FA, la La, LA, LAAAAAA!

Believe it or not, this is unstaged. This is our contribution to my parent's Christmas video in France. Though my French is poor at best, it was fun to do and represents, very well, our life!!
Merry Christmas everyone!

Dear Abby,

I have a five year old son, whom I adore. The past few weeks he has turned sour. I'm not sure what is wrong, but he is never satisfied, always complaining, picking fights and blaming it on the fact that he doesn't get what he wants. This is my happy-go-lucky child who always makes my life better. I need him back desperately!! The bigger problem is that this turns me into a ranting lunatic. I become a five year old myself saying things like "That's right and you're never going to get anything you want if you act like this," or "Life isn't fair and you need to get used to it...." The speeches go on and on. It turns a switch in me that I can't control and feel like I'm making the problems worse. What would you do? Any suggestions are helpful.

Sincerely,
Kindergarten Cop

True Aggies

Phil and I took a stroll down memory lane last night. In the cool, crisp autumn air, we walked around the campus of USU after dark. The same great campus where we started dating and fell in love 10 years ago! As we walked around, the memories flooded back. We wandered past where Phil used to work. He'd put up his "back in 5 minutes" sign and come find me in the library or watch my intermural softball games. We went through the building where we went to our first dance, and many dances afterward. We talked about where we had what classes and reminisced about College Hill. Hand-in-hand we started to feel the excitement and energy of being back in a college town.

And then Micah came up behind us, put an arm around each of our legs and split us apart, wanting to hold mommy's hand. Suddenly we were back in 2008 with three crazy boys running laps around the quad. What an odd feeling! To think back to the way things were and to realize what has happened over the last 10 years. What if someone had shown us a glimpse of us at that moment in the future? What would we have thought? (Probably that we were crazy!) Life has changed so drastically and so much has happened in not so much time. It's been a great ride and I'm proud of the little family we've become since our story began.

Would we go back? Yes, we decided, if we didn't have to relive the whole 10 years!! It's a long time. Those were such sweet days! But I think we've started to come full circle. Perhaps true aggies are the ones who return and share with their kids all the exciting and fun things about college life, saying things like "This is where dad had microbiology. This is where we lived and met... And maybe someday you'll come to this great school..."

"...Kids...kids? Get down from there...watch out...What? Again? You just went to the bathroom..." Oh man. Those were the days!

Oh Brother, where art thou?

Rainy days and Mondays usually get me down....

But this helped! I hope they always stay good friends.

Role Reversal

I have started babysitting three little girls a few hours a week. It has been fun and Micah looks forward to "the girls" coming and enjoys observing them. I say observe, because he rarely just picks up and starts playing with them, but is very interested in what the girls do.

I found myself with the same wide-eyed wonder the other day as we played house together. I was the big sister, Micah was my brother, Cooper (he still asks if I'm Carrissa and if he's Cooper). One of the girls was our sister, one the baby, and one the mom. I was flabbergasted, and I don't think I've ever been flabbergasted before!, at how well the mom served her role. It took her most of an hour to get dinner on the table. And this was plastic food, I remind you. The reasons it took long were very real and true to life. She'd start getting it ready, then someone would distract her. She'd need to pick up kids from piano lessons, break up a fight, help one of the kids do something. Always, calling them "honey," even if it was in a stern, reprimanding voice.

Then her phone rang. I couldn't help it, I had see what she'd do. "Mom, mom, mom," I tugged at her sleeve. "Just a minute, I'm on the phone," she mouthed to me. I had to push a little harder, but eventually she excused herself from the conversation to see what I needed. From the wagging of her finger, to the clearing of the dinner table, this little girl has been observing and I dare say, preparing for being a mom. It was really quite enlightening to watch. So that's why it takes so long to make dinner!!

Daylight Savings, Shmaylight Savings

My 6th grade teacher was not fond of Day Light savings. At some point in her life she had worked with sheep and was adamant about the fact that sheep woke and slept at the same times regardless of time on the clock. For some reason(s), this discussion has stuck with me over the years.

I could have been a shepard! My boys rise and fall on a pretty routine schedule and sure enough, Sunday morning they were up before the crack of dawn (4:45 to be exact) bleating at our bedroom door for breakfast. Did I mention I'm not really a morning person? We held them off as long as we could, then I said the magic words (for them and me!) "Why don't you go play computer, eh?" It's the same story every six months, trying to talk their little inner clocks into new schedules while managing to get enough sleep ourselves.

And then, there's the fact that it gets dark at 5:30. I know, I know we're now back to the "real" time and it would have been dark at 5:30 for all of October had we never changed in the first place. But it really does make me feel better to blame it on something! We've spent all fall racing from soccer game to soccer game, parks etc and have often come home with late bedtimes. Now in the matter of a few days, it's dark, we're tired, the night drags on and it's only 7:05. Can we please pretend it's the old time and put the boys down for bed yet? Perhaps we need a winter sport, or a life in general, but the darkness is one thing that depresses me about the long winter coming up!!

On a happier note, our furnace will not be leaking carbon monoxide into our home this long winter! yeah!! We had a routine physical done on it Monday and found that there were little cracks in our whozamawhatsits that could allow carbon monoxide into our home. They were REALLY sorry about it, but had to turn off the gas and deem it unsafe to run. We'd need to buy a new one immediately for the safety of all who would enter our home. So, Merry Christmas one and all, we've got a new furnace!!!