Calling all Lunch Boxes!

Who would have thought, more than 5 years ago, when I gave birth to a fabulous little girl the time would feel like it has flown by so quickly? Whoda thunk that this little baby (with attitude {and cheeks} to spare)

would turn into this little adult, who has been counting down until the day she could go to school for at least 6 months now? And, we have almost 4 more months to go. Heaven help me, and my patience level :)
This week I am registering Kari to start kindergarten in the fall at the local elementary school. She is so excited to go! I am sure she will do fabulously. She will make tons of friends, because that is just the kind of girl she is. If there is someone there, she will talk to them, play with them, color with them, etc. And she has always been the kind of girl who is not afraid of anything. She will walk into any game and start playing (no matter if she will be good at it or not- something I wish I were better at). She loves to learn. And, she is decent at sitting still for a bit.

Like I said, she has been counting down since at least her 5th birthday, but I am pretty sure it was way before that. One day, in the course of talking about going to school, she suddenly became very serious and very sad. She said, "Mommy, I can't go to school anymore." I responded with "Why?" And she said, "Because I don't have a lunch box." Yep, gonna get right on that. ;)

Today I went to pick up the papers to get her started. Firstly, when I arrived at the school, I guess I should be impressed by the security. You can't get into the school unless they buzz you in. (I have no idea how it works in the mornings/afternoon with children running free - I went during the middle of the day). And, they have a blocker set up so you physically cannot get past the office without going in, or at least being seen first. Like I said, I should be impressed that they are trying to be this safe with my children, but, in the small corners and recesses of my mind I am thinking, "Is this really necessary? And if so, why?"

Then, in the course of filling out 10 pages of papers about medical issues, parents, buses, social security numbers, etc, there is a page of who can specifically pick your child up. In bold print at the top it says *This information CANNOT be altered over the phone.* In other words, list everyone who can pick her up now, because if you can't and you want to call and tell the school so-and-so will be picking up your child, it ain't gonna fly. Again, I should be impressed, but now my recesses are thinking, "What if so-and-so can't, and hubby and I are in the hospital? Then, poor Kari will have to spend the night in the cafeteria, wrapped in old spelling tests, and living off cafeteria pizza and water." So, I am trying to think of anyone and everyone that I might someday need to pick her up. But, the things that really bugs me about this page, is at the bottom there is a place for people who can NOT pick your child up. It goes into details about custody papers, etc. Not only that, but there are 6 spaces! Six?!?! Really? Does anyone need that many spaces?

Then, I start to worry about her. I have had my first encounter with trying to pull back and not fighting all her demons for her (demons being 8 year old girls who think they are better than she is). When we travelled to TN a few weeks ago with the hubby, we spend some time at a park one day while we waited for him. Kari wanted a turn on a swing that the older girls were hogging. I stopped myself just short of pushing them all off in hopes that Kari would learn to deal with it herself. I like living in our little bubble. Where the worst she will have to deal with is her little brother "slovering" over her toys. Or, where, if sister pushes, I can make sure she is punished. I worry what kind of things she will pick up from other people. And, how to deal with it when she brings them home. Also, what happens if one of the kids sees her grafts on her leg or tummy? How will they handle it? Then, how will she handle their reactions?

Then, I start to think, well, things around here will change. I will have to check her homework, and read all the papers that she brings home, to make sure we aren't missing anything. And they have already sent home a PTA sign up sheet reminding me of dues. And all this willy nilly traveling we have been doing? No more... I don't yet know what the official policy is on absences, but, I would guess they don't look kindly on you taking your child out of school just for the hey of it.

Now, all this being said, I am most certainly not thinking about homeschooling her. For one thing, I don't have the patience or organization skills. For another, Kari is so looking forward to it, and I am so sure she will thrive in that atmosphere, that I could not, in good conscience, take that opportunity away from her. And far be it from me to deny myself a small bit of truth in the fact that I am kinda looking forward to having only 2 kids at home. I don't think I am in a bad school district, nor that the teachers or students are bad people, nor that my child will get stolen/molested/stalked/abused or fail all her standardized tests (yes, they have them as early as kindergarten). I am mainly saying I didn't know I could worry about things like this. The thoughts hadn't even crossed my mind. Goodness. This is a bit heavy for a Monday, but, there they are. Now, onto signing my daughter's life away, and then finding a suitable lunch box :)

In the presence of cuteness

Babies in general are cute. Well, most babies are. And, I happen to think, that hubby and I make pretty cute babies. Sometimes, my littlest one is so dang cute, I have to take shot upon shot of him smiling and giggling. And then, it is so hard to pick which one to share. In instances like this, you end up with cuteness overload. However, I can think of much worse things to be overloaded with. And, besides, who doesn't love to see a cute baby?

Yes, he still has wings, poor child. One day I will get around to changing that. One day....

The End.

Random

Sometimes, a girl's just gotta be random. I mean, not everything has a cohesiveness to it. Especially the thoughts floating around in my head. And lets face it: this blog is my thoughts on paper. Er, I mean, in type. You should feel privileged that you get into my head. And scared. Very scared. :)

These are pictures that: unplanned. Aimless. Accidental. Haphazard. (Yes, I have access to a thesaurus, and I am not afraid to use it.) But, they are also decently cute, and, I felt, worth the 2.3 seconds of fame they will get. I was waiting for a story, or joke, or something to tie them all together, or to use some of them and wait for the others. But, some of them are getting kinda old. And, although I don't post in chronological order (I don't really post in any logical order), it was starting to bug me. I don't like to have things hanging over my head. Least of all cute, random things.

Kari and Dylan with his first (of many) attempts at the juice cup. He has luckily caught on quite well, but the first few times he was not best pleased with the situation.

And Kaitlyn. What can I day about this picture? Nothing really.

I guess that it is why it is in my random folder....

And this picture.... Also one of those that takes the words right outta my mouth.

I will never understand why fashions come and go, but almost always come back around in some way. I think it is because people get bored with their clothes, and go noising around in their parents closets until they find something old, and say, "Hey - lets give this a try." I have news for you. The 80s weren't that pretty the first time around! Why bring them back? The other day I gave the girls the "pony tail sticking out of the back corner of your head" do. It reminded me of grade school. Had to take a picture.

Last but not least, I mentioned earlier that we tagged along with the hubby, and slept in a hotel room for a few days. We let the girls share one queen size bed, and we got the other. With all that room, where do they end up sleeping? Right on top of each other. Sometimes, you just gotta break out the camera, even if you have to set it on night setting to get a good shot :)

Easter, Part Eye Eye

Don't you just wish that all holidays could be dragged out for 2 weeks? Since you have been finding Easter grass all over your house already, and will probably continue to find some when next year, you put away the Easter stuff and say "Pink? I thought we went Yellow this year." Its the gift that keeps on giving. I personally don't do grass. It is against my religion. So, this will be my last eggsellent post until next year. Get it? Snickersnickersnort....

The Yogi Bear Jellystone Park people did an egg hunt for the kids the day before Easter. It was relatively short lived and sweet, but they had fun.

*Check out that sa-weet water slide in the background. It wasn't open yet-too early in the season. But something to think about... Who am I kidding?!?! Any time it is hot enough to want to play in the water, it is hot enough for me to not want to camp out without a/c. And lets face it, is it really camping with a/c?*

I didn't get a decent picture of Kari hunting, but I did get a nice one
of them in front of a big tree... Ears and all.
Wanting to be prepared, the Jellystone-ites "hid" the eggs (and do use that term loosely) about 2-3 hours before the hunt started. Nice people that they are, they stuffed them all with candy. Now, what happens when you put chocolate eggs out in the sun for 2-3 hours? This:

You couldn't even pick up the candy without it squeezing out all over your hands. :/ We ended up just throwing it all away. I know. Such a terrible waste of good chocolate not to mention human kindness. Oh well, Kaitlyn found a good way of dealing with it... Look Ma! All Clean!

*Caution: Adult Content coming up. Beware :) *

When you blend families, blending of traditions is necessary. In hubby's family, the bunny brings the baskets, but his parents hid the eggs. In my family, the bunny did both. Up until now, it didn't really matter, but we debated the problem (complete with another family group in tow) and still really hadn't come up with a satisfactory answer, but knew we pretty much needed to decide this year, since Kari is old enough to care, ask, and remember. When the girls woke up on Sunday morning, their baskets were neatly place inside the tent for them to find. Kari noticed the lack of eggs to which I replied that "we" would hide them later. She instantly teared up and said "I wanted the Easter Bunny to hide them." Using my quick Easter Bunny intellect, I told her that the Easter Bunny had placed the eggs in parental custody, with specific instructions as to their hiding places, because he was afraid someone else would find them, be they man or beast. Thankfully she bought it, but... I guess that solved that problem. Here they are finding eggs around our camp site.

*Crack one*

*Crack Two*

The Easter Bunny did a great job with hiding places. I always thought the "hunt" was more fun when there was actual hunting involved. You know, it lasted more than 30 seconds, and not everything was super obvious.

It makes the victory that much sweeter. See:

Because I was not in Internet range, and thus am posting this more than a week late, I will just say this once, for the benefit of all man kind. Hope you had an Eggscellent Easter!!!

The Great Outdoors

A little while back, I posted about our dry run... Remember? We did that because we were gonna meet with the fam somewhere between hither and yon to go camping. It just so happened that the best weekend for everybody was Easter weekend, and it turned out just lovely. I would say we were right on the cusp of too hot, but, luckily for us, we lived... ;)

While in the planning stages of this trip, we selected a NC state park and make our reservations through a call center. Thankfully, this particular call center spoke English, with no detectable accent, and everything seemed hunky dory. The hubby actually had to go to his job site in TN the week before, and the kids and I packed everything up and tagged along with him. We left from TN, drove to NC, only to find our camp site wasn't exactly what I thought it was going to be. The camp sites I reserved were technically next door to each other - if you didn't count the 30 ft gully between them. And, although the website said it was drive to camping, apparently that meant you could drive to the camp site, and then haul your stuff down a rather steep path, for, oh, half a mile or so. And we were about 500 ft from the bathroom... As the crow flies. Too bad the steep path to get us there was more than 500 ft and straight uphill. As luck would have it, Park Ranger Clay stopped by and asked us how we were doing. We told him this wasn't exactly what we had bargained for. We were slightly worried about Nana and Pop having to hike the hill several times a day (which is to say, I should probably have been more worried about me. I get lazy sometimes). Also, have I mentioned we have 3 children? That means we have tons of crap and several trips to the bathroom a day. It is only because Ranger Clay was so nice that I am not mentioning the park, because he went above and beyond to find us another place to stay. Ranger Clay, if you are out there, we love you. In a completely platonic, helpful, park ranger sorta way.

Thankfully, we were able to route everyone to Jellystone Park, in Marion, NC. It was slightly more expensive than a state run park, but, I would say worth it. Our sites were actually next to each other. We were 500 ft from the bathroom (or less). And, they had all kinds of games and activities. The girls loved it!

These were the Easter Games. Luckily, Kari does not take after me at all, and

rushed right in to play the games. She actually did really well.

Her sister is slightly more reserved, but when Kari dragged her along, she went willingly enough. Check out that attitude though. Where did that come from?!?!

Kari didn't drop the egg the whole way down the course. She did great!
Kaitlyn didn't either. But she cheated. A bit.

The weather thankfully held at a mostly decent temperature. I am glad we left when we did though, because you could tell that day was gonna be quite warm. We had a wonderful hired cook/dishwasher in the form of Pop. The tent was spacious and held up well. I loved the ability to hang up our "walls" and being able to stand all the way up in the center was heaven! Generally, we just had good fun hanging out and enjoying the company of family. Toward the end of the trip, we tried to get the 4 cousins together for a picture. These are the cute masks the Easter Bunny brought. However, as you can tell, it didn't work so well.

We figured we would go for a sitting up approach. Not so good either. I love Karley in this picture. She is looking at Dylan, like, "What is his deal?!?!"

At the end of the weekend, the girls were waiting. Waiting for what, you ask?

For hugs from Yogi Bear! He came around to wish the campers well,

and to give hugs. The girls loved it!

Kari also thought the golf cart was pretty cool.

Cousin Karley even got in on the action.

Oh alright... One more for you.

Kaitlyn even tried it. Yogi bear is not as scary as Santa or the Easter Bunny. Although, for our intents and purposes, they are essentially the same :)

Cheese!

Easter, Part 1

At church, I am in the primary presidency. (For those of you who don't speak Mormon-ese, that means I help with the kids church: planning activities, making sure we have teachers, in my case specifically, also doing the music) The weekend before Easter this year, we had an egg hunt for all the kids. We did some crafts, picked up eggs, wiggled, and of course, had lots of fun!

This is daddy helping make candy necklaces. I know its not a great picture,

but I love that Dylan is cuddling :)

He's such a good helper ;)
Kari insisted on wearing her "ears".

He stayed on his knees, for, like, ever! Good daddy!

Bent on her work.

This is Dylan's debut in his new little sneakers. So cute!

We lined up all the kids before we set them loose. Can you find my two?

Dylan got into it too... Poor daddy. If he didn't have a headache before, try letting a 22lb 1 year old beat on your head for a while. That'll do it to ya every time ;) Good thing he's a cutie!

At this point in the proceedings, he had had enough. He had missed his first nap, and he was ready to go home. And what did I do? Took a picture of course. Make sense, right?!?!

Luckily, daddy was able to calm him down, by letting him beat on his head some more.

Love me some men folk ;)

This post is pretty hard for me to write. It is an emotional issue that I have been plagued with for a while now. But, it is also something very near and dear to my heart, and therefore hard for me to talk about. You may not think it, to have read some of my posts in the past, but I am a pretty private person when it comes to things that need to be. I don't talk/write about this lightly.

Don't try to guess. You would never, in your wildest dreams, have seen this coming. I mean, we are a strong family. We have dealt with some very hard things. I wouldn't have thought this would have caused all the chaos and turmoil that it has. But, somethings, some little things get infected and grow and grow, and well... When things finally Pop! all the adrenaline just comes spewing out in a flood of energy. When things like this fester, they tend to make things worse. And when they finally do explode, they tend to be pretty interesting.

As I mentioned earlier, this has been going on for a while now. Years, as a matter of fact. I can remember the first time this ever came up, it was actually on my first date with my now husband. We talked about it for a while, and were ok with just putting it to rest. For one, it was our first date, and we had no intention of getting married. So, whatever our differences were, it didn't really matter since we weren't really worried about the "future". Unfortunately, it made its appearance the next year. And the year after that. It seems to be a yearly thing. Like clockwork. Sometime in the early spring, it rears its ugly head, and rains misery and destruction upon us.

Well, this year, I said No more! I couldn't take it anymore. However, it seems to have spread. Kari is aware of it, and has been asking questions. I decided (much to my own chagrin) that the honesty policy was best. I would always try to answer my children's questions honestly, regardless of how embarrassed it made me (I am thinking right now, specifically, of the birds and the bees talk). So far, with Kari, when we give her just a little bit of honesty at a time, it works. Sometimes, she asks for more. Sometimes, the bare essentials are enough. But, this time around, she seems to understand what is going on, and is no longer accepting of being just a bystander. She wants to participate. And that has me worried, especially since she doesn't *really* understand.

Ok, I guess I have written vaguely about it for long enough. It is time to just spit it out, and then maybe, just maybe, we can move on. But, like I said, this is a difficult thing for me to talk about, so, for whatever reason, I am putting it off as long as possible. Right. I am talking about April Fools Day. :) April Fools!!! Yes, mine and hubby's first date was on April Fools day... And we held hands ;) And Kari's contribution to the fray? What do you call a bear with no socks? Bear foot!!! Gotta love it! Have a super day!