Kelsey's word of the day

The other day when Macy was at school and Braden was down for a nap, Kelsey and I played her favorite game. She called it "Remembory". She usually calls the game "My Little Pony Matching Game".

The Good Things in Life and the Ironic Ones

The Good Things:

• Lots of homemade raspberry freezer jam made with fresh Bear Lake raspberries. One batch with my secret ingredient.
• Death by Chocolate cake for Grandma K's 90th birthday party last night.
• 2 helpers in the kitchen to help make the items above. One likes to add a little chef drama/acting as she stirs and mixes. The down side to this is there is usually some mess that is created like pectin being spilled on the hot burner.
• Homemade salsa made with garden fresh ingredients. I wish they were from my garden, but alas they came from the crop sharing thing I did this summer. This was really my first time making salsa and it sure took a long time.

The Ironic Part of Life:

• Tragedy always strikes while on the toilet and usually right before getting in the shower. A toy needs to be fixed, someone was mean to someone else, starvation hits even though it has only been five minutes since the last course. Good thing the earthquakes and fires have decided to hold off. Maybe they could teach my kids something.
• Brian caught a nasty flu bug and he hasn't even seen the kids all week. He has been working late hours on a major project at work all week long. I am crossing my fingers, following him with lysol and praying the kids don't catch it. School starts tomorrow. There will be plenty of germs there. We don't need to add ours to the mix. I am also praying because this momma doesn't want to be cleaning anything up.

Another Hand Mixer Bites the Dust (plus some summer stuff)

So I am now down another hand mixer. I burned it out the other day. What is with the cheap kitchen appliances? Okay I have to admit there is some doubt whether it was the machine or the user. I might not have gotten the beaters put in all the way on some thick batter. But in my defense it had recently seemed to be slowing a bit. Also I may have installed everything correctly that last time. I just don't remember.

I am also out another camera. Cameras and sunglasses fall into the same category for us. We can't afford to buy the really expensive kinds because within a matter of months they are lost, broken or dropped. This may be the third or fourth camera we have owned. Last year in Disneyland Brian dropped the camera while it was on and jammed the lense. Well butterfingers did it again but this time at Bear Lake. All right he was handing it to me and there seems to be a fuzzy point in the story, again (just like with the mixer), where the camera dropped. And I just remembered I lost my sunglasses at Cherry Hill. I purchased those in June.

So needless to say I have no proof that we did exciting things during the end of summer and were not just couch potatoes. Well, we did do some of the that. The kids for sure did some of this at Bear Lake when they had an ICarly marathon with some cousins once removed or however those titles go. It isn't my favorite show to let the girls watch but it was awfully quiet and enjoyable when they were glued to the TV. It allowed for a lot of train playing (Ticket to Ride).

I tried to wear the kids out with the fantastic trip to Bear Lake. But Macy could not get enough tubing in so obviously she was not worn out. Brian and I hiked to Bloomington Lake while there and we stopped by the Oregon Trail Museum. Still the kids kept going.

So we did some swimming at my grandma's condo's pool. I love that pool. They keep it at around 88 degrees. Still not tired. Instead the kids started growing gills. So I gave them more water. We spent 3 whole days at Cherry Hill with my family. The kids only came up to breath when it was time to eat and when the big bad mom said it was time to go to bed. Kelsey spent hours in the lazy river (ask my mom about that). Macy could not get enough of the rapids ride and loved being a big kid. She never wanted to hang out with me unless there was no one else to ride with. And Braden mixed his time between the lazy river, Pirates Cove (the little kids area) and the pool. He also enjoyed closing the pool down with a pooping incident. Don't ask. It was embarrassing especially when you do not realize it was your kid.

There have grandma sleepovers and great grandma's birthday parties. The party was even complete with big blow up water slides and bounce houses. There have been some Scales and Tails visits. The semi-annual visit to the dentist. This time there was success. Kelsey actually opened her month and let them clean her teeth. Macy also started piano. Maybe one day I will have the energy to describe the joy (dripping with sarcasm) of helping her practice. We have gone back to school shopping (hurray!). And tonight Macy gets to meet her teacher. I am still trying to figure out how to take first day of school pictures without a camera. I am not great at pictures but it is Kelsey's first day of elementary school in a week.

For me I am trying to get the motivation back to wake up early in the morning to exercise before I have to get kids up for school. I am also lacking in general motivation to get my to-do list done. It has grown considerably while we were out having fun. Even blogging was better than accomplishing anything this morning.