Back to school night

Last night was "back to school night" at Ethan's school. We went, and after being nickle and dimed for things like Yearbook fees, school t-shirt, PTA membership, Donation for a new playground, School lunch and breakfast, etc, we walked out of the office $200 poorer (That's in addition to the nearly $300 I paid last week to get him registered. Who knew first graders cost so much? He isn't even in sports or anything!) We then went to a short session where the principal talked to us about new policies, and goals for the new year, and then we went to Ethan's classroom. He showed us his desk, and where he hangs his coat (The EXACT place they were last year, there isn't much change that goes on in that room) and we talked to his teacher. She said that they are going to start mainstreaming him this year! We were hoping for that last year, but they didn't think he was ready for that then. After seeing him this week and all of the improvements he made over the summer they think he's ready now! (Not to toot my own horn or anything, but I'm really proud of BOTH of us for that. We worked really hard this summer and it looks like it paid off!) At first he will just go with his class to things like recess and library and computers, etc. If that goes well he will spend more and more time in his regular class until finally the only time he will leave his class is for therapy! YAY! We found out who his teacher is, and she had a line of people waiting to talk to her, so we didn't wait around, but we did look at a class list, and were excited to find out that he will be in his best friend, Joe's class! (Because he doesn't go to the school in our neighborhood, none of his friends from the neighborhood or church go there, but one of our neighbors has a grandson, Joe who lives in Ethan's school boundaries, and they have become best friends.) I'm glad that he well know at least one person. The teacher has no idea what she is in for with those two together! We talked to the therapists and then came home. It was a great night! I am so proud of Ethan and all of his accomplishments. I can't wait to see what this year has in store for him.

Hallelujah!!!

We did it! We survived the summer! It wasn't pretty, there was chaos, and disasters, and yelling, and bribery, and messes, and meltdowns, (and the kids had a rough time too:) but today summer is officially OVER!!! No, we really did have a great summer, and compared to last summer it was a breeze. We did a lot of things we wanted to do, and while some of our goals just didn't get met, we did have a very productive summer, and made a lot of improvements. Oh, an did we ever have FUN! I loved having Ethan home more, and being able to spend time with him. Did I cry when he got on the bus this morning? HECK NO!!! But, I will miss having him around so much. He can always make me smile. Was he sad to get on the bus this morning? Again, a big fat NO! He could barely contain himself when he found out he could go back to school today. He is SO ready to be a big huge first grader! (Am I old enough to have a FIRST GRADER!?!) Here are a few pictures of the morning.

Going to school instead of staying home with mom...Gets a big fat thumbs up!
Doing the happy dance while waiting for the bus...
Playing air guitar while singing a song he wrote about how much better school is than staying home with mom all day...

How does Adia feel about the freedom?

Ethan's yearly interview...

How they really feel...

This is what it looks like when my family has had a long tiring day, followed by going with mom to a photo shoot, followed by mom wanting to get in a few family shots afterwards. (Especially when you are at a really cool park, and the playground is right in sight)

I shot a birthday party for one of my friends on Saturday. Her family was great, and I had a really good time. It was hard because of the time of day, and the area we chose, and there were also LOTS of people celebrating the grandmother's birthday, and the more people involved the harder to get a good shot... I did have a great time, and loved getting to know the cute, fun, family. They were really sweet, even when Ethan ran up and stood right next to Grandma as she was blowing out the birthday candles, and the family members were snapping pictures. They are going to always wonder who the mystery kid is in those photos. SORRY! Anyway, it was at this amazing park here in our town. I love it there, and have done a few shoots there, but have never taken my family there. As long as we were there, and still had a little light, and a few frames left on the card, I decided to get some shots of the fam. This is the best we could do. (I quickly gave up and just let them run.) I love Ethan in this one. It shows the way we were all feeling. Of course, the other two don't look any more thrilled to be there. Oh well, at least I had fun:)

Missionary Meal

So on Saturday night our friend Mark (also the ward mission leader) called frantically asking if I would mind having the missionaries over for dinner on Sunday. I am so lucky that I now live in a town with an actual grocery store, or I would have been REALLY stressed out.) Anyway, that wasn't too big of a deal, until I remembered all of the other things that Sunday had in store for me, aside from church and my calling and Troy's calling (Which doesn't really require much from me, but still takes him away for several hours during the day, leaving me alone to get the kids ready for church, and then getting dinner cooked alone while keeping the kids from killing each other or messing up the house.) I also have been helping our neighbor out doing a newspaper route,-getting up at 3:00 AM and driving blindly through the streets of our town throwing papers at poor defenseless homes and cars, and dragging my tired butt back home just as Troy is rushing out the door to his early morning meeting yelling, "the kids want animal pancakes for breakfast, and I told them you would take care of it." So anyway, we made it through church, got the kids and myself home, and Troy to another meeting, the kids shoved down PB&J and went down stairs to change and play QUIETLY while I started making bread, and got the ham in the oven. I knew it was too quiet, but I was hoping that just this once they were just sincerely being good. What was I thinking? Troy got home said that he heard water running, and went down stairs to check it out. Just then the phone rang, and it was the missionaries. As I saw their number on the caller ID I hoped that they were canceling, but no such luck. They were calling in their order for dessert. I am serious. The elder I spoke to asked if I had dessert ready yet, when I answered no (I was going to throw together a brownie mix and serve it hot with ice cream, super easy) he said "oh, good. My companion and I are really trying to stay in shape while on our missions, so we are counting calories. We would like to eat as low fat as possible, and no sugary drinks or desserts. We like fruit or jello-WITHOUT floaties, or something equally low in calories." As I hung up my mind went over our meal, one fatty dish after another, ham, funeral potatoes, fresh rolls dripping with butter and jam... and with an hour and a half before they came there was no way I could have jello ready. WHAT AM I GOING TO DO?!? I quickly decided on fruit smoothies for dessert, and tweaked a few of the recipes or changed the dishes I could to keep the meal a little more healthy. As I was rushing around trying to fix things, and thinking not nice thoughts about how maybe the missionaries should ride bikes more if they were concerned about staying in shape,- who GAINS weight on their mission?- I suddenly heard a string of profanity from down stairs, and snapped back to reality remembering that the kids were down stairs... with Troy... and water. I ran down stairs, nearly being run over by the kids who were trying to get out of the "DANGER ZONE" as fast as they could. As I turned down the hall I could see a puddle of water coming from the bathroom. I rushed in to see an inch of water all over the floor, and Troy laying under the sink unscrewing the pipes from under the sink. My little darlings (Troy's words, not mine, I usually call them HIS kids when they do something bad) had decided to make a "spit wad heaven" in the bathroom using toilet paper, and water from the sink. They had covered the mirror, ceiling, walls, etc. with the giant lumps of toilet paper. Then, because the effects that water has on toilet paper is SO fascinating, they also decided to pack an ENTIRE ROLL of it down the DRAIN!!! then turn on the water full blast and see what happened. Well, I can tell you what happened, It clogged the drain, and broke a seal on one of the pipes, and caused our bathroom to flood right before we were having picky eaters over for dinner! Normally it takes a lot to stress me out, but for some reason (Lack of sleep probably being the big one) I nearly had a melt down. I wanted to throw myself on the ground and kick and scream for a second, but because it was covered in water, I decided it was a bad idea, and pulled myself back together. I sent the kids down stairs to clean up the mess. (They knew they were on thin ice, so they did it without complaining, I told Troy turned off the water so no more damage could be done, then supervised the cleaning effort. I went up stairs to make dinner.
All in all it turned out okay. It seems that when the elder said he and his companion were watching their weight he really meant the HE was watching his weight, as the other elder seemed fine to eat anything we set in front of him. Elder Chubby on the other hand ( he was really not chubby, he was very thin and in- shape, I just call him that in my head to make myself giggle) kept asking to look at the labels of everything (like I got everything out of a box or something) he was pretty put out when I didn't have a calorie count for him. None the less, he still ended up eating three warm rolls slathered in butter and jam, like that's any less calories or sugar than the glass of crystal light that he turned his nose up at and refused to drink. They were both very nice though, and Ethan LOVED them! He thought they were awesome, and he sat right next to them, and made them cut his meat, and butter his roll, and basically attend to his every need. They seemed happy to do it. After they left he asked all kinds of questions about missions, and what the missionaries do, and he decided the he is going to go on a mission when he "gets a little older, like, more than ten". I have been telling him that he was going to go on a mission for a long time now, but actually seeing missionaries in action has a much better impact than his crazy mom telling him how great it is going to be. It was a great example for him, and I'm sure we will do it again soon.
Oh, and another thing that happened, possibly my favorite of the day...
One of the missionaries (not Elder Chubby, Elder Good Manners who was Ethan's and my favorite) was from Pennsylvania, where Troy served his mission. They talked about places, and people who they both knew, but Elder Good Manners couldn't remember Troy or any of his companions. Then the Elder Manners asked how long ago Troy served. Troy told him he went into the mission field almost ten years ago, to which Elder Manners replied, "Oh, no wonder I don't remember you, I was just a little kid way back then!" I could have died. I was holding my breath to keep from laughing, and I'm sure I was turning purple. After they left Troy complained about how rude that was, and you could tell it hurt his pride a bit, but it's true, he would have been, like, NINE. Anyway, being old is something I tease Troy about all the time, and I thought it was great, and further proved my point:) Good times...

I have a plan!

This weekend with all of our traveling there was much public restroom using in my life. I HATE public restrooms. I don't like to use them, and I don't like my family to use them, but when you have three people in your family who have pea sized bladders (pun intended) and a six hour drive, what are you going to do? I don't love the idea of sitting on a seat that hundreds of other behinds have sat on, and who knows how long it has been since it has been cleaned. (hence the reason I carry Lysol wipes in my purse, and the reason I hover even after using the wipes) I also don't love that all that separates you from five other people who are sitting on their own overused potty seat is a thin partition which you can see through around the edges. It makes me very uncomfortable...enter children...more discomfort because now it is a social occasion. Adia is a talker. We can't go anywhere without making a new friend-even the restroom. This weekend we had stopped at one of our "approved" restroom stops (yes, I plan out where we can and can not stop on our trips. We like this particular one because it seems very clean, and they leave a can of Clorox disinfectant in the handicapped stall, and we USE IT!) Adia had already gone, and while I usually hold it until we get to our destination, I had just drunk three liter bottles of water, and didn't think I could comfortably wait the next three hours until we got to my parent's house. All of a sudden the door opens and someone enters the bathroom. Like a shot Adia is to the stall door peeking at who it is. Apparently it was someone with short hair because Adia yells out "mom, there's a boy in the bathroom. Hey boy, what are you doing in here. This bathroom is only for girls! Boy's shouldn't come in the girl's bathroom, that is not modest. Boy, why aren't you talking to me?..." I hear snickering from the other stalls. Of course the only stall open was the one next to me. Luckily the man/woman/? was only blowing his/her/? nose, and would likely be out of there soon, so I could hide in the bathroom until the coast was clear. Then Adia says "my mom is in here going poop like a good girl. (I TOTALLY WAS NOT!) Are you going poop? (She peeks under the stall) Nope, just blowing your nose! Good job not wiping it on your shirt. My mom makes a sound like this (Gagging sound) when I wipe my nose on my shirt." Now I hear bursts of full out laughter from the surrounding stalls as the man/woman/? heads toward the door) "wait boy, you didn't wash your hands! That makes germs, and you are going to get everyone sick...Boy...Boy...did you hear me!...) So there I am hovering over the toilet, and I should be thinking of a plan of action to get out of the bathroom without anyone actually seeing my face, but instead I am coming up with a plan of a different kind...the plan of PAYBACK! HA HA HA! All of a sudden I had jumped forward about fifty years. I am going to go on vacation with Adia and her family. I am going to go t0 the restroom with her, and when the bathroom is packed I am going to yell out "Adia, I can hear you pooping! That's my good girl! Boy you are sure stinking it up in here, but not as bad as this lady next to me. Boy, she must have eaten Mexican food for lunch! Whew!...) Everyone will think I am just a crazy old lady, but the truth? I am crazy...crazy like a fox... Watch out Adia, your time is coming... ( now if I can just really not BE crazy in 50 years...)

Tag...

My friend Jessica tagged me, so here goes:
The Rules:
• Link the person(s) who tagged you.
• Mention the rules on your blog.
• Tell about 6 unspectacular quirks of yours.
• Tag 6 fellow bloggers by linking them.

K- I am pretty unspectacular, so this should be pretty easy right?

1. It may not be cool, and I may not be great at it, but I really enjoy being domestic. I like to cook, garden, can, clean, sew, knit, etc. I just love it! I get a lot of joy out of it, and it makes me proud when I can look around my house and see things I have done for myself.
2. I have crooked pinky's. They are REALLY crooked. So much so that unless I concentrate on it they curl up. So everywhere I go, everything I do I look like a proper English lady drinking tea, or something.
3. When I am the passenger in a car I use my hand against the dash to try to control the car. It is my imaginary steering wheel, and brake. If I want the driver to slow down I put my hand on the dash, if I want them to move to the left I put my hand on the door, etc. It is really annoying, even to me, but it is a subconscious thing, and I can apologise and try to quit all I want, but it doesn't do any good, when Troy drives too close to the car in front of us, my hand shoots to the dash. I do it so much that there are permanent hand prints on the passenger side of our car.
4. I HATE it when my toe nails aren't painted. It really irritates me to have no color on my toes. I really can't handle it. And when they are freshly painted I feel SO GOOD!
5. I talk with my eyes. I can't keep secrets or hide my emotions because my eyes give me away. You know how people say "so and so couldn't talk if you tied her hands down"? Well I am that way with my eyes. Force me to close my eyes, and I probably couldn't say anything, and you surly wouldn't be able to understand me. I think that's one of the reasons I hate talking on the phone so much. I feel like I'm not getting my point across because you can't see what my eyes are saying.
6. I sleep on my stomach/left side with my right leg bent and up by my side and my left arm up with my face resting on it. Like how babies sleep with their legs bent and their bum in the air, I'm like half of that. And I can't sleep any other way. It doesn't matter what position I am in, if it isn't that one, I can't sleep. One time I separated my left shoulder, and couldn't sleep on my left side, and I really couldn't sleep-for about three months I just dozed off and on all night. Even with my serious pain meds, I couldn't get a good night's sleep. The funny thing about this is that Adia sleeps the EXACT same way. See, she really is my daughter.

So now I tag Melissa, Shanna, Emily, Ellie, Pam, and Stacy

Wild Weekend!

We went home to visit last weekend, and we had a whirlwind trip. Originally we were going to leave on Thursday night, but Troy ended up needing to work for a few hours on Friday, and part of the road to get home washed out on Thursday night, so we would have just been waiting in traffic anyway, so it ended up being a blessing. So Friday we had plans to leave around noon, but Troy's "couple of hours" tuned into ten hours, and we didn't leave until four in the afternoon. It made for a long drive, but finally we made it to my parent's house. The entire way Adia kept saying "Dad I think you are going down the wrong path. You need to go where there is the big thing and the somethin'" But she wouldn't tell us what the big thing or the somethin' was, so we weren't sure how to explain that we were on the right "path" Troy and Adia argued for most of the trip until we turned at Crescent Junction, at which time Adia yelled out "Finally, you are on the right path! See the big thing? See the somethin'?" It was nine thirty at night, and pouring down rain, so we couldn't see anything, but we said that we saw it, and changed the subject. When we got to my mom's house she told my parents this big story about how we were lost, and she had to tell us where to go. What a bossy Betty...
So, the next day we were going to go to the fair with Troy's parents, and then go to Levi and Cassie's house to help them put up walls in the basement. Nothing went as planned. We did go to the fair, but after being there for about ten minutes we lost Adia. WE LOST HER! I was so scared. I have never lost a child before in my life. Granted I have only been a mother for just over three years, but we have been to big places, crowded place, places with lots of people, and I have NEVER lost a kid before. The kids were going on the rides, and Troy's mom was there, so Troy and I went to look at the exhibits. (At the San Juan County Fair that only takes about four minutes) When we came back Troy's mom told us that she wasn't sure where Adia was. AHHH, if you want a way to give me a stroke on the spot, tell me that you don't know where my kid is, that will do it for sure. Because of our situation I am TERRIFIED (and actually have good reason to be) of someone kidnapping our kids. It is just a part of our life, and one of the main reasons that I am a super paranoid mother. We searched all of the rides, searched the exhibits, the animal pens, the bathrooms, everywhere we could think of. As the minutes ticked away, I became more and more afraid, thinking of her being crushed by a steer, or running out onto the highway, or being hit by a tractor, and it is totally not like her to run away, she never does something like that, so someone must have taken her, were they still at the fair with her, or had they already left with her tied up in their trunk, if they were already gone how would we ever find her, we didn't know what the kidnapper looked like, or what they were driving... My mind was running wild, and I was nearly in tears, It seemed like she had been gone for an eternity (Real time it was about seven minutes) then Troy came up to me with Adia in his arms. AHHH! She had come off of one ride, and didn't see Troy or I anywhere, and apparently didn't notice her Grandma standing nearby, and she thought we had left her, so she walked out to the parking lot trying to find our car. A nice lady noticed her, and talked to her, finding out that she had just come from the carnival area, and figured we might still be there, so she brought her back. The poor thing, she was scared to death, and thought we had left her. I just hugged her and hugged her until she was over it and asked for some space. Oh, I am the worst mother ever! But I learned a lot from this. It will NEVER happen again! I will be sure of that, I, the most overprotective mom on the planet am going to up my game! My kids are going to be thirty, and I will still be holding their hand in public, or maybe I ought to invest in one of those things like a dog leash only for kids, or maybe we will just stay home and never leave the house again...Yup, that sounds like the safest plan, I think I'll stick with that one, good idea...
So anyway, we survived the fair, packed our kids up and went to Levi's house. We got there just as they were finishing up their work for the day. We had just missed out on being able to help. I was so sad! But we got a tour of their beautiful new house, and had a BBQ so it turned out alright. Gosh, I miss that family! (Stacy and Jeremy and their kids were there too, so we got to see everybody, and it made me miss them all the more)
Then Sunday we went to church where Troy blessed the sacrament, my dad talked in sacrament meeting, my mom gave the lesson in Relief Society, and I gave the prayer, twice. (You have to love small branches!) Then we left our kids with my mom, and headed home. They are staying at my parent's house until Thursday. I was totally excited, at first.
Yesterday I got done with just about everything I could think of to do. I Ran some errands, filled and delivered a couple of orders, did the last of the school shopping, hunted down some dance shoes for Adia, got my driver's license renewed (It expired in June, but it didn't dawn on me that it was time to get it renewed until this weekend) went to Logan to have lunch with Troy, cleaned the house, did the laundry and unpacked the suitcases, and went to a movie. It was really quiet and a little lonely. This morning it was REALLY lonely. I called up the kids to see if they missed me. They didn't. In fact I talked to Adia, and after she told me all of the fun things they did without me she said " Grandma Bobbie (my grandma) is coming today and I want to stay here to see her." I told her that she could, that she is staying for all of today, all of tomorrow, and I won't see her again until Thursday around noon. She said "Oh, good, talk to you then" and HUNG UP! Boy do I feel loved! So I went to the Farmers market. That's one thing I love about living here, the farmer's markets that are all over the place. I got a bunch of strawberries, and some corn to can. I finished with that, and it's just after ten o'clock, I don't know what else I am going to do. Maybe I'll take a nap, yeah, that sounds good. If anyone who lives nearby wants to get together for lunch or something, let me know, I'm free...

Apricot Disaster!

When we decided to buy this house there was a huge tree in the back yard, and jokingly I told Troy, "I bet it's apricot" (we couldn't tell yet, it was too early for blossoms.) That seems to be our blessing/curse. Troy HATES apricots, and our first house had a huge apricot tree in the yard too. When we moved in there the neighbors told us not to worry about it because it had never had fruit on it. Well, wouldn't you know, the first summer we lived there that tree was LOADED with huge beautiful apricots. I canned and canned,(I like them, and so did the day care kids, and then later, my kids) and gave a bunch away, and still there were a ton that fell on top of Troy's truck, and made a huge mess, and made him cuss under his breath, and threaten to cut the tree down. (We also have a curse with cutting trees down, but that is better left for another post, I'm bitter about it:) So anyway, by the time we moved into this house sure enough, it was loaded with apricots. Not knowing much about it, we didn't spray the tree last year, and bugs took over, and we ended up not getting any apricots. That was fine, we were still finishing off the stuff I had canned two years before that. Then this year I decided that I wanted to get some fruit off of it, so we pruned, and fertilized, and sprayed, and took care of it. (By we I mean me, Troy was too busy cutting down our weeping willow tree and apple tree. Again, bitter, so I won't go into it) Well, we ended up with about two million apricots on the tree. I didn't know that it was a good idea to thin some of them out early on, so I didn't, and we have millions of small apricots. Well, I have spent over a week canning, I have 25 quarts of juice, 25 quarts of halves, 25 jars of jam,(plenty for our family) and have dried a bunch, and made a ton of fruit leather. I am happy about that, I really have been trying for the year to build up our food storage, and this helps a lot. But I also picked buckets and buckets for friends and neighbors, and even put a bulletin in the Relief Society news letter that anyone who wants some could come and get them. Still with all of that, we have loads still left in the tree. And they are really ripe now, so they just fall right off the tree, and get all over the lawn, and the swing set, and the hot tub, and the tree house. It is a mess. I have been raking them up so that they don't make a huge mess on the lawn, but this morning as I was raking them, they kept falling on me and splattering all over the place. I am starting to get the same opinion of apricots as Troy has! Oh, and Ethan thinks its hilarious to climb up in the tree house and pick them and throw them at unsuspecting people, or over the fence into the apartment parking lot. We keep seeing people drive past with apricot smear all over their wind shield, and I am worried that they are going to retaliate in some way. It has turned out to be quite a disaster. Why on earth did I think this would be a good idea? Oh well, it could be worse, I guess. We could have a million cats instead of a million apricots. Oh, the thought of that just made me throw up in my mouth a little, I guess I will count my blessings (and REALLY prune that tree )...

Update: Ethan did live through summer school!

Well, I wasn't going to write about this, but after the comments I received from everyone, I guess I better keep you informed. I did call the bus garage just to let them know about the little situation we had this morning. When I said in my last post that I wasn't sure what to do, I meant that I wasn't sure WHO to call about it, not that I wasn't sure IF I should call someone. I also meant that I wasn't sure I had done the right thing sending Ethan to school this morning, after he drove away it all of a sudden occurred to me that it might not have been a good idea, and I wanted to jump in the car and chase him down. But then again, I probably couldn't have caught up with them, I'm not sure I know all the "shortcuts":) Anyway, I just called the garage and asked who I would contact if I had a complaint about a bus driver. They actually guessed which summer program we were involved with. Apparently I am not the only concerned parent. The story is, this guy was only hired for the summer (so today was his last day) and they have been keeping an eye on him, but because of legal protocol, and because it was such a short time period, it was better to let him finish out his contract and then not hire him back than to try to fire him. I'm not sure if I agree with that, but now that it's over anyway, I'm not sure what else there is to do about it. Oh, boy, who knew this parenting thing was such a stress? Why didn't anyone warn me?...;)