a typical saturday morning

Kids come in. Way. Too. Early. Somewhere between 5-5:45am. It's still dark outside. The four of us lay in bed. Good thing we have a king bed. They beg for us to get up. We say, "Wait until it's light outside. It's still night time. Go back to sleep." It never works. They still beg. They fight, they kick, they laugh, they cuddle. Kate continually says, "I hungry. I want foooooood." When it gets light, we make Tanner a bed on the floor directly in front of the tv. He chooses a show. Kate chooses a show. Usually different shows. An argument happens. Shad and I are still very tired. We settle on a show. Kate lays in bed with us to watch the show, here and there screaming at us if the blanket touches her or looks like it might touch her. Toward the end of the show, they start begging for donuts. Shad says/lies, "The store isn't open yet. It's still too early." This conversation happens every 3 minutes for the next 20 minutes." We get up, get dressed, put the kids in the stroller, walk to the store. Kate chooses any donut that has pink on it. Tanner chooses any donut that has chocolate. Tanner finishes his before we get to the check-out line. Kate has barely taken one bite, but looks like she's smothered the whole thing all over her face and clothes. We walk home. It's November and the weather is perfect outside. I love Saturday mornings.

Tanner's Chistmas List

what they'll do for 1/2 a fruit roll-up

We had a few extra minutes to kill before heading off to church (a miracle unto itself), so I tried to take some pictures of the kids. They covered their faces, yelled at me, ran away, etc. Then I told them they could split a fruit roll-up...a sacred food they only get during Sacrament Meeting. These were the results.

life

• The best news in our house lately...Shad's office at Morgan Stanley, moved to a new location.....across the street from our neighborhood. It's unbelievable. From his office window, he can see our roof. Yes, it's that close. He walks to work now each morning, because it's faster than driving...3 1/2 minutes to be exact. So that's a total of 7 minutes of exercise he gets a day now....much more than he's had in years (on a regular basis). The kids and I actually rode bikes there a couple of nights ago to pick him up from work. I am loving it.
• I think Tanner may be developing an honesty problem. Meaning he lies. Flat out to my face. Every day. It used to be small lies like... I'll see him hit Kate and say, "Tanner why'd you hit Kate?" He'll say, "I didn't hit Kate." But now he's much more creative. A couple of nights ago, Tanner and I were going to go to Costco by ourselves and right before we left, Kate says, "Nanner, you can get icecream or churros at Costco." Tanner quickly responds, "No, they don't sell those anymore. They ran out." Then later in the car, Tanner says, "Mom when I told Kate that Costco ran out of treats, I was just teasing her. I didn't want her to come with us." Teasing? At least he's a bright kid, right?
  
• I am so uncomfortable. No matter how I word it, I can't describe how uncomfortable I am. It is so much worse being pregnant this time around. The Braxton Hix, the pain in my left leg that shoots up my back when I walk, the weird pain in my left foot when I walk, the 3 times I wake up a night because my calves tighten and shooting pain goes through my leg, and then add to it, who knows how many bladder infections I've had this time around which adds to the already huge number of times I go pee in the middle of the night. This baby moves all the time. I usually like feeling my babies move. And I'm grateful she moves a lot, so I know she's okay, but doesn't she ever need rest? Day and night she is like an acrobat. I feel like I can't get a whole breath in, or even a half of a breath. I'm hot constantly...which is freakishly abnormal for me, and I swear I am less smart today than I was yesterday. I can hardly form whole sentences when talking to people. My varicose veins...getting worse by the day and popping up in new places. Hands and feet, already starting to swell. I feel like my all my girl parts are going to fall right out of my body...the pressure down there...it just seems inevitable that it will happen at any time. I have to stop myself from praying that the baby will come today, because obviously that would be bad, but I am so ready to fast forward to January and pop this kid out. Thanks for listening.
• Kate still thinks she is the boss of the house. She tries, and usually succeeds, at bossing Shad and I both around. Tanner's the only one who won't take it.
• Tanner lives on soymilk with carnation mixed in. It's going to run out soon, and unfortunately, every store in the area stopped selling it....or so we've told Tanner. Maybe Tanner gets his dishonestly from his parents. I'm wondering when I have to stop lying to my kids...when they'll figure it out...like that an animal bit off the tips of Kate's binkies, or that their candy disappeared Halloween night, or that soymilk is no longer being produced.
• Did I mention how hot it is? It's November, I'm ready to be cold.
• I did all my Christmas shopping and packaged it all up, ready to send the week after Thanksgiving to relatives. I figured if I already feel this crappy, I'm definitely not going to be feeling up to Christmas shopping a month from now. I've finished the kids shopping too, and all I have left is Shads. Any great ideas??

Halloween 2009

Tanner was Bumble Bee from Transformers. (He's the left Transformer. He would NOT take any more pictures.)

Kate was Snow White. And the little princess was carried by Shad all night.

They were so excited to go trick-or-treating. We told them that they could eat as much candy as they wanted on Halloween night and then when they went to sleep after trick-or-treating, the rest of their candy would disappear. Tanner asked if he could save 2 pieces. So they stuffed themselves to the brim tonight and then carefully chose their two treasured pieces to save for tomorrow...tootsie rolls.

They were a wreck all the way home from their friend's house, falling apart at the seams after the immense amount of candy consumed, and now they are sound asleep.

I'm tired, but happy.

my baby....for 13 more weeks

She knows something is coming. She wants me to "hold me like a baby" "feed me like a baby" "rock me like a baby" all the time, every day. She's even told me that she doesn't want the new baby to come because she still wants to be the baby.

Of course she still wants it both ways...the best of both worlds. Like when I hand out vitamins, she wants as many as Tanner because she's a "big gi-yill" (big girl). Or when I try to help her get undressed and she yells, "no, I do it!" Or when she doesn't want to take a nap because she's "getting bigger". Or when she wants to sit in a booster and not her carseat "like Nanner, cuz I a big gi-yill".

She's not quite sure if she wants to grow up yet. And I'm not either.

my bedroom project

I wanted to update my bedroom and bring some more light in, so I painted our old bed and sewed all new bedding. I finished last night and I love it. Believe it or not, I think the little grey pillow took longer than anything on the whole bed. Anyone ever sewn with pom poms before? HUGE. PAIN. IN. THE. BUM. The pink flower I made by hand, seems like it would've taken longer, right? Nope. It was the pom poms. But enough with the pom poms....here are the pics. = )

**And, by the way, the "liquid deglosser" I used....magic. I will never sand furniture again (not that I ever really did to begin with). It smells kind of like fingernail polish remover and you just put some on a rag and wash your bed with it. Sort of like dusting with Pledge. Then you prime the furniture within and hour and your set to paint. You can get it at Lowes or Home Depot.

***One last thought. I'm thinking of painting the room a light gray color. Opinions?? Anyone used gray paint before and loved the shade on their walls??