00.001-06:00

""

She talks like this all day long!

Homeslice!

2011-01-31T18:13:00.001-06:00

My life conspires to always make me eat my words. And the more emphatically and often I spoke those words the more I must eat them. For example, during my two years as a working mom, I had many unkind things to say about stay-at-home moms. Things like this: "Yes, yes, it's the hardest job in the world. I know, because I do EVERY SINGLE THING they do AND I work full time." Also, I may have mentioned sweatpants. (To be fair- at that time I was being tormented by some overly religious male co-workers who thought that it was immoral for mothers to work at all- and they constantly commented that I had it "so easy" compared to their saintly stay at home wives. Damn. I am still mad at those guys!) But anyway, I ragged on stay at home moms pretty bad, and woo hoo, look where I am now! Home in my sweatpants!

Another issue that I have been quite opinionated about in the past is home schooling. Can you already see where this is going? I am kicking around the idea of home schooling Lauren next year. She isn't eligible to start school until the following year because of her October birthday, but she is SO ready to start school. She is already doing some crazy math and she is very close to being able to read, and I feel like getting started since she seems to want to do more. I have been talking to a local virtual school and am trying to settle on a curriculum, and this is all still in the research stage but I am getting more and more excited about it. If we don't like it, we can stop and she will start kindergarten on time just like she normally would, but if it is a big success then we might keep going.

It's snowing and sleeting tonight- I think everything will be cancelled tomorrow and that is nice but I already have cabin fever! I went out and rented a bunch of movies tonight and we have all the groceries we could ever need and the cars are filled up and we just bought new tires, so we are good. But damn. Again with the snow!

Today we made rice krispy treats and Lauren took one bite of hers and said. "Do you think they would like to have this up at Daddy's office?" I guess they were not that good- she has figured out that is how we get rid of extra treats! She had a good day- we have a new yoga tape and she really liked it. We also painted and read a ton of books and she took a long bubble bath and had a puppet show. Lots of fun!

Audrey has a new tooth! I am unfamiliar with children that don't scream for days before a tooth comes. Audrey just started making a funny face (she was feeling her new tooth with her tongue) and that is why I looked. And this is no slam on Lauren, of course, ha!

Ok baby is crying, back to my job!