A big day at our house

Zachary got his braces off today. So of course I had to take before and after pictures. He only had to wear the braces for 10 months and we figured he got off lucky considering Scott wore them for 3 years and I had them for 5 years. He requested a caramel apple to celebrate and I already went to Rocky Mountain chocolate factory and got his favorite grasshopper apple.

Our "baby" turned 8 today.

This is the cake the Riley insisted that we (read I) make. We saw it in the Rachel Ray magazine and I showed it to Riley. I said, "hey Riley isn't this a cool cake and it's got your favorite cotton candy on it". She decided then and there that she needed this cake for her birthday. Those of you who know me well know that I don't bake cakes. Paint a house? Sure! Use my power saw to install molding or baseboard? No problem. Remodel a bathroom? I'm there. Cake baking is just my downfall. I cannot get the friggin' cake out of the pan without making a mess. I'm not good at frosting and I just plain don't have patience for things like preheating an oven, mixing certain ingredients in a certain order, waiting for the cake to cool. I could go on and on about my baking issues. So this was a true test for me and I can't tell you how relieved I was that it turned out and as you can see from the picture below Riley was truly pleased with her cake. Oh, and it was delicious and we did not have a crumb left.
























On to the party details. We had about 20 family members over for dinner which was hamburgers, pasta salad, chips/dip, veggies and dip. All simple and all also requested by the birthday girl (maybe she was making up for that cake request). So the kids all played in the backyard, the men were glued to the USC game and the rest of us sat outside and enjoyed the perfect weather. Then she opened her large haul of presents. Thankfully she got lots of Barnes and Noble giftcards to feed her book addiction and tons of totally cute new clothes. Scott and I gave her a pink nintendo ds which she opened before we even woke up this morning, the little sneak.
Right now she is in her room with her cousin snuggled in sleeping bags with the lights off watching a new DVD on her portable DVD player and having a great time.
All in all she had a great birthday and now I have just over 2 months to get ready for Zachary's 12th birthday, the last one before the big teens. YIKES!

We now have a trumpet player in the house

Lord help me!!! This does not seem like a quiet instrument. We went out today and rented his trumpet, got his music book and cleaning kit. He starts band on Tuesday and will have practice twice a week. He will practice every night at home for at least 30 minutes though. Maybe I should have picked up some ear plugs and tylenol while I was out. At least to get me through those first few weeks. LOL!
Seriously though I'm really glad that Zachary is getting more involved in extra curricular activites this year. He has applied for student leadership, joined an archery class and now band. When he decides to get off his duff he really gets off his duff!

Uncontrollable urges

Riley got her first ticket of the school year. Not bad for my girl, she made it almost 3 weeks. Her ticket stated that she "had the uncontrollable urge to take one of her neighbors chicken nuggets at lunch." So I'm asking her why she did this and it goes something like this

me: Riley why did you take someone else's food?
R: I don't know. I could not help myself. They looked so good
Zachary (yes he had to chime in): Were they McDonald's chicken nuggets?
R: No
Z: Were they cafeteria chicken nuggets?
R: yes
Z: Those SUCK! Why would you even want to take one of those?
me: Ummm, excuse me. Can we focus on the real issue here? Why did you take someone else's food Riley?
R: I told you.... I COULD NOT HELP MYSELF!!
me: Well, what happened when you took her chicken nugget?
R: She got upset and told the proctor. The proctor (insert big tears here) made me go sit at a table by myself for the rest of lunch and then I could not eat anymore because it made me sad.

So hopefully a lesson learned that you don't get to help yourself to your neighbors lunch no matter how good it looks.

Laundry woes

My dear husband who still insists "I don't know how to do laundry". Was sorting laundry today. He told me to come double check the sorting before he put stuff in. Now I will openly admit I am totally anal about how the laundry is sorted, but I figured he has been doing the laundry for a while now and I was not coming to double check it. What was the worst he could do? Put some lights in with whites? I figured he knew enough that there would not be a laundry disaster. Well, think again. I had a pair of pants sitting on my dresser, which to me is a clear indication that it does not go in the laundry. It's not IN the laundry hamper right? It's not even on the floor near the laundry hamper, which seems to be where all of Scott's clothes end up. No, it was clearly placed on my dresser. It was on my dresser because they are nice lined dress pants from Ann Taylor that I wear to work and they have to be dry cleaned. Well, Scott did not interpret their location as I would have and he threw them in with the darks AND dried them on the regular cycle. Aaargh!! I really do appreciate him doing all the laundry, but I am so bummed about my pants.

I'm bored!!!!

Ok, it's too friggin' hot to go outside (108) and today was my first day off with the kids back in school. You would think it would be exciting to have the day to myself. Nope, I was bored out of my mind by 1 pm. Usually I would run errands, work in the yard, or go out and do SOMETHING, but since it was so hot I just stayed inside. I did go out for a coffee after the kids went to school at 8:30, but it was already over 90 so I came back home after that. Now I have 3 more days ahead with no plans and it will be just as hot. I would go to my sister's apt. to swim, but she is going out of town and I don't like to go without her. So I don't know what we will be doing to keep busy for 3 days.

What I learned tonight

These are the things I learned at BTS night at the kids school...

1. Both kids are in combo classes because they are well behaved independent workers. Who knew? LOL!
2. Teachers can no longer plan parties (pizza parties for example) and send home notes asking parents to contribute $2 towards the cost. Apparently the state has determined this constitutes "teachers selling food to students" and it is no longer allowed.
3. Schools now lose money when children are home sick even though teachers still have to run off the lessons, teach those lessons to the kids when they return and grade the work. Because of this new rule one classroom last year alone (that's one out of 30) lost $13,000 from their yearly budget.
4. 6th grade camp sound really awesome and I wish I could go (Zachary would die if his mother came to camp with him).

I'm sure there is more, but I'm sleepy.

Back to school-2007

The kids went back to school today. Zachary is in 6th grade this year and has grown so tall over the summer (and therefore is skinny, skinny) and Riley looks more grown up every day.
Zachary had a great first day and says his teacher is "great". I'm so relieved after our bad teacher experience last year. Let's just hope he continues to hold this grand opinion of his teacher. My first impression of his teacher was very positive though and I'm hopeful for a great year. Zachary is in a combo class, but there are only four 5th graders in his class and the rest are 6th graders. His teacher told him they were "hand-picked" because they were all very bright, independent, well behaved kids. So I am trying to keep a positive attitude about the combo class thing as well.
Riley has the same teacher that Zachary had for second grade and we love her. She also had a great first day and proudly announced "no tickets". LOL! This is an achievement for my girl who just can't seem to stop from sharing her thoughts out loud when she gets excited about something.
So one day down..... 179 more to go!

Riley's stage debut

Riley has been taking acting/improv. classes through our local community theatre. She had her stage debut today and played Sarah Kate from Afternoon of the Elves. She did such a great job and is a great little actress, if I do say so myself. Afterwards we gave her a bouquet of flowers, because every good actress gets flowers right? When I asked her how she liked acting the said, "it's great, I never even got stage fright".

My girl is growing up.

I came to the stark realization today that Riley is getting so big. What caused me to come to this conclusion is that one of my absolute favorite times seems to be gone. At the beginning of summer vacation Riley still came in my room most mornings and crawled into bed with me. I loved that quiet cuddling time in the mornings. Well, she has not done that in weeks. Now she gets up and heads out to the living room to play with Zachary or make her own oatmeal for breakfast. I'm constantly asking myself how these things happen and where does the time go???? So if you still have a morning cuddler enjoy every moment while it lasts. It will be gone before you know it!

Sleepless nights!

We got a new mattress on Friday and Scott was making fun of me laying on the mattress this way and that. I had to lay on my stomach because that is how I go to sleep. Then I had to lay on my back because that is how I lay when I'm reading. Finally I had to lay on my side because I always wake up that way. Scott wondered if I was going to nap on the mattresses too. He layed on the mattress for about 2 seconds and declared it fine. So we got the mattress home and Scott could not sleep that night. He said he was uncomfortable and could not get used to the mattress. Hmmm, who's laughing now. I refrained from an "I told you so", but just barely. He slept a little better last night, but it is going to take time for him to get used to the mattress. Maybe next time we go shopping for a major purchase he won't think I am so silly with all of my testing.

Cruise-Day 3

Our last destination was Ensenada, Mexico. The guys went golfing in Bajamar while Debbi and I only got off the ship briefly to shop a bit. This is a big difference from 4 years ago when we headed to Papas and Beer for tequila poppers and a wildly drunken afternoon. I guess we are getting old or we still have vivid memories that lots of tequila and a rocking ship don't mix well. LOL!

We were docked across from the Black Pearl (from the Pirates movies) so I had to get a shot of this for Zachary. I knew he would think it was pretty cool that we got to see it. Even though there was no way I was walking all the way over to get closer pics. So this would have to do.

When we set sail again we passed this sunken ship in the harbor that has become home to many sea lions. If you look closely the deck is littered with them just laying around taking in the sun. I spent several hours out on our balconey hoping to catch sight of some dolphins since Debbi's husband, Scott, said that he had spotted some everyday, but I never did find any and I still bummed about that. It was still very relaxing enjoying the ocean breeze while reading my book.

We had a nice last night aboard the ship. I had a wonderful hot stone massage while Scott napped after golfing. Then after dinner we went to the nightclub and watched a bit of karaoke. Those people were awful, but I've got to give them credit for getting up on the stage and willingly making fools of themselves for our entertainment. Brave souls! Then we watched a hilarious comedican before heading back to our cabins. Now I'm dreaming of a Meditteranean cruise for our 25th anniversary. We have been saving for a trip to Rome for our 25th, but now I'm thinking I would rather do the cruise which includes Rome and several other wonderful stops. So I'm off to dream of my next vacation.

Cruise-Day 2

Day two, which was also our 15th wedding anniversary, we took the tender over to Catalina Island. We did some shopping and thought the painted eagles were a good photo opportunity even though we still don't know quite what they represented??

Then we had lunch at the Landings overlooking the ocean and with a nice view of the casino. After that we headed back to the ship for a relaxing afternoon by the pool (again) before dinner. We also played bingo that afternoon which we had never done before and Scott won $241. Lucky guy! I never even came close to winning any of the pots, but it was fun which surprised me.

15th wedding anniversary cruise

Scott and I took a cruise to San Diego, Catalina Island and Ensenada Mexico for our 15th wedding anniversary. Our friends Scott and Debbi came along with us. Our first stop was San Diego, CA. We were docked right bythe Star of Inida and below is a picture from our balcony.

We decided to split up for the day and the guys went on a tour of the USS Midway while Debbi and I took in all the sights along the pier before we took the ferry over to Coronado Island. Of course we had to have our picture taken in front of a statue dedicated to the soldiers who served in WWII to show how impressively large it is. Had Scott been there we could have recreated the statue's pose like this adorable older couple did when they asked Debbi and I to take their picture.

Then Debbi and I were off to Coronado Island and the Hotel Del where we had lunch while taking in the fabulous view below. The hotel Del is so beautiful that I could post 10 pictures just of that. Of course Debbi and I split a ham and cheese wrap and got two bottles of water and it was $18. So it's a bit rich for my blood. It really reminds of old world hollywood. Beautiful architecture with tons of dark mahogany, old elevator with the metal cage around it, sprawling grounds that lead to the beach where they have private cabanas. Nice!!!

After lunch we caught a cab back to the ferry landing and headed back to the ship where we changed into our suits and headed to the pool. We had a nice time relaxing at the pool and drinking plenty of bahama mamas before we had to change for dinner.

There are two lobsters in my house

BOTH, the kids have sunburns. My in-laws took the kids to the beach today and brought them home sunburned again. This is the third time in their lives they have taken them to the beach and this is the third time they have come home sunburned. So, three strikes and their out. I told Scott that his parents are no longer allowed to take our kids to the beach. I even commented to my MIL when I picked them up (and before their sunburned really showed) that they looked a bit pink and she commented that "my mother had lots of sunburns and lived to 89 without getting skin cancer". Excuse me? That's the reasoning behind not bothering with sunscreen. We have even spoken to her about it in the past and Scott put sunscreen on the kids before he dropped them off and gave her sunscreen to put on them at the beach. She did not even take it with her, but left it at home. I am religious about wearing sunscreen and putting it on the kids. We spend lots of time in the sun and I am very tan, but we never go out without sunscreen on and always reapply it every couple of hours. So it makes me really angry when someone else takes our children out and disregards our wishes. Aaargh!!

Baby names???

NO, we are not having another, but my niece is. Erica found out that the baby is a healthy baby girl. So during baby name discussions Riley came up with some wonderful suggestions and was seriously offended when Erica chose not to use any of them. So in case anyone needs some future baby name suggestions here they are.... Tangerina, Crepe Suzette, and Tea Blossom. I'm not quite sure where she gets these ideas, but I'm guessing the Strawberry shortcake dolls have some influence. LOL! Erica says she is going to write the names down and suggest them to Riley when she has kids. That would be a hoot!
Oh and the winning name is...... Presley Marie. Her big brother Luke says "Pressy"

Last night was the March of Dimes awards dinner

I took my mom as my guest since it was her birthday and I wanted to spend the evening with her. It was rather appropriate since the March of Dimes was originally founded to develop the polio vaccine and my mom is a polio survivor. It was a nice evening out and I met a lot of really nice people. One of our friends is the Southern California ambassador family this year and I finally got to meet his wife. Their 3 year old daughter is the ambassador child. Lauren was born 6 weeks early with the cord wrapped tightly around her neck twice. She suffered a brain hemorrhage and all her organs shut down. She was in the NICU for 40 days with many ups and downs. She is doing great now. She has been diagnosed with mild cerebral palsy, but she gets therapy 5 times a week and is thriving. She is a very inspirational little girl.
I ended up being the number 3 top fundraiser (I raised $3,610) and I'm happy to say that we have a new fundraiser in our region who took the #1 spot and raised a whopping $10,000. We have to keep her fundraising for us. The total raised in our region for MOD was $735,000 which was up from $695,000 last year.

I love the 4th of July

This year we had a really good 4th of July even though Scott was out of town. The kids, Erica, Luke and I went to the Quakes (AAA team for the Angels) game on July 3rd and they had fireworks after the game. Luke loves baseball and there is nothing cuter than a two year old bouncing up and down on my lap yelling, "go Quakes" and "catch the ball". Then on the 4th we swam, BBQ'd at Erica's and then we went to the Fireworks show at my old high school. It was lots of fun. You just spread a blanket and chairs on the football field. They had a band, bounce house and slide and tons of carnival games. All of which were free with your $6 admission. So the kids played in the bounce house, ran around on the track, danced to the band and we even played frisbee. I ran into tons of people I know since I work for the city. The kids even ran into their principal and you would have thought Riley saw a celebrity. Who knew it could be so exciting to see your principal during summer break. Then it was time for the fireworks. A 12 year old girl sang the National Anthem and I still get goosebumps everytime I hear it. Especially now thinking of all the men serving in the middle east that could not be home to celebrate the freedom they defend and the families who are missing them.
On the lighter side... Riley lost a tooth on the 4th and being the horrible mother that I am I forgot to play tooth fairy. We got home so late and I was so tired it completely slipped my mind. So when she got up this morning and said the tooth fairy did not come I reminded her that it was a holiday and the tooth fairy gets holidays off. LOL!

The new and improved bedroom

Well, here is the almost finished product. I spent most of the day installing the blinds on the windows since it required three trips to Home Depot in the 104 degree heat. We had absolutely horrid 20 year old vertical blinds in there that had yellowed plastic on them they were so old. I can't tell you how good it felt to get rid of them. I still want to get curtains that have the same stripe as the dust ruffle on the bed, but since I have one large window and then three in the bay window that will have to wait. I will probably ask my mom for those for my Christmas present six months from now. For now the new blinds are in, painting is done and the new bedding is on the bed. The picture above the bed says "Always kiss me goodnight" which is sort of a joke with Scott because I give him a really bad time if he ever forgets to kiss me goodnight. So I found it at Linens and things and it had a small scratch on the frame so it was 50% off. I paid under $10 for it. What a steal! Now I can hardly wait for Scott to get home and see what I've done.

It's amazing what you can accomplish when you get up at 5 am.

I had to take Scott to the airport this morning at 5 am. He had to fly to Rhode Island because his Aunt passed away unexpectedly. When I got home I was wide awake and knew there was no chance I would be going to sleep. By 7 am I had cleaned the kitchen and living room. So I decided to FINALLY paint my master bedroom. I had stripped the wallpaper months ago and could not seem to get the motivation to paint. Well, since Scott was gone and paint fumes give him migraines I figured this was a good time. Plus, since Riley was at Disneyland today with my sister she would be spending the night there and I could sleep in her room if the paint fumes were just too much. So I bucked up and got to work. By 10 am I had the whole room (with vaulted ceilings) primed. Then I was off to Home Depot to buy the paint and more rollers. I picked up some lunch on my way back and got back to work. I had finished painting by 3 pm. It helped a lot that my mom came over and would put more paint on the roller and hand it back up to me so I did not have to climb up and down the ladder every time. So now it's finished and the furniture is all put back. I'm so glad that it's finally done and I can stop looking at the ugly bare walls.

First day of summer break!

Today is the first day of summer break here. It's gotten off to a great start for the kids and a rocky start for Mom and Dad. My niece, Madison, is staying with us for a few days. So the kids played outside last night until dark, then watched a movie and did not get in bed and go to sleep until almost 11. So I was up even later because I need time to relax after the kids go to bed. Scott, of course conked out as soon as the kids did. So anyone want to hazard a guess as to what time those exhausted children woke up???? 5:30 AM!!!!!! Yikes. They popped out of bed with the sun and were ready to go. Scott got up with them, but they were so noisy I could not sleep anyways. By 7 am they were riding their scooters on the back patio right past my bedroom window. At that point I gave up the good fight and just got out of bed. We are going to spend the afternoon swimming at my sister's house and then barbecuing afterwards. Then tomorrow we are going to the waterslide park. I don't know if I will survive the next couple of days. LOL!

Keri

The poor prehistoric tooth fairy

The other day when I was driving this is the conversation I overheard as Riley was reading a dinosaur book...
Riley: oh my gosh Zachary I feel SO bad for the prehistoric tooth fairies.
Zachary: Why?
Riley: Because dinosaurs teeth are so big and they must have been so heavy for the tooth fairy. She must have thought "why did I ever get into this business in the first place".

Then tonight she was telling me about how big sharks teeth are and I told her that I would never want to see one up close while still in the sharks mouth. I was informed that sharks only bite people by accident when they mistake people for their prey and they only make that mistake because "sharks have little brains and can't help it."

Beauty sleep?

Everything is more exciting when it belongs to mom. That seems to be the theme in our house. I buy an exercise ball and the kids spend more time bouncing on it than I do exercising with it. I buy hand weights and I have to pry them from their little hands to use them. So it should not have been any surprise to me when I dug out my rarely used eye mask tonight and decided to see if it would help with my headache. Well, you can see for yourself where it ended up.

Girls day today

I have been wanting a pedicure for a while now so today my niece, Riley and I went. Riley was way too cute with her little strawberries and creme from starbucks (a real rare treat) and browsing her magazine while her feet barely reached the tub. She picked out purple polish (I talked her out of the gold glitter hoochy mama polish) and got white flowers painted on her big toes. She got her first pedicure at two when I took her along with my sisters, nieces and I and she decided she was not having any of that watching stuff. She took her shoes off climbed onto my lap and plopped her toes in the water. The lady was so nice and let her pick polish and then painted her toes for her. Her first pedicure was much earlier than my first pedicure which was when I was pregnant with Riley. Hmmmm, maybe she caught the bug in utero. LOL! Now I've got a pedicure buddy for life.
Now we are heading to the pool for some relaxation in the sun while the party pooper boys stay home.

Riley was a search and rescue subject today

My friend Randi is training her dog as a search and resuce dog. Ali'i is almost completely certified and is now working on 48 hour old trails. So she asked if the kids would like to help Ali'i train and they and they were both excited about it. So Saturday morning we met at a park withou Ali'i and basically walked all over the place and left a trail. Then we went back tonight and Riley and I waited at the designated spot. While Scott and Zachary went along to see Ali'i in action. Zachary got to hold the GPS device that Randi would use when they were out in the wilderness.

Riley and I just waited and watched. It really was amazing to see Ali'i following the same path that we took two days ago even though countless people had been through that park over the holiday weekend.

Then when Ali'i found Riley she got to reward him with his treats and the kids got to play with him for a while. Now Zachary wants to be the subject next time and Riley wants to go along while he tracks.

I'm so sleepy today

Scott and I were up until 11 last night watching the season finale of Lost. Then while watching the 11 o'clock news we had an earthquake. Not a big one, but it was 3.8 and centered right near our house. Then a few minutes later there was another one. So then I was so tense.... waiting..... waiting for the next one that I did not go to bed until after 1 am. I did manage to finish the book I was reading, but now I'm so sleepy today and I have a headache. I always end up with a headache when I don't get enough sleep. Oh and it did not help that both kids and both dogs were up at 6 am tromping through the house like a herd of elephants. LOL!

My boy is not quite as old as he was yesterday

It's so strange to see Zachary's struggles back and forth from... I'm too old to need you back to being the little boy I knew. Just yesterday we were struggling with his attitude and him shrugging away when I would put my arm around him, etc. Then he wakes up today and is telling me how much he loves me, that I'm a great mom and giving me tons of hugs. Even when we went out for a walk he came up and took my hand. It was such a nice moment that I dare not point it out for fear it would end. We walked that way for the longest time. He is growing up so fast and I'm already seeing how his friends are becoming more and more important and influential, but then there are those wonderful moments when my boy is back and I know that he still needs us.

We have an armadillo in our house

Every day Riley is a new animal. We have had a tiger climbing the sofa, a bunny hopping through the house, a kitty rubbing on our legs, a puppy bouncing through the house, you name it… she has been it. Today she is an armadillo. She popped about of bed this morning and said, “mama today I’m an armadillo, but I don’t know what to eat.” I told her that I did not know what armadillos eat and she said very seriously, “but mama how can I be an armadillo if I don’t know what to eat?” So we discussed what armadillos look like and where they live. She said that armadillos have long claws and like to dig so we came to the conclusion that they must eat bugs and worms as part of their diet. So she had bugs and worms for breakfast which was really waffles and blueberries. I tell you she has quite the imagination. So my little armadillo is off to school and tonight we will read the armadillo books that I checked out from the library and YES, they do eat worms and bugs among other things.

My best Mother's day present

Riley wrote a journal entry that her teacher typed up for me and Riley gave it to me for Mother's day. So here is what she wrote

My Mom by Riley Johnson

My mama is special because she brings me books from the library. She is kind of like me. She loves me a whole lot. She makes good food and buys me strawberries. Her hugs are warm and cozy. I love my mama!

Awww, I told Scott that I will be very sad when I no longer get things like this on Mother's day. Zachary is already way past that and I know those days are just around the corner for Riley. It makes me appreciate this all the more. Riley even made a home made banner that said "I love you" and taped it up before I got up, made streamers to decorate and gave me tons of hugs/kisses and I love you's all day long. I couldn't ask for more.

Laguna Beach

We spent our afternoon at Laguna beach. The kids had fun playing in the waves and I wish we had brought their suits. I figured the water would still be too cold for swimming, but it was actually very warm.

So Zachary and Riley just chased the waves and played in the sand instead. They both had a great time doing that and Scott and I loved watching them play together.

Then we visited the tide pools and looked for sea anenomies and hermit crabs. There are not nearly as many as I remember seeing when Scott and I were dating (almost 20 years ago). I think too many people visit the tide pools and do not follow the rules about not disturbing the sea life or taking anything away with you.

Here is one small tide pool and if you look closely you can make out the anenomies on the left side.

On our way home we stopped at the pacific marine mammal center. They rescue, rehabilitate and release sea lions, seals and elephant seals. We learned a lot from our very helpful volunteer. Zachary may even attend a summer camp there where he will learn to care for, feed and clean up after the animals. They have a website with a live webcam at http://www.pacificmmc.org/

GOAL!

I'm walking this Sunday in the March of Dimes walkamerica and I finally reached my fundraising goal of $3,500. I did not think I was going to make it since I received some pledges and did not receive the checks, but in the end other pledges came in at the last minute. WOO HOO! This is the most I have ever raised for MOD. I'm always relieved when the walk weekend finally arrives because I spend two solid months so focused on fundraising and I become more and more obsessed with it as the date approaches. So I can now hang up my fundraising belt till next year.

Ray Bradbury

The library that I work for has an monthly book club and we invited Ray Bradbury to come speak since the April book was Fahrenheit 451. He graciously accepted and we decided to make it a public event instead of just for the book club members. We had over 300 people come and it was a great success. Mr. Bradbury even said that he would love to come back next year and speak again. The icing on the cake was that this morning when I got into work he had left a voice mail for me. He asked me to send him some of the tickets that I designed for the event. He said he loved them and would like to have copies to keep for himself.

A clean room is worth a picture.

Yes, it truly is worth a few pics. I love my daughter DEARLY and would not trade her for the world, but she is a slob. Coming from someone who is compulsive about cleaning/organizing (picture Monica from Friends) it drives me insane that Riley is such a slob. She leaves shoes, toys, books all over the place and has to be reminded constantly to pick up after herself. So I try to look at her room as HER space and let her do what she wants, but once a week she has to clean it so it can be vacuumed and dusted and change her bedding.

However, her equivalent of cleaning is pushing things under the bed, in the closet or into the four corners of the room. So every once in a while I just can't take it anymore and step in. Today was one of those days. I could have used a rake to clear things out from under the bed and the closet doors would no longer close. So after much time spent together we got it looking fairly presentable which required a picture because it won't last long!!!!

Her bookcase is even in some sort of order and since I have worked in a library for the past 15 years it just kills me that she won't keep them in some sort of order. That borders on sacriledge. LOL!

So for now I'm just trying to enjoy that the floor is not a hazard to bare feet, the closet doors can close, the books are in order and even the holes in the wall have been filled. The holes were courtesy of my Mom's dog Maila whose digging was not confined to the outside.

We went on a safari today!

Riley's class went on a safari today. They visited the savannah, the rain forest, the ocean and the desert. The kids all made their own jeeps, well I think some dad's made the jeeps, and they had binoculars made out of empty toilet paper rolls and of course they had to have safari hats.

They all walked from the school to the park next door where the parent volunteers had set up each "region" with stuffed animals that the kids had brought in. I was the customs agent in the savannah stamping the kids passports and telling them "welcome to the savannah". Then the kids got a clipboard and had to check off the animals they saw and whether they were a mammal, bird, insect or reptile, etc.

They had to search the trees for animals lurking above and make sure not to get to close to the ferocious beasts. Riley and Sierra had a close call with a tiger and had to "run for their lives".

After all the fun it was back to the school to watch an animal planet movie at the "drive in" while in their jeeps.

Dyeing easter eggs

We dyed Easter eggs tonight. Erica brought Luke over and he and Riley had a great time. Zachary decided he was "too old" for dyeing Easter eggs and preferred to have a friend over and ignore us completely (really not liking the pre-teen stage). Riley and Luke had lots of fun though and I'm glad we put them in old white t-shirts because it was quite a mess.
Luke preferred to THROW his eggs into the cups and then retrieve the eggs with his hands. We let him do his own thing and ended up with tons of broken multi colored eggs that will probably just end up in the trash, but they had fun. Everybody stayed for dinner and it was not until we were already grilling the hamburgers that I remembered it's Good Friday. So we were very bad Catholics because we ate meat on Good Friday.

We're going to have a new member of the family

Of our EXTENDED family that is. My niece, Erica (Luke's mom) is pregnant again. She is due around Thanksgiving and we are all very excited. Riley can hardly contain herself and has nicknamed the baby jellybelly. Zachary is much more subdued in his excitement, but when Erica came over yesterday he was talking to her tummy which I thought was so sweet. So I keep thinking that before Christmas we will have a new member of the family to love.

Longer school year?

We got a letter in the mail from the school district and they want to extend the school year. The kids would still only attend 180 days, but they would start in early August and end in early June. Right now they start in the end of August and go through mid-June. They want to extend the year and give the kids one week off for Thanksgiving and two weeks off in spring. I'm liking the idea since the kids will have a shorter summer and less time to get bored and also more breaks during the year when they really tend to need them. I guess all of this started because the high school is on semesters and they want the first semester to end at the winter break so they don't have finals right after winter break. So we have to vote this week and wait to see the results.

Searching my roots

Yesterday I went to my Dad's house for a barbecue and he mentioned Google'ing our last name, Opbroek. So I was sitting around today playing on my laptop and tried it. I found a lot of websites that were in Dutch. Some were small family websites with photos and I could see a family resemblence in some of them. So I started looking up other family names and tried Pistulka which is my paternal Grandmother's maiden name. I found a website that not only was dedicated to the Pistulka family and tracing the family tree, but I got to see scans of the manifests from the ship they were on and then from New York City. I found out that my great grandfather Anton Pistulka was between 1.5 and 2.5 months old when he arrived her from Bohemia. I also learned that of the 7 children in his family 5 married Opbroek's. How weird. Anyways I have frittered hours away checking out all these things and I am going to have to email the person who runs the website and give information on myself and my siblings/cousins so we can add another generation to the family tree. So you might try looking up your family names. You never know what you will find.

Here is the link to a picture of my Grandma http://www.pistulka.com/index_files/Page344.htm

We applied for our passports

Scott and I applied for our passports. Unfortunately we are not going anywhere exotic or exiting, like Australia or China. We are just going on a cruise to Mexico this August for our 15th wedding anniversary. It now takes 10 weeks to process the passport application so I am glad that we did not put it off. Now that I have it in process though I have grand travel plans, in my head at least. I dream of going all over to places I have never seen. Ahhhh, someday. At the very least we will travel to Rome in another 10 years. Scott and I both want to see Rome over any other place and so we opened a money market account and we have automatic deposits from our checks. So I told Scott that if we don't make it to Rome before our 25th wedding anniversary then we will use the MM account for a trip to Rome. Of course passports are only good for 10 years so we would have to renew it for the trip to Rome. Definitley need to make use of the passport again before that.

A positive attitude!

We had an IEP (individual education plan) meeting at Riley's school this morning. She is starting speech therapy to help her pronounce the letters s and z properly. Since both Scott and I attended speech for the same thing I guess the odds were stacked against her. The three of us met first thing this morning with the speech therapist and Riley's teacher. Riley was so excited she was literally bouncing in her seat. During her evaluation Mrs. Fitzgerald, the speech therapist, told her they would have tons of fun together playing games and reading books. Well, she surely convinced Riley because she can hardly wait. After they went over Riley's education plan Mrs. Fitzgerald asked how we felt about it and Riley yelled "super". LOL! Mrs. Fitzgerald also mentioned that Riley's other speech problem seems to be caused by an "air intake problem". She said that it's very rare and she has never dealt with that before. It can be a medical problem so we have to take her to the doctor and determine if that is the cause. I felt like an idiot that it never occured to me, but her words are being broken up because she is pausing to get air. I had thought she just needed to slow down a bit. So we will be taking her to the doctor and proceeding from there. At the end of the conference we had to sign a ton of papers including one stating that we were working on Riley graduating from high school. Talk about long term goals. Riley also had to sign all of the papers which made her feel very important.