Opportunity

Sometimes my kids just surprise the heck out me. Sometimes is funny. Sometimes it saddens me. I think, "didn't I teach them better than this"? or "Oh wow they learned that from me, oops". Other times I just do not know what to say and just have to walk away and think on it. I have been thinking on this for a few days now.

Some times bed times are crazy. They usually watch some Nick or Disney in their room before going to sleep. If I want them to go to bead early or I NEED them to go to bed early for my sanity and their well being, I will say pick a movie and you can watch it in your room. The other night they were just wound up. It was a movie in your room night.

About 30 minutes into the movie was the first warning...

"You guys need to lay down and watch the movie."

A little bit later...

"Tommy, Timmy, if it was time to play you would not be in bed"

A little more later...

"Alright guys, if I come in here again I am turning your movie off".

Ten minutes later I was maturely stomping into their room saying (gently of course) "OK, goodnight, movie off, you won't obey".

This then started the "NO NO NO we will be good. One more chance. Please PLEase PLEASE" barrage of begging. Then came the tears and then a full blown fit. Of course I was completely calm and composed through it all, you know.


I then again so maturely, yelled at my 8 year old...

"If you don't stop this right now I am gonna have Daddy take this TV out of your room for good".

He immediately stop the crying. Paused and yelled back...

"Fine, but tell him to replace it with a bigger one"!

I did not know what to say. He heard that opportunity and took it. They will not be getting a bigger TV. And I need to think through my threats a little better.

Proof is in the pee

We squeezed alot of "Holiday Stuff" into today. In downtown Carmel every Saturday in December you can see Santa, see real reindeer, and take a horse and carriage ride. There are people caroling on the streets. A man playing the violin. He gives the kids bells and they have a sing along. So it was a very fun time. We were very cold but had the essential cold weather gear to make it through the afternoon.

All of my little ones still believe in Santa. Tommy(8) Trinity(8) Timmy(5) This year there were several questions by the two older of the little ones that showed they are starting to figure it out. I came up with completely logical answers for both the little doubters and they are still convinced. But this will probably be the last year. I almost really messed up one time.

I said "we are going to see Santa today."


And Tommy said "oh we are going to the mall?"


"No we are going to Downtown Carmel"


"But Conner said he was going to see Santa and he went to the mall. So we have to go to the mall."


" No, Santa is Downtown too"


"Huh?!? What do you mean?"


OOOPS!!!! Oh man I new before I even finished the sentence I messed up big time. Okay think fast Kristy. You can do it!!!

"Okay guys alot of kids do not know this but it would take forever for Santa to actually talk to every kid and we could not all fit in one place so he has Helper Santas to be at all sorts of different places and they all report back to him. The real one happens to be where we are going today."

They totally believed me. Especially Timmy the 5 year old. He knows that he gets presents from us, other family, friends, and Santa. So he was really contemplating what he wanted to ask for from Santa. Then its really special.

We waited for 20 minutes in the cold. I do not think they were even aware how cold it was. When we walked into Santa's cottage they were in awe. So excited. Tommy could hardly speak. It was so cute. I could hardly hear him, so I have to figure out what he asked for. Timmy had no problem letting him know what he wanted, a Webkinz lizard. "Okay Santa, will you remember that?" Santa did a quick glance at me and I nodded. "Yes Timmy I will remember" Santa said. Trinity was quiet but shared her wish for Littlest Pet Shop. She did not require confirmation.


I am going to soak it all in this year. No matter how corny it is.


Then we went to see the reindeer. They were cute but the one kept peeing. Timmy said looking at the pee "see they are real".

No deep thoughts on this entry. Tori and the girls got first place at Regionals this weekend. Cheerleading is not what it used to be. They work so very hard. I am so proud of them. On to State this Saturday!!!!

The No Part

One of the best things about children is they do not have "filters" like we develop later on in life. Their thoughts are honest. They can say it like it is. The real answer. Not something they think others want to hear. Or spin it to sound gracious or politically correct.

Today was a tougher day for Tommy and I. We were at each other from 5 minutes after the alarm went off this morning. Tommy is my sensitive one, but at the same time he needs firmness. So, it is a balancing act with him. After 20 minutes of him trailing on my heels and asking

"Mom, can I go to Conner's"?

"No".

"Mom, my home works done, can I go to Conner's"?

"NO".

"Mom after dinner can I go to Conner's"?

"NO!".

"Mom when can I go to ....


I spin around at warp speed. Not screeching but definitely loud I say "Tommy, what part of No do you not understand"?

He thought for 1/2 a second looked me straight in the eyes and answered "The NO part".

Well, that said alot to me. Sometimes, I think we all have a problem with The No Part.

George Washington

Holy Cow!!! I had no idea how long it has been since I blogged. I really like to blog and just ramble on. Then its fun to edit it into something I think people will find amusing. Not that many people read this.

Life has gotten busy now that every one is in school. Taylor is in 11th grade. He has the normal sixteen year old attitude, but other than that he is so awsome. He makes me laugh alot. He is so unafraid of what people think of him. In a good way. He has a project that his class has to present in front of the other students. He said he wanted to dress like George Washington. I gave him a $15 budget and off he went. He and his friend present their reoprts on different days, so they are sharing a costume. They went to Goodwill, Walmart, and the Party Store. Last night at dinner my husband received and email to his phone and the picture below was attached. Needless to say we both laughed pretty hard. It brings a smile to my face every time I think about Taylor in that outfit.





The next time he is completely ignoring me, only takes out half the trash, or leaves 35 gross dishes in his room, I will think of him in that outfit and he may get off a little lighter.

10 things you do not want to hear from your kids!

1. This was due yesterday. (any school project).

2. Just hear me out completely before you say any thing.

3. If I tell you something do you promise not to be mad?

4. One child saying I'm gonna tell mom, and the other child frantically begging
them not to tell mom.

5. Mom, how do you use the carpet cleaner?

6. Does the remote still work if it gets wet?

7. Why is that squirrel eating our chair?

8. Conner's mom (neighbor boy) will be here in a few minutes to talk to you.

9. Timmy's bleeding.

10. SILENCE!!!

Oh my goodness!!!

I have one question. How does someone so tiny do so much damage? Anyone?...Anyone?...

Here is the story. I am up stairs cleaning out drawers. Timmy is down stairs watching Backyardigans. All seems peaceful and calm. Then I hear CRASH!! THUD!! and a kinda POOF!! all in 3 seconds. I yell "what was that"? Then I hear these words..."Oh my Goodness, mom we have a problem". That is not what you want to hear come out of a four year old's mouth.

So what could it have been. The typical options would be, he dropped the milk, or knocked over the toy bucket, or ran into the screen door and took it off the track (happens alot in warmer weather) or even knocked the shelf off the wall while diving off the stairs into a pile of pillows. These are common causes of loud noises in my house.

Okay, so, back to my post crash noise question "what was that"? And his reply was..."the fireplace fell out of the wall. Let me repeat...THE FIREPLACE FELL OUT OF THE WALL!!!

I was just kinda dumb founded. What could that mean. Some ash blew out, he knocked a door off? So I get up to see what happened, and he meant what he said. The fireplace fell out of the wall. There was insulation and ash and the whole front portion of my firplace on the floor of my family room.

As soon as I made eye contact with Timmy he said "well, you see mom, I was...." the rest is still a blur. I just had to laugh. In his mind he had a completely logical explanation. It had to do with his sword and bad guys and his imaginary friend Matt.

A mess like this just had to be looked at for a bit. We had PB&J's for lunch. All while gazing at our lovely mess. I just laughed every time I really thought about it. Only one of my children could accomplish this.

The fire place was not to hard to fix and the ash and stuff just vacuumed up. Two things were learned because of this situation. Timmy will not be using the fireplace doors as a "sword holder" anymore, and I should clean the ash out of my fire place more often.

The Blank Pages

My family has a new Family Time activity. We love Rock Band. If any one reading this has not tried it, I am telling you, you need to try it. It is so much freakin fun. It comes with a Microphone ( which doubles as the tamborine), drums, and a guitar. If you get an extra guitar, you have a bass guitar. We gave it to the kids for Christmas. My husband said after watching the kids for a few songs, "let me try". He was hooked. I kid you not, they all played Rock Band for 8 hours straight Christmas Day. Grammy and Poppy even got in on the action. I usually just watch. I only sing for the band when there is no other alternative.

They, have gotten more serious now. See, as you play songs and do well, you get scored in Stars on your performances. If you do well it opens up more venues and you get more gigs to play like a real band. Are you following all that? They all tend to practice alone sometimes between band sessions. I do have to say it is quite amusing to come down stairs at 1am and find my husband in the dark, in his boxers, playing a toy guitar. "what are you doing" I ask. "Practicing, I just need to be able to 4 star this song" he answers.

I am just glad they all have an activity they can do together and have fun. Let me know if you would like to swing by one night and catch The Blank Pages in action. Its a sight to behold.

Love your little Natives.

A while ago I read an article about the digital age we live in. We all live in it whether we like it or not. But, how did we get here was the idea. Are we Digital Immigrants, or Digital Natives. The basis of this is that people born before 1980 are all Digital Immigrants and people born 1980 and later are Digital Natives. People born after 1980 have never known an undigital world. There are some of us like my self, born in 1970, that even though I do not fall into the Native status I feel like a Native but I still know too much of the "old world" to truly be of the Native mind set. Even though the Natives have seen some of our primitive devices in a closet or out in the garage or in old pictures they have never experienced or used any of them. Here is an example, try to follow it may be confusing at first...

Tori: Hey mom we were at Sammy's grandma's house an we found this thing in the closet it was so cool.

Me: What was it?

Tori: It was like this box thingy, it had buttons, , but the box was like a key board, it plugged in but it did not have a screen so we could not see what it did.

Me: Tori did it have a black roller thing at the top, kinda in the box part?

Tori" Yea, how did you know?

Me: (now try to imagine the confusion and amazement all at the same time in my voice) Tori it was a typewriter.

Tori: What's that? (and she truly was not kidding)

So then I had to explain typewriters and answer all the questions that followed. "So you couldn't save anything? How do you back up and fix an error? how do you spell check? what if you need more than one copy? How did you add pictures?" I was not about to try to explain how we digital immigrants actually created the phrase "copy and paste" by actually copying and pasting.

Oh my gosh, this was such a wake up call for me. So, now when I see her texting away on the phone or Taylor typing 120 words a minute (he really does type that fast) all while listen to their ipods and answering 3 IM's and editing the digital movies they just made to up load to YouTube, I need to remind my self this is all normal in their world.

Just like my mom used holler across the room, "scoot back from the TV its bad for your eyes, or is that phone attached to your ear"? I find my self telling my kids they are going to have carpel tunnel from texting or rot their brains from to many video games.

It starts so young now. My 4 year old, Timmy, is definitely of the next, more advanced generation of digital natives. His generation will probably make fun of Taylor and Tori's devices just like we look back and laugh at how big cell phones used to be. He can almost out do Taylor(16) on most video games and can already get on and off the computer all by himself. He is smart in reference to what he thinks I want to hear too. The other day I walked in to the room and he must have sensed that I was going to tell him to turn off the games now. He quickly put up his hand and said "wait, wait, wait,... Mommy, this game is not bad for my brains". I gave him 10 more minutes and apparently his brains were tired. I came back and he was asleep mid game.




Well that's all for now. This may not be bad for my brains, but I only type about 20 words a minute so my fingers and brains are tired.

Best Buy 490

The Best Buy that Mitch works for did this and sent it out to all the other Best Buy Stores. This guy is really singing. All I could say was WOW!! Have a listen.

Merry Christmas!!

Gracefully...

Wow, it has been quite a while since my last post. All is well in the Page house at the current time. I will settle for that. With 7 family members you never know who will have the next crisis or illness so a good day is an accomplishment. We do have to go get Taylor's bracket reattached at 3:30, hmmm, wonder how that happened, Jolly Rancher anyone? If that is the worst thing today, we'll take it!



Well my new obsession is Myspace and Facebook. This is probably a predictor of the down fall or the process of becoming uncool for these web sites. When a 37 year old suburban house wife catches on to something, its probably on its way out or at least its shelf life with the younger crowd is diminishing. ( I can't believe I just typed "younger crowd", I am getting old) . Anyway, I love these outlets. I am reconnecting with old friends and can see what family members are up to. I browse alot, looking for more people to reconnected with. Its always fun to see a person's page show up that you never expected to have a page and its a really cool page at that!!



One thing my Myspace and Facebook pages have made me realize is that I am getting old. I understand 37 is not really old, but it sure as heck is not 17. Some of these people I have not seen since high school. I mean I still look like me right? So why don't they look like them? I got up in the attic the other day and brought down my yearbooks. Now when I get a message from a friend from high school I can figure out who they were if I don't remember the name.

Most people look really good, and once I match their high school face to their current face I can totally see it and I have the "Oh Yea, I remember you" moment. I wonder how long it takes them to figure out who I was/am.



Tori walked up to me while my year book was open. After starring at the page for a good while, she asked, "Which one are you?". She did not even recognize her own mother. I said "Oh Tori, I love you but go away", then Tori screeched with excitement, "There you are, no way, Oh my gosh, you had a mullet!" I corrected her "No I did not, boys had mullets, I, had a BI-LEVEL. It was VERY in at the time." I recently pulled out Mitch's picture where he had the Flock of Seagulls hair cut. I thought she was going to pee her pants laughing.

Oh well. I guess we all loose our high school face, and I can only do the best I can with my current face. At church the other day I said to my friend Brenda in the bathroom, "look, I have neck wrinkles". Then I proceeded to show her what I wished I could pull up, pull back, or reput here and there. She so wisely said, "No Kristy, we are just going to age gracefully." Fine, what ever.

Yes I guess I will try to just age gracefully. Actually, I ought to look that up in the dictionary first to see what that really would mean or if there are any variations of 'gracefully' that could work.

Pachelbel Bedtime

This is soooo true!!!

"Normal"

It has been a while since my last blog. All is well in the Page house. Even on days when it may not be "well" it is at least "normal" for the Page house. These are a few things that have happened in our lives.

1)We went camping for Labor day and came home proud owners of a new puppy. We named her Cara. I thought if I can take care of 5 kids I can do a puppy. Potty training a puppy is so much different than a child. When one of my kids was not doing well at potty training, I would just put the diaper back on and give myself a break. Well if you ever come over and Cara is sporting a diaper, don't be shocked because I am just about at that point.

2)I took Taylor in for what we thought was just a filling at the Dentist and it turned into an emergency root canal the next day. That was not fun for Taylor or my bank account. That was a horrible Mom moment. When we first arrived at the Dentist, I asked the receptionist if I needed to stay or could run an errand. She said "oh, he's almost 16, its no problem we will take good care of him, don't worry". So I did my errand and returned. When I returned and walked in, it was like the twilight zone. The Dentist was waiting in the waiting room for me. I'm sure my face said "oh crap" and then he said "come with me Mrs. Page". I walked in to the actual procedure area and there was Taylor, looking like a deer in the headlights. His face was saying "what the heck just happened to me and where were you?" Plus, he was drooling, he was so numb and could hardly talk, and had blood, BLOOD I say, all over his pants. People are not supposed to get bloody at the Dentist. Oh, felt like the worst mother EVER!!! Well the bottom line is his cavity was bigger than they thought. The Dentist had to drill so much of the tooth away that the tooth broke and the root was exposed and a few other things that I can't remember, because at that point everything the Dentist was saying was just spinning in my head. All I could think was I was not there for Taylor while all this happened. We went to the specialist the next day for the root canal (which went fine, the doctor even called Taylor personally that night to make sure he was doing alright) and now he is getting a crown next week. Worst Mother Ever!!!

3)My sister in law, Libbi, had her baby. Her name is Hazel Addison Ritz. She is beautiful. Dorey loves her little sister. They are all doing well for being sleep deprived. Hazel is in the up all night, sleep all day phase. I remember those no sleep days. Oh, how I love the smell of a baby' neck sound asleep on your shoulder. I am so glad Mitch and I took care of that possibility, because after holding Hazel I was ready for another one. Then I went home and tried to love on my baby Timmy, but he smelled like Doritos and he told me I was blocking the his game, "Move before my guy gets killed". I will love on him later, and on the bright side, I will sleep tonight.


That's all for now. I will write again soon. Maybe tonight.

Nap Time

I was just talking to my Dad while running a few errands. He asked me how I was and what I was up to, that sort of thing. I call my parents alot while driving and also at night about 10pm. My mom said every time the phone rings about 10pm my Dad says "Krissy's up". Obviously I have been up all day, but about 10pm is when the kids are all in bed, the house is quiet and i can actually get things done. Phone calls ( I have a few friends that know it is safe to call each other this late), laundry folded, floors mopped. I can get more done in that 2 hours than if I tried to do it through the day. However then I usuallly spend about 2 hours after that with Mitch watching tv or movies. So I am tired in the morning. Over the summer if I wanted a nap I could easily fit one in. But not anymore. We are in busy mode. When the alarm went off this morning I laid there for a while plotting, figuring, thinking of how I could fit a nap in today because the promise of a nap was all that was going to get me out of bed. I allowed myself to be fooled by the illusuion of it fitting it somwhere and up I went. It is now 3:34pm. Reality has set in. No nap today. I am brewing a new pot of coffee and then I should be good again. At least for a few hours.

Mandatory Baths

Its been a while since my last blog. Some of you may have viewed one blog that no longer exists (I deleted it) . I vented and then decided I did not like it anymore so it's gone.

It has been crazy around here trying to get used to every one in school. Homework, taking and picking people up from activities, mandatory baths, all the things that the school year requires. I mean just baths alone add alot to my day. Obviously Taylor and Tori are on their own now. Tommy, Trinity, and Timmy are a different story. In the summer if we were at the pool that could count as a bath. In my opinion, if there are enough chemicals in that pool to keep the water sanitary after 100 people are in it each day my kids have to be clean. At least sanitized. Plus I actually kinda like that chlorine smell. If it was a "strong chemical day" at the pool then we would just rinse off in the showers at the pool. Running in the sprinkler for an hour or two also counts in the summer. The wet grass falls off as they dry. The slip-n- slide definitely counts cause they always put shampoo on it to make it more slippery. If you try this at home make sure it is the tear free kind.

But now, baths are back to having to be real baths and on a regular basis. With Timmy and Tommy, first we go through the 10 minutes of which toys that are not technically bath tub toys that they can each take in. No, you can't take in the walkie talkies. No, you can't take in the remote control robot. No, not the raft from the garage. No, not your new book. No, I mean yes, yes, you can take in the lego's, but just a few. Then the mandatory 5 towels are put down to catch the water and I change my clothes and we start. First we play a bit then we argue over who gets washed first or who went first last time. Finally it is all said and done and I have a mound of wet towels and two clean boys. I do have to say though that one of the best smells in the world is a clean little boy in jammies right after his bath.

Trinity is easy with the bath part. She just quietly soaks. Playing with her Barbies in the tub or empty shampoo bottles playing Store or pretending to cook. When she is ready she yells "Kristy I'm Ready" She washes her herself but I do her hair. Her hair, long beautiful curly blond hair. She dries and dresses her self in jammies then we start the 15 minute process of brushing out that beautiful blond curly hair. I try to be gentle but with every snap of her head I am saying "ooohh sorry, oops so sorry, oh! did that hurt? We have tried every detangler we can find. It doesn't help. We just get through it slowly.

I know it is one of my jobs as a parent to keep my children clean and tidy. And I do, but, there are so many more options in the summer. At least I think of them as options.

Resale

Uuugghhh!!! It's back to school time. I mean, yeah I am ready for my kids to go back, am just not looking forward to the expense of back to school. School lists now are 50 items long. The thing that bugs me is it's not just school supplies anymore, it's classroom supplies. All the educational necessities plus everything the teacher feels he or she can get us to contribute. Some teacher, some where, one day probably said at a meeting "just put it all on the student supply list, even if we get half that's a huge score." (If you're a teacher please don't leave me nasty comments, I'm just venting!)

Supplies are not even the worst part though. It's the back to school clothes. I mean first off, the stores are advertising all these great Fall clothes. Has no one figured out yet that it is 98 degrees with 100% humidity in the middle of August? I don't want corduroy pants with sweater vest and a long sleeve shirt. ( Like any of my kids would wear that anyway) Really, we need summer clothes until late October/November. I don't want to buy a bunch of new summer clothes when they have plenty and I don't want to buy Fall clothes and have them pass out on the play ground or walking from the bus stop from heat stroke, but,they MUST have new School Clothes for that first week or OH MY GOSH the horror!!!! Tommy and Trinity are not really that big of a problem. A couple new t-shirts and cool new book bag and they are feeling brand new! Taylor is "anti label" so he is not too expensive, but he has had a huge growth spurt and I really would win The Worst Mother Of The Year award if I made him wear his jeans from last year. Flood?!? Now, Tori is the challenge. She also has grown and not much fits. Tori is what I would call "not anti-label" she would be more like "label". Oh the challenge begins, because I do not have a Label budget.

There is one new piece of arsenal in this war fought between parent and teenager that has come on the scene in the past 10 years or so. The resale store. HALLELUJAH!!! Hallelujah!!!! When I was younger the only kind of resale store was Goodwill or Salvation Army. Back then Goodwill was nothing like Goodwill today. The Goodwill near my house even has a Boutique section of all name brand clothes. You know you are a seasoned resale shopper when you are standing in Goodwill on 1/2 price day and you actually say ( and out loud to boot) "Yea, that shirt is cute, but there is no way I would pay $1.49 for it". The best though is when you find what should be in the Boutique section, but it is in the Regular section, and its half price. Jackpot!! The next day when your friend is like " cute shirt" you actually say "Goodwill, 1/2 price" its like a badge of honor.

The nice resale stores are just that, Nice. (They usually won't buy the clothes I take in there because after my kids wear them they aren't nice enough anymore, LOL) People have caught on to the used clothes thing now. Its just like a used car. You can get just as nice a car for alot less money if you let someone else buy it first and drive it off the lot. Then 6 month to a year later you buy it after it's traded in and save so much money. The first guy looks silly. It is the same with clothes. Yesterday I went to a resale store and bought Tori 2 pair of Abecrombie jeans and 6 Abercrombie shirts for $51. That was great deal. Later I saw 2 of the shirts still in the Abercrombie store new.

I am very thankful though for the people who can afford all these expensive clothes new, because some one has to buy them new, or I could not buy them used. So chop! chop! Keep shopping people.

Okay people I think it is about time I let you all know the truth. I dumped my husband and ran off with Peyton Manning. I have tried to hide this from you all but Peyton would not leave me alone so I finally gave in and said I would marry him. He said I could pick any ring I wanted and this is what I picked. The best ring in the world!! He gave up a bit of a fight but in the end I won. LOL!!!

My father in law works for the company that makes the Super Bowl Rings. This picture does not even show a 1/10 of it's beauty. I can now say I have worn a Super Bowl Ring, not many people can say that!

Bugs Cure Denial

I am a hopeless romantic. I love imagery and atmosphere. Like in my other post where I referenced the image of the Kool Aid house. I love coffee commercials where there is always a woman standing, looking out a window, hands wrapped around the mug, snuggling her cup of coffee, inhaling the steam. That is how I wish I could drink my coffee. Like I said, wish, I usually end up with a burned lip from the first sip, then a cold cup when I get back to it after I am done getting toothpaste out of hair, or wiping butts or getting the kids dressed. I guess if I really wanted to I could get up earlier and have my peaceful morning, but I like the idea of sleep better. In the winter I have a fire going almost all day. I love the coziness it adds to the room. Especially after school. Fire going, kids doing homework, me working on dinner, it just all seems right.

When we moved in to this house two years ago the first thing that made me want to buy this house was the back yard. The back yard had a tree right smack in the middle. A big tree. In my head I immediately started picturing the kids climbing that tree. The future tree house with secret club passwords. The leaves from it that would be raked up in the Fall and then jumped into with laughter. I really loved this tree.

Well last year my beloved tree got buds, bloomed, was beautiful full and green, leaves turned yellow, leaves fell off, and then the tree went into winter mode all in one month. I was like "excuse me Tree ( that's his name), what are you doing? Please fix your self, now". However when the Tree Doctor came out there was no hope. Tree did not go into winter mode Tree went to tree heaven. I was so SAD!!! I could not believe it. "What? Why? How? Are you sure there is nothing left to do? No experimental treatment or new drug therapy?" "You have to save him Doctor!!!" I was in denial. I just could not accept that my Tree was gone. Tree stood tall (but still dead) all Summer, Fall, Winter, Spring and again Summer.

Well, the bark is falling off Tree now and it looks a little sad. No one plays on Tree anymore. The other day my 15 year old son came shrieking into the house. I mean screaming like a girl! As he was mowing around Tree the biggest nastiest bug he said he has ever seen attacked him. He would not mow near Tree. He did not care if I grounded him or what ever. He would not mow around Tree. Well I went out to look for my self and "Holy ****" is what came out of my mouth. They were everywhere. I still do not know what they were. But Taylor was right. They were GROSS!!! In one second I can truly say my denial was over. A tree cutting party was scheduled immediately.

Tree is now gone. Just a stump is left to remind me off all the lost dreams. I have fully accepted the loss. I have moved on. However, I can also say that Tree is still in our lives. Tree is now a very good drink holder while we play Corn Hole!

Kool Aid Day

Today was a good day. There are different kinds of days for me. There are days when I wonder if I never should have had kids (I call these Kryptonite days), and most days are just normal, and there are above average good days, and then there are days like today. Today was a Kool-Aid day. All was well in the Page house. I call it a Kool-Aid day because years ago a friend of mine said that her goal was to have the "fun" house for her kids. Like on the old "Hey Kool- Aid" commercials where all the neighborhood kids are playing in the back yard and the grown ups are talking and it just all seems right. I had the grandchildren of the neighbor to the right of me over so between her group and my group there were 10 kids. I gave them pop, she gave them cookies, I hooked up the slip-n slide, it was just a great afternoon. I got my housework done, Taylor actually came to me, let me emphasize came to me, and asked what he needed to get done today and then actually did it!!!! Tori did not do one single UHHH! or stretch mom into a two syllable word at all today. Dinner went well. Just got the little ones to bed. So the day finished well. I am going to go relax and watch some shows now, because if today was a Kool-Aid day tomorrow has a good chance of being a Kryptonite day. And that is a whole other story.

Chocolate Cake

Today is the day before our last court date for Trinity. Actually night before, it's 10:15 pm.
I am nervous. Trinty is doing so well living with us full time. She has great friends, loved school last year, and loves all her church friends and activities. I am nervous that she will go back to her mom full time and us on the weekends. Her mom will most likely get full custody of her other 2 kids back, so that means the court is finding her "fit" to parent. That also means they have to decide where Trinity is best off full time. I have not stopped thinking about this all day. Well, I did get a break because I went to dinner with Lisa. Even though we talked about the Trinity stuff, it was different than when I was dwelling on the thoughts. I hate when thoughts go through my head over and over as if they are going to be different the next time. Lisa and I had a great dinner. I really love my time with her. And she paid, WOO HOO!! Thanks Lisa, if you ever happen to read this. And OH MY GOSH, the Chocolate Cake. It was to die for. I went on a cruise a few years ago and I had the best chocolate dessert I had ever had, until tonight. This was awesome. Lisa said "this is a dangerous thing to try I am warning you". She was right I am already plotting on how I can get back there for more. Chocolate Cake is a wondrous thing to begin with, but this was like drug. I was in a worry free mood for a couple hours after that. Actually, Lisa and I planned this dinner outing a week ago and I almost forgot about it. I am so glad Lisa called to remind me. I think God whispered in her ear and said "call and remind Kristy about dinner, she needs a friend, and some chocolate cake" Amen... Praise Jesus!!! cause Lisa and Chocolate Cake hit the spot.