Wednesday, August 26, 2009

IPHONY BALOGNA

Hi all - So many of you know I "lost" my IPhone on Monday night here at Disney World. Well after many go rounds with lost and found Joe decided to reactivate my phone tonight and call it, well lo and behold some person answered it. Joe heard a bunch of foreign mumbo jumbo, so the phone has gone from lost to stolen.

Joe sent a text message to them saying turn it in to Disney lost and found and we'll forget about it. I hope they listen. I'm not holding my breath though.

Interesting trip eh?

Monday, August 17, 2009

Diaper Disasters & other Travel Tales

This weekend me, Austin, and Ashley braved a 4 hour drive down to Indiana to visit Angie & her family. I hadn't seen her since her wedding last August which is totally unacceptable because her family lives a whole 25 minutes from me. ;) But, I digress I was hoping that Deb would have made it also but she has been swamped at work so we missed out on the Illinois brood this time.

Traveling with Ashley was quite interesting. We decided to stop at McDonald's mainly for a potty break for Austin but also to get him some food to eat while I fed Ashley in the car. We hit the bathroom and are ready to order when I look down at Ashley and notice a toy between her legs and oh God, it's covered in doody. Yup, a major poonami as Daiva calls them had arrived. I didn't even bring the diaper bag in with me! UGH!! So back out to the car both kids in tow, get the diaper bag, and head back in to McDonald's. Ashley seems fine in her nasty state so I go get Austin his food first as he's suddenly deciding he's dying of thirst. Meanwhile Joe calls so I'm giving him the poo lo down and all of a sudden I hear some old dude yelling at Austin, "DON'T EAT THAT, PUT THAT DOWN!" Austin had dropped a fry and was picking it up, I don't know if he was going to eat it or not but the guy got him upset and he totally cowered, wouldn't eat and was pretty inconsolable until I got him to the bathroom. I just shrugged the guy off, said my kid was sensitive and would be fine, packed up his food and retreated to the bathroom to deal with the poonami. Ugh! Poo out the front, poo out the back, it was everywhere. The carseat looked like a mustard massacre. We cleaned it up as best as we could and headed out to the van. She then ate and by the transitive property from the carseat, to Ashley's new outfit, to me, I myself looked like I'd been in a poonami. Oh well, on the road again.

An hour later she is screaming with boredom. So we hit Wendy's for a frosty and to get her out of the carseat. We again hit the bathroom. The handicapped stall which would have fit all of us was unbelievably nasty. TMI coming...Ladies please, flush the damn toilet and make sure your leavings make it down. I thankfully got us out of there before Austin could see the damages and being he freaks with a little bloody fingernail, seeing this toilet would have severely traumatized him for life and everyone we'd see in the next two weeks would have heard about the massacre in the Wendy's truck stop bathroom. Please people, it's not that hard to flush. The other stalls were tiny and I made Austin wait outside, I barely made it in with the carseat too. I know I would have totally knocked Austin into the toilet if I had him in there too. Alas, we all do our business and are on the road again. Not five minutes later Ashley is screaming again!! Onward we go! She's fed, she's dry, she's just bored. I don't know if that counts as CIO or not but off and on for the last hour she would just let me know she was back there voicing her distaste for the pooey carseat that she thought maybe she'd been destined to spend the rest of her life in. Alas we arrive two hours later than we'd hoped, safe, sound, and everyone is happy again.

We didn't do anything too exciting. We just visited, the kids played, you know the whole newborn pattern of eat, sleep, play. All of us partook. It was a nice trip, too short but nice. The boys are all animals. I wasn't able to get a nice picture of any of them really, too busy making silly faces. Oh well, I think they all had a good time. Ashley gifted us all with another diaper disaster, this time Angie got to wash her bouncy chair. It might be time to look into different diapers.

The trip home wasn't nearly as eventful. We only had to make one stop, again we pressed our luck at McDonald's. We parked way far away so I could feed Ashley fairly privately and then made the long walk in after to use the potty and get Austin an ice cream. Joe calls and I'm trying to get Ashley out of her carseat without dropping the beloved IPhone, I pick her up and Kaboom, the carseat back flips off the table. A nice little 7 year old girl came over and picked up all her toys. What a sweetie. No bathroom drama this time thankfully. We go to leave and it's raining lightly, but remember I parked way out in BFE and by the time we get to the van it's pouring and my keyfab isn't working. So I stumble with the keys, get the kids in and on the road we go again. Albeit a soaked ride home. But a little rain is a bit comical and we only had a little over an hour to go! Yes! We made it home safe and sound. All happy again.

With all the driving craziness I'm so thankful that next week the family flies to Florida. Should be smooth and easy traveling with Joe, Tommy, my Mom, and lil' Justin along to help and 2 1/2 hours on a plane beats 22 hours in the van. Heck with Ashley it would probably be 44 hours in the van. I don't know if we'll ever drive to Florida again. ;)

Overall it was a very good weekend and I would make the trip again. I definitely could have used Tommy but it was good for Austin to be the big man too. And I'm very gracious to Angie, Tim, Max, and Alex for letting us come stay with them. Fun times, fun times. :)

The thing is the poo disasters were really not shocking. Both the boys have done this to us in the past. In fact Tommy got a complete bath at the Bavarian Inn Restaurant bathroom sink once. Austin at the Animal Kingdom sink, a custodian just kept handing me paper towels. Baby poo is much easier to handle than toddler poo, so for that small gift of knowledge I have been given I am thankful as I know it will only get worse. And I will be here with the MacBook to divulge all the gruesome details to you wonderful readers.

Wednesday, August 12, 2009

Brace Yourself!

Here are Austin's new goods. He is graduating his left foot to a much smaller brace which is good news. His feet have grown so much but they always make the AFO's so big so he doesn't need to get them redone but maybe once a year. His new Nike's are super cool looking albeit a bit "clown-feet-ish" as they are so big. He's complained a bit about the new left one feeling painful on his heel. I'm hoping after a few days he gets more comfortable. And so far, knock on wood he hasn't dirfed in the dirt tripping over them because they are oversized. He was running tonight and was thankfully able to catch his balance when he did trip up a bit the one time I saw. He's had a great summer regarding balance. He can run in Crocs now and I don't worry as much about him falling. He's also made a lot of progress on his trike. I will have to take some video. He still can't turn at all but he can pedal down the sidewalk quite far. Summer is always a great progression time, this one was no different. Yay Austie!





Monkey Face


P.S. The boys had a field trip today with the school and Jill posted a video of Austin casting on her blog. It's awesome, you have to check it out!

Monday, August 10, 2009

In the Mall - Showing financial restraint

So today we went to Ann Arbor because Austin had an appointment for orthotics. Afterwards we trekked to the mall. A very nice and fancy mall. They had your typical stores that every mall has anchor their building like Sears/Penney's/Macy's but also had your high end stores like Coach, Godiva Chocolate, and an APPLE STORE! I love to go mall walking and just looking at all the stores and was good only buying Austin a pair of shoes at Von Maur. Another high end store, they pay a lady to play a grand piano instead of blasting us with elevator music through a sound system. But even this posh mall has it's ghetto alley. You know the wing in the mall that has all the little islands like the hand cream person, the 5 minute chair massage, the sunglass hut, the inadequate cell service square, the come sit in my jacuzzi tub, the let me sell you a new roofing job, you catch my drift right? I loathe going down these wings where the salespeople are like vultures. I walk as fast as I can, thinking "don't make eye contact, don't make eye contact"...before they can get you with the "is your hair naturally straight, do your nails flake off, can I just have 5 minutes of your time, MOVE MOVE MOVE before they get me. Because lets face it, I'm a sucker and I am easily pushed into high pressure sales.

In the 6th grade a vacuum salesmen came to the house and my Dad must have told him no on this $1600 Kirby vacuum about 10 times. The guy wouldn't leave, brought the price down to $800, was practically crying that he wouldn't be getting his monthly bonus if he didn't sell this one last vacuum and who knows what other junk he told us but I probably figured he had starving children at home or something. I begged Dad to buy this vacuum because the guy seemed so desperate...And he did buy it. And I know now that my Dad couldn't afford an $800 vacuum, I remember him having to borrow money from my Grandparents to buy a furnace. Sad thing is we really weren't quite the housekeeping family and I don't know how many times that vacuum was actually used. Dad does have a cleaning lady these days.

So when it comes to high pressure sales I know I might as well just buy it off the get go. I have extreme difficulty saying no. Stanley Steamer comes to clean our carpets every year and Joe tells me...DON'T BUY ANY OTHER SERVICE. Well they'll do a patch on the sofa and it comes back dirty black...SOLD! The kids must spill a lot on the carpet, it needs a protectant sealer...SOLD! I think one year my $100 coupon special ballooned to a $250 deluxe cleaning. I caught heck for that one. It's why I hate salespeople. The darn Scott's Lawn Service people get me every time too. Grubs, winter mold, and the latest mud worms. What the heck are mud worms??? And how devastating can they be to our lawn?

I really do feel for these people just trying to make a living, I know they probably despise their jobs and us cruddy customers. I hate being openly rude to these salespeople so I've learned the art of being evasive, look away as if the salespeople were medusa, screen my phone calls, don't answer the door when Scott's comes, they can't add a service if I don't approve it, hide, hide, hide!!!

On a nicer note, I never turn down local charities, or kids doing fundraisers. Or should I say I don't hide from them. I'll always happily buy a raffle ticket, or a pizza kit, or cookie dough, or donate my pop bottles, or whatever else they are trying to fund. Because just like I can't say no, I hate being told no when I'm trying to fundraise for my kids. Dealing with rejection is a whole nother post. ;)

Now if I could just work on the art of saying No Thank You without the guilt.

Sunday, August 9, 2009

JoDa - XII

Today is our 12th wedding anniversary. I can honestly say I'm happier now than I was 12 years ago. You all know it hasn't been a whole 12 years of a perfect dream marriage but we've been solid and I'm thankful for my wonderful hubby.

Half of 12 is 6 and on our wedding day Fr. Jim told us there are 6 little words that can help us get far in our marriage.

I AM SORRY - I FORGIVE YOU

Over the last 12 years I've probably uttered the "I am sorry" part more than Joe has and thankfully he will always say, albeit cheeky sometimes, "I forgive you." It definitely works on healing during those times where gosh darn one of us just screws up.

For me, I think every married couple should go to a wedding every year if possible. For real, who can't imagine themselves on their own wedding day when they are sharing in another couples happiness? And it's fun to think back to your own wedding and say "good gravy the styles have changed!"

To Josephus, thanks for being a wonderful life partner, and thanks for being such a great Dad to the kids too. I hope we last another MXII years. ;)

Here is an adorable picture that Tommy just took of us. Can you figure out what we two geeks are doing? A gold cyber-star for the person who guesses correctly.

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

Golf Tales


The 8th annual St. Elizabeth School golf outing was this weekend. It's always an interesting deal. Joe and I have either golfed or helped at most of the outings. And once again we came home with lotso toilet paper.

We added Doug and Lisa to our trio this year hoping to up our game and improve on our ladies 36 over par from last year. It was also going to be less tiresome because we wouldn't have to take turns double hitting a ball because we were short a player and it was a scramble. Lisa is also a great softball player/natural athlete so we thought we were in! Our hopes were dashed when she arrives with 2 clubs, her 9 year old sons U of M half size driver and a putter.

None of us had golfed since the last outing but we had high hopes. All of our first hits were pretty much crap and I even lost that first ball I hit but that my friends would be the only ball I would lose. Maybe we would only be in the 20's over par as Amy blasted a beautiful hit right on the green hoping to save par but all of us couldn't putt to save our life and we were 4 over par on our first hole. Hmm...4 x 18 would equal a whopping 72 over par. We were not off to a good start. Thankfully we did do better. Amy could drive that ball so well and the rest of us had a few good shots as well. However, our golf savior was also sporting a broken foot and started fizzling out towards the end. We ended up about 34 over par...we think. We didn't golf the last three holes because Jill was sick, Amy's foot was killing her, and Lisa & I were bushed shooting double all the time. Wimps. We easily won the last place toilet paper. The guys also repeated as last place champs with 17 over par. They declined heavily since last year, at least us girls seemed to maintain our chumpness.

The Pranks - You know it would not be an outing without trying to pull off a few pranks. I needed an ally this year so I couldn't be ganged up on 3-1 so I let Amy in on a few ideas. We got a few exploding balls which backfired on us as Jill & Lisa confiscated one and got Amy to hit one. Too bad she initially whiffed and only had a little white powder streak. She did hit it again and we got the full baby powder poof effect. We also played the game of "unhooking" the golf clubs and watching them fall off the cart a few times. The best was when we were on the break time at the clubhouse for a hot dog and when we took on the carts and off Jill's clubs go flying. Glorious as there was quite the audience.

Probably the best golf investment I've ever made had to be the purchase of an $11 air horn. We first get Lisa on the Mulligan/Vegas hole. (Yay for more audience) Lisa gets in her back swing and "HONK" slice goes her ball about 20 feet. Yup, 20 whopping feet. It was great! We later got Jill on the air horn and they attempted to get me. Julie came and confiscated it and tried to get the guys but it didn't phase Dennis who couldn't golf for sh!t that day according to Joe. Later in the afternoon we see a couple on the tee next to us and we teach their kids so Jill gets the air horn, and times it perfectly sending Jeff's ball sailing. It was quite comical. They played mixed and ended up winning the couples division by 2 shots with no help from us. I guess that was the only hole they bogey'd all day. Hilarious!

The bad thing about pulling all this off is you know they will try and get you back. Let's see while trying to shoot, I get a club up my skorts by Jill, Lisa uses a club as a samurai sword to stop me in my swing, and at one point they start pelting me with golf balls. By the 5th hole I was feeling pretty paranoid. ;)

The Bet - Teeing off on a hole with a hill, Jill & Lisa had already had a couple brews and I dared Jill that she wouldn't roll down the hill. You know how one beer can just totally make you lose your inhibitions well lo and behold she did. Unfortunately, immediately afterward she ended up massively sick. By the 14th hole she was done, totally baked. I think she missed most of the back 9. Here it is for your viewing pleasure. Don't mind my squeaky voice.



Overall it was a great day and we raised about $5000 for our school. The weather was gorgeous and it's always fun to get out with great friends for some fun and exercise. The kids got to go to their old babysitter's and had a good time so it was a great day for all! I like our once a year golfing, I think we'd be banned from the course if we were league golfers.