Whatever works

Well mom, even if they aren't using it for cars, at least they are getting some use out if it.

(For those that don't know, this ia a car rug/mat. It has non-slip stuff on the underside.)

Happy Birthday Jamie!

My youngest sister turned 12 today! Makes me feel so old. I remember my mom was driving me to a weeklong J-school camp at ISU the summer before I started college when she broke the news to me. I was 18.

It was always weird coming home from school on break because there was a baby in the house who I barely knew. I feel like I helped raise my other two sisters (I was 10 and 12 when they were born), but this little girl, heck, she could have been mine (and sometimes I think people thought she was).

She was so sweet and cuddly then.



Now, she is full of attitude, but we love her anyway! Happy birthday little sis!

Explosion

Today was my morning to sleep in. I managed to get to 6:30 a.m. before waking up to a commotion outside the bedroom door. Nick and Zander were yelling at each other. No biggy. I rolled over, hoping to nod back off again.

A few minutes later I hear Nick apologizing to Mike: "I didn't mean to break it Daddy." I wondered what was going on, then decided Mike probably had it under control, so I once again tried to fall back asleep. Then I heard the sound of glass being picked up off the floor in the hallway (the tinging noise it makes when it hits other pieces of glass in your palm is quite distinct). At that point I realized that even if Mike had it under control I should probably get up and see what was going on. This is what I found:







Mike has learned that I like documentation and grabbed the point and shoot to get these pictures before he started cleaning up. Apparently Nick and Zander were fighting over the nightlight. Zander was trying to take it out of the socket. Nick didn't want him to. A tugging match ensued and then the lightbulb exploded and the bottom of the nightlight singed Nick's hand. I'm not sure why, but it didn't actually burn it -- just got it a little sooty. Somehow Zander managed to escape from being cut by the exploding lightbulb, too.

On the positive side, the little mishap led us to another problem we've been having with our kitchen outlets and a quick call to Mike's dad (an electrician) fixed that, too.

5 a.m.

This is what happens when little boys wake up at 5 a.m. (or earlier) everyday for nearly two weeks and then only take one hour naps during the day.

They fall asleep while they are playing at 11:30 a.m., wearing mismatched p.j.s and tennis shoes with no socks. Isn't that a sight to behold.

Still trying

Nick is still trying really hard to stay awake all day. And some days, he still fails miserably. Today he fell asleep with the TV on, Zander playing and me cleaning up. And he stayed asleep through the TV on and Zander throwing a temper tantrum. He also stayed asleep while Zander poked him and yelled "Eat" when dinner was ready. Then he couldn't fall asleep last night. Yeah, that was great.

Getting things done

I freely admit I am not the best housekeeper. I loathe cleaning. But, I am also the kind of person that gets a little crazy when my house isn't at least mostly in order which causes a bit of a problem. I recently came across the Motivated Moms Web site and it has finally got my act in gear. I can't believe I am admitting this, but I paid $8 for a yearlong checklist of what to do each day to keep my house pretty darn clean. And so far it is working. Mike is pitching in. The boys are helping. And I feel like I can finally relax on the weekends because most everything is done during the week.

Nick has really gotten into it. At least a few days a week he comes home from school asking what we need to do to check off the list and then proceeds to help me with those things so he can make the checkmarks! It's great. I'm sure it won't last, but I will take the help for as long as I can get it.

It's raining, it's pouring

And in the middle of winter. Nick has been begging to go outside, but it has been so dang cold that I haven't wanted to send him out. The weekends it's been warm enough we've been too busy to be outside. Today he was begging and pleading to head outside, and I can't say I blame him. I'm a little sick of winter, too.

Zander has been sick (puked three times now), so I told Nick after I got Zander down for his nap I would take him outside. Little did I know it would be raining (in January) when Z finally went down. Well, I chickened out, but Mike was kind enough to bundle Nick up and head outside with him. They both came in about 30 minutes later dripping wet from the rain. And Nick took a spill in a snow/ice bank and scratched up his chin and cheek quite nicely. Gotta love winter.



Does this look like a face that was happy to be outside? Not so much -- but he was. I think this was right after he biffed it in the snow bank.


How about this face? Looks happy, huh? Look how wet his coat is. I can't say I blame him for looking cranky.

Lazy morning at home

Every few weeks I work a Friday night shift which leaves me home alone with the boys that morning. Unless we have a play date scheduled with friends these Friday mornings are usually pretty lazy. This one in particular started with Zander's favorite breakfast: "nonuts." I swear he has woke up asking for powdered sugar donuts (nonuts to him) everyday this week.





Nick watched one of his favorite cartoons: Dora the Explorer. He has no desire to watch Diego, just Dora. I blame it on the belly shirt she sports in every episode.



Then, Nick did a little work -- which eventually led to stickers being glued to the back of my kitchen chairs. This is why I refuse to purchase a nice dining room set. My kids would destroy it, and right now, I don't want to have to worry about it. So, my cheap college Kmart set will continue to live on until it no longer fits our family or can no longer withstand its abuse.



After Nick's work both boys colored with the Do-A-Dot markers they got for Christmas. I learned about these from an old college friend's Web site. She has lots of great ideas, though I am not sure these were one of them. The markers, which look like bingo dobbers, aren't really all that washable and are super messy. The kids love. I'm not yet sold.

Cootie

Nick loves playing games. One year, we thought we would be good parents and buy him a bunch. Boy, do we live to regret that year. Now we try to sidetrack him with puzzles. But, every once in awhile we get suckered into playing. Sometimes it's not too bad. Sometimes, well ... sometimes I'm not a very good parent. Right now, Nick loves Candyland and Cootie. Yeah, I'm not a huge fan of either. I'm more of a dominoes girl myself.





Mommy, Nick, and Daddy. Notice Nick won -- he's the only one with six legs. Heck, I didn't even have a mouth.

What about the bed?

So, I'm beginning to see a trend in my blog posts. There seems to be a lot of Zander sleeping. But, I love sleeping babies. They are so peaceful. And sometimes funny. Since moving into his big boy bed Zander has been fighting his naps. Sometimes it takes 5 minutes, others its 20. Today was somewhere in between, but he eventually gave up, unfortunately it was before he made it back to bed.

A few minutes after tucking him in I found him like this:


I took the picture, told him to go back to bed and left him to his own devices. I don't think he even tried to get out because just a few minutes later I found him like this:


And, yeah, I'll admit it. I left him in the bucket because I thought if he did fall asleep in there it would be so cute. I was right. :)

More Miss R

Sorry for the delay!! Here's a few more until you see the CD!

Cat nap

This is what too much Panther basketball will do to a little guy! We didn't get home until almost 9 p.m., which was well past Zander's bedtime. Unfortunately, this little 5-minute cat nap was enough to give him a short-lived second wind. After getting him in his PJs he got out of bed several times before finally giving in for the night.

Little Miss R

I didn't have much time to look through these before heading out tonight, but wanted to get at least one up, like I promised Miss R's momma! Hope you like it!

Those curls

I love baby hair. Nick had these great little curls and as soon as we cut his hair they were gone, never to be seen again. So, I have continually put off cutting Zander's hair. He's had a few bang trims (mostly because he couldn't see otherwise), but I have yet to touch the bulk of his hair. And it is those darn curls that keep me holding on. I absolutely LOVE them and really don't want them to go away. That, and his long hair keeps him looking like my baby. Once it's buzzed, he'll be a little boy, and that will make me sad. I want to keep him little and cuddly forever!

I wanna drive the zamboni

Nick is totally infatuated with zambonis. I truly believe that is 1/2 the reason he wants to go to hockey games (1/4 is for the refs and the other 1/4 is for the actual game). He will get out his hockey nets he got for Christmas, play 2 minutes of hockey, then move the nets out of the kitchen so he can use his shopping cart or the toy vaccuum to zamboni the ice/kitchen floor. He also uses his lego garbage can to zamboni the table. He gets mad when the televised hockey games cut to commercial between periods. The list goes on, but I think you get the picture.

So this weekend Felix, one of Mike's co-workers, offered to let Nick come down and see the zamboni. In part, I think Felix feels bad because he has shown up at our house on a few occassions to take Mike away for several days for business. He's done his best to make it up to the kid (we've also seen Felix's two vintage fire trucks -- real ones folks, not models), but Nick still isn't sure about him. So today, we watched Felix zamboni the ice and then headed down the to garage to learn all about what happens behind the scenes. I'm not sure how much Nick understood, but he sure looked like he was taking it all in. Unfortunately, he is so dang shy he rarely smiles around strangers which then makes it look like he's not having any fun. But, I know he did. A mom can tell these kinds of things.

First Felix showed Nick how the zamboni shaves ice from the arena and collects it in a bin on the front of the machine. Once the zamboni is parked, the front end lifts up and drops all the ice into a pool of warm water to be melted.





Then he showed him how really hot water squirts up from the back of the machine to create the new layer of ice. If you look closely you can see the water. A heavy white towel then smooths the water out so the new layer freezes evenly.



Then, Nick got to sit on the zamboni. We had walked over to that side of the machine and Nick grabbed my hand and inched toward the driver's seat. Felix, on the left, was kind enough to offer to let him sit up there, as long as he didn't touch anything. I'm pretty sure that is a repair bill we couldn't have afforded.



Felix showed Nick some other cool stuff, but by that time his attention was wandering back to the ice where the Jr. Hawks were playing Omaha. And then I had to get a picture of me and Zander, just to prove we were there!

Transitive law of Legos

Mike loves Legos. Nick loves firetrucks. Mike loves Nick therefore Nick loves Lego firetrucks.

Just like Mommy

Zander loves Nick's new Christmas present. He puts this little camera up to his eye and walks around telling everyone to say "Cheese." Funny, because I don't ever tell them to do that. I'm not quite sure where he picked that up from.



Then "I see it." He wants to view his masterpiece.

Sam the Fireman

Around Halloween Nick saw his first Sam the Fireman DVD. Since then he has been in love with anything fireman related. If we drive by a station he has to crane his neck to look inside. The only thing he wanted for his birthday was a fire truck that made siren noises. And for Christmas, we bought him the only two Sam the Fireman movies we could find. BIG MISTAKE --- at least for us. He LOVES them. I'm ready to burn them. But, at least they get his imagination going. He can't just sit and watch them. As soon as the fire alarm sounds he grabs his helmet, which my mom got him for Christmas, and starts zooming around the house telling everyone they have to get out. I guess I should be happy he has at least learned what to do in a fire, right? Oh, and Zander is infatuated with the helmet too. As soon as Nick drops it, he scoops it up and runs around yelling "Fire, Fire." It's really quite cute. Except when they fight over it. Like this: