First Day of School

Here are my thoughts this morning:

Boy, my house is a mess, I really need to clean it

Maybe I can scrapbook today.....no I have to much laundry to fold (2 weeks worth! Vacation really threw me for a loop)

Maybe I can hurry and get my housework done, then scrapbook.....no, don't feel like doing the house work

I do have all these cans and food to put in them for my food storage, maybe I should get started with that.....no I have to clean the kitchen first..........don't feel like cleaning the kitchen

Maybe I should clean up the house really quick, then get started on my food storage.....no if I clean the house then I should scrapbook

What else can I do before I start my housework? Maybe I should blog about something....no nothing to blog about

Maybe I should check other peoples blogs to see what they are blogging about (anything to not start housework right?)

Lets see.....This person blogged about the first day of school....this person blogged about first day of school....first day of school.......first day of school again....wait a minute!!! I have not blogged about my kids first day of school!!!! What is wrong with me???

Here goes:

Kaylee is starting first day. She is super excited to use her littlest pet shop lunch box every day. When we took her school shopping she surprised me at how stylish everything was that she picked out. She has a great eye for fashion (she did not get that from me.) Her reading skills are improving everyday and I know she will do great this year in school.

Trevor who is getting less thrilled about getting his picture taken, is still very thrilled to be starting second grade. He has several friends in his class and is ready to get back into things. I love that he is there to help Kaylee and show her things like where to turn in her lunch money. I have heard though that he avoids her at recess (who can really blame him right?) Trevor was much easier to take shopping, mostly it was...does it fit? Ok then, lets get it.

Of course Nathan and Ashton are still stuck with me in the messy house all day, but if you ask Nathan he will tell you that he does go to school. He can even tell you about his teacher and what his lesson was about that day. I am reminded as I look at these pictures that I still have not scrapbooked my kids first day of school last year!! What am I thinking sitting here on the computer when there is so much scrapbooking to be done? Oh yeah, the housework, better get started.

Give me a break......but not a crack!

Ok, so I sat down this morning to post about our trip to Bear Lake. I got a sneaky suspicion that Ashton needed some attention. I am not sure, but after 20 minutes of screaming at my feet I decided to scrap the post and change his diaper. (it was not a good post, I could not concentrate through the crying baby and the constant asking of Nathan if it was his turn on Nick Jr) I went to change Asthon just to find out that his diaper rash again is worse than yesterday! But I am getting ahead of myself so lets start at the beginning.

We didn't leave our house until 6:00 pm and drove through the night. (I guess now I know what happens when you blog first and pack later) We stopped by to visit my Grandma and Grandpa Bodily:

Then left Monday afternoon for the campground and got there with enough time to set up camp and have hot dogs and smores. The lake was amazing. It stayed shallow enough for the kids to play safely in. They had tons of fun.

We went on a hike to see a really old tree and on the way we found several crystals. Now my kids have claimed to have found crystals before (you know in peoples yards where they have landscaped with they sparkly white rock?) But this was different...real crystals. I am not sure what kind they are but he kids loved it. Uncle Ben was really good at finding the crystals and Kaylee's eyes sparkled like diamonds when he gave them to her.

(I told Kaylee to go get her crystals so I could get a picture and she brough her whole collection. The first three are from the hike the others are from peoples yards....see I told you so)

Speaking of diamonds. On the second day at the beach it was SUPER windy. The sand started to blow hard enough that it was pelting us and hurt, so we were packing up and heading to the cars. On one trip back to the car I just happened to look down at the right moment and saw a wedding ring on the ground....just sitting there! I picked it up and made sure it did not belong to anyone around. It looks real so I figure I will let the city know I found it in case someone claims it, but if not I will clean it up, have it appraised and find out how much my little treasure find is worth. (I am not posting a picture of the ring so that none of you can falsely claim it as your own....not that you would, but you know)

The day before we were going to leave Ashton's bum started getting sore (hence the title...no "cracks") I know it is not a funny joke if you have to explain it, but oh well. I had thought to bring Desitin, but decided against it. Well if you have ever been to Bear Lake you will know that the closest store within an hour of the place is a gas station, so we looked for some Desitin and found that a small tube was almost $8! We opted for the Vaseline ($1) thinking this would work until we got home.....it didn't. On the drive home we had to stop almost every hour to change a diaper. At least for the first half of the trip. The Vaseline did not seem to do much and I even looked at two other gas stations on the way home thinking I would just give in a buy the dumb Desitin, but they did not even carry any! So I was so excited when I got home to be able to sooth my poor baby's bottom.

I would like to say that as soon as we got home and started treating him with Desitin the rash went away, but it didn't! It is even worse now that before and I swear he goes to the bathroom every hour. Nathan was actually allergic to Desitin and Vaseline so maybe Ashton is too. I have resorted to letting him air dry after I rinse him in the sink after each diaper change (yeah that gets old FAST) I am about at my wits end. I am SO tired of changing diapers and nothing is helping the rash go away. So please forgive me for taking so long to post about my trip, it is hard to come back to a weeks worth of blogs to read, only having small breaks between diaper changes to work in!

Home Sweet Home

All I can say right now is......

AHHHH!

Flushing toilets, long hot showers, and.....desatin.

More to come soon, it's good to be HOME!

Heading Out the Door....Almost

Well, we are finally going to head out to Bear Lake. We are super excited. The kids have packed several bags over the last few weeks. (It makes it hard to pack a real bag when you have to search the house for clothes stuffed into every possible backpack or purse) Here are some DO's and DONT's I have learned about packing up my family for a big road trip:

1. Don't do laundry on the same day you pack the bags. I don't know why, but this just DOESN'T work for me! The laundry ends up all over the place and by the time I get it done the day is over without anything being finished.

2. Don't let kids pick out their own clothes. My kids can find the UGLIEST clothes in the bottom of their drawers and INSIST on packing them. (I am not sure why the ugly clothes remain in the drawers, but after I pretend to pack them, I put them right back in the drawer so that I can tell them no the next time they try to wear them)

3. Do plan at least and extra half hour after YOU think your done for your spouse to load the car up with stuff that they didn't tell you they wanted to bring, so you didn't pack.

4. Don't leave the dishwasher full of dirty dishes (It doesn't smell good when you get home)

5. Don't use crayons in the car. Lets just say that my car's carpet is very colorful in a "melted wax" kind of way.

6. Don't be fooled.....there is no such thing as a "leak proof" sippy cup.

7. Do rest assured, it doesn't matter how much stuff we try to bring, there IS a way to fit it in the van. The kids might not be able to put their feet down and the diapers might be so far under that the baby has to sit in his "mess" for 9 hours, but it is worth it to be able to bring all the comforts of home!

8. Do blog before you are finished packing. It makes for an interesting morning of kids yelling, not getting out the door before noon, and a messy house to return to, but it is worth it to satisfy your fellow bloggers when you will be out of the loop for a week!

Happy Birthday Bryan!!

Well, the BEST husband and father just turned 32! I am SO glad to have Bryan in my life. I am sure there is no one else out there who could put up with me, let alone love me so much!

As you can see, he turns my life upside down!

To Freeze or Not to Freeze

I LOVE Reese's peanut butter cups (not that I actually eat them, because I am still trying to lose my baby weight) So I was excited when my hubbie surprised me by getting a giant bag of them.....the word surprised being used loosely because I was in the candy isle with him when we put them in the cart. Oh the soft chocolate surrounding the sweetened, creamy peanut butter.....YUM! Anyway, we were in the middle of a game with my brother Barlow and his wife Andrea when Bryan pulled out the peanut butter cups, but where did he pull them out of???

THE FREEZER!

My delicious treat was now solid as a rock!! Oh the travesty. What you must understand is that Bryan freezes EVERYTHING. He can not drink mere tap water and bottled water in the fridge does not make the cut either so he sticks the bottled water in the freezer. He has also reached the point were he can not drink milk at all because it is just not cold enough. The obsession is not just with cold things though. He likes his food crunchy. If I make bread sticks only one of us will like them. Soft=I like them. Hard, crunchy, and over cooked=Bryan likes them. Marshmallows are the same. He takes the bag of marshmallows out of the Walmart bag, opens it and.....you guessed it, sticks it in the freezer, that's right. Stale marshmallows left in an open bag are apparently not as good as stale frozen ones, who knew? So the war continues, but did he have to bring in the peanut butter cups?? I mean have a heart.

To my astonishment, they liked it! Barlow and Andrea both liked the unnaturally hard candy. Andrea went as far as to say that she didn't really care for them normally (WHAT?!?) but that they were pretty good frozen. After our company left my sweetheart took the bag of candy, split it in half and put his half back in the freezer and mine on the shelf to thaw out.

And now as I sit here craving chocolate (which again, I would never really eat anyway) I find myself wandering over to the freezer. Oh what a sad day when I have to say.....He was RIGHT! They ARE better frozen! I don't think I will ever understand why someone would willing "burn" their french fries so that they are crispy instead of soft I have to admit that from now on, I think I will be freezing my peanut butter cups.

And the Cat Came Back.....

Over the last couple of weeks we have had tons of fun with company here. My parents, and my brother Gordon and his wife Jessica were in town. They were going to leave on Monday the 4Th. We were so sad to see them go. They packed up their car and took off down the road.

A couple of hours later we got a call saying that they had finished the few errands in town they had to do, but Jessica was very ill (pale and shaking kind of ill) So they were coming back!!! Hooray!! Of course we felt terrible about Jess being sick, but were very happy to have another day to spend with family. The next morning, they again packed up into the car and headed down the road. We had fewer tears this time, but were still sad to see them go. As I started getting my house back in order, we again received a call. This time it was the car that was not feeling so swell. It had blown a hole in the radiator in Pendleton (just over an hour down the road.) There was a mechanic coming to tow the car, but they had to order in a part so it would not be ready until the next day.....hooray? Yes, yes, Hooray! So back they came. My Brother had to be back at work, so they rented a car and drove home, but my parents had to wait for their car to be done. As they packed up to go on Wednesday, we had the feeling that this time it would stick....Hooray.....I mean ah man. They were just finishing up when a large Husky dog came and parked on our front porch. We said goodbye to my parents, but the pooch stayed most of the day. He seemed very nice and the kids named him Poocher.

(Nathan would not go near the dog) The dog left that night, but my other visitor (the stomach flu that Jessica gave me) Stayed around until the next day. I am happy to report that we are now visitor free, back to the normal routines......It is kind of dull......anyone want to come over?

9 Months Old

His first steps were actually at around 8 1/2 months old, but now he can walk for longer distances and prefers walking to crawling. You heard right, my "baby" is already walking. It happens way to fast.

It looks like he took a great fall at the end, but he just knocked the camera down. He has already figured out how to get up the steps (we found this out when he fell down them from the top. Now we have to gate the bottom of the steps when he is downstairs, and gate the top when he is up. What a life with a "toddler" :(

Oops

Forgot to add this picture in. Trevor wore a bright yellow shirt into the butterfly room and the butterflies really like it. They landed on him a couple of times. He thinks it is because their feeding bowl was yellow just like his shirt.