our power went out friday evening. I was on my way home, and James called me to tell me. He was halfway through nuking some hot dogs in the microwave for the kids when it went out. He requested I stop by BK for some dinner.

The power came back on about 5 minutes before I got home.

However, now, mysteriously.. our microwave does not heat food. It sounds like it’s working. It LOOKS like it’s working. The light is on, the turn table is spinning, but the food does not get hot.

This is a little inconvenient but no big deal.

Big Deal: Our heat on the main level is not working. We have tried peering intelligently at the furnace in the basement. I flipped the switch for it on, and off, and it seemed to start up and make noise. But warm air does not blow out of our vents. James went outside and peered intelligently at the blower units sitting next to the house. He informed me that one unit has a green flashy light, and the other unit has no light. This seemed to be pretty definitive information, until suddenly the unit lacking any blinking light turned on and made noise.

We kerflommuxed.

And chilly.

I laid down for 20 minutes in front of our gas fireplace, which we never ran again after seeing the gas bill the month after we moved in, and got the pilot light started. The entire thing even light up briefly when the switch was turned on, but then faded back down to solely pilot light.

We are continually thwarted in efforts to heat our home.

We’ll be upstairs.. until the service people get here.

-amy is CHILLY.

I can’t remember if I’ve talkeda bout this yet, so if I have, I’m sorry.

Jocelyn is huge. Late December we realized that she’s outgrown all her 3T shirts. The shirts I had to buy her in late sept/early oct because she’d outgrown all the fall 2T stuff I’d gotten her in early August.

She is now wearing a 4T.

FOUR TEE!

HER BROTHER WEARS A 4T!

…

SHE IS ONLY TWO! YEARS! OLD!

…

I’M FREAKING OUT HERE! AND I’VE HAD A MONTH TO GET USED TO IT!

So this does mean that my mom and I got to buy all sorts of darling cute clothes for her around Christmas, while she was visiting.

And the whole point of this post is to show you my very very favoritest item of them all.

Picked it up at Target. I love love love this fabric. I would buy bolts and bolts of it and paper our house with it, inside and outside, if i could.

However, whoever dressed her on the day this picture was taken, needed to be hit with the fashion stick.

Can you guess which parent it was?

PARENT DADDY????

Or PARENT MOMMY!?

Post YOUR guess in the comments!

Regardless. Aren’t we lucky to have such a sweet girl? 🙂

“how does a frosted mini wheat go to the bathroom?”

“how?”

“with it’s frosted mini wheat penis!!”

Every night, when I put the kids to bed, I always tell them to have good dreams. And then whenever I get them up, I ask them if they had good dreams, and what they were.* This morning I sat on Ethan’s bed and rubbed his back as he was waking up, and told him good morning. Usually this takes a few minutes for him to “wake up,” but this morning, nearly as soon as his eyes were open, he sat up and climbed into my lap for a great big morning hug. I asked him if he had good dreams, and he nodded, and then I asked him what he dreamed of. I think that sometimes he doesn’t remember or doesn’t dream, and has a standard answer of “trains!” or “dump trucks!” but sometimes I can really tell that he is remembering his dream and he tells me about it. It’s never as detailed as I would like, as I think the dreams of little kids are just fascinating.

This morning, he grinned up at me and said, “I dreamed about YOU!”

“REALLY! What did I do in your dream?”
“We went up in an AIRPLANE!”
“That sounds like it was a LOT of fun!”
“It was! It was great!”
“Let’s be sure to meet in your dreams again.”

It was pretty sweet.

*This makes it sound like I do all the putting to bed and waking up in the house. This is not the case. I just mean, whomever i’m putting to bed, and whenever i get someone up, this is what I say/ask.

This morning we were driving away from our house, and up ahead there was a school bus stopped, and the kids were all climbing on board. The car in front of us stopped, and a little girl and her mommy got out. Her mommy put some aquaphor on her lips, and then the girl hustled down to the bus, which was waiting for her, and she climbed on board.

My kids watched this in fascination. I excitedly pointed out the school bus to them, and then they were full of observations.

“LOOK at the BIG kids!”
“I’m going to be a big kid too, and get on a school bus!”
“I’m not a big kid. I’m an OLD KID.” (jocelyn)
“LOOOOOK! LOOOOOOK! SHE HAS AQUAPHOR TOOOOO!”
“Are they kindergarteners, mommy?”
“Yes, there are some kindergarteners there.”
“I’m going to be a kindergartener too, and ride the bus!”
“Yes, next year you’ll be a kindergartener, but I think you’ll still be at OurSchool, so we’ll drive you. But when you’re a first grader, THEN you’ll ride the bus.”

He didn’t answer to this, but was mulling it over.

Kindergarten decisions await us. Their preschool has a private full day kindergarten, and with 8 kids to 1 teacher vs. 25 kids to 1 teacher, I think you’ll agree that that isn’t a hard decision to make (keeping him at his current school vs. putting him in the overcrowded public school). Even if they fix the overcrowding (which I’ve heard they will) it is still not a ratio anywhere near as good as what OurSchool has. So even though the lure of saving money is strong, we’ll probably be doing the private school thing for him for kindergarten.

But the THOUGHT of putting him in the public school and how does that work? and what about before/after school care? and who runs it? when? how much? will he like it? is just poking at me all the time, and while I am happy with our situation right now, with both of us working, and both kids at the same school, in a few years, it will all change and it scares me a bit. It will definitely be tough to have Jocelyn at the private school, and ethan in the public school, just in terms of picking up / dropping off, but I wouldn’t want to gyp her out of a good start in her education by not putting her in the private kindergarten that her brother will have gone to, and I heard some talk at my Bunco night about the extended day care and how some of the mums weren’t too happy with it..

But what it really boils down to.. I would like to be home when my kids come home from school. It is how I grew up, and I just don’t like to picture anything other than that for my kids. It’s kind of weird. I mean, weird that I am totally fine with how things are now, but I don’t like going on this way in the future. You’d think that if I’m fine with it now, I should be fine with it then, but I’m not, I’m very squidgy about it then.

I don’t know what will happen, but I guess we’ve got a few years to figure it out yet. I know what I DON’T want, and that is sending my kids off to college and then feeling like my life is over and there’s nothing left to live for. I know that this doesn’t happen to all SAHMs, but I do know some that it HAS happened to, and heaven knows it can probably happen to working moms too.. I have made some big steps to try to keep my OWN life going along with my family life, and so I think the foundation is there.

Anyway. A lot of rambling. Again. We’ve got a few years to figure it out.

-amy gave you a two for one tuesday

On Saturday, Ethan and I went to Target for a prescription, and groceries.

And when my eyes lit on this, it was very easy for Ethan to convince me to get it.

“Let’s get it, momm–”
“OK!!”

It was $15, and has 4 games in it. Ms. Pacman, Galaga, Pole Position, and 2 others that I can’t remember.

The little joystick box has a cord going out of it that plugs right into your tv for video and audio. We have some of those on the front of our tv, so it’s very easy to just plug it in, change the video to video 2, and start playing. It also takes 4 AA batteries.

A friend of ours built a whole console that looks exactly like the video games I used to play at Pizza Hut when I was 8. The kind where the game is set in a glass top table, and there’s controls on either side, so 2 players can face each other. He built it and put a computer inside and the last time we were there and I played, I was amazed when James came up, said it was time to go, and I’d spent 2 hours playing Ms. Pacman.

This game is not NEARLY as good as his. I’ve died numerous times on this little $15 version because the controller wasn’t really doing what I said (I know, I know, it’s always easy to blame the controller, but this time, it’s TRUE.)

But it’s still damned fun.

When it’s my turn, and I’m playing Ms. Pacman, Ethan and Jocelyn sit and watch and root for the ghosts. I only know the name of the red one, Blinky, which is also the fastest and most wiley of the ghosts. James informed me that the pink one is Sue. I should look up the other ones. Ethan likes to gloat and say, “I GOTCHA!” when I die, and then says, “That was me. I’M BLINKY! I GOT YOU!!”

Guess who played for an hour after the kids were in bed.

-amy could only get to the pretzel screen.

One week ago, Monday, it was like 68 degrees.

Yesterday it snowed.

It’s finally behaving like winter! Yay!

Of course, I was one of the eediots who looked out the window, saw the snow, and said, “I’d better go out!”

Well, not really. It started snowing right around naptime, so of course, being the mean parents we are, we made them go up for naptime. After a half hour or so, I started gathering up all the snow apparel I know we’d need, which is when I realized that their snow suits were nowhere to be found. I thoughtfully bought new snow boots sometime in November, but I thought their snowsuits would do for another season. Little did I know that they had gone AWOL. My memory kind of pricks at the thought of snowsuits, so I think that I perhaps dropped them off at Good Will. I know that Jocelyn’s was probably too small, and perhaps Ethan’s too.

So anyway, before “naptime” was over and the kids came down and jonesin’ for the outdoors, I got myself in the 4Runner and headed out to Target. WITH THE REST OF THE WORLD. The roads were packed, but luckily, there weren’t any idiots. Everyone was slow and careful and very aware of what other cars were doing.

Where they had swimming suits and springtime gardening stuff on display.

I guess the good news, was that they did have a few snow suits left (and jocelyn’s will last her for the next 2-3 years at least, as it was a girl’s size XS) AND they were on clearance. I also picked myself up some new mittens, a scarf and a hat. And luckily, they still had some snow items (ALSO ON CLEARANCE) so I picked up 2 child sized snow shovels, and a cheap plastic sled.

So Sunday afternoon was spent outdoors, shoveling, scooping, bulldozing (or ‘snowdozing’ as Ethan called it), snow-girl making, demanding, “pull me! pull me!” (on the sled), loading the sled up with snow and pulling it around, flopping down and making snow angels, and then coming indoors stripping off all the snowy sodden clothes to sit on the couch and watch The Muppet Show with big mugs of cocoa and marshmellows.

This morning, I actually got up when my alarm clock went off (something that hadn’t happened yet this year) and went and turned on the tv to see about school closings. After watching for 40 minutes and not seeing the kids’ school (it’s a private pre-school/daycare) I finally looked up the number and called. They were open!

And so we got up, got everyone ready, bundled up all the snow apparel to be taken to school, and 2 very excited kids went off to school. I also had to call our house cleaning company and ask them not to come today, because oh boy is our house not ready.

Our county schools were closed today, along with many others, so the roads were remarkably not filled with idiots. However, will you people with snow built up on your cars PLEASE clean it ALL off? I nearly died of a heart attack when a huge sheet of ice flew off the car in front of me and slammed against my windshield. Snow is ok. But when it gets all icey.. damn.

So it was a loverly weekend.

How was yours? Did you make any snow-girls?

James took the kids out one December weekend, and took these cute running-around-crazy-in-a-field pictures.

I couldn’t come up with any witty captions.

And once again, I didn’t get new photos off the camera last night. And since I dug up cute baby Ethan pictures, I can’t leave Jocelyn out of it, can I?

Here she is, just over 1 year old.

Oh my goodness. Shoes! That I can put on! I don’t think this will ever not be fun!

Your shoes are so much more fun than mine, Mom.

I think I’ll sit still for a second, so they have at least one photo of me that isn’t blurry. But I won’t look at you. I REFUSE.

And I’m off! There’s some fuzz over there that I definitely need to eat!

Aren’t my little robeez shoes cute? If I wiggle them just so, I can make folks go, “awwwwww!”

I kind of like the power.

This is my daddy. He’ll pretty much do whatever I want him to. Especially when I grin at him.

See? POWER! I WILL RUUUUUULE THE WORLD!!! Or at least, my daddy.

Since I haven’t gotten any pictures OFF the camera and UP to flickr, here are some older photos.

Ethan at age 1, at grandma and grandpa’s house in Park City, UT.

Mom, Dad, I think I’d like to look into careers which involve long hoses and plugging things in and out. Also. Socks? Who needs em? That’s next on my list. First things first though.

I mean seriously. Who thought of this? PURE GENIUS.

I just can’t get enough of this Grandpa person. He has so many things in his shirt pocket. Plus, he doesn’t get tired of my endless curiosity.

You don’t know it yet, but this? This love of all things gadgety? It just grows as I get older.

I could play with this hose ALL DAY LONG. In fact, I did. Oooh, hey, what is THAT THING?

OH MY GOD! I can PULL IT.. I think I am in heaven.

Look. Exposed brick. If I time falling down JUST RIGHT.. I could give my mother an anneurism. One sock down, one to go.

Gotta go. I got things to pull, both of the xylophone, and sock variety.

the living room.

our heros, amy and james are sitting in their respective seats, laptops on lap. TV is on, but paused in front of them, and has been for some time.

The silence broken only by the sound of keyboards clicking now and then.

amy: *frown*

amy: “Are we out of internet?”

james: *click click*

james: “I beleive we are out of internet.”

amy: “Hmm. Funny, there’s still a teeny bit left. Enough for me to click on stuff in gmail.”

james: That IS odd.

amy: “Oop. Nope. It’s gone now.”

james: “We’ll have to pick up some more internet tommorrow.”

amy: “I can stop on my way home from work.”

james: “Ok.”

—-

a few minutes later, but now, james is watching a show via the xbox. the file he is watching is located downstairs on his desktop computer.

tv: *video is lagging strangely from the sound*

amy: is it supposed to be like that?

james: no.. are you transfering any files or something?

amy: Nope.

james: Looks like we’re out of network too.

amy: Ok. I’ll pick up some of that too.

-end scene-