Supposed to be Sleeping

Katy has a habit of napping about every third day. The other days I can hear her in there throwing babies and binkis, singing and yelling mom. I can usually tell when she has taken off her diaper so I go in and put one on or she has tried to take off her shirt and it is stuck. One day she just kept yelling mom so I went in and this is where she decided to put her babies to sleep.

I guess instead of napping she is learning some great mothering skills like squishing babies between a wall and a crib. It is a real space saver.

Full Circle

My sisters and brothers know the lovely story of how my mom broke a wooden spoon on my behind. For those of you that don't I was a little bit naughty growing up. I know, hard to believe. One time I was naughty and my mom spanked me and I said, "didn't hurt" to which her response was, "do you want one that does?" Yes was my answer so she got a wooden spoon which broke upon impact. My mother was not a child abuser in any way. She was very patient. She swore at us one time and we all laughed so hard that she didn't do that ever again. My discipline after the spoon incident was to stand in the corner when I was naughty and have stood in many corners, in many houses, motels, probably stores... Back to the story, the wooden spoon in question was just an old spoon that would have broken just as easily as stirring some juice. A 100 years later today Noah wasn't listening to me and I gave him to the count of three or he was going to get a spank. He didn't so I spanked him and his response was..."didn't hurt". I started to laugh. If my mom was paying attention, I am sure that she is laughing as well.

My Favorite Band is...

Noah came up to me and told me that his favorite band was The Killers and U2. Both Noah and Kate run around singing parts of Andy you're a Star. It has the lyrics, hey shut up, hey shut up, yeah. I probably shouldn't encourage my children to say shut up but it is so funny to hear Katy say, hey shub up, yeam. If we are in the car Noah will ask if Dan has his Ipod and then start making requests and then Katy pipes in with the same requests. When Noah hears the U2 commercial that comes on he will run in the room and start to sing with it. Maybe Noah will back a rock star when he grows up!

Lost Tooth

Jack came home from school yesterday so excited that his tooth was loose. Dad got the duty of pulling out the tooth. I don't know why but the whole pulling out a tooth is just too icky for me. I can sit through the kids with shots, clean up messes, put band aids on their boo boos, take them to the ER when blood is gushing out of their heads but not teeth. Dan was able to get the tooth out and Jack was happy! He had to run to his friends house to show him. I will put a picture on later when Dan comes home. I am scared about uploading photos because I am sure I will delete something I am not supposed to. I guess since Jack is now losing teeth that he isn't my baby anymore. It feels almost surreal that I have little boy that is 7 and will shortly be 8. Bizarre. I guess that means I am getting older which I don't like to think about. Time goes by way too fast.

Pumpkins in August?

My husband swears that he planted them when he was supposed to but our pumpkins are ripe now. If he didn't pick them they would go rotten. I was thinking a few pumpkins. He went over to our garden space and came home with this:

Think you are seeing double? Nope, 11 pumpkins.

I really am thankful for the garden and the food I get from it but what am I supposed to do with this many pumpkins? I am going to can them so that I can use them throughout the year but do you know how many pies this will make? I am thinking at least a zillion and one. Dan also said that since these ones were picked that the others still on the vines would be able to ripen. Again I am thinking a few so I hesitate for a second and ask. 20 is the answer. You heard me, 20 more pumpkins. Please tell me these will not ripen until October. Hopefully is his answer. I am praying to the almighty Mother Nature that I won't have 20 more pumpkins in a month. They need to wait just 2 more months. I also have no idea why he planted so many. We planted one vine last year and somebody stole all of our pumpkins so maybe he was thinking that if some get stolen we will still have a million for the kids to choose from. In theory a great plan, in reality a zillion and one pumpkin pies.

Had to throw in the picture of Katy. She is obsessed with hats lately.

Kid to English Dictionary

You know how your kids have words that would make a person scratch their head and wonder what they are talking about? One of my greatest joys in life is to send my kids with someone with no knowledge of what they are saying. I have said that I need to make a dictionary so that people know what they mean. Here are some of my favorites that my kids use.

• dog soda: mug rootbeer
• ear flossers: q-tips
• speed on you: go faster than you
• bemple song: "I love to see the Temple" song
• Jos-I-you: Josh where are you
• Mightning: Lightning
• elmo sit: This one Katy kept saying and at first I thought she was saying animal and then a naughty word. She really was saying Elmo sit. We have a stroller with Sesame Characters on it. She calls chairs sit. So Elmo sit. Makes perfect sense.

Swimming

For the 24th of July we were going to go to the parade but then remembered that on the days we went to the parade we end up with whining, hot and sweaty kids. Not a good combination. We decided to take the kids swimming instead. Here are a few pictures of the kids swimming. My apologies for the ones with me in it, they are a little bit frightening. I rarely I mean never put on a bathing suit and from these photos I remember why.

Kate decided she needed her floaters on her legs.

Kate and Josh

They all seemed to have a good time. Later that night we coated the kids with bug spray, took our TV outside and had a "drive-in movie". That fit into out budget better than the normal drive-in. On the plus side Kate could only go as far as the little bit of grass we have and the blankets we set out. There is nothing I like better than to chase my children in public. I look like the kids are in control which is easier to pretend that they don't from the safety of my own home. All in all it was a fun day.