Running on Empty

So hard to believe that it's been about 5 months since the last post. What in the world have I been doing? OH yeah, homeschooling. Juggling church, Awana, choir, library meetings, Mt St Laundry, soccer, life.
But my newest experiment in the life of me has been doing something I never, ever thought I would do. Interesting, isn't it? How many times have the lives of the unsuspecting taken a 90 degree turn from these experiments?

It all started out with a friend. The more activities we do, the more moms I meet. Some moms are really neat, the kind that you wish you could be when you grow up. The kind that have it all together, or at least brush their hair every day and wear shoes that match. Some moms are the crazy overbearing, scary kind. Some are so discombobulated they make me feel like I should be getting some kind of trophy for remembering my kids' names. And a select few are Friend Material. For me, finding moms made of this special fabric are few and far between. I think I have 2 or 3 right now, to be honest. Maybe a few more than that if I actually spent some real time with some moms at church.

One of these moms, however, was into all sorts of stuff that filled me with awe. She homeschooled her son, then 5. She was into all this organic and 'crunchy' stuff and didn't feed her kids refined anything. No sugar, white flour, etc. And her kids drank water. Without crying or being promised video game time afterwards. Wow! And she was completely unfazed by my kids' food allergies and even made them special brownies out of almond flour. They didn't exactly turn out, but we laughed our heads off at the treacle-like glue sticking our teeth together. I was too overjoyed at the taste of actual chocolate to complain.

Since then, this dear friend has moved to another state, but praise the Lord for technology. We email some and Facebook often. And when I decided to amp up my workouts a bit, she paved the way down the road of running by doing a half-marathon.
She fussed about her short, stubby legs and her slow run time, but the woman has a 13.1 sticker on her car. She RAN 13.1 miles in miserably cold, rainy weather. Even when I scoffed at running, a year or so ago, she was encouraging. She loved it. She felt great. There were endorphins. She was addicted to feeling this good. Try it. You'll love it.

Run?! Me? WHY?!!!

I am not an athletic type of girl. Believe me. It has always been thus. This is why I like books. I was in band. I had a disastrous middle school basketball career and I still have no idea how to play the game. Really. But the uniform was...uh, not neat. It was polyester and the girls on the other teams (and my own team) were scary. It only took me 20 years or so to figure out that I liked the practices and the drills, but not the game.

So I got on my treadmill and tried to run. *The first 2 and a half months were, let's face it, not fun. Constant interruptions (kids, dog, phone calls), I can't run fast and read at the same time, there was nothing good on tv, etc. There was no way I could run outside and leave my kids to wreak havoc on the house and each other. Treadmill it is. So my friend encouraged me to try a 5k. It's only 3 miles, she said. You can do it! You'll love it so much you'll be running them all the time. You'll want to run more and do longer races.

Ok then, I thought. I can be like those weight loss stories where the lady loses 50 pounds and runs this impressive feats of athletic prowess (a short-lived fantasy). So I ran every other day or so. (*see above)

There was a 5k in my town, a little podunk town, for our annual Loyalty Day (Loyalty to what? I always wanted to know.). It was sometime in May. Hm. I could do that. Tell me again why someone needs to pay someone to run? I have to pay $15 for registration to kill myself running on a badly paved road and all I get is this t-shirt? Okay. All right. Fine. But after that, that's it. I'm done. I'll tell everyone I tried it and that will be it, because I hate running! It's why God invented bicycles and rollerblades and cars!

Later on, I was at a gardening meeting and got into a conversation about running (because misery loves company?) and someone mentioned a run in town (the actual Town where we go grocery shopping, not the one I live in). "So-and-so is a runner. I used to run with her all the time. She's in our homeschool group, do you know her?" I did know her; she goes to my church and is in the choir with me. I had never really spoken to her. She is tall and thin and beautiful and looks like a runner. She sings beautifully and uses mushroom compost in her garden. Sigh. Wow.

So the next choir practice, I screwed up my courage and mentioned that her name had come up in a conversation with (insert name of previous running partner). Later in the conversation, she mentioned the run in town and that she wanted to run in it. "You should do it," she said. "It's weekend after next." Uh. That was the weekend before my town's run. How in the world was I supposed to be ready a week early?!
I signed up for it anyway. I also signed my family up for something called a Family Fun Run.
So I ran my first 5k and it was miserable! By the time I got to the turnaround I was ready to sock the measurer in the eye, because whoever measured this race was a liar. It wasn't this far on the treadmill! The second half was long and hot and the kid in front of me started throwing up repeatedly and shriek/sobbing noisily. I remember thinking "too late to change your mind." Yuck!

Granted, there was some pretty scenery and a scary bridge made of mostly mesh metal where you could see the water below you (urp). Not to mention the inclines (looking back, those weren't really hills, though they felt like it at the time). I rolled over the finish line ready to give up the ghost, sweaty, nasty and chafing.


I also loved the look on my husband's face when he saw me and gave me a hug. "We weren't expecting you for another 5 or 10 minutes!" Oh, balm to my winded, heaving soul. He changed his tune when he realized I hadn't been joking about the Family Fun Run and he actually had to run a mile with our 3 year old. (They ended up walking, with the kid on his shoulders while I actually ran with my oldest.)

The next weekend was the race in my town. I got up at dawn's early light (okay, fine it was 7:30, but everyone else was sleeping) and walked a couple of streets to where our run started. It was another interesting run. I felt like I did better this time, but on a flat country road with nothing but pasture on either side, your mind plays tricks. Wavy heat coming up from the pavement can make the end of the road seem like you're never going to get there. I tripped in a pot hole. I got busy watching horses running in a meadow and almost ran off the road. I counted the phone poles I had to pass to get to the end of the road. And then I got there and had to turn the corner and run still more before I got to the finish line.

I got a really good deal on this one. Due to the smallness of my town and the race, there weren't that many people there. So even though I finished almost 10 minutes after the first person, I was the first female to cross the finish line, so I got a plaque and a medal (for my age group) and some prize money that paid for my 2 races and the one I wanted to do the next week. The look on my husband's face when I waltzed through the door with all that loot was very satisfying. Oh yeah. More balm to my soul.


The next weekend was a Wellness Festival and my husband and youngest opted out of the Family Fun Run. This run was the worst by far. It was cold and windy and I ended up wearing a pair of cotton house-capris because I don't own any cold weather running gear except a fleece pullover. Because I run on a treadmill, that's why. And this run had HILLS. The kind where you look up at the top and the runners above/ahead of you are tiny and you can hear yourself wheezing. I also found out that all those running articles on Running Downhill weren't a joke. I could picture myself tripping and rolling to the bottom so clearly.
This was another race that Would Never End. The last length was uphill. Whose idea was that? My husband texted me "take off your sweater and put it around waist." HUH? Well, one of those great things about having running tights or yoga pants to wear is they don't show sweat like gray cotton. I feel bad for the people running behind ME! Having to stare at someone's sweaty butt-crack could be an incentive for passing someone, but not much encouragement if you can't. Oh, mortification. There will be no picture for this one. We can say it was too cold.
Then I decided to take a break from runs. It was expensive to keep running and I had accomplished my goal. I had run not one, but 3 5k's and even accomplished my secret wish to medal in my age group. I had improved my time to a respectable 28 minutes and change. And I was sore! My knee was hurting and I had a sore heel.
I waited a week and when I felt better, I got back on the treadmill. I realized I felt better when I was doing some sort of exercise. Then one day I wondered how I would feel if I ran 5 miles. What was 10k? Oh, add 2 5ks together. Okay. Well, I got a phone call after I hit the 5 mile mark and had to walk the last 1.2 miles of my 10k, but I still did it.
My friend from out of state congratulated me on Facebook. She said she'd be in Tulsa in October running a 15k (about 10 miles). "You should do it with me!" she said. "You did 10k, so what's another 5?" Uh...so I looked online for a training schedule for a 15k and it doesn't look so bad. Now my 'easy' run is 3 miles. Yes, this is me. When did 5k get to be the easy run? I'll let you know how it goes in October. Either way, I'm kind of amazed that I am still running. Why would ANYONE want to run 10 miles, much less 13.1? OH yeah, the t-shirt, the ball cap, the sticker. Because anyone who puts themselves through all this, physically and mentally, deserves something tangible. Especially if they never got their endorphins.

January with a Vengeance

The winter storm hit and we finally got enough snow to play in. :) The dog is in raptures, kicking up her heels in the back yard like a calf in a spring pasture. My HC thinks it has something to do with her German (Shepherd) heritage and the fact that she has thick black fur. But when she comes in with rapidly melting cakes of dandruffy snow and shakes all over the play room, the excitement is lost on me.

The play aspect of the snow also quickly lost its novelty when my HC bundled up the kids and took them out. I stayed inside, cleaning frantically, lest the power go out as it is wont to do when the weather does anything out of the ordinary (like rain, snow or get really windy). And there is nothing more aggravating than having no power or warm water, a smoking pile of Mt. St. Laundry and an earthquake of dishes in the sink. But I digress.

So I was washing the dishes and putting clean laundry away, smug in my industry, when lo and behold, I hear wailing and crying children and an aggravated Daddy stomping at the front door. I grabbed the closest towel, a small kitchen towel, tossed it on the floor and prepared for the onslaught of frosted unhappiness. The door opened and 3 red-faced, ice-encrusted snow people squeezed in, two of which were howling. My HC had been playing with the kids outside and chased Ian. Ian did a tumbleweed into the ditch and got completely immersed in snow. He quickly learned the inconvenient effect of cold snow inside warm clothes. On his way out of the ditch, cold and wet, he slipped a couple more times and my HC had the effrontery to laugh. Thus the first round of howling. After a second or two of heated discussion and throwing of blame as to who caused the tumbling into the ditch, two stubborn males stomped (and cry/hollered) their way towards the door, towing an innocent, frosty Erin, now adding her own noisy chorus of crying because she wasn't done playing outside yet.
Well, my 5 minutes of quiet was over and I hadn't even gotten to sit down yet. Then the abominable snow creature yelling like a yeti needed assistance stripping at the door. It was not fun peeling all those frozen, stiff clothes and boots and layers off of him. Then it was Erin's turn. My HC had already washed his hands of the whole affair and retreated back to the bliss of the iphone. The kids finished expressing their emotions and ran off to play and I was left with cold, soggy piles of clothes, coats, boots, mittens, etc and a wet floor. :/

After a snack, more laundry, and a Netflix movie, (having coaxed my handsome HC from the clutches of the evil app), the neighborhood kids came a-knocking. My husband fled, again, and launched himself on the bed, claiming he was resting. The neighbor boys pleaded for some disctraction to ease their 12 year old boredom. My kids pleaded with me for more time to play in the snow. My husband projected loud fake snoring from the bedroom. So I got the coats and accoutrements from the dryer, dressed everyone and went outside to freeze. My Florida born, thin-skinned self would much rather stay Inside and enjoy the snow.



But I stood around, amused the neighbor boys for about 5 minutes before they got on their bikes to be bored somewhere else and then proceeded to yell the same thing about 78.4 times to keep the kids out of the neighbor's yard, whose snow was prettier, deeper, not as cold and so much funner than our own larger yard, which had dirt, dog poo, foot prints and other undesirable elements.


And evidently the neighbor's snow made much better snow angels.

Then it was my turn to drag noisily protesting merengue-children inside to peel snowy clothes off Again, and set them next to the heater to thaw (no handy Campbell's soup to melt my snowman). Followed by begging for hot chocolate and more snacks.

But I am happy to report that I got to work some more on my mini-quilt, made from the leftover squares of Ian's twin quilt. I also got a big box this week from my Grandma and Mom of mat-er-i-alllllll (said in an Oprah yell)! My next project is an amateur's attempt to turn pretty fabric into (hopefully) a casserole dish holder/carrier. Or a cotton origami figure.

In the meantime, we are still dealing with unwanted aspects of the snow, mostly sliding-glass doors that are frozen shut, and frozen car trunks. :)


An update: We ran out of Magic Treehouse books after we finished the BFG. So, since we are learning about the pioneer days and the gradual settling of the west in our History lessons, we are now reading Tucket's Travels by Gary Paulsen, a favorite author of mine. Francis Tucket is a 14 year old boy who gets taken from his wagon train by Pawnee Indians (on his birthday!) and rescued by a mountain man. The mountain man teaches him how to shoot a rifle, ride an Indian pony and survive in the wilderness. Eventually, Francis will try to make his way, alone, to Oregon to find his family again. How is Ian enjoying it, you ask? Ian wishes it had pictures.

Corn Maze!

Today we went to the Right Choices Corn Maze and Pumpkin Patch in Southwest City, MO (pop. 855). It was a nice drive up, about an hour and change for us, and pretty much a straight shot, so we made it there without hassle. It's a working farm, run by nice, pleasant Christian folks. We got there and promptly visited the small, red, barnlike structure that were nice, clean restrooms. We paid, went inside and ate a picnic lunch at the picnic tables next to the concession stand. Then all the homeschool group gathered in a large wooden area filled with benches for a lesson about the history of the area, the history and uses of corn, and how to farm a giant corn field. We had a great time, as you can see in the following:



Everyone piled into tractor-pulled carts with hay seats for a tour of the fields and woods. We went all the way around the maze, ending at the line of farm equipment and attachments that were used to farm the field (and new pumpkin patch). Erin had more fun pulling hay out of the bales and scattering it everywhere.



After the hay ride, we lined up to ride the cow train. Erin hopped right in.



Ian decided that he wanted to go too, and the Train (tractor) Conductor said that the big barrels were for grown ups, so I piled in too! (I was the only adult in the whole train.)



The Train went into one side of the maze. The tractor moo-ed the whole time. It got slightly annoying, but there were enough little kids moo-ing along with it that it wasn't so bad.



This is a picture looking into the outer wall of the maze. There ain't no cheating by going through the wall, folks. And there are also mesh walls to hold it together, as we found out later.



There were two slides built into the side of this big hill. The other one was slower, for smaller kids and required riding on a gunny sack. This one was the roller slide and required plywood squares. My adventurous cutie piled into line with the big kids and loved every second. Doubters be gone!



This was close to to the concession/picnic area and was a triple level accumulation of shin-deep corn kernels. And yes, it got everywhere. Ian dumped plenty out of his shoes in the car. Erin shucked her shoes off after a few minutes and kept playing.



This was on one side of the Corn Box.


There was a Hay Tunnel and an Echo Bale. This was the Hay Jump, outside of the opening to the Short Maze (the long one is a couple of miles; I was completely fine with the short one).


Ian took the map with the clues and did absolutely nothing with it. He guessed at every turn and it took us about 20 minutes longer than it should have, but he had fun being in charge. Erin just ran around. I trudged behind with the cooler and my purse.


We survived and were completely worn out.

We went to the Farm Zoo and visited the cute animals. The pig and chickens were Erin's favorite. She 'talked' to one chicken for quite a while (I was going down the slides with Ian, yee haw). Then we did the Corn Cannon, where they help you shoot ears of corn at targets. It was noisy and Erin was tired and crying, so we did not linger. I could tell that Ian could have camped out there for another hour.



So we quickly picked out our baby pumpkins and piled our tired selves into the car for the ride home with a movie and a cold drink.

And guess who conked out on the way home? So now I am ready for bed and everyone else is recharged. Sheesh.

The Blur of Summer

Wow. I see now when my last post was. That was quite a while ago. And so much has happened since then. We had the summer library program and I wrote about 6? 7? articles for it, including a kiss-butt sponsor article to thank the sponsors for all their donations. I felt very shmoozy, but tried to keep the cheese level down. We went on vacation (sort of) back to the home-town, and got to see a lot of family. We were there for the kids' birthdays, and had their party at the park. They had a blast! It was one of my goals (and parental desires) to have a big bash with all their family there to play with them and spoil them. Previous parties have had 2 people there. One year we had a couple of much older kids and some coworkers, but it felt more like a barbeque type thing than a party. Anyway, the kids had so much fun and played with all the family and still talk about it.

Another time, we will discuss the difference between visiting-family vacations and other vacations where you sit and do nothing until someone decides to sight-see. We had fun, but we were really tired when we got home. :) And of course, no one reads this but my family members and they will be horrified: "We thought you had fun! We tried so hard to make it fun for you!" [dissolves into sobs] We had some really fun times, but it is hard to coordinate schedules with 10 people and the 'are we or aren't we?' aspect. We also wish we could have spent more time at the beach....a lot more?


We got home and recovered some. Then it was my birthday! The big 3-0! We went to one of those Japanese Hibachi restaurants and freaked the kids out with the flames. It was funny.



The rest of August was spent doing schoolwork, keeping the house together and trying to find a way to save Play n Learn, the library thing we go to every Tuesday. Cherokee Nation cut the funding and it will be ending next week. So we wrote some letters to the Council House and fussed a bit, but I'm pretty sure that no one will go against the Mighty Budget Cut! The decree has been made. There have been noises with the other mothers about continuing it independently, but it is a lot of work and I think it will fizzle out eventually. I have volunteered to read stories, but it won't be like the 2 hours of playing at stations, crafts and snacks that we do now. But at least it will be free.
Something else that happened. [sniff sniff.] My friend, my homeschooling encouragement, the one with the 2 kids conveniently the same gender and ages of my own kids, has moved! As soon as we got back from FL, they moved to TX, following the awesome new job her husband got. We are so excited for them, but I am selfish and I miss her! And the playmates for my kids.
And now it is September. In a couple of weeks, Ian will be finished with 1st grade. We will take a couple of weeks vacation and then start 2nd grade.
We joined a homeschool co-op out of Siloam Springs that has great activities. We went to a group swim at the Aquatic center there and it was fantastic. There is a Fire Safety trip in a couple of weeks at the fire station there and a trip to a Corn Maze in Missouri on October 1! Woo hoo! So everyone who thinks that socialization is an issue can relax. Though honestly, socialization is the LAST thing I am concerned about. It's not like we are hermits in the Canadian wilderness. Those are kids I would worry about socialization, yet I'm sure they are pretty normal too.

I am almost done with Ian's quilt! This just the quilt face. I have put the back on and am doing the final handwork. It seems to be so slow, but only because I am so close to finishing!
I have been using my free time (haha!) for the treadmill, and even then I am interrupted several times. Eventually though, the kids will come to respect Mommy's quiet-don't-mess-with-me-or-I-will-trip-and-end-up-smeared-on-the-wall-with-carpet-burn treadmill time. And the dog will quit trying to jump on with me while I am trotting.

So with our normal routine, the kids, the dog, the homeschooling, the travel, the HC's job, etc, we have been busy. If you need an example of how hard it is to do anything for more than 2.47 minutes at a time, then know that, while writing this, I have been interrupted about 8 times due to a schoolwork help request (silly ones, like, what's that word? Oh! It's right there on the page.) and 3 times for a pee break, since Erin has fallen early into the ritual of girls going to the loo in groups. The dog is barking, my HC is texting, Erin needs a bandaid for some imagined boo-boo, the kids are screeching at each other because Ian won't quit making an annoying noise that Erin takes exception to. Sigh. Another squabble. Sheesh!
Summer was such a busy blur, and the fall promises to be even more fun. But don't worry, I'll try to keep you posted. :) It could have been worse, right? I could have posted all my summer articles again (yawn!).

Busy as a June Bug

This month has been pretty crazy. We've got our homeschooling (I am such a slave driver, but my kid is smart), we've got the summer library program, which is 3 and sometimes 4 days a week, we've got a garden, a grassy lawn and a pool, which all need to be tended regularly, and we've got a house with two active kids, which is hard to keep clean. Oh yeah, and I write the newspaper articles for that library program, so no ducking out for me. So it's been crazy nonstop. I haven't watched any tv (pbs kids does not count as tv for me), I haven't been able to work on my quilt (tick tock, Mandi!) or have much me time, but everything else is coming along nicely. Erin is having a bunch of fun with Ian home all the time. They play, fight, love on and screech at each other. This is the pinnacle of sibling affection, to me. My HC has been busy going to one training session after another. Some have been good and educational, some have been a waste of time. All I am concerned with is that he gets to eat out more than me. Aren't I so shallow? Then again, he did gain a little weight....lol. But being home trimmed it right off. No fair.
Now that June is almost over, Ian's favorite holiday, July 4th is coming up. The kid loves fireworks! And there are fireworks stands everywhere. We bought a few bucks worth of smoke bombs, sparklers and poppers and he is already putting in his order for the big day. Our town has an ordinance (there is an ordinance for everything...) that you can't let off any fireworks until the week before and the week after the 4th. The small noiseless ones are ok. They won't get you reported to the cops, anyway. And we don't go for the screaming ones anyway, since our kids are still little and our neighbors are close. But Ian is very excited. Of course, after the 4th, it is not long until his birthday, so that is thrilling for him too.


Saturday we went to see Toy Story 3 and since we couldn't find a theater that showed it in 2d, we were forced to watch it in 3D. We had promised the kids that we would go to see it in the theater, so 3D it was. Erin wasn't interested in wearing the glasses and I don't know how she wasn't cross-eyed afterwards, because the picture is blurry if you don't have the 3D glasses on. I will admit, though, that my HC looked adorable because the glasses are plastic and black-framed and he looked kinda nerdy. A new look for him, to be sure. Ian had to be reminded to put his back on. I was in and out with an antsy Erin. It made it worse that there were no seats together and we managed to find 2 on one row and one seat in the row directly behind it. Erin and I ended up sitting on the steps next to the seats for the last 30 minutes of the movie. Yippee.
Here are some pics of the kids, just in case you've forgotten what they look like. :)

The Power of Styrofoam!

We are so happy about our Netflix Instant Play. I love watching nonstop seasons of Bones. Erin loves Caillou and VeggieTales. Ian loves the Mario Brothers Supershow, circa 1986 (save me) and Lilo and Stitch episodes. My HC likes to choose a bunch of B movies that we end up turning off. That's not always the case, but we're on a roll right now. But what we have watched at least 27 times in the past week (and I wish I were joking about the number) is Bolt. Erin always asks for it and Ian always gravitates to where it is playing. We all laugh at the same spots every time (well, we do not find the same spots funny, but I laugh at the hamster every time and Erin laughs at the cat every time and Ian laughs where Bolt gets the traffic cone stuck to his head every time. You get it. And just so he's not left out, my HC laughs at the hamster in the kayak, the hamster stealing a french fry and the animal control guy getting pepper sprayed in the eyes. Every time.) So when I say something like "You don't know the power of styrofoam!" or other related comments, especially those in the overzealous fan voice of Rhino the hamster, forgive me. It is now subliminally imbedded in all our minds.
We are in the last 2 weeks of school. Huzzah. So we are wrapping up homework, testing, the washing (again?!) of backpacks due to leaky thermoses. Sigh.
We also ordered next year's curriculum, which we may start half-time after school is out just to give us something to do.
(Ian just interrupted me. "Mommy, uh, are you wearing sunscreen?" "Uh huh," I said, "Erin and I went to the park today for Play and Learn." "Oh. I can smell it. I wanna go to the park."
Considering that when we went to the park today, I had to call in a broken step where Erin and I almost fell through, I'm not a big fan of the park. They did come and fix the step, where a bolt had broken on one side, but there are too many other areas that need repair (or broken things removed) that I'm not too fond of the playground at the park. But when school is over, we will be available to play with our other home school friends. Yay!
This week, my HC is home, having a normal (haha!) week. The laugh is because he's been having to be here and there at 5am yesterday and today to assist with this and that. And he's been coming home at the normal time. Next week he is starting his first week of Investigator school in Ada, OK. It's a bit of a drive, but he'll be home on the weekends. It is a very good thing to be in that school, however, as they handpick who gets to be in (everything is all about who you know. sigh!) and only allow 30 attendees at a time. I think there may be 2 such classes a year. So it is well indeed. Now about that supposed training class in Hawaii? (waaaah!) We'll see if that comes about. You'll hear plenty of whining and crying from the peanut gallery if it does (mostly from me and Ian the Vulcan (volcano lover)).
Meanwhile, we are enjoying the goodies brought back from New Mexico, including the cactus seeds we are attempting to grow. We'll find out in another couple of days if they will grow.
I got my sweepstakes prize in the mail today. It came FedEx and they called again to ask where my house was. 'Rural route what? Do you have a house number? Uh, that house number is not registered either (duh, if it was, we wouldn't have a rural route in town). Um. What street? Oh, hey! Didn't I just deliver something to you last month? (yeah, the Blackberry replacement). Oh! Now I remember your house. Alright, I'll be there in about 30 minutes.' (Uh, just how lost WAS the guy?)
So I get this box from Anchor Bay Entertainment and the first thing I think is Thomas the Tank Engine. Hmmm. Maybe the grandparents sent something? Uh. It was kind of heavy. Well, it was this:





Is this a sign? Mandi, you need some help. The first thing Mom said was "so they think if you do this video you'll look like her?" Clearly my mother is not a fan of the workout DVD. Not that I am either. I am not very consistent about such things. I get turned around when I'm facing someone chirping "Left! Left!" while they're going to my right. But these are a bit different. One is a boxing type DVD, another is pilates (I'm frightened) and they all come with something. Resistance band, weighted gloves, etc. I will report if they ever get used. Or unwrapped. Or if I can nag my HC into doing some with me, just for fun, in case he starts mocking me.

But he's just ignorant. Because he doesn't know the power of styrofoam.

Coming soon: my Mother's day present, as soon as it comes in the mail, barring any more complications from the FedEx guy or UPS.

An Interesting Week

This week has been interesting. Really interesting. It seems as if I've won some kind of sweepstakes through Redbook Magazine. It is my "grown-up" magazine that I get, though I am suspicious that my HC also reads it when he's bored. You didn't hear that from me. April was it's Sweepstakes Every Day month or something and I entered everything. I guess I was bored. Well, I got an email saying that I won April's Work It Out sweepstakes and I cannot for anything remember which one that was. I remember there was one for workout videos and one for athletic shoes and a few more that has something to do with 'Working It Out'. I guess I'll find out when it gets here in 3-6 months, like the email said.
Another interesting thing that happened. We opted out of Ebay and decided on CraigsList for selling our Xbox stuff and for the Kelty Kids Child Carrier (which we only used once for Hiking Devil's Den and then my HC was so sore from toting Erin around he vowed never to use it again! And we didn't.) Yesterday we got an email about the xbox stuff. Then came a flurry of texts resulting in a sale last night! It only lasted 8 hours before it was sold and we are very pleased. Now we are waiting to hear about the Carrier. Please, Lord let it sell!
These things, of course, will go into our Florida Fund. We are hoping to make a vacation-type trip sometime this summer. And my HC will be coming this time, too. Woo hoo! It was so bleak without him in January. Everything is always funner with Daddy around, as the kids will attest. And Mommy is a little more fun with Daddy around, too.
There are 26 days of school left and Ian is becoming increasingly difficult to get out of bed and to school in the morning. Sigh. At least we have the weekend to look forward to. Relief! Another Friday is almost over.
I am watching Gosford Park right now and finding it hard to do with Erin crawling over me like I am her personal tree/trampoline.
Everyone is almost better, just some lingering coughs.
The garden is doing very well. Some peas showed up, as well as a couple of watermelon and cucumber. The morning glories are sprouting up as well. Now we'll see if they get big enough to actually climb the fence. We'll see.

Fried Ears

The weekend was an incredibly busy one for us. Do you ever get those [incredibly rare] days when you just feel energized and actually get a whole list of stuff done? Then you spend the rest of the week wondering why you can't feel like that all the time and have a Donna Reed-esque life? Well, last weekend was incredible. We put our entire garden in, ironically the biggest one to date. We had said that we weren't going to do a garden this year, but we are forgoing the weed mat (waah!) and got the seeds very cheap at the local farm store. We did spring for chicken wire to put a barrier between the yard and the garden, to signal the dog to stop (it doesn't exactly keep her out).
We also changed our garden menu a bit. We are not doing corn this year, since it has been set upon by Japanese beetles every year and we only get a 1/2 gallon baggie of shucked corn total after they've finished with it. And we didn't plant anything that we didn't like this year. In the past, we've always planted okra since we love pickled okra. But there was never enough ready at the same time to pickle. And this year I am not making cucumber pickles because we have approximately 27 jars from last year that no one will touch. I am trying, but there was that one mushy jar....yuck. And I have discovered, by a majority vote, that no one else likes zucchini. And no one wants to eat any more zucchini bread or muffins. Ever.
So that saves me a bundle of work right there. So I get a break from pickling, harvesting gigantic okra that is inedible and shredding pounds of zucchini to freeze that no one will eat. I feel better already. Am I REALLY the only one that likes zucchini?! Really?!
I was outvoted again when I suggested opting out of the tomatoes. Phooey.
So this year's garden menu is: (drum roll)
Early Alaska Green Peas [along the whole back fence]
Maxi Beans (green beans) [3 short rows, bush style]
Carrots [a short double row]
Tomatoes (100 and Rutgers) [5 plants total]
Strawberries (Quinalt) [2 plants]
Crookneck Squash (yellow) [3 hills]
Cucumbers (burpless) [3 hills]
Cantaloupe [a short row]
Watermelon [4 hills, with 3 plantings in each hill]

Keep in mind that half of our garden is watermelon, since they need a lot of space.
We are hoping that the peas will shoot up and cover the whole 6 foot back fence, since the lot behind has been turned into a gravel parking lot...whee.
Personally, since we are not doing weed mat this year (bigger garden = more weed mat= too expensive...), I am hoping that a mulch truck will stop at our house and ask us if we need a ton or 2. In the meantime, we'll be out weeding....

So we spent all weekend outside, with the kids going in and out, depending on how many flies they wanted to let in. My HC got fried around his tank top and then burnt weird the next day, so from the back it looks like he was wearing a sports bra. It's a really good thing he can't see himself from the back. Try to smother a laugh or he will find you.
So all my lotion has been used up for the Greater Good (translation: HC). Erin's little pigtail part got red and she has a nice farmer's tan. Ian's nose is a bit red and my ears are fried to fire engine-like proportions. And I am sore all over from raking and shoveling and hoeing. My HC only had to do the rotor tiller, don't know what he has to be sore about. (I am only pouting a bit; watching him till with that thing was enough for me.) Erin also loved a few earthworms to death and pulled one apart ("Mommy! Wum boke!")

In addition to the garden success, my HC mowed and weed eated the front and back yard. We scrubbed all the winter muck off of the siding (as high as I could reach with the scrub pole), cleaned out the yucky corner of the house/yard, cleaned out the tupperware cabinet, cleaned out the shed, cleaned up some stuff to sell on Ebay, did all the laundry, etc. Still can't believe we did all that. Boo yah!

So you'll have to forgive me if I don't have any pictures, because I left my phone inside while I was performing all that manual labor. There's not much to see now except for dirt and hills, anyway.

But as with soreness, the after-effects remain. Now I have garden fingers, because my left hand is all scraped and rough from planting and there's dirt stuck in my nails that will just have to wear off. But I got me a garden, man!

Easter

We had a pretty good time this past Easter weekend, even though we missed the family. Saturday night we colored our eggs. We told Ian that if the Easter bunny liked our colored eggs, then the Easter bunny would leave treats. And in our house, the Easter bunny hides the baskets, because bunnies are skittish and like to hide. And Lily sleeps inside, though she sleeps hard enough that we could hide the basket under her, but she would smell jelly beans and go nutso. She has acquired a real taste for jelly beans. The Starburst kind. If you trick her with generic, she tastes it and will spit out a sticky, goobery mess wherever she happens to be. And people tend to step on sticky, goobery messes around here. Namely me.



On Sunday, we had our Easter dinner (our piglet ham, I meanly called it. I apologize. It turned out to be a good, solid ham and I shouldn't have mocked it.) And, of course, The Hunt. The kids and I put a bunch of plastic eggs together inside while HC cleaned up the yard (a constant endeavor with an energetic young dog). We got 55 plastic eggs assembled and counted and waited inside, where every second seemed like an hour. Finally, Daddy was ready! And then Mommy had to take pictures. Groan!





We hid and hunted eggs until everyone was tired of it (it was rather windy; a normal spring Oklahoma wind of 20-30 mph).

And later, my wonderful HC started tilling my garden plot!!! Woo hoo!

A little Wii Before Bedtime

Yesterday was a pretty busy day. I got an entire pile of quilt squares finished, so there's a pat on the back for me. Ian had his class Easter party yesterday, since it's supposed to storm today. He is so finished with school it's not funny. He's just not interested in school or homework or the mean kids in his class. But he is interested in the class trip to Fun City on April 30. It's sort of like Chuck E Cheese, but not quite so crowded and a bigger playplace. I am still working through the logistics of substituting their pizza for him. Hopefully it won't be so bad and he won't feel so bad about having to have homemade with a tiny scrape of cheese on it. Hopefully he'll be excited about playing and not worry about the food so much.
We played outside a lot yesterday after school. The only way to bribe Erin back inside was with a popsicle. Boy are we glad that it's warm enough for popsicles! It was pretty windy yesterday too, so we had a definite need for conditioner at bathtime, not to mention finding half of a green fruit snack tangled in someone's hair (no, it wasn't mine, thanks). Also got the sandbox sand out of the back of the Jeep and set up the sandbox for the season. The kids were ecstatic. Unfortunately, none of the sandbox toys from last year survived rough play and/or Lily through to this year. So that's on the list. but from the looks of the sink, they didn't have any problems at all. You can always tell when the kids have a good time; there's always evidence left for me to clean up.
















And you didn't even get to see the tub. But you can imagine. Then my HC and Ian had a bowling competition with the Wii. And as you can see, Ian paid Erin in Easter candy to distract Daddy long enough for him to win. Let me tell you, the kid can Wii bowl. But he is very encouraging to everyone else too, especially if they get a gutter ball. But he doesn't look very sympathetic, not with that oh-boy-I'm-going-to-win twinkle in his eye. Stinker. But that's ok, because after he went to bed, I got to bowl and I beat Daddy too. ;)

Flars and Aigs

This past weekend was pretty busy for us. The town had its annual easter egg hunt at the park on Saturday. Of course, it was over in about 5 minutes. But we didn't see the Five o'clock shadow guy with a warrant in the Easter bunny costume, so I guess that was good. Then the fun trip to walmart (on a saturday! aaah!). Sunday, we went to another Easter egg hunt in Siloam Springs. Caught that hunt and then went back to Walmart to get the finishing touches for our flower bed. And then, since our Xbox 360 was broken, we took the plunge and got a Wii. More kid games, more active, cheaper games, etc. Anyway, we spent the rest of last night doing the flower bed and sending the kids to bed so we could play bowling (I won), golf (got creamed by my HC for some reason) and boxing (worked up a serious sweat). So now I'm sore from working out a bit (and playing a video game?!).
So if you wanna come and challenge me to a round or two of boxing, just remember, I have 2 KO's under my belt. Oh yeah.

(and in case you're wondering, that's Valerie Bertinelli on the tv behind Erin)