Mysterious Case of the Lost Lovey Bear

Natalie has a very strong attachment to a small pooh bear that she often misplaces, but thankfully we usually locate it within a reasonable amount of time. This was not the case last night when she carted it off somewhere in the house. When I came home from running errands, John told me they had all searched the house, but no luck. Thankfully, she went to sleep alright with one of her other lovies.

It became a problem at 3 a.m.

Natalie started screaming. Her replacement lovey was unacceptable and she was only ratcheting up her screaming level. In a desperate attempt to find her bear, we began turning the house upside down, double and triple checking every place throughout the house a bear might find attractive. At 3:30 a.m., we still had not found the stinking bear. John decided to let Natalie help search in hopes she remembered where she had last played with it. She was so cute helping look, even bending down and checking different nooks and crannies.

Still no luck. I happened to find one of her bunnies in the older girls room that she seems to like somewhat, so we gave it to her and she settled down. Of course, this meant John and I were WIDE awake at 3:45 a.m. This did not make for a pleasant wake-up call when John's alarm went off at 7 a.m. Better luck tonight.

I have resumed searching for the long lost bear today, but to no avail. I think Natalie is just going to have to make do with the bunny until bear decides to come out from his hiding place.

Did you miss me?

I'm back from the beach, so I can resume blogging now...that is after I can get my house put back together again.

Bike Repair Woman

You might remember a few weeks ago when I was so proud of fixing Kimberly's bike tire. Well, she was having more issues with the other bike tire yesterday, so I told her to wait for her dad to get home. Guess what he said? "Well, you did such a good job fixing the last tire, why don't you go ahead and do this one?"

He got my womanly glare in return.

He started fixing the tire himself this morning, but it needed a completely new tube. Since he needed to attack the war zone (see next posting) with the tiller, I felt bad and offered to go buy a new tube. While I was at it, I bought a new tube for Kimberly's old bike so Alicia could start riding it.

I came home, pulled off the bike tires, put in the new tubes, put the tires back on (this of course involves wrenches and grease on my beautiful womanly hands), blew up the tires and wa-la! I did another manly project on my own. I have learned though that it comes around to bite me in the butt afterwords since John now thinks I am a pro bike repair woman.

I am never learning how to do those types of chores again. I will leave it in manly territory from now on.

Our War Zone

John has put the bedroom/bathroom remodel project on hold so he could redo the backyard - sprinkler system and grass. We all went out to help him tonight after dinner. The girls were really helpful digging loose dirt out of ditches, and even helped John cut some pipe. What Fun!!

Tomorrow he will till all of the dead grass (does it look dead enough? I think so), then Tuesday the new drought tolerant sod arrives. We'll have a new looking backyard in a week. Yay!

Camping in the Rain

For Memorial weekend, we went camping with several of our friends. We planned this out months ago and were thrilled when we saw at the beginning of last week that the holiday weather would be sun, sun, and more sun. Our excitement turned to depression when Thursday arrived with the dismal news that the weekend weather would be rain, rain, and more rain.

We decided we were going to make the best of it and went anyway prepared with two canopies, umbrellas, and extra clothes. We were off to a good start on Saturday and had the usual fun - sitting around the fire laughing our heads off, keeping the kids away from the river, cooking smores, and of course yummy dutch oven dinner and dessert.

The weather held up fine even through Saturday night, so we were of course thrilled. Sunday morning we introduced our friends to chocolate chip pancakes, and in return, they made Dr. Pepper pancakes for us. John said they tasted great, but I had to pass as I didn't want a caffeine buzz that early in the morning. Afterwords, we started roasting Starburst, another camping adventure I'd never even heard of. While tasting the delicacies, the rain began. Just a light drizzle, nothing we couldn't handle with the kids set up under one canopy with a craft, and us adults under another canopy near the fire.

Camping resumed as normal, until an hour later when it began pouring. We all hibernated in our tents, only coming out for lunch, and then back to the tents for nap time to see if the rain would go away soon. By 2:30 after 5 hours of non-stop rain, we had a pow pow and decided enough was enough, so we packed up all of our stuff...in the rain. Our tent is still set up in the backyard drying out.

Despite the rain, we had a wonderful time and finished up the camping trip by still doing the camp dinner back at one of the neighbors houses, and pancakes for breakfast at another neighbor's house Monday morning. Now I just need to finish the camfire smelling laundry that is piled up in my laundry room!

Playing games in the tent waiting for the rain to pass.

No Professional Portraits Anytime Soon

So, I'm thinking Natalie is just prone to accidents because she has had several major falls in the last week, as evidenced by her lovely face. One of the incidents involved trying to ride her bike down the porch stairs. She quickly learned that if you try that, you will more than likely do a flip and land on your face. Ouch. At least she has her bear she lovingly calls baby to help her get through the tough times.

She is still stinkin' cute though, but I am having to postpone the professional portraits I had planned for the girls after school lets out in a week. I'm not hopeful we will be getting to them anytime soon as she keeps falling and getting hurt. My mother in law says its because she only knows how to run - walking doesn't seem to be in her vocabulary. I tend to agree with her.

Pure Bliss

My idea of pure bliss...lying in my hammock yesterday afternoon for a nap while feeling the sun bake my skin. I know it's not good, but I just love that feeling, so I have to indulge every once in awhile. I thought about putting on sun screen, but by that point, I was fully basking in the sun's delights, so I decided to risk any and all pinkness. I did have a hint of pink afterwards, but nothing a little aloe couldn't handle.

Another blissful pleasure this last week has been my daily hot dog for lunch. Ugh...I hate even admitting this, but it is the only thing that sounds good right now! Trust me - I have tried everything! So for now, hot dogs it is until this weird pregnancy fetish subsides.

Finally, another byproduct of the sunny weather means BBQ Bliss! We got to enjoy two barbecues with friends this weekend. Sigh...I love warm weather. Even though my Northwest family thinks I am crazy to love the desert, I don't know how they can stand the rain 90 percent of the time. Living in the desert for this Seattlite transplant is pure bliss.