peace and quiet

I'm pretty sure my parents threw a party today after all their company left- for the sole reason that they were once again in peace and quiet. We had a noisy weekend full of fun, but I'm sure it's hard to have your normally-quiet-and-clean house ransacked by 7 people, 3 of whom are children and noisy and messy. :)

Ryan and Brecken had a great time playing these past 4 days. Perhaps I should say they had a great time playing most of these past 4 days. One minute they'd be playing and having a great time- playing cars, playing chase, playing wrestling, making barns out of every single one of my mom's couch cushions in order to watch cartoons without anyone bothering them... and then the next minute would be an all out fight.

"She's MY grandma."
"NO! She's MY grandma!"
"NO! SHE'S MY GRANDMA AND NOT YOURS!"

(or something to that effect. That wasn't the only fight, belive me- there were others about who said what first, going back and forth between "NO!" "YES!" a hundred times about things they had no idea why they were saying no or yes, the color of the sky.... whatever you can dream up, they probably fought over it!)

But tonight when we got home, Brecken asked if Ryan could come over tonight to play.

Oh the joys of having two 3-year olds in the same house for extended periods of time. :)

think he's excited?

Brecken: Come on, Mommy. Let's go to Gillette!

Me: We can't go yet, Daddy is still at work!

Brecken: Then let's go without him!!

gobble gobble

We're off on vacation today. In the past seven nights, I have slept in my own bed twice! We were in Lingle last weekend, and then I left at 5:40 in the morning on Monday to take some of my high school kids to Laramie for an honor choir. We got home last night. My kids did great and had a lot of fun. My seniors got me flowers! I have no idea why- I certainly haven't done anything! The girl who gave them to me said it was because it was their last year at District Clinic. I told her I could fix that- a flunking grade in English would surely make them come back next year, right? I certainly don't want to lose my seniors- they are wonderful.

Today, after Josh gets done with school and practice at 2:00, we're headed to Gillette for Thanksgiving. The whole family will be there, it will be a full house, that's for sure! I'm very much looking forward to the turkey, mashed potatoes, and gravy! We will have to be careful to call the turkey "chicken" so we have a chance of Brecken eating it.

Time to get the dogs off to the kennel and get some laundry done before we leave. Josh and Brecken have school today and I do not- it's a weird feeling!

a great man

A very wise man sought me out on my wedding day, and told me to call him if my groom needed reminded of how to be a good husband. He said he made sure all the boys in his family knew how to treat their wife. I promised him I'd call if I needed to. I've never had to.

That great man left us last week and made the journey to Heaven. As we celebrated his life this weekend, I had the feeling that that great man was looking down on us, admiring all the work he did in his life. His Greatness was left behind in everyone he touched- his beautiful bride of 57 years, his children, nieces, nephews, sisters, brothers, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren. His Greatness was left behind in anyone who had the extreme honor of ever meeting him. It's evident in all he did- not many people are elected as County Clerk for 25 years in a row.

I'm grateful that I had the chance to know him, even if it was just a little tiny bit.

To his beautiful bride of 57 years, I cried when I found out he was a devoted reader of my silly little stories on here. I was and still am truly amazed. I hope I can keep it up so you can carry on the daily readings- and I will try to update more often so there aren't as many mornings with no news. :)

Yes, a great man has left us. But you can be sure his Greatness lives on.

second opinion

Josh and I went to Cheyenne today, to a gastroenterologist, to get a second opinion on my liver. He said he is sure the radiologist is correct that it's a benign growth of cells, and sees no reason to worry about it at all. He is sending me for bloodwork to make sure it doesn't pick up any abnormalities, but he said he would be shocked if anything showed up. What a relief to hear. Now if that annoying feeling in my side would go away, I'd be a happy camper. :)

He said liver issues in women could be caused by the use of birth control pills, and could be made bigger by pregnancy, but he sure wouldn't not go ahead and have another baby because of it. These growths don't be come dangerous, really, so if it did get bigger for some reason, it wouldn't be really bad. Who knows- maybe it was caused by being pregnant in the first place, and we never knew it! (pretty sure it's not because of birth control pills since I've been on those for maybe a total of a whole year in my whole life!) He also agreed with the radiologist that I should have another CT Scan in 6 months, but if I was pregnant at that time, it was fine to put it off until after a baby was born.

Brecken spent the day (well, half of it anyway) with my sister again, for the second time this week. We are very grateful that my sister lives where we always end up going, because it's great to drop him off and not have to bring him to the doctor. So, thanks, Kristen!!! We really, really appreciate you!!!

the naughty one

Brecken has had a rough week at school. It's been freezing cold, and for some reason, they are still taking the kids outside for recess. (Even our kids at school this week have had inside recess!) We've been asked to bring snowpants and all that good ol' winter gear so they can go out. Brecken HATES things around his toes. He refuses to wear socks, even. But this week, he has been refusing to wear his snowboots. As a result, he has had to stay inside for recess. Which means there is one less adult body outside with all the other kids, since someone has to stay in with him.

I think his teachers aren't very pleased with us. They even asked our babysitter to talk to us about ideas we could use on him. I have one stubborn child though, and I'm not sure what to do. I DID have him help me pick out new boots online tonight, and I ordered them two sizes too big so they are loose around his feet, like his beloved Crocs, which are the the only shoes he will wear. He got to pick out whatever boots he wanted to tonight and he declared the ones he picked "Perfect!" Hopefully he will still think they are perfect when they arrive in the mail, and hopefully he will wear them at school.

I cried tonight after we got home. I don't want my child to be the one who won't listen and gets in trouble. I'm hoping, in a very weird way, that he's getting sick. I don't want him to be sick, but I want there to be a reason that he is not listening very well this week. It's not like him to be naughty- he's normally a very easy-going kid! (and tonight he fell asleep at 6:30.... maybe he's overly tired this week?) I'm hoping this is a trend that will be over SOON, and I hope his teachers know that we really are working on the listening thing at home, and that we don't put up with naughty! We are both teachers- we know how hard it is to have naughty kids, so we aren't going to let our child be one of them! Surely, they know how 3-year olds act, right? I now believe people when they say 3 is worse than the terrible 2's.... its soooooo very true in our house!

Come on, age of 4....

faces of the past

Brecken picked up a picture we have, of my whole family at my sister's wedding in 2004. It was only five years ago, but we all must have changed more than I realized. The only people in the picture Brecken could recognize were Daddy and his Grandpa (my dad). I asked where I was, and he couldn't find me. And he couldn't find Aunt Kristen. Or Grandma. Or anyone else I asked about. When I helped him identify these people, we had the following conversation:

B: Where's Ryan?
Me: He isn't there, because he wasn't born yet!
B: Where's me?
Me: You weren't born yet either.
B: But where was I?
Me: Nowhere, really, you weren't alive yet.
B: Was I at Kristen's house?
Me: No, buddy, you weren't. You weren't alive yet, so you weren't anywhere.

It's hard to explain to a 3 year old why he isn't in a picture with all the people he loves!

ideas for brecken

I've been getting a few people ask what Brecken wants for Christmas, so here are a few ideas:

• He is still into dinosaurs- dino shirts, dino toys, dinos in general.
• He loves to play games but we only have a few. We already have Elefun- don't get him that one. He plays Flippin' Frogs and Hungry Hungry Hippos at daycare but we don't have them yet- he would like those.
• He loves to do artwork.
• He is a Croc lover- that's all he will wear. Shoe size right now is an 8.
• Shirt/sweatshirt size is 3T.
• Pants size is 2T, but he only wears sweatpants. He will not wear anything else. They can't be the sweatpants that have the elastic around the ankles either- they have to be the wide leg kind. He is very picky about his clothes.
• He really wants purple athletic shorts like Daddy's, if anyone happens to find some!!
• He loves loves loves to read.
• He loves his movies too- Noggin/Nick Jr. ones are the best because they have shorter episodes- full length movies don't hold his interest. Favorites right now are Diego, Dora, Wow Wow Wubbsey, Max and Ruby, and recently he has really gotten excited by Curious George. We don't have any Curious George movies yet so he would love that!

Hope that helps with anyone that needs any ideas for him...

terribly busy

That's what this past week was. I put in 12+ hour days at work Monday-Thursday, so today it was VERY nice to have an early-out at school and get to leave at 1:00. Monday I took my choir kids to Rawlins after school to try out for all-state. Tuesday I had concession stand duty for the jr. high boys basketball game. Wednesday and Thursday nights I had parent/teacher conferences. Needless to say, I'm exhausted and quite sore tonight! I've been hanging out on the bed, listening to my cousin's high school football game on the internet (they are in the 2nd round of the playoffs!), and looking forward to doing nothing this weekend. I'll try to get pictures posted of our Halloween, though you won't get to see a costume- that story will accompany the post.