This is not a drill

One of the apps Ashton has on his phone is called Instagram. It allows you to enhance your photos with different filters and post them for friends. He is a fan, but rarely uses it, or checks it. 

Having an Instagram account myself, two days ago I noticed a spike in his picture posting. Then it happened. GIRLS from school were liking his photos, and he was liking theirs. 

I try to never tease him about liking girls, because I want him to know it is okay, and that he can talk to us about it, so I casually asked him about it in the car:

"So, Ashton, I saw you have some new friends on your Instagram."

"Yeah."

"Are the girls in your class?"

"I don't know."

"What do you mean, you don't know. Do you know this person? Her name is her Instagram user name, and she has posted about 45 pictures of herself."

"I guess."

I dropped it, even though I could have went on that there are only 360 kids in the entire school. I'm pretty sure everyone knows everyone in their same grade, and probably also in their combined grade. Or at least well enough to recognize one of the 45 close up pictures of this girls face. He half way shares things with us. I don't want to mess that up. He still wants to hide the fact that he likes girls. I'll take it! 

So instead of asking directly, I went to the source. Since we pay for his phone, we get to look through it to keep tabs on what he is doing. After he went to bed, I spent a while looking at all the pictures of his new friends, who are also all friends of each other, and who obviously go to school with him. All are harmless, but for goodness sakes girls, keep your tongue in your mouth. It isn't cute when Miley Cyrus does it, and it isn't cute when you do it either. 

But the realization is still there. The liking girls thing became very obvious almost over night. I can't deal, but seriously, what is not to like about a kid with this voice:

That is going to be really embarrassing someday. 

Six years young...

Talan has been waiting for several months to turn 6, and that day finally arrived. To him, six is less of a little kid and more of a big kid. I think I agree. 

He charged in my room at 6am. I pretended to be asleep until my normal wake up time of 645am while Talan spent that 45 minutes laying quietly and calmly next to me and getting up and running full speed into the dining room to look at and make sure his pile of presents was still there. They were....every single time. He had his favorite toaster strudels for breakfast, put on his best birthday outfit and headed down the hill for school. 

At lunch Aunt Tanya, and Gramps showed up for a surprise visit with Talan's favorite lunch. A cheeseburger with ketchup only, apple slices and a chocolate milk from Sonic. 

After lunch Syphr and I brought brownies to Talan's class. Talan came from a school that celebrated no birthdays, to a school that makes a really big deal for the whole day. He wore a birthday crown all day, there was a banner, a present on his desk from his teacher waiting for him after lunch, a toy of his choice from the prize box and treats! What could be better than that!

One of the 50 things on Talan's birthday wish list, that he got, was a snow cone maker. It was set up and waiting for him when he arrived home from school. The perfect treat after the high percentage of humidity, and a walk home from school up our beast of a hill. 

He spent the rest of the day opening presents, bug hunting with his brothers outside, making forts in the basement, eating his choice of hot dogs and chicken nuggets, and watching an episode of Caillou.

TALAN'S BIRTHDAY INTERVIEW:

1. How old are you?  six
2. Where do you live? Ummm. On the top of the hill.
3. What is your favorite color? green
4. What is your favorite animal? Zebra! Because he has stripes. Ohhh! Knock knock. Whose there? Zebra. Zebra who? Zebra with stripes on. (He doesn't quite get jokes yet)
5. What is your favorite thing to do? Play Wii and Playstation all day!
6. What is your favorite thing about school? That I get to play games inside sometimes.
7. Who is your teacher? Mrs. Beam. She is nice.
8. What is your favorite thing to do with your brothers? Play Wii and Playstation! I always like to do that like every day.
9. What do you want to be when you grow up? ummm. A guy who studies rocks, or a video game maker, or maybe a policeman. I don't know. I just want to do everything. 
10. What makes you special? That I'm a nice boy. Ummm. That I love sports. Umm. That on my birthday I get to tell Ashton what to do and STOP PLAYING WITH THAT ASHTON! IT IS MINE!

Even though this kid drives me crazy on a regular basis, I'm so glad he is part of our family. He is funny, smart, thoughtful, sweet, and incredibly lovable. 

Its the most wonderful time of the year!!

Back to school time. I love the school supply shopping, doing last minute fun things, setting school year routines, and knowing that soon I will once again have a bit of a break to run errands, have a quiet house for more than 3 minutes, and maybe be able to shower without someone banging on the door or claiming to be dying of starvation.

Ashton is gracing 6th grade with his presence this year. His official last year before he heads to the craziness of middle school. He won't admit it, but he was really excited. Even though he tries really hard to keep his joyous outbursts contained, I could tell he was ready to go back.  St. George has mixed grades, so his homeroom is made up of 5th and 6th graders. He has the same most excellent homeroom teacher, Mrs. Carlson, and all the same kids that were in 5th grade last year in his class. The 7th graders moved on, and some new 5th graders moved in. 

I don't know what to do with this kid most of the time, but I do know to expect that I'm going to have to take several 'Ashton style' pictures before he can be expected to be any form of serious. I hope he always has this personality. He keeps us entertained. So, here is the big time 6th grader:

Once we got to school  I told the boys I wanted to take their photo out front. I knew as soon as we walked in the front doors Ashton would sneak away as fast as he could. I was hoping for smiles, but I'll take what I can get. 

The last glimpse of the big kid as he makes his way down the hall. By this time we had walked through the front doors, and if he knew I took this photo he might have died of embarrassment. 

Talan is a big time Kindergartner again this year. He is so much more mature, and while I'm still glad we sent him last year, he is absolutely ready this time around. His teacher is Mrs. Beam, Talan thinks she is beautiful, and she just might be the absolute best fit for him as a teacher. His preschool teacher once described him as having such a big personality in such a little body. I think that is spot on. He is going to be great this year at an incredibly fantastic school that has made the decision to go nut free starting this year. A sigh of relief, and less worry for me, and a less outcasting school experience for Talan. 

Talan also shares Ashton's issue of having to take a series of silly pictures before he can be expected to smile. 

 Syphr was not pleased that summer came to an end. He pouted on the walk back to the car, all the way home, and for a while once home. Once he came out of his pouting mood, he made a microphone out of a plastic golf club handle, and a fox finger puppet. I was supposed to sing about the fox jumping. Apparently my made up song was not on the same level of creativity and awesomeness that Ashton usually provides, so pout mode was reactivated once more.

 Syphr was overjoyed when his brothers came home. He made them play an entire days worth of games in 3 hours, and was glued to Ashton for the entire night. The next morning he learned there was more than 1 day of school. Poor guy.

 We are 6 days into school so far, and all is well. Ashton loves to learn, and the school loves to teach, so he is excited to start learning in detail about the Revolutionary War this week. Talan excitedly brings home new papers ever day, is making new friends, and is loving every second of school besides the long day. Syphr has learned that when his brothers are at school he can play with whatever he wants without constantly having to have his guard up. There is much less pouting.

It has begun

One of the neighbor girls who is the same age as Ashton has been over the past couple days to hang out. Ashton in no way objects. 

When she comes over Ashton goes into complete show off mode.

Here he is trying to impress her by being as gross as possible:

It is totally working. Looks like eleven is when girls lose their cooties. 

Nursing home, here I come!

Recently, all three boys have discovered their life calling. I'm scared.

Ashton, who has been talking about being a scientist since he could speak, decided his desired career path would now be worm trainer. WORM TRAINER. He will train them to dance. I've seen Ashton dance. We should all be very scared.

Talan, once determined to become an astronaut, would now like to trade that in to be a professional video game player. I'm not talking about the kind that get up, go to work, create the games, and test them for the market. I'm talking about the kind that don't get paid to sit on their basement couch surrounded by pizza boxes and empty soda bottles radiating smell because they haven't showered in a week and a half. Dream big buddy.

Syphr is the only one that refuses to change his career path. He would like to somehow become a race car. Not driver. He thinks when he is big he will  morph into an actual race car, and gets very defensive when anyone tries to hinder his big plans.

These are the kids that will take care of me when I'm old. I think they have been out of school too long, and maybe have been watching too much Netflix and playing too much playstation.

Eleven

Ten days ago Ashton dropped a 'pre' and became a pre-teen when he turned eleven. I was slightly dreading the eleventh year. I've heard not so many good things. So far, its been smooth sailing, and honestly, the almost three year old is the one I should be scared of. He does his own laundry, he does whatever chores I ask without drama usually, he lets his brothers touch his new nerf guns. These things most likely would not have happened when he was ten. Then I started thinking. Maybe my open dread over the eleventh year was a good thing. Maybe his way of rebelling is proving me wrong. Unintended reverse psychology. One point for mom! (but we should probably just let Ashton think he is winning this one.)

Ashton's birthday this year consisted of:

loving his brother

a breakfast of all his favorite things

presents straight from his birthday list, which only included one thing: all Nerf stuff

I seriously can not get this kid to make a normal face for a picture.

Judging from his answers, this might be the last year the pre-teen willingly gives a birthday interview.

how old are you? I'm eleven

what is your favorite:

color? blue

animal? a flying ninja monkey

movie? Ironman 2

book? Magyk. The kind of magyk with a Y

thing to do? not get birthday interviewed

food? shrimp

restaurant? Sakura

subject in school? science

who are your friends? um...the flying ninja monkeys

what do you want to be when you grow up? a scientist

what kind of scientist? a sciency scientist...a mad scientist! (pause, and insert a smirk and daydream look.) I want to be a marine biologist because it is fun and you actually get to do stuff.

what are you most excited about right now? being at the end of my birthday interview

if you become famous, what will you be famous for? discovering a new species of squid.

what is something your parents always say? control yourself

why did the duck cross the road? because he wasn't a chicken

tell me a joke...

knock knock.
who's there?
banana
banana who?

knock knock
who's there?
orange
orange who?
orange you glad I didn't do that whole banana, banana, banana thing?


 Sure, he is completely irrational at times, and tries to play pranks like putting a rubber band on the sprayer by the kitchen sink so when I turn on the water I end up with a bath, but we seriously lucked out with this kid. I know his future is going to be phenomenal, and I feel so lucky we get to watch it all unfold.

Hey Girl

Last night, while helping me make dinner, I realized there might be such a thing as too much brother time.

There is a Talan style for everything

Recently Talan's prayers have contained the following:

"thank you for keeping us safe from everything that is dangerous that is an animal" --this one is actually shortened. He used to go through a really long list of animals before he started classifying them as 'animals that are dangerous'.

"please help mommy to never see spiders." --thanks kid

"please help spiders to not eat our whole faces off." --queue nightmares. I did not realize spiders eating my face was an option.

"please help Ashton to not be so mean to me."

"please help Ashton to not hurt me."

"please help Ashton to never be a bully."

"please help us to stop saying the word butt."

" please help Syphr to grow up and start acting like a big kid."--that would be two brothers thrown under the prayer bus now.

"thank you for keeping us safe from dinosaurs."

"thank you for keeping us safe from dragons."

"thank you for keeping us safe from reptiles."--dinosaurs, dragons, and reptiles have not been put into the general list of 'animals that are dangerous' apparently.

 "please help every person in the whole universe to be nice to each other."

 Love that kid!

Saint George welcomes us (Kansas, not Utah)

We have arrived safely to our new amazing house, and almost a month later I have finally accepted my new surroundings enough to write this post. It has been a bit of an adjustment.

I was insanely stressed about our first move with movers. There are some horror stories out there, but we seriously lucked out. The guys were polite, efficient, they didn't steal or break my stuff, and they showed up to deliver early. Hopefully our next experience in three years will be the same.

The car ride was surprisingly better than our 90 minute trial. For once, my problem of completely over planning came in handy, and when we arrived there were still things to do in the "bag-o-fun" that the kids hadn't even seen yet, which was great because all of our belongings were still in transit, and we needed something to do in an empty house. Hide and seek gets old after a while. There may have been very little leg room, but to me that is a small price to pay for 20 hours of minimal whining.

On the must do list for your next road trip are the following: laminated faces with dry erase crayons, play dough, and ELECTRONICS!

Back in my day we had to lay in the back of the non air conditioned van, because seat belts were overrated back then, and it was more spacious if we just removed the entire middle seat altogether, while driving through the middle of the desert, and make up songs that make no sense yet I can still recite to this day. And if that got old your sister might throw your shoe out the window of the moving blazing hot van for entertainment. How times have changed.

Upon arriving in Kansas we went straight to Manhattan to sign our lease and move into our house that we had never seen before. I found this house as we were about to sign the lease to another residence. The new owners had not even closed on it. By the end of the week, and $20 dollar postage to guarantee our deposit checks arrival in a timely fashion, it was ours. We had never been inside, and neither had the rental company, but it had tons of space, no carpet in the bathrooms, and a concrete safe room for tornado safety.

When we walked in this is what we saw:

Coming from our 952 square foot townhouse in Virginia, we now have almost 2500 square feet to call home. It makes the adjustment to what is outside the 2500 square feet pretty easy to deal with. Saint George is a hole in the wall town with a widespread, mostly farm population of 639. If you blink you'll miss it.

Downtown St. George:

There is no Target, no grocery store, no drug store, no library, and no restaurants. My sister makes fun of me because I went into a bit of a state of shock after arriving. In my own defense about this state of shock, I did walk in to the brick building on the left to pay my water connection fee, and the county treasurer was wearing ripped up jeans and a Budweiser t-shirt, perfectly accessorized by his huge white beard.  This feels like the deep country even though we are only a 10 minute drive into town. My neighbors wear hunting camo, there are turkeys, foxes and deer running across the road, at night I can not see the end of my driveway, I had to fill out a special postal form for rural areas because if I get a package that post man better know what to do with it if I am not home. He is not coming back!

Since we've been here almost a month now, I'm starting to really love living here. Everything is so quiet and peaceful. Instead of firetrucks, I hear a train in the distance every so often. I can see stars from my windows, my kids can play outside and be kids without having to have constant supervision.

This is what my traffic looks like (speed limit 75. take that Virginia!):

The school, has shown me all that Polk was lacking. Guess how much history my kid learned in Virginia.  NONE! We lived minutes from the nations capital with so many opportunities to teach them about government and our country's history, and they failed miserably. The school in our tiny little town is phenomenal. When you find a school that teaches things other than where the biggest sources of funding come from, you know its going to be great. And Ashton has gone from having up to 5 hours of homework a night (not even an exaggeration), to homework once a week if even that, yet he picked up right where he left off in his accelerated classes. I can see him less stressed which makes for a slightly nicer, and more helpful pre-pre teen.

Our house sits on the top of a pretty big hill. It might be more likely to be sucked up by a tornado, but we get cell service (we don't at the bottom of the hill),  we have perfect view of storms rolling in:

and we get this view every non-stormy night:

Life is good in the sticks.

Help me!

Yesterday we drove 90 minutes to visit some of brads distant relatives. We both thought it would be a great trial for the kids since it is only a fraction of car time our week will contain.

It did NOT go well.

Ashton was constantly asking, "how much longerrrrrrr." Or "when are we going to be theeeerrreee."

Talan was constantly touching his brothers or leaning on them because that is a great way to annoy them quickly.

And Syphr was demanding in a very loud voice to be let out of his car seat so he could run.

It did not go well. It is highly likely I may not be alive when we arrive in Kansas.