Wacky Hair Day!

I just wanted to look at the cool rooms at the Designer Showhouse to gain some sort of crafting inspiration with my favorite crafting partner. However, there was a bit of a traumatizing experience upon completion of our tour of the first house which led me to ask, 'did that just happen?!'

Because of this experience I have compiled a list of 7 things which are NOT acceptable to say to both a complete stranger, and also someone who is 9 months pregnant and practically miserable.

NEVER:

1. Point at the pregnant person's stomach and say, "Good luck with that." If you just stop at 'good luck' its a nice comment and something that is acceptable to say to someone you do not know. Adding 'with that' to the end of the comment makes it seem as though I have a life altering problem that she is glad to not be a part of. I personally am growing a fetus, or baby, or child, not "that".

2. Tell a pregnant person a story about your friend whose baby died 2 weeks before she was to be born. As if I don't have enough to deal with, lets add paranoia of everything that could go wrong enter my brain.

3. Act as if my life is over because I'm having another boy. Sure I would have enjoyed having a girl, if only to do her hair and shop with her. The fact of it is, I enjoy shopping by myself, and I can barely keep Talan's chicken hair under control. We were given a baby who happens to be a boy and we couldn't be more thrilled about that.

4. Gloat that your third baby was a girl. That's awesome. See comment three. I'm sure she finds you insanely embarrassing.

5. When I am waddling around, barely able to breathe, having all sorts of contractions all the time, and a baby is head-butting my bladder as I walk past several bathrooms labeled 'please do not use'...basically when I'm in my misery mode...do not recommend a book to me aimed at achieving the desired gender of your next baby. As if I even want to consider being pregnant again right at this moment in my life.

6. I can not stress this one enough! It is bad enough to recommend the book stated in comment 5, but do not feel as if you need to go into further detail of what is stated in the book and use words such as: ovulation, conceive, and sperm. On that note, I did not ask, nor do I want to know when you ovulated and conceived your own children. Gross!

7. This is just for anyone in general, not only when encountering a pregnant stranger. If someone is walking out the door, and starting to hobble down the stairs, not making any eye contact with you, it probably means they are trying to leave, and do not wish to engage in a family planning discussion with you. Let them leave.


Thank you.

Science Rules!

Yes, my 8 year old is a science geek. He recently used half of his birthday itunes gift card stash to buy 17 episodes of his all time favorite show....Bill Nye the Science Guy. In his defense, he also bought another Jonas Brothers cd to balance out his nerdiness with a little coolness.

We are 3 episodes in and have so far learned about chemical reactions, pollution, and static electricity/air pressure. In each episode there is at least 1 experiment to try at home.

We tried this one tonight...




I highly recommend Bill Nye the Science Guy to all you fellow science geeks out there.

TMI

By the title of this blog post I just want to say you have been warned that further content might cause you to feel great regret for not stopping reading right here.

A couple days ago I was getting Talan ready for bed. Before I put on a new diaper I always ask him if he wants to sit on his potty. He always says no and I shrug and let it go because I had accepted his decision that he would never leave his diapers behind. However this time he said yes, ran to his frog potty and ran out screaming, "I PEED!" All day yesterday and today he has been wearing underwear. Ashton's underwear actually, what a great brother to share! It has been going great! Four accidents yesterday and only one actual accident today. We are on the road to success.

Today brought something new to the potty training world that I have never experienced before. (this is where the tmi comes in). Talan was playing in the living room and all was well. Next thing I know Talan comes strolling into my room tossing a piece of poop back and forth in his hands as if it were a new ball. I froze. He looked at me and said, "what's that mommy?" Part of me wanted to laugh hysterically, but instead we had to talk about how we don't touch poop, which sadly wouldn't be the first time we've had this conversation.

This too shall pass, right?

It doesn't matter what Ashton is doing. All Talan knows is that Ashton is doing it so it must be awesome and he's going to do it too.

Beatles -- Day Tripper

Here is a snippet (since blogger limits the length of my posted videos) of what the self proclaimed rockstar is working on these days...

Leavin on a jet plane

As of a couple hours ago our growing family is moving on to the next chapter in our lives. Brad has boarded a plane heading to Washington DC to resume his life at the Pentagon in the morning. He will be once again working in the Army Operations Center. I have a very basic and general knowledge of what he does there for 12-14 hours a day, or night, but I know that he is safe and that is good enough for me. Frankly, I'd rather not know what he has to deal with there.

One thing we have found though is as much as our family has had to say goodbye and be apart it absolutely never gets easier. Whether it is for one month or fifteen. It is especially hard when little Talan is clinging to Brad's neck saying, "stay here dad." But we are proud of what he is doing, and we know the worst part is now over. And I'm thankful that we have great kids who are adaptable to our ever changing situation even though I know it is hard on them.

Below I thought I would answer two questions that I get asked a lot, so maybe I won't have to answer quite so often:

--Brad will be back for the baby to be born. He is coming home May 23rd then May 24th is baby day. After we will have about a week and a half here before we load our family of five into good old Chappie and drive to Virginia where we will spend the summer in Brad's cramped little apartment most likely enjoying every second of it. I'm really excited to be taking Ashton to all the sights now that he is learning about presidents at school. He wasn't quite big enough to appreciate everything last time.

--The kids and I are planning to live in Kansas until Brad finds a more permanent job. Due to some people taking advantage of the government and pocketing a large chunk of change which they were claiming to pay in rent the government is no longer providing funds for soldiers to find their own housing. Instead they have contracted with several apartments in the area to provide the incoming soldiers with a fully furnished 1 bedroom apartment. They only have to provide 1 bedroom since this deployment is unaccompanied, meaning no family tag alongs. Brad will be able to fly home about once a month, and we will fly his way for all lengthy school vacations. In the in between times, we can call, text, webcam, email, and chat to our hearts content.

So, this is what is happening with our family these days. Never a dull moment. :)

Where's Ashton?

I only asked if I could take his picture

This is what Urban Dictionary has to say about the word Talan:

Talan is the ruler of the Universe. You better not even breathe out disagreement, or he may strike you down right there, heathen.

Judging from the following pictures which very accurately portrays the "look of death" i receive on a daily, but mostly hourly basis, I'm thinking that definition is not too far off.

Math whiz

Turns out Ashton is a math king. He must get that from Brad. Last week was the State Math Assessment and we are super proud of how well he did:





Yay Ashton!