Sleep, beautiful sleep

Last night Spud actually SLEPT THROUGH THE NIGHT! Granted, he didn't go to bed until about 10:30, but he didn't wake up this morning until about 9:00! It was amazing. We recently starting having him sleep in his own bed in the kids' bedroom, but he usually wakes up and we bring him into our room. I'm sure it won't happen every night, but it was certainly a milestone for all of us.

And our Ichthoberfest party a week ago went really well. We probably had about 50 people turn out, and the food and company were both excellent. It was a fun get-together, and I look forward to next year's party. We're trying to come up with a springtime festival as well, so if you have any ideas...

Oh, and I just got the decal that I ordered for the rear window of The Box, it's the rat from the center of this sign (though the decal is white):


I also bought the sign to post in the rat room/office. After I wash the car & get the decal on, I'll post a picture.

Thought for Today

I had to give a talk in church today, which is one of my least favorite things, but I had occasion to share a poem I wrote several years ago as it tied in with the topic I was assigned: Faith. I thought I'd share it here for Spiritual Thought Sunday, which I haven't done in a while. (I really should learn how to do cool font things here, but I have no clue how.)



Wherefore Didst Thou Doubt?

Lord I see Thee in the distance
While my ship is tossed at sea,
How I long to be in Thy Presence;
Thou proclaimest, "Come to me."

Can I leave my ship of comfort
To step out onto the sea?
Though ragged, the ship's familiar.
Surrounding it, uncertainty.

Fixing fast my gaze upon Him
I leave my safe ship far behind
I have faith in Him who called me,
He, the Savior of mankind.

Ere my faith stays strong, sustaining,
And my sight fixed on His face
I shall reach HIm, though the winds blow
And be clasped in His embrace.

(Matthew 14:24-33)

Brush with near-greatness

I saw this guy http://www.fox.com/dance/bios/13_bsusak.htm today at Wal-Mart, of all places. He was a finalist on "So You Think You Can Dance," which is one of the few "reality-type" shows that I've ever followed at all. I nearly asked if it was him, but after checking the website I'm sure it was, as I heard his friend call him Ben. Plus, how many people look like that? (He's an interesting character.)

funny website of the day

http://www.catsthatlooklikehitler.com/

I love the hairless "Kitler," #413.

Blogging sloth

While I think it is generally a good thing that I spend drastically less time at the computer since the move, I do have to say that I have missed blogging as much as I did before, and I've also missed keeping up on reading my favorite blogs. But between doing homeschool-preschool with Noodle, keeping Spud out of mischief and keeping the house kept up, I simply don't have the time to do more than 20 minutes a day on the computer, and that's if I'm lucky. So, that's life lately. David has nearly finished the bookshelves for the office -- tomorrow we'll start priming & painting. We're also busy planning our Ichthoberfest (celebration of fish) party for next month. It should be a good time. The weather here has turned cold the past few days, and we have been getting the hang of our wood-burning stove. It's nice. I love the heat from a stove/fireplace. It's so much more warming to me than electric heaters, and it doesn't have that heater smell.

David turned 29 on Saturday. I bought him the Lord of the Rings DVDs as well as a Ghostbusters 1 & 2 set. We watched the LOTR movies Saturday-Monday, and I really enjoyed them. Having never read the books nor seen the movies previous to then, I didn't know anything about them. This allowed me the privilege of zoning out anytime anyone would talk about them (which seemed to be quite frequently) and also of thinking myself superior because I wasn't tossing ridiculous names like "Gollum, Frodo, Aragon, Gandalf, etc" around. I don't know if other people are like this, but I tend to be repelled by super popularity of things. The hype around the LOTR movies made me even less interested in seeing them. I was the same way about reading "The Da Vinci Code," and still haven't read it, though I did see the movie. I guess sometimes I figure that if EVERYONE likes it, it must not be that great. Because obviously the masses have no taste. But in the case of the LOTR, I have to repent and say that I did think they were pretty great movies, and that I really liked the story. I will probably even read the books one of these years. I did get bored of all the battle scenes though. Which wasn't a surprise to me, as I also got really bored of the battle scenes in the Star Wars movies. Speaking of which, I've still not seen Episode 2....

The Latest

Our current home improvement project is to build bookshelves for the office/library. We bought the wood and David cut it all to size tonight. It will be great to get these done, as we've got lots of books, videos and games that could dearly use a home outside of their boxes. We'll also be building a case/shelf for the rat cage, which will be nice as well to keep it protected and secure.

Other than that, we are really loving living here. The backyard is absolutely wonderful. I love having the playground and the trampoline. And the garden remnants have even yielded some tomatoes. Next year we play to construct garden boxes to ease in the process of protecting things from dog & kids.

Oh, and Spud has been weaned! Whoo hoo! It's been a rough week, in that he still has wanted to nurse at times, but I figured at his age it is almost easier to go cold turkey than to try and help him understand that it's okay sometimes. He's two months older than Noodle was at weaning age. Thanks to David keeping him in our bedroom with him, I've been able to get some GOOD sleep in the spare bedroom. The first night it was absolutely bizarre to wake up and have slept uninterrupted for several hours. Ahhh, sweet slumber.

Hey hey he's a monkey

These moments are the reason this little menacing messmaking monkey is still around and not doing time at the coal mines.

The Great Bug Hunter

I couldn't help but think of Steve Irwin (may he rest in peace) today when little Noodle was so proud after capturing this dragonfly all on her own.

sad news

My rat Berkeley died tonight. He's been sickly for the past few months, and after the medication didn't seem to make any improvement, I discontinued it, and kept his energy up by feeding him baby formula mixed in with yogurt/cottage cheese. Last night when I was cleaning out the "hospital cage" I keep him in at times (so he had a chance to eat leisurely, he really wanted to get out and run around a bit. He climbed up the cage (haltingly so, but with determination) and ran around a little bit, and it seemed to wear him out. Today it was obvious he had taken a turn for the worse, and when I just checked on him, he had passed away. I am relieved, though, that the end came so quickly for him. Up until yesterday he was still eating and doing as well as he had been.

How do I love thee?

Let me count the ways.

I'm referring, of course, to my new high speed internet connection. Yeah baby!

1. It doesn't take www.homestarrunner.com ages to load every toon or strongbad email
2. PICTURES! I can look at PICTURES!!
3. Actually able to use alphabet learning/reading webpages with Noodle
4. Those petfinder.org adoption pages load right up, allowing me to search the adoptable doggies and kitties at lightning speed
5. Shopping at iTunes Music Store
6. Not having to dial up!!!
7. An added bonus is that my dot mac mail account works with this browser, whereas NetZero wouldn't allow it.

I'm surely forgetting some, but BOY is high speed fantastic!

Blast from the Past

We've moved! We're in the new house, surrounded by boxes on every side. Also, David decided to take out half a wall and we opted to paint the family room, so we've also managed to make a huge mess. I spent all day yesterday cleaning the old apartment, but it'll probably take another full day. The new washer & dryer (Kenmore HE2Plus series--they are awesome!) were delivered yesterday, the computer was back online last night, and today we got our TV/cable set up. Now if I can just do something with all this stuff!

The weekend of August 4th-6th we drove up to Idaho to attend my ten year high school reunion. I'd vascillated about going, but in the end decided I would rather go than wonder how it would have been. I had a great time. It was fun to see so many familiar faces and remember high school for a bit. I was surprised to enjoy it so much, because I was more than ready to leave high school when I graduated, and unlike many of my classmates, I never returned for summers. I haven't kept in touch with anyone, at least not consistently, and to a large extent I have felt like my life began after high school. But I really enjoyed hearing what people are up to, and I came away feeling really happy and satisfied with what I have accomplished in the last decade. And it didn't hurt any to have so many people tell me how great I look, including a friend overhearing a guy I dated comment to his friend that I was HOT. So I'm not above ego stroking--sue me.

Tidbits

So the kids and I were eating Nutella on Graham crackers and being the thinking ahead sort of mom that I am, I took Spud's shirt off so it wouldn’t get all chocolatey, and put the shirt on the back of one of the kitchen chairs. He was finishing up and I went to the bathroom. When I came back to the kitchen, there’s my little messmaker, holding his shirt with chocolatey hands. He’d obviously been handling it a bit, as there was chocolate ALL over it. So much for my efforts to cut down on mess!

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Spud has recently learned the phrase “Night night,” and has realized that it is a farewell. So now he’s combining his two farewells, “Night night,” and “Bye bye” into “Bite night.”

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We should be ready to close on the house any day now. The holdup was either the title company or the mortgage company was supposed to send paperwork to the other one and instead of the 1-2 days it should have taken, it took a week. We are thinking we can have our furniture delivered a week from Friday, and there should be enough empty rooms downstairs to store it in until we move all the way in.

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I’ve been dogshopping on petfinder.org. I fell in love with a sister/brother duo today, though I really don’t think we are up for two doggies. Here they are, if you want to take a gander:

http://search.petfinder.com/petnote/displaypet.cgi?petid=6765321
http://search.petfinder.com/petnote/displaypet.cgi?petid=6765372

I’d love it if we could get the girl and my in-laws, who are dog shopping too, could get the brother. But that’s probably a fair amount of wishful thinking.

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My ten year high school reunion is this weekend. I’ve gone back and forth about attending, but finally decided I’d rather go and not enjoy it (though I think I will) than not go and wonder if I would’ve enjoyed it. Plus, the organizer sent me the RSVP list, and enough people that I know and would enjoy seeing are planning to attend, so I think it’ll be nice.

I got a fever, and the prescription is...

MORE COWBELL!!

Actually, the kids had the fevers these past couple of days. Spud had it Sunday & Monday, and Noodle had it Monday & today. Poor kids. Luckily it only seems to be a fever. No vomitting or other problems. And I must say that I greatly prefer a sick 4 year old to a sick 19 month old. Noodle has probably slept or "rested" 80% of the time she's been ill, whereas Spud just stayed awake and whined and fussed.

As soon as I feel justified in spending money on unnecessary t-shirts, I'm going to order from these websites:
http://www.bustedtees.com/ and http://www.threadless.com/catalog

Here are a couple of my favorites from BustedTees




So, other than sick kids and house stuff, not too much has been going on. We have been shopping for furniture, which is quite fun when the kids are happy. I really am looking forward to having so much space to live in. The thought of all that room makes me giddy. We will be ready to close next week sometime, but I think the actual move-in date will be pushed back. The house M & S (the sellers of our future house) are buying won't be available until mid-August, so those people will be "renting" the house back for a couple of weeks after they close. I'm dying to get out of here, but a couple of extra weeks won't kill us.

Five Years

David & I have been married five years today! Though I am thinking that we have some sort of anniversary curse--last year we stayed home with two sick kids, and this year we both had uneasy stomachs, so we had to forego our dinner plans. We did end up going to see the new "Pirates of the Carribbean" movie, and that was a lot of fun. We'd originally thought to go have a little getaway without the kids, but it fell through for a variety of reasons.

Family Reunion

We had a family reunion for my mom's side last weekend at Bear Lake in Idaho. It was a lot of fun. We spent a whole day at the "beach" (okay, shore) and the kids had a blast. You had to go out a long ways before it was even waist deep, so all of the kids enjoyed the freedom that afforded. Noodle was too busy gallavanting around with cousins or on her own to be bothered posing for pictures, but here she is wandering about in the lake (she has the hat on).



And Spud had a great time splashing and mucking around in the shallows. He couldn't have been happier.

More house photos

Here are a few more pictures of the house--entryway, office & living room. We got the contract all signed, so now we just have to get the loan finalized. WHOO HOO!!!

HOUSE!!

We are buying this house!! I'm so excited! Close date is August 8th.

busy busy

Well, I know I have a couple of readers, so I just wanted to let you know what I've been up to. They asked me to be a guest blogger over at Feminist Mormon Housewives (http://www.feministmormonhousewives.org), so that has taken up most of my blog time & energy this past week.

But here is what happens when you give a kid a cupcake:


And this is what happens when you can't lock that same kid out of the bathroom when his sister is in the tub:

Jeremiah was a bullfrog...

Or rather, Spot (that's his nickname, his real name is Kermit) is an African Dwarf Frog. The newest species to join our family. Noodle's Pop-pop won him at the carnival for her today. So of course we had to go buy a little habitat & accesories for the "free" frog. And because I excessively worry about taking good care of all our animal companions, I'll probably have to go out and buy a little aerator for his habitat, too so he has abundant oxygen. But we didn't get that today, and I think he'll be fine. I might put Admiral Chubbs' aerator in there for a bit tomorrow.

In other news, while the kids were at the carnival, David and I went rollerblading for the first time in two years. It was a blast! The only injury was a large blister on David's no-arch foot. Poor guy. I'd forgotten how fun rollerblading is. And the river trail we went on was recently repaved and so it is just perfect for rollerblading. Very fun.

Then we went to the mall to continue our quest for the perfect bike trailer and ended up buying $$$ worth of Dead Sea salt nail/skin care products from this really cool Jewish guy named Eli. It's nice stuff, though, and isn't it always more fun to buy from people who are really cool? We think so.

AND David's best friend from high school and his wife welcomed a baby girl into their family this morning, which is really exciting. She was about 13 days early, 6 lb 7 oz and mother and baby are both doing great.

What more can you ask of a Saturday?

and he can sing, too!

One of my former roommates introduced me to the music of Sarah Brightman, and on the one album of her's that I bought she sings a couple duets with the male singer Andrea Bocelli. I remember this roommate and a fellow vocal-performing friend of hers discussing Andrea Bocelli, and they were just raving and gushing over him, and how amazing it is that he is such a good singer, blah blah blah, because he's BLIND. I didn't think of it too much at the time, but after David & I were married and were listening to this CD in the car (it's "nighttime" music for the kids) I thought of it again and realized how inane it was. He's blind, but he can still sing!! Amazing. Oh wait, being blind wouldn't really make it all that hard to sing now, would it. As long as you have a good memory, it seems like you could do just fine. I think I'm a bit more impressed by blind players of instruments, or deaf singers. A deaf singer would be truly amazing, but I think that's about impossible. Well, not for them to sing, but for them to be good at it. Which reminds me of poor Beethoven in his last years, trying so hard to hear the music he was composing that he cut the legs off of a piano to better feel the vibrations. I love Beethoven's music. When I was in Vienna I got to visit his former home, and also his grave. He was a neat man.