my reason for lack of Easter pics

This year I got the boys somewhat matchy ties for Easter.  Zach's and Christopher's are similar because that's the way it has to be to keep the peace (Christopher has to be Just Like Zach).

Nick is into bow ties, but he only has two.  His black bow tie that he has to wear for orchestra concerts, and his red Doctor Who one.  I thought a little variety was in order.

After checking out stores at the mall, I ended up just ordering one off Amazon.  It was supposed to be here last Friday.   Amazon has always been ridiculously reliable so I wasn't worried.

Friday came and went.  No tie.

Same with Saturday.

The mail doesn't come on Sunday, so I didn't even look.

Monday and Tuesday came and went without the long awaited for delivery.  (yes, I realize we are talking about a bow tie)

I checked, and the website says they had shipped it days ago.  Unfortunately UPS had yet to lay eyes on it.

I figured all hope was lost, talked to customer service, and had another tie on it's way for no charge.

Hallelujah.

Of course the first tie showed up only hours later.

I'm thinking the regular neck ties thought it was too nerdy and beat it up.

Orson Gygi

aka - kitchen heaven

I love this place.

Everything you could possibly need or want for cooking or baking all under one roof at pretty reasonable prices.  I was tempted to buy another (I already have two) 4 qt caramel pan just because it was perfect and at a smoking price.

I was also a little tempted to get another wooden spoon or two, (I already have 13) but reason won out.  (my mom's shirt is pretty appropriate for the size of that spoon don'tcha think?)

Last year my favoritest ever new item were the lids for the cookie sheets.  You know, the big silver pans with the one inch deep sides?  Well, who knew you could get lids for them?  A year later I am asking myself how I ever lived without lids!

This year my favorite item are these-

Onion goggles!!

GENIUS.

And they work like a charm.

No burning or fumes or tears.  No taking breaks to wash your face in the middle of preparing dinner.

I suppose people who own ski equipment (not us) can just use ski goggles, but these are smaller and have a handy dandy carrying case and are meant to be kept in the kitchen, not hiding away with the rest of the sports equipment.

groceries

my new favorite place to buy groceries- Amazon.com

I already use it for nearly everything else.

So when my Wal-mart stopped carrying my favorite flavor of Special K protein meal bars- the honey almond ones (in the diet section, not the cereal aisle) I looked on Amazon. I like them for breakfast. I'm not a big breakfast eater. And I need protein or I feel sick. These are like the perfect little meal. A little more on the pricier side (a dollar a bar) but as a meal replacement not just a snack, it's not so bad if you look at it that way.

Anyway, Wal-mart stopped carrying them, and that was the only place I could find them. I was stuck with the chocolate peanut butter ones, which were okay as far as protein bars go, but that's not saying much.

So on a whim, I checked amazon. And hey! guess what? Amazon carries them. I have to buy a case of 6 boxes, but I get free shipping, and I think I am still coming out ahead if you count gas money and time and all that.

And then tonight (and pay attention mom- you're gonna like this) 3 out of 4 of my kid's favorite Macaroni and cheese is the Cheesy Alfredo kind. We can't find it in Arizona. My poor mother has been known to get down on the floor of grocery store aisles so she can clear out their entire stock of the Cheesy Alfredo mac before she comes down to visit. (as fate would have it, it would always be on the bottom shelf, with some clear in the back so it's quite the ordeal) The older two have learned to ration it, but now that Christopher loves it, he has no concept of the fact that if he eats it all this month, there won't be any to take it's place for quite awhile.

I guess you know where this is going- I checked amazon, and yes, they have it! and I think it's actually cheaper than what my mom was paying at the regular grocery store. (plus free shipping!) So mom, we thank you for your years of devoted service, but I think I shall be able to manage this by myself from now on.

the shoe chooses you

Nick and I both needed new gym shoes. Besides being too small for him, and full of holes, they have no arch support whatsoever and it seems that his arches are collapsing. Time for new school shoes. Up until now I've gotten away with spending $30 or less on his shoes, but that probably explains why they are falling apart and his feet hurt.

And I needed new shoes cause I lost mine. I know, you're thinking, "How does a grown woman lose her shoes? Didn't you grow out of that when you were like six?" And yes, I am still guilty of taking them off and just leaving them wherever I happen to be, but they are really, really lost this time. Like I think they accidentally got shipped off to Goodwill with the last giant carload of stuff when we cleaned out the closets.

Anyways, there's that scene in the first Harry Potter book when Harry first steps into Ollivander's wand shop, and the magical tape starts measuring him, and Ollivander grabs a box with a wand in it, and has Harry try it, and they go through several magical wands until they find just the right one, because you don't choose the wand, the wand chooses you.

I felt kinda like that today. In a regular shoe store you go in, narrow down what kind of shoe you want by what you are going to be doing in it (running, walking, etc), pick out a shoe that catches your eye, then send the underpaid worker bee back to get your shoe. You make all the decisions.
Unless of course you go to Run AZ, and there the shoe chooses you. (I usually steer clear of product endorsement kind of posts, unless of course it's a book or movie or music or food or something I really love or I can relate it to a book or movie or music or food- like in this case both a book and a movie.)

So you walk in and although they have a wall of shoes, you don't get to pick. Instead of an old wizard, a young athletic-type worker-bee asks you what you will be doing in the shoes (running, walking, etc) and what size you think you are, then you have to roll up your pants and walk around in your socks so they can watch you walk. Then they scurry on to the back room and bring you a pair. "Try it out. Let me watch you run. Nope. Not those. Try these. Not those either. Hmmmm. What about these? Now run with a different one on each foot." They watch you walk, and watch you run, and ask questions until they narrow down the perfect pair. Color, name brand, and price don't even get mentioned. I chuckled to myself as a girl got matched up with a really ugly pair of shoes. "Don't they come in a cuter color?!?!" Nope. They were florescent green. Fortunately both Nick's and my feet seem to like reasonably priced (and in my case -cute) shoes.

Now I have no more excuses. Caramel-palooza is behind me, and I have new shoes, time to get my sorry-I-gained-all-my-weight-back-butt back in gear.

boys.

The other day my two older boys approached me with a baggie of money and a shopping list. They had pooled their resources and and wanted a little add-on thingy to the wii controller. (and a bunch of food- apparently the pantry was running dangerously low.)

My purse and keys were handed to me, flip flops placed on the floor in front of me, and we were off.

Nick was in the lead guiding the way with shopping list in hand (complete with check boxes when the item was located.)

Zach pushed the cart, and Christopher alternated between riding on the side of the cart and running around the store. He'd also alternate between throwing a short fit because someone told him "no" (like when he wanted pink sparkly flip flops) and yelling just for fun because he enjoyed the acoustics of the large space (we were at a Super Target)

I was happy to keep a safe distance behind, pretending they weren't really my children, but staying within eyesight of them just in case.

They weren't being naughty or obnoxious, just loud. And exuberant. And rambunctious. You, know. Boys.

So at one point we pass this young couple taking a break in the outdoor patio corner of the store. She was clearly very pregnant and must have needed to sit and rest a bit before trekking to the cash registers.

I saw them watch my brood as they made their way noisily down aisle at which point the couple shared a chuckle between themselves. (clearly in response to my kids)

I stopped and pointed to her stomach- "Is that your first?"

"Yes. And it's a boy too. We were just saying that he's probably going to be just like them" (pointing to my bunch- apparently my discrete distance wasn't fooling anybody)

I left them with a congratulations and good luck wishes, and hurried off after my kids before Christopher decided my absence was something to scream about. (or half the toy department ended up in my cart.)

Boys. They're a joy. (as I type this, my middle son is reading over my shoulder and asking "are you done yet?" apparently there is a really important video game he needs to play.- also another reason my blogging has been spotty at best- I now have to share my computer with bored little boys.)

John's trip

Before I begin, John had strict instructions to "take lots of pictures". I wanted to feel like I was there because I had looked at so many pictures. I gave him my camera (which I appropriated when my other one died- RIP) and deleted a lot of the garbagey pictures off the memory card so he had over a Gig of memory to work with, and then repeated myself several times- "LOTS OF PICTURES". He took 57 (I counted) I was a little bit disappointed, but it could have been a lot worse.

Also I would just like to put it out there that no, John did not visit the very famous Red Light District, or purchase anything from a "Coffee Shop". Some lady at work yesterday actually threw something at John when he told her that he did not partake in "the best parts" of Amsterdam.

He did however, take some pictures of Tulips, (they are in the peak of their season right now, and one of my very favorite flowers)

Travel the city by boat on the many canals,
Take pictures of a "typical scene in Amsterdam"
Eat fries with mayo,Visit the Anne Frank House, he doesn't have a picture of that, but this is the church bell tower she could hear outside her room-Toured the Rijksmuseum (national museum featuring Rembrandt) and tried to visit the Van Gogh museum but it was closed. From there he went to London where John went some time shopping at Harrods-
Saw the Princess Diana memorial-
found a replacement for the Foosball table we threw out a few months ago. Yes, that's a Swarovski Football table for 80,000 British pounds. (Roughly $100,000 USD)
bought me some chocolate,
teased me with the front window display of a pastry shop,
Took pictures of places he wouldn't mind visiting should he ever return like The Natural History Museum-
And the guy who Founded Boy Scouts-
Then went and caught a really nasty cold while waiting outside to get into Wembley Stadium (A big Soccer Stadium, or as the rest of the world calls it- Football)
He was hoping to catch a Manchester United game (his favorite team) but they were having the preliminaries for the World Cup, so he just had to watch England beat Croatia. (He did get to see his favorite player from Manchester United score two goals, and David Beckham had a "really awesome assist")

Then just because he was having too much fun, he ended the trip by getting lost in the streets of London for over an hour. (But obviously made it home okay)

waste not, want not

The other day Christopher had decided that I was not going to spend my day lounging around in my pajamas reading my book club book, Jane Eyre, but that we needed to go somewhere. Anywhere. He informed me of this by taking off my favorite fuzzy warm socks, and handing me my flip flops.

I agreed that since we were out of things like apples and bananas and the weather was perfect and lovely, that a walk to Sprouts would indeed be a very good idea.

However, later when I went into the kitchen to get one of those apples I just purchased for an afternoon snack I was very confused as to why there were was only one left. The older kids were still at school, John said he didn't eat one, and Christopher isn't capable of eating three whole apples and leaving no evidence behind.

What I finally found was this-

Well, actually I fished them out the nearly empty garbage can. Grrrr. Besides eating only a bite or two of the apples, over the last few days I have found whole bananas in the garbage and half eaten ones all over the house. Just this morning I found one in the laundry room. Still fairly fresh. (I'm just worried someone is going to find one with their foot first)

If it weren't for the fact that I actually enjoyed the walk and the perfectly sublime weather, I'd almost say that trip to the store for fresh produce was a waste of time and money.

(my mantra is still "Terrific two's not terrible two's. Terrific two's, not terrible two's....)

Confessions

Confession #1- I can be stubborn. I don't like change. I fight it tooth and nail, or passive-aggressively, whichever suits my purpose best. Like with technology. I am slow to embrace new technology because the old works just fine, thank you very much. Even though, time and time again, I wonder how I ever got along without it in the first place.

Confession #2- I walked into an Apple store for the first time today, and I liked it. I have fought the presence of Apple in my life for as long as I can remember, with the exception of downloading a few songs from itunes. (cause I got a free gift card) I remember being in high school, and being really irritated that the computer lab had macs, because they were stupid and didn't work like my PC and they were stupid, and I didn't like them, and people who said things like "I love Macs! They are so easy to use!" really irritated me, and I wouldn't sit by them even though they could probably help me figure things out, but that was the point, I didn't want to figure those things out, I liked my PC thank you very much, and I wanted nothing to do with Macs. And then later on, when I worked at customer service at a store that sold computer software, and Mac owners would come in and act like it was the store's fault because they couldn't read the box to see that the software was for PC's and not Macs, and when they opened the box and tried to run the PC software on their machine and it wouldn't work, they were irritated about it. Well, that was just fuel for my fire that if Apple wanted to be exclusive and a pain about it, and not play with the other kids, and any mac users I ran into at this point still irritated me, then I wanted nothing to do with them. But I broke down today, and swallowed my pride and stepped into a store. And talked to a salesperson. And made a couple purchases. And couldn't be happier about it. It was easy, and they were nice, and although I probably bought some of the cheapest merchandise in the store, not once did they try to convince me I needed something more expensive, and he promised that their stuff will work with my PC at home, and I tried not to look at the pretty new ipods, because my walkman works perfectly well, thank you very much.

to shop, or not to shop?

I woke up this morning to one of my least favorite phrases, "mommy my tummy hurts." Which of course followed immediately by Zach trying to make it to the toilet, and not quite getting there. MOST of it made it in the toilet, but I still got to spend part of my morning cleaning up puke out of my carpet and wiping up the mess on the bathroom floor (I shall be thoroughly mopping just as soon as I finish here.)

He of course stayed home from school today, and spent most of the morning in bed. Totally pathetic and lethargic, but not feverish. He asked for some water, so I gave him some with a warning not to drink too much too fast, which he either didn't listen to, or we have different definitions of what "too much" is. Up came all the water.

After a two hour nap he seems to feel better. He announced that his arms and legs work. Which is fantastic, although I didn't know I needed to worry about them. He's currently downstairs very enthusiastically playing on his Nintendo DS and has been informing me for the past hour and a half every thing he is missing at school. "My class is at recess right now. I have nine more minutes of morning recess."

So it's school policy that once your kid pukes you gotta wait 24 hours before they can go back, just to make sure they don't pass along any bugs or have some kind of relapse all over the playground. Which is a perfectly sensible rule, and I am grateful for it and happy to comply. And generally think that rule should be applied to most all other areas of life.

Here's my problem though- I'm almost totally out of diapers. I totally was gonna go shopping this morning until Zach derailed that plan. We have most of the other necessities, bread, milk, cereal, but diapers are kinda important around here. After the one he's wearing, I have one left, unless I have one stashed away in the car or the church bag or something. Barring anything terrible like Christopher getting a massive case of diarrhea, we should be okay until Nick comes home to babysit, but with Zach seeming to be feeling better, I admit I am sorely tempted to take him to Costco or Target with me. This one last diaper business makes me nervous. I'm a big believer in Murphy's Law.