Friday Nights

Pretty sure I can tell you where to find me.  A tradition this year; good to be back at it after the move.

Our New Lawn Furniture

Saturday: We arrived to an empty, new home.  Excited to get our stuff on Monday, but prepared for it to be delayed to Tuesday.  We were fresh, and ready, and excited.

Sunday: Hurt a little getting up out of the air mattress in the morning, but the thought that our stuff  might arrive tomorrow kept us going!  So we took advantage of our free day to go shop lawn furniture sales. 

Monday: Morning sprung, but we hadn't heard that our stuff would arrive.  No worries, we put up our lawn furniture in the sun room.  A cute, multi-purpose lounging and eating/gathering room for the next day--just till our stuff arrived.  The Internet was connected, so who needed anything else?  A pan to cook, please--we had some frozen meals.  My back hurt a little from the air mattress, so I opted for sleeping on the floor.

Tuesday: The moving company called yesterday, and the truck was still in Houston on Monday for routine maintenance.  We'd get our stuff on Wednesday.  We decided to pass the time at a local home and garden store.  I bought a tree, and added it to our little furniture collection. One more night on the floor, no problem.

Wednesday: I awoke to my daily double Alleve, thanked Patric for insisting that we take the coffee pot with us in the car, and then I threw a little sarcastic thank you at him for moving us here.  No worries, our stuff would come today!  Then the moving company called: the truck was broken down, in Houston.  After a few words flung here and there and everywhere, I went for a drive because I love my family, and I didn't want to kill them.  I bought the candle and added it to our little furniture collection/everything thing we own. Oh, no they didn't have a date yet when we would actually get our stuff.  After my calming drive, I suggested to Patric that he try pulling the cushions from our lawn furniture and sleeping on them.  We put a Transformer twin sheet around three of them to hold them together, and his snoring kept me awake on the floor.

Thursday: I clawed the Alleve from the bottle before attempting to sit up. Drank two pots of coffee.  Took the kids to register for school, where we found out they wouldn't accept our records, started a week earlier than we thought, and have to wear uniforms.  Then we got kicked out of an on-post laundry facility, went to the airbase, snuck into another laundry facility, washed our collective five pieces of clothing, and may have eaten popcorn for dinner.  We huddled around the computer on our lawn furniture after figuring out how to watch DirectTV online out of desperation. The moving company called that day, they may be there Friday, probably Saturday, don't be surprised if it is Monday.  Whatever.  As we drug our lawn furniture cushions to the bedroom, Patric suggested that I give them a try.  It may have been the wild look in my eye at this point.

Friday: I awoke with no hope, but I had slept.  We put our lawn furniture back together, ate breakfast around it, watched the news, watered our plant, lit and blew out a candle, swept up the floor around our lawn furniture and cleaned it up. And then Patric took the children out to buy them stuff to make their own fairy gardens, because we were running out of ideas and our lawn furniture was not that exciting anymore.  The moving company called.  They would be there at 8:00 am the next morning.  Whatever.

Saturday: Not really excited, but at least rested, I hugged my lawn furniture cushions before rolling out of bed.  We didn't bother to wake the children, because we didn't really believe our stuff was arriving.  So when it did arrive, we were pretty much still in our pajamas with skeptical looks in our eyes.  As things rolled off the truck, we realized it really was our stuff, and so started three days of unpacking and rearranging.  The lawn furniture is now where it belongs, on the patio, getting soaked in the rain.  Hallelujah

Returning from Kansas

I think grandma and grandpa tuckered them out.

Stupid Busy

Sunday afternoon, we had bubbles and an impromptu play date at the park and a little shopping.

With daddy in tow, which has been hard to do as he has been working to turn in his final grad school project and keep up with National Guard weekends. And the draft is in as of Saturday!
Here they are using the computer for what it is meant for--playing Superhero Squad.



And I've been furiously trying to clean the house up to get ready for this.
Because, hey, why don't we just decide to up and move to a new city in the midst of all of this.

And it has left us plain tuckered out.

But we're seeing the end in site, or the new beginning, whichever way you want to say it.

So, everyone that had a birthday between January and now, we're so sorry. I have a card for you; it's in a pile, somewhere...

What's Going On?

National Guard Weekend.

And it was cold.

Saturday night I changed them out of Friday's pajamas and put them in clean ones at least.

Ben has his baby "Benjamin" that I am the mommy of and must feed and diaper in our game that goes.on.forever. Nicholas is tipping furniture of course. Elaine looks content, but that is the 50th costume change of the day and she requests help with the hunt-for and changing-into of each one. Alida. She's tired. She had night duty. 3:30 a.m., every morning lately. Yesterday, she was so exhausted she fell asleep on the couch and snored through the loudest movie ever since the kids are learning to use the remote and enjoy turning up the sound these days.

Good times, good times.

January

January 2010

A long weekend with girls who claimed they just wanted to sleep.

Claimed, I say.

January 2008

Again on the floor in hopeful hibernation mode, warm in our daily outfit of footie pajamas.

January 2005
Was this really the last January that someone slept in our house?
Last night at 3:30 in the morning, at least that's what I'm told because I didn't hear a lick of this, Alida came down and asked her daddy to get her some chocolate milk.

Overslept

For the first time since who knows, we overslept this morning.

Racing out of bed at 6:30 in the morning with a 7:00 deadline for six people, four of whom need severe prodding to get going, is not fun. I'm pretty sure I'll check the alarm about 50 times before bed tonight.

But I keep reminding myself that we got an extra hour plus of sleep out of the deal.

Saturday Mornings

Perhaps because they are starting to be a bit more calm, I found myself convinced yesterday it was Friday, which would of course put me at the edge of a Saturday morning by the time I picked up the kids. When I did pick up the kids, I couldn't figure out why their happy-nappys weren't there to pick up (nap blankets for weekly wash over the weekend). Then I reminded myself that it was Thursday. Two seconds later, I was wondering aloud why Nicholas had homework for the weekend? Then I reminded myself it was Thursday. On the way out the door about 3 minutes later, I nearly asked out loud again why no happy nappys today? I caught myself and remembered it was Thursday. We got to the car 1 minute later and I out-loud took Friday McDonalds orders. Nicholas had to remind me that it wasn't Friday. Good grief.

Then this morning, Friday morning, three of my four children showed up lights blaring and loud in the living room playing some game with each other at 4:15 and again at 4:55. All I could think was, at least it's not Saturday morning.

The Weekend Daddy Was Getting All Medaled-Up

Grandpa met us in middle Tennessee on a gorgeous fall day.

That happened to be the day of an airshow, so we ditched the meetings for an hour to go visit the airplanes. The boys claimed they saw the guns on this one.

No one was cooperating much with pictures.

Later we swam.

And swam, and swam, and swam until little eyes were red and skin was wrinkly. And this will be the moment that Nicholas declared he got the hang of it and was off not clinging for dear life to anyone that would hold him.

And in an unprecedented feat of sleeping, they didn't budge until after 8:30 the next morning.

More Typical Than I'd Like To Admit

Eight O'clock: lights out for the girls

Eight-thirty: lights out for the boys.

Last night the boys are bouncing off the walls, come out of their room to check on their Batman tattoos several times.

Girls, huddle in the corner by the night-light in their room with every book from the shelf. Have an absolute panic attack when they somehow spot a bug.

Finally, sleep.

11:45 Ben

We both startle out of bed to the sound of banging in the half-bath downstairs.

Ben has decided to make a pit-stop, downstairs, and then start slamming his feet against the foot stool as loud as he can.

Go back to bed Ben.

2:30 Alida

She's wandered down, made it to our bathroom. I hazily wake to hear her rustling around. As I'm trying to process where I am, she walks in our room and announces she's just used our bathroom. Well, way to go pumpkin.

Go back to bed Alida.

5:30 Elaine

She shows up as I am brushing my teeth, wanting to watch a movie.

Go back to bed Elaine.

6:45 a.m.

The one with a reason for disturbed sleep after being sick this week, still snoring.

Youth Hostel

It's been 100+ degrees; the heat index has been 100+ a million-some degrees.

Our upstairs air went out late Saturday afternoon.

Since it was so hot up there that the thermostat couldn't even measure the temperature anymore, we let them camp downstairs with us.

Believe me, it took some deliberation to make this decision...
We're a happy family.

The Weekend Outing: Breaking In the Car

Saturday we picked up our hitch hiker Nancy, who also happens to drive well, and headed North to St. Louis.

Movies, blowing raspberries, sleeping, and snacking kept us pretty entertained for the trip.

Yes, even a little bit of sleeping. Although not much.

Once there we gave Nancy the weekend off and headed to our friends.

We hit the Magic House, which they so smartly live about a mile from, and it was fabulous. We didn't even get to see the whole place.

But the girls got to the water play, and there they played, and played, and played.

Jules played with the boys in the Leggo pit after they gave up and left the girls to the water. I love the purse. Nice touch.

Alida, who grew very attached to this skirt, served pizza.

And they had a ball for the longest time on the three-story slide.

You would think they would have taken a nap after this. They didn't.

They waited until we were 20 minutes from home to fall asleep.

And then they slept on the couch.

What is that lovely shade of red on the girl's hand, you ask?

Well it is left over from what Elaine was doing while she was not napping at our friend's house.

It is one thing entirely to say you will replace say a dish--familiar Dukes?

It is another thing to try to figure out how you are going to replace a wall after your 2-year-old gets into the nail polish...

Any ideas?

The Saturday Outing: Five Under Five

No, no, no. Not me with five under five. I left, and I had a lovely afternoon thank you.

It was a Stuber kid inning with...um there are five kids.

Nanny-turned-mommy Jenny brought her little one and her husband, who's moving quickly back there to get out of the camera shot, and they spent the afternoon with the munchkins. These boys of mine are going to think that birthdays last until Christmas with all of the gifts that keep sliding in. Thank you Jenny.

I love it when only-child children come over. The just sit and laugh at us. Emily did the same thing the last time she stopped by.

And why is it that every time someone new comes by to help they are able to get this to happen? It is frustrating I tell you, they fight this with me to the bitter bedtime every weekend.

So uncomfortable looking.

Thank you for not stringing up the Jayhawks Jenny and crew.

They know not what land they live in.

And thank you for the strangely encouraging comment that this seems harder now than when everyone was younger. In so many ways I agree.

It Is Legal, Right?

Aside: I read once that if your kid falls asleep immediately in the car every time you drive off, she probably isn't getting enough sleep. If she falls asleep, and then you heave her out of the car, and then she continues to sleep in your arms when you get to the park even though it is freezing and there are kids running around screaming and even poking at her, I think it's safe to say the girl needs to go to sleep at night.

On to matters of legality.

I have an obsession of sorts with finding the perfect school playground in our area.

They are always empty on the weekends.

(Nicholas rethought launching himself off of this.)

We found one last weekend, and the kids loved it.

Oh, Alida, you woke up. Join the party.

But I always have this little walk-a-mile-with-me speech prepared and waiting for the moment the police drive up and tell me we can't be on the school property or something. I think it is the absence of other people that makes me think we're breaking a rule I don't know about. But they're open (we don't go if we have to jump fences or anything), and I do pay taxes, so it's legal right? I just never see anyone else there...

Yes, she is running around the park with a play hammer. That might technically be legal...

Well

They are asleep in a bed I guess. That's progress.

And when I got them up this morning--exhausted no doubt from wandering their room until who knows--they had traded beds some time during the night. I had put old striped jammies there back in her bed after this picture, but she was back in Alida's bed this morning and Alida was snoring in Elaine's.
I'm exhausted. Why aren't these people exhausted? Where do these not-yet-30-pound-people get this energy?

Randomness: Busy

Daddy spent a lot of time as a couch this past month.

Alida. Well, Alida you entertain us.

There were several naps after busy nights of wandering and playing in the dark and general mayhem.

There is a big smile Alida.

We're still working on staying in bed at night.

Almost there.

Yes Elaine, you know how to smile for me.

Thank you.

And Nicholas, it has never been a problem for you except for the "no pic-pic" phase.

Alida, really. Come on.

And grandpa came along at the end and took the boys and their dad on a big adventure.

And we said good bye. We miss you already so much. Be safe Patric.

The countdown has begun.