Happy 11th Anniversary!

Sometimes, things just don't go as planned.

Some things, you can count on...like how cute Henry is during

cheese and cracker and snuggle time:

But other things don't always go as planned..

Like when you take Charlie to the doctor to have his stitches removed and you walk out with multiple prescriptions to treat the flu since you have a high risk patient (only because he is a young child). So our 11th Anniversary was spent improvising, and we did a mighty fine job improvising!

Here is what Nate came home with on Saturday:

So, instead of spending a pretty penny in a restaurant, we brought the restaurant to us.

Nigella Lawson's real deal brownies which included about $14 in bittersweet chocolate:

Whatcha doin' Nate?

Clarifying butter for the lobster, of course!

Since Henry isn't a fan of lobster or clams, he was treated to one ginormous crab leg, which he carried around with him part of the afternoon.

Show me your crab leg, Henry....

Not that you can tell from the picture, be we also had a wedge salad with candied walnuts:

And WAY too many clams steamed in wine, butter and parsely:

Henry also helped me roll some Halloween cookies.

And we laughed, a lot, despite Charlie's fever and diaper issues.

But laughing wears fever baby out and Charlie took lots of crash breaks like this:

I'm home today with Charlie and I think he is doing much, much better.

So, while we had a last minute change of anniversary plans, and didn't get to enjoy a nice quiet dinner for two and an "anything but G-rated movie", we did improvise and enjoyed a very nice seafood-fest and had a very nice time with our boys. Which in the end, is the most important thing to me anyways.

Happy 11th Anniversary Nate, I love you!

Automation Gone Wrong

I love automation. I like computers and online banking and paying bills online and even automated phone systems. But today, I experienced automation gone wrong.

I had to call Fed Ex this morning to schedule a pick up, and Charlie insisted on me holding him.

Automated Lady: "Are you calling about a pick-up? If so, say 'pick-up'"

Me: "Pic...."
Charlie: "OW!" (not sure why he said Ow, I was holding him.

Automated Lady: "Let me make sure I understood you. You said 'Ground'?"

Me: "N-"
Charlie: "Momeeeeee"

Automated Lady: "Let me make sure I understood you. You said 'delivery'?"

Forget it...I'll just use the internet, it can't hear.

Ps and Qs

This morning, as I was about to set Charlie's morning meal on his tray, he looks at me and says "Peeeeeeeezzzzz?"!!!

Bless your heart, Charlie Barton.

This is good, and bad. Good because manners are a very important part of Charlie's day at the Stringer Center (which means we are getting our money's worth), but bad in that if he used that "peeeez" stuff on me, I will likely give him anything he asks for because it is so unbelievably cute when you hear it said in his tiny little voice. Needless to say, Charlie ate 9 (mini) pancakes for breakfast because he kept using his new word, and ok, because I kept wanting to hear it. I'll start practicing restraint tomorrow. Promise.

Clone Trooper (costume) Saves the Day!

It was like a preschool horror film…..Henry and I walking, hand in hand, down the Dynamotion hallway for our morning drop-offs and good-byes, which 7 days into our new routine, still make me a little sad and anxious (Henry is doing GREAT, by the way…in fact, better than great!).

We open the door to find every child dressed in either a super hero costume or a pink princess costume. Henry stood still, dropped my hand, mouth open and wide-eyed. I knew we were in big, big trouble.

Henry: “Look Mommy, Spider-man” he says pointing at 1 of the 3 masked heroes.

Me to Teacher: “So (teeth-gritted smile), is today ‘costume’ day?”

It, in fact, was. But I missed the note they left on the door the night before. They also told the kids to tell the parents, but I guess Henry forgot…which is shocking since it involved a costume.

What to do…what to do??? I’m frantic and feel horrible that the new kid was the only little one who didn’t have a costume!

Henry: “Mama, you will go home and get my Clone Trooper costume?”
Me: “Of course! I’ll be right back with your Clone Trooper costume!!!!”

A couple of hours later, I bust into the room, sweaty, breathless, Clone Trooper costume and mask in hand to save the day! Of course, Henry was happily playing with his friends and probably forgot all about the fact that he didn’t have a costume, but let’s pretend.

Henry sees me and immediately goes from 1 to 10 on the squeal scale.

“Oh Mommy, You did it! You got me my costume! Look kids! Look at my clone trooper! I have a mask!”

Crouched at Henry's feet, one foot in I look up to find us surrounded by three little tiny pink princesses all watching me ceremoniously dress my little Clone Trooper. The little tiny princesses did not say a word, they did not smile, they simply watched and protected us from the large group of super heroes that were beginning to swarm in our direction to see what all of the fuss was about. Though he only had one foot in the costume, Henry stretched his body to the fullest and pointed to his chest to show the boys his Clone Trooper Costume. I had to remind him that it wasn’t on yet.

Once fully Clone Troopered, he jumped and jumped and hopped and jumped to the high-pitched squeal that was coming from his mouth. The room was still, watching in awe. This must be the first time they have seen Henry go off the grid like this.

And then he was off, no good-byes, no kisses. He was now a Clone Trooper and off grouped with the other Super Heroes across the room, busy planning to save the World.
But, as he looked at me across the room through his Clone mask, I knew. I just knew.

How to receive Immediate Medical Service...

You bring in a bleeding baby!

Yes, it's true! Not even did I not have to fill out any paperwork, I was whisked past a

roomful of mask-wielding, phelgm-producing, H1N1 inhabiting people so that they could

tend to our blood dripping, yet smiling Charlie.

This is what happens when a toddler tips a chair backwards as they stand on the chair and rock it back and forth.

But SIX stitches later....you have an all fixed up little baby:

I am very proud of this little tough guy who laid still for over an hour as strangers

shined bright lights on his face, covered his face with a plastic drape, applied various stinky-smelling solutions to his chin and ultimately sewed him back together.

But nothing will stop Charlie from eating. Nothing.

I thought the funniest part of the whole adventure was when Doctor told us to keep the stitches dry and clean. I was like "are you serious?" Within 10 minutes of being home, Charlie had stuffed enough food between his skin and the bandaid that it actually just fell off, so I'm pretty sure we will not be very successful with that instruction.

Henry took the whole thing much harder than anyone:

But a very nice Nurse kept Henry company and entertained as Charlie got his stitches.

Henry told Nurse Sabrina all kinds of things...like that we went to Chuck E. Cheese last night (we didn't) and that we moved into a new house and he started a new school. He also said that our whole family has birthdays in June (??).

So for the next 8 days, we will be doing what we can to keep these little blue things clean and dry.

And after all was said and done, we ate chinese food.

And this was my fortune:

It says: "An unexpected event will soon make your life more exciting"

Like, no kidding.

I will soon have to write about how the significant things in Charlie's life seem to play out in fortune cookie fortunes. This isn't the first time this has happened. Very Strange.

Love, B

Video!

Wordless Wednesday

Our New Home

Introducing our new home....for a while:

Cuz I just liked this light fixture:

The office:

Living room then the Dining room behind it. The loft is above the living room:

I'm standing in the living room looking at the front entry way:

1/2 bath off of the kitchen. Nathan laid the law down tonight by declaring "Its no load dropping mandate" since its so close to the kitchen of course. I'm not sure why he even needed to say that out loud since he would be the only one guilty of this.

Part of the kitchen. That is the 1/2 bath on the left and the dining room straight ahead:

Family room:

Lots of shelves in the garage:

Looking at the living room from the loft:

The loft:

Master:

Master bathroom:

Master:

Master closet. Sigh....

Henry's room:

Henry's closet. He claims he will like to hide in there and read books.

Henry & Charlie bathroom:

Charlie's room:

Bonus room:

And all for these little ones!

We can start moving stuff on Oct 1st, but won't move the big stuff until Oct 6th and we are so excited!!!

Love, B

SpiderMan!

WE HAVE AN OFFER!

WE

HAVE

AN

OFFER!

A

FULL-PRICE

OFFER!!!

And we accepted it....and now, we celebrate and then we need to find a new place to live

in THIRTY days!

Better get looking.

Pre-School Grad Night

Pre-School Graduation Night was full of....

Excited kids who were so proud to show off their daily digs

Big Brothers proud to show off their little brothers

So much so that little brothers were annoyed with big brothers because they were pulling them all around the school by their little arms.

Big nervous smiles and giggles

Garbled words to songs that I couldn't quite understand and teachers working their hardest to keep the crazy group of little people singing and doing hand motions.

Meaningful words spoken by Cindy to the 3 little graduates as their parents cried and I kinda cried along with them.

Overall, it was adorable to see the kids in their familiar surroundings interacting with their teachers. It is a great group of parents and kids and I really hope we find a new house close enough that we don't have to pull Henry this year.

Charlie, who automatically smiled "cheeeeezzzzee" when I held up the camera. I was trying to catch him feeding his goldfish to the dog one-by-one. Yes, we now eat out of plastic bags and paper plates, if I have them. Less dishes = happier mom.

We had a potluck dinner...but the boys were too preoccupied with the sandbox that they didn't care about food. And of course, Henry and sweet, sweet Maddie (sigh) chased each other while Nate and I (again) tried to come up with the right words to discuss an arranged marriage with her parents. Maddie's parents feel the same way about Henry as we do Maddie. They are so cute together!

At first, Charlie really wasn't sure what to make of the sand that got in his sandals. He kept shaking his foot and saying "guck" (yuck?)...but soon got over it and moved on to throwing sand as we ate nearby. I even enjoyed some sand-crusted watermelon. Mmmmm..

Charlie was just in love with the pint-sized sink that he could could turn on himself. If we had one of these at home, he'd be the shiniest, cleanest boy on earth!

When is a toilet ever cute? When it is pint-sized, of course! I made Nate stand next to it for perspective. He thinks I am nuts.

The art wall:

Right before the kids came out to perform, Cindy announced to the large group that some kids are really nervous, so "Becky, you may want to wave really big when Henry comes out."

Then Henry walks out, leading the group, with his shirt tucked in to his underwear nice and tight which is an obvious sign that he went to the bathroom by himself.

I love this little happy guy:

The motley crew:

When it came time to perform, Henry, who has practiced for a full year now, only sang one of the 4 songs. I think he was really tired, and pretty crabby, so he spent most of the program with his head buried in my lap.

But was way more in his element goofing around with his buddy Carson as the other kids performed:

And

TA-DAH!

It is rather large....almost as big as our house...lets just hope it does its job.

Looking forward to starting our 3-day weekend.

Its the start of BEAVER FOOTBALL (which by-the-way) yesterday, Henry asked me as we were loading up in my car, if we could go to Oregon State.....Oh boy, was Nate proud.

Go BEAVS!

Love, B

I dream of........cleaning???

Last night, I dreamt about cleaning my tiny kitchen floor with Lysol Disinfecting Wipes on my hands and knees. I cleaned all night in my sleep, or so it felt. I need help.

We are OTM Day 4 and the activity continues, but at a much slower pace. We had a showing scheduled this morning and we have one scheduled for tomorrow, but that isn’t nearly what we the last few days have been like. We hear there are a handful of people interested, but nothing solid yet. The sign still isn’t up, but they have spray painted our lawn, apparently indicating where the sign people should dig. Or maybe it is Realty Trust’s underground marketing campaign, like hanging shoes over a power line by their tied laces.

Four weeks ago, I often walked right by dust bunnies letting them tumbleweed themselves in my wake. Four weeks ago, I left the house with my bed unmade (stop gasping Mom!) I also would leave a room that was littered with boy stuff, completely unfazed of the mess. I would even let a few dishes sit in the sink until the next scheduled wash time and I did laundry twice a week.

Now, however, I practically wear a tool belt containing Lysol wipes, I organize my cleaning products and actually enjoy looking at them, I always have a paper towel in my hand and I get overly excited with Arm & Hammer’s Pet Fresh carpet deodorizer. I can, in an instant, make any evidence of pets and children disappear! I cannot leave a room unless everything is put back in its rightful place, I wash AND DRY every dish as it is used and put it away and I do a load of laundry every day, maybe even two loads…even if that means there are only 3 items to wash. Great. I am becoming my Mother. This selling the house stuff is turning me into my very neat, “oops, you missed a spot” mother! Not that that’s a bad thing, Mother. What’s the saying? Tidy house, tidy life. I actually love having a “show-ready” house. It is nice to walk into a simple, clean home after a messy, chaotic work day. I just might keep things this way even after we move. I know, actions speak louder than my typed words, so we’ll revisit this topic a couple months down the road for all ya’ll haters.

In the meantime, our new normal is becoming…well…more normal. And I likes me some more normal!!!

Tonight we will attend In a Childs Path “Graduation”. Henry is a participant in the ceremony – we know this because he has been singing the program songs for a full year now, including my personal favorite "I jump the pirate ship". Even though it isn’t my child graduating from pre-school, I have pit in my stomach because this now means my child is the (what they call) “kindergartener” at pre-school. He gets to sit at a special table and take a little one under his wing for the next year. I’ll post pictures from the ceremony tomorrow.
Love, B

OTM - Day 2

It is the end of OTM Day 2. Our Realtor Open House apparently went really well - we counted 31 Realtor cards, and according to Realtor Rick, many people didn't even leave a card. It was a busy day here and that is great news - we hope. We have 2 second showings - one was today and one in the morning. Overall, we got great feedback and seem to be priced just right.

Would love to hear that cell phone ring with some great news.

The kids have HAD IT with this whole limbo thing. I mean, HAD IT. They are tired, off schedule and crabby as they have ever been. They are even punching each other in the face.

Evidence:

Just kidding. I just needed to post a photo to remind myself that I still know how. This was an accident in the backyard a few weeks ago. This is what happens when a broom handle cracks you on the lip. Off to put our crabby crabs to beddy bed and to prep for OTM Day 3.

Love, B