June 2008 archive

OKC Adventure Log: 6/29/08

NOTE: All times are approximate

10:00 am: (Yup, no early start today, we learned our lesson yesterday) Fill up with gas for $4.19/gallon (it’s getting cheaper! oh wait, the octane got lower too…). Should have thought of that last night. Depart with Ily in the pilot’s seat. 80 degrees. Pass 4 more hitchhikers on the way out of town.

12 noon: Stop for a potty break & lunch in Snowville, UT. A child who shall remain anonymous has a meltdown because he wants a toy pool table and and we won’t buy it for him. On the road we finally get him to eat. After that he declares matter of factly, “I’m tired,” and promply falls alseep. Bryan is in the pilot seat.

1:34: 97 degrees. Exit highway and head to Grandma’s in Salt Lake City, UT.

We enjoyed the rest of the day relaxing with Grandma, Grandpa, Julie, and Andy. Later Jandy and Cinda, college friends of ours who both live in Salt Lake now, visited us at Grandma’s house and their kids had fun playing with ours while we chatted. By the time you read this we should be on our way to our next stop in Colorado.

Posted by Bryan and Ily on June 30, 2008 | Filed under: Family News | 2 comments

OKC Adventure Log: 6/28/08

NOTE: All times are approximate.

4 am: Bryan and Ily wake up to get ready for the road trip.

5:30 am: Get boys in the car.

6:00 am: We cross the Columbia and officially begin. Bryan at the helm.

7:00 am: Notice the outside temperature is already 74. Arrive in The Dalles, OR (that’s one city, it just sounds plural) for breakfast. Boys refused to sleep in the car so we stopped for breakfast at McDonald’s. A Styrofoam Hotcake container holding one entire hotcake is knocked to the floor. Nobody eats it. An older man talking loudly and using, uh, “rough’ language is a cowboy according to Micah. We also pick up a cooler at Fred Meyer. Boys earn their first Happy Dollars (but not for the pancake incident).

8:30 am: Back on the road with Bryan still at the helm. He notices a large number of wind surfers camped on the shore of the Columbia, but none are on the water, which is smooth as glass because there is no wind. This is unusual for The Gorge. Ryan Shupe and the Rubberband is playing on the CD player.

10:00 am: We see six hitchhikers on our way through Pendleton, OR. It’s 80 degrees as we begin our climb up Cabbage Hill (which is actually green right now!). At the top the temp has dropped to 75.

11:20 am: We stop in La Grand, OR to use the bathroom (Bryan drank too much orange juice at
Mc Donald’s) and refill half a tank of gas ($4.30/gallon). The boys purchase the privilege to watch a DVD with their happy dollars. We depart with Ily at the helm.

11:48 am: We cross the 45th parallel. 80 degrees outside. We can see snow on the tops of the Blue Mountains.

12:00 noon: Stop in Baker City for lunch. The kids were, “starving!” We eat at McDonald’s again. What can we say, Play Places are nice. The loud old man here is much more, um, polite in his language than the one in The Dalles. Micah says nothing about cowboys. Ily and Bryan power nap on the benches in Play Place while the kids get energy out.

1:30 pm: 86 degrees. Depart McDonald’s with Ily at the helm. See 3 more hitchhikers.

2:00 pm: 95 degrees. We pass the cement plant.

2:50 pm: Stop in Ontario to go potty. 96 degrees. Bryan realizes the significance of the name Ore-ida as we pass said factory so close to the Oregon-Idaho border.

6ish pm: (Kind of lost track of time here) We stop in Twin Falls for dinner. Walk around Magic Valley Mall (doesn’t take long to cover it all) and eat at the food court (not McDonald’s!). Decide to give up on Salt Lake for today and stay the night. We play at Centennial Waterfront Park along the Snake River in a beautiful gorge. Bryan has worst allergy attack he’s had in years. The landscape and foliage does look very similar to the Tri-Cities, only the Snake is much smaller here. Stay night at a new Ameritel Inn.

Posted by Bryan and Ily on June 29, 2008 | Filed under: Family News | 2 comments

Escape artist/ the story of an unobservant mother

Last night we went to a park for the mandatory soccer meeting at the beginning of the season to meet your coach and find out about practices and such. There were something like 500 people there all to meet their coaches, get their team t-shirt, and learn the guidelines of the league. We now have 2 boys doing soccer so we had to split up and have one adult at each meeting. I got to take Micah to meet his coach and had to keep Reece with us. So Reece stayed in the stroller for a bit and then he got out and played with the soccer balls and was orbiting around us… and then he was gone. At a park full of people he disappeared. I put him in orange often so I can find him in a crowd if he gets separated from us, but yesterday it didn’t help because lots of kids were wearing their new soccer team shirts, 1/6th of which turned out to be orange. So my little boy who normally sticks out, blended in this time. It was during the meeting when he disappeared from my view so I asked the other parents on our team if they saw where he had gone. They all panicked way worse than I did. They were ready to spread out across the park and search for him, but I am thinking, “oh gosh! that little turkey got away again!”

No Panic thoughts really occurred in me. I guess he is my third so I am more apathetic. Or maybe I am oblivious to him and shouldn’t be allowed to have kids. Or maybe my comfort level has changed, or maybe he saw his dad and ran off to be with him and Bryan thought I saw him collect Reece to take him to the playground, but I didn’t so he really was safe and if I panicked it would be for no reason… Needless to say, I figured my son was not likely road pizza or kidnapped, he is just sneaky and silent and off again. This has been happening a lot lately.

So I finally spotted him a long way off at the playground happily hanging on the bars. I had no clue where Bryan was but I did see Oliver (Isaac’s best friend) so I knew Isaac was in the vicinity so I didn’t rush over there. Also, where Oliver is, there his mother is also, so If Reece biffed it, she might comfort him… Maybe. So now I have spotted him, the other parents are probably thinking, “why isn’t she running off to get him?” and I am thinking, ” My third child sure is getting away with a lot more than my first and second- I would have spanked them for sure for running away… Oh well, let’s finish the meeting and then I will go get him…”

When the meeting was over I went to the park to find Reece and finally found Bryan and it turns out that Bryan had been looking for me and the other boys at our meeting and couldn’t find us, but he did see Reece (and me no where near) just as he was heading straight thru the swings (mind you there are kids on the swings and he could get clobbered by them on accident!). He was too far away to prevent an accident and miraculously Reece made it through unscathed. So Reece is either the luckiest toddler alive, or he really knows what he is doing. He sure can escape easily too. I think he has supernatural abilities. Like invisibility.

So today it happened again. He disappeared at the gym at the end of gymnastics. We were in the far back gym for gymnastics this time because of the team girls getting priority in the big gym. (Also, they don’t want the littlest people getting accidentally hurt if they get in the way of the big girls who are flipping all over and can’t see the little people who might be in the way.) So we are getting ready to go, I am making sure I have boy 1 and boy 2 when I realize boy 3 who was just there, is missing. It turns out he really likes the foam pit so he snuck off and I found him back in there. Again, he could have died because there are girls flipping into there, but hey, he is THE lucky toddler so he hadn’t gotten hurt yet.

Without going into huge descriptions of the layout of the gym I will just tell you that I am amazed with this little boys’ memory, spacial skills, and comprehension. It takes a lot of comprehension to remember where everything is and he had to do some navigating to get back to the foam pit. And he was pretty smart to know that if he gets far enough out in the middle, I can’t get to him because I sink in that pit but he doesn’t.

What can I do with this kid?!!! He is escaping all the time. He is so sweet and cute and I can’t stay mad at him after he runs off. I am going to have to resort to a leash soon I know it! I just don’t have hawk eyes anymore.

Posted by Ily on June 25, 2008 | Filed under: Family News | 2 comments

"Meatball, I need you!"

Those are the words spoken tonight at dinner by Reece, our two year old. He has mastered using a fork. What good manners. He has mastered using a spoon. What good manners. He has learned how to be mostly polite, but he still lacks the skills of eating with his mouth closed and not talking with his mouth full. Not so good manners.

So he was talking very loudly (we are convinced he will be a cheerleader when he grows up because of his ability to speak with so much excitement) with meatballs in his mouth when oops, out one came. Yuck, except very funny when he says “Meatball I need you!” right after. All night he has been yelling “meatball”... pronounced “he-ball”... It has been a very loud dinner. Who knew serving meatballs would be so entertaining for the family?

Posted by Ily on June 21, 2008 | Filed under: Family News | 3 comments

Reece's B-day Pictures

Here is the link to the birthday pictures. It was the best easiest birthday ever at our house. I should do that more often. Reece’s actual birthday was Monday and I considered taking the kids out for ice cream to celebrate but when they were given the option to just stay home and watch one episode of “Avatar” versus going out for ice cream they all hands down chose the cartoon. So we ate chocolate, literally just the chocolate chips, and watched our new favorite show. Man, we know how to party!

Tabblo: Reece Murdock turns 2!

This weekend we had a little family get together to celebrate the birthday of Reece, our baby who is now 2.  He has grown up so fast!    ... See my Tabblo>

Posted by Ily on June 18, 2008 | Filed under: Family News | 2 comments

Fathers Day Gift

After discussing the matter with some friends and researching on the internet, we decided to try the Scarecrow Sprinkler to try and keep cats out of the sandbox. It was on sale for half off at Amazon.com and it looked like it’d be fun for the kids, even if it didn’t keep cats away. I opened it up on Saturday when the sun was shining everyone was here for Reece’s birthday party and I tried to document some of our test runs. Here is Micah triggering it with a broom:

Once we I was satisfied with it I placed it in the ground facing the sandbox. Here’s Isaac and a neighbor kid taunting the Scarecrow after that:

Looks pretty fun, doesn’t it? It’s probably fortunate that I didn’t document all of our testing. You see, we starting playing with it by rolling balls in front of it, right in plain view of Jason and Reece (both not quite two years old). Jason and Reece like to chase balls, you see, and they chased them right into the territory of The Scarecrow. And The Scarecrow did it’s job. Like you would expect of any heartless and indiscriminant machine, it took no pity on the ignorance of poor toddlers. I probably shouldn’t point out that if you look close in those previous videos you can see that The Scarecrow stands right about two-year old face height. yes, they both took a blast of cold Scarecrow fury right in the head. Did I feel bad? Yes. But it was warm outside and they seemed to recover pretty quickly after their unexpected face shots. They eventually learned to keep their distance, and we learned how to quickly disable The Scarecrow when they got too close. It was educational for all. And kind of funny, really. I mean, c’mon, it was just a little water. They’re kids, they bounce back. Therapy isn’t that expensive.

I think the scarecrow will work to keep cats way, but my hose is a little too leaky for me to want to leave it on all day and night so The Scarecrow can remain armed. That can probably be fixed. Other than that little issue, I think it’s pure genius and I wish I was making and selling Scarecrows. Product testing would be really fun (no, I wouldn’t use two year-olds).

Oh, and in other news, a friend took a closer look at some weeds in our backyard that we haven’t quite gotten to this spring, and told us they were catnip. The Internet seems to confirm it too. Unbelievable.

Posted by Bryan on June 16, 2008 | Filed under: Family News | 3 comments

Reece's 2nd Birthday

We had a family birthday party for Reece’s 2nd birthday on Saturday. Mom, Dad, Melinda, Benj, Jason came. We went to Jungle Playland and since the weather was sunny we practically had the whole place to ourselves. After that we had lunch at the nearby Burgerville and then went to our house, opened presents, and ate cake. We are having trouble uploading the pictures, but here is a video of Reece opening presents:

We’ll get the pictures posted as soon as we can.

Posted by Bryan on June 15, 2008 | Filed under: Family News | 1 comment

Lucia Falls in the Rain

We went to Lucia Falls on Saturday. We had so much fun there last year and we were hoping for a repeat. It was much different this year. The water was a good 4 or 5 feet higher so the falls themselves were more impressive, but a lot less rocks were available for climbing on. It was also raining on and off, so the rocks that were there were slippery. Isaac and I ventured out a little ways but it was just too difficult to maintain footing. Instead we enjoyed the falls from the trail (for about 10 minutes before the boys got bored). Here’s a video we made:

After that we sat on the porch of the old building that is in the parking lot and watched it rain for a bit. The boys found a place where water was dripping off of the roof and stood under it with their rain coats. Then they took their hoods off and and stood under it. I told them we should have brought some shampoo and washed their hair right there. Once all three had soaking wet hair, we took it as our cue that it was time to eat lunch and head back home. Overall it was fun, but we’ll be glad when the rain stops and summer really comes.

Posted by Bryan on June 9, 2008 | Filed under: Family News | 0 comments

Stuff worthy to write up

Posted by Ily on June 4, 2008 | Filed under: Family News | 4 comments

The rant of the day

Bear with me and my insecurities. I am going to rant right now. I have this problem, I think people don’t like me unless they share random little useless facts about themselves with me. I love hearing little day to day quirks about people. The small accomplishments, the little silly things that happen in their day, I love to hear about these things! It brings me joy.

It bugs me to no end that my husband never remembers to share little things with me like how his parents told him they painted a room in their house or other random things that. These random things don’t affect my salvation or make me a better person really, they just make me feel a part of other’s lives. I have a need to feel a part of something greater than myself. Something like my extended family, or even all of humanity.

Growing up my Mom and Dad would call home while they were at work or out and about just to say hi and share some small little things that weren’t particularly awesome and awe inspiring, but they did make me feel like I was sharing the experience with them. I liked that. (Though I do admit I didn’t really like that when the phone would ring in the middle of the night, but now I am paying them back by calling after my kids bedtime, which happens to be pretty late for them thanks to the two hour time difference between here and Oklahoma.)

So you who are in my family, you who are my friends, you who I hardly know, but should know, the more menial things you tell me, the happier I am. I am strange, but I love to hear about your child’s diaper rash ( so I can commiserate). Or the fact that you ran out of spoons for ice cream after dinner and it bugged you because you just wanted to dig into your ice cream, but had to let it melt a bit while you washed a spoon… Yep, I like to hear about that stuff.

I know I am random. I am ridiculous. But that is how I am. I can’t change it. I don’t feel connected with someone unless I know little things. I feel awkward around you unless I know that you prefer shower curtains or shower doors. Or that you went to the park and spent hours on the swings because the sun was out. Or that you spent a day last Fall doing something as small as weeding the garden.

Also, FYI: If it comes out of my mouth, what I said is probably what I meant. Nothing more, maybe something less. I get into to trouble a lot because I forget to filter my thoughts and they all just come out. So If I said “you look great in brown”, I mean it. I don’t mean that you look best in a color that resembles the earth because it camouflages you or you seem like a drab person. I just mean that brown looks good on you and makes you look nice.

I am pretty simple. Pretty stupid too because I am not good at with-holding my thoughts. I think it is because I am from the South or something. A girl raised in the South, by a woman raised in New York, who was raised by Europeans. I must be the culture clash of the century.

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Update:

Oh my, your comments so far are making me fall off my chair laughing! Thanks for letting me know the menial things in your life. That is where we find the real comedy that brings a giggle and brightens the day. The groceries, the missing store, the shower curtains… I love it! Thank you, thank you!

Posted by Ily on June 1, 2008 | Filed under: Family News | 8 comments

The dumbest player ever

Yep, that’s me. I have been called that name by my 4 year old son this week. How it came to be my new title is this: I was playing Uno with Micah, I was helping him so he could win and learn the rules and strategy, apparently I let him win too much because after the 4th time he DECLARED LOUD ENOUGH FOR THE WHOLE NEIGHBORHOOD TO HEAR that “MOM IS THE DUMBEST PLAYER EVER! SHE CAN“T EVEN BEAT ME!” I was shocked and wanted to laugh, but really my pride was hurt too! Next time, He’s going down!

Posted by Ily on June 1, 2008 | Filed under: Family News | 1 comment

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