My Soapox: Chocolate Lovers Unite

I'm thinking of adding a new feature to my blog.  My Soapbox.  These will be posts were I rant and rave about things that make me crazy.  Feel free to pass these posts up if you are only looking for the positive things in life!

There is a new disturbing trend happening with our food.

Food companies are having a difficult time and consequently are trying to think of new ways to charge the same amount but give us less food.  They think that the general public is too dim witted to see what they are doing.
And perhaps they are correct.

First they started doing things like making cereal boxes skinnier.  They look like the same size from the front but when you pick it up you can see they are much smaller.  Pieces of gum are also getting smaller.  You have to eat at least 2 if you actually want something to chew.

The trick that bothers me the most is that they are filling up our food with air.  They first did it to yogurt.  They knew that no one truly loves yogurt so most people wouldn't care. I tried "whipped" yogurt once - it's not good.  Then they started whipping frosting and pudding.  This made me upset.  Whipped pudding is also not tasty and yet millions of women are buying it believing it's luxurious.  Wake up you women - it's not luxurious - IT'S PUDDING (also "pearl" tampons don't make you a princess either)!  Whipped frosting actually spreads nicely but it takes twice as much to frost a cake.  The only food that should be whipped is whipped cream.  They can whip the daylights out of that for all I care.
Those evil food geniuses! They have finally crossed a line.  I will be apathetic only so far.  They have now started filling my chocolate kisses with air holes.  AIR HOLES!  And they are marketing it like it is some great gift they are doing for us!  When I buy chocolate I expect chocolate - not air!  If I want more air I will breathe more deeply.  Chocolate lovers unite.  We must not fall for their tricks.  Make a pledge to yourself today to never buy chocolate filled with air.  You deserve better.  Our monthly hormones deserve better.  Our 'late nights we can't believe the kids are actually in bed' deserve better!  

And off of the soapbox I step.

The Grades For The Day

Some days we just don't bring our A game.

Today was one of those days for me.  In all honesty it's been one of those months for me!

If I am going to grade myself today I think it's only fair that I grade my family.

William has earned a 95% for the day.

He lost 10% for ridiculously stinky diapers and knocking over my crafting table, but he earned 5% back for extreme cuteness.

He was such a good little boy today that it starts to make you think "Why don't I have another one of these little darlings?".  These thoughts don't usually last for more than a day - hence no new babies.  We had our primary program today and since Soungsik and I both needed to sit on the stand we opted to take William up with us.  This was a risky decision that could have totally backfired.  We lucked out and William was better than he has probably ever been in sacrament meeting.  Maybe I should speak to the bishop and see if we can sit on the stand every week.  He was even better than a few of the older children!  When I went to take him to nursery he just went in all by himself and when Soungsik and I went to pick him up after he joyously yelled "mommy!"  so he got a few brownie points!  He took a nap, said thank you for lunch, cuddled and gave me at least 10 kisses before he went quietly off to bed.  Thinking about it now I should give him 100% but some smells are just inexcusable.  

Isabelle has earned 95% also.

She started off the day great by sneaking into my bed and cuddling up to me.  She waited until I woke up and then we had girl talk for about 10 minutes on important issues like what dresses we wanted to wear to church, how we would do our hair, what color of nail polish would look beautiful on us and what we should make for breakfast.  During the primary program Isabelle had her part perfectly memorized and did so great.  She sat so quietly and sang lovely as well.  I have no idea how she was the rest of church - I hope good!  I took 15% away from Isabelle during piano and violin practice and 5% for spilling milk after I told her I'd pour it. She earned 15% back when she told me at bedtime "Mommy you are the best, best mommy a girl ever had!!!"  Even though we have our rough mommy/daughter moments most of the time she is a pure joy.  I just love watching the person she is growing into.

Soungsik has earned...hummm...it's kind of hard to grade your husband.

I'll do it anyways.  He gets 85%.  He had lost 50% for making us late to church this week (not entirely his fault) but I gave him 35% percent back for cutting and sanding wood blocks for me in the freezing cold for two hours yesterday.  He is so mellow and laid back.  In fact sometimes I wonder if we get along a little too well.  Oh we have our "conversations" every now and again, but for the most part we are just enjoying growing old together.  Today Soungsik took William with him during the primary program - brownie points.  He also made lunch and was so patient with me when I had a meltdown this morning.  He is my new team teacher in primary and I love it.  He thinks he is very serious and mean with the kids, but in reality the boys in class are having a blast playing with him.  The jury is still out on if he helps in class or not!  He keeps making me watch really stupid westerns, but then he makes up for it by making me laugh. Yep, I think I'll keep him.

Me?  I only get 65%.  I started off the day so well.  I had the best of intentions.  We had a nice, relaxed morning. My lesson was prepared the night before including delicious cookies.  Isabelle and I got up and painted nails and made a hot breakfast for a cold morning.  The kids got in the tub. The begged to play for 10 more minutes so being the great mom I am I said "you bet kids, no hurry, we have all the time in the world."  Oh yes, I was really on the ball this morning.  I took Isabelle into the bathroom to start off on the beautiful ringlets we had previously decided to do in our hair.  My husband came into the room, still in his pajamas and asked "What time does our church start anyways?"  I looked at him like he was one of the most mindless people ever, rolled my eyes a little, and then said "11:00 honey...the exact same time it has started for the past 2 years."  I mean really..DUH!  He then informed me "Well it is 11:00."  From there my voice began in a normal tone and increasingly got more high pitched, loud, and frantic.  I sounded something like this..."What?  What time did you say?  Are you kidding me?  That's not even funny Soungsik!  Not funny one bit!  What time is it really?  We still have an hour left before church."  Of course I didn't wait for him to answer.  Walking over to the clock..."I can't believe you would tease me like this!  It is not 11:00.  That's not possible.  Some of us have been up for four hours.  It doesn't take 4 hours to get 3 people ready for church.  You are so mean to tease me like that...HOLY MOLEY!  CRAP - IT'S 11:00!  But my hair and makeup aren't done.  Isabelle and William's hair isn't done.  We don't have shoes on!  I don't' even know where the shoes are!  Is William stinky?  NO - we don't have time for stinky!!!  I don't care if I rip all of your hair out Isabelle - we don't have time to care!  The tangles must be gone and gone now!"....Getting in the car... "We don't need seat belts.  We don't even have time to die! A car crash would make us way too  late - no we won't be doing that today! Why of all weeks do I have to loose my mind on the day of the primary program!"  If we would have missed Isabelle's part I don't think she ever would have forgiven me. Luckily we got there well before the program started. Granted my makeup was bad, my hair, Isabelle's hair, and William's hair was still undone, but we ALL had shoes on and they even matched!  It was then that I realized I forgot my program so I didn't know when I needed to send kids up, bad teacher (they all made it anyways).  I also forgot to bring Isabelle's scriptures.  She was one of the only kids without them when we sang Scripture Power, bad mom.  I watched jealously as one of Isabelle's cute friends walked up to the pulpit with beyond curly ringlets, bad mom.  One of the boys in my class had his chair breaking.  I just sat and watched him fix it on his own, bad teacher.  I watched as one naughty boy, no make that 2 naughty boys that were being annoying.  I did nothing. I was emotionally spent, bad teacher.  In class I only gave a 10 minute lesson and we talked and ate cookies and goofed off the rest of the time, bad teacher.  I fed my children peanut butter and honey sandwiches and peaches for dinner, bad mom.  I put Isabelle straight into her pajamas after church - it saves time right?  It is almost 11:00 and Isabelle is still awake.  It turns out that tonight I don't really care, bad mom.  My sink is full of dirty dishes that I have zero intention of washing tonight, bad wife. 

All that being said I was pretty happy today.  Today was a nice day.  I think I'll do much better tomorrow.

I think I'll care a little more.  I have the best of intentions... we all know how well those worked out for me today.
I am the best best mommy a girl could have!

I could probably take over the world if I put in an A day!

Children's Museum

The kids and I headed off to the Children's Museum on Friday.

Now I am going to be a little bit of a fuddy duddy, but I don't like the Children's Museum.

I can't really get over the employee making me spit my gum out last time.

Just like a mean teacher in middle school or something.

That incident and the fact that my kids end up playing mostly in the "grocery store" with the exact same plastic food that we have at home are two of the reasons why I don't love it there.  Since I am an awesome mom I take the kids, because they love it there.

 Here's William playing with the same trains that are at Grandma's house.

 

Yippee kay yay my city children...

 

There's a new sheriff in town.

 

As it turns out you don't have to teach boys how to use cranks.

The water was a pretty big hit.

My musical children also loved this.

 

Their favorite thing was the ball area. 

I don't know what it is actually called but there are hundreds of balls that you can drop down tubes or get them sucked up tubes, ect.  I was so proud of both of my kids on Friday.

 William had about 8 bigger kids just rip balls out of his hands.

I was watching and thinking "Should I butt in and be one of those mom's that does everything for her kids?"

I decided not to since no one was being hurt.

After a while a kid came up and tried to grab a ball out of Williams hands.

William gripped that ball like his life depended on it and looked the kid straight in the eyes and ROARED as load as he could. The kid looked frightened and I just sat in my chair and chuckled a little inside.

Why on Earth was I thinking William would ever need my protection?

I have learned my lesson and so has that other little ball stealing boy.

Many of the children were lets say "ball hogging".

Filling up baskets with 20 or 30 balls and then keeping them all to themselves.

(Another reason I don't love the Children's Musem)

Not Isabelle though.

At first she was just sharing with William

After a little while she got a basket and filled it full of balls.

Again I just sat and watched, to see if my daughter would become a ball hogger.

Instead of keeping the balls she took about 4 or 5 younger kids up the stand with her and shared all of the balls.  In fact she did this multiple times.  I was such a proud mama.

So I guess the Children's Museum wasn't as bad as I remember it being.

I got to see a glimpse of what I hope will be my children's etiquette for life, 

and they got to have a great time.

We may even go again sometime.

It's not hard being a mom when you have kids like these!

We Love Halloween

This past week Soungsik, William and myself took turns being sick.  Isabelle lucked out of it this time. Because of the sickness not much got done this week and Halloween crept up on us.

We have had a wonderful time this Halloween. 

It was so warm this year that it didn't even feel like the end of October.

(It started snowing today, so we got very lucky!) 

I am not complaining about the warmth - it was perfect.  

 Isabelle wore her rag doll costume from last year to school.

Her costume this year would have been destroyed at school.

After I dressed her up in this I wondered to myself

"Why on Earth did I make a new costume for this year?"

The answer echoed loud in my mind, it is because she is my first child.

It's easy to forget that you are a "first time" mom when your baby is almost 6.

I am sure I will have this revelation over and over again over the next 14 years.

On Sunday night we had a family party at our house.

It was quite fun.

 For dinner people brought different kinds of soups.

I never knew you could get so full on soup.

It was delicious!

After dinner we got into pumpkin carving.

It was very messy.

 

Isabelle is looking at Cameron like

"What moron gave an 11 year old boy a knife that big?"

The answer is, I don't know, it wasn't me, and fortunately no fingers were amputated.

I had dreams of carving all 7 of our pumpkins.

After completing 2 Soungsik and I decided that was plenty of pumpkins guts for 1 year.

 

I did the ghosts and Soungsik did the cat.

If you ask Isabelle the cat pumpkin is hers.  She did it.

I mean she did pick the pattern out and delegate a little, 

we all know those are the most crucial parts of pumpkin carving.

Then it was onto the costum fashion show.

Ooh la la.

 

Best costumes of the year were the minions.

William thought they were real.

He was fascinated by them and just kept saying "hi...hi...hi".

All of the cousins looked adorable.

 

Hayden was using his Jedi force around the house.

It was very intimidating.

 Lily declared herself the Queen of ALL People.

Yoda and the Queen kept battling each other for superiority.

I still don't know who won.

William was a puppy.

 

I am a horrible mom. 

I didn't get very many pictures of William.

He never stops moving so I can't ever get good pictures of him.

He was a pretty cute little puppy!

William LOVED trick-or-treating.

He got the hang of it after about 2 houses.

After all he wasn't born yesterday!

Isabelle was a peacock.

 

We had fun making this costume this year.

Isabelle was especially excited to get to wear makeup.

 

She is as pretty as a peacock!

A peacock with attitude!

Happy Halloween!

A Beautiful October Day

It has been the UEA  (Utah Education Association) holiday the past two days.  

Everybody that goes to school, teachers included, get a fall vacation.

I decided that since I am a hard working teacher, I would give myself a holiday.

Perhaps teachers actually go to training or something during this time,
I am not really sure.

We declared it a holiday at our house and decided to head up the canyon for what 

may be one of the last perfect days of the year.

And it was PERFECT!  

We had lunch at Vivian Park and there was a playground that we couldn't keep the kids from.

 Actually we didn't try very hard to stop them.

 William discovered how to climb the rope ladder.  Oh hurray - NOT!

 I was just watching him and visions of all of his future medical bills flashed through my head.

It was not a fun vision.

Then I watched this little monkey and visions of past medical bills flashed through my mind.

It must be getting close to Halloween because I keep seeing lots of frightening things.

This is frightening to me for an entirely different reason that I won't go into!

But for those of you who keep asking if we are going to have three children...
I already have three!

The "kids" just couldn't leave the train tracks alone.

 I am pretty sure that this both illegal and stupid.

Sometimes fun trumps illegal and stupid.

Where there are train tracks you are bound to find a train, or at the very least an empty boxcar.

 

You can't go past a beautiful, peaceful, flowing river without throwing some rocks into it.

 Isabelle picked very cute dainty little rocks.

William opted for the more manly boulder versions.

He threw at least 10 rocks this size in.

If they still employ strong men at the circus I bet he would qualify.

The leaves were so beautiful and brought a needed sense of calm into my mind. 

I don't know how old this tree is, but it had an old soul to it...
you know, for a tree.

Since it was a holiday we decided to do a slumber party in the family room.

We don't do sleepovers, so this is probably as close as our kids will get to one.

We watched a double feature, played some Halloween Bingo (which I won for once, usually Isabelle beats me senseless!) and shoved popcorn into our mouths as fast as our hands could shove.

See???

 

The three "kids" slept on a mattress on the floor.  

And the boring non-risk taking adult had dibs on the big couch.

Amazingly, we all slept like babies and the kids even slept in until 8:30 this morning.

I am thinking this should become a monthly family tradition.

I can just picture me with my teenage kids having a blast at the family slumber party. 

They won't get too cool for that will they?

Hee Haw Farms

 

Today we had a fun family outing to Hee Haw Farms in

Pleasant Grove.

What a great way to kick off our fall festivities.

This year was so much better because

Soungsik joined us for the fun.

I want one of these tire swing horses.  They are so cute and you don't have to clean up after them!

I cannot look at a John Deere tractor without missing

 my Grandpa Nielson!

And then there were the training John Deere tractors. 

Isabelle was still too short to peddle.

How sad to be my daughter...sigh. 

William just used his legs Flintstone style.

That's how he rides his bike too and he can get going pretty fast using that method.

William's favorite part of the farm was the petting zoo.

He thought it was hilarious when two of the little

 pygmy goats started to butt heads!

 This one little goat would not stop following William.

It must have felt William's inner animal!

Isabelle was in love, but fortunately she didn't ask for a pet goat.

  

Everyone had different comments about the slide.

Isabelle said it was VERY scary.

William said "scawwy"too, but he loved it.

Soungsik just said "My butt hurts!"

We decided to give the sore bottoms a rest on a soft hayride.

This was so nice and relaxing.

If there weren't a bunch of other people there,

I could have easily fallen to sleep. 

Here we are lost in the corn maze.

But what do you expect when a 5 year old is your guide?

She did eventually find an exit for us.

Never you mind that it happened to be the entrance!

Last but not least we had Isabelle's favorite part...

the pumpkin patch!

Hooray for the Great Pumpkin!

We were all famished after running around in circles in the corn maze so we forced dad to buy us some lunch at Rumbi's. 

 Or should I say Yummmbies?

If today proves anything it's that even though my mom was a rough & tough cowgirl, her daughter is sadly a city girl. 

We should not have had so much fun in a

petting zoo and being pulled behind a tractor.

My apologies mom!