firefly nights

Tonight was one of those marvelous, once in a blue moon nights where life just seems perfect.  I almost missed out on these moments... I originally had plans to ditch the family after Kidz Kamp night and go for a few drinks.  The kids have been driving me bonkers at home lately.  It's been a Long, rainy week. 

Anyhow, at church Ry decided he wanted to go to outback to eat after the Kidz Kamp event was over and the kids begged for brown bread.  It was 7:30 and I knew we were asking for a disaster.  We are gluttons for punishment and always leave dinners at restaurants thinking "why did we do this again??"   But anyhow, we went to outback.  
The kids were amazing.  Sure they got antsy but for the most part they were great!  They ate their food, kept themselves entertained and we treated them with desert.  We all shared a chocolate thunder in which no one whined over anyone else getting more than them.  We left and I couldn't stop praising the kids for their good behavior.

On the way home Ry said to me "do you hear that?"  Yup. It was the sound of the boys talking and laughing and conspiring together.  Happily!   No fighting!  In this moment they were best friends.  Partners in crime.  

We got home and noticed there were fireflies outside.  We ran in and got a jar and went out back to catch some. They spent a good 20 minutes chasing the fireflies and filling their jars.  It was the perfect end to a summer night. 
Here's to hoping they sleep in in the morning!

Prayers needed

Words have left me short on this topic, because all I can really, truly say is cancer sucks.  Simply said.  It fucking sucks.

My family tree has a lot of cancer, and I'm pretty certain at some point in my life I'll have my own battle with cancer.  That's scary to think.  And sad that it just seems so.... strange to just accept that it's a reality. 

My great grandma and all her sisters had breast cancer.  My aunt had breast cancer before she was 40. And this May, my grandma was diagnosed with breast cancer.

In a way I feel confident that she will defeat in this.  This is my grandma... she's been through the wringer and always comes out on top.  But there's always that scary reality that things could turn for the worst. 

This is my grandma... who I spent weeks with as a toddler, flying to Michigan with her from Texas.  Who took care of me on sick days when my mom had to work or go to school, who watched The Price is Right with me before kindergarten.  The grandma who I was always excited to have sleepovers at her house and she'd take me to the store to get a craft or art kit.  The grandma who spoiled the hell out of us at Christmas, who bought me a cockatiel for my 13th birthday.  The grandma who makes the best chocolate pie ever for Thanksgiving and Christmas.  The one I would willingly spend weekends with as a teenager, just to get out of the house.   The grandma who always had red hots in a candy dish on her counter.  The grandma who became Oma to my babies, and has been there for them from day one- always willing to take care of them and love on them.  The Oma who Hudson surely won't be able to live without ever- so she MUST live forever.  Or at least until he's able to understand the circle of life.  

Tomorrow afternoon she has surgery to remove the lump in her breast.  It seems, so far, that it should be uncomplicated and she'll have to have radiation.   But she also has (a lack of) blood clotting issues so that makes surgery so scary too.  She can get a little cut and it'll bleed for days.   The thought of the bad things that could happen tomorrow are suppressed deep down, but I know they're real.

So please, if you're the praying type, say a prayer for her.  She's the best.  

Down the drain, literally

Well, our first week of Summer Break is officially over... and down the drain.   It was a total flop.   It started out great-- Sunday we went on a bike ride but by Monday morning, things were looking bad.

Porter woke up and threw up.  Poor guy spent the entire day sick in the chair in the living room, barely eating anything more than toast and gatorade.   By the evening he was perking up a little bit...  I went to boot camp at Marleen's and got my butt whooped.  WHEW I'm out of shape!

Tuesday was pretty decent... the kids seemed okay.  We got a lot done in the yard- watered and weeded teh garden, mowed the lawn, did a few loads of laundry and dried on the line.   Eian came over in the evening and we had him stay the night.  The boys fell asleep on the sectional in the basement watching a movie.

Somewhere in the middle of the night between Tuesday and Wednesday Amelia woke up puking.  How gross it was ham and strawberries.  I changed her sheets and jammies and put her back to bed.  Then Hudson woke up puking.  Then Amelia puked again, so I changed her sheets AGAIN.  And then Hudson puked.  You get the idea, right?   I ended up crashing in Hudsons room in the extra bed, and it seemed like every time I got back into bed and was about to fall asleep, someone was crying because their tummy hurt or was puking.

By the morning on Wednesday I was a zombie.  Ryan was up for work so I told him to take Eian home.  I texted his mom and sent him on his way.   All day Wednesday was a blur.  I was exhausted, the kids were all whiny and not feeling well.  Hudson disappeared mid-morning and I found him sleeping in his room.  That's when you know he feels like crap!   He woke up for a bit in the afternoon and then went back to sleep for awhile.  He was so lethargic and sad looking.

Wednesday night Ryan came home sick.... here we go!   I needed to go grocery shopping, but Ryan suggested I just order in dinner and then go in the morning. SURE!   Porter and I got pizza and not an hour after eating I was throwing up.   Off to bed we all went.

Thursday of course the kids were feeling better but I felt like crud.  On top of that we had NO food in the house (remember... I was supposed to be grocery shopping!!).  Thank goodness my mom was able to come by and bring some bread, butter, 7 up and some snacks for the kids.  By the afternoon I was feeling much better. WHEW!

So our first week literally was a blur of puking and lack of sleep.    It was great, let me tell ya....

falling waters trail family bike ride

Sunday was a gorgeous day- not too hot and no rain!  With a little persistence from me (towards Ryan.... the kids were down for it), we packed up the crew and bikes and headed for the Falling Waters Trail.   Kind of crazy we've never biked it before, although I guess last year was really the first year Hudson was biking on his own and at that point Amelia was too tiny.   Hmm.  

We started at the New Leaf Park- on the inner city trail, and rode about 2.5 miles down through the Falling Waters Trail.  It was so peaceful and nice (well, if you imagined being on the trail without two boys fighting about who was passing who, or a husband barking at the kids to stay on one side of the trail, or a baby screaming because she was tired....).  We did have to make a potty break for Porter at the trail head on Weatherwax Rd, but good to know that a port a potty is available. 

The 2.5 mile ride back to the car was the un-fun part.  Amelia screamed most of the way, and I was getting grumpy even though I tried really hard to stay positive so Negative Nancy (aka Ryan) would try to enjoy the ride.  

We'll definitely be going back again- I'd love to make it an every-Sunday tradition... maybe pack a picnic lunch and take the bikes to church... head there straight from church?  Hmm.  I wonder if we can get that organized...

Harlem Shake | Barczak Style

The other day, Ryan showed me some of the Harlem Shake videos on YouTube (if you haven't seen them... go now and watch!  Just search for "Harlem Shake").  HILARIOUS.   We showed the boys and they were cracking up.   Porter thought it'd be fun if we made one, and of course I thought so too.  Ryan and Hudson were not so sure... and really didn't want to make one.  After some convincing (and pouting), they gave in and joined in the fun.   We had a BLAST!  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r69bp3GWUK0

Visting Santa

It has been a few years since we've seen the "Mall Santa"- the last few years we have gone to Miss Marleen's and Santa comes there with presents!!   My sister wanted all the kids to go together so we headed to the mall with my mom.  (Sidenote... I'm not sure I've stepped foot in our local mall since Gap closed uh... 3 years ago???)

As expected, Hudson was SO unsure of Santa.  Heather had to carry him up there (his face buried in her shoulder, refusing to look at Santa).  He didn't cry or scream or anything, just totally ignored Santa- wouldn't look at him or speak to him!  HAHAHA!  It was quite humorous.   To be fair, he really didn't feel good either- he was hit hard with a cold and had been up all night and super early that morning so he was tired and under the weather.  

Amelia didn't mind him at all... she was kind of confused about what was going on.  

Porter walked right up to him, fiddled with his teeth and tie a bit but told him what he wanted for Christmas (this day in particular he wanted a new nerf gun.  Previously, his request was a pistol or a cross bow to which I explained to him that Santa won't bring presents that he knows Mommy's and Daddy's don't want their kids to have.  He took that into consideration and changed his request HAHA!)

And the whole clan.  What a mess.  

Thirty-One

Thirty one seems like an insignificant year. It really is. It isn't the age you are allowed to legally drink. Nor the age that takes you out of your forever young twenties Nor is it the age that sends you over the hill. It's easy to forget thirty one.


My husband, however, did not. What I thought was an unsuspecting annual "birthday buddies" dinner with the Huffs (Don and I, along with Heather Morrison, share December 10 as a birthday) turned into the results of a month long conspiracy between Katie and Ryan to surprise Don and I for our birthdays!

Sure, There were a few instances where I wondered if something was going on... My sister mentioned my mom was going to be in town (and then insisted she was just overtired and losing track of the date), and then the fact that we were going to a different restaurant than normal, in which Ryan blamed it on each of us as an excuse (he told me I picked the restaurant last year and Don wanted Buffalo bBQ wings- even though I was so craving a chocolate thunder for my bday I kept my mouth closed for the sake of compromise). And there were a few other things that made me think hmmmm but for the most part I was clueless. I blame today on being uuber cranky and missing lots of signs. I was dreading dinner.... Was grumpy and irritable and just wanted to hole up at home.

We picked don and Katie up (should have been another clue... We normally meet up), and Katie was impatiently texting me "where are you?? Mamas hungry!!" And on the way there we got into a deep Disney vacation conversation.

When we got to the restaurant I saw Adrian, and it still didn't register until we walked around the corner and there were family members and amazing friends all gathered to celebrate with us!! My best surprise- my mom flew into town!!! I was floored. Could not believe they pulled it off and that they thought to do something like this. It sure makes thirty one seem a lot more significant. Thank you to everyone who came (and thank you to those who couldn't make it but I know you wanted to be there!). And even more thanks to Ryan and Katie for showing Don and I how loved we are, and that thirty one (and thirty six) don't have to be as insignificant as they seem.

Take it all in

We pulled out the Christmas decorations tonight.  Put Pandora on Christmas music and began digging through boxes.

What a lucky life I have, I thought.   My husband and I working together to string the lights on the tree. The music dancing through the air.  The 4 of us randomly singing loudly and off key.

Take it all in.

The boys discovering their ornaments, again, as if with new eyes.  "I remember this!"  I can hear a twinge in Porter's voice as he sounds so sentimental, almost choked up.  Hudson, his eyes squinty, his hands clasped beneath his chin, grinning when I fill up the snow globe ornament with water.  Pure joy in such simple things.

Take it all in.

Amelia, crawling around in her diaper amidst the Christmas explosion, fitting in with our family like the perfect puzzle piece.  The boys chasing each other in and out of the boxes with airplane ornaments, making whizzing, zooming and shooting noises.  Me, scolding Ryan and reminding him to take a deep breath, let the kids be kids.  Let them be little.

Take it all in.

The irony of "The Most Wonderful Time of the Year" playing as I hold a half naked baby on one hip, steady a fallen Christmas tree with the other hand, while Ryan attempts to secure it yet again while lying amidst broken ornaments and spilled water.  The boys upset over the loss of our recent Mackinaw ornament.  Ryan huffing and puffing, while I can do nothing but laugh as the baby giggles and flings herself around... the tree falling on two of our kids is so our luck.

Take it all in.

Despite the chaos.  The loudness.  The laughter. The drama.  The irritation   The bad luck.  The love.  The bickering.  This is our life.  Our family.  These are the moments its all about.

Take it all in.

The. Best. Christmas. Tree. Ever. (if you have a sense of humor)

Fun family traditions?  Uh.  Seems like anytime we try to plan something fun as a family it ends up being a ridiculous stressful event full of whining and irritated huffing and puffing.

Today for example.  We planned to get our Christmas tree   A real one this year.  I also planned to meet a lady at meijer at noon to buy a movie.   I told Ryan this at like 10 am.   Amelia laid down for a nap and at 1130 I decides to wake her up and asked Ry to get the boys coats, shoes and hats on and pack some cheese and crackers while I got Amelia dressed.

Well he had to get himself dressed.  And then mentioned he needed to dump garbage out of the truck (he takes our garbage to his work to dump).  Then the truck was in the back yard (which is gated), so we had to move the van to get the truck out.  The carseats weren't even in the truck.  The chainsaw wasn't in the truck.  Porter was whining and getting pissed because his shoes didn't "feel right".  Hudson was getting pissed because he couldn't get his mitten on right.  Amelia was pissed because she wanted a bottle.  I was pissed because we only had 10 minutes to get across town to meet this lady.  Ughhh.   I was ready to call it quits and just dig out the fake tree yet again.  

But... we made it work.  I called the lady, we got the carseats in the truck, the kids loaded up and we made it only 15 minutes late.  Sure, we were all silent and brooding on the trip out there but once we got to the tree farm (which is a friends' parents tree farm, and was closed so we had the run of the place) our spirits lifted.  The boys were really excited about our new adventure.   

The pickins' were kind of slim for a smaller tree.  These trees were HUGE!  We walked all the way down the path and back and contemplated and discussed and compared and pondered.   Ryan's theory was "We just need to find one that has a good 'body' and we can trim it into a good shape once we're home" Ok.  Remember this, right?   

So we find a few trees that are far too tall.  One would work if we hacked the top off (it was kind of narrower in the middle toward the top) and others seemed like they'd work if we hacked about 4 feet off the bottom and trimmed the sides up a ton.  We finally settled on one that seemed pretty close to what we needed.  It was a little fuller than we'd liked but we figured we can trim it up, right? 

We took a few pictures... my hubby is the best- he carried this huge wooden uh, thing, over so I could set my camera up and use the self timer.   We packed the tree up, and headed home.  

Here's where the fun begins... are you ready for some laughs??  When we finally got around to bringing the tree in it was dark.  Ryan went outside and when he brought the tree in the first thing I thought was "WOAH... way too big."  We obviously either overestimated the size of our house or underestimated the size of that tree.  The second thought? "What the hell happened to the top of the tree and why is there so much trunk showing?!"  (Ryan says "I only trimmed a little off the top!)  I am pretty sure this is why he said to me "I"m going to run up to Menards for garbage bags... and look at their trees." I shot the idea down.  NO!  We went and picked out our tree and we're going to make it work!  Little did I know he'd hacked a hunk of the top off of it! HAAH!

So out to the front yard we went with a hedge trimmer and chainsaw.   Ry cut off some of teh trunk (and I'm pretty sure more of the branches at the bottom because we needed to cut MORE trunk off later), and I went to town with the hedge trimmers trying to shape the tree into a recognizable triangle shape.   The neighbor came by to get his dog (who ran into our yard) and said "That's unique... cutting the top of the tree off instead of the bottom!  Shows you don't follow the crowd, huh?"  HAHAHA!

After oh, an hour?? Who knows... and many many laughs, we finally got our tree looking decent.  Oh my word.   Ryan kept saying we should just go buy another tree and I refused.  No.  This was OUR ugly tree and it is going to be a great memory.  Ugly or not, it's staying.  

Changing Times

This past week has flown by!  My mom was here to vist and as usual, it went by way too fast.  :(   I miss her being nearby and seeing the kids often.

The time change is tonight... in 40 minutes to be exact.  That technically means I get an extra hour of sleep (or editing... or web surfing...) but since I have kids it pretty much means I'll be getting up at the butt crack of dawn because my kid will think it is 7am and it will really be only 6am.  Ugh. This morning the boys did surprise me by letting us sleep in until 9am... we found them downstairs watching Madagascar 3 surrounded by empty Halloween candy wrappers.  Typical.

November is NaBloPoMo.... and for the past few years I've done a great job at attempting to post each day and year after year... failing.   Well... since today is the Time Change, I'm going to use this Time to Change my bad blogging habits.   Or at least put in a good effort to attempt to change them :)  Anyone else care to join me?   I'm going to try to set aside at least 20 min/day to jot a little something down on the ol' blog.

So let me recap my last week:

Saturday:  Porter had a Halloween party at a friends house.  Its so neat that he is old enough to have these kind of friend parties!   The school doesn't celebrate Halloween and P's friends parents said they felt like the kids should get to see each other dressed up.  She did a great job with the party... I picked Porter up and they'd had a Halloween snack, made a craft, played outside, had goodie bags.  Good times!

We celebrated my Grandma's 70th birthday!  My aunt threw her a huge party and I loved seeing her so happy and everyone there celebrating her!  She is an amazing person- I love her to death.  Happy Birthday Grandma... you don't look a day over 75! HAHAHA!  (inside joke y'all)  

Sunday:  More Halloween fun!  We went to church, spent the early afternoon at my grandma's so the kids could have ice cream with her.  Her party was no-kids, so we wanted them to have a chance to celebrate too.   Addi also got a late b-day present from my mom:  Butterscotch the mini pony!  She is such a little animal lover- reminds me of me!   She also loooves horses!  

Sunday afternoon we headed out to the Huff Compound for a hayride/bonfire and hotdogs.  Between all of the Huff grandkids (4 girls and 3 boys), and just the couple friends who went there were quite a few kids!  The boys, typical, spent the evening rough housing and wrestling.  I just don't get boys.  

Monday:  Ry had taken the day off work so it was a nice surprise to have the day with him home.   He took Porter to school and then in the early afternoon decided to take Hudson to a movie.  It was around 1:30 and he decided he'd pick Porter up early from school and surprise him.  So, the boys had an extra special date day with daddy!  We met my mom and Aubri for dinner at Hunt Club and then had our traditional ice cream at The Parlour.  YUM!!

This family got the Dare To Be Great:   21 scoops!!!

Tuesday:  Hmm.  I don't remember Tuesday. 

Wednesday was Halloween.  I'll give that it's own post :)  

Adios!  It's now 2am and I'm pretty sure I'll hate myself in the morning.   

Mama's here!

Amelia and I picked my mom up at the airport after dropping Hudson off at school on Thursday.  The boys knew my mom was coming to visit but I don't think they really realized what day exactly.   When I dropped them both off at school I told them I'd bring them a surprise when I picked them up.

They were both so happy to see her.  I asked Porter if he thought it was a good surprise and he said "Yeah.  I thought we were going to Disney World, though."   Funny boy!

Grandma and Amelia reunited!

We met my sister and her girls at Los Tres for dinner.  Amelia spent a good 15 minutes sucking on a lemon.  Eeww!  (nice cleavage, Heather)

Pumpkin Picking

We've made it a tradition to go to Adams Farm Market for our pumpkins.  You can't beat $5 for huge beasts!  Unfortunately, we go there at 6:15 and realized they were closing at 6:30 so we were "speed shopping" for pumpkins and I was trying to document Amelia's first pumpkin patch trip.  Boo.  I got some cute pics and the boys had fun pulling around their own wagons and attempting to load up the huge pumpkins.  Hudson was in a beastly mood so he's pretty grumpy in every picture!  

This boy just loves picking Amelia up and thinks he's an adult.  He is good with her, though, and is so careful.

When we got home I bribed them with 10 extra minutes to stay up if they let me get a picture.  And "a" picture is what I got!

Because this is their typical silliness....

Beatin' the heat this week

It's been a week since I blogged.  Really??? A week!?!  And actually if I'm honest, longer than that because I wrote Amelia's update while we were up north on vacay.

This week has been full of fun.  We hopped right back into our everyday chaos without missing a beat. Okay, maybe a few beats.  Monday I got a babysitter for a couple hours in the morning.  I was in dire need of some kid-free time.  Of course I got all wild and crazy and hit up Menards and Target!  I picked up paint at Menards for the dining room table I bought off the Jackson For Sale Board on FB and two pair of 49 cent sunglasses!  Heh heh!  They were 7.49/ea with a $7 mail in rebate.  Sweet!

Wednesday we had a play date with some friends.  A group of my friends and their friends and friends of friends (ha!) are making a point of getting together once a week throughout the summer.  Its nice to have something to look forward to and to get some adult conversation while the kids entertain each other :)

The past 2 days the boys and I have hung out at my grandma's pool with my sister and her kids.  Shocking... my grandma has a pool and this is the first I've used it since I was a child.  As a kid, my mom used to take my sister and I swimming alllll the time during the summer.  Heather and I have so many memories at my grandma and grandpa's house.  As we grew older I have kind of drifted from my dad's side of the family (maybe partially because of my parents' divorce when I was 14?) but anyhow, I guess it never crossed my mind to use her pool.  Well, that and I didn't want it to be like I was just using her for her pool since I rarely see her throughout the year.  However, Heather stopped by her house Wednesday night when she saw my dad's truck there and she was invited to use the pool.  And then she texted me the next day so we decided to head on over there to swim.  For 4 hours we swam and the boys had a blast!!  It was 103* on Thursday and the pool was a must.  Perfect perfect.  Poor Amelia, though, she was sweating in the shade even.  Today wasn't as hot, but we still swam for a good 3 1/2 hours!  We're going to try to make 2 days a week swim days, as long as weather permits!

By the time we got home the boys were passed out.  What a great day!