Hiking is Fun?

Since Stew is out of town I'm doing double duty with the kids. Today Jared had a hike with the Webelos and the 11 year olds and a parent was "encouraged" to come. Since Jackson also wanted to hike that left Jordan. I suppose I could have put some effort in to finding her some place to hang out for the morning but sometime during the week a little "family hike" sounded like fun. We loaded up the backpack and met everyone at the church. 27 hikers - 25 men/boys - and then me and Jordan. At one point I thought about backing out and one of the dads even gave me the option but nope - we're going to hike. At 2.8 miles I wondered if this was really a good idea. At 4.8 miles I wasn't sure I was actually going to make it as it only got hotter this morning. But .6 miles later we were in the car with the A/C going full blast and headed to McDonalds. Sounds like a successful morning...now if we only had the energy to get some chores done. Oh well.

-And that is a picture of a tarantula we came across on our hike. Some boys were disappointed we didn't see any snakes - I was not.

Wonderful Do Nothing Day

Today is a do nothing day. I've had days and days of this vacation running around. Not today. Today it is 11:30 and I'm still in my jammies. The kids are up and dressed and playing Clue. I did get dressed enough to let the garage door repairman in the garage to fix the chain but that has been my big activity of the day so far. The kids don't even seem to care that we're not going anywhere, that nobody is coming over. They are probably as worn out and ready for a do nothing day as I am.

Crazy Mom Life

I'm in the midst of a crazy mom life. Actually I'm in the beginning of 5 weeks of craziness. My husband just left for a 5 week work trip. That's 5 weeks of me being a single mom. I saw a blog the other day where the girl took pictures of all of her activities during a day - I'm not sure my blog has enough room for that some days. Just today my schedule was this:

Leave house at 9am for a 10am allergy appointment for Jared.
Sit in waiting room for 40 minutes.
After 2 1/2 hours at the allergist (including waiting room time) we left at 12:30. This was after Jared was poked and prodded and covered with welts. Apparantly it's easier to say what he ISN'T allergic to than to list those things he is allergic to.
Our next stop was Chuck E Cheese because the boy deserved it and we were all hungry and needed a fun break.
Run home and get Jordan changed for Gymnastics at 4:00
Organize a ride for Jared to scouts at 4:30.
That's where we are now - so at 5 we will be done with gymnastics and head over to pick up Jared from scouts.
We will be home for an hour and a half and Jackson will be off to scouts/mutual at the church. I was just called to give another child a ride because her husband is out of town. I laughed to myself - said I would pick him up - no problem.
At 8:30 I will have to pick up the boys and bring them home again.
Hopefully around 9:30 all kids will be in bed and I can chill for a bit.

Of course that will last for hours longer as my chilling will turn in to late night tv viewing because when the husband is gone it takes me much longer to fall asleep.

And then tomorrow - we can do it all over again. Just substitute the allergy doctor for the orthodontist and one activity for another and I'm sure I'll be just as tired come 9:30.

If you're wondering - the kids are out of school for fall break - they will go back on Monday and then my crazy life will be strictly an afterschool affair. I may just nap all day while they're gone.

Back to Blogging - or trying

I actually read some blogs today. The strange thing is that I read blogs of people I actually know. If you look at my list of favorite blogs I don't actually know any of those people. I have read and followed and even retold stories of blogs I have read but I didn't know anyone that actually blogged. And I wasn't sure I wanted anyone I know reading what I blog. Like a secret journal that can be read by people you don't know. It seems safe. Now I'm thinking that I might want to branch out. That I might want to read those other blogs - that I might want to be part of that group. Then I wonder - what if those girls don't want me reading their blogs. Is there a rule about reading the blogs of people you actually know? I got the one blog address from facebook and it snowballed from there. Do I casually comment on something that is written that I relate to? I'm on totally different ground. I'll let you know how it all works out.

You Can't Pick Your Family...

Actually you can pick your family when it comes to the inlaws but it doesn't really work very well. When I met my husband and consequently his family I thought they were all sane. I remember sitting in the living room while we all enjoyed a Buster Bar from Dairy Queen...good times. I also remember the day I got married when my mother in law said, "Well, now it's a done deal we can all quit pretending we're people that we aren't." At the time I thought it was a joke. 16 1/2 years later it is certainly no joke. I have a brother in law and his family and then a sister in law and her family that are all normal. And then there are the mother/father in law and the oldest brother and his family. Sometimes you have to really wonder how people end up like they do when they come from the same parents.

You may wonder what spurred this blog. My oldest son is 12 and in our church this is a pretty big age so the events that occur has brought in quite a few family members. I'm pretty sure that when they are all on "my turf" their quirkiness shows 10fold. Fortunately for me part of their craziness also includes them driving many miles to be here only to turn around as quickly as they can to head back.

My Lack of Blogging

Why is there no blog here? Where have I been? I've been lazy, I've also been busy, and I've been on Facebook. Horrible addiction.

Life is good. I'm enjoying having the kids home for the summer. We've had adventures to California to visit Grandma and Grandpa and coming up we have another adventure to Utah. My niece leaves on her mission for the church on July 2nd. She's going to London England (London South) and I just know she is going to love it! I have known her since she was 3 years old and now she's a beautiful young woman getting ready to go on a mission. She will experience so many new things, including her very first airplane ride. I'm going to need a lot of stamps and stationary too so my kids can write her all kinds of letters.

So, I will try to do better. I will try to think of fun little stories to get this blog going again. I will...right after I get back home.

Senior Pranks

This morning I got the kids ready for school and Jackson headed out the door. He is the only one that rides the bus. The other two could but we enjoy the extra 20 minutes we get to sleep in and watch Sponge Bob in the morning so I drive them. I left the house and noticed Jackson still standing there with all the kids. Not unheard of as there are sometimes issues with a later driver or traffic incident. The elementary school kids were still at the bus stop too - that is a little bit more eyebrow raising. I head to the school and there are no busses at all at the school. Before you ask if there was actually school this morning, there was, that's why all the kids were waiting for the bus. I head back home and there is my son still at the bus stop. I make him get in the car and we head off to his school. It seems that the senior prank this year was to let the air out of the tires of 76 school busses. They also painted Class of 2009 on the busses, in washable paint. It seems like a harmless prank, nobody was hurt, a few kids got to be late for school - all fun right? Of course they weren't thinking about the man power that would need to be called in to get the busses operational. The checks on the vehicles to make sure they were safe to drive. It seems that harmless prank is costing around $10,000. not so harmless is it? Maybe I'm just old and ornery? I don't know.

I did not participate in a senior prank when I was in highschool. In fact I can't recall one happening my senior year - but I could be wrong. When my brother was a senior a group of his friends did pull a prank on their English teacher. At the time Trinity Broadcasting Network was a pretty small operation located not far from our house. The group of boys went over in the middle of the night and loaded up pieces of the lifesize nativity and transported them to the front lawn of their teacher's house. In the morning he woke up to his children excitedly talking about the camels, sheep and cows in the front yard. Monday morning the teacher told each class that whoever was responsible needed to remove the animals and take them back where they came from. So, in the middle of the night they went back and got the animals to return them to Trinity. As they were unloading the van the police cars pulled up and the boys got a bit worried. My mom received a phone call at 4 am that she needed to pick up her son. The broadcasting network didn't press charges but all of the boys were handcuffed to the stop sign next to the van. The best part of the story is that a month later the mom whose van they used was loading some stuff into the van and went to move all the blankets that were in the corner only to find that there was still a sheep in there. She had to drive back and return the long lost sheep to it's flock.