My costume

Pretty good right.   It took a lot to put it together.

This guy was at Sea World....is he not the BEST Waldo you've ever seen ?     I had to get a picture with him.   I mean how many times do you really find waldo ? 

Cam woke up sick.    We'll see how it goes today.   He might be sitting out on trick or treating.
Syd has finally come to the good side and is an angel this year.  An angel of the white and feathery wings kind.
The littles are Buzz Light Year
and the big boys are Spider-man.
Pictures to come.

The kids have been eating "Halloween" candy for a week.    I told them that they can eat as much as they want before bedtime tonight.   but come midnight.  the candy fairy will be coming to collect ALL of the candy in our house.  
Which translates to.....I'll be dumping all of our candy into one trick or treaters bag, right before lights off.

Stay Safe everyone.
Happy Halloween !

Nature

Cameron just told me that I can leave the doors to the TV room open tonight. (they are across from his bedroom and he's always had us close them at night)  He said he knows that Aliens aren't real and he's not afraid anymore.
I love it that he was able to come to this conclusion and share it with me.
Cameron is the odd one out in so many ways.    Besides of course the obvious blond hair blue eyes.  He has such a mellow laid back personality.   I have NO idea where it comes from.....neither the donor nor myself contributed to it...that's for sure.

Yesterday the boys were having a Halloween Party at their hip hop class.    Spencer ran downstairs to grab some plastic halloween buckets that they have been playing with for a few weeks.   Each child had one originally.   I've counted 3 left.  1 is broken.
Spencer brought up 2, 1 of which was the broken one.    Spencer sadly admitted that there were only 2 left and one of the ones he had was broken.   I assured him that there was another one....but he disagreed and said, no...these are the only 2.   He then turned to Cam and said, "this one is mine"  grabbing the one with the unbroken handle.
Already headed down the stairs to find the non broken bucket to break up the fight I was sure would ensue after Spencers announcement I hear Cam say, "ok Spence"
I did find the other bucket.  And it wasn't broken.   but he could have cared less.

Each one was brought up in the same house under the same guidance and order.   
Each one of my kids has been given more or less the same choices and consequences.
But I can guarantee that if the tables would have been turned....and Cameron would have declared the unbroken bucket to be his.....all hell would have broke loose and Spencer would have cried until I either found the other bucket or fixed the one he had. 
(I say this with the evidence of past experience...however, to be fair both Spencer and Cameron are SUPER sweet and Spencer has shown compassion and understanding on a number of occassions)

Like many parents with wonderfully obedient children.   I'd like to take most of the credit for his behaviors and choices.   
But alas.   I can only look at how different each of my 5 children are and admit that I have little to do with it.   
He his who he is and my job is just to continue offering him vegetables and fruits in hopes that one day he'll eat them.

I'd like also to take credit for how competely handsome he is.   but as he has no real resemblance to me....I just have to give that one to the other mother :)

Here's your 4 1/2 minutes of free time. Yours truly, Me !

And hell.   If your kids are anything like mine....they'll want to watch it, "again mama, again"  like 2 more times.  AND then they'll see the other light shows that are advertised after this one and with a click of your mouse....BOOM....3-5 more minutes.  Potentially I've given you the gift of like 30 or so minutes.
Enjoy yourselves. 
Have a drink.
Eat your dinner slow tonight.

Sixth sensory for $4.99

This was mostly for my Cam man dude....who still hates to be sticky and has a hard time touching things like glue, paint and slime.   :)
I've heard about these awesome hidrogems and wanted to give them a try.    We found these at JoAnne's craft store for $4.00.    
They are squishy and super slippery.  They can be broken pretty easily but MY kids played with them and we didn't have any broken ones.
Well.  We decided to freeze them as an experiment as they are made mostly of water to see how they would freeze...and then we let them thaw in our hands.   The kids got a little too anxious squeezing the hard frozen balls and as they quickly melted down, defrosting to their original soft balls they were broken into little pieces and thrown away.   Still fun to do.
MUCH more fun than the cockroach we froze and then waited to come back to life in St. George.  Which by the way....didn't happen.   Nope.  They die.  

What I loved was to sit back and watch how true to personality each and every one of my kids were while playing.  

Syd made patterns with hers

Nathan put his in jail.  Those two are in jail on his lid.

When Ryan wasn't making a mess with his....he would make a train and choo choo them around his lid.
Cameron immediately started playing, writing his story with each one in his own make believe world.

Spencers were babies and promptly put to sleep.

Such fun little water balls.

This sensory time lasted almost an hour with all 5 of my kids.
GOOD times people !  Good times.

Halloween Party 2011

Remember our neighborhood Halloween Party last year. 
We did it again this weekend.   
We changed it up a bit.   Instead of doing it all at my house we split it up between several of our houses.
We had such a great time.  
Walking to one of the other houses, Syd wrapped her arms around my waist and said, "thanks mom for having this party"   :)
Here are a few pictures.

yummy homemade chili

We split up the little kids and the big kids games this year.

Each team chewed up gum and one player had to mold it to look like frankenstein.

Eating banana's through nylons

blowing cereal out of their noses into a cup on a team members head.  
There was some hesitation with this game :) 

Mommy Monster Makeover. 
The BEST time to have 2 moms :)   Mommy J was our victim participant.

Each family made over their own mom.

I think they look FABulous !  :)

Story time for the littles.  The big kids were having a treasure hunt throughout the neighborhood.

(this is the perfect time to live next to a 3rd grade teacher)

Little people treasure hunt/picking candy up off of the lawn after story time.

We ended the night wrapped in blankets as "The Great Pumpkin" played on the back of our neighbors garage.
So far, I've loved this tradition.   The kids have so much fun.
I'm already planning next years my peeps.  :)

Happy Spirit Day

No More Bullying !!!

My wife sent me this picture from her phone tonight.   
I sent her a message back that said.   "Put a beer in her hand and it could be me."
Luckily for the kids...I'm not cracking a beer open until After they are in bed.

oh and also a quick change.....I don't wear aprons.  add 3 more kids...all of which are in pajamas and one of them would be wearing the heels.   (never drink and wear heels)   and BAM it's us.  

Is it Saturday yet ?

This moment......

brought to you by tired and loving it.

The wife left me at 5am on Sunday.   It's only been 3 days.  but being alone with 5 little kids for even 1 day is a lot.   (lets not forget I'm in the throes of pmdd week too. ugh)   I refer back to "The Jerk"
The first day felt like a week, the second day felt like 5 days, the third day just felt like a day but the fourth day felt like 3 days.  ha ha ha love that movie.

Any ways.   I'm driving home from Syd's appointment.   One I had scheduled late (5:30pm) to accommodate J's work schedule.  well that didn't work out, bastard son of a bitch scheduling a month in advance....what was I thinking. :)
I had been trying to keep 4 little wound up boys whose attention spans vary radically....entertained for an hour.
Just getting in and out of the van can be exhausting.   They immediately take off and start fighting over who is going to push the handicap button....because they can't all push it.   OR CAN THEY.  and we have to wait for the doors to close completely before the next person who feels scorned gets his turn....problem is, 2 out of the 5 ran inside the building, one went down the hall and the other stood and waited for the doors to close so that he could push the handicap button again riiiiight before the scorned kid on the outside was able to push it.  so Now these two are fighting and again waiting for the doors which take like 3 1/2 minutes to close, to push it again.   The last kid who stayed outside heads for the parking lot and I still have no idea which door the one that ran down the hall went in.
FUH ! 
So by the time everyone was back in their seat belts and I was back on the road heading home....all I wanted to do was to push the ear plugs to my mp3 player so far in to my head that no sound could escape in or out.  

It was all beautiful again.  and then Galileo by the indigo girls comes on.  I am IMMEDIATELY transported back to my early 20's.   I'm camping with good friends, tan from head to toe, wearing short shorts and a tank top, holding a beer in one hand, a hat on my head and kicking some hacky.       
I'm sure everyone has their "time" of their life when they were so blissfully self absorbed without a care in the world.  
Being gay during this time ROCKED.
Nothing like having some fantastic women around to spend these times with.   Just the girls.  
And I did, too.  Had the BEST group of people around me all of the time.

We all drifted.  Not too far a part.   I still get a glimpse of them now and then.   A lot of us have kids.

As the song came to a close, I was still feeling the heat from the sun through my chest remembering the "good ol days" and I looked in my rear view mirror at my sweet kids.   quietly listening to Rhinoceros Tap, looking out their respective windows.   I didn't wish to be free from all responsibility.   I didn't regret the decisions that got me there.  I just smiled the biggest smile, because they WERE good ol days....and I had them.

and now, because I know you want to sing it.....
How long til my soul gets it right
Can any human being ever reach that kind of light
I call on the resting soul of Galileo
King of night vision, king of insight.

Halloween silhouettes !

I copied this idea from one of our 1/2 sibs.   (thanks Toni)
I used a lamp and taped white paper on the wall.    I had the kids stand and pose while I tried to trace their shadows.
Not such a good idea.   ESPECIALLY with little kids.  
After I cut out what I was able to get traced,  I taped it to my black paper and cut it out again.
Next time I'll have them lay on the paper and trace and cut once.  
Like most things...I always make them out to be more than they need to be.  ;-)

from left : Ryan with his hands on his head, and Cameron (I'm not sure why I didn't get a better picture of those 2)
next window Spencer and Nathan and last is Syd.

I love that you are able to document their little size and also decorate the house at the same time. 
Such a multitasking craft.

Note.  let me tell you how many times I've walked through the house late at night and thought that someone was watching or standing outside of the window.   FREEEEAKY.  especially while alone.  just be prepared for that if you do it.

Painting pumpkins 101 by a complete novice.

A couple of years ago my mom and I saw some painted pumpkins in one of her Home and Garden magazines.    Ever since we've threatened to try them ourselves.  
Janice has a work trip this week.   She left this morning before 5am and won't be home until Friday.    I thought this was the PERfect opportunity to take a day to myself and asked my mom to share it with me and paint pumpkins.   So Saturday was my day.   The day to paint pumpkins.

We were certainly more confident about all of it while buying the paint.   but as soon as it came time to actually paint them we completely forgot all of the cute ideas we remembered seeing. 
It was a rough start for me.....but my mom kept reminding me how, this was supposed to be fun and not to worry about it.  (easier said than done when you wanted super great just like the magazine, painted pumpkins)

We started by wasing them.      



we did 3 parts water to 1 part bleach. 




let dry



Tape the tops.   always have an assistant.  Any dog will do.




We hand painted the tops but I think next time I might just spray paint them the same color as the pumpkin.




spray paint.   you'll notice her one gloved hand.   I wasn't so cautious and my hand still shows signs of black and white painting today.




blow the bottoms to help dry before you set them down to spray the rest.  :)




let dry




And paint and decorate.  
We also did a little bit of bling (notice my white one) 
These are mine.




My moms.   Cute right.   This picture doesn't do justice to some of the little details she did to hers.

 This took us all day.   Well that we laid down and took a nap and watched a movie didn't help.  ha ha  
They turned out great and we were both happy with the end product.  
Today of course I have a ton more ideas and would do some things differently...but that'll have to wait until next year.

This moment Friday

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember

Word. press.

Everyone is doing it and I think it's coming to that for me too.
I just need to know how easy it is to switch over ?   How to do it that's easy to follow and is there anyone who doesn't like it and why ?  Is there a good enough reason to stay with blogg.er ?

I have had nothing but problems commenting on people's blogs (australia peeps, that includes you)
I get stuck in that friggin' loop...and there have been times when what I had to say wasn't just a Hey, What's Up ? it was really important and pertinent to what was being asked in the post.
who are we kidding.  ANY time I comment it's important :) ha ha ha
no seriously though.  it bugs me.

SO.  Last night was the last straw...I decided that I was going to start switching over.

and now.  HAAAAYLP !

  

More memories

In no particular order.  and yes...I'm still talking about it.  pictures.

More than anything in the whole world...my babies LOVE them some woody and buzz. Toy story and Monsters inc are their very favorite movies. "Toe-ee Story mama" Meeting them in person was almost too much for their little heads to take. :)

Still the most magical of all !

This is actually at the airport.   My kids loved it still.



More than the characters...the ducks and squirrels were a big hit with my gang.  :)
If they weren't trying to feed them....they were screaming and chasing them.



awesome !

sting rays.  did you know when you feed them....their mouths suck on to your hand/the food like a vacuum cleaner. 
A little weird.

amazing 



The gang.   This was at the end of the day.   can you tell :)