Happy Birthday Cassie!

Cassie's birthday was yesterday. She and the boy came over. I made cake balls for her and we had calzones for dinner. Yummy! Isn't Cass cute?














Doesn't the littlest resemble the biggest in these photos? They both have stuff on their lip and chin. ;)

Fun in the Snow.

I don't have pics of this because it was sort of spur of the moment snow fun. We were actually headed into the house after getting back from shopping. Yesterday, I pulled in the driveway and saw that the snow had come off the roof, so I figured I'd shovel it before it froze like that. Of course, I could have left it to melt because it was FIFTY DEGREES today. Oh well, it was fun.

Xavier was asleep in the car and Mal and I were shoveling. Mal had a blast. He climbed the five foot snow mountain next to our driveway, he played with the neighbors Mastiff, Bartlett (Barklett, if you were to ask Mal), then he decided it was time to start a snowball fight. So every time he threw snow at me, I would gently nudge him with my shovel, knocking him into the snow pile and I would dump a shovelful of snow on him. Well, he loved it. His eyes were dancing, he was laughing and shrieking and instigating and having a good old time. It got to the point where he would throw the snow at me and run to the snow pile and throw himself down in it!

I also taught the boys to make snow angels this week. They keep dropping to the ground and making them everywhere! Including the living room floor and the toy aisle at the pharmacy. :D

Thank You Mommy

A week or so ago, Mal and M had this conversation:

Mal: Fank you Daddy.
M: Thanks for what Malachi?
Mal: Fank you for my life Daddy.
Sniffle, sniffle, emotion , hugging, blah blah blah. Right?

Well, since then Mal has said the same thing to both of us several times. Today he and I have *this* conversation:

Mal: Fank you for my life Mommy.
Me: You're welcome Mal. I'm so glad I get to be a part of your life.
Mal: Too bad you ruined it.

Not even four and I have apparently ruined my kids life. Good to know.

Friday Fill-Ins

1. I'm often tired, I'm often covered with snot, I love my children.

2. Why do I have brains and not brawn. ;)

3. How does this fake math work, anyway?

4. Every morning, I put toothpaste on my toothbrush.

5. I consider myself lucky because I have my health, my family and my faith.

6. One day we’ll see the most glorious of all visions.

7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to sleep (I see a trend here), tomorrow my plans include shopping the Stampin' Up! catalog and Sunday, I want to see if March comes in like a lion or a lamb!

I Cut the Puppy.

So..... I ran to the store (actually, I took the van). Of course, Xav was sleeping when we got back. I took Mal in, took groceries in, the neighbor's dad came over to return the shovel he borrowed, talked to him for a couple minutes and took Xav in. Then Mal and I have this conversation.

Mal: I cut the puppy.
Me: HUH?
Mal: I CUT the dog.
Me: Really? What did you cut her with?
Mal: I cut Fiona.
Me: What did you use to cut her? (Thinking fast of anything "cutter" like lying around and only coming up with the butter knife on the counter.)
Mal: I cut her. (See a trend here?)
Me: MAL! Focus! *What* did you use to cut the dog?
Mal (triumphantly): THIS! (He picks up my Pampered Chef kitchen shears.)

Upon further inspection, Fiona *is* missing some brown hair from her back and the fluffy, white winter coat can be seen. Exhibit A:

More videos on YouTube.

Monkeys jumping in the crib.

Xav and the bubblewrap.

Mal recently told me not to wake up his milk. I turned to see he had done this:

He just came over to the computer and said, "momma look! It's sleepin'."

Playing Catchup

Where to start? I've had some trouble getting on here to post this past week. Well, Mal isn't feeling well. This is the "cheeriest" I could get him to look for me today.













And here is a nice shot of Xav. He had his 2 year check up today and is 31 pounds and 34 1/4 inches. Both measurements place him in the 75th percentile.















We got a lot of snow since last night. The trail M made through the back yard is half filled in again after about four hours.

Friday Fill-Ins

1-3 are courtesy of Mar this week.

And...here we go!

1. Give me chocolate and I'll eat it.

2. Whenever the boys are quiet, I get nervous.

3. I wish I could narrow down my wishes to one choice to answer this fill-in.

4. Phish Food (nom nom nom) was the last thing I ate that was utterly delicious.

5. To live in this world takes guts.

6. Other than this one, http://kindredarts.blogspot.com/ is the last blog I commented on. (Hi Jess!)

7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to a shower and a sleep, tomorrow my plans include harassing the husband and Sunday, I want to do some stamping!

Friday Fill-Ins

1. It seems like spring is just around the corner and then it snows again.

2. Can I have the remote when you're done, please?

3. If I thought you needed my advice I'd give it to you!

4. Your troubledymakerness is what I think of most when I think of you.

5. To me, Valentine's Day means another excuse to make cards.

6. The Lord gives me strength.

7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to a hopefully quiet evening, tomorrow my plans include a hopefully quiet Valentine's Day and Sunday, I want to attend a hopefully quiet church service!

My Friend

When I dropped Mal at school yesterday, he announced "My name is Mal and this is my friend Mommy". I feel pretty good about that. :D

After he mooched me goodbye, he called, "have fun at the castle!" Paraphrasing one of my favorite movies! What a great kid!

Speaking of The Princess Bride, every time the boys watch WallE and I here Autopilot say "not possible", I imagine Vizzini saying "inconceivable". Cracks me up. I just can't seem to help it.

More Potty Talk

We headed to WallyWorld last night to let the boys pick out a potty seat. They chose one with ducks on it. There really weren't many options. I don't understand why so few potty seats and chairs have deflectors for boys anymore.

Late this morning, every time I turned around Xavier was grabbing himself and I tried to convince him to sit on the new potty seat. No dice. When naptime rolled around, I went to tuck him in and saw something odd. Wha? What *is* that? His diaper was coming out of his pantleg! Sheesh! So, I put a new diaper on him and put him back to bed. Yikes, that could have been a mess!


I have a new video (<~~~just click those words) of Mal over on You Tube. He's reciting a favorite scene from the Potty Power video. You can hear Xav in the background saying "potty powdoo" over and over.

Dave and Cass came over for tax help on Sunday. Unfortunately, Dave for got to bring his tax stuff. KIDS! Maybe next time. Cassie brought her handy dandy Texas Instruments calculator with bells and whistles attached. M fell in love.



















Here he is after being sucked into the TI's aura of smartiness. He was oblivious to the camera. We think he is trying to calculate something "very important" and gEEky or he could just be graphing boobs.

What You've All Been Waiting For

I bypassed the printer and was able to upload more pictures. These two were taken just before bedtime. Xav was helping daddy fix a sander or something.



























These three were last night. The boys were doing their usual "run around like maniacs until someone gets hurt and mommy puts and end to it" thing. The first one is Xav's face with the booboo on the forehead and cheek and the runny nose from crying. The miracle here is that I wasn't wearing that snot on my clothes!














Next is Mal mooching Xav's booboo all better, which is only fair since he was the cause of it.

















Then mommy wised up and got the floor mats out so they could flop around and fall at will and (hopefully) no one would get broken.

















Finally, just when I thought this was going to end up in a horrific battle of wills, Mal decided last night that maybe he would pull his pants down and sit on his potty! He never did take his diaper off, but I consider it a huge step. He must have pulled his pants down, sat on the potty, stood and pulled his pants back up about half a dozen times. Xavier had to do what Mal was doing, as usual. Only he was more than willing to take his diaper off. He can't pull his pants up and down by himself though. Neither one did any business on the potty, but this is a huge leap from the screaming and crying the mere suggestion of sitting on the potty used to bring.

















I have Potty Power to thank for this. We got the video from Grandma and Grandpa recently. They have been requesting it every night. It is silly and lame and a tiny bit annoying and they LOVE it! So my toddler mommy friends who are struggling with toilet training, I highly recommend it.

Friday Fill-Ins

1. Please don't tell me my children are still awake at 10PM.

2. Can you rub my back in the morning?

3. The color white makes me want to marry someone else. Someone who won't tease me 24/7! :)

4. I have a craving for dark rich CHOOOOCOLATE.

5. If my life had a pause button, I'd pause it while I am sleeping. HA!

6. Eyes are the windows to the soul, or so I've heard.

7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to sleep, tomorrow my plans include finishing tax stuff and Sunday, I want to pass the boys off on M!

Bloggy Challenge

The rules for this challenge are - Go to where you store your photos on your computer. Go to the SIXTH folder and pick the SIXTH photo. Post that photo on your blog along with a SHORT story about it. Tag SIX people and leave a comment on their blog or email them letting them know you chose them. If you want to participate consider yourself tagged.

This is a picture of the nativity from nearby Bakersfield. Kind of boring for the challenge, considering I posted a picture of it last month. Oh well. Got something more exciting? Play along.














For those of you looking for pictures of the boys, I have to work on that. My printer is not reading the card from the camera right now, so I can't upload any.

I had a date...

...with my very own husband! Shocker I know! The big brother and Cassie came over and watched movies and put the little guys to bed for us.

First we went to Chili's (mmmm... southwestern eggrolls!). I thought it would be packed, at least on the bar side, but there was hardly anyone there. It was nice to have some grown up (with M? HA!) conversation, but sometimes I had a hard time trying to think of something to say that wasn't about the boys.

Then we headed to the nearby theater to see Taken with Liam Neeson. It was great! There was one guy in the back that would crack us up. He was really enjoying the movie. If you like action films, go see this.