End of Summer

Thankfully, there was a change last year in Texas law, so that schools couldn't start the first or second week of August. However, Summer is over for me as far as travel and activities with the kids. The rest of their time, for the most part, this summer will be with the other parents. Mike had to work late last night and it was the first day the kids were gone. I stayed busy, to be sure, but it was so quiet with just me and the babies--Anastasia actually got some uninterrupted nap time. I watched a little HGTV while I folded my 6 loads of laundry (an improvement from last week's 10).

I did a little sewing for a Relief Society service project since I am moving soon, and it would be good to finish that before I leave. I cleaned up the aftermath of having kids and not being interested in battling them to get chores done. And, of course, I played with and cared for two of the sweetest, cutest, low-maintenance babies around.

Today I have not gotten much accomplished, but I did vacuum the living room, since the babies are scooting around on the floor now. I need to go to the store to buy a couple of things, but I would prefer to wait until Mike gets home so that I don't have to haul them out of the house. That's the stinker about not having the big kids here.

Let me see what else I can do.

Computer is MINE!

My husband went to work today. I finally get the computer back! All that means for you is that we finally have the data transferred to the new hard drives and I can upload my pictures now. Here are a couple of things you missed.

Ha! I just witnessed another milestone! Amelia is sitting up, tipped over sideways, and pushed herself back up. She did it a second time, but she can't do it a third time because she has one leg out behind her. Anastasia sat up by herself for over 5 minutes this morning. She finally went past critical mass and couldn't recover.

I have decided that my babies are identical twins and I'm sticking to it. When people ask if they are, I will not hedge anymore--it only confuses people anyway. There are some distinct differences but I think that is to be expected. They have the same eyes, nose, mouth and dimples. Amelia grows a little faster because she sleeps better. Anastasia wakes up at the slightest sound and won't go back to sleep for a while after ward. They have the same little fingernails. There are no noticable differences in their body proportions. Even though Anastasia has muscular torticolis, which is often accompanied by head malformation, the backs of their heads are strikingly similar. They are round-headed baldies with a strawberry peach fuzz. No that doesn't mean their hair is going to be my color. It will be even less vibrant than my "unenhanced" dishwater strawberry and probably a little darker.

Anyway, there they are.

So I Married a Geek

I have had limited computer access the past two days because my husband tore apart the good computer to beef it up to specs that only the most geekiest of geeks would need. Then, of course, because he is home, and it is his new computer (regardless of it being my birthday weekend) he has needed to "test it out."

But there's more to his geek-ness than even I had supposed. Disclaimer: I am usually very private about certain things, but this just is too good not to share. As he's "waking up" this morning, he wraps his arms around me, kisses my ear, and whispers "Let's just do html so we don't have to worry about your flash." He was still quite asleep--but useful. Whatever turns you on, babe. Love you.

Happy Birthday

Here's a different tag game. I thought it would be appropriate to post on my birthday. Leave a memory comment. Come on, you didn't get me anything else.

1. As a comment on my blog, leave one memory that you and I had together. It doesn't matter if you knew me a little or a lot, anything you remember!
2. Next, re-post these instructions on your blog and see how many people leave a memory about you.
It's actually pretty funny to see the responses. If you leave a memory about me, I'll assume you're playing the game and I'll come to your blog and leave one about you.

Gasp!

I was just about to do a different post but something much more exciting just happened. Anastasia covered half the length of my bed in less than 10 seconds doing a full-on low crawl. I called Daddy to tell him, and he says, "I know, I saw her doing it last night when you were at Isaac's Court of Honor. I didn't know it was a new thing."

My baby can crawl! It's okay, though, I still have one that can't. They are 6 months old now. They still don't sit up for extended periods of time, but Amelia is getting especially good at it. They have great control, unless they see something they want out of reach. They are so stinking fun!

Self-induced

I had a self-induced computer-free day yesterday. I did nine loads of laundry and cleaned my nasty bathroom. Then I expended huge amounts of effort to "encourage" my children help clean up. It is time to get moving on this house so we can move on to the next house.

Speaking of which, Mike and I spent this afternoon shopping discount building supply stores and appliance outlets for the stuff we need to get our new house up to specs before we move in. We found some pretty good deals.

There is just a naked concrete slab in our living/dining area just as you walk in the front door, so flooring is a must. Because it is a (not formal, but everyday) dining/living combo, carpet is out. Tile is just not at all what I am looking for, and laminate is too easy for 8 kids to warp and destroy--oh, and Mike wants a dog. So hardwood it is. The ones we looked at are nothing like the hardwoods in my 1920's house. They make the wood so thin now, and half the time it's layered with plywood. The cheapest we found was $1.50/sq. ft. I didn't really like it. We fell in love with the Brazillian Koa at Lumber Liquidators, which is about $3.20/sq.ft. It's purdy!

So In Love

When I get close to Anastasia she always wants to reach for my face. She grabs it and pulls me to her so she can eat my face. She slobbers and babbles in a soft musical tone. She wants to hug and kiss me whenever she sees my face.

She is like that with her daddy too, but that makes him a little nervous right now. He has a big cut on the side of his nose that it is no good for her to get her fingernails in. He had a carcinoma successfully removed on Thursday. He's been living off of hydrocodone and Dr.Pepper.

Amelia stretches her cheeks to the point of explosion with her smile whenever she looks at me. She is very free with her smiles and wants everyone to look at her so she can smile at them.

I am so stinkin' in love with my little girls...Such joy and wonder! I can't squeeze them tight enough. I can't kiss their cheeks and neck enough. I can't get enough of their slobber all over my face. Precious, precious love.

Then there's my husband, who loves to hold me and be close to me. His eyes sparkle and his face is filled with affection when he looks at me and our children. Our first two years together have been riddled with challenges, including being married to a complete stranger. We are beginning to know one another and appreciate the endurance of our affection through all our adversity.

AND after long months of searching, we have finally found a house. It is 4 years old, and has the space that we need at the price we can manage. It is a little further out than is ideal, but its not going to change Mike's commute time but by a couple of minutes. Our contract is pending and it should close before the end of the month. Life is good.

Blueberries

I didn't take any pictures at the blueberry farm, but it was fun. We went on Thursday (Jul 10) with the John/Marla family. Between us all we picked a flat of them for a little over $1.00/pint. We made blueberry muffins, blueberry crepes, and I made blueberry waffles. We froze the rest that we didn't eat by the handful.

The following Tuesday everyone else went to Nauvoo for a couple of days. I would not have made it back to Texas in time for Anastasia's physical therapy evaluation if I had gone along. I didn't feel like we had enough blueberries and I wanted to take some home to Mike, so I went back to the U Pick farm. Tragically, I did not remember to bring home any of the bags of blueberries that I had made the kids pick beside me. Maybe if there are enough of them left when we go back for Thanksgiving, I will make a blueberry pie.

The Gordon family was part of the second berry excursion. They live (for now) just down the road from Craig and Consie. We adults had all gone out to dinner together the night after I got there. We had a great time. When we got the kids involved a few days later they got along great also.

Eh bebe, bebe, bebe! Swing!

At the beginning of my time in MO, the weather was rather warm and mostly humid. We took the kids to the park and they did not enjoy it as much as they might have under different conditions. The babies on the other hand enjoyed it thoroughly.











Lexi, Katie, Claire, and Eva's feet and Jacob in the background--maybe it's Sam, they look ridiculously similar.








Amelia














Anastasia
















Doubles

Art

I didn't take many pictures while we were on vacation, but this one caught my eye--still life is so much easier to capture.

Dairy Farm

The day after we arrived we went to the Shatto Milk Company Dairy and had a tour for our family--13 kids and 4 adults. We packed into their little processing area. When we were done they gave us samples of all of their yummy milk, including orange cream (my favorite), banana, strawberry, and root beer (tastes like the bottom of a root beer float).

They got to pet the cows, and Lexi grew a third arm. They couldn't feed them because the calves were full from the tour who had just finished. They played outside the Dairy farm store while Grandpa Skembo purchased a fair sampling of all the milk that we had sampled on our tour. It didn't last long when we got it home, though.

The only place you can buy it though is in select parts of Kansas and Missouri. It is a very small family operation--though they have impressive production. I couldn't help but think of Uncle Matt and his job with milk transportation.

Sorry

I never gave anyone a heads up, but I have been in Missouri for the past 10 days.  I have been thinking about you, but I have been in a house that doesn't even have a computer in it.  I'm  surviving--somehow.  

I will update you more when I get back on Thursday, but the most present and amusing thing is a continuation of the last post.  I got started reading New Moon to Mike before we left.  Mike was not available for me to call and read it to him for a couple of days while he was in Dallas and I in Missouri.  I read ahead without him--stayed up until 4 am doing it.  A couple of days later, he finally had some time to sit on the phone with me while I read it to him.  I had to read two more chapters than I really wanted to because the one ended with fingernails on her window, and the other ended with a potential attack from a red-headed vampire.  At 12:30 I insisted on going to bed.  He tried to go to bed but after an hour and a half of not being able to sleep, he went and bought a second copy and read the rest of it.  While he was at it, he figured he'd get the third book.

He tried to wait for me but after three days, he couldn't stand it anymore.  Apparently he read all of it last night.  I may be reading on Thursday, rather than blogging.  I may be able to do more than one thing--we'll see.

Just the Two of Us (And the Two of Them)

It's been a very sweet weekend. Mike and I have been the only ones here since Friday, noon. He hasn't had to rush into work, or anywhere else for that matter. Most of that time he's been "driving" while I read to him. He is playing Project Gotham Racing 4 while I read Twilight. He gave it to me for our anniversary. We are done reading it now. There are a lot of other useful and productive things we could have done, but we just sat around, reading the book and admiring our silly, noisy, playful, demanding, perfect daughters. They make us laugh. We feel like we should punish them for being so cute, but all we can do is scold them. They insolently giggle at us.

We also watched a couple of movies. Mike went to return them. I fear, for the sake of my future productivity, that he is taking that opportunity to look for the next book in the Twilight series. We enjoyed it, obviously.

Pictures of Pictures

I had an in-home photo shoot with the babies a few weeks ago. The prints just came. They were ridiculously expensive. I could have gotten the same effect from Wal-Mart.

I have decided I definitely don't like posed, artificial backgrounds on professional portraits. On my Circle of Sisters blog, Melissa Fulmer is listed as one of the links. She blogs her photography, and it is exceptional.

Next time...

Summer Begins

Today is the last day I have to wake up to take Isaac to school. I finally get to sleep in. However, I don't know that it will do me much good, as my husband will still be getting up to multiple snoozes before work.

It will be just Mike and the babies and I for the 4th. I will probably start another book with him. I read out loud to him while he plays video games or doodles on the computer. We just finished the latest Lee Child book. I had never read one before. This probably wasn't a good one to start with, for me, but it gave my husband and I some time together.

He bought me Twilight because he heard everyone else talking about it, so he gets to find out with me if it is everything people say.

Now I need to post my spiritual thought on Circle of Sisters and look for a house. We put in an offer for one on Monday, but they took someone else's first. The house that I posted the picture of long ago doesn't qualify for financing. If we don't find something in the next week or two, I will stay here for another year.