Baptism Message

I've been sitting here reminiscing with my blog tonight thanks to my SIL, Abby; she is at that awkward point in her pregnancy where she has important clothing choices to make-throw in the towel and wear sweat pants all the time, or try like the dickens to make her normal jeans work until the last.possible.minute (guess which route I took?). She's super cute, and super tiny (oh to be pregnant in my 20's again). She's had a sealed envelope in her house for several weeks now that contains the sex of their baby and hasn't touched it-can you believe the will power? I'd have ripped that thing open within 4 1/2 minutes.

If you've never read her blog-you should, she's an entertaining writer (getting her masters in journalism at Georgetown right now-smart girl).

Anyway, I digress.

I started looking back through my Pedro pregnancy posts and found this cute one-now, when I say cute, I'm certainly not talking about me 8 months pregnant-but the sweet little story about Juan Carlos (then 3- now almost 8!) and our dead turtle. I had totally forgotten about it.

That makes me feel bad that I'm not blogging more now-how much of this crazy period of my life am I really going to remember a few years down the road? So, I am recommitting myself to my blog-even if they are just lame little posts to remember the funny things my kids do.

With that in mind...

Today we attended the baptism of one of our friends' son. Our primary always sets out paper for those who attend to write a little message to the child getting baptized and then they compile the messages into a little book. Pedro, who can only write his name at this point, wanted to write something a little more meaningful, so he handed me the paper and pencil and asked me to write it for him. I asked him what he wanted to tell Andrew on his special baptism day and he said, "Tell him I love Santa."

Is that too cute?

The Best Christmas Present Ev-er

I've been trying to deal with the guilt that comes with receiving a new laptop from your spouse when you've purchased him an ant farm (albeit the best ant farm I could find).

You might be wondering how in the world I would even think up the idea of giving Guapo an ant farm (or why?). It's some strange appendage from his childhood-he has very fond memories of having an ant farm as a young lad. Whenever I ask him what he wants for his birthday or Christmas that's always the first (and only) answer he gives me (he's less than helpful in the present department). I've tried other ant farms before, but they were always a "disappointment"-ie lots of dead ants, no tunneling.

But, as I was struggling this year to stay within our tight Christmas budget (apparently so HE could buy the good gifts and get all the glory), I figured, "What the heck, I'll get him another ant farm."

Well, the ants arrived today in the mail and I got to put them in their new habitat:

I kept an eye on them for a few hours and there was no tunneling action going on; I was certain we were on the brink of another ant apocalypse.

But, lo and behold-check out what they've done this evening:

Pretty dang cool, huh?

The beauty of my gift is that it keeps on giving; according to the instructions, long after your ants have died, "their art lives on-a testament to the collective intelligence and industrious determination of this incredible insect...each kit includes a lighted base for showcasing your unique sculpture as a beautiful night light."

I'm sure it will end up in Juan Carlos's bedroom. Actually I'm hoping it ends up there as Guapo is threatening to put it on the fireplace mantle.

Have a great weekend!

First Playdate

Just to mark this day in history, Pedro (almost 4) had his very first playdate.

He went home with a little friend directly after preschool for a couple of hours. So, what did I do with all my free time? Well, I divided it basically between two activities:

1) pacing around the house not feeling quite right
2)worrying that they would get in a car crash while driving from the school to the ice cream shop, and then from their house to our house

I called after an hour or so to make sure he'd made it to their house and she asked him if he wanted to talk to me and I could hear him in the background, "No, that's ok."

He made it home safely and all is well (other than a bucket load of tears shed because I wouldn't take him immediately to Target to by a Lighting McQueen game for the Wii that he played at his friend's house), but I still feel weird.

My little guy is growing up. :(

What's Up?

I'm not even going to bore you with my excuses.

I'm just plain.old.busy. I don't have a maid or a driver any more and I do have 4 active kids so I'm just busy, busy, busy all the day long.

Christmas

Christmas was good. One of those where you decide ahead of time with your spouse that you're not going to spend a lot of money on each other. Yeah. I got Guapo an ant farm and some licorice, and he got me a new laptop.

I'll get him back.

New Year's

New Year's was good. We drove to Utah to spend it with all of Guapo's family-all 16 kids and 14 adults-and a huge snow storm that trapped us all in for a good 24 hours. It was lots of fun-our kids just love being with their cousins. And we have two new ones one the way-one is still an "it" but the other is a GIRL! There have been 9 boys in a row-Margarita was the last girl almost 13 years ago. So, that's exciting.

Cub Scouts

I was enjoying my calling as cub scout den leader a little too much-I think I told one too many people how much fun I was having, so I was released and called into a new Relief Society presidency (woman's organization of our church). Luckily, I was spared from planning monthly activities which would have made me a wreck the next two years, and was put in charge of compassionate service (keeping an eye out on those with health issues and such) and education (making sure the Sunday lessons are decent)-two of my favorite things, so I am happy. And I like the new president a lot, she and I have been running together the past couple of months. The other counselor is the re-gifter from this post- she's a cool lady, too (but I probably won't be giving her any gifts-unless I KNOW it's something she wants). I'm enjoying it, it's just a little more labor intensive than my weekly cub meeting and I miss the boys.

My House

I have stopped scrubbing the floors on my hands and knees once a week and washing eveyone's sheets once a week. Now I'm down to twice a month on those jobs and I admitt I haven't been in the kids' bathroom in quite a while-they are *supposed* to be doing that as one of their chores-but I have my doubts about it getting done properly. I just can't keep the house spotless without some professional help which I don't foresee happening (and I'm not saying I want it to happen). Oh well. I love having some time to myself in my own house-it's freedom for me (even if the floors aren't perfect).

Running

I am signed up to run the Ragnar So-Cal relay race April 14. What does that entail? Twelve women running a total of 200 miles in 24 hours of which I will be running 20.4 miles broken up into 3 legs. It's scaring the crap out of me (excuse me, I mean, horsefeathers). So, training for that is taking up a decent percentage of my free time.

Kids

Kids are good. Juan Carlos has this new thing were he is always going around with just one sock on, or one shoe on. Not sure what that's about.

Pedro calls hiccups, "hook-ups" which I think is adorable.

Margarita got a 4.0 her first semester of 7th grade-yay!

Julio is like a sponge for sport facts-I can't believe he's only been aware of American football for several months and he knows all the players, past Superbowl teams and scores, stats of all kinds-amazing.

Pets

Guapo installed an electric fence for Quakey today, and Tuesday he's going in to be neutered. Poor guy has some not-so-fun days ahead of him.

Kitty wants to only drink running water out of the bathroom sink-whenever I go into the bathroom there she is, begging me to turn on the water so she can drink from her water fountain.

Ronald is my good boy.

Hermit crabs make boring pets.

Winter

Even though we've gotten way less snow than normal here this year, I am loving being back in a 4-season locale. Love, love, love it.


That's all. Did I leave anything out?

Horse Feathers (or is it one word?)

Remember how my older kids taught Pedro to replace the word "uneducated" for the word "stupid"?

They have now brought to my attention how often I say the word "crap" by teaching Pedro to tell me that crap is not a nice word (I know it already!) and to replace it with "horse feathers" (horesefeathers?).

Whatever would I do without the little gems?

Some Bold Re-Gifting

I hesitate to share this with little holiday story you because the re-gifter is a really cool lady and a friend of mine from church. But, I keep cracking up thinking about it, so I have to share. No one in my "new" life knows about my blog (that I know of), but even so, I'm sure I'll be deleting this post in a few days when my conscience gets the best of me.

Last night this woman and her husband came over for a quick visit and brought us a little plate of treats (maybe it was his idea-why am I blaming her? I can totally see Guapo suggesting something like this). We chatted for a while and then they left at which point I surveyed the plate. A nice variety of homemade candies and cookies.

But hey, wait just a second-haven't I seen that chocolate covered Oreo with the cute little holly leaf and berries on it somewhere before?

And what about those chocolate covered peanuts clusters?

I know I've seen the cute little gingerbread cookie with the M&M buttons.

We had received three plates of goodies from people in our ward before this little plate; the little plate had something from each of the others on it. I still had the other plates, so I know I'm not making this stuff up.

My friend is known for being super practical and not worrying about what other people think-so it totally makes sense. It prevents her from a) eating too many sweets and b) from having to do time-consuming holiday baking, and c) spending money on those types of gifts. Win-win-win, right? She had to have assumed that I would have received a plate from at least one of the three people I did, and yet she went ahead and re-gifted anyway.

I respect her decision and may even consider the move myself- just probably not to people within the same social circle.

Those chocolate covered oreos were my favorite-so I was happy to get an extra. :)

Random Holiday Post

Holiday shopping

As of today at 4:00 pm I.am.officially.done. Everything is wrapped. Everything is shipped. I will buy nothing else.

Except, what do people generally give to the mail carrier? Money? If so, how much?

Margarita Redeemed

We had a busy week of holiday parties, concerts, and recitals. And we're not done yet. At Margarita's choir concert Tuesday night this was a sight that made me happy:

The lost and found table. Apparently Margarita's not the only middle-schooler who temporarily can't find things (they are never lost; even if we haven't seen them for months).

The Problem with Mormons

I thought it'd be fun have a casual "little" get together Sunday evening with a three other families from our church. You know- hot chocolate, snacks, some relaxed conversation.

I just added up how many kids will be here.

EIGHTEEN.

Any ideas for high-yield snacks?

Holiday Cheer

After contemplating for months about how my children would no longer have holiday celebrations being in US public schools, I have been happily surprised. Sure, Julio had "Secret Snow People" instead of "Secret Santas" in his class, but Margarita's choir concert had a couple of songs about Jesus' birth(I thought that was a huge no-no), the teachers wished us "Merry Christmas", and Pedro's class even had a special visitor today:

I know, what a crappy photo. It was bad lighting for my poor little iPhone, but I also discovered later that the lens was totally gooped up (how in the world did that happen? Pedro, I'm sure.)

Look at this one:

Santa asked the kids to be quite while he read them a story so Pedro sat like this for the next few minutes. What a little monkey.

2 Minutes of Fame

Julio's basketball team got to play for 5 minutes at the halftime of the CU game tonight. There are 10 players so they each got about 2 1/2 minutes. Julio said it felt like 23 seconds. He attempted one shot and got a rebound. His little buddy who hasn't made a basket all season (tomorrow's the last game), scored.

See? I cleaned my lens. Much better.

Hey, What About Juan Carlos?

I just realized I've talked about every kid but Juan Carlos; as I mentioned before, this week has been crazy. So on Wednesday morning as I'm walking the boys to school I realize his clothes look a little too familiar. We had gotten home from the choir concert late and they kids scurried to bed-some of them not even bothering to change into jammies. He got up and wore the same (visibly dirty) clothes the next day. Lovely.

Oh well, at least he was at school.

So, that's what we're up to. My kids finished school today. I'm not sure if things will be more hectic because they are around, or less hectic because we don't have all of their activities we have to be at. I guess I'll find out soon enough.

Happy Holidays!