Cerebrate Good Times

On New Year's Day as it got near bedtime, I noticed something. Or, rather, a lack of something. Cinder had been in the house most of the day, as had the other cats, since it was cold and snowy. But whereas Dortmunder and Vin tend to spend a lot of time napping in closets or under furniture, Cinder always lets us know where he is. He flops down on the floor where we are constantly walking from kitchen to living room, or is curled up on the couch for hours at a time where the kids like to sit. The point is, it's never a mystery where he has gotten himself off to. So we looked around and concluded that he was not in the house after all. I went outside with a flashlight and found kitty prints going toward the neighbors' yard, but they had shoveled a little later than I had, and I couldn't find any more tracks. The next day there were cat prints on our back porch, so during the night he had probably come to the door there wanting to be let in. I went out and followed the...

A couple of weeks ago we went to Bear Lake with my family to celebrate my parents' 50th anniversary. It was an interesting weekend for several reasons. We had never stayed under one roof before with my family. My only sibling who is a parent is my sister, who has a two-year-old. So we were a little anxious about kids being loud and keeping people up. Katie doesn't care to spend too much time in the company of extended family, preferring the comfort of our own home. And there were just the usual stresses of fitting everything in the van that we needed for a long weekend, and the three-hour drive with them. My parents rented a very nice cabin with three floors, up on the hillside overlooking the lake. We got to catch up with everyone, as my sister and one brother had never even met James, and my other brother had only seen him once in passing when we visited Salt Lake overnight. We also spent time talking with my parents about their personal history, asking questions about t...

Yesterday was James's birthday, and it seems like a good time to reflect on the experience of having him join the family, and this crazy parenthood thing in general. James is a really happy baby most of the time. He's super smiley and has some rather suave looks. He's just started saying a couple words. As with many babies, he started saying "Uh-oh" quite a while ago, but I never know if it counts. From a linguistic perspective, he's communicating an idea verbally, so yes. He also says "Cat," or "gah" and uses the term for dogs too. And it seems like he is constantly asking, "What's that?" He started off doing the same monkey crawl Clara did, using one knee and the other foot, but he might be settling into more of a regular crawl. He's been standing for a while now, and the other day he took one tiny little step while free standing. Our kids don't generally walk for another month or two after hitting the ye...

I had a couple interesting dreams last night. First, it was as though all of Stephen King's creations existed at once in a world and were trying to get me. It was one of those dreams that doesn't necessarily terrify me, but it does leave me feeling exhausted. I remember trying to find where I could go that they wouldn't find me, although I really don't remember anything about specific monsters. Second, it was the Rapture, in a pretty protestant-style situation. The good people were allowed into heaven. What you did was to wait until the sun appeared like a square cursor on a computer screen, and then stare at it, and you and whoever you were touching ascended. I was trying to gather my family. Katie put on warm clothes, because at altitude it's freezing, of course, so I followed suit. It felt like things kept delaying us, but we finally were ready. I said goodbye to the house, and I felt very emotional about it. We ascended, which really only lasted a few mome...

These last few days in our house have been a fascinating experiment incorporating elements of psychology, physiology and biology. It all started last Thursday evening, when we realized that our house was 85 degrees despite the thermostat being set at 75. I called an AC repair company first thing Friday morning, and we were informed that it would take at least a week for the replacement part to arrive. In the meantime we’ve experience a slow descent into the depths of Hell, and I’ve become convinced that we are a part of some scientific experiment. The mornings are comparatively pleasant, in the low 80s in the house, climbing to the mid-90s in the late afternoon, and remaining scorching until after the sun sets. We’ve been spending time outside and going various places as much as possible, but we can’t completely avoid the house. So obviously we’re hot and sweaty (I’ve discovered that I can drink more water than I ever expected), and more irritable, and it’s hard to be motivated t...

On Memorial Day, my dad and I took Sam up to a lake for his first real fishing experience. And on his first cast, he caught this little guy: [caption id="attachment_1838" align="aligncenter" width="523" caption="I defy you to find a more patriotic image than this."] [/caption] In the end that was the only fish we took home. There were tons of little fish biting, but they were too small to keep. Still, our goal was to get Sam a fish, so that was accomplished. Now, here’s another funny story. Katie had a rough experience at the grocery store on Friday. She locked Allison in the car in the parking lot, but fortunately an off-duty policeman helped her unlock the door. Then, when she got home, she saw that a gallon of milk had broken open and spilled all over the trunk. When I got home, she told me what had happened and said that she had cleaned it up as best she could. Knowing her superhuman cleaning abilities, I didn’t think about it much anymore. T...

I feel like I've been complaining a lot lately. So let's get started. Last weekend we went down to southern Utah for the wedding of Katie's sister. On Friday we packed up the car, got in and... the car wouldn't start. Eventually we sorted out that the battery had been drained the night before, when Katie had the doors open for a long time vacuuming it. So I got it  jump-started it, and we were off. Everything went fine until that night, when we finally got the kids to sleep in the motel room (which is always a challenge). I didn't get much sleep because I was in the bed with Allison, and she rolled around all night. In addition, there was a screaming baby in the room next to us that was apparently up all night too. The next day we discovered that it was in fact screaming triplets. And the people kept their door open all morning to more effectively share the joy with the world. The wedding itself went fine, and they had a nice outdoor reception with beautiful weather...

We spent the weekend in southern Utah, because Katie's sister got married. In the sprinkler valve box at her parents' house, we found a little surprise. None of the pictures I took turned out very clear, but this is a little toad. It was a cute, fat little thing. And another cute, fat little thing: Oh, I'm just kidding. But it made for a nice segue.

Saturday was a weird day. I ran 17 miles in the morning. Then I mowed our lawn for the first time ever, which was kind of an interesting experience after all the work I put into things. Then I took Sam to the park for a while. Then I had a bunch of bricks I bought to edge the flower bed in the front yard, but I decided to take them back and get something different. So I loaded them up and went back to the store. Then I had to load up the new blocks, of which I needed twice as many. Then I had to try to push that huge cart with 400 pounds of stone on it, and it was unbelievably hard. So I had to push it around the store and then out to the car. Then I had to load them in the car (I nearly bottomed it out, which I’ve never done before), then I had to unload them again when I got home. Then I spent a while leveling the dirt and laying out the stones. I honestly don’t know when I’ve been that tired.

Last week I was reading this book to Sam, and he made a brilliant observation. I've pointed out before that Sam is surprisingly insightful for a six-year-old. In this case, he very intelligently pointed out that, "There's no problem in this story." He recognized that there's no conflict in this book, unlike most books that we read. I probably would have been in high school (if not college) before I could have made that observation. The kid is pretty amazing.

Monty has been biding his time. For two and a half years now, he's been planning this, exploring every inch of his cage, delicately probing at the lid. And Sunday night he decided that it was time to go. Somehow he pushed the lid up and got himself through the opening in such a way that it fell back into place. Then he presumably spent some time exploring, before settling down in the nice, cozy spot behind Allison's dresser. Now, a couple points here. Ball pythons might seem intimidating to people who aren't big into reptiles, but they are super gentle and harmless. If they are bothered they don't bite, but curl up into a ball (hence the name). So nobody was in any danger here. As far as I have been able to determine, there is no record of a ball python ever injuring a human.

It was a pretty busy weekend. Saturday was Allison's birthday, so we finally went out on Friday night to get her some gifts (we're so organized). Then on Saturday we had an Easter egg hunt outside. When we went out, Sam said the weeds in our yard looked bad, and that we should pull them. He went back inside the house to put some gloves on to get working, but we finally prevailed upon him to just do the egg hunt. (I sprayed the weeds later that day, okay?) Just being two, I'm sure she didn't really get the whole birthday thing, but she did catch on to the egg hunt. And she even tried to blow out her candles. On Sunday we were stuck in the church parking lot for a while, so we decided to take a couple pictures. I was trying to get one with both kids, but this other random kid came and was trying to get in the picture.

Last night we dyed Easter eggs together. Sam was a little too anxious, and of the 16 eggs we had, he used at least ten of them. Then, when we had colored them all, Allison started putting them all back in the dye. So we ended up with some interesting-looking eggs, one of which was super awesome: The one with all the eyes and tails and whatnot is Sam's.

I haven't posted anything for a while. So here are a couple pics of the kids. [caption id="attachment_1737" align="aligncenter" width="502" caption="Buckets of fun"] [/caption] [caption id="attachment_1718" align="aligncenter" width="502" caption="She likes Sam's sunglasses, and she prefers to wear them upside down."] [/caption]

We all probably have a few things that are mysteriously difficult to do. For example, I have never successfully built a snowman. The whole "rolling the snowball" thing never really worked for me. On a related note, my dad has been wanting for years to fly a kite with Sam. But, bless his heart, my dad always buys fancy, expensive kites that are just too heavy to fly in anything less than gale-force wind. (Meanwhile, I got a $2 cheapo plastic K-Mart special that worked great.) Anyway, on Saturday there was finally enough wind that they were able to fly this box kite:

Do you remember how exciting it was when you were a kid (or possibly a college student) and you found a prize in your breakfast cereal? Why not relive that magical time of your life? All you need is a child who enjoys playing in your flour canister. Just turn your back for a moment, and presto—a necklace chain in your cookie dough!

Yesterday morning I went running, then went to the park with Sam, then took him out to practice his fishing skills in the river behind the house, and then played outside with the kids some more. So I was outside for 5 or 6 hours, and I managed to get a mild sunburn. March 10? I think that's a new record for me.

Can I just say that I love when things happen that make me feel more significant than I am? Last night we were gone for most of the evening, foolishly driving up to Salt Lake in the worst snowstorm we’ve had all winter. While we were up there, we found out from a friend that the power had gone out in our neighborhood. We stayed in SL a little longer than we had planned, but eventually we decided to head back and hope the power was restored soon. As we entered the neighborhood, it was interesting to see where the outage began. We pulled onto our dark street and stopped for a moment to talk with a neighbor out shoveling his driveway. All of a sudden the whole street lit up, and we got to pretend that it was just because we came home. Sam, however, was disappointed. He “wanted to see what it was like” to have the power off at home. We tried to explain that it was the same as when we turn off all the lights, but he would have none of that.

This comes across as another " complaining about lack of sleep " post, but I really just think it's funny how much we all switch places during the night. I mean, at some point all you can do is laugh (preferably maniacally, as you are carted away in a straightjacket). Bedtime: Katie goes to lie down in Allison's room to help her fall asleep. I am in Sam's room to do the same (he has a hard time falling asleep in his room alone). Allison is having a hard time too, so Katie sends me to bed once Sam is asleep. She comes in at some point. At 12:30 or so, Sam comes into our room crying. I get up and go lie down in his room to keep him company as he falls asleep again. At around 1, while I'm still in Sam's room, Allison wakes up crying. I go into her room for a few minutes and get her back to sleep. At around 3, Allison is up again. Katie goes into her room to try getting her down again. After a few minutes it's obvious that won't work, so she comes back...

8:30: Allison goes to sleep. 9:15: Allison wakes up. 9:30: Sam goes to sleep. 10:00: I go to sleep. Katie stays up to get Allison down again. 11:00: I wake up to Allison’s crying and, feeling guilty, go to help Katie get her back to bed. 11:45: Allison is asleep again, and Katie and I go to bed. 11:50 to 12:30: The neighbors’ dogs whine and bark. (The neighbors have been gone for 5 days, and the dogs are unhappy to be left out in the cold, because they normally sleep inside.) 12:30: Unable to sleep, I go over to the neighbors’ house to complain. They have just gotten back and were about to bring the dogs in anyway. 12:45 to 1:??: Feeling stupid because I complained just before the problem would have been solved anyway, I am unable to sleep. 2:55: Allison wakes up and won’t go back to sleep in her room. I hold her for a while to get her sleepy again and take her in to sleep in our bed with Katie. 3:15 to 6:20: I sleep on the floor in Allison’s room. 6:20 to 6:50: I decide to set my alar...