Jesus Loves Me. I Love Burritos.

Ah. Another day has gone by. If my son doesn't quit peeing in his bedroom, he will not live to see four. We had a personality swap at swimming today. Griffin cried for mommy, Kenna worked it through and ended the lesson with high fives and smiles.
I ran my tushy off this morning after drop off. Went to a meeting about taking over the Tucson Moms newsletter, then to the rheumatologist (yikes. I'm getting a referral to a neurologist now. I'm officially falling apart), then back to school to meet with the director regarding Laney. I am going to observe in her class on Friday and then make a decision about whether to move her. I'm not sure if it is just a stage with her that she'll work through, if it is her class, or if it's her teacher.
Laney was singing in the car today. First she sang "Jesus Loves Me This I Know". Then she talked about wanting to go to Nico's for food. Then she sang:

I love burritos, this I know

Cause my tummy tells me so...

There was more along those lines. Now I'll never be able to hear Jesus Loves Me and not think of burritos!

I also made reservations today for the luau and dolphin encounters. I'm getting excited about our trip. Now I probably need to figure out what we are taking...

Pests...I mean Pets

Griffin has decided that he has a new pet. A fly showed up in our home yesterday and he was thrilled that it landed on him. It is now his pet. He has really big plans for his new pet. They are going to go for walks outside and it will sleep in his room. Kenna was going to swat the fly and he was horrified. I love that boy. And we need to look in to getting a dog.
The twins restarted ISR swim lessons yesterday. Griffin was soooo excited to show Pam how he swims. Kenna was just pissed. Ms. Pam told her that it was ok to cry but not to scream at her. Ah. My sweet angel. Laney starts swim team today. We should be all ready to swim like crazy in Hawaii.
Laney is still having a problem at school. She just doesn't want to go. I'm thinking that her teacher might not be a good fit and we probably need to make some sort of change. She's too little to not like school! I just hate being "that mom" that is difficult. The pleaser in me doesn't like to make waves and be a pain. I am often doing the inner eye roll at other moms that are high maintenance. I guess it is my turn now. Queue eye rolls, mommy is going in...

Just When You Think You've Figured Them Out

I think it has been pretty established that my oldest child is what one would call "independent". She has always ventured bravely into the unknown without a backward glance. Until this week. This week we went to school and my daughter had a full out hissy fit. Begging me not to leave her. Begging to spend the day with me. I comforted and then detached myself and left a screaming child to her teacher. When I returned, she had spent the better part of her day crying. She went to the office to call down. She went to the bathroom to call down. When the teacher asked her about it, she told her "sometimes we have crying colds, like babies, and then we just need to cry". Mrs. Miller thought this was something invented by our family as opposed to something dreamed up on the fly by a dramatic child. ha. Mrs Miller also told me that she was deeply impressed by Laney's vocabulary. I guess not every 4 year old thinks her teacher is "tremendous." Laney has also been mysteriously possessed by a helpful, sweet nature. She's been cleaning house, helping me do things, and taking care of her brother and sister.
Griffin and Kenna have also been having adjustment issues. Griffin "Never" Phillips hasn't been listening to his teacher. Kenna has been attempting to boss other kids with limited success. I suppose we'll all be well adjusted by the time it is Fall break and they miss school for a week and a half.

Staying Afloat in the Sea of Domesticity

Blogging moms are cool, but every so often I read about everything they do (for example Pioneer Woman) and think: Crap. I really suck. Is this just me? Doubtful. But I'm having some serious pangs of envy. Somehow I need to figure out how to do more with my life.
And speaking of my life. What are my big wins of the day? Got bug guts scrubbed off my car and about a pound of kid snack efffluvia vacuumed out. Oh bliss. A clean car. Sigh...enjoying the moment. The sad truth is that I failed to adequatedly remove the remanants of whole colonies of insects that were smeared on the car on our trip north (ahem. yes. in May...) Drive through car wash proved inadequate. Full service car wash elusive. So. I made due and then we returned to AZ. And the monsoon rain did not wash it off either.
I also went to the gym and swam for the first time in a million years. I'm trying to get back into shape again after a long hiatus due to kids and RA. Yea me!
Kids went to school and then we came home and swam in the pool. Griffin can't float but has decided that he is a swimmer. He's swimming between the lagoon shelf and the steps. I think he's swallowing a lot of water while doing it. It scares the heck out of me since sometime he doesn't make it all the way and he flails around for the edge. Yikes! Laney also went to her swim team try out and got placed in a group.
This weekend I'm going to try to dig out from under the pile of "to do's" that have accumulated and get us back to being the well oiled machine of a family we are (ha ha ha).

Snow Day (old post. February?)

We woke up this morning to an inch of snow. The kids had fun playing in it. I was suprised. I thought we were supposed to get bad weather over night but had no idea we'd get real snow. I had trouble getting them all ready to go to church with the excitement of the snow. Charles drove up to Phoenix yesterday night and flew out this morning to Hawaii. I'm glad he didn't chance driving in the bad weather in the dark. Funny enough, my friend Richelle's husband Eric was on the same flight with Charles! It's small world.

I'm trying to get remotivated today. I started the year out feeling pretty motivated but this last week I've been really bleh. Tired and just not into doing anything. At all. Except eating. So I'm attempting to recharge the motivational engines this week.

The kids are sitting at the table with me right now. We just finished playing "dragons" and "baby birds". Our living room nest is still not picked up. I caught K giving Laney's stuffed animal a hair cut. Now they are all chopping away at the newspaper and practicing using scissors.

I saw Rorie's mom at Target yesterday. She told me that Rorie recently changed her plans to marry her older brother's friend and she's planning to marry Laney instead. LOL.

I think the kids are attempting to chop up the table cloth now. Off I go.

[Found this in my drafts for some reason. So here you go. A post from last winter.]

Back in the Saddle Again

We made it home without any major hitches. Griffin puked in Deer Lodge. We'd stopped the car and he got up, then puked. I'm pretty sure it doesn't count if we don't have someone throw up once. It is almost guaranteed if we feed them something pink first. I took the twins into the bathroom and to buy dramamine and this old lady gave me a hug in the bathroom. I thought "weird" but I went for it anyway. Never pass up a hug.
We always dress for AZ on the way home and then freeze to death on the way there. Montana is always cold for some reason. It actually hit 32 degrees going through St. Regis. On Labor Day weekend. I guess things warmed up again later though.
It was HOT in Tucson (suprise) and I'd turned our AC off after I got my last bill ($235. Seriously. And we weren't there). I asked Ernie to come over and turn things on before we got there, but it was hot in the house. I couldn't figure out why it was taking so long to cool downstairs until the next day when I realized I hadn't turned on the AC compressor online.
The kids started school and were just thrilled. The twins marched in to Mrs. Wallace's class and started playing and didn't even blink when I left. Laney is in love with her new teacher, who is new to St. As and pretty young. She pronounced Mrs Miller to be "tremendous!" after school. I was nervous because I'd heard some dissatisfied reports from other moms.
We also restarted play group. I need to get my playgroup hat back on and come up with some ideas. September is one of the hardest months because we're all busy and it still really hot out so outdoor stuff is difficult. I think I'm going to have to do one more lame date to give myself some prep time and then we'll be back in action. I'm considering making ice cream in the park--I saw a cool idea for making ice cream in ziplocks where the kids throw them around. Fun, right?
We've also returned to church again which makes me really happy. I like to go to church and I like that it is something that we share as an entire family every week. I missed it over the summer.
We were looking at the tiny amount of photos we took over the summer and realized that we didn't take "after" picts of the house! I'm going to have to con someone into doing that for me.
Today is dentist day for the kids and errands errand errands.