Pocket Monkey

Kids seem to get the strangest obsessions as they grow. It seems like it changes every day too. As Alex has grown, he has now become quite the little character. He is constantly pretending things. Lately he has taken to a new 'imaginary friend'. I'm not sure it is really a friend, but that is the best thing I can call it. He will walk around with his palm facing up like he is caring something every so gently. It fools me quite often. Sometimes I really do think he is carrying something. When you ask him what he is carrying he will tell you that it is his lady bug named Floppy. But there is obviously no bug there. He actually will wake up in the mornings and come out of his room carrying his imaginary bug. It's cute. One of the other things that has developed, is his awareness of pockets. He loves love LOVES his pockets. True to little boy nature, he puts everything he can find into his pockets. Sometimes I find things that I have absolutely no idea what it is or where on Earth he got it. Rocks, twigs, pennies, bottle caps, bits of trash, plastic chunks...the list goes on. The funny part of this is that I never remember to check his pockets before I do laundry. So it has become part of my normal routine to check the washer/dryer after laundry is done and see what I can find floating haphazardly in the bottom of the machine. Each laundry day makes for yet another handful of surprises. I've even found a dollar bill and an old cellphone in there. I took a picture of one of my 'hauls'. It makes me smile when I see those random knick-knacks in the washer. I'll be interested to see what I'll find in there when Abby discovers pockets. I have a feeling she will follow every so closely in her brother's footsteps when it comes to this. It's only a matter of time before my laundry treasure hunt doubles in size from two pocket monkeys.

This is what I found after just own load of laundry. Funny thing...the dinosaur has been through the wash at least three times now. It must be a favorite.

Pickles the Bunny

I'd like to introduce you to the newest member of our family...

Pickles.

Isn't she adorable? I must admit that Alex picked a fine looking little bunny. This past weekend we all piled into the mini van and headed out into the country to pick a bunny. She is a holland mini-lop and will grow to a whopping four pounds. Okay, so whopping was a stretch for words. She's going to be a small one, but that is better all around. At first, I had the notion that she might become an indoor rabbit. You've heard of people doing that, right? Well, those people are complete nutters. In case you weren't aware of this little tidbit, rabbits are stinky little critters. Their pee smells like ammonia and they poop more than a newborn human. They pretty much leave a perfect trail of constant poop behind them when the hop along. It's disgusting. It's even more disgusting when your one year old wants to follow the bunny around so she can pick up the 'present's' and put them in her mouth. (Seriously, I'm compiling a list of disgusting things Abby eats) Anyhow, she came to live in a small cage in the house until we can get a hutch built for her outside. No indoor bunnies for his family. To say the least, Alex is smitten with Pickles. Abby adores her and wants to hold her all the time (not good for poor Pickles). Unfortunately the smell got to be too much for our tiny house and Pickles had to go live at Aunt Mandy's house with thier new bunny (Pickles litter mate) Nacho. Click here to meet Nacho. Alex was devastated to leave her there, but in the end I explained it all and he was fine with the idea of building her a hutch. Hopefully all will go well and we can get a hutch built soon so Pickles can come home. We miss her furry little face already.

Happy Birthday Mom!

Happy Birthday Mom! Today my mom turns...ah ha! I bet you thought I'd be cruel enough to reveal her true age. Not a chance peeps, so don't ask. It wouldn't be lady like, ya know what I mean? I hope you have a super great birthday.

Actually, there is pretty much no question whether she will have a good birthday. She will. Do you want to know why? Because...yes folks...another woman got bitten by the Twilight bug. And that woman is my very own mother dearest. And for her birthday she will spend the evening engrossed in the series. I gave her the first book for mother's day and she was slow to start, but alas, she has become just as addicted as the rest of us Twilighters. It's pretty funny because she was set on the fact that it would just be another book. A good book, she was not hesitant to admit, but just a book, nonetheless. One book, one movie, and and one obsession later, she has joined us on the dark side of temptation. He he he...I have turned her into a monster. She even bought the second book before I could get it for her. She also now proudly owns the movie. How do I know she is 100% hooked? Because she has told me she will be seeing New Moon in the theatre. This may not seem like good proof to you, but look folks. She doesn't see movies in the theatre. So that's sayin' something. Good for you mom! You'll be joining me on my second viewing of it come November. She has sped through Eclipse and has almost finished and will be probably knocking down my door tonight to borrow the last book. So once again, Happy Birthday Mom! Go treat yourself and get some more reading in. Love you!

A Phlog (Photo Blog)

Yes, I made that word up. Phlog is not a word. Actually, come to think of it, it might actually be a term these days. Seems like most words that don't seem real are actually words that people know by heart. But I'm not hip to the text/internet lingo. So for your enjoyment, I have some photos to share. I have been slacking in that department, I must admit. So kick back and enjoy the phlog.

We got to go to my parents' house for Memorial Day and my mom's Daisies fill the whole front yard. The kids had a blast picking them.

Alex and Wesley really are great buddies. But I'm still not sure Wesley is diggin' the whole hug scene. He's still gettin' used to crazy Alex with his lack of respect for personal space.

This is funny. Alex loves this video about firetrucks that we check out constantly at the library. So one day he decided to get dressed in his fire gear. He has on a fire hat, fire coat, fire boots, and fire gloves. He told me this as he put each item on. He searched, but couldn't mangage to find a fire mask.

We got to enjoy the three day weekend with a little 'fishing' with my Mom and Dad. Actually, there was no fishing for me or the kids. I wanted to, but chasing them around and herding them away from the constant attempts to jump in the water kept me too busy. But my parents caught some good catfish (sorry you weren't there Ben).

Alex and Grandpa

Abby and Grandma

A moment of future torture, forever captured on film. One day I will bring this photo out to torture them when they are older. Cute though, eh?

When it rains...

This week has been utterly one of the most annoyingly awful weeks that I have had to go through in quite awhile. As a matter of fact, I'm not sure it is over yet due to the fact that it is Friday. I still have to get through Saturday without any massive mishaps. We shall see.

Today we got a lovely kick in the head. You see, as of the last month, Alex has been suffering more and more with his allergies. I am not surprised in the slightest seeing as how Josh (Mr. no allergies) has found out that he, too, shall now be added to my medicine board. (I have a dry-erase board that I keep track of all medicine taken in the house.) Anyhow, so he has developed allergies in his old age. We finally broke down and got him started on Claritin. Joy of joys...more money to shell out. As if Alex's medicine wasn't enough. This isn't the kick in the head either. You see, Alex has also been getting Xopenex breathing treatments more and more often since allergy season kicked into full gear. I thought that this was normal for a kid with allergies and asthma. I was apparently horribly mistaken. His constant bouts of coughing has become more and more frequent. It isn't bad until around bedtime. He seems to be worse the more that he plays outside. And so Claritin has been in his system nonstop now for over a week. But each night for the last five days, he has woken up at midnight with a horrible asthma cough that turns into a wheeze. These are his version of an asthma attack/episode. Not good. Not good at all. So I called the doctor to see when I might need to schedule an appointment to talk about options to control it better. They freaked out when I told them he'd had a rescue inhaler treatment for five days in a row. Apparently, well controlled asthma would involve only having rescue inhalers (Xopenex) twice in two to three months. WHAT?!? Why didn't any other docotor tell me this?? Ugh...now how bad of a mom do I feel like? So after a very long appointment with a very nice doctor, Alex is officially on three meds a day for as long as it takes to get him in control. He shouldn't have another cough or wheeze for two to three months before we try to back him down into his least medicated control niche. And to add to our kick in the head, we also got a punch in the gut. The combo of this medicine will be like adding a brand new car payment to our monthly budget. The only thing we found out of interest was that the thing that causes really bad problems with allergies at night and in the morning is dust. He has a dust allergy so that would make sense. But how much more crap do I have to do around this joint to make it cleaner?? If you knew what I already did, you'd be asking the same thing. So all that medicine is kind of scary. What is it doing long term? But the alternative is worse. The doc handed me a book called "Mikey's Mom Didn't Know That Asthma Could Kill..." Great...now I feel better. Sheesh. What the flippin' monkeys happened to my week?

So it's been a B-E-A-utiful week here if you combine into the mix Josh's lack of work flow and the knock-down-drag-out family feud we had on my side of the gene pool. We're talkin' Jerry Springer crap here folks. (Don't ask, for I shan't go into the gory details. But it's pretty funny stuff.) Let's just say that I once thought that Jerry Springer was all made up, but now I am a believer. It's totally real. So when it rains, it truly does poor. Tomorrow is another day...so, bring it on!

A brief moment of non-zen

I woke up today with a rain cloud over my house. No...seriously, this isn't a metaphor. It was a cloudy and kind of drizzly day. So this only meant that outside play time was going to be drastically lowered today. Alex and Abby have become so used to being outside during almost every waking moment, that it is nearly impossible for them to enjoy the days without it. Not a problem for the most part. But today it was only about 60 degrees in the morning and I didn't feel like breaking the pants back out. So they got to stay inside and enjoy the boredom that is our house. I was actually hoping that it would do good for Alex's allergies. They have been in a full blown uproar these past weeks. Poor kid. Claritin and Xopenex nearly every day. It's a curse, I swear that it is. I always find myself wishing that it would be me with the issues. At least, as an adult, I could understand why it was happening to me. But alas, this isn't how it panned out. So on to my moment of non-zen.

In his attempt to make as much mischief as he can so as to rebel against his outside ban, Alex decided to climb up to where I was charging my new cell phone. Before I go on, let me say that I love my new cell phone. It is merely a Net10 phone but could have fun ringtones on it. I had a Star Wars one and a Transformers background. It was my own little personal phone. (Can you see where this is leading?) So he unplugged it from the wall and before I could get to him, he snapped the charger from the phone and pulled the guts out of it, making it forever unchargable. Nice, right? Well, at least I had a nice full battery of charge left on it until I could get a new phone to replace it, right? Yeah...not in a moment of non-zen. Josh got home and took it upon himself to attempt to restuff the pieces back into the phone. One cuss word, a bloody finger, and one dead phone later, my moment of non-zen was complete. Dead...gone...my happy little phone is no more than a fun new toy for the kids. Seriously people, as petty as it sounds, this really sucks. Well, Josh didn't like the idea of me gallavanting all over with two kiddos and no emergeny phone to call 911. So I got a new phone from the same stupid store I got this last one in hopes of it being the same and guess what? It isn't. It doesn't even have different ringtones as an option! What the fart!?! What kind of stupid phone these days doesn't have at least a list of 20 cheezy ringtones to choose from. Take it back to the store, right? No...I stupidly called Net10 to switch my minutes to it already before realizing the phone totally sucks. *sigh* Zen doesn't like me very much.

Happy Birthday Penny, Jasmine, & Logan!

On another Williams' animal note today, Penny, Jasmine, and Logan turn three years old today. Three years ago, Josh and I were living with my parents in an attempt to find a house of our own. I was massive pregnant with Alex and found these wee little kittens that a mama kitty could no longer care for. She died a few days after I took over for her. They had a little brother that didn't make it and the three of them were hard pressed to make it through themselves. Massive amounts of medicine, one eye removal surgery and lots of bottles later, they pulled through against the odds that the vets gave them. Today, they are healthy and strong. They are also spoiled rotten! They spend their time sleeping, playing, and being vultures (scavenging for food anywhere we might leave it out...hey, in their head if it's left out it's rightfully theirs). Happy Birthday Kitties! Our lives wouldn't be the same without you!