Chocolate Tortellini

Tonight we had "chocolate" tortellini for dinner. The kids loved it, and ate every bite. They even had seconds. They have no idea that the brown stuff in the tortellini is really mushrooms, and I will never tell. Mwahahahaha!

This is the reason why we have long sleeved bibs.

A busy day

Today was a day of errands. We had a whole list of things to get done; I usually stick to one or two a day, but today we were on a mission! I briefed the kids on our plan for the day, and then we set off to see if we could actually get it all done before nap time.

First there was the mail and the trash (yes these are errands. They were on the list and I had to drive to do them.)

Second we dropped off the rent check.
Third was a hair cut for Mr. I wanted to do this one first thing in the morning while he was being good. We had to wait a while, but the kids just sat and read books like little angels. (haha, I know the truth) When it was his turn I gave him a "very special" little pocket mirror to hold to keep his hands busy. He was really good and only got fidgety at the very end; we almost got out with no crying. Oh well, we will try for that next time.

For our forth errand we ran over to the outlets to pick up a discount card for me and look for rain boots for the kids. I never did get the discount card I needed (no longer being made), but we got lucky and found the boots for Mr, as well as a bunch of other stuff, %50 off at the Carters outlet. Unfortunately no girl boots, so those were still on the list.
Next, of course, we had to stop at the bathroom. (Yes, I took this picture in the bathroom, but they were just so cute. :)
For the fifth errand we went into the shoe store but they had no boots.
Sixth was the OshKosh outlet and it looked like they didn't have any either, but we finally spotted some in the very back. Yay! They were %50 off to, and of the seven pairs left two were her size. I tried to convince her that she wanted the polka dotted pair (they were like these), but she was set on the pink. She had made her decision before we even left the house. I was kind of heart broken; the dots were so cute, but it was her choice. So pink it was, and one more errand down.
One more stop at the bathrooms.
Seventh stop of the morning was McDonald's for lunch. We went through the drive through so they could eat on the way to our next errand, but we ended up just sitting in the parking lot. I crawled back with them, and we enjoyed a nice lunch talking and listening to our Magic Tree House book on CD.
Eighth was a quick stop at trader Joe's. Only one hour; I think that's a record for us. It was nap time when we got there so I didn't want to hang around too long.
My list was done! Eight errands completed and we could go home! (This is a big deal for me)
Here are the kids in their new boots. Mr. got fireman boots, and of course pink for Sunshine. And here is a very tired one-hour-past-my-nap-time BabyGirl. She was so good all day, really a trooper!
Here are our finds from Carters. Mr's jeans were only $5!! Also some cute things for the girls. I just love the little red skirt for Sunshine!

Babysitting

After running few errands this morning we came home, gave the baby a nap, and then headed out again for the afternoon. A friend of mine had asked me to babysit, so I had the five kids sitting around the table at dinner. They were so cute, I just wanted to share.

What a day

Today was a little trying at times. Ok, most of the day, but that doesn't mean all of the day, so I have decide to go Pollyanna and post about the things that made me glad today.

Our morning activity. I had to drag myself out of the house, but I was rewarded with smiling faces, good conversations with good friends, and a great place for my kids to play all morning. I am glad for the MOMS Club and the lovely flowers Sunshine picked while we were out.

Trader Joe's fried rice. I did not feel like cooking today, so I was glad when I looked at my weekly meal planner and saw that it was a heat-and-serve night. Shrimp in the pan- five minutes. Fried rice in the pan-two minutes. Dinner served (with applesauce on the side) ten minutes. (and you thought I was going to say "priceless") :D
I was also glad because usually I have to share, but tonight I got to eat all I wanted (oh, and I did), and there is even some left for my lunch tomorrow!

Getting the mail. I have started to take the kids for a walk every evening to get the mail. It's hard for us to get out in the afternoon, so this is a nice little change of scenery between snack time and TV time. What I am so glad about today, though, is that we played tag. It was just plain fun! We laughed and ran and just enjoyed the perfect weather and each other.

Our magazine arrived too. :)

Our roses. I am glad that our roses are finally blooming. Well these are no longer blooming thanks to two very helpful, junior gardeners, but there will be more, and it always makes me glad to look out the window and see these lovely orange, pink, and yellow roses!

Sleeping children. Yes I am glad, glad, glad for sleeping children. They woke up early this morning, so that means I woke up early this morning. This probably accounts for the trying day since I was very tired. But early to rise means early to bed, and they all fell asleep as soon as their heads hit the pillow. That is a good thing.

Class Time?

For the last week or two I have been looking at different classes for the kids; I figured that since I would not be able to take anything this quarter it might be fun to let the kids take a class. I found this one (name hidden to protect the not-so-innocent):

This is a Musical Theater class for preschoolers. Children

will sing, dance, and work on age appropriate plays.

Ages: 3 to 5 years

It sounded good and had everything I was looking for, affordable, would get them running around, and something both kids could take together. (That last one was a must, I needed the three year old to be able to participate.) So I took the kids to the class today just to try it out. Everything started out good, Sunshine was timid but joined in and Mr. seemed interested, so I thought he just need time to warm up. Mr, BabyGirl, and I sat outside with the other parents for a few minutes until he decided to join the class as well.
Then it happened. I peeked in to see how they were doing, and there were my two sitting off to the side while all the other kids were standing and singing. At least they are just sitting, I thought, but that didn't last long. The teacher pulled out the instruments and my kids immediately jumped up and started fussing about what they got and what they wanted. The teacher looked frazzled. I stopped looking, thinking, there was only 30 minutes left, she must be used to this, right? I peeked in again. Oh no, there were my two, running in big circles around the other kids while the teacher chased them. She looked VERY frazzled now. I closed the door, hoping that the teacher had seen this before. Surely they were just acting up because it was their first day at class. Surely they would settle down in a minute, but these thoughts were quickly interrupted by my three year old bursting through the door (smile on his face) with the teacher panting behind him. "I haven't been able to teach for the last five minutes; I just don't think he's ready for this class." she said. Ok. I wanted to crawl under a table. But I didn't, I asked how is she doing. The teacher said "She was doing good, but then..." I didn't hear anything after that, I just called to Sunshine that it was time to go.
But the show wasn't over yet. Sunshine was in tears before she even reached the door, I could see on her face that she was embarrassed and upset - a bad combination for her. I tried to explain to her that since the two of them would not listen to the teacher we had to go, but when I turned around to get the stroller she, in mid fit, ran for the door. I tried to follow with the stroller for a moment, but realized I would never catch her before she made it to the street, so I abandoned the stroller, baby, and three year old and took off running. I did catch her before she made it to the street. Luckily there was little danger since she was headed for an empty parking lot, but I was still upset/embarrassed beyond words. Then, of course, I had to collect the three year old who had decided to follow us, and the three of us had to go back inside, with all of the other parent watching, to collect the baby.
The walk to the car seemed to take forever. This had been a disaster! A million questions filled my head. Are they not ready for classes? Was it just the first day jitters? Why didn't the teacher have some way to deal with kids who were not listening? Surely a little timeout would have worked... or maybe not. Are my kids the only ones to act like that? Did all the other kids just go right in and join in without a hitch on their first day? Maybe I should have started them in classes sooner? Maybe it's too soon?
I would like to try again with a different class, but I'm not anxious to repeat that scene ever again. Yikes! Come on friends, family; anybody got some advice?

The library

We made it to the library yesterday; we were late to our friends house, but luckily she's a mom so she understood. I am really loving the library website which allows us to look-up and put books on hold from the comfort of my couch! I tried looking it up at the library before but with three little kids it was a joke, so like I said, I love this feature. I put a bunch of books on hold, so here is the stash we came home with.There are a few sewing books for me and some USAF books for the kids. I thought it would be good for the kids to see some stories and pictures to go along with everything they have been hearing about. Sunshine was irritated that these were not "fun" books and said she didn't want to read any "daddy" books; I assume she means books that are for Daddy not about Daddy, but with her you just never know. Oh well, at least Mr. and I are happy.

( A follow up note: Sunshine has been seen carrying the My Hero book around the house for the last two days :)

Walk on the beach

We went for a walk on the boardwalk today. The Ladybugs were everywhere! It was not a day for the squeemish, they were in our hair, on our clothes, and flying everywhere we looked. The kids thought it was great.

The pictures don't do it justice; it was gorgeous! But also very hot.The kids were trying to collect Ladybugs in the bucket, but they kept flying out.

So they moved on to collecting seedpods from the eucalyptus trees, wow, do they smell strong!

BabyGirl was part of the stroller brigade.

Here is my tired crew at the end.

And here's me looking very hot. No, really; I was about to melt. You can see Mr. in the background flushed from the heat. We were all glad to get back into the car's AC.

To bad the house doesn't have any.

Concert in the park

Sunday we went to the Concert in the Park; it was a nice outing for the day since we had been to church Saturday night. When we got there it was pretty crowded, but we had a great time. The music was playing and so were the kids; after they got tired of the playground we went over to the ice cream stand and picked out a big "birthday cake" bar with chocolate and sprinkles. We all shared it, and it was sooo good. There are no pictures because it was gone so fast, and because I had chocolate all over my hands :). After that we went back to the playground, and they played till their hearts were content and I was worn out. I think the heat and sun got to all of us because Mr. crashed at bed time, a rare event and a welcome end to a busy day. ;)

BabyGirl loves to be pushed in the swing, and Sunshine was happy to do it, at least for a little while.

Mr. is back there in the red.

I have been trying to braid Sunshine's hair more often since I read this post. She looks so pretty, but I need a lot more practice. :)

Here we are after the ice cream; chillin' in the grass.Mr. was trying so hard to smile with the sun in his eyes.

Holy Week

We didn't do much this week except help get DH ready for OTS. There was a lot of running around and trips back and forth to the recruiting center to get paperwork done, but here are some of the things we were able to squeeze in. :)

Holy Thursday we did our Passover meal of roast lamb, flat bread, bitter salad, Charoset, wine/grape juice, and a (ginger) lamb cake for dessert. I got this idea last year from the book The Year And Our Children, and although we do not observe all of the ceremony of the Jewish tradition ours was a lovely way to remember Jesus's Passover meal of the Last Supper where we were given the Eucharist. Before and after the meal we read from the childrens bible all the stories of the holy Week through Easter Sunday. It was really neat, and the kids had a great time.

Good Friday we were at the recruiting center all day, and the kids took part in a easter egg hunt. We all had a good time, and the kids were really good and agreed to save the candy for Sunday.

Holy Saturday the kids and I decorated Easter eggs and ate, of course, egg salad for lunch. They did great! We actually let them dry correctly this year, so they didn't dye our hands every time we picked them up. The kids decorated them with stickers afterward.

*~ Easter ~*

Here are the kids on Easter morning. They were so excited, because we had saved all the decorations and treats for Easter Sunday!

All except BabyGirl, she didn't know what all the commotion was about.

Sunshine and Mr. got it right away though, CANDY!

Finally BabyGirl decided to check out her basket too.

OH, is it for me?

Hmm, Just books??

Ok!

Really we did let her have some jellybeans too (in the highchair with a bib ;), but that was all she got because she spit them up on Daddy while we were at church.

Here are the kids rejoicing for Jesus (ok, and for candy).

Well, not all the kids.

(In case you haven't seen the previous posts, we get that face a lot.)

This is us after mass.
It's not the best picture, but it's the only one we got of the five of us, so I'm gonna go with it.

Happy Easter!!

Coming and Going

We had a wonderful 1st birthday party for BabyGirl / going away party for DH.
It was the week before Easter so things hadn't gotten too busy yet.

It was really nice to get together with everybody to celebrate BabyGirl, and DH really enjoyed getting to see everybody before the stress of leaving (for OTS) really hit.

Here's me next to the food spread; where else would a good hostess be?

BabyGirl is waiting for her cake. She looks so cute drinking from a straw!

She's still waiting...

and waiting.

It's almost there.

She had the whole cake to herself!

Mr. was eyeing it, but he had to wait for a piece of Daddy's cake.

How old are you BabyGirl?
(Really I think she was licking her fingers, but this pic looked so funny:)

Happy Girl.

Oh, so happy.

BabyGirl had fun playing with the wrapping paper while the kids opened her gifts.

Here she is just happy playing with her toys.

Or maybe not.

DH and John were visiting while Megan put together BabyGirl's new push-toy.

BabyGirl loves her new push-toy!
She had so much fun rolling around that big room after we put the tables up.
She definitely enjoyed her birthday as much as any one-year-old-who-doesn't-even-know-it-is-her-birthday could. :)

Here's a close-up of the cakes; #1 for BabyGirl and USAF for DH.