People bug me

OK, not everyone bugs me but I encountered someone tonight who really irritated me.

I took the boys to Panda Express tonight. Believe it or not, that is their favorite restaurant. The one nearest our house is the one at Jordan Landing which also happens to be busy pretty much all the time. So as we were standing in line they were horsing around with eachother, being a little crazy (but really I have seen worse in both my children and others) and I could tell that the lady in front of us was getting annoyed. I made sure that we were far enough back that my boys didn't bump into her and I tried to calm them down a little but they were excited and hungry and maybe a little hyped up from the sugar they got at the family Christmas party today. So after about 10 minutes she turns to me and says "do you need a whip or something?" and I did a little fake laugh "ha ha, maybe a little duct tape would do"- you know joking, friendly banter. Then she says "maybe you shouldn't take them out Christmas shopping or anywhere else if they act like this". At first I was shocked but then after it sunk in I was a little mad. My boys are generally well-behaved and tonight they were certainly not being bad. The man with this woman didn't seem bothered by them but she sure did.

I have every right to go places with my children and to be honest, I really don't go many places anymore since Brad has been working 2 jobs and I am alone with the boys in the evening. You know how kids are in the evening when they are tired....not the time to take them out shopping or anything. So generally we just stay home, but sometimes I have errands to run or shopping to do and they have to come with me. It hasn't been fun. Recently at a grocery store Trevor decided he didn't want me to buy milk that night so he cried all the way from the back of the store (why is the dairy in the back of the store?) to the checkout area "I don't want to buy miiiiillllllk!" while I carried him. He was tired and so was I but we needed some groceries and it was the only opportunity I had to go to the store.

It reminded me of a time, many years ago, when I was strapping Tyler into his car seat in the Walmart parking lot and an impatient woman honked at me because she was unable to pull in to the next parking space because my back door was opened. You parents out there know it only takes a few seconds to strap a child in so it's not like I was taking very long but apparently it was too long for her. Back then I did give her a little piece of my mind, today I didn't.

So why do people have to be so rude? I don't get it. If I see a child throwing a temper tantrum or crying in a store I feel sympathy for that parent because I know what it is like and it isn't easy. I guess I will just have to let her rude comments roll off my back and know that I am doing the best I can.

Oh Trevor! Part 2

The other night we spent 30 minutes looking for Trevor's favorite blanket at bedtime so he could go to sleep. We searched everywhere and finally found it in the refridgerator. When I asked him why he said "because I wanted it to be cold" as if that were a completely normal answer!

A productive conversation

This exchange happened tonight between Tyler and me.

The scene: I come walking into the kitchen to find him and Trevor digging in the cupboard where we keep the paper plates, paper cups, napkins, etc.

Me: Tyler, what are you doing?

Tyler: I'm doing something so I can do something.

Trevor: Yeah, do something

That cleared it up for me.

Tyler's 7th Birthday

Tyler's real birthday was Sunday November 15th but we celebrated the previous Sunday at Grandpa and Grandma Newman's house. Then on Friday I brought cupcakes to his class and they sang him "Happy Birthday". On Saturday we had his friend birthday party and on Sunday we celebrated with Grandma Thacker.

For his friend party we went to the Taylorsville Rec Center. A little bit of a drive for us but it was so worth it. We spent an hour climbing the rock wall and then went in to the party room for pizza, soda, cake and presents. I bought an ice cream cake from Baskin Robbins (it's the first time I had ever bought one) and it was toxic-bright but tasted good. The party was so fun and I am glad we did it there. My mom's fiance Garry works at the Rec center and told me about the parties they offer. He also helped me shuttle the kids to and from (in the snow!) so extra thanks to him.

Here are a ton of pictures:

The invite

Tyler climbing the rock wall

The brightly colored and illegible cake

Isn't this a great looking group of kids??

Instead of a cake this year he had cupcakes that looked like....

Hamburgers!

It's still hard for me to believe that I have a 7-year-old. It seems like just yesterday he was born and now he is an incredibly handsome, smart little boy. I love him so much!

Isn't he a doll? He got lots of Lego's for his birthday. Betcha didn't guess that already!

I am so stressed-out!

I think this is the most overwhelmed I have ever been in my life! Last week I had a big UNOS- United Network of Organ Sharing (For more info click here) audit at work that took a lot of preparation. We did well but my perfectionist tendencies come out during these things and I get really hard on myself for any mistakes that I make. You know, I am not allowed to be human but everyone else can be. We have two other audits from other agencies coming in 2010- I can hardly wait. Oh, and they want to take new pictures for my work's website. This stresses my out because I look so young and skinny and acne-free in my old picture. I don't want a new one, but they are making me!

I also (for the first time ever, yes I am a bad mom) was throwing a friend birthday party for Tyler's 7th birthday. We have always just done family parties but this year he recognized that other kids were having friend parties and he wanted one too. So add that in to the mix.

And now I am preparing for my mom's wedding. This is a hard one and earlier this week I went through a day of grieving for my dad. I mean full-blown hysterical sobbing. I don't want to see my mom married to anyone other than my dad so this has been a big struggle and is the reason that it hasn't been posted on my blog before today. But the time is nearly here and I'll do what I have to do to support my mom.

Oh, and one of my co-workers asked me if I could present to a group of medical students on the Living Kidney program that we have in Utah and my experience as a living donor back in 2004. I was like sure, no big deal until she told me I needed to fill up 40 minutes. 40 minutes?!?! I haven't even begun preparing for this yet! For more info click here

To top all this off there is also Thanksgiving, Christmas, shopping for Christmas, two work parties, two family parties and a 90th birthday party for Brad's grandpa (the one who was our temple sealer).

It truly is the most wonderful time of the year.

Here's something positive to cap off my negative post. I made this beautiful and delicious apple crisp. I used Granny Smith, Jonagold and Gala apples and it was divine!

Halloween 2009

Here are the boys in their costumes

Originally Tyler wanted to be Frankenstein and Trevor wanted to be a Ghost but they don't make classic costume like that anymore and I am not creative nor do I sew. Instead we went to the Halloween store and looked around. Tyler settled on a Star Wars Clone Trooper (big surprise there!) and once Trevor spotted the Superman costume he was hooked. It was a nice, easy shopping trip.

Look how nice my front stoop looked. I was so proud. Here's a close-up of our pumpkins.

The boys and I painted them one evening when Brad was at work because I don't do the goopy-gross mess of carving. If Brad had been home he would've though.

We went to our usual Halloween Party/Trunk or Treat with my in-laws about 2 weeks before Halloween. Their YW/YM plan a party in the gymnasium and then the adults do a trunk or treat afterwards. It's always so much fun with a cake walk, face painting, fish pond, crafts, etc. Here's Trevor decorating a candy bag. I thought it was cute that he sticks his tongue out when concentrating.

Here's Tyler doing the obligatory donut-on-a-string. I try not to let myself think about how many other people's mouths have touched that string because then I get high-strung. He was cute though and really wanted to do it. The only bad part to the night was the trick or treating in the rain. Cold and wet does not make for a happy mommy.

Here's my adorable niece Katelyn in her Cinderella costume. Isn't she a doll? She totally ignores me but I'm OK with that because I love her anyway.

A couple nights later we did our other tradition which is to go to Red Butte Garden's Garden After Dark. This picture is of all the kids who were there with us that night. This year was particularly fun for the kids. They painted pumpkins, made witches potion (dried flower petals in a vile), made witches brooms, had broom races and did all the other games and activities scattered throughout the garden. It was so fun.

Tyler's painted pumpkin

Trevor digging in the hay to find a hidden object to turn in for a packet of magic seeds. Unfortunately he spotted a plastic spider and....

This is what happened.

I laugh because he was never afraid of spiders until this one incident in Walmart. I took the boys in to the Halloween area with me. Neither of them were afraid of any of the Halloween displays including the moving scary pretend people. So, I picked up this huge (probably 3 foot in diameter) hairy spider and when I went to show him he freaked out. I mean, you could've heard him on the other side of the store. And ever since then he has been afraid of spiders- real or fake. My mother-in-law gave the boys each a little goody bag full of Halloween things and in it was one of those little spider rings. Once he saw it he threw the bag across the room and refused to touch it again until I had taken the spider out. Crazy kid!

Next we had Trevor's preschool Halloween program. He absolutely refused to sit on the chairs with the rest of his class and ended up sitting on my lap in the front row and singing all the songs from there. Much to my surprise though when it was his turn to do his speaking part he marched right up there and said it without any hesitation. Oh Trevor, how I love you. You always keep me guessing.

And finally, all the adorable cousins getting ready for the ward trunk or treat on Halloween. From left to right there is Hailey, Trevor, Tyler, Lucy and Avery. After the trunk or treat we went over to a house in our neighborhood where this guy wears stilts, is dressed in all black with a scary mask and comes walking out with a chainsaw. We hadn't ever taken the kids up there but wanted to check it out. Hailey was the only one brave enough to walk up there (or to young to know to be scared!). He was way nice though and when he saw the kids hanging back by the car he took off his mask and turned off the chainsaw to show the kids he was just a person dressed up. We chatted for a bit (my brother-in-law knows him through their stake somehow) and then we headed over to my house for our usual pizza and chatfest. Fun was had by all.

Even though we didn't get to do all the things I had wanted to do (Gardner Village, Cornbelly's, a pumpkin patch and corn maze) we still had a great time together and that's all that matters.

Gorgeous Flowers

Aren't these beautiful? They are just two of the gorgeous flowers from our San Diego trip.

Vacation Day 7 and the road home!

As mentioned in an earlier post we spent 2 days at Sea World. Trevor's favorite part of Sea World was the Sesame Street Bay of Play area so we spent a lot of time there on both days. These are the three rides they have plus they have a splash pad and a huge obstacle course/climbing area that parents and kids can go through together.

 Oscar's Rockin' Eel

This was the big boat that the life-size characters would come out on to sing and dance. You could also pay to take a picture with them. We didn't.

Abby's Sea Star Spin

This one was Trevor's favorite- Elmo's Flying Fish. He asked about going back to San Diego to ride this for several weeks.

We had originally planned to check out of our hotel, swing over to Sea World , spend a couple hours there and then hit the road home. Well, once we got to Sea World we started having so much fun that we stayed until 9 p.m.! It was Labor Day weekend so it was more crowded that we had been used to all week but we tolerated it. They were having fireworks that night so it got more crowded the later it got. After we left we went to an In-N-Out Burger to see what all the rage is about since they are not common yet in Utah. Let's just say we were underwhelmed. From there we just wanted to go home. I told Brad we could rent a cheap hotel room for a night but he wanted to try to drive it so we stayed up and took turns only stopping for gas, snacks and to switch drivers.

It took 12 hours to get home and when we did Brad and I were exhausted. The boys slept most of the way home so we really lucked out there. My feet were hugely swollen by this time and I was starting to worry that maybe I was having some kidney function issues. We hurried to unload the car, unpack, get the laundry started and then we got naps. It was so nice to be home but we feel thankful that we were able to do this dream vacation this year. This is the first real vacation we have taken as a family and it was bliss.

Vacation Day 6 - San Diego Zoo

Day 6 was spent at the San Diego zoo, another place we visited on our honeymoon. The only thing that seemed different to me this time was the hilly terrain. Of course, it's probably because my health was much better back then but boy howdy I struggled at the zoo this time.
When we first arrived we took a 40-minute bus tour to get a general layout of the zoo and see some behind-the-scene places of the zoo that you can't get to on foot. We were also shown the places to get on and off the courtesy bus they have. Later in the day we took the sky ride (shown above) that goes from one end of the park to another. The boys loved it but it made me feel anxious.

It was fun to see animals that we don't have at our zoo here in Utah like the cuddly Koala's....

the peaceful Panda's....

and this adorably cute baby gorilla. He was hilarious! It was so nice to see such active animals. You can tell that they are well taken care of because of how active they were.

They had a huge new elephant exhibit that covered prehistoric animals up to modern day elephants. They even had their training and educational areas elephants open so that the public could watch the trainers interact with the elephants. It is by far the best zoo that I have ever been to.

Vacation Days 5 & 7- Sea World

We spent days 5 & 7 at Sea World San Diego. It brought back a lot of memories for Brad and me because that is one place we visited on our honeymoon. It sure has changed a lot though.

The Shamu Beetle - so cute!
The first place Tyler wanted to go was the new Atlantis ride. It is part rollercoaster part water ride and all fun. If you look closely you can see Tyler and me on the back row of the car. Trevor was too short for this ride and since he hates water he would've been miserable anyway.

We also went to the Shamu show and that is always fun. We stayed out of the splash zone for this one but....

got soaked at the dolphin show. Trevor freaked out and I got salt water in my eyes so that wasn't fun. The dolphins were adorable though.

This was right after Trevor woke up from a nap and we went into the dark shark building. I asked him if he liked sharks and snapped the picture right as he answered. Isn't he cute?

This is Tyler in front of the Manatee Rescue exhibit. All of their Manatees were rescued off the coast of Florida after being injured by boats. Each of them had scars or missing limbs and it was so sad but they were really cute and seemed happy to be there.

This was Tyler's expression after he fed a stingray. I was not about to feed one of those things. One was really aggressive and would lift it's face and half it's body over the edge of the shallow pool in search of food. I wasn't about to feed him. But it didn't bother the boys. Yikes!

Next we went to the tidepool and touched star fish. Tyler loved them but....

Trevor wasn't so sure about them. I thought they were beautiful. There were some that were huge- probably 15 inches in diameter and all sorts of colors!

Since we were there 8 years ago they have added Sesame Street Bay of Play, Atlantis, the Clydesdales exhibit, the Shipwreck Rapids (like Lagoon's Rattlesnake Rapids), the Arctic Experience, the Sky Tower and the Bay Ride. Trevor wanted to spend the whole time in the Sesame Street play area so we did that quite a bit both days. I'll post those pics on Day 7.

Vacation Day 4 - Coronado Beach

We were all tired from 2 days at Legoland so we decided to have a "rest" day and go to the beach. Brad had done some research and found that Coronado was the nicest one around so we headed there. First we had to cross this huge bridge to Coronado Island. The island was lovely and quaint and I just wanted to explore the street and window shop.

Coronado Beach Bridge
But I needed to get off these swollen ankles (they were only half their usual swollen size on this morning and I wanted to keep the swelling down for the last 3 days of the trip!). So I walked a little in the cool, wet sand then parked myself on a towel and soaked up the sunshine.

Jamie's gigantic swollen ankles and feet
Brad and Tyler searched for seashells in the ocean -they found this huge beauty!- and jumped the crashing waves. Tyler loved playing in the water and swallowed a whole bunch of salt water that day.

Tyler's prize seashell

Meanwhile Trevor and I just walked in the shallow end. He wasn't too fond of the water getting anywhere above his knees and the waves made him nervous. He did like to chase the seagulls though so he did that while I lounged on the sand.

Trevor chasing the seagulls

The boys built a huge sand castle and we also made a craft. I had brought shiny glass beads and plaster of paris so we could make molds in the sand along with the seashells we found. They turned out neat but break easy and make a mess and I'm not real big on messy things.

The family by the sand castle

After the beach we went back to the hotel and cleaned up, took a little nap & rested and then we went to Benihana for dinner. Our hotel was in a great location and all we had to do was walk through the hotel parking lot and up some stairs and we were at three different restaurants. Our service and food was wonderful and we all had a good time. We swam in the hotel pool again that night and then headed for bed.

Having fun at Benihana

Vacation Days 2 & 3 - Legoland

Entrance to Legoland

We spent two days at Legoland and could've been there longer! It was so much fun for all of us!

Legoland birthday cake

It's Legoland's 10th birthday so they had this huge cake made out of Lego's. It depicts the different rides and things they have in the park. It was very cool.

Pirate on bench

Darth Vader & Yoda

They also had these statues made out of Lego bricks scattered throughout the park that you could take pictures with. We have tons. The top pic is of the boys knocking-out a drunk pirate who was sitting on a bench outside the Tidal Wave-like ride that we had just gotten off of. Quite frankly I was the one feeling a little drunk after that ride- I am no longer a spring chicken when it comes to amusement park rides. The bottom picture is of the boys with some of their favorite Star War's characters made from Lego's. You really should click on this picture and zoom in on Trevor's face. It's classic.

One of the water rides

One of the dry rides

They also have all kinds of rides from mild rides for toddlers to wild roller coasters. We were able to ride everything once and some of our favorite rides a second time. Trevor was able to ride almost everything, there were maybe 6 rides he was too short to go on. We also chose the perfect time of year to go. It wasn't too hot, the lines were short and the crowds were minimal. I would never want to go during peak season. Tyler really liked the above water ride and Trevor's favorite was this ride that would bounce you up and down.


CAUTION: The most ridiculous thing I have ever seen in my life is up next:
At Legoland you get VIP parking if you are the owner of a Volvo. Yes, lucky you. Apparently Lego's started in Denmark and are affiliated with Volvo (all the car rides are little miniature Volvo's and there is even a full-sized Volvo made of Lego's on a car frame inside the park). Anyway, Brad and I just thought this was absolutely crazy! We'll be prepared next time.

At the end of those two days we were exhausted but having so much fun. This was a dream vacation for us. We had never done a big vacation like this and felt that our kids were the perfect age to do it this year. We all enjoyed Legoland so much that we want to go back again before the boys outgrow it. I even told Brad that if we lived in Southern California I would want a season pass.