Snore

Image from here.

It is 12:34am CST (at least it is that time right now, when I finish typing this sentence and when you read this it will be a totally different time, but I wanted you to know anyway).

Now it is 12:35am. For me.
And I am sitting at this computer typing in words listening to the rumbling sounds coming from a snoozing somebody. A few minutes ago somebody else was talking about something.  Busy night here, huh?

I'm waiting for it to be midnight April 6th, 2010 MST. I was going to go to bed and wake up for the event, but I stayed up too late and didn't want to do the whole go to sleep, wake up, be groggy, wake all the way up and go back to bed again and not be able to go back to sleep. Did that two nights ago when some rude young neighbors decided to antagonize the dog. Not fun.

Tonight will be fun. miss h's enrollment for fall classes opens and we're hitting it right when it opens. 
(Yay, she wants me around for this!)

Very far cry from the days when I went to a giant gym and waited in line for hours and hours only to find out what I wanted was full or canceled.

I still have nightmares that I am in college and it's finals time. Only I haven't been to class - ever - and I can't find the room the exam is being given in. Oh, yes, it's a doozy and bothers me greatly.

And now I will share a family story that has become legend:

Once upon a time, we had a little boy who woke up numerous times every night. He said a monster woke him up and was very scared. It was a difficult period in his and our little lives.

One day my mr. was taking a nap on the couch in the living room. little mr. b was playing in his room down the hall. little mr. b came out in to the living room and said to me, "Mommy, the monster's here."
So being a good mommy, I encouraged him to face his fears and lead me to the monster. (Hoping of course that we could deal with the problem and be free of the monster.)

little mr. b took my hand and walked me over to his snoring dad and said, "That's the monster noise that wakes me up."

Now, if you will excuse me, I need to go ask someone turn on his side.
Good night.
12:51am.

Sunday, Sunday, Sunday (on Saturday)

Today's a big day in the Mormon circle of the world.
Actually, today and tomorrow.
It's General Conference weekend.
Happens twice a year.
First weekend in April and first weekend in October.
It's a time where we can be fed spiritually and hear the messages our Heavenly Father wants us to hear.
For our time.
Right now.
Today.

So, if you'd like to join the family, you are totally invited.
(We'll be playing this bingo game with m&ms and enjoying our time together.)
If you can't make it to our house, you can access Conference in quite a few different ways.
(And know, that if you can't watch or listen live, you can always access it later. The directions are there.)

Here's a link to the Church news & events website:
http://lds.org/church/events/181st-general-conference-of-the-church?lang=eng
Scroll down to "How do I watch?" and you can choose the best option for you.

Toast

Image found here.

Today's show and tell item was supposed to start with the letter "T."
little mr. j wanted to take the toaster.
After some cajoling, he settled on toast.
When he came home he told us that, "This was the first time ever in the history of my school that someone has brought toast for show and tell."
Yay us!

And in more preschool antics, he came home with one of those very coveted tooth shaped container charm necklaces-you know the ones the spoiled kids get when they lose a tooth at school-and he told me, "Mom, Mom, I lost a tooth! [pause] April Fools!"

I wondered if his teacher might have told him to do that to get back for the toast.
(She's got a very fun sense of humor.)
(The tooth necklace was a little reward for remembering to bring your show and tell.)
(Something we've forgot in the past few weeks, and will not forget again.)
('I' is next week's letter. I suggested ice that's melted. He wasn't impressed.
He would like to bring his friend, Isacc.)

When I asked him if he heard that April Fool's joke at school, he said, "No, I made it up myself, on the bus."
Good night, we are going to have to take great care on future April 1sts.
Or else we'll be toast.

There's a Fence Blocking Me

This is one of many pictures that I did not take.

I was driving on a freeway and didn't feel like

it would be very safe to take my attention off the road,

but wanted so badly a picture of the Utah

mountains that I said to my awesome cousin,

Heidi,

"Would you please take some pictures for me?"

And she did.

And I'm glad.

Because it looks like I'm having my annual

(maybe bi-annual or quarterly)

mental freak out.

This time it's my identity.

Well, my future identity.

Who will I be?

What will I do?

Why can't I get it together and keep up the house?

I have a daughter leaving in June to start college.

(That's what prompted the Utah trip-checking out things.)

I have a baby who'll be in school full time in September.

I have a husband who is very involved in lots of things, but still likes some attention.

I have two other tender hearted kids who have their own special needs.

(And I don't mean they are special needs kids, I mean they each have things they are dealing with - that, as a mom, I get the divine priveledge of helping them work through.)

I finished college.

I chose not to have a career.

I (really, we) chose to start our family young.

I (we) worked hard to get my mr. through school.

I told myself that I'd "go for it" when the kids were older.

But now I am wondering how much older.

I worry about how we'll make it,

even though I know it always works out.

And I feel like there is something wonderful hiding behind a fence,

waiting for me to get through to it.

I would really like to know what it is.

My hand on the wheel of an awesome rental car with my dad's hat on the dash.

Conversations

Image from here.

I finished our taxes. I know I should have done this before March 1, as we now have a "student" in the house, but, I didn't, and now we will deal with the consequences. Oh well.
I will do better next year.
And I will learn more about FAFSA.
Yay.

"Precious Father, why have you given me this desire to wrestle and then made me such a stinky warrior?"
--Nacho

 little mr. j has had a weird fever that comes on hard and then breaks (very sweatily breaks).
Then it goes away for a while and then it comes back. He plays, plays, plays and then crashes.
I've kept him home from PreK since Wednesday.
He's been doing better today. That fever tried to pop up again at 10am, but I think we made it go away.
Today was class picture day and I didn't want him to miss that, so I emailed his teacher (yesterday) and asked if it was ok if I brought him in just for the picture and she called back while I was taking a nap with him and his breaking fever on the couch. Her email wasn't working but she wanted me to tell him that they missed him and of course he could come for the picture and she was sorry she woke me up. I believe I told her I didn't mind and thank you, but I'm not quite sure. All I knew was that I was now awake, someone was talking to me and I was wet with sweat.

He smiled real cute for the picture and tried to explain to his friends that he wasn't really there.
He was there,
but his friends weren't noticing.

He has a bit of a snotty nose.
That's it.
Yesterday, during the fever, I asked him how he felt? "Does your tummy hurt? Throat? Are you achy?"
He said, "When I get down from a chair, I walk like a penguin."
OK.
Fever talk?
I don't know, he was pretty coherent.

Right now, he and miss s are watching Nacho Libre in the family room.
Earlier today he and I picked miss s up from school to take her to a doctor appt.
The doctor tried to talk little mr. j into working for her, but when she found out he had weak phone skills, she said she couldn't hire him.  So sad.
But, as we were going out to our car, there were five business men in slacks, light blue polo shirts and a couple of cigarettes having a conversation two vehicles over from ours.
miss s said she didn't think that many people smoked anymore.

They were talking about Nacho Libre.
I think they worked for COX (cable provider).
We use DISH.

Yesterday she told me about a conversation that she walked by at school.
It had to do with underwear.
And Mormons.
And Mormon underwear.
She just kept walking,
but I don't think she walked very fast because she told me an awful lot about that conversation.

Now a joke,
Say this to someone, "What are you doing under there?
And when they say, "Under where?"
You say, "BAHAHAHAHAHA."

And a conversation that my mr sat by during lunch today (it's a copy of an email he sent me):
the mrs,  my total scout mileage is 908 miles for 2010. Attached is the monthly breakdown. Thank you for taking care of our taxes again. I’m eavesdropping on some guys talking about the errors in the Book of Mormon. The interesting thing is they agree it’s a great book and has good content, but they are picking at things like Nephi writing about Laban’s “steel” sword before steel was invented. Now they are talking about how American Indians couldn’t have descended from Lehi because they were here thousands of years before the history of the Book of Mormon. Now they are saying, “I could have written a Book of Mormon”. Pretty interesting...

Take care, your mr

Only his miles were wrong and he sent me a follow up email. And we don't call each other the mr and mrs.

I wonder how all this connects. Because it just has to.
I'm going to go take my temperature.
Good night.
Hug hug, kiss kiss, hug hug, big kiss, little hug, kiss kiss, little kiss.
--from Nacho (& me)

Snippy

These are not mine. Mine cost a lot less than these ones.

I got mine at Westlake ACE Hardware. I don't know which lake it's West of, but if it's the lake I'm thinking of, Ace is REALLY West of it.

The snazzy image came from here.

So here's a list of what's been trimmed, cut down or taken out this week:

a baby field of  love grass

(ok, this was trimmed the week before, but I'm still counting it)

8 wisdom teeth

little mr. b's finger and toe nails

(finally)

my eyebrows

(actually, plucked)

dead decorative tall grass in the landscaping

dead decorative tall grass in the landscaping

dead decorative tall grass in the landscaping

dead decorative tall grass in the landscaping

dead decorative tall grass in the landscaping

crazy knockout rose bush

crazy knockout rose bush

crazy knockout rose bush

(I know this was wrong, but they were driving me crazy.)

And, because I was on a tear yesterday

(it began with the deads and ended with heads),

little mr. b's hair

little mr. j's hair

my toenails

Alyson's toenails

(I was only a witness.)

And,

at exactly 9:23pm on this day, 22 March, 2011,

the next to last baby molar of a certain

young man.

(I wonder if the tooth fairy will remember to come tonight.)

Today the big Oklahoma wind visited again. It was garbage day. It's not good to have a big windy day and a big garbage day coincide. Makes for a very large mess. Lesson: when you live in a windy area, bag your garbage well before you put it in the bin.  Our bins are big. I filled one up with dead decorative grass and knockout rose debris. It wasn't very heavy and kept on tipping over-along with about 5 others on our street. little mr. j and I did quite the secret service project for our neighbors.  Hence the lesson, because no one wants to pick up other people's ickys and blue melted ice cream. After we finished, we retrieved our yard waste from other folk's yards, got stabbed by some thorns and fought with the bin a couple more times. I finally found something big and broken in the garage and threw it in to give the thing some weight. Now it's gone.

This afternoon, when I came home, there was a wind powered tonka truck driving around in our driveway and an empty trash bin with wanderlust traveling down the road, half a house away.

So tonight, I dare you to ask, "why so snippy?"

Sunday School

I hope this week that I'll not be in the thick of thin things.
How about you?