a blended life

1)This is a picture of a. a mouse turd on a diaper b. a Polly Pocket shoe on a diaper c. Hannah's leftover chewed up chocolate surprise d. all of the above I thought we'd take a quiz since it's the middle of summer and everyone's brain is starting to cook from the heat (if you're living in Utah, anyway.) Let's continue 2)How do you like your brain cooked? a. scrambled b. poached c. sunnyside up d. all of the above Okay, that was gross. Sorry. 3)Why haven't I blogged in over a week? a. the stomach flu bug came back with a vengeance b. some controversy over my blog deflated my blog balloon, slighty (don't worry, I blew it up again) c. the stomach flu bug dehydrated me d. my kids make me crazy e. all of the above 4) Tomorrow is a. Brian's day off b.Leah's last day of preschool c. Carrie will go nuts with both of them home d. all of the above No offense, of course. But it is hot and we do live in the stupidest place in Cache Valley. 5) Things people ...

Here it is...the moment you've all been waiting for. Pictures of someone else's trip. Is there anything more boring? Please don't feel any obligation to read this post. However, I did have the time of my life and would like to send a big thanks to Jacob and Karina for being excellent hosts/tour guides/fellow Rock Band players. I loved it!! Karina is a great cook. I'm so glad I got to spend most of the trip with her! She was fabulous for putting up with my inability to figure out the public transportation and multiple pea brained schemes. Anyway, back to the travelogue... This is a picture of me and Jacob showing appropriate respect to the thousands of people who died in Vietnam. The Vietnam Memorial is very sobering. The names even disappear when it rains! We also visited the Holocaust Museum (no pictures of that, though). Both places are definite downers, but I'm glad we visited them. It's a good reality check and so important to learn about. President Lincol...

Due to a nasty round of stomach flu, pictures of my fabulous trip (it really was great) will have to wait a day or two until things calm down around here. According to Murphy Brown (remember that show?), no one want the details of stomach problems. So I'll just end it here.

I am leaving in seven hours (who's counting?) for a very exciting trip to Baltimore, DC, and NYC. I've never been to this side of the country before, except the Atlanta airport. But that doesn't count. I'm going by myself and spending almost a week with my brother Jacob and his wife Karina. My poor parents are mercifully taking my kids and Brian is, as the neighbor said, 'baching it' (assuming the position of bachelor for the week). Do I have any business galavanting across the nation right now? Of course not, but it's too late to turn back and anyone who's known me for a while knows that I've been wanting to go to NYC since I was 12. So, carpe diem (not carpe dimwit, Brian) and hopefully I'll have some good pictures to post in a week!!! Needless to say there will not be any blogging done until then!

Hard day-don't want to talk about it, but I will say this: We went to a friend's house and Leah (accidently) wet her pants. The mom of the house gave her a diaper, which set us back in the potty training adventure. When we came home she (on purpose, with a glint in her eye) peed on the floor not once, not twice....eleven times. I finally had to put her Barbie in time out and made her clean it up. I'm not in favor of getting mad for potty accidents, but this was over the top. I really need a vacation.

Here's some random thoughts and events from my day- 1)My coworker filled me in on how the kitty is doing. It makes me miss her, but it sounds like the kitty has a lot of catching up to do developmentally, and is very time consuming. I'm glad we're not dealing with that right now and Tiffini said she really needed this kitten because it's helped her relieve some stress. 2)Morelia peed on everything she was wearing. I sent her home barefoot, in boy's jeans. Her reaction to the accident was kind of sever and it makes us wonder if she gets punished for wetting her pants. It was very sad. 3)One of the other kid's mom, whose name is Spring Bean (no joke) talked to me about medicating children. It was good to talk to her because we've been thinking about getting something psychotropic for Leah. 4)Speaking of the devil-ette, she held her doo-doo for 51 hours before she finally let it go. Not that I'm counting. I will spare the details of the first trip to Macey...

This morning around 9:30, Leah came up to me and said "I'm going to sit on the potty now." She proceeded to sit down and do her business, which was a first for us. After a little tinkle, she got up and asked for a diaper. I said no, we are done with diapers and she can us the potty like a big girl now. A screaming tantrum, 15 minutes long, followed my no diapers statement. She pulled herself together and sat back on the potty and really let it loose. And that was it! She didn't wear a diaper all day and even went #2. She was pretty excited and was very proud of herself. Of course, she didn't mind the enormous amount of praise I was giving her. Hooray! Hooray!

We came across a malnourished, unwanted kitten on Wednesday night. It fell in love with Leah right away, so we decided to bring her home and revive her a little. She kept me up all night mewing like a newborn. For a few reasons, we definitely couldn't keep the furball: 1)No pets allowed in our contract 2) I'm horribly allergic 3) Our nomadish lifestyle is not conducive to owning needy pets 4) We can't afford shots, food, spay, etc I took the kitty to work the next day and my coworker Tiffini volunteered to nurse her and find a home. It was kind of fun to have the kitty around, but a lot of work, a lot of sneezing, and not enough sleep. Tiffini's hisband named the cat Kiera. It's doing better and is a very sociable, lovable kitty. We miss her!