Sounds like a great blog entry.

Sounds like a great blog entry.  This is what Kyle said to me a few nights ago as I described my day to him, never a good thing.  The day started with Adam sleeping in, I thought what a great thing for me.  I was wrong.  As I am walking out the door to take Sarah and Alex to the bus stop Adam wakes up, and he is GRUMPY!  He does not want me to leave, and he does not want to come with me.  I finally just have to go or we are going to miss the bus.  I get all the way down the street and hear this kid screaming for his mommy, oh yes it's my kid.  As a side note, Alex gets on the bus right in front of our house, with a little friend of his, Sarah gets on the bus at the end of our street with two of her little friends, why we have two stops so close together I'm not really sure.  Anyway, Adam is screaming for me, which sends Alex into a panic so he is screaming for me to "come back, Adam needs you".  I am starting to feel a little embarrassed that everyone around us is watching these two boys scream down the street at me, what I don't realize is that this is only the beginning.  I leave Sarah, which she does not like, run back to the house and grab Adam.  He has no coat, no socks, green snot is running down his face and it's very cold out.  I feel like a really awesome mom right now.  I get back to the stop as the bus is pulling up.  I give Sarah a hug and she is very calmly walking on when her foot hits the first step of the bus.... something triggers PANIC!  She starts screaming, really yelling and trowing a fit.  I try to make her sit down, the bus driver tries to make her sit down - nothing is working.  I get off the bus and turn around to see my daughter standing on the other side of the closed doors crying her eyes out and screaming her head off.  Let me remind you there are lots of parents watching.  The bus driver has to open the door, as Sarah won't sit down.  The bus drives off to the next stop as I am telling her that she can't go to school today because she didn't ride the bus.  WOW, that really sent her into a fit and the next thing I know she is running down the street chasing the bus, which of course she does not catch (this was really sad and a bit pathetic to watch).  By the time I get home she is standing at our van, begging me to take her to school.  I make her promise she will never do that again, which she does, and off we go.  By the way, Adam is still not dressed and his nose is still not wiped.  Well I am very glad I took her to school, because when I get there I find out Alex is frantic, he thinks he lost his sister.  He didn't know she didn't get on the bus and unknown to me he had been walking her to class every day after they got off the bus, how sweet is that.  He had gone to her class and he and her teacher were searching everywhere for her.  I then had to explain the whole event to her teacher and I also had to explain why my crazy kids get on the bus in two different places.  UGHHHH.  I realize that I have not showered, I'm in my sweats and my three year old looks like I don't care for him at all, bare feet and all - a real white trash moment!  I see Alex standing behind me with huge eyes, so worried about Sarah, so that almost made the morning worth it, almost.  Needless to say we now get on the bus at the same stop and Sarah has not cried again about getting on the bus.  I have survived another adventure in parenting.

Thank you, thank you very much.

These are the words that I hear floating down the stairs right now.  Apparently Sarah has won a music award of some kind and is making a grand speech to her fans.  Sarah , Alex and Adam are all in a band, rocking out.  The boys are on guitar and Sarah, of course, is the lead singer.  It's really very precious to watch them, and of course it makes their musical parents proud.  Beyond these wonderful talents that they are working on, currently Adam is also trying his best to best the toilet.  Yesterday was a sad day as the toilet bested him.  He tried a couple of times to go and just couldn't make it happen, then at Burger King he had the blow out.  Poop from neck, I'm not kidding, to feet, again not kidding.  Poor kid, poor mom, poor people at Burger King eating lunch.  Today he was defeated before he even started as he has now developed a hate of the toilet and wants his diapers back.  I really don't blame him, poop everywhere just is not fun for anyone.  I'm sure the day that he wins the battle over the toilet I will blog a novel, as I will be so excited.  But for now we'll just keep working on it.  Although public outings may need to be a thing of the past for a while.  I have just received an invitation to watch the band play a gig in our bonus room, cool.  (the picture is an old one of the band in the early days)

No longer in her 20's

Today was one of my best girlfriends 30th birthday.  Erin is a spunky, sweet, lovable red head that loves the Lord and spurs me on to be a better christian gal.  I know that she prays for me, my kids and my family.  When Connie asked me to help her plan Erin's 30th bash I was honored to do so, and loved every minute of it.  Last night about 30 of Erin's great friends came, dressed up, to Emily's house for a big surprise.  Erin had no idea what we were planning and was shocked when we were all waiting behind that door.  I must say her husband totally impressed me with his ability to be tricky, good job Rich.  We had a great time chatting all night, eating yummy food, and watching the fun video that I made of her life so far.  

An extra fun treat was that today our accountability group surprised her by kidnapping her to Portland.  We met like normal and had our prayer time, then said "o.k. let's go".  I think she was really happy that her actual birthday had something fun on it too.  She's a great gal, one of my best friends, and I wish her a truly happy birthday.  Now she gets to start feeling old, aches and pains hit faster then you ever think they will.  Boo.

Breakfast at Mother's Bistro

The gang at Cupcake Jones

Erin's Birthday Cupcake 

She did it!

Well Sarah is officially a kindergarden princess now.  She had her assessment day on Monday, which went fairly well.  She was scared when I left, but mostly calm.  I picked her up as well as dropped her off.  She was holding her teachers hand as she walked out to the car, looking a bit unsure but she said she had a good time.  

Yesterday was the dreaded first day of school.  She kept asking me if there were going to be a lot of people (assessment day is just a few kids).  I couldn't really set her mind at ease because I knew it would feel like a million people to her.  Especially because parents tend to hang out and watch their kids.  They don't realize the added stress this is on a little girl like Sarah.  Anyway, she cried, A LOT.  Hard, full on sobbing, terrified tears.  I leaned down and prayed with her, telling her Jesus would be right here the whole time even if mommy wasn't.  This did not provide the comfort I was hoping for.  I finally had to hand her off to the teachers aid and grab Adam, who was not being super helpful of course, and run.  I was really close to crying, but held it together.  Another parent that I know stayed a little longer and when she came out she said Sarah was already fine.  I knew she would be, she just likes to make it hard.

So today was going to be the big first time on the bus day.  She's really excited and I'm excited to watch her and take all these great pictures.  Of course Adam wakes up throwing up.  This makes everything a little more interesting, but I think maybe he'll be fine long enough to get the kids on the bus.  Just as we are walking out the door he pukes, milk bleh, all over himself and the floor.  Like a trooper though he stood in one spot (puke still on him and the floor) while I ran the kids down to the bus stop.  I snapped a fast picture of her in line and handed her off to my friend Emily.  Thanks Emily for being late to all your stuff so Sarah had someone to wait with.  I was blessed by my mom who came and sat with Adam while I waited for her to get home, so at least I have a picture of her getting off the bus.  She was all smiles and had sat with a sweet little girl from our neighborhood all the way home.  After all that I am still in shock that my little girl is in school every day.  She seems very tall, very capable and very mature all of the sudden.  

Waiting at the bus stop, and being picked up.

Sarah is having a girl!

Today my wonderful, great, amazing friends Kari and Valerie came over and we threw our other wonderful, great, amazing friend Sarah a shower.  This was to celebrate the sweet little girl Ellie she is expecting.  We had a great turnout which was wonderful for Sarah and I must say we had some pretty great food and a lot of laughing took place.  It was an all chocolate themed party, because the color chocolate just goes great with pink.  That, and we really LOVE chocolate,

well us throwing the shower do anyway.  It was a wonderful mix of people and I was so glad to get to meet all these different parts of Sarah's life.  She has become a very dear friend to me and I am very grateful to God for placing her in my life.  Sarah is very encouraging and a real genuine person, which can be hard to find.  So the theme of the shower was brown and pink and we went all out in sticking to it.  I was really excited because I got a great deal on beautiful flowers at the South Salem Farmer's Market.  The flower lady made two huge flower arrangements for me and she allowed me to special order them, in all pink, to pick up on Sunday morning.  A great discovery, as I found that was much cheaper then going to a florist.  I made these cute vases with brown ribbon around them and then in pink glitter put the babies initials on them.  We also made candle votives that we filled with coffee, put pink ribbon around, and then put the babies initials on too.

We made brownies, and cherry chocolate cream in edible white chocolate cups.  Mint cream filling, which we tinted pink, in dark chocolate cones, chocolate covered strawberries with an E on each of 

them to stand for "Ellie".  We had a chocolate fountain with some yummy treats to dip and then to top it all off the most amazing punch 

ever.  Kari found a recipe for chocolate egg cream punch.  It has no eggs in it so don't fret.  It was a carton of vanilla ice cream, almost a gallon of chocolate milk, the real stuff that you buy at the store, and then about 1 liter of club soda.  It sat for about 20 minutes before serving.  It was like a chocolate milkshake punch.  SOOOOO good. 

We then played the craziest, most fun game.  To honor Sarah's musical side we split everyone into 5 groups, gave them song

titles and song styles and asked them to write a song, and perform it, for Sarah.  The song titles were based on the new babies initials, EMP.  We had things like Every Mother's Prayer, Every Moments Precious and Ellie's Mighty Pipes.  The groups did an outstanding job!  It really could have flopped except that they actually worked really hard to make it fun, some had choreography and some had a little drama to go along with it.

The winning group did a rap song, beat box and all.  They were hilarious. It was a really fun day, because the guests were so fun,  and it couldn't have been for a better girl, or planned with better friends.  I love all those girls and I can't wait to see them again.

Inserted is pictures of the food and decor and a couple of the song groups.  The last picture is of Sam and Sarah, they are sweet friends.  I hope that as they grow older we will see them planning showers for each other and being blessed by their friendship in the way I am with these gals. 

Seriously, First Grade!

Wow, I can not believe I have a first grader!  I have truly been dreading this day.  I can't believe that I see Alex only a few hours every night, we will be the weird family where the mom is begging the kid to take a sick day.  I must show him the art of faking a fever, I guess.  For those reading this that know about Alex's first day last year, this is not going to compare.  (Our cat followed us to school, it is something I will never forget.  We were quite a sight with me holding this crazy cat that was freaked out by the time we got there.  Long story short it was hilarious.  I still owe Angie big time for holding the cat while I walked Alex in, I found out later she is very allergic.)  Because of the adventures getting to school last year I had no time to be sad about what a big boy I had, so I am making up for it this year.  

Today actually went pretty well.  Just some teary eyes as I walked back out to the car.  Last night however I wondered around two different stores completely sad with tears in my eyes, ready to really sob at any moment, searching for school supplies.  Future note, don't wait until the night before school starts.  We still don't have the erasers he was supposed to have, oh well.  What's really sweet is that last week my mom asked Alex if he was excited.  He said no because he knew I was going to be really sad with him gone, he said he knew I might even cry.  What will I do the day he actually wants to go to college or, gasp, get married!  

Well off he is, on one of many life adventures.  He had been telling me all summer that he was not excited, but he was up and dressed before I was ready and he had his backpack on before he even ate breakfast.  He watched excitedly as I packed his lunch and complained that I took way to long getting Sarah dressed so we could leave.  I would say he was excited.  Then the best, he got to sit right next to one of his very best friends, Will.  His teacher seems really nice and being the independent that he is, he opted to ride the bus home today.  

I am only about 45 minutes away from getting to greet him with a yummy snack and way more hugs and kisses then he will want to deal with. 

Now I just have to get through watching Sarah go to school next week.  It won't be pretty.

A day at the zoo

We enjoyed a very fun day at the zoo over our holiday weekend.  Sadly the rest was mostly spent working in the yard, and my hands are swollen and sore today because of it.  I think I'm getting old.  Anyway, the zoo was loads of fun.  All of the animals were close up and easy to see.  Some of the first animals we saw were eagles.  The kids thought those were awesome.  At one point they were all flapping their arms and flying around the place.  It was really funny to see Alex because he was fully in character and had this very serious expression on his face, trying to be very eagle-like in mood as well.  I guess the eagles looked very serious and grumpy to him.  

Adam loved every single animal but was most excited to see the giraffes.  He was also really happy because we brought a stroller for him, something we rarely do.  He was rather possessive of it actually, no one else was even allowed to look at it. 

Sarah was more interested in the creepy animals then I would have thought.  Actually rather brave for her, she is easily worried and scared, so I was happy with this desire to see everything right up close.  But when we got to the insect zoo the kids were calmly looking at the cage of HUGE cockroaches when I notice that one of the helpers is standing next to Sarah with one in his hand.  I know if I say anything and she turns her head she will freak out, so out of the corner of my mouth I whisper to Kyle, grab Sarah before she.....  She of course turns and freaks out.  Mostly just a lot of tears which was followed by a fear of all things for about 10 minutes.  But I have to say in her defense when she turned she was basically face to face with the thing.  The boys being boys, basically snuggled with the thing.  Gross!  Overall a great day.

Enjoy a few pictures from our fun day.

Here are the kids doing their best eagle, in an eagle's nest.

Here they are looking at the elephants, we were wishing we could have seen the new baby.

I hope this is not a vision of Alex's driving in the future!

They have a new creepy polar bear mascot walking around.  Just not the same when you were recently at Disneyland, but the kids wanted to hug him all the same.