Does this make me old?

The following YouTube video was posted by a friend and by a sister-in-law on facebook and I just had to share it.

Everything's amazing, nobody's happy:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LoGYx35ypus

I was wondering if having clear memories of those "simpler times" makes me old - maybe "retro" makes it sound cooler!
Or does it maybe just give me a slightly better grip on today's reality.

Flat Stanley

Flat Stanley has traveled around the world and has taken a pit stop in Watkinsville. While he was here we took him around town. Here are some shots of Flat Stanley's visit.

At the aquarium in Atlanta his favorite fishes were the flat faced ones. And he wasn't a bit scared of the spider crabs.

Athens is home to the University of Georgia and their mascot Uga, so around town they have different decorated Ugas. Chik-fil-A started in Georgia, so this picture tackled both local favorites.

The kids wanted to take him to their schools.

And we had to stop by our favorite ice cream shop.Flat Stanley asked specifically to see our river, but it is a still bit too cold to go swimming.The last stop was by Robert's work to see the chickens.

Flat Stanley will now return to Arizona, his trip here finished.
Natalie's class is just starting Flat Stanley and so she'll be sending her own off and we'll get a chance to see his further adventures.

Mud Pies

In Houston we were introduced to mud pies (it might have two d's). It's like a mini taco salad in a crunchy shell, named after our friend's grandma who made them.
We have had many mud pie parties - it's a favorite.

The shells are made by deep frying small corn tortillas, using a ladle to shape them. We haven't found any "ultra thin" corn tortillas since leaving Houston, but they still turn out well. The meat is seasoned with El Pato (we probably have our years supply), the refried beans are made from scratch, refried in a cast iron pan, and mashed with the "bean masher" (which I always thought was a potato masher), finely shredded cheddar cheese, julienned lettus, canned whole tomatoes - diced, a little salt and pepper and hot sauce . . .

and you're good to go!

It's best to have friends over to share - come hungry!

It's been a while since we've shared them with the makers of the original, so I hope we are keeping it real!
Whenever we have invited people for mud pies they always get really excited and then I say, "it's not the chocolatey dessert." So, this time I decided to try my hand at the chocolatey dessert as well. I found a recipe for T.G.I. Friday's Mocha Mud Pie and made some adjustments (I don't like mocha ice cream, so I used chocolate ice cream) . . .

- there were no complaints.

The Aquarium

The aquarium in Atlanta is billed as the "world's largest aquarium. " We got bounce back passes from some friends, so I took the kids there when they were off for President's Day. We headed out early and got there right when it opened. We had the touch pool, with sting rays and sharks, pretty much to ourselves.

Alyssa's friend come with us and everyone had a great time.

My nephew sent us Flat Stanley, so we took him to the aquarium with us. We were at the big wall, that's what I call it and there is a picture of it later, and I had Natalie hold up Flat Stanley for a picture. A man sitting behind me started laughing and said "is that Flat Stanley?" "Yes," I said, "all the way from Arizona!"

Logan was amazed at everything and would just stand with his face up to every glass. He would have spent his whole time at the first exhibit if we didn't move him along. The beluga whales were one of his favorites.

The big tunnel under the water was a favorite of everyone and we went through it a couple of times. They have a slow moving sidewalk that you can stand on and watch what is above and around you without having to try and physically walk as well.

At the end of the tunnel there is a room with a huge wall (as big as an IMAX screen). We were there when they were feeding the fish and stayed to watch them feed the whale sharks.

The jellyfish are always cool (when you're not actually in water with them!). Alyssa took some great pictures.

Moon jellies above, sea nettle below.

We got a chance to see everything and some things twice. The last half hour was spent at a more crowded touch pool - I'm glad we got there early and saw most of the exhibits before there were a TON of people. Logan, when he couldn't touch the sting rays started splashing them, then started getting cranky. After 3 hours Logan hit meltdown and it was time to go. Everyone had a fabulous time. A very fun day!

Valentine's Day

The kids have been getting excited for Valentine's Day ever since they got their assignment to make their boxes for their class Valentine's Day parties. Alyssa, being in middle school and having no class Valentine's Day party, "helped" Jake with his box.

Jake was super excited for his box because it was a robot who's mouth opened and you drop the Valentines in, they went down the neck to the bottom. Then the bottom opens so you could get them out. That dark "mole" to left (looking at the picture) of his nose is a remnant of the chocolate treats they had a school. :) He had a great day! And got sick that night from eating to much!

The week of Valentine's Day, the kids decided to run a stomach bug between them, and Natalie's turn came just in time for her to miss her Valentine's Day party at school. She cried that she couldn't go. To help her feel better, I dropped her Valentine "Caterpillar" box (it has googly eyes in the front) at school in the morning and picked it up at the end of the day. She was upset to have missed the party, but loved looking at all the cards and treats from her classmates.
Alyssa wanted to try her hand at sugar cookies. So, she made a batch, made part of it pink, then the kids took turns cutting out different size hearts. After the cookies baked and cooled, they were frosted and decorated and shared.
Valentine's Day is not one of Robert's favorite holidays, but he doesn't mind sharing it with ALL the people he loves and as indicated by Alyssa's comment today, "it's Valentine's Day, we should spend it together as a family," he has trained his children well.
The kids woke up to a Valentine's treat at the table and we had a special family dinner of a spiral ham, potato casserole and mandarin oranges.
HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!

Friday the 13th

To many this is a superstitious day, one when something bad is bound to happen.

For me it is a reminder of my wedding anniversary. Robert and I got married August 13th - a Friday!
Today marks exactly 15 1/2 years of marriage - including day of the week.
I don't have a scanner, so no lovely pictures of us on that day - but one of the Manti Temple where we got married.

Sunshine

After a few cold fronts over the past while, we have been in a warming trend and had a beautiful weekend of near 70 degrees.
This morning, before church, Jake and Logan were playing together outside. Jake, as he rode by on his bike said, "mom, we're having a fun day today."
Natalie and Alyssa spent the morning together on a walk down to the river. After coming back Alyssa said how it has been the best weekend and Natalie went immediately upstairs to write in her journal about her walk with her sister. Alyssa was outside all day yesterday and was almost too tired for the friends we had over for dinner.
What a wonderful thing a little warmth and sunshine is!

Waiting for Rocks

We, meaning Robert, are in the middle of a new project and I thought I would share the progress so far. We had some shrubbery (I don't know what kind) on most of our hill, in the back yard, by our driveway. Some people might think, hey - it's an evergreen, no tending needed, leave it alone. To me, I didn't like it, not one little bit. And after a few, ok - many, "explorations" by the kids and "tennis ball searches" by Izzy, it became spotted with holes and dead branches. And, being in the only spot of the yard that gets sun all day long, it was the perfect spot for a garden. So what do you do? Pull it all out and terrace it!

This is what it looked like.
These two pictures are from when we moved and I'm SO glad we put in sod last year, the grass looks so much better now!

Here we, meaning Robert, have cleared about 2/3 of the hill (although I did help by pulling up and cut the branches into smaller sizes for burning). We had a good burn day and once we got burning Robert just finished clearing the hill.

Here are the stairs along the side, we will fill in the space between the stairs and the house with smaller rocks.

The top terrace is done and the second one is being worked on.
There is still a bunch of work to do.
We, meaning Robert, is now waiting on rocks. This weekend he is hoping to gather some more (thanks to Larry and Casey who don't want a ton of rocks in their yard) and if the kids will cooperate I can help bring up dirt. We have beautiful dirt in the woods where trees have died and their stumps/roots have disintegrated and have left large mounds of rich soil. So other than grunt work, meaning Robert (he wants to make sure I acknowledge his efforts) - this has been a cost free project.

We can start planting in March and I'm totally excited to utilize Georgia's two growing seasons! The kids are excited to pick out what we will plant (I hope they stay as excited to help pull weeds) and Alyssa wants to be in charge of flowers along the bottom.
Once it is completed I'll post pictures again.

What is it?!

I looked out the kitchen window the other day and saw Izzy sitting at the path leading into the woods. Just sitting there and was there for quite a while - at least 20 minutes - not moving.
(that is quite a while for a dog like Izzy to not be moving)

I wonder what she saw, or heard, maybe she thought Robert was down there was waiting for him to come back, or maybe it was that her ball had rolled down just out of reach (she has an electric perimeter with the edge at the start of the path).
Whatever it was, it kept her still for a while and the thought that popped into my head was "The Watcher In The Woods" - a favorite movie from when I was younger and probably the only scary movie I'll watch.

Crazy Boys

Jake:

Last Sunday Jake asked what day it was. His eyes lit up when I told him February 1st. "Mom! It isn't January anymore! Can we go swimming in the river?!" I tried to explain that a mild day might feel nice but the water was still really cold and we would have to wait until the water gets warmer.
In a way I'm glad we had a cold front move through - that is a better reason to wait to go swimming than your mom saying the water is too cold!

Logan:

We had to move Jake into the spare bedroom because Logan has some odd sleeping habits lately.
He has to have both blankets (you can see the green one in the picture, the blue one is underneath him), Pooh Bear, and Horse (he sleeps on top of this pile) . . . lights ON . . . and music playing. If ever I turn the lights off after he is asleep and he wakes up, he starts calling out "lights ON! LIGHTS ON!" I can turn on the lights, sometimes needing to turn the music back on, and he will lay down and go back to sleep without a problem.
I've come to just leaving the lights on all night and, unless he has a bad dream, he will sleep the night. I've gone in sometimes and he has pulled the blankets up over his head.

OK, Jake just got home from school and I have to add this because it made me laugh:
I sign a daily behavior chart for him. He usually tells me what he got when he comes in: an "E", "S+", "S". Today he came in and said, "Mom, I got an S+. You need to tell me all the school rules. I know that no kissing is a school rule." I asked if he got a check kissing someone! He said no, but for not following a school rule. The note on his behavior chart said he got a check for "blowing crumbs across table onto floor at lunch (after repeated warnings)." I don't think I know all the "lunchroom rules." :)
The note continued and said that: other than that, his day was great and other teachers said how wonderfully behaved he was when he was in other classrooms for activities. :)

Cute, but crazy boys!