and we're back. [Walt, Wizards, and....Woolungasaurus?]

[bumbershoot]

Funny thing about having a 6 year old put away his legos (individual pieces into the bins for each color)...said 6 year old tends to forget what he's doing, and he starts *building* things instead!

And it's amazing what parental SLEEP can do for the attitude about the lego cleanup...today it's funny while yesterday was "omg I'm losing it calgon take me away"...

OK back to helping him AND my OWN cleanup!


(OK the kid just popped his head into the fridge (my desk is in the kitchen-ish area), then walked away with his "I've got something that I'm hiding from you" walk...I asked him what he had, he did this whole big "dropping it then putting hands up to show there's nothing in the hands" thing...he's hiding a piece of lettuce that he's eating! Seriously? You're *hiding* that you're eating lettuce? Hilarious!)

 

[kaoden39]

That is so typical six year old. Like mom is going to yell over lettuce. Gotta love them.

Now for my drama. I am sure you know that my husband Scotty rides bicycles. I think everybody does. One day he was out for a solo bike ride and on his way home going 44 miles an hour down a hill when he had a blow out on his front tire. Causing him to flip several times. Thankfully he had a helmet on. Even though he did he was still knocked unconscious. He was found laying in the middle of the frontage road by someone that was driving down the freeway. The wife spotted Scotty and he had his road id on and they called me. I figured that I would get him to the dr faster than if i called an ambulance so we helped him into the van and off to er. Where we were for at least six hours. This was on August 14, he finally returned to work today. Yes I have drama.

 

[Brady's Mom]

That is so typical six year old. Like mom is going to yell over lettuce. Gotta love them.

Now for my drama. I am sure you know that my husband Scotty rides bicycles. I think everybody does. One day he was out for a solo bike ride and on his way home going 44 miles an hour down a hill when he had a blow out on his front tire. Causing him to flip several times. Thankfully he had a helmet on. Even though he did he was still knocked unconscious. He was found laying in the middle of the frontage road by someone that was driving down the freeway. The wife spotted Scotty and he had his road id on and they called me. I figured that I would get him to the dr faster than if i called an ambulance so we helped him into the van and off to er. Where we were for at least six hours. This was on August 14, he finally returned to work today. Yes I have drama.

YIKES!!! Seriously hope he's okay. DH used to ride bicycles when he was younger and I would worry when he was gone for long rides. Thank goodness for someone spotting him and calling you.

 

[Brady's Mom]

Funny thing about having a 6 year old put away his legos (individual pieces into the bins for each color)...said 6 year old tends to forget what he's doing, and he starts *building* things instead!

And it's amazing what parental SLEEP can do for the attitude about the lego cleanup...today it's funny while yesterday was "omg I'm losing it calgon take me away"...

OK back to helping him AND my OWN cleanup!


(OK the kid just popped his head into the fridge (my desk is in the kitchen-ish area), then walked away with his "I've got something that I'm hiding from you" walk...I asked him what he had, he did this whole big "dropping it then putting hands up to show there's nothing in the hands" thing...he's hiding a piece of lettuce that he's eating! Seriously? You're *hiding* that you're eating lettuce? Hilarious!)

HeHe....My kids do the same thing - with food and Legos. It's amazing how much sending them to clean up their legos instigates playing.

DS 21 has a huge box of Legos (he's loved them since he was 3 ish) and he brought them upstairs for DS 5 (who doesn't start school until next Wed.) to play with yesterday while his brothers were at school. OMGosh - I had a Lego tornado in my living room and the sadness when I made them clean them up...really we do need to eat dinner at some time this evening - even though legos are soooo much more fun.

The funny thing is that DS 21 does NOT share his legos very well with his brothers - I made them only play in one room with them so they didn't get mixed up with anyone else's. The funny part is that he actually did share them....

 

[kaoden39]

YIKES!!! Seriously hope he's okay. DH used to ride bicycles when he was younger and I would worry when he was gone for long rides. Thank goodness for someone spotting him and calling you.

Thanks. I hate it when he goes off on his long rides. I worry about all of the crazy drivers out there and now I worry about him wrecking on his own. He hasn't been back on the bike yet. Thank you.

 

[QueenDoOver]

Ok, so I need to figure out how to pop in more often!

Molly, I hope this rain is helping with the sneezing. We have all been sneezing and coughing and sore throats at my house too.

We try really hard with Nathan not to focus on weight, but rather on trying to make healthy choices, like lower fat and calorie options, active times, reduced electronic times, more fruits and vegis, etc He does tend to be an active child so that part is easy, if we can just keep his sweet tooth under control. I wish I could get him to eat a piece of lettuce though!

I can't believe you have your legos all sorted by color! I have always wanted them to be that way, but can't ever decide on a system. Color, and then specialty pieces, and then people?? So it is one big bucket. I like to build legos too! I really like to play Mr. Potato head, and now we finally have the storm trooper helmet after our last trip. So exciting. We need a few more potatos though!

Drama! Michelle, that bike wreck would scare me to death! That is way to fast to be going on a bike. I'd make my husband up his life insurance for sure!

Thanks for the ticket info Molly. I guess if I get serious about that, I will have to start haunting the boards, as you put it. For now, things have taken a different turn. We have an accepted offer on a new house and if the inspection passes on Sunday, then it looks like we are moving. Just a few miles away, but big wooded lot, big flat yard, and bigger, remodeled house. I'm very excited, although it is stressful. I can't believe how low interest rates are and what a phenomenal price we were able to negotiate. We never would have been able to do this if circumstances had been different.

Just sayin. If a person were going to get into owning real estate, now is the time

We are keeping our other house as a rental, just in case you want to move to Mukilteo

 

[bumbershoot]

Oh Michelle, how frightening! I hope he's OK (and you as well). So glad that someone found him, and what a good idea to have ID on him.

Tracey, a new home, how exciting! If you need help with the move, let me know. I'll of course have the kid with me, but he likes carrying boxes as well. And I know first-hand that sometimes close moves are harder than long-distances ones...the frustration level can go really high b/c you think it should be easy, but it's not, it's just the same sort of move as any move is!


Hey, the lettuce thing shocked me, don't get me wrong. He'll eat weird things like horned melon and tamarind, but he has never been a big *salad* person (which is annoying b/c I loooooove salad and always have, always got the salad bar when we went to The Burger Pit growing up, even when I was still so short I was *under* the sneezeguard...I would love to share my tips on the Perfect Salad, LOL, but he has pretty much refused!). Then for one of his birthday dinners he actually ate some of the salad at the Spaghetti Factory (I even took pictures, that's how extraordinary it was)...so I guess he's slowly going into the lettuce world, but obviously needs to hide it.


Yesterday Robert was home and stayed home, so he got to see both ballet and gymnastics. And we worked out. Woo! Anyway, during gymnastics there were only four boys (instead of 15) so not only were they much calmer and looked after, but they got to do things many more times than usual. During one of the times down the trampoline mat, they were doing "tucks" where they lifted their knees up to their chest while bouncing down the mat...we didn't see it happen, but I guess E smacked his mouth with his knee and drastically loosened his already loose upper tooth. It's *this* close to coming out...but he feels it's not quite ready to be out (even though he's now checking with every bite to make sure it doesn't come out), says there are still too many "wires" holding it in...but still, it'll be soon!



The Universal board people say that there's ONE guidebook that's worth reading, and the others are not. The one worth reading is called Universal Orlando, by Kubersky and Monaghan. The 2011 edition has just been published, and Monaghan is selling it at half price with free shipping through around Labor Day (it's not at amazon etc yet). I ordered it on the 23rd, got shipping confirmation yesterday, and GOT IT yesterday.

If anyone wants a Universal guidebook for half price, like I said, he's selling it directly for that price for about a week longer, at http://www.intrepidtraveler.com/store/uoadvance

I haven't looked at the book yet (it came while we were at E's gymnastics, and I actually went to a baseball game after that with a new friend last night, a game that lasted 4 hours and the score was 17 to 11, so I pretty much just went to sleep!) but everyone on the Universal forum raves about it...

 

[bumbershoot]

Yay, my ticker's back! And it shows me that there are 3 months and 1 day left! Woo!

 

[QueenDoOver]

Yay, my ticker's back! And it shows me that there are 3 months and 1 day left! Woo!

That is coming up so quickly! Yeah!

Thanks for the offer to help move. Still don't know, as inspection revealed a lot of stuff that we are now negotiating on...

But my floor does need scrubbed if you want to hire E out. I can't get any work out of my kids!

 

[bumbershoot]

But my floor does need scrubbed if you want to hire E out. I can't get any work out of my kids!

Gawd...Robert went and told E that if he helped to clean the floor for all the wood floor in our condo that we'd buy him a big lego set. He had a 30 second convo with me, then told E.

I will give him a pass, since it turned out he was getting some nasty cold last night that has him still sleeping instead of at work, but HE is the one that has us putting all of our debt-snowball money into savings for the trip "just in case" (which will give us enough trip savings for SEVERAL trips IMO), and now he wants to spend 100 bucks on a lego set for something I would have given E 10, maybe 20, bucks for. And I know he's not thinking about tax or shipping or anything...I'm glad we're in the position we're in this year instead of last, because frankly just having the kid help me out doing something that was FREE to us doesn't automatically give us 110+ bucks AND more storage bins!!!!!

 

[QueenDoOver]

Gawd...Robert went and told E that if he helped to clean the floor for all the wood floor in our condo that we'd buy him a big lego set. He had a 30 second convo with me, then told E.

I will give him a pass, since it turned out he was getting some nasty cold last night that has him still sleeping instead of at work, but HE is the one that has us putting all of our debt-snowball money into savings for the trip "just in case" (which will give us enough trip savings for SEVERAL trips IMO), and now he wants to spend 100 bucks on a lego set for something I would have given E 10, maybe 20, bucks for. And I know he's not thinking about tax or shipping or anything...I'm glad we're in the position we're in this year instead of last, because frankly just having the kid help me out doing something that was FREE to us doesn't automatically give us 110+ bucks AND more storage bins!!!!!

Oh ugh! Well, it doesn't get any better. My philosophy has always been that kids do chores because they are part of the family and share in responsibility for caring for the family home to the extent they are capable. So I always have this epic battle between my 14 year old and my 7 year old, because we expect more from the 14 year old. The same goes for allowance. I provide the boys with money for them to spend, as their portion of the family income and to allow them to make spending decisions with the budget they have. The problem is that they both want to save their money and still have me pay for everything. I constantly have to remind them that they can decide to buy it or not with their own money. And then there are the things they want to buy that I don't think are acceptable. With my 14 year old, it is rated M war games. No way. With my 7 year old, he wants to buy a DSI and I am opposed because he has a DS, and the only upgrade is a camera and video recorder, but he does have the money saved, and I suppose I should let him make that decision, but it kills me to see him spend the money on that! And then we have agreed that my 14 year old will babysit for us up to 8 hours per month as part of his chores, and that we will pay him beyond that. So, I haven't actually had him watch his brother for months, but needed him to take care of him for basically two days, 6 hours each day. And at the end of the 2nd day, I handed him a $20 bill and just said it was for him to have a little extra spending money, since he was starting high school and I know he will have some extra things he will want to spend it on. Dang kid sort snarled at me and said, oh yeah, that's just instead of really paying me for babysitting, right? Geesh! Ungrateful brat! I am sure he will outgrow this attitude, won't he???
So there you have my big rant! Didn't mean to thread steal, but I guess my point is, it is hard to know if you are making the right parenting decisions at any given moment and how it will all turn out and I think R deserves the break

 

[bumbershoot]

Tracey, don't ever worry about taking over! Seriously, if there's one place that's OK for others to vent in, it's my place.

as their portion of the family income and to allow them to make spending decisions with the budget they have

I love that! Seriously love that. Not sure I have ever heard anyone use those words before, and I'm simply swooning right now.

Will write more later, started this while on hold and now I have to make another call, gotta find the MIL a cardiologist (do not ask me why she didn't have one already, I'm confused beyond belief) so that she can be diagnosed with the things (or perhaps not!) that her GP has been treating her for for THREE YEARS.

Honestly, if any one of us in our extended family hires a primary healthcare provider (other than E's fab dentist), run in the opposite direction! We manage to pick the bad ones!

 

[bumbershoot]

Woo, dropped a "pre" from the link to this PTR.

And got MIL's cardio guy all squared away. GP is faxing referral, she's got a date to see him, whew.

 

[QueenDoOver]

Woo, dropped a "pre" from the link to this PTR.

And got MIL's cardio guy all squared away. GP is faxing referral, she's got a date to see him, whew.

Oh dear? The medical management is challenging at best. We do love our family doctor, but the entire process is just a big confusing cluster to deal with. I try to make the kids stay healthy

Well my news today is that no need to help me pack. We aren't moving. And I believe the universe is all in sync because I lost my job today with a company that I have worked at for 10 years. I am still in shock. But....I am excited at what the future holds.


One thing I plan to do is organize! I want to sell our extra DVD's and CD's. Didn't you just do that Molly? Can you give me any tips?

 

[bumbershoot]

Tracey, oh no! I'm so sorry about your job (but glad that you hadn't committed to buying a new home, whew).

abundatrade.com and secondspin.com

Abunda tends to value things higher, but you pay for shipping and aren't reimbursed.

Second doesn't always have the highest value, but they reimburse for shipping of the cost of the # of CDs they accept.






should add...I'm glad you're excited about the future. That's a fun place to be.

 

[bumbershoot]

The boy lost another tooth tonight.

The tooth (top, middle, on his left) had been loose for awhile, and this week it got REALLY loose (his hitting his mouth with his own knee at gymnastics didn't help!). He did NOT want us to help it, he wanted it to come out naturally (sigh...my kind of kid...I had to let him do that of course). And tonight *just* before dinner he was wiggling it and suddenly it was in his hand.

The space looks so disturbing, but his smile looks SO cute.


My brother urged a visit on us again, so E and I are off to CA on Saturday! Poor Robert, all alone...

Oh and I found out that the sister of my sister in law is going to homeschool. So she emailed me, and it's lovely to be in touch with her! She and I are VERY much alike (except she's a financial advisor with her own business...then again, I'm now the financial advisor for my OWN family!), and although her daughter is only 2, she's been researching homeschool curriculae since she was born. We are leaning towards the same things. Of course we are. We even look alike (or at least we did in the early 90s). How did that happen??? OH and she lives in one of my fave cities, a place "where old age meets new age", according to a sign at the co-op there.

 

[bumbershoot]

OK, I need a new sunscreen. I use 4 different kinds, from 3 brand names, at various times, and I get red through ALL of them. Even when I apply and reapply in a totally appropriate way. Even when I'm not out for THAT long.

I might have to go back to walmart, to get their NoAd, because that stuff seemed to work!

It's driving me crazy....my face does not look good in bright red!

 

[bookgirl]

OK, I need a new sunscreen. I use 4 different kinds, from 3 brand names, at various times, and I get red through ALL of them. Even when I apply and reapply in a totally appropriate way. Even when I'm not out for THAT long.

I might have to go back to walmart, to get their NoAd, because that stuff seemed to work!

It's driving me crazy....my face does not look good in bright red!

I have an allergy to ultraviolets so I burn easily. Well that and I'm fair skinned and freckled. This summer I used a combo. For everyday kinda exposures (long periods of time, sight seeing in shorts and tshirts, face/ears/neck exposure) I used Aveeno lotion it was a 55 spf. Did great and it did not break me out (eczema). For extreme exposure (rafting, swimming, walking along the boardwalk, etc) I used a spray on SPORT type of sunscreen both generic and Coppertone. I always buy 75 or above when I'm going to have extreme exposure.

The secret seems to be that no matter what I use, I have to reapply at least every 60 to 90 minutes or sooner if I've been in the water. I spent 10 hours in a raft under direct summer sunlight and did not get any significant burn.

Goodluck, finding something that works.

 

[Brady's Mom]

OK, I need a new sunscreen. I use 4 different kinds, from 3 brand names, at various times, and I get red through ALL of them. Even when I apply and reapply in a totally appropriate way. Even when I'm not out for THAT long.

I might have to go back to walmart, to get their NoAd, because that stuff seemed to work!

It's driving me crazy....my face does not look good in bright red!

My face doesn't look good bright red, either.

You should look for a sunblock instead of a sunscreen. I have much better luck with the block, I think most have zinc oxide in them that helps keep the sun from burning the skin. I have reddish hair, fair skin and freckles and burn super easily so I look for the block.

I use Neutrogena Ultra Sport 100+ because skin cancer runs in my family. I also have a teeny tube of some face specific Neutrogena that is 70 (I think) and it works well on my face. I do have to reapply often or I burn. Neutrogena makes my sister break out - but does just fine for me.

I've used the NoAd WalMart brand before and burned to a lovely shade of red - so it doesn't work for me, but I don't think every brand works for everyone. If you find one that works for you - stick with it since they are soooo expensive!

Hope you're having/had a good time in SD. I am feeling in need of a little vacation - feeling a little overwhelmed at the moment.

 

[bumbershoot]

Thanks for the ideas, both of you!

I don't know what the solution is going to be for me, but to help with the redness Bliss Body Butter is awesome! it's some sort of lemon balm and something else in it, and I discovered the benefits for me during our last trip here...thankfully the sis in law still has a tube of it (she keeps drawers full of travel size stuff she gets on flights and at hotels for guests) and I slather it on, and the redness goes away. Lovely lovely stuff.


Yesterday and today we swam at their clubhouse (the filter on brother's pool wasn't working, which meant that the pool wasn't being heated by the water on the roof (solar heating, water runs up to the top of the roof in little tubes, then comes down into the pool all toasty) and it was getting gross), and that place is swank. Both days we got to play "it's our house", and I kept hearing the song It's Good To Be A Gangsta in my head, because really, Hollywood moguls and gangsters could own a home with a pool THAT big and a clubhouse THAT nice. However, the daquiri service was nonexistent, and if I owned that house, I would definitely have someone on call to bring out the beverages.



I finally outed our DVC to brother and sis in law. I think they think we're fools but oh well.