Ahhh...The Family Roadtrip

We are into hour 15 of our road trip and we are all still talking to each other, have had basically no trouble and only one minor kid meltdown. All in all a very good start to our trip. But, don't take this as any indication of my support for the family roadtrip. I stand by my assertion that we are a flying family, and even a good roadtrip won't change that.
My slightly insane husband suggested that we drive from DC to Orlando, Florida...all in one day. Remember those three beatiful little men that I've mentioned before? Well, between them and the thought of a full day with no real food and rest stop and gas station potties, I'll admit the idea of being on the road for that long was not appealing.
While not admitting that Tom was right (don't want him to get a big head), we do travel well together. I personally believe that a few Game Boys, some cool DVD's from home, and the occassional snack made this trip an easy one.
So, we're almost there - I'll be sure to say "Hi" to the Mouse for you!
P.S. - Tom wanted me to be sure to mention that "As a demonstration of my profound commitment to my family's safety and in the best interest of those concerned" we actually left last night. In the middle of rush hour. From Washington DC area. Yes, rush hour. While not the best timing, we thought it would be better NOT to attempt a 15 hour drive in one day. Personally I think Tom realized his folly.

So much for the spice

I wanted to add some spice to my look - so I decided that a bit of color in my hair would be the way to go. I wasn't interested in coloring my hair, because I like the color of my hair, but adding a touch of color. Well, if you don't know, I have brown hair. In the summer it has red highlights from the sun, but it's just brown. I wanted some bright pink or purple, and since the holidays were coming up, I figured that it would be best to get the purple as I wear lots of reds over the winter and I figure that purple would look better. Well, my stylist was all over this. She hunted up some temporary color for me and we went to work. A good, oh, 20 minutes later we were rinsing and I could tell from her facial expression that something was wrong - terribly wrong. She told me to come sit back down and we'd dry to see if it "worked." I was afraid from her look that my hair had fallen out or it was green or something strange like that. But no, there was nothing. I don't mean there was nothing wrong, but there was nothing at all. My brown hair was still brown with maybe one or two STRANDS of hair purple. So, we went back and did a larger chunk of hair (since it only takes about 20 minutes total), and we sat down again with the mirror and looked. Well, there was a bit more purple in my hair, but again, nothing visible without the mirror up close. Dangit. I want my purple hair but the purple hair doesn't want me. Deflated, my stylist and I decided that we'd think on it and see what we could come up with - maybe using actual hair color that is semi-permanent (the purple was also semi-permanent and would wash out in a bout 6 weeks, but shw ants to use actual real hair color) so that it shows in my hair. But, this would only be red as real hair color doens't come in wild colors. The temporary pink may or may not work - same kind as the purple but lighter.

What we think happened is that it blended right in with my lovely brown hair (GRRR). If you look very, very closely I do have some purple strands here and there, but overall I look no different. We aren't sure that the gray hair took any of the color, but I'm not one for bleach so the whole bleaching to get the pink or purple in my hair isn't an option at this point. But, I do have an e-mail out to my cousin, who does this professionally (and has dark hair). I'm hoping that she comes through for me so that I can get that cool purple hair - it's not like I'm asking for world peace here (although that would be nice too), just a touch of color in my hair.

The Cast

In case you were wondering. Max got a soccer cast...a very easy decision for him:

And hopefully it will come off Monday!

How NoVA does parades

Not DC - they have HUGE parades, but Northern Virginia. I am a parade JUNKIE and we missed this one last year due to some unfortunate circumstances. So, we hit the Reston Thanksgiving Day parade and aside from freezing had a good time (well at least I did...). We saw the standard parade fare, old cars, scouts (both Boy and Girl), giant balloons (even a giant attack eagle balloon - check out this little girl - she ducked just before it attacked her!)

Really, no kiddos were harmed in the marching of this parade - she was holding the beak...

We also saw bands, fire trucks, and of course Ronald McDonald (huh? Yeah, Ronald). Then, we saw the Zamboni (hey, it was cold out),

the swing dancing penguins,

the Hogettes (crazy fund raising Redskin fans),

and last but not least, Santa and Mrs. Claus.

So, I was impressed enough by this parade to deem it Suzie Parade Worthy (meaning I'll drag the family again next year). Then again it doesn't take much (ask Tom about the Leander Days parade or the Anderson Mill 4th of July Parade...and I can go on). Hopefully though it will be a bit warmer, or the wind will be still for us so we won't freeze. Forty two isn't bad (did I just say that?) but when the wind chill cuts right through the pants and the wind howls past the buildings, it feels like upper 20's. But we'll be back there next year, right on time, lining up to see Santa and Mrs. Claus again!

Food

Food for your belly (from our Texas Thanksgiving last weekend):




And food for thought (from YouTube - thanks Aunt Norma and Uncle Hugh for showing us this):

Finally Fall

Here's proof:

Unfortunately, here's more proof:

YUK!

Seems that the nasty yuk hasn't quite left our house. As of today I'm the only one who still has it, but Ian has lingering effects of it - he's hacking and coughing as we speak (and yes, it's 11pm here - but he's coughing in his sleep). Can't be good for him poor little guy, but he refuses to take cough suppressant and I'm not up for a fight tonight. So, he hacks and coughs in his sleep. Tomorrow is a new day and hopefully we will be feeling better.

We spent the past weekend in Texas visiting with Dad and Doreen and attending Dad's retirement ceremony. Nice to see him taking time for himself after all these years of working. We'll see how he adjusts to having free time, and see if he fills it all with "things to do," or if he just hangs out and relaxes some. I'm voting for the latter (Uh, Hello Dad - get it?).

We left town on Thursday and I was busy doing laundry on Wednesday night so that we'd have some clothes (I'm terribly behind on the whole laundry thing right now). Half way through my second load of about five that I was planning to do, the dryer STOPS WORKING. Uh, hullo? Don't you know that we are leaving town tomorrow and I have other things to do? So, instead of doing some of those other things I spent two hours at the laundromat. Now, this turned out to be much better than I expected. I piled my load of half dry clothes, the load from the washer that was clean but wet, and all that I could stuff into a couple of big baskets and headed a block up the street. Wouldn't have been so bad but it was pouring down rain. Now, I haven't been to a laundromat in YEARS. We've had a washer dryer in just about every place we've lived in for probably the past 15 years or so. Can remember one place in Sarasota that didn't have a washer/dryer, but that was waaaaay back when. Anyway, I took my quarters, clothes and detergent in and started the loads going. Two hours later all five loads were done. Amazing. Except for the rent a cop coming in and scaring off the migrant workers (who weren't bothering anyone and just had come in to find some refuge from the cold and rain) not much went on. I read the paper, drank my coke and folded clothes as they came out. I might need to do this more often. If I can get five loads done in 120 minutes - folded and everything - you might hear about this again!

Meanwhile the "dryer repair guy," aka Tom, promised to look at it tomorrow night after his meeting. Nothing exciting as we've already fixed the dryer twice (well, Tom fixed the dryer thus he's the repair guy...) and he says it should be another easy fix. Hopefully he's right as the dryer that came with the house doesn't work and was kind of old looking anyway. So, hopefully in a few days we will have a functional dryer. In the meantime I might just have to take a morning and head off to the laundromat again. Who knows how much laundry I can get clean with a bit of planning!

Oh yeah...and I forgot to pick up Bunsen from the vet (where he was boarded). Hope he doesn't notice...

Mom I colored you a PICTURE!

Yeah. Sounds good on paper, but on my beige burber CARPET? Done in DRY ERASE MARKER??? Yeah, not cool. Fortunately, Oxy Clean Laundry stuff gets the stains out...mostly. Yes, the laundry stuff because that's all we had. Now we have light pink and blue stains on the lovely beige berber carpet. Oh, and it's the only carpet in the entire house.

When asked if they wrote on the carpet, Sam answered "It was an accident." Nice, but we don't believe you. We can clearly see your name there. Sigh...double sigh...and the biggest sigh of all is that history is repeating itself. Apparently my kids are genetically programmed to write on the carpet with a semi permanent market. Max did the exact same thing when he was 4.5 years old...on my grey berber carpet...with a red Sharpie.

Who knew?

Who knew...

...that one of my kiddos can do a handstand on the wall?

...that the other kiddo would follow suit when he saw the first one doing it?

...that both little guys can climb a ladder/wall up to about 10 feet without any trouble?

...that both kiddos look like monkeys when swing on a rope?

...that they would bounce like maniacs on a trampoline?

...that one would hang as he moved along the length of a high bar them plummet into a foam pit?

...that the other would hang for only a second then squeal with delight as he fell into the pit?

...that they would roll and tumble and climb and flip until they had to be told that class was over?

...that they would talk for ten minutes about all the cool stuff they did at their first gymnastics class?

Not me...but this is where I found myself this morning as the little boys went to their very first gymnastics class!

How to Save $50 a Month

Step 1 - Get these:

Step 2 - Buy these: Step 3 - Use the item purchased in Step 2:

Works every time...50 bucks a pop...

I need a pop up timer

You know those pop up timers that they have on turkeys? You know - the ones that tell you when the turkey is done? O.K. I'll admit that I've only made one, maybe two turkeys but I had one on both turkeys that I made. Well, I need one of those for ear infections. I think it would be very convenient and helpful if kids came equipped with pop up indicators that told us when they had an ear infection.

Sam has been under the weather for a few days. He had a fever yesterday and this morning, so we were giving him Tylenol Plus some runny nose stuff to help with his runny nose (yeah, I know all about the recall, but he's 4.5 and I can read the bottle so as not to overdose him). The stuff dries him up some and drops his fever, plus it seems to make him feel MUCH better, and now we know that it probably masks the ear pain, or so I'm guessing. Tonight, after a day of hanging out, resting, and trying to get himself back into working order, Sam complained that his ear hurt. Well, Max whacked him (accidentally) pretty good earlier in the day, but he said it hurt as he tugged on his ear, and it was enough to keep him from falling to sleep. Poor guy - he might have an ear infection. Here's where the pop up timer comes into play.

For those of us who have kiddos who rarely get things like these, it would be great to know that he has an ear infection or not. Now we have to haul him off to the doctor to see if his runny nose caused his tubes to swell and get all gunked up (yuk!) and whether the fever was from the aforementioned gunk. Hopefully it's not, it's just an ear that got whacked on and hurts, but since we're hopping on a plane on Thursday it's important that we get this cleared up ASAP. Otherwise his head (and mine) might explode on the plane, causing the heads of all those lovely passengers flying with us to explode as well.

So, tomorrow we call the doctor, and hopefully Sam will get some relief from this, whatever it is. But oh how much easier would it be if that timer thing popped up - then we'd know - yep, it's an ear infection!

Rock Lobster!

I've had a song in my head for days now. Max got this cool red lobster at a birthday party this past Monday that you put in water and it grows to six times it's size. Pretty cool, right? But, every time I see it or think of it I get to this:

Now, I love the B-52's, but having a song stuck in your head is the worst! The funny thing about this is that Tom didn't know what song this was. He really really dislikes 80's music, so no big surprise there, but it's a pretty famous song.

So, without further adieu, here's Max's magical transforming red rock lobster!

Yes dear? Deer. Huh.

Yes, deer - six to be exact. This is our backyard. Cool, isn't it? And we live inside the beltway, a mere 15 minutes from DC. Not bad. Not bad at all.

No way...

Can't believe what I just saw. The Florida State Seminoles, who are under .500 in the ACC, just beat Boston College, the #2 team in the country. GO NOLES!

Humpty Dumpty

Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall.
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.
All the king's horses and all the king's men
Couldn't put Humpty together again.

Yeah. Falling off a wall. Humpty - you don't hold a candle to my kid Max. You see, Max fell off the ladder for his bunk bed and broke his arm. But, unlike you, Mr. Dumpty, he's repairable. He is currently splinted with a trip to the orthopedist on Monday. I'm sure that the orthopedist, not exactly one of the king's men (she's a she), doesn't have a whole lot to do to put my kiddo back together as it's a buckle fracture. So, Humpty, too bad for you, but Max is on the mend. And his biggest complaint is that he has to wear an eye patch...

So BOO to you Humpty!!!

Smells Like Feet. Yes, I said feet.

I have three little boys. Well, they are 7, 4.5 and 4.5 years old, so not terribly little. The biggest problem is that they are boys, and this whole boy thing is a complete foreign thing to me. I grew up as an only child, and being a girl I don't remember that I was terribly stinky. (Please don't ask my Dad that question - I don't really want to know the answer...). Anyway, I have three very active boys who smell. Actually, they stink. Their room smells like feet - not a locker room, but feet. And it doesn't matter how often I leave the window open, bathe the kids, change the sheets, or do the laundry - their room smells like feet. I am seriously considering putting an air freshener in their room, but I don't want to walk in and be overwhelmed by the smell of feet and vanilla...sigh...

Any suggestions?