That's What I Like About You

Even though the people that attend my leadership classes at work must think I have the worst kids in the world with the stories I tell sometimes, I really don't. I have great kids. All kids are frustrating at times, right? Sometimes, I don't want my kids to climb on me, hang on me, jump on me, ask me to pick them up, etc. But then, I talk about them sometimes and realize that they are great.

Gunnar is the best big brother. He is always making sure that his brothers are taken care of. Lately, Paden and Gunnar have been fighting quite a bit. But, you know that Gunnar still wants and needs Paden to be a part of his life. Gunnar and Paden have alternating nights they pick the movie for bedtime. Gunnar lets Fischer pick on his night. I didn't think Fischer was all into picking his own movie, so I didn't put him on the calendar. I guess I put him on for March. Gunnar doesn't like to have Fischer crying, so he's always trying to make sure Fischer is happy. Gunnar sacrifices his own happiness for his brothers, a lot. When Gunnar is doing something cool, he always wants Paden to be there to see it. I love that Gunnar loves his brothers. I know that when they get older, Gunnar will always protect them.

Paden is such a funny, smart, young boy. He just turned six, but has been a smart alec since he could talk, so we've been dealing with his crazy talk for the last 4+ years. Today, we were writing down our family story for the week. Paden was talking about OMSI and how they saw a real mummy. He made me write down all the steps on how to make a mummy, so in case you need to know, you can check our family journal. Then he was talking about how they couldn't go to this crazy donut store in Portland because there was a really long line. Paden said, "Yeah, and I was pissed." Yes, we told him that wasn't appropriate language for him. To which he replied, "Well, I was." Paden loves to help with anything. If you are cooking, he's there. If you are crafting, he's there. If you are vacuuming, he's there. Now, I haven't seen him show up when I am cleaning the bathroom. He always wants to help and learn how to do new stuff. I love that Paden tells it like it is. I love that Paden wants to be with you and give you loves. I love that he has to have 57 blankets and pillows on his bed. He likes to use them in different orders each night. Sometimes, it's snuggie as layer 1, Jaye Dean's blanket as layer 2, scooby then superman. Sometimes, it's Jaye Dean's first! He's silly. When he was sick, we put extra pillows to prop him up so he could breath; he's still using them, but not really proping him up, just surrounding him.

Fischer is a hoot. He loves to laugh. He laughs at himself. He copies everything the other two do. He knows what he wants; you aren't going to just put milk in his cup and not have him notice. If he wants juice, he will not be drinking your milk. He was counting the other day - about to four, Neil said he can count to five. I was unaware of this fact. He was counting CDs as he removed them from the CD case. He likes to dance. He likes to give the puppy a treat. We are currently out of treats and when I asked him if he wanted to help me feed the dog yesterday, he went to get a treat only to find them all gone. He had a crocodile tear/pouty lip meltdown. It was so cute. He likes cars & trucks. He likes Thomas the Tank Engine and Bob the Builder. He loves to throw things - we keep lots of soft, squishy balls readily available. He has great form when he throws; he steps with his opposite foot, he releases at a good point and he follows through. He also was in a "set" stance to start a foot race. He'd say, "ready . . . GO!" and then take off. He was racing himself, I guess. Gunnar did join in though. Fischer has to have a kiss before bed. He might get one first, but then he'll want another if you give the other boys theirs. He loves to GO. He will be ready to get dressed and will pester you until you are out the door if you mention he's going anywhere. I usually don't mention to him we are going until I am truly ready to leave. As soon as you mention "GO" he is up and at the door so quick. He'll find his shoes first if he doesn't already have them on. He likes to wear hats. One day he chose a ball cap instead of a knit beanie like he normally wears. He went through the entire hat basket until settling on a black NRA hat. Yep, the NRA. What a kid! I think he's going to be OCD about handwashing though; he always has to have his hands wiped or washed.

I love that my boys wake up in the mornings without issue. They don't always get dressed as rapidly as we need to; sometimes they stall really well. But, they wake up without an alarm and most of the time are out of bed before me. I love that they go to bed easy. Quite a while back, we started our bedtime routine at 7:30pm. That gives them time to wiggle and whatnot, but still be asleep by 8pm. Sometimes they fall asleep quick and sometimes not - usually Gunnar is the one who can and will stay up. Paden couldn't stay awake for very long and Fischer's been good about going to be.

They like to play and be boys. I like to let them as often as I can remind myself.

This may not interest you, but as a record for me . . .

Fischer is 3 months away from turning TWO; today he is 21 months old. Holy cow! Time flies. I love the toddler stage. Although it can be frustratingat times, the kid is super funny. He can throw a ball with perfect form - step with opposite foot, good release point, follow through - it's amazing. He was also getting in the "set" position to start a foot race the other day. I am not sure how he knows this stuff. Funny, funny boy.

I started making a list of all the words he knows and uses on a regular basis. He repeats anything anyone says. Someone burst out, "What the heck?" the other day and so did Fischer, "what eck?" It was funny.

For my record, at 21 months here's the list of words (which I of course put into excel and sorted alphabetically :) just had to make sure I didn't have repeats):

apple
ball (he also calls oranges "ball")
banana
bath
bird
blankie
Bob (the builder)
bowl
bye
car
cheese
coat
color
cookie
cow
cup
diaper
done
ears
eat
eyes
Fischer (shisher is how he says his own name)
fork
go
Gunnar (nunner is how he says it)
hair
hands
hat
horse
hurt
juice
kiss
later
light
Mama
meat
milk
mine
more
mouth
mouse
move
nigh-night
no
nose
ok
on
out
Paden (a-e is all he really says for Paden)
pants
Papa
please
poop
puppy
shirt
shoes
socks
teeth
thanks
that one
there it is
truck
uh huh
up/down stairs
vitamin

Of course, not all of these are perfect annunciation, but we know what he's saying. Maybe he said a lot before we left for Las Vegas, but after being away from him for a few days, I noticed new words when we got back. He TALKS non-stop! He is always talking, talking, talking with some screaming and yelling mixed in. What a ball of energy, that kid. Love him, love him, love him.

Have a picture I took of him the other day when I took Paden's picture in his robe. He insisted I took his picture too . . . but apparently I left my camera on and the battery is now dead.

Birthday Boy, Padey Boy!

We celebrated Paden's birthday on the actual date of his birth - February 15th (last Tuesday). So, I haven't found time to blog about this even sooner. What the heck?

He had a little bit of trouble making up his mind what he wanted, what he wanted for dinner, what he wanted to do. In fact, one week later, he's still insisting that he is having a "friend party" for his birthday. I just don't think it's going to happen. So, he finally chose a dinner of tortellini for dinner. We already told him no video games and no toys for this birthday (we're just tired of that kind of crap). He settled on some board games that he wanted (took him a while, he wanted them all). So, we had some help picking up a couple of the items since we'd already been to town once or twice and he couldn't decide. He settled on Monopoly Jr and Clue (just regular adult clue, not junior. He got a Scooby Doo cake, which didn't taste good to anyone but Gunnar. Paden didn't even eat any of it. I feel like of bad that he didn't like his cake. However, Wally World just didn't do well this go 'round. We had dinner and cake, then tried to play his games. He and Gunnar were playing and Fischer wasn't being very cooperative. It was finally time to go to bed and Paden was upset and started to cry. He yelled, "Fischer sabotaged our two games and now I can't play!" Fischer did do what he was accused of doing, so no argument from me . . . just it was bedtime! I didn't get any pictures of them trying to play the games.

It must have been at Christmas time when my mom was here visiting that Paden asked her to make him a robe. According to him, it's not called a "bathrobe", it's just called a "robe". He's not going to take a bath in it, you know! So, anyway, Grandma with the puppies remembered this request and sent him a robe and a few hats for his birthday. He LOVES it. He wore all afternoon after he got home from school and opened the mail! Here, he's seen sporting my shoes (have no idea why). Now he doesn't have to drag a blanket around everywhere when he's cold, which is all the time since our thermostat is set at 60 degrees all winter long (there's a reason for that and it's not solely to turn the kids into Popsicles). Anyway, he totally loved the robe.

We also took Paden to the Harlem Globetrotters for his birthday. If we were cool parents, we would have gotten one of them to pose with Paden for his birthday picture and bought him a $25 basketball and wait in line for a week and a half for autographs, etc., etc. As you can clearly see by lack of pictures of this event, we aren't those cool parents. He had a pretty good time at the game even though we had to kind of remind him to pay attention so he didn't miss any funny stuff. He said he enjoyed it, but he wasn't enthralled with it as he would have been had he been playing the Harlem Globetrotters PC edition. All in all, I think we provided a pretty nice birthday. I am not positive he would agree 100%, but compared to a kick in the teeth, I am sure he'd play along. :)

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I am sure I have used that blog post title before, but it's been a while, so I thought it was OK to recycle it. I am really not sure what this post is all about. Likely just some random thoughts so I can go to sleep.

I started taking Zumba last Monday and it's a great sweat-inducing workout. There are a few moves that I can't do and I am definitely not as good as swinging those hips out as the instructor, but it's still great. There's some friends there to make it more enjoyable as we laugh our way through each song. Something the instructor said on the first day continues to stick with me and haunt me. She said that she knew most of the attendees were looking to lose weight. She said that was great, but remember that losing weight is 75% diet and 25% exercise. Dang burn it! Food is so good. So, I guess I am going to make another attempt at watching calories and fat intake. I just don't think I should take the class and not conscientiously watch what goes into my fat tummy. So, anyway, that is on Mondays and Wednesdays and it's a good commitment for me.

We had some good food for Super Bowl, I thought anyway. Nothing much more than meat and chips and salsa. What more do you need really? The BLT dip was dee-lish as well though, thanks Khea. I should have sent home the left over salsa home with Jessica - sorry, Jess your loss for not coming over! We still love you though.

Today, we had Family Home Evening. It was short and sweet and no frills - no song or anything - just the lesson. I told Paden he was in charge of the lesson and I asked him if he wanted to go look through the Friend magazine or if he had a scripture in mind that he wanted to share. He said that he had a story and it was fabulous. He did such a great job. His lesson was based on this Bible verse: James 1:5 "If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him." He did a great job telling about this verse and reading it to us. We then retired to the kitchen for some delicious peach smoothie making, complete with Reddi-wip (only the best for our smoothies and yeah, I work for that Company - too bad I don't work at the actual creamy goodness plant!)

The lesson led me to remember what our Bishop said one Sunday not too long ago (like maybe last Sunday, not yesterday but the one before). He said that if you are doing 5 things, you likely won't have problems enough to be seeking guidance from the Bishop. Family Prayer, Scripture Study, Family Home Evening, Paying Tithing and . . . apparently I am not doing the 5th one because I can't remember what it is right now. Maybe it was simply Go to Church, but I really can't recall. Anyway, he told a couple of stories about Family Home Evenings. He said that it doesn't really matter how long they last or what the lesson is about . . . it matters that you have them. It matters that you take time as a family and be together - trying to get some spiritual upliftment is a bonus (did I just make up a word?). He also told about a time that boxing was the activity of choice. It was a funny story. So, tonight after our 5 minute lesson by Paden which was close to being overshadowed by Fischer's playing and Gunnar's enticing of Fischer, I said, "It doesn't matter long it lasts, it matters that we did it . . . that's what the Bishop said." To which Gunnar replied, "Can we box?" To which Paden replied by starting to punch me in the back, which actually felt kind of good - like one of those crazy china man massages. Anyway, I guess they do listen at church sometimes - even when you think they aren't.

I am thankful for those at church who teach the children. We have some great primary leaders (you know who you are) and teachers out there. I know that the boys are learning great things. While I am thinking about it too - we're thankful for Morgan who used to teach the music in primary. Paden used to call her up and request to learn new versus to songs or to request new songs. It was so cute. He really enjoys the music (at least I think he still does).

Switching back to another thought that I will always remember our Bishop saying . . . he actually said it to a good friend of mine when he went to see them and she was apologizing for the mess in her house. He said, "Well, you live here don't you?" Love it. I remind myself that often. ;)

So, that's about it for my randomness for tonight. I am going to go make a list for tomorrow so I can get some stuff done! I make lists at work daily and it helps to accomplish much and stay on track. I could use that same method here and see if it works!

What could be worse . . .

. . . than two little boys on antibiotics from Tuesday forward this week for various infections in them? Paden had an ear infection started on Monday night - why always in the middle of the night when you can't do anything but fill them up with generic children's Tylenol and hope it relieves the wailing and whining that comes with a pain in their ear?? Why? I do really want to know that. Fischer has had a cough for a little while, so they went ahead and doped him up too since it sounds like a bronchial infection (which is what I had a few weeks ago). They got antihistamine for their sinuses, Tylenol with codeine for the pain and antibiotics for the infections, plus the doc said to try some sort of expectorant. I think we came home with some cough suppressant too, but not to use at the same time as the expectorant. I am not really sure, it was Neil who took them Tuesday morning. I stayed home Monday due to a sick baby sitter and then Paden came home from school early too. Neil took Tues and Wed off with the sick-o kids. He also started feeling ill. I am still hoping (as of Saturday night) that I come through this round unscathed. After all, I did already get sick first!

So, what could be worse than all that? Well, here's the rest of the story . . .

Gunnar starts getting a little stuffed up sometime after Wednesday, I think . . . the days all run together. He usually doesn't get sick, so I figured that he would just get a little stuffed up and be fine. So, we take off Friday morning to head north to visit the Livingston grandparents. We got the boys haircuts. They needed them. So far, so good.

Fischer is kind of a brat going to bed. I didn't take the porta-crib. He was going to lay down with the other two. But, he was being a little wiggly or something and Gunnar got upset and was going to sleep on the floor. So, I took Fischer out and laid on top of him while he screamed until he fell asleep. So, that was fun. I haven't had to do that for a long time! (I don't do nap time, otherwise I would have to then.) So, we get to sleep after 9pm I think. At 1am, Gunnar comes flying out of his room, very loudly, yelling that his ear hurts.

Great.

I didn't bring the Tylenol with codeine, which was given to Paden for his ear pain. Why, you ask? I don't know, I say. I wish I would have. I had the regular, generic Tylenol, and the 7,000 other meds for the other two. Anyway, the regular, generic Tylenol only gave relief for Gunnar for about 90-120 minutes at at time. I didn't sleep pretty much from 1am. At 4am, Gunnar woke up again, which then woke Fischer up, who then remembered he was mad that he wasn't sleeping with his brothers, which started the screaming again . . . all the while Gunnar is moaning and whining and crying about his ear. BACK TO SLEEP PEOPLE! So, at 7am, we all get up.

The walk-in clinic at the local hospital is open from 8am to noon on Saturday, thank goodness. So, we head into the clinic. We walk in, we are the only people there. We wait for few minutes, I could hear the people in the back, but not even all the lights were on yet. About 8:05, the receptionist comes out with her purse, doughnut and cup in her hand. Oops! Yep, you have customers already. I didn't give her a hard time; I remained silent. So, we get out of there about 8:30am with the official, yep it's infected. Really? I knew that already - can I keep my $107 since I am really the one who made the diagnosis at 1am, but for some reason the pharmacy won't go with my sloppy hand-written Rx? Anyway . . . but . . . guess what doesn't open until 9am? The pharmacy . . . at Walmart or Rite Aid. What the crap? Really? It's a pharmacy, not a bank! Sheesh.

So, other than that fiasco . . . we put all the duck hunting stuff in storage and will have our garage back (little bit of tidying required still). That was a good thing. Oh, and the haircuts were good . . . . except Fischer's "I-am-having-a-hard-time-pooping" routine after the haircut wasn't so great. We had to stand outside the barber shop due to the smell and the crying; he was done before Neil was done with his haircut. More fiber vitamins. We just stocked up on them at Costco on the way home!

I am so tired, I can't even make complete sentences anymore. Time for bed. Cleaning will have to get done tomorrow at which time I will be in a rush to get it down after church and before the Super Bowl. So be it. I work best under pressure! I might let it go if we had any clean dishes and counter space to put out the food, but alas, we do not.

Are you ready for some football??? I am ready for some brisket. That's what I'm talkin' about. Brisket on the new Traeger. Mmm, mmm, mmm.

Ah, the Pinewood Derby

My eyes are hurting right now, so luckily for you all this will be short and sweet and probably not reflective of ALL of my feelings about the scout Pinewood Derby.

Gunnar got second place! This was his first derby. He drew the shape of his car, Neil cut it for him and Gunnar did the rest. Well, until the weight part. Neil did the adding/subtracting of the weight. Gunnar also won "Most Colorful" due to his very unique, cool and colorful paint job.

In the end, he enjoyed himself and was happy with the results. The program records the times as well as the points for 1st, 2nd & 3rd places. Gunnar's total elapsed time was only .006 seconds slower than the 1st place car. Pretty cool. The first place car come from a family of life long scouters.

Good job, Gunnar!