Seriously?

This is what I saw when I looked out the window this morning. I immediately began searching the house for a loaded gun.


Luckily I also saw that my tulips had bloomed this morning which distracted me from my gun search. I bought these at Costco last week and I really like them. The girls regard them as some sort of science experiment so the money I spent was justified.



Hanna wanted to be in the picture and chose this pose. I told her that tulips don't really smell but that didn't seem to matter.

Slow week

It's a slow week and I don't have anything interesting to blog about so I'm going to post the girl's basketball photos. Grace just took a clinic but she really liked it and was doing well. I talked previously about how well Hanna was doing but I'm happy to report that she improved greatly throughout the season. I'm not saying she's ready to be recruited by UCONN but it wasn't painful to watch. Hanna has a good time doing anything social, so she says she wants to play next year. Yikes.


Being the fabulous mom I am, I forgot about Hanna's pictures so the coach called asking "where's Hanna?" I had to run her down there as-is but for all my worrying, the picture turned out fine.


I did have something strange happen this week that caused to me take my blog off Google. I saw that someone from Germany had viewed so I clicked on it to see who and why. They had entered a search into Google and it came up with my blog. The search they entered was, "Tampon girl/sex". It came up with my post about teaching the girls about menses in the Nordstrom bathroom. It weirded me out but also made me chuckle slightly. Ryan and I pictured this pimply German youngster sitting at his computer typing and saying "tampon girl/sex" with a thick German accent. I don't know what "tampon girl/sex" is nor do I want to know but those Germans must be pretty freaky.

No Easter Bunny?

The Easter Bunny was good to us this year bringing us lots of delicious candy. I bought the girls new Easter outfits which they really liked. I didn't think I'd get so much joy out of dressing them up but I really do like it. Having girls is fun. I did make one huge parenting blunder today when I told Grace there wasn't an Easter Bunny. I had put notebooks in the girl's Easter baskets and I told them to put them in their church bags so they'd have something to draw on at church. Hanna asked me if I bought them and not thinking, I told them that I had. I sometimes forget that Grace is only seven and very sensitive. I knew Hanna had pretty much figured out that the Easter Bunny was bunk and for some reason I decided it was time to confess to them that there was no bunny. This is how it went:

Me: "Yes, Dad and I are the Easter Bunny."
Hanna: "Whatever, dude. I'm so grown up that nothing shocks me." (ok she didn't say that but that is what she was thinking)
Grace: "There isn't a Easter Bunny?"
Me: "No. I'm sorry. I thought you knew that there couldn't be a huge bunny that hopped around handing out candy."
Grace crying: "I thought there was an Easter Bunny!"
Me: "Grace I'm so sorry. I thought you knew. Sometimes it's just fun to pretend these things. You can still believe there is an Easter Bunny."
Grace crying: "I can't go back now that you've told me he isn't real."

I calmed her down and then told Ryan what happened. He talked to her and they decided that the Easter Bunny left the chocolate eggs hidden in the house but that we had bought everything else. She seemed happy with that but I still feel horrible.

Ryan said no one wanted to see a picture of him.

Grace always looks at Ryan when I'm taking a photo. I thought it looked cute.

Kitties

This is too freakin adorable! I watched this yesterday and used the powers I have to translate what these cats are saying to each other.
"I'm bored, let's go over to Karen's house."
"Sounds good. We'll get in her car and wait for her."
"Purrfect! When she gets in the car we'll terrify her by sitting on the seat looking adorable."
"She'll pee her pants!"
"Exactly. Now lick this spot here."

Praise the Lord! The tooth is out.

I saw Grace at recess today and decided that tooth had to come out! It was grossing me and others out to look at it. I took her into my private "teacher bathroom" and told her to start working on it because if she didn't get it out on her own in a minute or two, I was yanking that thing out. She tried valiantly but it took me to finally wrench it free. I looked at and it had some sort of weird substance inside it. I stuck my fingernail in it and it popped out. Grace and I picked it up off the floor and I realized it was half a Nerd. This kid had half a Nerd stuck inside her tooth! I mean, it's bad when Nerds are falling out of your bra but when you literally have them stuck in your teeth, you know you have a problem. Oh well, the tooth is out and she no longer looks like the result of close inbreeding.

Things are going to change!

That's my new motto. I don't know if it's turning 34 or what but my body is just not doing what I want it to. I want it to stay around 105 pounds while letting me eat bags of chocolate mini eggs and doing a lot of nothing. Unfortunately it is not going to let me do these things so hence the new motto "things are going to change". I'm also motivated by summer quickly approaching and that means I'll have to wear a swim suit soon. Plus in May, my mom and I are heading to Mexico and I will be wearing a bikini there. Not a string bikini but some sort of two piece that isn't a tankini. So this flabby, white body has to be bikini ready by the end of May. I bought a bikini I thought I would like on Gap.com last week and I tried it on after it came yesterday. The trying on was followed by a few minutes of huddling in the fetal position on the bathroom floor while weeping quietly. So this morning I got up at 5:40 and went to the school to take a class one of the teachers has going. It was a boot camp/circuit type class that I really liked and was quite challenging. Have you ever jumped rope for two minutes? It's hard, try it. The getting up that early is all mental and I tell myself that I can come home and sleep for 45 minutes before I have to get up for work. That little reward is enough to get me up. Sad but that's how I function. I'm hoping this class plus my already in progress effort to limit my daily calories, will result in me liking my body a lot more.

Here is me looking cute in a bikini at one time in my life.

BYU Swim

Quists were kind enough to invite us to go swimming with them at BYU tonight. We went with the Beans also because Mr. Bean is a professor at BYU and only employees can go or take guests. For those of you unfamiliar with the BYU pool and it's rules, you have to wear a "modest" one piece swimming suit to swim there. Back in the day when I attended BYU, you had to wear a BYU issue swimming suit and man were those sexy! They were just a navy blue tank suit but I think they left them in the rotation until the were almost transparent and stretched out about five sizes. They finally changed the rules a few years back and you can now wear your own "modest" swimming suit. Apparently Karen and Tracey's girls do not own "modest" swimming suites (that fit) so they were planning on using a BYU issue suit. Well surprise! They just recently got rid of all the BYU suits and you can no longer wear a lovely BYU issue tank. So we had three teenage girls without suits. The kind BYU students who were working the locker room desk told us there might be some in the lost and found. They fished out three suits that were somewhat usable. Victoria's was almost transparent and stretched out, Taylor's was the most decent of the bunch but it was a bit big in the top for her and Sydney's had to be taken in with hair elastics. They were good sports about it and did end up swimming in the lost and found suits. Don't expect pictures of them in their suits. Teenage girls do not mess around with that kind of thing. Taylor told me she'd burn my camera if I took a picture of her.

You have to click on the picture and check out Grace's hillbilly tooth. It's so close to coming out but as of yet, no one has been able to coax it out.

I don't know what gang sign she's flashing. I'm guessing some tats will be showing up soon.

I just thought this was a cute picture of Grace.

Amaryllis

Too tard to moddle

I saw this on Mimi Smartypants and I thought it was too funny to keep to myself.

Too tared to moddle

New Blog

I decided on this template and I think it's the one most people liked. If lost all my links when I changed so I hope I got everyone back in. If not, remind me. I'm also undecided on the font/text colors. Give me your opinions please.
Not much has been going on here this week. I've been doing a lot of bike riding but the weather is not holding out and it's supposed to snow this weekend. wah.

Is lighter text easier to read? I left it dark in some places to test it out. Comments Please!

Working on the blog template

I'm trying out new blog templates so it might be wacky around here for a few days. Feel free to comment on likes and dislikes.

Spring Fever

Spring is so close I can smell it but spring can be tricksy. It likes to give you a taste of the beautiful and then snatch it away, giving you a spring snowstorm just because it can. Today was one of those gloomy, breezy spring days that doesn't really do much for me. It kind of reminds me of spring in Alberta which is really just a windy, dry winter. The thought of spring has got me thinking about a bikes. I bought a GT mountain bike over 12 years ago in Sheridan, WY and it's been a great bike. It's a little too mountainy for my style of bike riding which is basically riding around the hood with the kids. We looked yesterday at a few places but they were either not what I was looking for or WAY too pricey. We decided to check out our local bike shop where we have taken our bikes to get tuned. We both like the idea of supporting local businesses but we also want a good deal. When we pulled up there was a big sign in the window advertising that all 2007 bikes were 25% off. Perfect. This was how I bought my last bike. There weren't many left but I immediately liked the Specialized Expedition Sport and it was like butter to ride. It is really "springy" compared to my old bike. Ryan said it was like riding in an easy chair. I asked him if this was a "mom bike" he basically confirmed that it was which is just what I wanted. We took it for a ride today but with the wind chill I'm guessing it is in the 30's so the ride didn't last long. While we were gone picking up the bike, Ryan and Grace got the kite out to fly.

My bike.

The Santaquin Exploration Bike Posse

Flying the kite.



Grace fell asleep on the chair last night while watching a movie. Hanna had a sleepover and she was trying to stay up.

Poor Jon

Mimi Smartypants linked this and it made me laugh but it was a somber laugh.

garfield minus garfield

Hooray for Diffendoofer Day!

Friday was Diffendoofer Day at school and I was lucky enough to be subbing in Hanna's class that day. It was Dr. Suess' birthday so the whole school was having a Seuss celebration. You were supposed to wear your clothes backwards or inside out but the girls also decided they wanted funny "Seuss" hairdos. I was kind of going for Who look with Grace but Hanna just wanted her hair "poofed" so I did it. I'm sure there is a Seuss character out there that has hair like that. I turned all my clothes inside out as well but at lunch I returned my jeans to normal. I think I was the only teacher in my part of the school who had done anything and I admit the peer pressure got to me. It was a good day to sub because the teacher had a lot of fun things planned and we spent the last hour watching Dr. Seuss movies. My favourite Dr. Seuss book is "In a People House" mainly because it brings up fond childhood memories. I read it to the girls a lot when they were little and both of them memorized the words and could read it with me when they were very young. What's your favourite Dr. Seuss book?

Hanna's got some crazy eyes going on in these pictures.

Puke Cat

A friend was describing how her new kitten throws up indigested food and man, did that bring up memories. Thirteen years ago I was a newlywed who was determined to have her own cat. I drug Ryan to a farm in Laramie, WY and made him dig a black and white kitten from under an old barn. Who wants the cat that wants to be taken home? Not me! I wanted the one that ran under the barn the minute it saw humans. Can you say feral? Simon turned out to be an okay cat except that she had something physiologically wrong with her that caused her to throw up her food immediately after eating. It didn't happen every time she ate but it happened at least a few times a week, sometimes every day. We took her to a vet when she was young but he had no real (or cheap) explanation. So we bought a Bissel carpet cleaner and spent the next 7 years cleaning up puke. Simon was an entertaining cat though and she loved to play, bite and scratch. Remember feral? She also liked to lay on things. Once I had Grace I just couldn't take care of two babies under two plus clean up cat puke, so Simon went to live with Ryan's parents. When the whole family migrated to Santaquin, Grandma adopted Simon and took her to Oregon when she moved this January. I think Grandma really loves that cat and Simon keeps Grandma company. Grandma says Simon's too old to eat regular cat food so she cooks her chicken every day. She still pukes but it makes Grandma happy to have someone to take care of and also relieves the guilt I feel for giving her up.

From little ball of furry cuteness...

to shoe puking evilness.