Best Weekend EVER!!!!

Ok, Saturday started out on a sour note. Our little village was having it's "City-wide Garage Sales". This is something that I look forward to every summer. I always find something great. But, I got up early (on a Saturday and I hate doing that), eager to get out there by 8am!! Well, that slowly morphed into 9am (which is still quite an accomplishment). Once B got up, my partner in garage sale shopping, he decided he didn't really want to go. What? I have to garage sale alone? I went upstairs to see if any of my children (who would normally be up by now) were awake. But, alas, they were not. So, I garage sale shopped all by my lonesome. And, it was pretty uneventful. I went home empty handed. But, Savannah was up when I got home and she and I decided to run across the street to check out our neighbor's sale. Well, I found a great oak quilt rack to hang on the wall. (M mother is a prolific quilter and I can never have enough quilt storage, or display. I'll post pictures of her quilting genius later) Then, we walked to a couple of other nearby sales and Savannah may have found the best garage sale find EVER!!! A claw machine toy. We had to get it. Savannah and Myles are completely obsessed with those stupid claw machines. I have probably spent an entire months earnings on those things, but now they have their own. And, after I get batteries in it today, it will be our favorite thing for a while. The kids even watch youtube videos of claw machine wins and they may be making their own videos now. Then, yesterday afternoon, we went out to a local AT&T shop to get autographs from Carlton Fiske and Joe Morgan. The College World Series is in town and this was one of their fanfest events. Well, while we were in line for the autographs, there was a box to enter to win Coldplay tickets from a local radio station (I love you Q98.5). I entered, telling B that I was going to win and force him to go to the show. (He isn't a big fan, but that soon changed. Sort of) Well, guess who won? ME!! I could not believe it. I never win anything. But, I won. (Actually, I owe all of this to my lucky charm, Savannah. She won us tickets to Wicked, and now she rubbed her luck on me and I won Coldplay tickets) And best of all, I didn't have to answer any Coldplay trivia that I wouldn't know nor did I have to talk on the radio giving the name of the station that sent me to Coldplay (they'll always be Sweet 98 to me).

So, we headed down to the CWS fanfest at Rosenblatt and Myles got to do the batting cages and pitching events. He had a good time. Savannah, however, was quickly bored. And, while we were down there waiting for Myles to get into a batting clinic, I was mistaken for Gwenyth Paltrow. ha ha. That's right, I look exactly like Gwenyth Paltrow. (I take that as a great compliment and that guy is my new BFF)

So, we dropped the kids of with my parents and off to Coldplay we went. It was incredible. Our seats were sort of in the back, but right in the center of the back and we could see the stage really well. Even B, the non-fan, thought the show was better than he expected (and that is truely high praise coming from him). I took as many pictures and video as my illegally smuggled in camera could take. Of course, all of the pictures turned out blurry, but I'm posting the best one and some video for your enjoyment. Toward the end of the show, Coldplay walked across the floor of the arena and up into the back only 2 sections over from me. They performed several songs from there and I got several songs on video during that part of the show. It was so awesome! They even gave out free CD's at the end of the show. You can download them off of their website, if you are interested. I'll try to post the video later, it's not cooperating right now.

Tonight, we are going to try to get tickets to the Texas game at the CWS. There may be more adventures ahead!

Putt-Putt or Grump-Grump

Yesterday, I had this brilliant idea of taking Myles to the batting cages. I had found a place with batting cages, putt-putt, and a rock wall. Then, to seal our fate, today at work, I found some coupons for this place and we were off to bat and do whatever else struck our fancy. Once we arrived, we discovered that we should have brought our own batting helmet and bat. Thank goodness Myles brought his batting gloves, or we may have just driven for nearly an hour only to have to turn back. Once Myles got a look at the helmets, he lost all enthusiasm. Hey, I can completely understand. When you are doing what you love, you want to look cool. But, I forced him to make the best of it. So, into the batting cage he begrudgingly went sporting a crappy batting helmet and wielding a crappy bat. Then during the first batting session, B made the mistake of critiquing every swing Myles took. So, since Myles doesn't take criticism well, he was no longer interested in batting after the use of our first token (first of 15 tokens). Crap. So, in an effort to improve the moods, I suggest that we do a round of putt-putt and then come back to the cages. "I guess," was the enthusiastic response I got. I made the mistake of letting Savannah go first at the first 3 holes, which made Myles mad. Then, Savannah was getting the ball into the hole in fewer strokes than Myles, so that also worked against my efforts at improving his mood. After pounding his club against the ground and after hitting his golf ball so hard that 3 strangers nearly lost an eye, I forced him to sit out the next two holes.
Then, something in the universe shifted. Suddenly, the game became "Who can get the ball in the hole faster". In this game, there are no turns and no fouls. And everyone thinks this is fun. So, for about 4 holes I was able to enjoy the kids having fun together. Of course, by this time, B had had enough of this place and was growing increasingly grouchy. (Can't please 'em all) Once we had reached the 7th hole we discovered that the water in this place smelled terrible and there were gnats everywhere. That must have been one of the challenges of the course because there seemed to be a cloud of gnats at the start of each hole. I could hardly see through all of the gnats. Then, Savannah mistakenly stepped in one of the many puddles that were all over the course and soaked her sock and foot. That was the end of her putt-putt pleasantness. Fun was over! Here is the problem puddle pictured next to Myles. (He, of course, thought Savannah's misfortune was the height of hilarity. That only worsened the situation). So, Savannah walked off, sullenly.

She, then refused to be anywhere within my vision. And, I was forced to keep track of her by peeking through the shrubbery. I tried getting a picture of her grumpy face through a bush, feeling like a member of the paparazzi.

So, once we had reached the end of the 18 holes, Myles had greatly improved his mood. Due mostly to the fact that he won since Savannah had quit early. (We weren't keeping score anyway, but you know sibling rivalry. If you can weasel a victory to hold over the siblings head, all the better)

So, at this point, I have one happy, pseudo-victorious kid, one not happy kid who was refusing to be within 100 yards of us, and one grumpy B lingering in our shadows. "So, who's ready to try the batting cages again?" I chirped. B perked up, Myles said yes, and Savannah was clear on the other side of the course and was pretending she couldn't hear me. We eventually made it over to the batting cages and everyone, but me (embarassment was not going to be served up to me this pleasant afternoon), did some batting. They had fun, but pooped out quite quickly. Those balls come so rapidly!

Days tally:

Number of happy golfers: 1

Number of wet, soggy feet: 2

Number of gnats inhaled by me: 237

Number of angry sisters: 1

Number of balls hit: 121

Number of tears shed: 1,000,001

Number of days I will need to recover from my afternoon of putt-putting: I'll let you know

Watch Where You Step!

Today the kids were outside looking in the shed for a missing scooter. Instead of a scooter, they found an inchworm. (Way cooler than a dumb old scooter anyway). We tried to take a picture of the inch worm. You can kind of see it in this picture.

It was very hard to get a picture of the little guy since he was so small. So, I left the kids outside to play with the inchworm. A little while later, I went outside to round them up so that we could go run a couple of errands. I discovered that my pot of snapdragons was now sitting in the middle of our front porch and many of the snapdragons had been picked and were laying in a pile beside the planter. I grumbled inwardly and yelled for the kids to come up, while I put the planter back where it belonged. "NOOOOOOO!!! STOOOPPPP!!" Savannah yelled as she ran up to me. "That's protecting Inchy," she told me, as she dropped to her knees to frantically search the pile of snapdragon debrit for Inchy. "He's not here," she wailed. I tried to explain to her that he probably either inched his way into the snapdragon pot, where he'd be better hidden, or he was hiding underneath one of the leaves at her feet. He is incredibly small. Then, I made the mistake of saying, "Watch where you step!" She immediately picked up her feet to check the bottom of her shoes and then continued the search on the porch. "I'm not leaving until I find him," she informed me. I went inside, knowing this search would become quite boring in about 90 seconds.

Right on time, she came into the house and said, "Well, you murdered him." "What?" I asked. "I found him smushed in a puddle of water that was shaped exactly like your foot. So, you murdered him. You didn't watch where you stepped!"

So, I am the murderer of Inchy. Her CSI skills have confirmed me as the guilty party. RIP Inchy.

Laffy Taffy

What's in that stuff? I was sitting at Myles's baseball game last night and my dad had brought a bag of Laffy Taffy for Savannah. Well, bring a bag of candy within 25 feet of me and I'm having some. So, approximately 4 Laffy Taffys later, those jokes on the wrapper were sounding pretty hilarious. My dad had been dipping into the bag as well, and he was laughing quite heartily at the stupid jokes as well. It seemed that everything we said was funny. My inner standup comedian had been unleashed. But, today, I'm thinking back on some of the things I said during the game, while I was thinking myself quite hilarious, and I'm now wishing I had just kept my mouth shut. I hate when hindsight points out the fact that I'm a total idiot. I may have to move to a new town and a new life all thanks to Laffy Taffy. Is there a witness protection program for people who have made an ass of themself after eating a handful (ok, several hands full) of Laffy Taffys? I'm staying away from that stuff from now on.
Joke 1: Whats green and pecks wood? Woody Wood Pickle
Joke 2: What has more lives than a cat? A frog -- it croaks every night.
Joke 3: How do you make an orange laugh? Tickle it's navel.
Eat 10 Laffy Taffys and these jokes will sound much funnier.

Pumpkins

I went out last night and bought two more plants for my yard. One to fill the hole I left after moving my hydrangea and then we found a grass called bunny tail grass that Savannah and I just couldn't pass up. After planting them while fighting off approximately 50 million mosquitoes, B came out to inspect my work. His first comment… "Why are you watering weeds?" That comment earned him the skunk eye. (The skunk eye was made more effective due to the swelling caused by the 15 mosquitoes currently feeding on my eyelid) So, he must now be taken around the yard and shown where he cannot mow. He is quite famous for mowing down all of my landscaping. He's a true menace with the mower.
On an exciting note, our pumpkins are starting. I'm going to chronicle our summer and fall of pumpkin and watermelon growing this year. We have grown competition size pumpkins for 3 years now. This year we are going to attempt to recreate the first year. That year I planted the pumpkins right next to some watermelon. Then, our neighbors across the street cut down a large tree in their front yard. After the tree fell, approximately 40 gagillion bees that had been living happily in the hollowed out trunk of that tree became suddenly homeless. Do not dispair, though, they quickly found new accomodations. Behind the siding of the front corner of our house. I was at work, when this happened, but B called me saying that he couldn't see out of any of the windows on the front of the house because a swarm of bees was covering them. All of them. Yikes!
So, anyway, they rehomed themselves and we had to figure out what to do about all of these bees living in our house. (40 gagillion bees in your house cannot be good, right?) Turns out exterminators are not allowed to remove bees and you have to find a beekeeper. However beekeepers aren't always the best at not screwing up your house while trying to get the queen bee out, nor are they responsible for any repairs. So, after talking with many honey producers and a couple of beekeepers we decided to leave the bees alone and hope the winter killed them off (which it did). But, while we were providing shelter to the bees we were also attempting to grow our first crop of competition size pumpkins. We planted them right next to watermelons and thanks to the bees and their pollinating ways, we ended up with patermelons. They might just have been the best accident ever. We got our huge pumpkins and discovered when we carved them that the insides smelled like watermelon. No nasty pumpkin smell for us. It might have been the best pumpkin carving year ever. But, once our bees died off, our pumkin growing success died as well. Last year I had to pollinate the pumpkins myself and this year we are going to self pollinate again and try to recreate the patermelons. This time I'm saving the seeds. So, we have started about 6 pumpkin plants and 2 watermelon plants. And, we'll see how it goes. So, here are last years pumpkins:

And the year before that (these are the patermelons):

Self pollinating didn't happen until too late in the season, so we didn't get any humongous pumpkins, but this year we are more pumpkin smart and will have better results, I'm determined. And if things don't go according to plan, we may just have to start keeping bees out back as well. This is one of our baby pumpkin plants:

In an effort to make my son proud, I feel obligated to mention the fact that The Big Unit, Randy Johnson, earned his 300th win last night playing against the Nationals. Here is a picture Myles took of him last year, I think, when he got to see him playing for the Yankees.

Baseball and the ever amusing Falsetto

Yesterday, Myles had a baseball game that was held at a baseball field in the neighborhood that I grew up in. I had a lot of fun driving my family all through my old neighborhood and pointing out the houses of my childhood friends. I drove them past my elementary school, the park I used to play at, and finally past my old house. It looked nothing like I remembered it. NOTHING. It was a little disturbing to me. Shouldn't that house be kept original so that when I become famous it can be turned into a museum? People cannot tour through my old bedroom, when there has been an addition to the house, which I'm quite certain has changed the perfectness of my former bedroom. Did they dare to remove the blue floral wallpaper that so perfectly coordinated with my Holly Hobby bedspread? I hope not.
Anyway, the entire neighborhood seems different. The trees grew to huge heights, most of the houses have changed, and most likely, most of the people have moved. The kids were quickly growing tired of my stories of which trees I used to be able to climb to the top of, which cul-de-sac was the scene of my getting run over by a Big Wheel (I'll explain this story in a later post), and the house that used to belong to the most evil, scary boys I knew. "Ok, Mom. That's great. Where are the baseball fields?" So, I drove us to the baseball fields and everyone quickly ran from the car.
Now, first things first. Where the hell is summer? I think this baseball season is about half over and I have yet to go to a game where I'm not freezing. Our pool is open, but if it's not warm enough for shorts to be worn, then there is no way I'm setting foot anywhere near that pool.
The boys start warming up before the game and one of the other moms asks me if the umps are any older than our boys. I look over at them and discover that this game is being umped by 12 year olds. Myles is on the 11 year old team. And these 12 year olds are wearing sunglasses and are visibly drunk with power. The coaches were even being ordered around by these little umps. Then the game started and Savannah noticed something strange when the ump would call a strike. She and I are both easily bored at sporting events and have amused ourselves many times by making fun of the way the umps call strikes. Well, it turns out that our 12 year old ump had the funniest strike call ever. It was falsetto strike boy. I had to take a video.

The game was a great one for us, though. Arlington won 24 to 6. And the boys were worried that the Omaha teams were going to be tough to beat. Myles got 2 hits and earned himself 2 packs of baseball cards. Woo-hoo!

Now, there is a True Blood marathon on HBO tonight and I have to go tuck myself in to some Vampire love.

Invisible Woman

I think this might be the plight of most mothers, but I discovered yesterday that I have become the invisible woman. I decided to join the modern world and start a facebook page. So, I spent nearly an hour looking for a recent picture of myself and couldn't find one. Not one. I seriously only found two pictures of myself. One is the one I used on facebook, and the other was from a year and a half ago. I have made the effort to take pictures of my kids as they have grown and have pictures of our family at every holiday event, but I am missing from every single one of them. I am going to have to start assigning photography duties to a different family member for each holiday, so that I can appear in some of the pictures. Otherwise, my kids will grow up and look back on these pictures and wonder if they even had a mother. They have a dad and dogs, but there is no evidence of a mother. She's the invisible woman.

Ok, I wanted to start this blog over a month ago, and as I should have known, I got too busy to post anything. So, for a quick catch up. Myles and Savannah are now officially on summer vacation. We survived their track and field day. Barely. Myles had to run the last race of the day and Mother Nature chose the 30 seconds prior to his race to open up the skies and pour rain down on us. Myles was thoroughly soaked by the end of the race and the temperature that day was about 55 degrees, so he was freezing as well. He was none too happy about it either. But, the realization that there was no school to go to the next day made things seem better. That and the Taco Bell lunch that was promised after everyone took hot showers.

Myles has been engrossed in his baseball season and has his tournament this weekend. Stay tuned to hear how that goes. Last year I sat at his games without any sunscreen and received the worst sunburn of my life. This year, it's supposed to be cool and cloudy and I will still be covered in SPF 1000.

Savannah and I went to see Wicked a couple of weeks ago. It was fabulous. Actually, I went to see it with B on a Tuesday night (the tickets were a birthday gift). He was not counting down the days and minutes to the show as I was, but I have sat through many a boring guitar show with him, so it was payback time. Anyway, we were sitting right in the center in the second row. It was fabulous. I could gush about it for hours. And, it was the very first broadway show I have ever seen. I got dressed up, we went out to dinner, and I forgot my camera. (My camera and I have a love - hate relationship). We got to the show and there were several time during it that I had to give B an elbow to the ribs because I could see his head bobbing. Now, to be fair, B works nights and his sleeping schedule is completely screwed up, but this theater was filled with people who would be willing to stab him for his seat, so nodding off was not allowed. He made it through the show and when asked by my mother what he thought, he responded, "It was pretty good if you like all that singing and dancing crap." High praise indeed. I was completely in love with the show and found out that there is a lottery for tickets each day. So, B thought it would be fun to try for tickets through the lottery and I could take our daughter, Savannah. And, guess what? We won tickets. So Savannah and I sat in the 4th row and our tickets only cost us $25 apiece. She loved it as much as I did and I learned how fun it is to go to a show with someone who can get as excited about it as I was. We were given buttons that said "I won the Wicked Lottery" and Savannah wore hers proudly all week. She is now my official theater buddy. I plan to take her to many more shows.

Alright, I'm going to end this post before my hands cramp up. Check back for more!