Month: August 2008

Is that what I think it is?
Getting gas in Salt Lake City can be a test of the mind over matter.
First, notice the price of gas.

Second take a look at that pepsi bottle on top of the gas pump.

I don’t know about you guys, but that didn’t look like Pepsi to me.

Maybe it is Pepsi in the form of “already broken down by the human bladder”.

And, somebody needs to tell some caffeine drinking Mormon to start drinking more water and to dispose of his bodily fluids in a more efficient and less gross manner.

YUCK!

But, I guess I conquered the test.
We filled up, sanitized up, and got on our way to the armpit of America:
Rawlins, WY.
I wrote a new ad for the city.
It goes somthing like this:
Come and stay with us.
If you are in the middle of Wyoming with nowhere else to go, we welcome you.
We are the only small town in America
where a yucky hotel room costs you ONLY $130 a night.
The wait at the dilapidated TacoBell/KFC is over an hour.
And the stagecoach designed roads leave you lucky for the life of your rental car and kids.

And when you leave the line in dispair and go to the grocery store, you will be so happy, because we have old fashioned fruit roll ups.

And you’ll get them all to yourself for the rest of your drive because they are so healthy and natural that your kids won’t want to eat them.

Disassembling Our Daycare
Today is the first day of summer that I got to sleep in as long as I wanted.
I know, I know.
How sad!
Lazy summer mornings are one of the hugest perks of being a stay home mom.
I rejoiced the day that all of my kids were old enough to take care of themselves in the morning.

In fact I parented with the notion of them being independent enough to get their own breakfast and play a DVD all by themselves.

And, whala, they prefer to wake up around nine and get themselves a bowl of cereal while watching a movie.
And this works great for us because I prefer to sleep until 10 a.m.
Especially when I am still recovering from a long road trip.

The Clarke’s are moving and so we no longer get to watch Adriana.
Abigail is going to miss losing a couple strands of here from time to time.

And Brayden is going to be spending the rest of this month with his auntie while his pregnant mother finishes out her last few weeks of work.

Bella will really miss having someone else around who is smaller than her and worships the ground that she walks on.

And Sophia, she is just going to miss the babies all together.
She is the most natural nurturer that I have ever known.
She would stop whatever she was doing to care for one of them, and I didn’t even have to ask.
She takes after her Grammy in so many ways.
We are sure going to miss having these guys around.

Especially when school starts when I won’t be able to sleep in anyway.

I really need some more kids fast!!!
Anyone willing to give us a toddler who sleeps through the night?

I don’t want to work with my husband every day.
I love him to pieces but I want to enjoy the time I spend with him.
Taking his orders as a paralegal has the potential of ruining our date nights.
Anyone willing to work as a paralegal for free so that I can go to the spa everyday?
After nine years of child rearing, and a summer daycare I think I deserve it, don’t you?
Schucks, I better go and buy some business attire.

The People We Went to See
We all survived. Barely.
Can you think of anything better for a person’s quest for perfection than spending 4 days with 40 tired and weary reunion going family members?
I can’t think of anything more joyful.
Or more trying.
But, you will be pleased to know that there were only a few little spats between the brothers and sisters.
I guess we are all growing up.
Which is quite obvious by the amount of bodies present.
And, it’s all because two people fell in love.





Breakfast anyone?

I arrived home yesterday. I scheduled the past 20 posts or so, and you were no less the wiser, were you?

I also scheduled this post. If you don’t hear from me in a few days, you know I am lost under the dirty laundry somewhere.

We went to Utah and back in a car with all three kids. I most certainly will have things to tell you. But, for now I am restocking my fridge.

Would you like one of our specialties?

The girls affectionately call it “smashed boiled eggs”.

Abigail and Bella like to smash them and thank goodness Sophia likes to eat them.

Summer Fun
Here are some of the girls favorites from this summer.
Not just any Mr. Potato.
Abigail informed me, “This is a Mr. Picasso Potato.”


The Webkinz were placed for their photo shoot.

Did you know that the magnets in Little Pet Shops
allow them to scale lamps?

And perch from lamp switches?

Forts are always fun.

And when you take your walls down,
you can use them to make Rapunzel hair.

She knows she’s the envy of her sisters.

Lunch is a chore, but there’s always mac n cheese.
Like, always, like, every day.

And who doesn’t love tomato soup, grilled cheese and apple juice?
They are a winning combination.

And, when mom is blogging too much, my girls always know where to find the staples, like Fruit By The Foot. We can’t live without them. And they are only $1 a box at Big Lots. If they are out when you go, it’s just because we got there before you.

I’m Hot

The other day LG and I went to the park with some of the girls from church. We had a blast fishing with Abigail and her friends and their dads.

I wore my new crazy hat. I am a hat person. I love hats and this one caught my eye back at Cracker Barrel a while back. I know, I know, it’s a little much but I love it. You can wad it all up and throw it in your purse. LG isn’t much of a fan, but he knows to deal with my crazy fashion sense. I am sure that he secretly hopes that I will grow out of my love for the hat before there is a reason for me to wear it somewhere embarrassing: which is pretty much nowhere. LG never cares what people think about him or his crazy “so far from trophy wife it’s pathetic”.

Anyhow, we were walking down to the pond and we walked past a group of men that are a certain ethnicity. This ethnicity always seems to be attracted to me for as long as I can remember.
As we got passed them, I turned to LG and said, “See, did you see that? They were totally checking out your wife!”
LG chuckled and replied in all seriousness, “Alice, I know you’re hot and all, but I don’t think they were checking you out.” I got all defensive and said, “They most certainly were.”
LG quietly reminded me, “It’s the hat” and left it at that. Um, what could I say to that? No matter how badly I wanted to think I was hot, I knew he was right.
But, don’t feel bad. Stop crying for this fat mid 30’s woman who doesn’t get checked out by strangers anymore. It turned out o.k. because just a few days later we were driving down the interstate. I was in the driver seat and LG in the passenger side. A truck full of construction workers passed me on my left.
The cute muscular tattooed worker in the passenger seat winked at me. Yes, he winked at me. The 16 year old girl inside of me got all excited for sec. and then dragged myself back to my reality that I shouldn’t care if this guy winked at me. Me to self: “Alice you are married and almost 35, and you don’t need to be excited about some obviously drunk construction worker!”
After gathering my composure from the combined feelings of shock and anxiety that he had the gall to do that when my big tough husband sat right by my side, I turned to LG, “Did you see that? He totally just winked at me!” LG said totally unabashed, “Yeah and he waved at you too.” He really had waved too right after he got too far to see me in his rearview mirror, but I barely noticed because I was still talking to myself. It didn’t seem to even bother my man, and half of me was upset because I wanted LG’s testosterone to take the guy out. I didn’t say anything because the other half of me was just happy that he couldn’t say it was only because of the hat.

Our bounty

LG: “Alice, we have to have a garden this year so that we can teach the kids how to work. And we can put up (that’s what they call canning in the south) some stuff and build our food storage.”

Me: “But, I am going to have to do everything, and I am already babysitting two kids this summer. And you are starting your practice, and we are already so busy. Can’t we just buy some canned goods and call it good this year? We did just buy our wheat and our emergency water buckets, doesn’t that count for the Stake’s goal of building our supply by one more month this year?”

LG: “No way. C’mon it will be really good for the kids. I will get out there and weed with them every Saturday.”

Me: “Alright, if you promise that you’ll get out there with them. I don’t need one more thing right now.”

LG: “I promise.”

Score: LG – no weeding Me – 3 weedings The kids – 10 minutes of weeding
The Garden – growing amazingly without enough weeding

And, I must add. LG did all of the rototiller, so he’s not in the doghouse because of the weeding. But, he better help me put some of this stuff up or he will be.

The late beans and corn to work around our Utah vacation.

15 tomato plants
The raspberries are starting well.

It’s too bad we will probably move before they ever flower.

Pears
Apples

how I feel about my vote this year

THIS IS A NONPARTISAN JOKE THAT CAN BE ENJOYED BY BOTH PARTIES! NOT ONLY THAT, it is POLITICALLY CORRECT!!…….and so timely!

While walking down the street one day a US senator is tragically hit by a truck and dies. His soul arrives in heaven and is met by St. Peter at the entrance.

“Welcome to heaven,” says St. Peter. “Before you settle in, it Seems there is a problem. We seldom see a high official around these parts, you see, so we’re not sure what to do with you.”

“No problem, just let me in,” says the senator.

“Well, I’d like to, but I have orders from higher up. What we’ll do is have you spend one day in hell and one in heaven. Then you can choose where to spend eternity.”

“Really, I’ve made up my mind. I want to be in heaven,” says the senator.

“I’m sorry, but we have our rules.” And with that, St. Peter escorts him to the elevator and he goes down, down, down to hell. The doors open and he finds himself in the middle of a green golf Course. In the distance is a clubhouse and standing in front of it are all his friends and other politicians who had worked with him.

Everyone is very happy and in evening dress. They run to greet him, shake his hand, and reminisce about the good times they had while getting rich at the Expense of the people.
They play a friendly game of golf and then dine on lobster, caviar and champagne.
Also present is the devil, who really is a very friendly guy who has a good time dancing and telling jokes. They are having such a good time that before he realizes it, it is time to go.
Everyone gives him a hearty farewell and waves while the elevator rises …

The elevator goes up, up, up and the door reopens on heaven where St. Peter is waiting for him.
“Now it’s time to visit heaven.”

So, 24 hours pass with the senator joining a group of contented souls moving from cloud to cloud, playing the harp and singing. They have a good time and, Before he realizes it, the 24 hours have gone by and St. Peter returns.

“Well, then, you’ve spent a day in hell and another in heaven. Now choose your eternity.”

The senator reflects for a minute, then answers: “Well, I would never have said it before, I Mean heaven has been delightful, but I think I would be better off in hell.”

So St. Peter escorts him to the elevator and he goes down, down, down to hell.

Now the doors of the elevator open and he’s in the middle of a barren land covered with waste and garbage.

He sees all his friends, dressed in rags, picking up the trash and putting it in black bags as more trash falls from above…

The devil comes over to him and puts his arm around his shoulder. “I don’t understand,” stammers the senator. “Yesterday I was here and there was a golf course and clubhouse, and we ate lobster and caviar, drank champagne, and danced and had a great time. Now there’s just a wasteland full of garbage and my friends look miserable. What happened?”

The devil looks at him, smiles and says…….

“Yesterday we were campaigning. Today you voted.”