Happy Birthday Boys

Here's a tribute to our boys as they celebrate their 8th birthday!





C&C turn 8 on Vimeo

Future Scoops Employee

Kennedy wanted to go shopping today because she had money burning a hole in her pink sequin purse. She bought herself this cute wooden banana split set and has been having the best time playing ice cream shop. Auntie Sheri...I think you may have to hire her in a few years!
Scoops opens for business next weekend! Don't know what Scoops is? Check out the link to the right!

Birthday Fun

Katelyn had her birthday party last night at the YMCA. The girls got together for some rock climbing, pizza and dance dance revolution. Hard to believe she is going to be 12 next week.

cool

Did you know that there is a website that will help you find a good fitting pair of jeans? At zafu.com you can answer a few questions about your body type and how you like jeans to fit and they will give you a list of jeans suited to your shape. That should save a lot of time in the dressing room trying on pair after pair of ill fitting denim! The top two on my list were Lucky Brand Classic Bootleg jean and "Honey" by Joe's Jeans. I think I might order them just to see if this website delivers what it claims to... I guess they've had almost a million women try on jeans from more than 90 brands. What I found funny was that my all-time favorite pair of jeans is Gap long and lean, and they were nowhere to be found on my personalized list. Hmmm.

Kennedy's Political Statement for the Day

Is it really too much to ask?
Peace.Love.FrenchFries

You're Wearing That?

If I had a book club like Oprah, I would recommend that all mothers and grown daughters read this book by Deborah Tannen. It explains so much about what makes the mother/daughter relationship so difficult and rewarding at the same time. The book asks the question, "Do we ever stop caring what our mothers think?" and suggests that even after our mothers are gone there will still be situations where we will find ourselves asking, "What would my mother think of this?"

"A daughter wants to feel that her mother is proud of her, thinks she's okay. So any evidence that her mother's approval is less than total can be hurtful, and hurt can swiftly convert to anger. But how could a mother think her daughter is perfect, doing everything right, every moment? All human beings could improve in some ways at some times, and people close to us are the most likely to see those ways. This means that the closer a mother is to her daughter, the more opportunities she sees for improvement--all the more because she wants to see things go well for her. But anything she says to help her daughter calls attention to perceived weaknesses, and that is the opposite of approval."

This book was so relevant for me right now as I can understand both points of view. As a daughter, I still seek my mother's approval while as a mother Katelyn and I are starting to clash on ideas about how she should act, dress and fix (or not fix) her hair etc. The author says that most daughters she interviewed for the book felt that the number one thing moms criticized them about was their hair! Why do we as mothers care so much about how our children(especially girls) look? She reasons that it is because one of the criteria by which we as mothers are judged is the appearance of our children-they represent us to the world. If they don't look "presentable", we are not doing our job as a mother. This was so funny to me because my kids have actually said to me..."Mom, we don't want to wear these clothes. We don't always have to look 'decent'."

Here is the catch 22 of a mother/daughter relationship:

The main complaint from daughters about their mothers: She is always criticizing me. The main complaint from mothers about their daughters: I can't open my mouth, she takes everything as criticism. THAT is why it's difficult!

Hooray!

Last week we got a notice in the mail that after ten years, we finally made the LAST payment on Tim's student loan! Only ten more and mine might be paid off!

fast.fun

Daddy was away for work this weekend so the kiddos and I headed down to grammies house for some fun. Our plan was to spend the day at the zoo. Note for next year...check what time the zoo closes before you go. As is typical for us, we arrived at the zoo at 3pm and found out that it closed at 4pm. But we packed as much fun as we could into that hour! Oh well. Grandma took the kids to a movie Saturday night and I got to do my favorite thing....nothing. Sit by myself on the deck and read magazines; perfect! Thanks grandma!

Four Stars

On Henotes Island, "Concordia" was a hilarious little sidekick to the main character. She got all the funniest lines (and therefore the laughs) and pretty much stole the show. This reviewer thought her comic timing was impeccable and that her performance could be described as brilliant! Congratulations Katelyn!

A Snapshot of My Life

Last night one of my boys must have been sleepwalking (I won't say which one because I'm sure he'd be humiliated if he knew I was telling this story). I saw the light in the laundry room flip on and I couldn't figure out who would be in there at 11:30 at night....so I went to check it out and my poor little boy thought he was in the bathroom and was using the garbage can for his toilet! So this morning I got to scrub out and disinfect the garbage can. In my best Keith Urban voice, "Who wouldn't wanna be me?"

A First Time for Everything

I have always thought that someday someone should invent a camera that you can carry in your brain... so you always have one just in case. There are so many times I've wished I'd had something like that to record little things that happen so fast that they are over by the time you can run and get a camera. Had I had one of these devices implanted in my brain, these are the photos you would have seen posted on my blog this morning. (A little back story to set the scene; I had to pick up the boys in the cities last night after work because they went to an audition for their agency yesterday.)
The first photo would be of me and my boys walking through knee-high grass on the side of I-94 at approximately 10:30pm last night. (Yes...I ran out of gas just before the Sauk Centre exit. Hopefully the inventor of the brain camera remembered the flash, because it was really dark.) What a fun adventure I kept telling the boys...and reminding myself. Photo number two of the night would be the boys posed in front of the police car of the nice officer who gave us a ride back to our vehicle and helped mom out when the nozzle of the gas can didn't work and gas started pouring all over the road and me. As we were climbing into the back of the sqaud car the boys were mortified that someone would think we were being arrested. Oh and we can't forget photo number three which would be of mom eating an entire box of Krispy Kremes the rest of the way home...nothing like a little sugar coma to calm me down. It was the first, and hopefully the last time I will drive the vehicle right out of gas. Apparently the miles remaining range is more like a suggestion.

Diet Coke Plus???

Hmmm...diet coke fortified with vitamins and minerals. I'm alittle skeptical. I think this is just a marketing ploy to get people like me, who know they consume too much diet coke to feel better about drinking it. Seriously, if you were looking to add more vitamins to your diet, do you really think you should turn to a soda? I will probably try it, just like I did the diet coke flavored with Splenda(hated it), but I have a feeling I will just stick with the good old gut rotting, cancer causing standard Diet Coke.

Our Easter Weekend

Since I didn't take any photos at Easter this year, I was looking for some from when the kids were little to post, and I realized that I really don't have very many. I guess Easter pictures are not my thing. It could have something to do with rushing to get through the Easter egg hunt so you can hurry up and get dressed and fix your hair and eat breakfast (most likely chocolate eggs) and try to get to church on time. It's not the most conducive morning for taking pictures. ("Hurry up and smile"...I can hear myself yelling.)
Anyway, this Easter was pretty relaxed for us. We did hurry through our egg hunt...I had to give them clues on where some of the bigger things were hidden. The kids decided the Easter Bunny must have just brought and hid the candy and mom bought and hid the toys...otherwise how would she know where they were hidden? We made it to church on time, went out to the country club for brunch and got a room at the Holiday Inn so the kids could swim and have fun. We had a few competitive games of ping pong and foosball, read and relaxed. Today it's back to work and school...38 days of school until the school-year is over!

Move Over Tiger

Tim has been saying all week how excited he is to watch the Masters this weekend.
Me too! My new favorite player is Adam Scott. He won a tournament we were watching last weekend and is two over so far in the Masters.... and apparently has said that 2007 is going to be his year. But who am I kidding; we all know I am not watching him for his skills.

**Editor's Note: What do you think?

Photo Shoot with Sweet Miss E

More Fun at Ria's

My babies!

Enough

Here are the kids on their way to the bus this morning. We had to dig out the winter coats and boots for our beautiful April weather.

This Day in the Life

I recently read about an author, Joni Cole who collected diary entries from women across America and compiled them into a book. There is now a National Day Diary Project where you can submit your entries to be included in her next book. I think the posting date had to be March 27th... oops...late again. Anyway, here is my version for today, April 1, 2007.

• Time I went to bed last night (this morning): 3:42 am
• Time I slept in until: 10:48 am
• What I ate for breakfast: Ritz crackers and water
• Flyers I read from the Sunday paper: Target and Herberger's
• Scent of body wash I used today: Dial soy and almond milk....love it!
• Project I worked on: April newsletter and calendar for daycare parents
• CD playing in my car today: Sugarland
• Amount I spent at the grocery store: $243.45
• Scent of candle I'm burning right now: cranberry
• On my nerves today: crappy weather...depressing, and the fact that I was hungry all weekend. You name it, I ate it.
• Looking forward to: 5 days off in a row next weekend, photo shoot with new baby born to one of my daycare families last week.
• Plans for tonight: Go to my boys' hockey game, watch the movie Babel