I Totally Know How to Party November 10, 2013

Whew!  I think I must have entered some sort of time warp because this week FLEW by in a blur of assemblies, church activities, and candy wrappers.  Before I knew it, Saturday was upon me.  I went to work (there are always at least five teachers at school every Saturday), ran some errands, and then I got to hang out with one of my most awesome friends for her (a few weeks late) birthday.

We began our evening with some yummy Sri Lankan food at the Banana Leaf. 

Why yes, that is a terrible food picture.  It could be worse though – at least I haven’t started taking duck-face selfies yet.

Once our appetites were appeased, it was time for the real fun to begin.

That’s right – we went to Barnes and Noble. 

And now, ladies and gentlemen, it’s time for me to call attention to an extremely disturbing Christmas trend.

Elf on the Shelf.

From the website:  “The Elf on the Shelf® is a special scout elf sent from the North Pole to help Santa Claus manage his naughty and nice lists. When a family adopts an elf and gives it a name, the elf receives its Christmas magic and can fly to the North Pole each night to tell Santa Claus about all of the day’s adventures. Each morning, the elf returns to its family and perches in a different place to watch the fun. Children love to wake up and race around the house looking for their elf each morning.”

Sounds innocent enough, right?

WRONG.

Exhibit A:

He’s creepy.  Just…creepy.  I don’t know about you, but even as an adult, the thought of that disturbed little elf prowling around the house and spying on me is the stuff of nightmares.  

Apparently, the Elf of the Shelf people are out to ensure that every child in America is suffering from terror induced sleep deprivation, because there were Elf displays EVERYWHERE.  I now give you exhibit B:

But wait – it gets worse.

Now you can accessorize your Elf.

With a sparkly skirt.

Exhibit C:

Because nothing says “Christmas Cheer” like a pint-sized cross-dressing pedophilic elf.

In case having the manic little goblin stare silently at you while you’re going about your day isn’t enough, you can also get interactive with your elf.

Exhibit D:

I really wish that I had more time to spend on this post, because I haven’t even come close to describing the true horror of the elf.

And just in case you aren’t convinced that the elf is the most insidiously creepy toy ever invented, I’ve saved the most horrifying part for last.

Exhibit E:  The BIRTHDAY Elf

That’s right.  It’s not enough for the Elf to terrify small children during Christmas time.  Now he’s out to ruin their birthdays, too.

While wearing a sexy cupcake costume.

I’ll just let you digest that for a minute. 

Sweet dreams tonight.

Oh, and lest you think that I spent the entire evening obsessing over an evil elf, I also did some serious shopping.

I present to you exhibit F:

I think this needs to be my new coffee table book.

It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year! November 3, 2013

Ah, Halloween.  So much fun, so little time.

My cute scouts carved some jack-o-lanterns all by themselves.

Believe it or not, no blood was shed during the carving of these pumpkins.

I wish I wish I wish I could show you some pictures of my sweet second graders on Halloween day.  We had a BLAST!  I loved having a day to just have fun with my students (now, now, don’t worry – we did some math – in the dark with flashlights and spooky music playing in the background).

Bizzie began the month with a very cute Minnie Mouse costume.  Then she broke the ears.  Then she lost the ears.  She ended up being a …princess?…doll?…mobster wife?…instead.

Please ignore the messy porch.  We had a rotten pumpkin incident.  Yes, it was nasty.

Also please ignore the non-traditional trick-or-treating bags.  It’s possible that I forgot that tiny detail.  Or maybe I just knew that giant gift bags would hold more candy.

No worries, though.  The Halloween weather was beautiful, and the munchkins have been solely subsisting on candy all weekend long.

And the weather now?  It’s snowing.

Apparently I Should Have Just Hit the Hornet October 27, 2013

Did I say that I was going to do bi-weekly posts?  I meant weekly.  My bad.

Remember how a few months ago the girls and I went on a zipline?  This week, it was the boys’ turn.  (Except for Daniel.  He doesn’t believe in having fun.)

We arrived at the gear up station (no idea what it’s actually called) a few minutes late, thanks to a wrong turn taken by the driver.  (The driver is blaming it on taking too much cold medicine in a futile effort to avoid hacking up a lung mid-zipline.)  (And yes, I am the driver.  This is why I should totally be on the Amazing Race – I am constantly getting lost.  It would make for very entertaining tv.)

Jakester was SUPER excited.  He grinned ear to ear the whole time he was putting his harness on.  I took the obligatory pre-zipline picture of the boys and then…

Joshua said something was poking him under his chin strap.  I checked it out, and much to Josh’s dismay, it was a hornet.  A very calm hornet.  A hornet that was not about to move off of the warm softness of Josh’s throat.  I didn’t know what to do.  I didn’t want to hit it and risk it stinging Josh, so I did what any good mom would do and took some pictures instead.

It was only after taking a dozen pics or so that I realized it had already stung poor Josh.  So I did what any good mom would do and smacked the hornet (and Josh) as hard as I could with my glove.  The hornet flew off angrily and Josh…

…well, Josh wasn’t too happy with me.

Now that the hornet was taken care of, it was time to load up in the giant van that takes tour groups to the top of the mountain.  The last time I went ziplining, I was in a middle seat on the passenger side of the van, so I just assumed that we were on a safe little mountain road.  This time, I could see exactly what we were driving on.  Holy dangerous narrow high up road, Batman!  Now that I’ve seen the “road,” I seriously think the drive up is the most dangerous part of the whole ziplining experience.  Yikes!

We were miraculously able to reach our destination without further mishap, and then the zipping began.  The boys took to it like pros, although it was quite comical to watch the tour guides trying to attach tiny little Jakester to the lines.  I tried to get some action shots, but this is the best I could do:

Oops – stopped too soon.

There was a small incident on the third line where the tour guide on the receiving end of the line accidentally threw Jakob’s brake out onto the line instead of the emergency brake, and as he was desperately trying to bring it back in nearly had a collision with Josh, who had been sent down after we mistook the guide’s frantic waving for the “all clear” signal.  I’m told it was kind of hilarious, but unfortunately I hadn’t gone down the line yet and didn’t get to see it.

Here the munchkins are on the last line.

All done!  We can’t wait to go again next year!

Hmmm…maybe I should have adjusted his helmet.

 

Surprise – I’m Still Here! October 20, 2013

I know – you’ve all (all three of you) been waiting with bated breath to see what I’ve been up to.  Sorry – July and August sort of got away from me and September just about killed me.  Luckily for you, today I Skyped with Daniel and he requested that I resume blogging.  (Awww….he misses us.)  Luckily for me, my trusty phone managed to capture a teensy bit of my life from the past few months.

And now, without further ado, I present….

A ridiculously brief recap of the past three months as told by the contents of my phone gallery.

July

We enjoyed a fantabulous but all too brief family reunion smack dab in the middle of the most gorgeous mountains in Utah.  There I was, enjoying the best that Mother Nature has to offer and visiting with families members that I only get to see once or twice a year, and guess what the only thing I thought to take pictures of was:

That’s right – a Calvin and Hobbes-style snowman family created by Daniel during a rainstorm.  Because who needs pictures of actual people when you have playdough?  Sometimes I’m not very good at life.

The munchkins had swimming lessons.  Jakester can now go off the diving board all by himself – no life jacket needed.  Or at least that’s what he thinks.  Those of us watching from the sidelines are never quite sure that he’s going to make it out of the water.

And as for Bizzie…she can now put her face in the water and blow bubbles.

I successfully fought off the urge to join my favorite cows in their swimming hole during a particularly hot run.   It does NOT pay to sleep in when you have a long run planned in the middle of summer.

August

Daniel turned 19.  See how excited he looks?  He moved up to the eeeevil U a few weeks later.  I’m still trying to get over the pain of having a Ute in the family.

Don’t mock the girlie birthday cake.  Daniel decided that it’s deliciousness was worth any teasing he might have to endure for choosing it.

When I realized that school was about to start and our carefree summer was about to end, I went into summer-fun-having overdrive mode.

First, Sarah, Em, and I spent some quality girl time getting pedicures.

NOT!!!!

We went ziplining instead.  It was much more fun.

Before we headed up the mountain, we amused our fellow zipliners as we unsuccessfully attempted to take a group photo.  After about seventy bazillion attempts, we finally managed to get a keeper:

I am not even kidding when I say that that’s the best picture we got.  And why didn’t anyone tell me to fix my helmet?

Em and I went horseback riding with some friends.  I think that I love riding even more than hiking.  Now I need to get rich so that I can buy some horses.  Or maybe I can just steal Sadie.  Russ…Mindy…what do you think?

And in the spirit of continuing the adventure, we went to the Olympic Museum at Park City.

Emma and Jakob tore up the track.

Daniel, Josh, and Biz?  Not so much.  Those big boys love their brakes.

Jakester couldn’t get enough of the ropes courses.  He totally lapped some buff college dudes on one of the challenge courses.  The look on their faces when they realized that a small-for-his-age seven-year-old was showing them up was priceless.

School started, and I was introduced to the cutest class of second graders on the planet.  Seriously.  I love them.

But….in between teaching a grade that I had absolutely NO experience with, soccer games, football games, church activities, and GETTING A PR IN A HALF MARATHON, I might have been just a tiny bit overwhelmed with life.

So I gained a lot of weight and started fighting with my fellow teachers.

Sorry, Facebook friends, that joke never gets old.  Unless you’re not me.

This brings us to October, which has been a much better month.

We found some time for hiking and climbing.

And we headed to Jakers (best. pumpkin patch. ever) to enjoy some dangerous fun pick up some pumpkins.Jakob had just jumped off those really high hay bales in that picture.

Bizzie was the only one with enough common sense to walk through the maze instead of on it.

We rode the train up to the big city for some Fall Break fun.  Pssst….don’t ever go to Discovery Gateway.  Trust me on this one.

We also caught a football game.  BYU won because we were there.  I think they should give us season tickets.

Our beloved Sabrina endured a very difficult shed.  We were sure she was dead twice.  We even all started crying over her crumpled, broken body once.  Then she got up and started walking around and we felt kind of silly but also very relieved.  Someone please tell me that tarantulas can live forever, because I don’t think we’ll be able to handle it when she really does die.

By the way, have you ever wanted to see a close-up of tarantula fangs?

 

You’re welcome.

This all brings us to today.  The combination of long teacher hours and short winter days was wreaking havoc with my running, which in turn was wreaking havoc with my sanity.  The girls and I put together my solution tonight.

Please ignore the safety cord thingy in front of Bizzie’s face.

After all that hard work, we rewarded ourselves by decorating some sugar cookies.

Whew!  Not that I’m all caught up, I can begin a serious of ridiculously brief biweekly posts dedicated to Daniel.

He’s going to regret this.