Happy Shared-iversary!

Dave and I celebrated our anniversary last Saturday. I actually forgot all about it until earlier in the week he asked me what we were gonna do on Saturday and I was like, I dunno, why? And he informed me it was our 15th anniversary. Oops.
We call it a sharediversary now because we are friends with two other couples (from when we all lived in Lansing) who have the same anniversary as us and sometimes we'd even run into each other on our anniversary(s) at a restaurant or something. We gave up and finally just decided to stop bumping into each other on our anniversary and just all go out together. Unfortunately we're all spread out across the U.S. so now it's just me and Dave. But that's OK, that's probably how it should be, right?
Anyway, last Saturday we got a sitter and went out for like FIVE hours. It was so great! We went to see the new Indiana Jones movie. It was 'classic' Indiana Jones with all the action, corny lines, and even a snake thrown in of course. We then ate at a restaurant called Houlihan's. It is a chain and my friend Nichole took me there over a year ago in Virginia. It is YUMMY! They have such a variety of food that anyone would be happy there. I ordered brie as an appetizer. I don't think Dave had ever had brie before. I LOVE it. It's soooooooo good...I just try not to think about how fattening it is. I couldn't quite finish my dinner but was able to find a way to fit in some dessert anyway. Hey, it's not everyday you're celebrating your 15th anniversary, right?
We actually went out earlier in the day so that evening we took the kids to meet some friends at the race track. I thought it would be fun to take the kids to see the horses and watch the races, etc. The kids were able to hang out right at the fence to watch the horses go by. Umm, one problem, though. It was not what we were expecting. It was harness racing which, sorry, is not quite as exciting as watching normal horse and jockey racing. The horses are only allowed to trot, not gallop or run. I kinda felt bad for the horses too as the riders were whipping them to go faster and faster during the race. I seriously doubt it was hurting the horse but I could almost hear the horse thinking, "Geez, buddy. Give me a break! I can only trot! I'm not allowed to run!"
Overall, the kids were unimpressed and we left after 3 or 4 races. I'd really like to go back sometime when they have the "real" horse racing. I'll bet that's exciting to watch. Maybe we can find that next year on our Sharediversary! Here's to the next 15 years! Woohoo!

I Love the Zoo!

OK, not really. We went to the Bronx zoo recently as our "year membership" was almost up and we are not going to renew at this time, maybe later. Anyway, unfortunately for us, we chose to go to the zoo at the same time that EVERYONE ELSE was going to the Yankees/Mets game, which was being held at Yankee Stadium, which we all know is in the Bronx. Yeah, not such a great idea. It wasn't horrendous, though, and once we got past the stadium, the traffic wasn't bad. We stopped at a McDonald's because I thought it would be cheaper than eating food purchased IN the zoo. I may have been wrong. Apparently McDonald's is more expensive in NYC than in Jersey. The Bronx isn't especially affluent so I don't know how these people afford to live there AND eat at McDonald's. Maybe that's why McDonald's wasn't very crowded. Or maybe they were all on their way to the baseball game. I digress...
The good news was that the zoo wasn't crowded. And hey, I like the zoo, for the most part. I used to love going to the zoo. When we lived in Lansing, I took the kids all the time. They were younger then and I think I had more "say" in how we spent our time at the zoo. Here's the problem: I'm a female in a family full of males. While at the zoo, I want to sit and gaze at the giraffes, flamingos, and zebras. But when we go to the zoo we spend most of our time, if not all, blazing past the giraffes where I get a cursory glance at them as I walk by on our way to: the monkey house, the reptile house, or the "world of darkness" a.k.a. the bat house. Here's Peter in the reptile house.















Here's me in the reptile house:
























I swear I wasn't just tired or lazy or overwhelmed with reptiles. For some reason, the zoo employees thought WE were reptiles and I swear it was like 110* in there. I was absolutely melting. When we stepped back outside it felt like we were stepping out into the arctic. I was never so happy to get out of the reptile house.
We did, however, get to spend a little time in the butterfly house so that's at least something. Oh wait, I just remembered. We went in after we had blown right past it and I said, "Wha-?! Wait?! What?!!! We're not going into the butterfly house!?"
And I admit the monkey house was pretty cool. It's actually a gorilla house at the Bronx zoo. And this time the gorillas were out and about, as opposed to hanging around napping far out of sight. There were a couple baby gorillas, too, and they would come up to the glass and "play" with the people standing there. Then they would run back to their moms and start nursing. They were really cute. What is it about gorillas that I, personally, find so daunting? I swear when one of the moms turned towards me, it felt like she was looking right at me. Her eyes and face seemed so wise and knowing. I felt like she was saying, you guys are so stupid, we're the ones who are older and wiser. We know what's really important in life. And then she started picking her nose and eating it and I thought, hmm, maybe not so much. OK, so that didn't really happen, but you KNOW it could've!

Oh sweet Moses...for the love of all things decadent!

While in Switzerland, Dave had lunch at the Patek Phillipe factory cafeteria. Don't be misled by the sound of "cafeteria food". We're not talking chicken nuggets and tater tots. We're not talking $4.99 "value meals", either. Almost everything he had was wonderful and I don't know how he came back weighing the same. I guess you walk a lot when you don't have a car. Here's one of their weekly menus. It's all in French so Dave didn't always know exactly what he was ordering. Talk about ordering whatever sounds good...
Notice the third choice on Wednesday includes grilled "cheval". Uh, yeah, that's horse. It's considered a delicacy over there. Dave ordered it, even knowing that it was horse, and said it was actually quite yummy. SPEAKING of quite yummy, he also ordered dessert almost everyday. Oh man, if I could only have been there...

The Dream Tisha

As everyone knows, Oprah has a few "favorite things". One thing she likes to talk about is her favorite bra: the Dream Tisha bra by Le Mystere. Well, they run over $60 and I certainly don't need one but I have other, full figured friends, who would like to have one and T.J. Maxx has them right now for $10. So, it took me scouring THREE different T.J. Maxx's but I finally found one in the right size for this friend who shall remain nameless to protect her bra size identity. Before I send it to her, though, I thought I'd take a picture or two just for fun. Man, I cannot even imagine lugging around something like that attached to my chest all day. That must be annoying!? I suppose you get used to it...?OK, so maybe I'm a little jealous...

Mother's Day=Chocolate Day

Dave got home from Switzerland the day before Mother's Day, as everyone knows. He brought home various chocolate treats. A whole bag of Lindt chocolates for the kids, another bag to share at work, and yet another bag to share at the gym with his racquetball buddies. He also brought the kids some chocolate Swiss Army knives...they were really cute. He also brought home a bar of dark chocolate LOADED with hazelnuts and a small box of chocolate truffles. He even brought home a box to send to Steph.
And he brought THIS home for me:





Huh?! What?! Wait...where's all MY chocolates?!?!?! This isn't fair! This is no good at all!
Oh yeah, I ate them. I remember now. I was drunk with chocolatey goodness so it's all a little vague right now...like remembering a dream. A very beautiful dream.

So anyway, most of the chocolate is gone and although I'm tremendously happy with what I got, I should've been a little more specific with Dave. I told him to bring a lot of chocolate home. What I meant was, bring like a six months supply of chocolate home. Maybe that would be too much? As it was, he had to borrow an extra duffle bag from someone to check as luggage...because of all the chocolate. He didn't bring anything else back with him. Apparently they have "weight limits" on these darn planes. Whatever. Don't get between me and my chocolate!

So it was a good Mother's Day this year. I got to sleep in and eat Eggos in bed. I received homemade cards and presents...you can never have too many homemade bookmarks, right? One of my children, who shall remain nameless to protect his identity, gave me nothing and never so much as even said "Happy Mother's Day" to me. I'm not sharing this to be snotty or anything...I really think part of it is that the kids were so excited to have Dave home and were really wrapped up in having "Dad time". At the end of the day when I realized he'd done nothing for me for Mother's Day, I thought to myself, "OK, well, here we go. I guess it begins right about now"...I didn't bring it up to him or Dave or anyone because I didn't want to make a big deal out of it and I certainly didn't want to make him feel bad or guilty about it. Hopefully he won't feel bad if/when he reads this one day. After all, I DID protect his identity, right?! No guessing! (You'd never guess anyway).

Oh, one of the things I did on Mother's Day was work in the yard. I know that sounds crazy but it was a beautiful day and I actually enjoy working in the yard when I have the time. I was trying to clear out the "circle" around a big tree in the front yard where it's supposed to be a big circle of mulch around the tree trunk but instead it was a big circle of weeds and such. It took me a lot longer than I had planned but looks really nice now. As I was pulling up weeds and grass, I realized I was throwing away perfectly good grass. Not a big deal except that our backyard is totally patchy and needs more grass. SO, instead of throwing all the grass away, I decided to transplant it to the backyard to fill in some patches. It was a lot of work and I'm not sure anyone can tell any difference at all! It reminded me, though, of that movie Fun With Dick and Jane where Jim Carey goes around to all his neighbors' yards and the golf courses to dig up patches of grass and put them in his yard. Hmmm...my neighbors should be very afraid...

iGallop

OK, so I found something almost as bad as the Hawaii Chair. Well, maybe it is as bad. I wouldn't really know. But for those of you looking for a quick weight loss solution, this may be your answer:

Notice the chick pretending to shoot her guns. I think you burn more calories that way.

All right, all right

So it wasn't really Alice Nelson from the Brady Bunch who came to help me the next week. It was STEPH! She came all the way from Oklahoma to be my wing man for a whole week. It was totally like having Alice live with me. The kids and I even started calling her Alice. She would actually sweep the floors and do the dishes while I was at work and then I would come home to find lunch on the table for me or dinner in the oven. We also ate LOTS of chocolate stuff. That Steph is a bad influence on me...you all know I RARELY indulge in chocolate.
She also brought her youngest, Andyn with her. She was a doll and shared a room with Sam. All three boys absolutely fell in love with her and begged me for the first day or two if we could PLEASE have a new baby sister. Uh...no. I told them the only way that would happen was if they went out and found one and brought her home. They finally gave up and Sam decided he would start begging for a dog instead.
I made Steph come with me to one of my Zumba classes. She stayed in the back and did the white-girl version of Zumba. I think she even had an overbite. Anyway, despite being out of breath, she laughed the whole time...either at me or herself; I'm not sure which!
I learned some interesting things about Steph since we shared the same bed. For one, unlike Dave, she can fall asleep in seconds flat. Also, sometimes just as she starts slipping into unconsciousness, she makes a weird moaning noise. One trait she does share with Dave is the ability to snore really loud but she doesn't mind when I elbow her to knock it off (Dave doesn't mind either). I also learned (although I already suspected this) that she can sleep in REALLY late if she's wearing ear plugs and you're taking care of her baby.
One of the best things about having Steph here, in addition to everything else, was that she taught me how to use PhotoShop to make my own Zumba fliers. Now I can use the images and marketing tools available to me from the Zumba site to print at home. Never could figure that out before!
So after Steph left, I had one more week to "get through" and then Dave got home this past Saturday. Aaah, not a moment too soon! It had rained for 2 days straight and I had a really bad day on Friday. Then on Saturday, the weather turned beautiful, the sun came out and Dave got home. More on that and all the Swiss chocolate he brought home...later!
One trivia question: Who did Alice have the hots for?

Wendy Whirlwind; that's me!

Aiye carumba! What a whirlwind week/month it has been! The first week Dave was gone (right after my birthday and the mystery cookies) went by really fast as we adjusted to not having him around and me taking the kids with me to work, etc. I did pretty good that first week. I did completely forget to take Peter to his first t-ball practice and there was something else I spaced out on that week, too, but now I can't remember what it was...what a surprise. Oh yeah, I forgot to take Caleb to an orthodontist appt. Even after they called and confirmed it with me. Hey, I'm shocked that I can even remember it now.
ANYWAY, a week after Dave left, my dad arrived to stay with me for a week. This was because I had called him a few days before Dave left and I left a pathetic sounding message on my dad's voicemail. It said something to the effect of, "Hi Dad, it's me. Um, so Dave's leaving this weekend and, um, sniff sniff, I'm totally FREAKING OUT because I don't know what I was THINKING but I cannot do this by myself. Any chance you and Nan were planning on heading to New Jersey for a visit? I could really use you for a week...I know it's totally selfish of me to ask...sniff, sniff, I'm just totally FREAKING OUT and feeling overwhelmed and stressed, and did I mention FREAKING OUT?" So, my dear old dad drove all the way from Texas in his old conversion van which gets about 15 mpg, at best, on the freeway...spending all my inheritance money on gas, to rescue me once again.
I say, once again, because it reminds me of a time when I was a student at BYU. It was my first year there (I started in January, not in the fall) and all my friends, roommates, and even my boyfriend were all leaving for the summer. I stayed because I had an academic scholarship through the summer. Anyway, I was really sad and depressed and feeling sorry for myself as all my friends left and I was all alone for a few days before the new semester began. And THEN, my dad showed up! From Texas! We hopped in his car and had a major excursion. We went to the Grand Canyon, Las Vegas, Death Valley, Yosemite, Lake Tahoe, and San Francisco all in a few short days. I had never been to ANY of those places and it was so fun. I liked San Francisco so much that that's where I chose for Dave and I to have our honeymoon...but that's a different story for a different time. So, I guess even though I'm 36 31, I still need my dad to come rescue me now and then. It's nice to know he's there for me...or here for me, I guess I should say!
SO, dad would babysit while I went to work. It was spring break week for the kids so he took them to the park and let them play or shared his golf clubs with them. He also took them fishing. Dave and I have never done this and now I remember why. If any of you ever hear me say, "Hey, wouldn't it be fun to take the kids fishing," just slap me. The kids spent, I think, about 5 minutes fishing and my dad and I spent about 5 hours untangling line. OK, that may be a slight exaggeration. Sam actually did pretty good and really got into it. The fish just weren't biting that day. Darn fish. Very annoying.
My dad also spoiled us by taking us out to dinner/lunch all the time so I never had to cook or anything. As an instructor at several gyms, I've learned that spring break can be hell. Here's why: I never go out of town on spring break. Thus, I'm left to sub classes for all the instructors who DO go out of town. Plus I had agreed to teach some kids Zumba classes at the Y for their kids spring break camps. Yeah, stupid, I know. Next year I'm going to either go out of town or just pretend that I'm going out of town. I actually taught 18 classes in 5 days. By Friday, my body hurt so bad I could barely move. I had to take lots of Advil and hot showers!
That Saturday, I "performed" at a party. You know how people hire clowns to come to their kid's party...I was the Zumba clown. No, really, it wasn't quite like that. It was an adult party for a couple from Cuba. They were having a small gathering with friends and family and thought it would be fun to have me come and lead them in some salsa, merengue, etc. My only stipulation (other than they had to pay me big bucks) was that they would feed me, too! Anyway, despite feeling like a freak some of the time, it was really fun and I think they enjoyed it.
My dad had to leave that night but guess who arrived to help me out for the NEXT whole week?! I'll give you a hint here.

Happy Blogiversary!

Actually, this is Steph! But I just wanted to let you all know that Shelley is celebrating one year of blogging today!! And because I just posted about this on my blog I thought it would be cute to post it on her blog, too!! Congrats, Shelley!!

Quote of the Day

Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way, when you criticize them, you are a mile away from them, and you have their shoes.--Frieda Norris

Mystery cookies

For my birthday last weekend, the kids decided to surprise me by baking some cookies. I knew something was up when they insisted that I go upstairs and kick up my feet for awhile. I heard lots of ruckus going on in the kitchen and figured they were trying to surprise me with something for my birthday. I resisted the urge to panic, or call 911, and just held my breath. About TWO hours later they called me downstairs by telling me they were having a problem they needed help with. Oh boy, I thought. When I rounded the corner they sang happy birthday and presented me with about 3 dozen cookies. They were grinning from ear to ear and I couldn't help beaming myself.
They did a really good job and the cookies were actually edible. I don't know exactly what kind of cookies they were...they were kind of a shortbread cookie with M&Ms and butterscotch chips thrown in. I took some pictures with my phone but can't figure out how to transfer them to the computer. (My real camera is in Switzerland right now). Anyway, there was one batch of cookies that looked like balls or raw dough. Apparently I have still forgotten to teach the kids about preheating the oven. They just put the first batch in and then turned it on. I also found out they turned the oven off in between batches. Oh well, no big deal. I told them maybe we shouldn't eat that first batch, though, because of the raw eggs. They told me not to worry because there were no eggs in these cookies! I didn't know you could make cookies without using eggs, but hey, what do I know!?

I just got finished putting together a cd of pictures for Sam's 5th grade "end of the school year" party. It's not 'til June but they want pictures of each kid for a slide show or something. (In our school, they have a HUGE party for the 5th graders who are now 'graduating' from elementary to middle school). Anyway, I included this picture because he's such an adorable 6 month old...sitting in a field of Texas blue bonnets that were growing wild on the side of the freeway.



To be honest, this is the picture I WANTED to include:




Isn't he just adorable?! This is one of my favorite-all-time pictures. Not just because he's wearing a fairy princess costume. It's because of how truly HAPPY he is to be wearing a fairy princess costume. Look at his smile, look at his eyes; you can just feel how happy he is! Alas, he wouldn't let me include it in the slide show. I decided to honor his wishes. Don't need him blaming me for THAT later in therapy.

Speaking of favorite-all-time-pictures. Here's another one of my favorites. It's Peter:

THE END.

Glop

I made chili for dinner last night. I use this chili mix that we all really like a lot. It is from Bear Creek soups and is called Darn Good Chili. All you have to do is add water and a can of tomatoes. I always add a pound of cooked ground beef, too. Anyway, as long as Peter can pick out the tomatoes, everyone is very happy. Sam usually has two bowls and is sad the next day if there are no leftovers.

WELL, yesterday I didn't have any ground beef to add and I could have picked some up at the store but I had a great idea! I've known lotsa people who substitute cooked wheat for ground beef in various recipes, including chili. I have LOTS of wheat stored up in my garage so I thought this would be a great idea. I could use up some of my delicious, nutritious whole wheat and not have to make an extra trip to the store!

So we sit down and start to dig in and the kids are excited because the love this stuff. Soon thereafter Sam made a comment...something like, "What is this stuff?"
"It's chili, of course!" I told him.
"It seems different. It doesn't taste the same," he said.
"Hmm, I dunno, it's the same chili I always make," I innocently say as I show him the empty package...just to prove that it's the SAME chili I always make.
After a few more minutes he finally exclaimed, "Where's the MEAT!?!"
"Huh, what?" I pretended I couldn't understand what he was talking about.
"There's no meat!"
"Oh, uh, yeah, I didn't have any so I put in wheat instead. It rhymes with meat, see, wheat--meat, get it? Wheat/meat?" I explained.
He groaned and it just went downhill from there. Peter and Caleb and I were able to eat it just fine but Sam was heartbroken. (I'll admit it DID taste very different but it wasn't gross or anything).

Finally he just refused to eat it and asked if he could have more crackers. I politely said sorry, the crackers are for people who are eating their chili. He groaned again and was completely exasperated by now. He yelled, "IT'S NOT CHILI!"
I tried to explain that yes, indeed, it was chili, it just didn't have beef in it.

Later I served some giant strawberries for dessert. Again, I said these are for those of us who have finished our chili. Poor kid, by now he had tears in his eyes. He yelled again, "It's not chili! If it was chili I would eat it!"
By now my patience had run out and I asked him in my Mr. Smarty-pants voice as my head bobbled side to side..."If it's not chili, then what exactly is it?"

"GLOP," he said.

I suppose it was my fault for asking. I should know better by now. You'll be happy to know that once he saw his brothers gobbling down the strawberries he was suddenly able to gag down every bite of his...glop.

Today is Thursday which is Eggo waffle night at our house so everyone should be happy about that...although I did buy a generic brand of Eggos this time...OOPS, could spell trouble.

Middle child

This morning as I was thinking in the shower (I get a lot of good thinking done in the shower) I realized that Jane, the girl who cut herself some new bangs at our house, is a middle child. And then I realized, HEY, MY middle child gave himself a haircut once, too! And he was about the same age as Jane is now. Here's some pictures of his escapade:

There was nothing left to do but practically shave him bald. He did NOT like that so that cured him of his scissor shennanigans...until we lived in Oklahoma and he once cut off all his eyelashes. That actually stressed me out more than his haircut because he has the most beautiful long, thick eyelashes. AND not to mention what was he doing with scissors right up next to his eyeballs?! Isn't anyone keeping an eye on these kids? At least the middle ones?!

Okie Dokie...

Okie dokie, I'm getting slothful with the blogging. I keep making mental notes of what I need/want to write about and then when I sit down to write, I can't remember any of them. So, I'm just gonna start typing and I'm sure they'll all come flooding back in no particular order. I won't win any prizes for the "flows the best" blog entry but I can live with that.
First of all, my day in the city last weekend was really fun. I enjoyed the Zumba class and learned some new moves. It's always fun to be a student now and then instead of the leader all the time.
Mamma Mia was spectacular! We had great seats and could see everything very well. The music was great, of course, and I knew all the words to all the songs so I could sing along in my head. The band/orchestra was perfect although they were situated under the stage so we never actually saw them...just the conductor. I can't imagine how much money those shows cost to put on but then again, every seat was full and most of those seats are over $100 each...and there were a LOT of seats!
While I was doing all this, Dave took the kids to Central Park and the Museum of Natural History. They were going to head home around lunch time but ended up staying 'til almost four o'clock so they must've been having fun!

Change of subject: yesterday Peter asked me how many inches there are between our floor and heaven. He was totally serious and so I said, Ummm, around 107...no WAIT--make that 108. He said that wasn't nearly enough and luckily wandered off to find Dave to ask.
Speaking of Peter, he had a friend over a couple of weeks ago...we'll call her Jane. Jane has been over once or twice before and although Peter loves her to death, she is a handful for me so unfortunately he only gets to invite her when I'm feeling ambitious and energetic. He has another friend, we'll call him Evan (tee hee, that's his REAL name!) who comes over at least once a week and they play so nicely and rarely get into trouble so it's no problem at all. Not so with Jane. I have to keep an eye on them all the time...not that they fight or anything, it's just that she is a busybody. She is into EVERYTHING. I'm surprised she hasn't been into my underwear drawer yet...seriously! Anyway, they had, what I thought was a very successful playdate this one day. No serious problems or interventions on my part. When it was time for Jane to go home, I was standing in the foyer making small talk with Jane's mom whom I don't know very well at all. Jane came bounding down the stairs with her cute brown hair and quirky crooked bangs.
Jane's mom said, "Jane! Did you cut your hair?!" My eyes bugged out as my head snapped to look at Jane's hair.
"Uhhhh, did she not already have bangs when she came here today?", I asked.
"...No" was her mom's reply.
Oh geez, I thought, can this really be happening? We did ascertain, at least, that Jane had cut her own hair and at least Peter hadn't cut it but still...her mom was very cool about it but I doubt she is going to let her come over again anytime soon. Which is actually fine with me; my nerves are frazzled.

Caleb was in the backyard looking under rocks (his favorite pastime) when he found this little fella.
It's either a salamander or a newt. He grabbed it by the tail thinking it was an earthworm and pulled it out from under the rock. Later he found a second one that was a little bit smaller. The one in the pic is named Louie and the second one was named Mike. I'm just glad it wasn't a snake.



And since we're looking at pictures of creepy things, here's a picture of my stovetop. This is AFTER I cleaned the heck out of it. You can even see scratch marks where my Mr. Clean magic eraser has previously scratched it up. I've tried EVERYTHING but steel wool because I'm sure that'll just scratch it worse. I had mild success with bleach at one point but even that is not working anymore. I'm posting it so maybe one of you can tell me how to clean it. It did not look like this when we moved in so it really bugs me. Any ideas?

A Note About Dave's Blog

At the beginning of the year I (Dave) had started my own blog. It was meant to be a site where a few invited friends of mine could visit and discuss certain topics. I thought I took steps to keep it private, but somehow I missed the fact it showed up under Shelley's list of blogs. Within the past two weeks I have had a few people tell me they read my blog, which was a surprise until I learned how easy it was to access! I debated whether to shift the site's purpose to being open to anyone to read and decided I would try it. My first post after making this decision was written Friday, the 28th. The posts before that date were odds and ends left over from discussions before I was aware of its general availability. I tend to be a somewhat cerebral guy when I write and so if that is your sort of thing I hope you enjoy reading it. www.davidcapener.blogspot.com