Somehow, over the last month or two, the kids have suddenly become involved in many more activities than we have ever had before. I feel like a good chunk of my life these days is spent shuttling them back and forth to school and their various practices and classes. Right now we have Brownies, soccer, dance, and Karate, and next week we will be adding tumbling and Spanish as well! A number of these things are just at our YMCA, which is pretty low key, thank goodness!

Today is Noah's half birthday, so tonight we are going to take him out for ice cream to celebrate. It's hard to believe that tomorrow he will be closer to being five than three, when it seems like it was just yesterday that he was turning four. He is still as sweet as ever, but his interests have definitely changed over the past few months. After years of being a huge Thomas the Train fan, he moved onto a Star Wars obsession, and doesn't give Thomas a second thought now. He won't even wear his Thomas underwear anymore, which makes me a little sad.

Steve bought two lightsabers awhile ago, and he and Noah play with them constantly. Even though he never "wins", Noah never tires of the game. Steve drew this picture of himself and Noah, maybe to give Noah the impression that he is better than he actually is. I'm sure if Noah decided he was tired of the lightsabers, Steve would be pretty disappointed!A couple months ago, Noah saw a Storm Trooper gun at Target and begged and begged to get it. I still don't love the idea of playing with weapons so I told him that he could save up his own money to buy it, thinking there was no chance he'd be able to come up with the $20 price of the gun. He obviously had more faith in himself than I did, because he immediately set out to get $20. We told him that when we go out for ice cream, he could skip the ice cream and we'd give him $2 instead so he did that a few times, plus he did little jobs around the house and looked in all our nooks and crannies for money. One night he found $6 outside of Peach Wave, and another day he found $5 on the floor of Target, so both of those finds helped him quite a bit. We had a random plastic tube hanging around our house and he saved his money in there, calling it (for some unknown but charming reason) his "money carriage".Last week he finally had enough money so we all went to Target, with Noah proudly holding the money carriage. He picked out the gun, brought it to the check-out line, and purchased it all by himself.He has been playing with it a ton since then, and still seems very excited that he finally owns it. Even though I have always been opposed to toy guns, I don't begrudge him this one because he worked so hard for it and it makes him so happy. So far he has been following the rule of "no shooting Mommy", but if that changes at any time in the future, I may quickly decide otherwise!

I am so happy that September is here! Fall is absolutely my most favorite season. I am not the only around here who is excited looking forward to cooler temperatures, though. In the future, I should probably not buy Allie any fall clothes or a winter coat while it is still warm, because then I end up with a little girl who insists on either wearing long sleeves and pants when it is 98 degrees, or wearing a winter coat with nothing else.Allie and Noah started preschool a couple weeks ago and they both seem to love it. It's a four hour day, with Allie going two days a week and Noah going three. I thought Allie might cry the first day at least, but she barely glanced at Steve and me as we walked out the door. When I picked her up, I asked one of her teachers if Allie had been sad at all, and she said, "Not even for a minute!"
Several people have asked me if I felt sad, dropping my baby off at preschool. Although I certainly adore her and love spending time with her, I really wasn't a bit sad. It may be different when she starts kindergarten or something, but for now, the idea of having eight hours every single week all to myself is just too exciting for me to be sad. After more than seven and a half years of doing all our grocery shopping with the kids, I can now finally go grocery shopping all by myself! Huzzah!

My marathon training is going okay. The marathon is just over a month away at this point. Several weeks ago I ran 20 miles, my farthest so far, and it was rough. The last three miles were kind of on the miserable side, and I didn't do much but lay in bed for most of the day after I got back. Ever since then, I have been a little more nervous about the marathon. This weekend I will be going 22 miles, and I am definitely wishing it were already over. I ran a half marathon a couple weeks ago, which I really loved, although that's another thing that is making me more anxious about the marathon. While the half marathon was great, I didn't really want to turn around and run it again right away, you know? Anyway, Steve took this picture of me in the half, right before I crossed the finish line. I am the one in the purple shirt. I finished in two hours, six minutes, and six seconds.

Two days before Allie's birthday, Emma and Noah cooked up a plan to make her some type of present. They came to me to tell me about it, and started with, "Well, first we need you to sew her a dress...". I had to inform them that, while it was certainly a lovely idea, I was probably not going to sew her a dress in the next day, and that their plan should maybe involve more effort on their part, instead of all the effort on my part. Emma asked if they could give Allie a shirt instead, and if she could sew it herself.

My initial feeling was that I didn't trust Emma to use my sewing machine and that it would probably be better if they designed the shirt and I just sewed it myself. I then started to remember when I was a kid, probably just slightly older than Emma, and my grandma let me use her sewing machine all on my own to make whatever I wanted. For a long time, my little brother proudly wore a satin-y, red, sleeveless shirt with no hems that I had sewed for him, and I'm pretty sure the handle of my grandma's garage broom is still sporting a couple "broom covers" that I sewed. One time, my friend Nicki and I spent the night at my grandma's house and stayed up most of the night, sewing "pajamas" for ourselves. I use the term pajamas very loosely, considering that our "patterns" were made by laying on the fabric and tracing around our bodies with a marker. Still, I remember having a lot of fun sewing at my grandma's house, and I think it was awesome that she let me use her sewing machine when no one else trusted me enough to use theirs.Keeping all that in mind, I decided to let Emma sew the shirt herself (albeit with plenty of supervision). I helped her trace one of Allie's other shirts to make a pattern, and then once she had cut out all the pieces, I showed her how to use the sewing machine. With the exception of a small amount of sewing around the arm holes and ironing on the applique, she made the entire shirt by herself.
Allie was so excited when she opened it, and has worn it several times already. One time in particular, she wore it three days in a row, only finally taking it off when she managed to somehow drop a huge glob of guacamole down the inside of it. In the end, I'm glad that I let Emma sew the shirt because it's a cute present regardless, but definitely much more meaningful because she made it herself.

Our computer broke last week, and even though I don't actually sit down at the computer on a daily basis, after about a week, sending emails or browsing the internet exclusively on my phone was starting to get on my nerves. We bought another computer on Friday and set it up last night, but at this point it's mostly worthless to me because it's completely empty of all my bookmarks, songs, pictures, etc. I was backing everything up on an external hard drive semi-regularly, so while most of those things are not lost for good, I don't really know how to get them from the external hard drive into useable form on this new computer.

Last Sunday Allie turned three years old. We had kind of a busy weekend with my parents in town and Steve and I having our first overnight alone together in seven and a half years. Suddenly it was Sunday afternoon and my parents had left and I realized I had no plans for a birthday cake for Allie. We asked her what kind of cake she wanted and she said a Dora cake. Since I'm really not a huge fan of my kids being into "characters", I kind of tried to talk her into something else, but she insisted. And, of course, since it was Allie's birthday, if she wanted a Dora cake, then a Dora cake it would be.

Steve acted like he thought I blew it, like how was I going to come up with a Dora cake at this late hour? Not to worry. During Allie's nap, Emma and I went to Michael's and bought a Dora cake pan. We came home and baked it together, ate dinner while it cooled, and then I decorated it right after we ate. It came together pretty quickly, and even though it is certainly no masterpiece, Allie seemed to love it, which is the most important thing.All week she has been telling random strangers that she is three, and even though I keep hearing it over and over, it's still hard for me to believe. It seems like she was just born. We were so surprised when we found out we were having another baby when Noah was only seven months old, but she has been such a wonderful surprise. Our family really is so much better because she is in it.
Happy birthday, big girl.

Now that we are nearing the end of summer, I thought I'd post an update before it's over for good. Our summer this year has been really delightful. With the kiddos all getting older - Allie will be three next week! - we've settled into a wonderful groove that doesn't involve the things that troubled me during their babyhoods, such as getting them to just take a nap already or toddlers demanding to nurse 24 hours a day. I feel like we have entered a new stage of our lives, and it happens to be pretty awesome.

This is the first summer I've felt comfortable taking the kids to the pool by myself, and we've been going three or four days a week. Emma and Noah have both learned to swim, and Emma has recently perfected the art of jumping off the diving board. I thought I might be tired of the pool by the end of the summer, but nope. I think we are all going to miss it when it closes for the year.

We also joined the YMCA this summer, which has been great. I've attempted to join various community centers in the past, but always had to give up the idea, due to somebody or other crying for me in the childcare. This time around they all like it and often ask to go there even more, even though we already go at least three days a week.

This summer I have also decided to train for the Kansas City marathon, which is in October. I signed up with a running group that does their long runs on various routes around the city every Saturday. Long runs by themselves do not seem that great, but running with this group is a lot of fun. This morning the run was in Lawrence and I was not too keen on getting up and driving an hour to get to Lawrence by 6:00 a.m., but I was also supposed to be running seventeen miles and I didn't want to do that all by myself. The kids and Steve and I all ended up going to Lawrence last night and staying in a cool old hotel for a mini-vacation, and the really great thing was that this morning I only had to walk out of the hotel and down the street to meet up with everybody and run my seventeen miles.

Steve and I had our eighth anniversary last week. We went out to dinner with the kids, but the real celebration is going to come next weekend, when my parents are going to take the kids to a hotel overnight while Steve and I stay at a bed and breakfast on the Plaza. It will be our first night together without the kids since Emma was born. We attempted it once when I was pregnant with Noah, but my parents ended up driving an inconsolable Emma to us at 2:00 in the morning. I hope this time ends up a little better than that!

That's about it for now, because we are off the the Royals game for the night. Go Royals!

Over the weekend we had our Second Annual Girls' Weekend with my dad's side of the family. Last year we all went to Rocheport, but this year all the out-of-towners came to Kansas City and everyone stayed at my brother and sister-in-law's house. We managed to pack a crazy amount of fun into two days and nights. Our weekend included the City Market, pedicures, meals out, a play at the American Heartland Theater, shopping at the Plaza, and of course, plenty of plain old sitting around and chatting.Since I live so close, I came home late both nights to sleep in my own bed and check in with my family before leaving again in the morning. They made the most of my being gone most of the weekend by going plenty of restaurants where I refuse to go, but that they all like, such as Applebee's and Waffle House. Steve also took them to a Royals game, and I think they celebrated my not being there for that by consuming an extraordinary amount of junk!Like last year, all of the ladies were supposed to bring some sort of memento for everyone else to take home. A couple years ago my lovely friend Allison gave me some decorated magnetic clothespins, and I have been using them on my fridge ever since. I've often wished that I had more of them so I figured this would be the perfect opportunity to make some - I could make plenty to give away, but also keep some for myself! They ended up looking pretty cute and we liked them so much that Emma is making more for end-of-the-year teacher gifts.I am so happy that my family started this tradition and I am already looking forward to next year!

Some more random tidbits...

~ Emma and Allie both have had a little trouble, for pretty much their whole lives, growing their hair. Emma has worked her whole life to get long hair, and after more than seven years, with only three trim-type haircuts, this is where she has gotten.A couple weeks ago, out of nowhere, she started saying she wanted to cut it. She kept bringing it up, so we brought her in to Great Clips to get it done. I sort of thought she'd back out at the last minute, but nope.I thought it looked so cute afterward, and she seemed happy with it. Happy, at least, until later that night when we thought she was getting ready for bed. In reality, she was in her room, crying her poor little eyes out. After a lot of reassurance, she finally stopped crying and since then there have been no more tears over the loss of her hair.

~ This past weekend, on Mother's Day, I ran a 5k race - my first race in almost fifteen years. Last fall I spent a few weeks trying to get myself into running again, and at that time I was running around twelve-minute miles. I gave up on the running pretty quickly, and didn't do any sort of working out until January when I started trying to do some sort of exercise video just about every day. When I attempted to run again in March or so, I was amazed that - just because I was in much better shape - I was able to run ten-minute miles. I signed up for the 5k to give myself some motivation and, since I figured I'd keep getting a little faster, I made a personal goal for myself to finish the race in under 28 minutes, which means my mile split times would have had to be around 9:30. I am excited to say that my actual race time ended up being 25:58! There were 448 people in my age group (age 30-35) and I came in 18th, so I was feeling pretty darn proud of myself afterward. I really enjoyed the race, and now I am looking forward to running a 10k in July and then a half marathon in October.

~ Remember how my car A/C was broken? Well, last Wednesday they fixed it (again) and asked me to bring it by in a week so they could check on it. Unfortunately, it didn't even make it a week because by yesterday it wasn't working again. Wait though, it gets worse. Monday night our house A/C stopped working! Consequently, I had no way to escape yesterday's scorching heat. When we went to bed last night it was 90 degrees in our house - blech! Even though I would have liked to avoid these problems all together, they certainly make me appreciate the luxury of having a temperature-controlled environment! I only have to suffer through until A.B. May gets here on Saturday (and my van should be fixed this afternoon), but some people had to go their whole lives with no A/C. I definitely feel for them after these last few days! Yesterday the kids and I spent most of the afternoon at Chik-Fil-A, just to get a little relief from the heat, and I expect that again today we will make an effort to spend as little time as possible in our house.~ This morning we took the kids to a charity breakfast for the Strong City School Fund. When we heard about it, we thought it was a good cause and wanted to go, but didn't know if it would be very kid-friendly. I called the lady in charge and she said we could bring them if we wanted, but I sort of got the idea from her that my kids would likely be the only ones there. We decided to go anyway, hoping for the best. This morning as we walked into the Downtown Marriott, into a sea of adults dressed in business attire, I momentarily regretted my decision. With our three little kids in hand, I felt like we totally stood out. In the end though, the kids really pulled it off. I don't think they annoyed anyone too terribly, and the only two incidents involved Allie's spilling her wine glass of orange juice and then later peeing on her dress a little when Steve took her to the bathroom. All in all, not too bad!

Some random tidbits...

~ The Easter Bunny brought sunglasses for the kids, and they have been wearing them everywhere all week. The fact that sunglasses are usually just worn outside is totally lost on them. (The quality of that photo is so poor due to the very limited light that is available at the ungodly hour at which my children wake up.)

~ My driver's license expires tomorrow, so on Friday I was planning to go get a new one. It turns out that apparently you need your birth certificate for that, and when I opened our family's "identification documents" folder, I only found Steve's, Emma's, Noah's, and Allie's. Where the heck is my birth certificate? I wonder how much of a hassle it is to get a new one.

~ Is anyone else as excited as me about zucchini being in season? I am particularly obsessed with the zucchini-and-corn combo lately, as evidenced by our dinners this week. We've had zucchini, corn, and feta quesadillas, quinoa with corn and zucchini, and zucchini, corn, and goat cheese pizzas. Yum yum yum! What else can I make with corn and zucchini?

~ I've been getting my hair highlighted for years now, and I'm getting a little tired of it. It's expensive and it always takes so long. I'm considering coloring it myself, using the stuff in a box. Steve thinks that I will be sorry, but I think I really just am not that into hair color so even if it doesn't look great it won't be the end of the world. We will see.

~ Last August I paid something ridiculous like $800 to have the air conditioner in my van fixed. This spring, the first time I tried to turn it on, it didn't work. I took it back and they fixed it again (for free, thankfully). Now it isn't working - again. Come on, people! We are dropping it off again tomorrow, hopefully for the last time.

~ We made these little Easter treats for the kids' teachers and people in our family. They were the perfect project for the kids because they were able to do everything themselves except for tying on the ribbon at the end. I was kicking myself because I had just dropped off a bin of glass for recycling a couple days before we did this, so we ended up having to use canning jars. Other jars would have been better because they would have been plain on the outside, and also I wouldn't have been wasting my canning jars, but overall I think they ended up being pretty cute.
~ Tomorrow I will be 32 years old. So far my 30's have been pretty enjoyable so I am looking forward to another great year!

For years, whenever we go to the library, I've just picked up whatever books I have on hold and then browsed around the juvenile section with the kids. Yesterday, however, we went there because we had some time to kill and I didn't have any books on hold waiting for me, so I decided to browse around in the cookbook section to see if I could find anything good to read while we were there. I can't believe I don't do that more often! I love cookbooks and, even though they were getting heavy and I knew I would feel kind of silly checking out so many, I kept adding to my pile. Look what I came home with!I've been having fun reading through these since yesterday, and finding all sorts of new delicious-sounding things to make. There was a slight downside to my random browsing, however. Allie was carrying her own bag for her books, and while I was engrossed in the cookbooks, she was close by taking other books off the shelf and adding them to her bag, completely unbeknownst to me. Then when we checked out, I was distracted by Noah's abusing the handicap door button and possibly smashing unsuspecting library patrons in the door, so I didn't pay much attention to the books that we were actually getting. You can imagine my confusion at home when I unloaded the books and discovered some real gems, such as Living with Diabetes and (sure to become a family favorite) Busting Out: Putting Your Best Breasts Forward.
Later in the afternoon, I wanted to make some strawberry preserves. I made a batch of strawberry/cranberry preserves back at Christmas to go in gift baskets and I thought those turned out really well. We have used up the last of that batch and we enjoyed it so much that I wanted to make more, except just a strawberry version this time. I found a recipe that didn't use pectin, which is a plus, and it had lots of good reviews so I decided to go with that one.The mixture was supposed to boil until it reached 220 degrees. In the reviews some people complained that theirs didn't set up and then other people said that was because they probably didn't wait until it reached 220. Because of this, I kept boiling and boiling and boiling mine forever, waiting for it to get hot enough. It was only up to about 200 when I started to get the idea that it was burning. There was the slightest burning smell, and when I stirred it, there was charred black stuff on the bottom. Finally I gave up and just put it all in the jars, hoping for the best. It did set up, but the flavor isn't wonderful. I'm not sure what happened. I did cut back on the sugar by half, so maybe that affected it's ability to get up to 220 degrees. Who knows? It's not great, but still good enough that I think we will go ahead and eat it. Emma used it to make some pb&j sandwiches and, thankfully, there were no complaints from the peanut gallery.

Emma has been asking for a new bike for awhile, and we've told her that as soon as she learns how to ride without training wheels, we will get a new bike for her. Unfortunately for her, there isn't really a good spot to learn because there are no sidewalks in our neighborhood and I won't let them ride in the street. Finally last weekend, we loaded up the bikes and drove to a big, empty parking lot, hoping to teach both Emma and Noah how to ditch the training wheels.

Honestly, I didn't have very high hopes. When Emma first got her bike back in September of 2008, it was a disaster. She was terrified and as we walked along next to her, she kept letting go of the handle bars to grab onto us which, of course, is no way to ride a bike. We were all so frustrated that day that I think we put the bike in the garage and didn't get it back out again until the next spring. Even after that, it took her a long time to feel comfortable with it. I found this picture from her first day with her bike, and I was really hoping that getting rid of the training wheels would go a little more smoothly!Steve had the brilliant idea to stop and buy them protective gloves, elbow, and knee pads. Noah in particular fell down quite a bit and never once got hurt. The whole thing went much better than we expected - in fact, both of them were pedaling around all alone within five minutes! We were so proud of them!

Since then, we've been going to various parking lots and trails so they can practice riding. Emma has it down completely, but Noah has suffered a few mishaps. On Saturday he fell and hit his poor little face on the ground, resulting in bloody scrapes on his forehead and chin. Yesterday they were riding around a little trail loop that had a big mud puddle in the middle. They all loved speeding through the puddle, spraying muddy water into the air behind them, until Noah slipped and fell right in the middle of said puddle. He was a wet and muddy mess, but recovered quickly.Allie has been working on riding her bike with the training wheels, and has made some progress as well. Even with the training wheels, she still manages to fall quite a bit. There is a home video that my mom took of my little brother years ago when he learned how to ride a two-wheeler and at one point in the video he falls on the driveway, and I remember my other brothers and I rewinding that video over and over and laughing every time we saw my brother fall. Maybe someday my own children will look back on our videos and laugh:

That was sweet little Noah, four years ago today. Whenever one of my kids has a birthday, I always find myself thinking back to the day they were born. This morning while Allie and I strolled through Target at 11:00, I told her that four years ago at that exact moment, I knelt down to buckle Emma into the stroller and my water broke all over the driveway. Allie didn't seem too interested, but I am happy to think back to that day when Noah came into our lives.

I'm convinced that kid might be the sweetest little boy who ever lived. He is super affectionate, and is a wonderful cuddler. He comes into our room every night, crawls into bed, and quietly asks, "Mommy, can we cuddle?" One night he didn't come in, and in the morning when Steve and I realized he had stayed in his own bed all night, we both felt sad that maybe his cuddling days were over. Luckily, that was just a fluke, and he has been in every night since. He is generally pretty sweet to his sisters, too. A few weeks ago my parents were visiting and the kids were going somewhere in their car. Noah told my dad that he wanted to sit next to Emma, and when my dad asked why, Noah said, "Because I love her." Awww. That really warms my heart. (When my dad then asked him if he wanted to sit next to Allie, his response was a little less sweet: "No. She bites!")The kids and I went to my parents' house over the weekend and we celebrated Noah's birthday while we were there, in addition to going bowling, playing laser tag (which was SO fun!), making a train out of chairs, and playing lots of games. Tonight he wants to go to Minsky's for dinner, and I made an Oreo ice cream cake to take along. I wanted to do something different than regular cake, since we just had that over the weekend, but yesterday he told me he was excited about his train cake. Oops. I hadn't been planning to do any special decorating, so hopefully he'll be content if I just pipe a train track and slap a toy train on the top.
We made M&M cookies for him to bring to preschool today, and Allie and I are going this afternoon to read a book to his class while they eat their treats. I'm starting to get a teeny bit nervous about it, even though I realize it's silly to be nervous about reading a book to a bunch of preschoolers. Still, I know Noah will be excited when Allie and I get there, and hopefully the kids will be too busy munching on their cookies to pay much attention to my reading!

Last night we went out to dinner to celebrate my sister-in-law's birthday. We got a baby-sitter for the kiddos and it was fun to enjoy a meal during which no one crawled under the table or spit out globs of chewed food or stuck their hand in my water. Our baby-sitter is a sweet eighth-grader at Emma's school and this was her second time watching the kids. The first time she came, it was our first time ever leaving the kids with someone who was not a relative and I felt slightly guilty and uncomfortable about that, but the kids seem to love her and it's gone really well both times.I wanted to make a little treat for the birthday girl, and since it was St. Patrick's Day and also because I've been wanting an excuse to make these cupcakes for quite awhile, this seemed like the perfect opportunity to make them. They are chocolate Guinness cupcakes with a Bailey's ganache filling in the center and Bailey's buttercream icing on top. Seriously yummy, although they took most of the afternoon to make and I probably won't make them again because I don't think cupcakes are worth quite that much effort to me. When I was almost finished with them, Noah came and asked me if I would make those cupcakes to bring to his class for his birthday later this month. I had to tell him no, because not only would it be wildly inappropriate to serve cupcakes with alcohol in them to a bunch of preschoolers, but I think the only cupcakes in my near future are going to come from a boxed cake mix and premade icing!Earlier this week the kids and I made a healthy carrot cake which Noah has happily been eating for breakfast every day, and also a batch of peanut butter oatmeal sandwich cookies. The cookies were pretty delicious and I could have likely eaten them all in a very short amount of time, but luckily we had to bring them up to our church for a bake sale thing they have going on there this weekend. I have pretty much stopped making cookies for just our family to eat, but I always jump at the chance to make them whenever they are needed at the kids' schools or at church. That way the kids and I get to make cookies together and then we get to enjoy one or two (or maybe four or five) and then we take them somewhere where they can't tempt us anymore. It's win-win!Today we went to Kaleidoscope and the Under the Sea exhibit at Crown Center. It was a lot of fun but I think they were all worn out because they all fell asleep early tonight. Steve is asleep in there with them, so I have been enjoying an entire evening of peacefulness all to myself. Bliss!

Since I'm trying to get more exercise these days, I'm also trying to be a little more aware of what I eat. Generally I think I have a pretty healthy diet, except for my darn sweet tooth that is always letting me down, especially at night after the kids are in bed. So, for the most part, I am just trying to cut back on things like deciding to make brownies at 9:00 at night or trying to convince Steve to run to Sheridan's for some ice cream when I should probably be going to bed instead. With this in mind, last weekend when we were at Mimi's for breakfast, I decided that maybe I should order something instead of my usual eggs Benedict. I picked out something healthier, but then I started to think about how I would feel when Steve's eggs Benedict showed up along with my less-delicious breakfast, I wanted to make sure it was absolutely worth it before I went ahead and ordered something else. I was frantically trying to look up the calorie counts on some website on my phone while our server was taking our order, and in the end I couldn't find it in time, so I went ahead and ordered my wonderful eggs Benedict (which, of course, was unbelievably tasty).

After that experience, I found an app that lists the nutritional information for every single thing at pretty much every chain restaurant there is. I was excited to find that because I thought it would be pretty interesting. Um, no. Interesting, yes, and probably really for the best, but now that I know the nutritional information on some things I eat pretty regularly, I kind of wish I could go back to my previous happily ignorant state! There are three places where we go quite a bit - Jason's Deli, Cheesecake Factory, and Chik-Fil-A. At Cheesecake Factory, I order the Chicken Bellagio every single time because it is SO delicious. Well, now that I know that it has 1,981 calories (!) I can, sadly, never order it again. Also, as a general rule no one in our family ever orders fries at restaurants, and we really like Chik-Fil-A because they have good options of fruit and yummy coleslaw instead of fries. I love their coleslaw and usually finish my own little cup as well as any leftovers that my family members do not finish of their own. I will not be doing this anymore, either, because one teeny tiny cup of coleslaw has 580 calories and 50 grams of fat! Jeez! We would be better off eating the fries! Lastly, every time we go to Jason's Deli we order our own things, but then always order a Plain Jane for everyone to share. A Plain Jane is a humongous baked potato that is loaded with everything that makes baked potatoes delicious - butter, sour cream, bacon, and cheese. Obviously, I knew it couldn't be good but split between the five of us, how bad could it be, right? Turns out, bad. Really, really bad. One Plain Jane baked potato has - are you ready for this - 2,291 calories and 146 grams of fat! So. I'm not sure if the lesson here is that you should try and find out the nutritional information for the stuff you get at restaurants, or if you shouldn't because they might end up being ruined for you forever!

Our weekend so far has been kind of a bummer. Emma has been really sick with a high fever and all day yesterday and all night last night she has gone back and forth between sleeping fitfully and crying because she is so hot and miserable. I don't remember her ever having a fever like this, but I hope it goes away soon. I feel terrible for her, and am also disappointed that we have not been able to do the fun stuff we had planned for this weekend.

And, just so this isn't yet another picture-less post, here is a picture of Allie in a dress that she has been wearing for four days now. I bought the girls matching dresses at Costco and I am glad that Allie likes her so much, although at some point I am going to have to wrestle it away from her because by now it's dirty enough that it's starting to gross me out a little bit!

I think I mentioned here awhile back that I was doing the 30 Day Shred workout. I did it for thirty days in October, and I liked it, but when the thirty days were over I totally stopped doing any working out whatsoever. In January I wanted to get back to it, so I planned to do one of the workouts every other day. I also bought a few of Jillian Michaels' other videos and starting adding them in as well. I really noticed a positive difference in my energy level on the days I worked out so I started doing a workout every day, and after awhile I started to feel like I was ready for something more. I had heard other people mention P90X but it seemed a little more hard core than I wanted, and also the workouts are all between sixty and ninety minutes and I didn't think I wanted to devote that much time to working out every single day. Still, I was getting pretty tired of the Jillian videos, so eventually I caved and ordered P90X.

Now I am on day ten of P90X, and I am loving it! I'm sort of amazed at how much I look forward to the workouts every day. I'm guessing that after eighty more days of it, my excitement may be waning, but for now I am really happy to be getting in shape and actually enjoying it!

When I first started the Shred workouts - which are only twenty minutes long - my kids seriously drove me nuts during them. They would constantly try to crawl under my legs and would be in my space, making it very difficult for me to move. They learned pretty quickly, however, that mommy doesn't like it when you sit on her back while she's doing push-ups! Now though, they are more accustomed to it, and (surprisingly) they really don't interfere much at all anymore. Before I start I make sure to get out some toy - Legos, blocks, etc. - that will keep them busy, and I put a strip of tape down the middle of our rug. They are free to play and do whatever they want on their side of the tape, and I am free to move around as needed on my side.

Of course, occasionally someone will need help in the bathroom or need a snack or something and that's totally fine. The only time that bothered me was during the ninety minute yoga session, when they were really making it hard for me to concentrate. Tomorrow is a yoga day again, and instead of doing it at home, I'm planning to go to a Bikram yoga class with my sister-in-law, who goes all the time. I'm excited, but also kind of nervous about that. Not so much about the yoga itself, but about the temperature. They keep the rooms at 105 degrees with some crazy high humidity level, and I can see myself either passing out or, if not that, at least giving up and tearing out of the room to escape the miserable torture of the heat. Let's hope it does not come to that, but I will update and let you know either way. I'm sure you are on the edge of your seat!

Last week one day, Emma asked me when she could get a cell phone. When I told her I didn't know, she asked me how old I was when I first got a cell phone. She seemed pretty incredulous when I told her I was 22, and even more shocked when I told her that cell phones didn't even exist when I was her age. We started talking about when different things were invented, and she asked if TVs were around when I was little. I said yes, but then told her that there weren't any TVs at all when her great-grandmas were little. "So they couldn't even watch movies?" she asked, as if she could hardly believe such a thing were possible. Noah, who had been listening to our conversation, thought about that for a second, then chimed in with, "Yes they could, Emma. They probably just watched them on their iPads!"

So, remember how I mentioned that Emma had lost a couple teeth? Well, the first time around our tooth fairy behaved like a respectable little tooth fairy should, bringing her gift on the actual night that the tooth was lost. The second time around, however, she totally choked - not once, but twice. Both mornings Emma was disappointed, and I guess she wanted to make sure that she wasn't forgotten again, because when I finally stealthily reached under her regular pillow to grab her tooth pillow on the third night, I found it laying on top of this sweet little note:I wrote a sloppy reply, trying to disguise my handwriting, and I guess she fell for it, because she seemed to have forgiven the tooth fairy by the next morning. Hopefully the tooth fairy can get it together before any more teeth are lost!

Tonight we are having a sleepover at our house with two other little girls from Emma's class. I think they've been having a great time so far, but now they've been in bed for about an hour and I can still hear very loud whispering coming from the room. I am tired and would like to be in bed, but I can't really go to sleep while they are all still awake...hence the blog update! Steve said he would keep an eye on them for the rest of the night, but he is watching a movie with his headphones in the living room, which means he is essentially deaf to whatever is going on in Emma's bedroom. Also, being engrossed in the movie, he is completely oblivious to the little girls who are getting out of bed to go to the bathroom (again) or get a drink (again) or just to tell us they can't sleep.

Now that I think of it, I'm pretty sure that there was never very much actual sleep going on at the sleepovers when I was a kid. Maybe I'm being naive to think these girls are actually going to go to sleep? Do the parents really have to stay up as long as the kids are awake? Hmmm... I might have to give this some more thought before agreeing to any more sleepovers in the future! In the mean time, I suppose I better go find something to do to keep me awake for as long as I'm forced to stay up. Yawn.

This sweet girl turned seven last Monday. Doesn't she look like an old kid? We had three celebrations due to different people being in town and different friends being able to come over other days, but it was just our own family on her actual birthday, which was perfect.I guess to celebrate being seven, she has been losing teeth like nobody's business. Her first one was loose for months, and she wouldn't let anyone touch it. Finally it was so loose she could turn it all the way around in her mouth, but it still was not out. My parents were in town at that point, and one morning we all went out for breakfast. Emma spent a good chunk of the meal crying about her tooth, unable to eat, yet still unwilling to let anyone get near it. I was starting to worry that this whole business of losing teeth might be more drama than it was worth. Luckily, that afternoon she was sitting on the couch, absentmindedly moving at around with her tongue, and it just fell out! I think she was surprised at how easy and painless it was. By then she had two more loose teeth, one of which just popped out Friday morning while she was brushing her teeth, completely drama-free. Hurray!

I had been planning to make little tooth pillows for all my kids, but when I mentioned that to Emma last summer, she said she wanted to make one herself. Even though I was the teeniest bit sad that I didn't get to do it, I let her pick out the fabric, plan the design, and sew it all herself (well, I helped stitch on the little heart pocket). So, when that first tooth finally fell out, there was a sweet little pillow already waiting for it. (For some reason, this picture is showing up sideways and I can't for the life of me figure out why. I'm not going to spend any more time on it, so just tilt your head a little and you'll be good.)

The kids have this whole week off school and we don't have a single thing on the calendar. I was worried that we might start getting on each other's nerves with all this uninterrupted togetherness, but this week has been really delightful so far.We've had lots of time to use our new Christmas presents. My grandma gave Noah and Emma these gingerbread kits and they were really excited to put them together. Noah and Allie started decorating the train, but then pretty soon they realized they could eat the candy instead, so most of the candy went in their mouths instead of on the train. I guess bowls filled with colorful little candies are just too hard to resist! Once they had finished eating the candy in the bowls, they started in on the train, and by the next morning it looked like this:Emma's house has fared a little better, although every day it seems there is a little less candy than the day before.That sweet little girl pretty much just sits and works on projects all day long. We gave her a potholder loom for Christmas so she has already made several of those,and she also got some oil pastels that have been keeping her busy. She just blows me away with her artistic ability. At six years old, she is better at drawing than I have ever been.She also just comes up with random crafty ideas and then will spend hours working on them. Today she has been busy making an elaborate New Year's Eve banner. Yesterday she asked me for some aluminum foil, then drew and cut out a bunch of stars and a moon. She wanted me to hang them on the fan in the living room, "to set the mood", she said. For what, I'm not really sure, but I do think they look kind of festive.I am going to be feeling sad next week when she goes back to school!

We have been busy making so many things here. I think my kids are at the most fun age for Christmas. They are so excited about every single aspect of Christmas, particularly the gift-giving one. Noah brings me his toys all day long, wanting me to help him wrap them for Emma and Allie, and Emma is hard at work pretty much every spare minute, making cards, ornaments, and presents for everyone she can think of.One of the things we have made so far is marshmallows. I made simple little baskets for Noah's teachers with hot chocolate, candy canes, and the marshmallows.They were really fun to make, and I think they turned out pretty well. Just one more reason to have more hot chocolate around here!