HO. LE. CRAP.

Just would like to show you all what I found IN. MY. GARAGE. tonight. Ick, ick, ick.

This little varmint is known as a Potato Bug in Oklahoma, a Jerusalem cricket, or, as Jared and I used to call them, Sand Puppies (we found some on the end of good ol' Vine Street when it was just a dirt road). It is about 2 1/2 inches long. And creepy as H-E-Double hockey sticks. And I was barefoot. It almost killed me. Even though they're not poisonous. Still. I am going to go to bed now and am already planning on having horrible nightmares. Good night everyone! Sleep tight knowing that you are not living among the scorpions, enormous spiders, mice and sand puppies. I'll just lie awake and shudder every now and again.

Thrown under the bus.

So I have this great friend Erin. As many of you know. She is the one that I aspire to be like someday. She is one of the most talented, creative people that you'll ever hope to come across. And now we found another hidden talent of hers. Throwing innocent victims under buses. That's right. She posted my blogs, both my family blog and my stamp blog on her new and wonderful blogspot, www.gypsysnook.com. At first I thought it was gypsy snook, which sounds like either a dance or some kind of an infection. But then I figured out it was gypsys nook. Filled with all her craftiness and the wonderful things that she makes. While she cooks. And cleans. Oh, and cares for her 4 darlings. While sewing. And cutting her own wood for projects. You get the picture. {ANYWAYS} She posted my blogs up there to goad me into posting on them so that it wasn't shameful for me to have my last posting state 1 year ago. Shamefully. Well, it worked. And so now I am up at 2:00 a.m., missing precious sleep so that I can keep up appearances. Thanks Erin. Now I have you to thank for the Stampin Up problem as well as sleep deprivation.

The blog titled "I Hate Thanksgiving" or "Rock the Vote"

Let me tell y'all something. I dislike Thanksgiving. Very much. So much that I might just say that I hate it. Its out there now, no pulling it back in. I love the family time together, I love the meaning of the holiday, I just don't love the gorging. Or the 'oh geez I think I'm going to throw up if I eat one more....SURE, I'll have another piece of pumpkin pie' or the bloated bodies lying around after the meal. It's just not my favorite holiday. Perhaps I should practice some restraint and not stuff myself silly, some of you might ask? Maybe. But who wants to eat Thanksgiving leftovers for a month and a half? Nah, better to take care of it all at once.

Onto the voting part of the title, we are debating on driving to San Francisco for Thanksgiving. There is one member of our family that flat out REFUSES to go. SO, the question I am wrestling with is do we drive out, me, 3 kids, whatever grandparent loses the armwrestle and has to ride in our van with us...leaving Aaron all alone (but not really because he'll go to his family's house and have their traditional dinner and their traditional enchiladas, which is why I am suspecting he'd really like to go there and is just pretending he doesn't want to go to SF, he just wants a crack at the enchiladas) or do we stay here and have our own little Thanksgiving dinner with the 5 of us in our house for our first Thanksgiving? I can't decide. Tell me what you think.

P.S. Do you think that I might have a problem with run-on sentences?

And some more...

Summer Photos

So here are a few photos from a couple months back, I got some great pics done of the kids in the summer and never posted them.

Hey, I already said that the goal was once every 6 months...

So technically, I am being an overachiever. Again. I said that I was going to try to blog at least every 6 months, it has only been like 2. We just had to let all of our thousands of fans know what we're up to...M & L both started up with school again, Mars loves school but detests getting up early everyday. She is the biggest nightowl I've ever met, during a sleepover at our house I told her and her friend that they could stay up as late as they wanted, and at 3:30 a.m. I finally had to pull the plug on that promise.
Laine loves her school, her teachers, and her friends. She can't wait to go to kindergarten. She just turned 5 and tonight she told her uncle Jared that since she is 5 she can now see all the food over the counter at Subway. Ahhhh, the milestones, huh? Crawling, walking, talking, the Subway counter. *Wiping a tear* Lainee (as previously mentioned) turned 5 on Saturday. Some of you might be thinking "But wait!!!! Wasn't Saturday the 26th day of the 9th month of the year YOUR birthday?" And yes, you'd be correct. I had my birthday TAKEN from me by my sweet daughter. So we decided that this year, since Disneyland was giving out free tickets on your birthday that we'd take advantage and get 3 of us in free (Ash is still 2 he gets in for free). So we drove out to Cali with all of us plus Papa in the good ol' van, spent 2 days at Disneyland, Sunday morning at the beach and then drove back. You might think that this would have been a good plan, right? Well, let me just tell you that at one point on her bday I had Lainee scream at the top of her lungs, tears rolling down her cheeks "THIS IS THE WORST BIRTHDAY EVER!!!" I would have LOVED it if my parents took me to Disneyland for my birthday. Guess you can't please some people, right? We'll just have to do it up bigger next year, try to make amends for the rotten time she was put through. Poor kid.
Ash got sick at Disneyland, I think that he was dehydrated. We watched the Pixar parade (all his favorites) and when Lightning McQueen and Mater came by (the absolute favorite of all), he didn't react even a little bit. So I knew something was up. I took him inside to get a drink and then the projectile vomiting began. You haven't lived until you've had 2 handfuls of vomit at Disneyland. Grandma & Papa took him to the hotel to get him cooled off, and he didn't really care one way or the other if he went back. As long as he had some Tylenol, he really liked the rides. Except for the Matterhorn. I asked him if he liked the ride and he said "No, its scary!" We're so glad that we got to go celebrate there, we had a great week of celebrations.
Mars just lost her front tooth, she came home from school with it in a baggie. I asked her how it came out, she told me that she was hugging her friend James and he didn't want her to hug him so he pushed her away and knocked her tooth out. We're thinking of suing. Laine discovered that she also has a loose tooth. She is convinced that it is because she turned 5.
I have been released from scouts. I am 99% sure that it is because I refused to do the Tarzan cry at Roundtable. I was getting the ol' stinkeye from the leader that wanted everyone to do it, she made everyone repeat it several times while glaring in my direction because "not everyone was doing it and I noticed a couple of people not pounding on their chests with their fists." Yeah, that was me. Released may not be the best word, I may have just been blacklisted for not showing my scouting spirit. Now I am the Primary 1st counselor. I'll let you know if they are trying to teach me a lesson or not.
I will post our Disney pics in the morning, when I get them off of my mom's camera. So technically, that will make 2 posts in a 24 hour period. Take that, all you people that think I'm being a slacker!

Camera troubles

So after I found my camera (phew) I was at the Donner Reed Museum for scouts (someone ask me what we had for a snack, hee hee) and I went to take the boys' pictures inside the jail. Total Photo Op. And the camera busted. It was like "Pictures of scouts? Really? I think this is the all time low, so nope, I am going to resign. Right....NOW!" And then this little error showed up that said Lens error, restart camera. Which would have been all right, except for there is no way to restart the camera. At all. So after tapping it, then hitting it, then almost throwing it I decided it is time to get a new camera. Yay! And then I accidentally fixed it, and now it is JUST LIKE NEW. sigh.