Happy Halloween!

Iron man using his flight stabilizers!

Ooooooh Sad Puppy!

This was EB tonight. We went
Trick-or-treating at Jer's work this evening and
he did NOT like his little hat with the puppy ears on it.
Actually, he didn't like the costume at all and
any time he was reminded he was wearing it he
would try to pull it off.
But he was so darned cute in it....
I had to get a picture, even if he was a bit distraught.
Awwwww, poor kid.

Of hairspray and bathtub rings...

All of my kids loved the hairspray even if all of them aren't huge fans of taking baths. I guess it was worth it to them though... they all want it again today! ... guess I won't be scrubbing that ring out of the tub till AFTER halloween.

Halloween at Preschool

Ya, the little fairy girl doesn't look so sure about it eh?

Grrrrrrr Mama Bear Almost Makes Her Debut....

So for the past week or so Goober has been telling me about kids teasing him at school.

I was thinking on the playground mostly, where there are teachers and duties. Turns out it's at the bus stop in the morning when there aren't any teachers or parents around. I gave Goober advice about trying not to care about what they think, that if he is going to care about what people think they should be his friends and family. People that are around him all the time. I talk to him about ignoring them and pretending like they aren't there. Because I know that the bigger reaction they get the more they will tease.

So this morning I sent Goober out to the bus stop and stood at the door and watched.

Can I just say, some kids are really stupid?

Did they not think I could hear them taunting him and laughing from across the street? really? REALLY? He did a great job in trying to ignore them. Needless to say I was pissed. But I also don't want to make the problem worse, and with how pissed I was I knew I probably would. So what did I do?

I sent Jeremy over there.

Turns out it's three kids (all the other kids at the bus stop pointed out which kids they were, Jer thanked the kids that told for being nice). Isn't it kinda odd, the kids that are teasing are a chubby blonde girl, a short pale kid, and a Hispanic kid. Now, the Hispanic kid probably isn't teased very much simply because half of the school or more is Hispanic, but the chubby one and the runty one probably are (or were) a lot.

Jer basically just asked them why they thought it was okay to tease Goober... to which there was no reply, just cowering. Then he told them that we know they live near here and it wouldn't be hard to find their parents and talk to them if the teasing continued. The response ... silence... (it does seem that the cowards are usually the bullies). Jer then asked them "Okay?" to which they sheepishly nodded.

I really hope that fixes that. I know it will do one of two things, I will either make the problem abate, or it will get worse and we will be talking to parents.

Oh the joys of elementary school.

It's THAT time again...

You know, the time to stab pumpkins repeatedly
and yank their guts out just for kicks and giggles.

Pictures

I took this shortly after getting Goober out of bed,
and though I love sunrises
I don't like getting up early enough to see them!

This is Goober shortly after coming home from school.
he lost his other front tooth during lunch that
day and was totally stoked that they gave
him a cool box to keep it in.

Does Everyone Wonder...

What life might have been like had they taken a different path? Or is this just something I think about from time to time?

Now, Don't get me wrong! My life is great, I have a wonderful loving husband that does far more for me than I do for him (as far as I can see that is!). I have healthy, intelligent, active kids who have no problem with giving mom hugs and kisses and helping out where they can (for the most part, we do have our moments!). Granted life as a stay at home mom can get ruff, and anyone who says otherwise has never done it (at least not for any real length of time).

You see, the monotony is what kills ya as a stay at home parent. Same thing day in and day out. There is the added spice of children's antics and stresses of tantrums, but for the most part it's cleaning, laundry, grocery shopping, homework, cooking, mediation, finances, and a couple of other things thrown in here and there. And guess what all of those things have in common? Yup, the job is never really done. In fact they seldom stay done for a 24 hour period of time, and count your blessings if they stay done that long! :)

The thing that keeps me going as a stay at home mom is the fact that I know my children gain so much from it. When they come home from school they can always count on the fact that I will help them with homework and ask them about their day. I can help them with managing bully's or celebrate a lost tooth with them. When they fall off their bikes I'm always around to check if they are okay and to hold them and hug them until they have calmed down, and sometimes slap a band aid or two on if needed. They always have the same rules, they don't have to figure out what rules apply to home and what rules apply to daycare or other places. They also know that mom can come and get them from school if they are sick, or can read to them if they are having a hard day.

Honestly, I had a stay at home mom growing up, and I can't see letting anyone else raise my children except me or Jer.

But I often find myself wondering... where might I be had a chosen a different path. What if, instead of being a "preppy" kid I had chosen to be a bit rebellious. Would I have learned more about how life works or not? Would I be of the religious affiliation that I am. Would I be religious at all. Would I know what it is like to be drunk. Would I have a tattoo. Would I value the gentle qualities of my husband more? Or do I already value them that much? I don't know. Would I be in a stable relationship? Or would I be married to a complete butt head.

What if in college I had chosen to go into law, or medicine, or mechanical engineering, or political science? Would I have been a career woman now with a successful livelihood? Or maybe just another peon at a large corporation. Or even a politician? Would I be married? Because Jer and I met when I was "taking a break" from college for what I thought would be a year. Or would I be married to someone of quality but completely different.

Or maybe I would still be married to Jer but maybe not have had kids as quickly. What if he had finished school. Where would we be then? What if we had chosen to travel the world a little before "settling down", would we have even have children by now. Would we have adopted instead of having our own (like both of us fully expected to do)?

This isn't saying that I would want any of these "other" things. Sometimes I just wonder. And I wonder if other people wonder too.

Just Random Stuff.

So Goober made a friend... and was really happy about it... then the friend disappeared. I'm guessing to lack of paying rent on her parents part, but honestly? Who knows? All I know is that she isn't in the house she used to be in.

Well, yesterday Goober came home from school and announced that he made another friend with a girl in his class (the old friend was in he class too, but disappeared from there as well). He even remembered the new friends house number. Anyhow, I told him that I had to talk to her parents before I allowed him to go see if she could play (call me protective, but I ALWAYS want parents phone numbers and for them to have mine in case something bad happens).


Unfortunately the Energizer Bunny has been low on batteries lately due to having a fever :( Poor little dude. So I made Goober wait for me to put him down for another nap, he was vegging in front of a DVD looking like he was sleeping except his eyes were open. And I walked with Goober and Missy to the new "Friend"s house. Her mom is nice and she has two younger siblings... a younger brother (who will end up being the same grade as Missy) and a little sister who is just older than EB. Just the opposite of Goober.

They enjoyed playing yesterday and most of the day today. The kids played most of the morning in the backyard with Gma and Gpa J while they were here helping us while we moved dirt. Loads and Loads of DIRT. Dad was a doll and offered to help us out by getting a little tractor to use. We had a full truckload of dirt in front of our house waiting to be moved and our wheelbarrow is weak on one side and tips relatively easily so it was going REALLY slowly. Anyhow, we got almost all of the dirt moved thanks to dad... I really don't think it would have happened before snowfall without him. THANKS DAD!!!! (Aren't my parents AWESOME!?!?!)

Now, you may wonder why we needed so much dirt? Mainly because the noobs that owned our house before us didn't level the yard before they planted and put in the sprinkler system. So all of the water from ours and the neighbors sprinklers would gather in a big puddle in the middle of our backyard while other areas of lawn died due to not getting watered enough. So a large portion of our backyard is now covered in dirt. Wooohooo so fun. It won't have grass till spring. So this should be entertaining to try to keep the kids out of the mud all winter.

On a less overwhelming note: we got my garden area all ready! So now, come spring I can plant some veggies and yummy stuff. I have never owned a vegetable garden in my life... so we will see how that works. Worst thing that could happen? I hate it and plant bushes where the garden spot is :)

Anyhow, that has been my life the past couple of days.

First Sleep Over

So last week Goober asked if you could have a sleepover. I figure as long as I know the kids and parents well, why not? :)

So last night Mr M spent the night. Mr M is Goobers best friend and one of my best friends son. So it ended up working out great. EB was a bit of a booger... but after he was down the kids had fun and stayed up late... then, of course, woke up early in the morning and we had waffles.

All the kids are out playing in the back yard despite the chilly fall air and their rosy cheeks. I'm so glad no body is fighting after spending so much time together! :D

Anonymous Comment Day

Okay I haven't done one of these in a WHILE, but thought since I don't really have anything earth shattering to post I might as well. :)

Have you EVER thought your family was full of nutcases? Why?

Figure that's a good one for an anonymous answer!

Why I'm greatful for DVD's

And no, I'm not changing to Blue-ray... as soon as I get all the movies I want it will just change again. Soooo I'm going to try to wait it out till the next change and save the money of having to replace a whole movie library twice. I'm so smart! :P

Anyhow, recently Jer borrowed some older VHS from my mother in law. Last night, guess what happened? Ya, EB figured out the actual "tape" comes out of the VHS. LOL Anyhow, I'm truly grateful that by far the majority of our movies are on DVD. They are so much more resilient! And less drawing for little fingers!

I have no clue how my parents did it when we were little and actually retained some VHS clear through till we were old enough to replace them ourselves. :)

Sigh.

I have phone troubles... and apparently camera troubles too (cause I took a picture of Missy's hair yesterday and now I can't find my darned camera!!!).... but back to the phone troubles.

We have had pretty much one working phone in our house since we moved in. Granted it's a cordless so that makes it a little better.

Thing is, we actually have 3 cordless phones hooked up, and a corded one too! The corded one didn't have a DSL filter on it cause it's a wall mount and finding a wall mount filter is astonishingly hard to do in this town. My 2 other cordless phones have "issues". The one was totally fine in our old house but now whenever I pick it up to talk on it it sounds like I'm standing in a tornado.... ssssswwwweeeeeeeewwwwww in the background constantly. The other one always decided to have connection issues with the base so that when it rang or you picked it up to dial it basically said "ya right, you actually think your going to USE me? hahaha well TAKE THAT SUCKA!"

So I made due with one phone for a long time.

Recently I finally made the trip to Radio Shack and found a DSL filter for the wall mount. yay. At least when I forget the cordless downstairs now I can actually answer the phone (even if I am confined to the kitchen when I do it). And I bought a new phone for downstairs because I was tired of the other one going on strike.

I came home, hooked it up and charged it... it worked great (wait for it) until yesterday. 3 days after I bought it it decides to not respond to it's buttons and to constantly be lit up. :P

Why is it that everyone has something like this? Be it lawnmowers or hairdryers or.... phones?

----

And now I've misplaced my cell phone! ROFLMAO But I got the new phone to work again! YAY! But that new phone worked great to find my cell phone... and then I got to thinking really hard and found my camera.... ya this post is dumb. lol

Summary Of My Life Right Now

I wrote an email to one of my sisters recently and realized that I did an okay job of summing up where I am at in life right now. So here is where I'm at.

My kids and I are pretty good, I think Potty Training is my bane, I'm SO not looking forward to starting The Energizer Bunny. Goober still has issues and still wets the bed fairly often, but where there is history of bed wetting in the family that's no surprise. Missy is a bit better though in this area.

I've been in a bit of a confused state for a while now. I'm truly at odds with my religion in many ways but in others areas I fully believe, Jer on the other hand fully supports the religion though is sympathetic to my frustrations. I have a hard time knowing if I should continue to go to church to save my children from becoming "projects" and socially stigmatized or if I should stop going so that they can learn to think outside of traditional roles. Specifically my daughter whom I want to learn to know how to truly be a leader when the religion seams to scream at girls and women to constantly be a submissive follower. grrrrr.

My social group is a frustration at the moment as well... though there isn't much "drama" (thank goodness) there isn't a whole lot of enthusiasm either. I find that I have one truly good friend that that the rest appear to merely "put up" with me. This is irritating for someone who loves having a lot of people around, loves to people watch, and will forever want to be the center of attention even though I've found my personality is not the type that people are usually drawn to. Mostly people find me a bit loud and opinionated and instead of understanding that I just want to be heard and not that I want them to agree with me all the time, they back away. I never know when I'm over analyzing the social sphere to the point that I'm finding issues that aren't really there.

I hate it when everything hits the fan at once, though I'm glad that I don't have greater issues to deal with and am generally content with life as it is.

So there ya have it.

Goober and Grandpa J

So a few weeks ago my dad needed a get away. Unfortunately my mom's shoulder was in the "really screwed up" phase so she couldn't go with him. Jer and I also had previous engagements... but Goober didn't!!

So dad took Goober camping with him. Boy was Goober excited! And by the pictures it looks like they had a loud of fun too.

They picked Huckleberries...
And they looked at the stars! Goober even called home to tell us about the Big Dipper!

Dad said he was glad Goober was a sound sleeper cause there was a really load screech owl that woke dad up during the night, but Goober slept straight till dawn... and then of course got up really early! lol

Thanks for taking him dad!

Lost a Front Tooth

(I know weird picture, but it shows his lost tooth well)

And then he promptly lost it. :P So now the Tooth Fairy has to figure out what to do.