Little bit of background

John and I met while I was a freshman in college. T came a year later, jo another year later, M 18 months later, and Van 3 years later. We live in a nice small town town, are huge football fans, and my husband is going to med school. He likes to play frisbee golf, go to the gym, and watch, talk about, listen to, debate about and play pickup games of football. He is a huge help to me and loves being a dad. the kids think he is the greatest thing, and love the way he plays rough with them.



mad b/c he cant get in highchair...
fine b/c camera is on him
happily entertained w/ camera

nice shot

So, this is our baby. He will be 2 on the 23rd of next month. The past 2 years have gone so super fast, it has been unreal. He is the youngest of our 4 boys. When in public, I often get asked if a. they are all mine (of course they are, do you think I am stupid enough to take other kids out...) , and b. how do I do it (hahaha). Here is what life is like in our house:

6:30 am. Awoken to blinding light from T turning on bathroom light. I forgot to shut the door that separates our bedroom from the bathroom that also opens into the hall. DH staggers into the shower

6:31- pretend to still be asleep as Van starts calling for us

6:45- DH has gotten baby and let him down in living room

6:46- baby and brothers are fighting. can no longer pretend to sleep. get out of bed and get them to the table for breakfast. They are thankfully mostly dressed and ready for school

7- threaten again to take food away of they don't sit down and eat.

7:01- Jo spills breakfast all over himself.

7:02- same ds spills milk all over table

7:10- finish breakfast, Jo goes to change into 2nd outfit of day, i head to shower

7:20- hear kids screaming. regretfully leave shower. break up fight. direct T to homework. Jo has accident. now on third change of clothes for the morning.

7:21- head downstairs to start load of laundry

7:23- get dressed

7:25- wrestle baby into clothes. he wipes dirty face on me. head off to change shirt

7:30- prayers as DH leaves for school for the day

7:31- clean up breakfast, park kids in front of tv. kick oldest out of room as he has been grounded from tv for the week and send him back to his book

7:32- send T BACK out of room to the sounds of but camp lazlo is my favorite blah blah blah...

7:33- threaten to ground him from tv for the rest of his life unless he leaves now. hand him his book again.

7:34- ohhh... still need to brush teeth. pry kids away from tv to brush.

7:37- sopping mess of water and toothpaste has to be cleaned before I can get ready for work. I love sharing the bathroom with 4 boys. Van insists on standing at the sink the entire time I try to get ready eating toothpaste. (its safe to swallow!)

8:00- warn the boys we will leave in 15 minutes. you will not be able to watch the whole next show, just a part. do you understand? a chorus of yeses follow. I realize one of the voices was oldest son. take tv away for the next day. pry him back out.

8:01- baby has soaked his shirt and is now rubbing toothbrush in his hair, on the sink, and on the floor. wrestle the little einstein brush away from him, reminding myself to buy a new, identical one later on this week.

8:02- while frantically trying to dry my hair, baby is standing at the door giggling every time i turn the dryer on him and screaming my turn when i try to use it. giving up on dry hair, i head to the living room- 8 more minutes, get backpacks, snacks, etc.

8:05- baby has found snack drawer and NEEDS yogos and fruit snacks. hoping to avoid a tantrum, open yogos on living room floor

8:07- looking for car keys and shoes. look to second son. no shoes. he had them on minutes ago.

8:08- looking for his shoes while stepping on wet yogos isn't a pleasant experience. turn off tv. lots of complaining follows

8:10- time to go. all wearing shoes, have snacks. out to car. T has to go potty and runs back in. Jo has no backpack, runs back in.

8:15- all back in car and ready to go.

8:30- drop off older two, take younger 2 to preschool while I work...

so, uh, that's how i do it... we stay in a state of organized chaos at all times. I unfortunately have a child who is just amazingly dirty. i don't understand how he can make such a mess all the time. he doesn't use napkins at the table, he wipes his face on his shirt, he squeezes out the most amazing amounts of toothpaste, it is super frustrating. on other notes:

I have finally finished painting the preschool room I was in charge of. It took me 2 1/2 days but it looks wonderful! I painted a light blue at the top and a darker blue at the bottom with both blues have a purple tint. I painted the bulletin board trim, the cubbies, and the trim a truer purple to make it officially the purple room (each class has a different color theme). It looks awesome, and it totally motivated me to come home and paint rooms of my house. I am starting with my scrapbook room/johns office/guest room which I am painting a really fun lime green. I am so excited!

Soccer starts this week for both boys. our weekly schedule is now as follows:

tues: YW at 7

wed: j soccer from 5:15-6:15, orchestra rehearsal for me from 5:30-7

thurs: PTO meeting for me once a month from 4-5, t soccer from 5:30-7 every week

It doesn't seem to bad on paper, but between driving them to school every day by 8:30, and picking them up at 3:30 (it takes a full 30 minutes to get them and get home for some reason...) then having to run back out shortly thereafter, I feel so busy right now. We are still trying to get used to Johns schedule too. for first block, he is home from school everyday at noon, but there are various meetings in the afternoons and of course studying that it has been a weird adjustment. I expected him to be busier already. I am sure that will come. in the meantime, i have to go. i still haven't finished cleaning up from breakfast.

the joy of hiking

So.... we took our kids hiking the other day at the local waterfall. I figured it would be such a nice way to spend sat. morning.... I never realized a 4 mile hike w/ 4 kids would be an all day event, but ok...
M (age 4), Van (23 months); T (7); Jo (6)

First thing in the morning... bright eyed and cheerful. We took a picnic lunch with us, which we left in the car. packed in backpacks were PLENTY of snacks and water. We read the board at the beginning of the hike showing the trails and the map. We choose to take the "scenic winding trail, that puts you next to the water on you climb to the falls" over the "uphill walk to the falls" assuming of course that the scenic route sounded easier. Halfway through our "adventure", we realized we were on the more difficult trail.... begin adventure.... EVERY minute it seemed, T was posing. hey mom, take a picture of me, hey mom, take a picture of this. Hey mom, isn't the moss cool? you should take a picture. hey mom, another little waterfall... will you take a picture? This continued for a full hour before I finally explained to him (with all the niceness i could muster) that if I kept pulling my camera out every minute while we pose, look, hike, etc. that this would take all day. M got hungry every 15 minutes or so. After about 30 minutes, he begins to announce he is ready for lunch. After about 1 1/2 of hiking, we inform him lunch is in the car and we will eat when we are done hiking. He begins sobbing hysterically. Meanwhile, Van (almost 2) decides he will not hold hands, and insists on RUNNING the trail. For a boy who only started walking at 16 months, running is not a good choice. He still has that drunken sideways type stroll going, and is totally pigeoned toed on top of that. His legs now look like minced meat (as does his forehead, chest and palms...) John starts to carry him. About 3/4 of a mile before we reach the waterfall, M has had enough. I commit to taking M and Van back down the mountain to start lunch. we would wait for John, T and Jo to eat. As John and the boys head further up the trail, a VERY NICE family stops us to ask why we were turning around early and convinces M that he would be SAD to not make it all the way to the top. (grumble grumble,.... what were they thinking) Carrying my 30 pound toddler then becomes my responsibility as M has decided he really does want to see the falls. the next 1/4 mile was torture until i finally caught up to John and gratefully passed the fat baby off to him.
Finally at the top to the falls! they were super cold and felt really good!
Our best family picture ever! (just kidding, but only slightly) Look at Van... he has the WORST cheese face.....
Van running on the slippery moss covered rocks. Sounds fun huh?? He has a nice goose egg to prove just how fun it was! The two mile hike down was horrible. we were so hot, tired, and wanted our lunch. We had no idea how long it would take to do that, but we managed to make it on the right trail this time. slow learners we are not!

First things first

I have for years been posting in blogs and other web sites. This is my attempt to pull everything to one site, as I am horrible w/ keeping up with multiple things. Also, this is my lazy way of getting pictures to family! It is hard to believe there are people who have yet to get a facebook account to see pictures I post. We are super boring, so I guess I get to document all the dull day in and day out events for family now. I have 4 boys, ages 7 and under. They are loud, great burpers, and very busy. The toilet seat is always down (they have learned well), but you do have to make sure it is dry before you sit down (well, some of them). They keep me super busy. Between soccer practices, baseball and t-balls teams, and swimming, we spend most of our time outside at practices. When they are at home, they eat (alot) and sleep (not as much as I wish). The oldest two started school yesterday. I have spent the last 2 days running errands (It is SOOOO easy w/ only two kids) and cleaning the house. We moved to a new house abt a month ago, and still have boxes to unpack and pictures to hang, but it is slowly coming around.
they might not have been super excited for the first day, but I sure was!

We moved out of our kids school zone this summer so I have taken the job of communting them everyday to and from school. It's only the second day and I have had enough. When I am not driving them around or sitting at ball fields, I work at a preschool. I love to run and scrapbook and i play the cello. My DH, John goes to school, talks about school, and studies for school. Like I said, we are pretty boring:-)