The Great Warm Up

It is going to be nice around here for the next couple of weeks. That means temperatures above freezing so some of that snow we have been getting will melt. It also means that kids will be outside burning off a lot of energy. They will come in with wet everything from boots, socks, snow pants, mittens, and yes even little bodies. That means drying things out every day and washing those that are to muddy to wear the next day. All of that does not really bother me to much it just comes with enjoying winter. I do enjoy the kids who have had a good time playing, come in tired, hungry, and need to go to bed. They will all sleep well except for Hanna who never sleeps anyway.

Croissants

Since Dad and Jared were running errands for work I had asked them to pick up four gallons of milk and two dozen breakfast croissants for Allen while they were at Sam`s Club. I had asked for breakfast croissants you know those things that have eggs and sausage on them, the ones you find in the frozen section, and can be popped into the microwave for two minutes.

As part of Allen`s school day he practices making his own breakfast when he gets to school. His favorite thing to make for breakfast is those croissants so I figured that I could send a couple dozen of them and he would be happy for weeks. Allen has been eating these things for breakfast almost everyday for years so everyone who lives here certainly knows what I was talking about.

When the guys got home they had the milk, well how can you mess up getting milk anyway. They also had two boxes of large croissants. Now why would I send them to get those when I have a baker in the house who could make them if I wanted them? Jared calls them a pain in the butt to make so we do not have them often. Needless to say these will not work for Allen to cook at school so I guess that we will be having turkey and cheese croissants for dinner tonight. I will have to make a salad to go with them and run and get what I really needed in the first place some other time.

Jared says that I need to be more specific when I send them to get things but if I write them a list they leave it lay on the counter anyway so what would be the point of doing that? Sorry Allen, no croissants for a couple of days.

We Had A Stay At Home Weekend

Other then church stuff we pretty much stayed at home this weekend. Rene` and Karre baked two double batches of cookies. That was mainly because Rene` wanted to take some of them back to school with her.

All four of the girls got together and built a fort using the couch, love seat, chair, and lots of blankets for Paul. Jared found him a flashlight and he played in there for most of the afternoon. He even talked me into going in there and if he had not been jumping on me I might have even found it comfortable enough for a nap.

Karre and Lauren did their homework while I cleaned up the kitchen and the boys played WII. Rene` headed back to school a little bit ago. Trevor has already been gone for a couple of days because he had to get back early to teach a class for new RAs.

One last thing UND won both the hockey games against MSU this weekend. It was a pretty good weekend around here.

Uncle!

It`s only January 8th and we have another two hour late school day, that is how many now? They will go out the door, not soon enough though. Hanna just does not do this well at all.

I give up trying to get her together for the day on days like this. When she gets to school she acts like some sort of little angel, at least that is the impression I get from the adults there. Getting her to that angel state of being is just about wearing me out. If she comes looking like a mess, not wearing her underwear,(who on earth goes without underwear when wearing blue jeans( or socks, not having everything in her lunch box just blame it on the weather and move ahead anyway. That is my plan of action here.

Vacation In Photos

Paul was so excited about visiting with Mickey Mouse, but when he actually got to meet him he was being rather shy and at a loss for words. He and Dad went to visit Minnie Mouse at her house and they got to sit on the couch there. Paul has told me all about it several times already.

These are the balloons that just say "I need one please, mom" ?

Dad and Trevor standing in the middle of the street at Hollywood Studios taking in the millions of Christmas lights there.

Allen and Trevor visited with Pluto and posed for the camera.

Any princess would find this castle a wonderful place to call home.



Karre and Rene` found a tropical place to hang out together for awhile.


We had breakfast with these fun, full of energy characters before heading home. We had a really great vacation and it was hard to come back to the world of work and school. We can look forward to taking a break again some day.

Confused

We have a couple of very confused kids running around here. About five minutes to six this morning we got the automated message that school would be two hours hate. For Paul two hours late means no school so that is easy enough to handle because he can understand what no school means. Two hours late for Hanna is another thing all together. She has no clue how long two hours is so she is in a complete panic and rushing through the routine so she is not doing things at all or doing them wrong. She was finally settled down, well as much as a Hanna can settle down. and then, you guessed it, they called school off for the entire day. Now I have a kid on my hands who thinks that I call school off, control the weather, and to top it off can not find anything to do without someone directing her all of the time. It`s a good thing that Rene` is still home on winter break. She will keep the kid busy. At the moment they are taking toys downstairs and I am guessing she will have them cleaning up their mess down there.

We Are Back

We are back from vacation. We had a really great time. Everyone enjoyed those precious drama free days. We had only one behavior issue the entire time we were on vacation. That was when Allen decided to kidnap Paul`s Mickey Mouse and ran off to play tag with it. The abduction of the mouse caused Paul to scream. The mouse was retrieved in less then two minutes and we were back to peace and quiet. We had such a good time that Dad commented on the drive home that I need to figure out how to do this again. I will see what I can do with that one. If Hanna loses her PCA hours then it is notgoing to happen as there is no one who would be crazy enough to put up with her without pay. I will post some photos when I have more time.

I spent yesterday dealing with a water heater that was not working, I can not do much laundry or dishes without hot water. The plumber was called and he said that he would be over in about half an hour. That half an hour turned out to be one and a half hours. Of course when they figured out the problem they did not have the part on the truck so they had to go back to the shop for it. I finally got things rolling around here by mid afternoon.

While I was waiting around for the plumber I started going through the phone messages, emails, and mail. In the mail there was a letter that informed us that Lauren`s communication device has finally been approved. There are a lot of dead trees out there with the mountain of paperwork that went into getting that one done. Lauren will be one happy kid when that thing finally gets here. Now there are only four more things to argue with those people about, but I got lots of sunshine and swimming time so now I am ready to get back to work.