Sheesh! How Many Elves are There?

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The Elves are Coming!

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Somebody Could Have Warned Me...

Hannah and I just got back from our viewing of Twilight. (The absence of an exclamation point, especially coming from me should be foreshadowing as to what's coming.) Really, somebody could have warned me. I've talked to many, MANY of you that have seen it already. You warned me about the "intense" scenes that are so corny they make you want to laugh and about the excessively high schoolish parts. I've read the books so I know all the flaws in the storyline and I accept it for what it is, entertaining fluff that's fun to zip through and be done with. I was even warned about Bella's voice being this post-adolescent boy baritone delivered dead pan most of the time, but come on! Couldn't someone have mentioned the freakish make-up job on the vampires??!!!!! Edward had us rolling in our seats with those painted eyebrows and lipstick caked lips (with lip liner clearly evident.) I really loved when he kissed her on the forehead and left S.W.A.K. (sealed with a kiss) marks on her delicate, pale skin! I also loved the sparkly skin effect complete with orchestral singing! And his hair! Can you say heat miser? I'm so disappointed in my friends who previewed this for me and left me unprepared to deal with Edward's serious short comings! Oh well. Luckily, I went into it with low expectations and it actually was much better than I thought it would be. I think I could say I actually enjoyed myself. I truly liked Bella better in the movie than in the book (she was much stronger and less whiney.) But I still can't get over Edward and his high school musical make-up stylings (Not THE High School Musical, just your run-of-the-mill high school theater make-up job). Shame on all of you! I'll have to remember to be more specific in my questioning when the next one comes out. (For example: Okay, how much hair does Jacob have on his body now? How sickeningly depressed is Bella, does it make you want to puke?) Be prepared for a grilling when New Moon hits the theaters friends, 'cuz I'm not going in unarmed again!

More fun with Balderdash!

We have such a grand time playing Balderdash with the family that I've already posted once about it (And Curty Says...) Well here's another great definition of a word by Curty: the word is tantony. The real definition explains that the word comes from St. Anthony, the patron saint of swine-herds and means the runt of the litter. That's an odd little tidbit to pack into your brain, huh? Well Curty's definition is much more straightforward: "A guy named Tony and has a tan." Of course!

The other funny fact exposed during this particular game of Balderdash was that my kids believe everything I say. At least two or three of them always vote for my definitions. I like this phenomenon alot, but I had to laugh when I put it to the test. The word we got was proggers. For a woman that has birthed seven children, the similarity to preggers, was just too much so I wrote, "A group of pregnant frogs." I figured even I had to write a silly one that everybody would laugh at once in a while. I got two votes for my definition! Woo hoo! I have power over my children. I can tell them anything and they will believe me. It's fortunate for them that I watched the movie Spiderman, where I learned, "With great power comes great responsibility," (Thanks Uncle Ben) or I could really mess them up.

I just couldn't leave it alone...

The messy background bugged me too much, I had to fix it. (Spending another hour or so in front of the computer for a background that gets to stay up about two weeks.) What is my problem? If only I could obsess about the cleanliness of my house with such tenacity!

My New Look Darnit!

Well, I designed a new blog background and then it didn't come in the right size, even though I used the same template as I did for the last two I've done. After playing with it for another hour, tweaking the size 50 pixels at a time, I finally got it on the eighth try! It's very cute but I'm noticing it's also a little impractical. With all the doo dads and fru fru stuff, it's kind of hard to read. Well, I'm NOT going to work on it anymore. It's only two weeks until Thanksgiving then I have to take it down, so everybody can just live with it! Now I'm going to go read How to Win Friends and Influence People so my next post will be nicer.

My sister's angst

I recently visited my sister's blog and discovered I was t he subject of a post. I have been wrongly accused of dissing my sister by placing her at the bottom of my blog list. Her post If I were living a Seinfeld Episode can be read at her blog: Huh? And other profound reactions to Life. My response I decided to copy here as it became lengthy enough to be a post itself. Here it is:

"Becky, Becky, Becky...how could you doubt my loyalty? Even after you did do all those things to me, I have always loved you more than you love me. (You forgot to mention the time you told me you only loved me because I lived far away -- that if I lived near you, you would not love me as much.) Don't you know that my blog tour is sorted according to most recent posting? Even now, as of this writing, YOU are at the top of the list. Oh ye of little faith. But I take great pleasure that it was my blog that spurred you to post, even if the last paragraph of your post seems a little drug induced! By the way, the word spread like wild fire through my house this afternoon..."Aunt Becky posted! Aunt Becky posted! Did you see?" It was a time of great rejoicing. I think this should be a post on my blog, I'm going to copy and paste right away!"

I just thought I'd share a little of my sisterly pain and hope you all can go and let my sister know that I have done her no wrong.

Halloween!

It appears that I'm the slowest one in the world to get Halloween pics up, but I have an excuse. I decided to revive my digi-scrappin' and do a scrapbook page of Halloween. Of course, that took longer than expected and now I'm too tired to write anything fun and interesting about Halloween. Suffice it to say that Gid has amazing stamina for trick-or-treating, neighborhood block parties with giant bounce house obstacles courses are the way to go, and Arizona is definitely a GREAT place for Halloween because we were all still wearing shorts and sitting around chatting while the kids ran crazy through the neighborhood 'til 11:00 p.m. Fun times! I had a craving for pumpkin pie so I skipped the candy and made pie so I could consume said pie on Halloween night without too much of a sugar hangover the next day.

Just by way of explanation: the Halloween page following has pictures from both the trunk-or-treat and Halloween. Hannah dressed up only for trunk-or-treat as a sparkly, sequined superhero. Eli changed from a happy, lightsaber cow to a pantsless ninja from one event to the next. Jonah also made a transition to cowboy from some strange Artemis Fowl character (not pictured) due to the fascination that arose from buying and shooting cap guns. Curtis was originally the ninja then turned cowboy for the same reason as Jonah. Zach, for the first time is in no Halloween pictures because he had marching band events during both nights of shameless begging for candy. He did get to dress up for the football game he went to, the drum line dudes were all car accident victims, but I didn't get a picture of that lovely group. (Thank goodness!) And I guess that's all I have to say about that.

So nice to have a wise husband...

I am going to happily defer to my husband's blog all thoughts political and sports (like I would EVER say anything about sports! Go Eagles! He made me say that.) He had some wise words to follow up last night's Obama win, so I will once again point to his blog. Plus, I designed a nice, new manly blog background for him and I want everyone to go ooh and aaah over it! Heh, heh.

ReynoldBBlog: A new president, a new time.

Why I'm Voting for McCain

If you really want to know why I'm voting for McCain, go see my husband Ren's blog. I couldn't explain it better and I'm glad he analyzes it all so well. Have a great election day tomorrow!

Gideon Turns Two!

So, Gid's birthday was the day before Halloween, but he "turned two" on Tuesday. It corresponded exactly with my husband going out of town for 3 days this week and me having a particularly BAD time of the month. So nice of him to time his coming of age perfectly! This week, Gid clogged three different toilets in the house by happily emptying the contents of bathroom garbages piece by piece into them, being quite careful to flush between items. I didn't even realize he'd clogged the boys' bathroom downstairs, but the clogging of the main bathroom upstairs was announced to me by children running frantically up the stairs Tuesday night screeching, "There's water pouring out of the ceiling!" I ran to investigate and found Gid next to the upstairs toilet standing in an inch or so of water, flushing happily! Let's just say this was not the best time to try my motherly patience (at the end of a long, crampy day with no husband). I'm not happy to admit I did some screaming and some spanking and some more screaming and probably scarred my child for life. Poor Gid. Poor Jen.

The next day he turned into the bully. I was trying to work with Curtis on school stuff but kept getting interrupted by yells of pain and protest by Eli who was on the receiving end of a two-year old (minus one day) reign of terror. Gid was pulling hair, scratching and hitting Eli with cars and other toys that shouldn't be weapons but are when wielded by an ankle biter with a vendetta. I tried to parent from afar over and over again "Gid, stop hurting Eli!" which was not effective (duh!) Finally my last store of patience was used up (at 11:00 a.m.) when I slapped Gid's hand to release it from its death grip on Elil's blond locks and sat him forcefully on the stairs. Then I collapsed on the couch and rocked Eli and cried. When Eli felt better, Gid toddled over and looked at me with his tear-filled eyes. I picked him up and put him on my lap and cried some more. He got so quiet as he watched me crying. It's too bad he can't talk (but maybe I should cry in front of him more often.) Let's just say the day didn't really get better from there, but it didn't get worse, so that's something.

Thursday morning, Gid's birthday, I vowed that as a special birthday present to him, I wouldn't scream at him or spank him. What mother could offer more? We hold a Kindermusik class in our basement on Thursday mornings, so I went down to tidy up only to discover that the kids has trashed the basement the night before without my knowing it! Gid had gotten into the puzzles and dumped them all over the ground. There were candy wrappers from someone's recent sugar binge strewn across the room. Cody and his friend had had a nerf war and they'd built fortresses at each end of the basement with chairs and there were books and toys spread everywhere. I frantically set to work trying to pick it all up, hopelessly encouraging Curty to help me (the child that gets overwhelmed when the silverware basket is too full.) The phone kept ringing and the Littles were pulling toys out as fast as I could get them put away. But, I had enough time to pull off my amazing feat of cleaning until I made the fateful decision to start getting Gid undressed. I took off his jammies in the middle of this frenzy and his diaper also, planning on running upstairs to get him clothes in just a second. Then I was on the phone again and Eli yells, "Mom! Gid pooped on the floor!" Sure enough, Gid was standing amongst a lovely set of poop logs saying, "Uh oh!" To my credit (and amazement) I didn't freak it (too much). As I cleaned this up, Gid went into the boys' bathroom (the one with the clogged toilet that I hadn't gotten unclogged yet because that's what husbands are for) and started his garbage flushing game again. This time though, the boys had used the toilet and yellow water overflowed all over the bathroom floor just minutes before the music class was supposed to arrive. I still didn't yell! (Moms ARE superhuman when they need to be!) I think God cares about the welfare of my child a lot to give me so much help controlling myself. The saving grace was that we did get everything cleaned up and the boys had a wonderful time in the music class -- a first for Gid who has hated it the past two weeks. After the class, I sent Eli up to go to the bathroom and when he was gone a long time I went up to find him only to discover that he had peed on the floor in a failed attempt to get his pants down. I'm sorry, but this day was just a little too full of potty matter for my taste!

Ren got home at noon, thank heavens!!!!!!!! I told him that in a few days I was going to blog about my days with him away, but it just wasn't funny yet. As I write about it now, I still don't see much humor in it, but I feel a little better. Maybe all of you who read this can feel a little better too, knowing that either: 1) I can relate to most any pain or frustration you may be feeling in regards to having a crazy life, or 2) Your life could be worse! (or at least have more potty incidents in it). Don't you feel better? I'm glad I could help out with that.