Welcome!

This week marked our first visitors. But I'm getting ahead of myself....first things first.

Because it was THAT day
Monday, September 12 2011

I'll be honest....I'm behind on blogging and so it's now been two weeks since I took this picture and I can't remember the exact story behind it.




I do remember it was a rough day and so about an hour before bedtime I declared I had had ENOUGH at which point I told Mike he was in charge of putting the kids to bed and I retreated to a bubble bath with a book. Hence the picture. What I don't remember is why it was such a bad day.

Guess it just goes to prove the saying "this too shall pass." Because apparently it did.


Follow Your Heart
Tuesday, September 13 2011

Today I got to go with Adam on his first 2nd grade field trip. They have been learning about all the different body systems so to end their unit they went to the Halle Heart Children's Museum.




It was actually very cool. Except that at one of the stops on our tour we learned about how healthy eating helps our hearts. Our tour guide talked about how much fat you should (or shouldn't) eat each day and taught about reading nutrition labels and paying close attention to serving sizes. So now Adam has become our nutrition label police. Which means I now have to eat ice cream after he goes to bed so he won't give me a lecture about how much fat is in each serving.

Color me Green
Wednesday, September 14 2011

They finally started putting the exterior color on the house. So-for those of you who asked, this is what color it is going to be.



When my mother-in-law saw it she called it puke green. I prefer "Desert Green".

And speaking of my mother-in-law.....

Visitors!
Thursday, September 15 2011

Today our first visitors arrived! Grandma and grandpa must really love the kids because they drove 11 hours to sleep on an air mattress and go out in the 110 degree heat! (Back in May before we even left, when they were planning this trip none of us had any idea it would still be so hot in September!)



Here we go again
Friday, September 16 2011

A couple of weeks ago we went to the McCormick-Stillman Railroad Park.

When I asked the kids where they wanted to take grandma and grandpa when they arrived they unanimously replied they wanted to go back to the railroad park.

So, back to the railroad park we went!



Big House
Saturday, September 17 2011

Today, still trying to entertain our visitors, we headed southward to Coolidge to the Casa Grande National Monument.



You can see from how tiny my kids look next to it that it really is a BIG house!

Parting is such sweet sorrow
Sunday, September 18 2011

Today we bid farewell to our first visitors. I had intended on taking a picture of then hugging the kids goodbye, or of them pulling out of the driveway. But forgot. So instead you get a picture of the empty driveway taken hours after they had left.

100

We reached 100 days in Arizona this week. Of course I didn't realize it at the time so the day slipped away without any fanfare. Just as well I guess. It was a busy week and if I had known it was 100 days I would've felt obligated to do something and then been stressed about having one more thing to do.


Trader Joe's or bust!
Monday, September 5, 2011

We have been living in Arizona now for 3 months now and it took us this long to FINALLY make our first trip to Trader Joe's. (We didn't have them in Utah.) I was excited about the yummy assortment of things to eat inside, the kids were only excited about the bus cut out outside.





Oops!
Tuesday, September 6, 2011

Confession-I didn't actually take this picture on Tuesday....I took it Wednesday morning. Because Tuesday I had 2 boys up at 3:30 in the morning with stomach cramps and yet more diarrhea. (They went nearly all day Monday with no incident so I really thought we were finally done!) I'll spare you the gorey details but this morning's events prompted me to finally take them to the Dr. for it. So I spent the day trying to find a new pediatrician that was covered by my insurance and then dragging kids to the Dr. all while hoping nobody would have to go at just the wrong time.....and suffice it to say it's the first day since we arrived that I honestly just plain forgot to take a picture. I guess it was bound to happen at some point.



But I took this lovely picture of the house the next morning during the school drop off. It's coming right along, don't you think?

At your service
Wednesday, September 7, 2011

Today was my first day volunteering at the school. I love spending time in my kids' classrooms. (Ug, I have always hated, however, making the possessive plural of words....I always question if I am doing it right.)

Anyway-today I was in Adam's classroom. They earn money for turning in homework on time and for following directions and such and once a month they get to spend their money at the class store. So I helped man the store. It is interesting to see what 7 year olds get excited about. And I've said it before but I will say it again, I ADORE my son's teacher. Seriously. Looking forward to working much more with her this year!



Re-purposed
Thursday, September 8, 2011

We have a square table. I love my square table. Except that I can't find a table cloth to fit it. I've been looking for MONTHS for a table cloth that fits with no luck.

Today I was wandering around Target and found this shower curtain on clearance. When out of the blue it hit me-the shower curtain was exactly the size I've been looking for in a table cloth! Apparently I've just been looking on the wrong isle all these months.



This is one of the plastic shower curtains so the kids can spill on it and it wipes right off. And it fits my table!!!! I'm in love.

Sweet Serendipity
Friday, September 9, 2011

Adam has been reading Mr. Popper's Penguins. I told him once he finished it maybe we'd go see the movie. He finished it earlier this week so I figured today would be a good day to pick the kids up from school and surprise them by taking them to the movie. So I started checking online to see if I could find it playing anywhere.

It was just my luck that starting today the Harkins Theaters have a free movie playing at each of their theaters in honor of their 78th anniversary and at the theater closest to the kids' school the free movie was Mr. Popper's Penguins.

I could not have planned that better if I had tried!



Let's get down to business
Saturday, September 10, 2011

I spent pretty much the entire day in my bed room watching Tamara Lackey's Business course on CreativeLive.



I  have no idea what my kids did all day. But they didn't break anything and nobody got hurt.

Believe in Magic
Sunday, September 11, 2011

Yesterday Zoey received a very special delivery. (Okay, there was something for me, too. But she's cuter.)






















This is her all ready for church, wearing her very special new necklace. She is completely smitten with it.

   

Home Alone

For the first time since we arrived in Arizona Mike had to travel for work. He was gone all week and although we survived it was a long week. We are still new enough in this house that I don't quite know all it's creaks and quirks so with Mike gone every little noise at night freaked me out. Plus I don't really know any of our neighbors yet so I worried (more then was necessary) about what would happen if I did need help.

Turns out it was a lot of worry for nothing (it usually is) and we all got along just fine.


What's for Dinner?
Monday, August 29, 2011

I hate cooking. I mean HATE cooking. Seriously. I have no passion or talent for it. Which means I procrastinate meal planning. Which means I NEVER know what we are going to have for dinner. Ever.

Tonight I had a bunch of random ingredients: canned crescent rolls, some cooked chicken, broccoli, shredded cheese. So I rolled out a crescent rolls, put a little of everything else on top, then slapped another rolled out roll on top and pinched the sides together, sprinkled a little parmesan cheese on top for good measure and voila!



I thought for sure my kids would think they were great because all the ingredients are things they typically eat. But of course everybody found something to complain about. Hence the reason I hate dinner time!

Picture Day!
Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Today was picture day. I don't actually buy the individual picture packages (I do purchase the class picture) but the kids still got all dolled up just the same.





Don't try this at home
Wednesday, August 31, 2011

We stopped by the house today after school to check on the progress. It never ceases to amaze me how fast these guys work. Mudding and taping of the entire house completely done in one day. The kids were especially impressed by the guys on stilts.



As you can see, it was a very hot day.

Happy Anyday
Thursday, September 1, 2011

Harrison's birthday was 35 days ago. I guess we just like to keep the party going at our house.



Happy Friday?
Friday, September 2, 2011

When I put this shirt on this morning I was optimistic. Turns out it was anything BUT a Happy Friday.



The short list includes:
 AC quit working, again
 Mike had to catch a later flight (LONG frustrating story) so wasn't going to get home until very late
 Both my boys began what turned into over a week of diarrhea

What a way to begin the holiday weekend!

Trains! Trains! Trains!
Saturday September 3, 2011

We decided we needed to do something super fun to make up for how craptastic Friday was. I had originally planned on just heading to the community pool but with 2 boys with mild diarrhea the day before we figured we should be good parents and keep them out of the pool.

But the boys weren't feeling sick at all. So we headed to Scottsdale to the McCormick-Stillman Train Park. It was HOT but that just meant that nobody was there. The kids all had a FANTASTIC time.



We did have one little bathroom accident but luckily I had brought along clean shorts, just in case.

Mother in Training
Sunday, September 4, 2011

Zoey LOVES to bake. Which she so doesn't get from me. (See Monday.....) But it was kind of a lazy Sunday afternoon (due to continued diarrhea we stayed home from church) so I let her mix up some pumpkin chocolate chip muffins.

I'm hoping that when she is just a little bit older she can just take over all the cooking permanently at our house.

To tumblr or not to tumblr? That is the question.

Not that anybody cares....but it's my blog so I can ramble aimlessly if I want.....but I have spent a considerable amount of time this week working on transferring this little blog of mine over to tumblr. Because I was looking for ways to keep up on this blog without it being such a big ordeal at the end of each week to get my pics from my phone to flickr then to my blog and tumblr has a really great iPhone app for posting straight from my phone.

So I spent way too much time trying to make my life easier when just writing this blog post would've been faster. Do you have weeks like that????

And after all that time spent I have decided, for now at least, to just stay here. Lots of reasons why that are boring and I won't go into but mostly because tumblr doesn't support comments and I'd be lying if I didn't admit I like getting comments from ya'll. It makes me feel connected....and since we moved and I don't have friends here yet and I'll admit, I've been lonely. So feeling connected to a vibrant online community has become more important to me then ever.

Although I am still considering switching to a daily post instead of a weekly one....I don't know I'm torn. Are these weekly posts getting too long? Heck yea they are-because I'm still yammering away about this! Less typing and more pictures already!

Zoey's Home!
Monday, August 22, 2011

The only thing missing from this picture is her shoes thrown haphazardly into the mix. Having Zoey in our home is a little like living constantly in the wake of a hurricane.



I think she may be genetically predisposed to mess making and hoarding. Do I try and train this out of her or just try to manage the best I can but mostly just love her just like she is?

Sleeping Handsome
Tuesday, August 23, 2011

He doesn't nap much these days but today Harrison crawled up on my lap and feel asleep. Is there ANYTHING as precious as a sleeping child?



Notice the super matted down hair-ALL my kids sweat profusely when they fall asleep. Seriously. One of these days I should take a picture of on of their pillows after they have been asleep so you can see the huge sweat spots left behind by their sweaty little precious heads.

Not a commentary on gas prices
Wednesday, August 24, 2011

This is actually a story about me having to get gas in my pajamas.




We were running late this morning. I typically get up before the kids and have already showered before they awake. It's just easier that way. But this morning I just couldn't pull myself out of bed. Then the kids couldn't get moving. And shoes were missing and homework wasn't in the backpack and so I didn't make it to the shower before time to start the school trek. Which meant that for the first time since school started I was taking the kids to school in my pajamas. (Which means I didn't have on a bra.)

Which would have been fine except that as soon as we got in the car it starting dinging and flashing at me that I was very low on gas. Why didn't I get gas last night? Why?

The school run is a long drive and my choices were all bleak. I could stop and get gas, but we were already running late and would this make the kids late for school?

I thought about trying to get the kids to school then getting gas on the way home. But there isn't a gas station near the school. And when you add all the idling in the drop off line on top of the miles to school I wasn't 100% sure I'd make it.

Still I almost chanced it until I remembered I was in pajamas. And this is our only car so I ran out of gas I couldn't call Mike and beg him to come get me. If I ran out of gas I would be hiking in the Arizona heat in my pajamas and slippers to get gas. And if I ran out anywhere close to the school I would be hiking in the Arizona heat in my pajamas in front of all the other school parents.

So stopped first and got gas. And we weren't late. We pulled up after the first bell but before the second, cutting it closer then I like but at least I didn't run out of gas in my pajamas!


Sweet
Thursday, August 25, 2011

So many hours to fill while the older kids are at school-today he played Candy Land by himself for about 45 minutes.



I would've played with him but it was actually much more amusing to me to watch and listen to him play by himself. The little gingerbread men would talk to each other as they moved along the board and at times I couldn't contain my giggles at what they would say to each other.

Swiftly and Skillfully 
Friday, August 26, 2011

A crew of 6 men sheet rocked our entire home today. The whole thing. When we finished the basement in our Utah home it took Mike weeks and weeks to do the sheet rock.

I know you can't really compare because Mike was still working a full time job and was often times working by himself. But it is still amazing to me to see how fast they worked.



These two for, example, where throwing up these ceiling pieces like it was no big deal. They grab the together and then jump up those step ladders like nobody's business. They hoisted it over their head as if it was light as a feather. (My dad has the bump on his head from helping Mike put up ceiling pieces to prove that they are not in fact as light as a feather.) And then one handed they'd place a nail and then pound it in with 3 swings.

I'm thinking that the transition from construction worker to Cirque du Soleil performer is not as big of a stretch as you'd imagine. Especially the roofers. Have you seen they way the dangle off the side of a pitched roof?

Inspired
Saturday, August 27, 2011

Too hot to go outside, too stir crazy to stay home we did a little window shopping today. These are some of the things that inspired me.



I am very in love these days with cool colors. Greens and blue hues I guess remind me of someplace tropical. I am also drawn to geometric shapes. So of course I loved this chair!



I loved this armorie as well. Green and squares! I actually like Zoey is that bright yellow next to it. I feel inspired to spray paint my bed green and my night stands yellow.

A Robot Fairy 
Sunday, August 28, 2011

Zoey found the box of dress ups that I had hidden the back of a closet hoping that could just stay in their box until we moved into the new house. But she was NOT having that. She found that box fair and square and she WAS going to dress up.....as a robot fairy?



And why shouldn't she be a fairy robot? That girl dances to the beat of her own drum and I love her for it.