Things That Make Me Go Ew

There are things that freak me out in life.  Things that make me gag or make my skin crawl.  And obviously it makes sense to share them with you.

1. Pills: When somebody swallows a pill it should never touch the tongue.  If I am swallowing a pill and it touches my tongue I gag.  If somebody else is swallowing a pill and I can see it sitting on their tongue…I gag.  Just thinking about it now while writing this is making me feel queasy.  And yes this does mean Justin will intentionally look at me and set a pill on his tongue and smile mischievously.

2. Butter: When I was in high school my best friend’s little brother dared my best friend and me to eat an entire spoonful of butter.  Not a little spoon, but a mixing spoon sized blob.  So we did.  I barely got it down and I swear I was throwing up butter for days.  If I even get it on my hand while cooking I gag now.  And this means Justin will put a slathering of butter on my kids plates occasionally to watch me squirm as they lick it off.  

3. Chicken: The site of raw chicken is disgusting.  Touching raw chicken is even worse.  But THE worst is the then cooked chicken.  Well, it’s only gross if I was the one who cooked it.  If I had to touch the chicken while it was raw I cannot eat it.  If somebody cooks it for me then I love chicken…unless it’s on a bone.  So to sum it up chicken on a bone is from the devil and if I had to touch raw chicken then I won’t eat it once it’s cooked.

4. Vomit: The smell of vomit or the site of anyone vomiting since me into gagging convulsions. I can handle nearly every body fluid that shoots or pours out of my children except for vomit.  Justin knows…if a kid is throwing up he has to handle it or else he’ll be handling a vomiting child and a vomiting me.

5. Dry Windshield Wipers: If you turn on your windshield wipers when it’s dry so they make that loud squeaky sound my skin crawls.  My whole body feels like a giant ball of snakes that’s trying to escape from the horrid sound. It’s not a pleasurable experience.

And now you know.  Which means most of you reading this will make an effort to do these things now to see my probably hysterically overdramatic reaction to these events.  And a select few, the best ones, will avoid these things (thank you to those 3 of you).

Happy Father's Day

The long awaited (well probably not, but lets pretend) Father’s Day Blog.

There’s this guy I know named Justin.  Well really he was known as “Davis” when I met him.  That’s what he was called and somehow around the time we got married people started calling him by his first name.  Not sure why, but it happened.

So a serious of events happened in our life.  Some of those events were out of our control.  Some of them based on mistakes we made.  Some of them hard choices we made. The final result was that Justin became a stay at home daddy when Jordan was born a little over 4 years ago.

I think Justin will be one of the first to admit this isn’t his dream “job”.  Yet he gets our kids fed.  He gets our kids to appointments.  He runs errands with all 3 of them.  He makes it through the day with our children still alive (sometimes barely).

So aside from doing his “job” to literally keep the kids alive he has done something even more amazing.  His been our kids’ daddy.

He’s Daddy – The one who tends to their needs from a cup of juice to a giant hug

He’s Daddy – The one who makes them breakfast and takes them to the park

He’s Daddy – The one who prays with them before bed and turns up the music to dance around the house

He’s Daddy – The best playground to slide down or swing from

He’s Daddy – The funniest person they know

He’s Daddy – The first man in their lives to love and respect them

He’s Daddy – The one to guard and protect them

He’s Daddy – The one to teach and to guide them

So I wanted to say Happy Father’s Day to my husband.  My Baby Daddy.  The man who sacrifices so much to take care of our babies and still has time to take care of me.

I love you Davis!

The moment he became a Daddy

Holding Little Ms Jordan

Holding his Son for the First Time

So Sayith Tay and Jay #45

What Season is it? How do you know?

Taylor: Summer.  It's summer break.

Jordan: Fall.  Because you just telled us.

What is your favorite thing to do during summer?

Taylor: Go swimming.

Jordan: I love to take a shower and put the dress on.

What do you want to do this summer?

Taylor: Eat some cake.

Jordan: Color.  Watch a movie.

Why does mommy make you do homework during summer?

Taylor: Because I have to because you want me to learn.

Jordan: Um, I don't know know.   So I can do homework.

What is the best part of summer?

Taylor: That you can get to swimming and I have some ice cream.

Jordan: Um watching a movie.

What is the worst part of summer?

Taylor: Nothing.  I like summer.

Jordan: Um, Daddy spanking my butt.

No Use Cryin' Over Popped Balloons

As I sat and thought about what I wanted to blog about on my lunch break today I was torn between 2 things:

Father's Day
Taylor's Graduation

One of those happens every year and one of those is a once in a lifetime event (that is a total waste of time...its Kindergaten people!)

I chose the once in a lifetime event because:

1. I really like the dress Taylor is wearing and want to show it off as much as I can
2. To get it out of the way...I mean we went becuase Taylor was excited and for that reason I am excited...but really...KINDERGARTEN graduation?!
3. I haven't had time to sit and go through all my pictures to find good Father's Day ones yet

So I took the day off on Friday to enjoy (tolerate) sitting outside in the hot sun for an hour (litteraly balloons were popping from the heat). 

We got to watch Taylor strut her stuff to her seat in the back row...and that's pretty much all we saw of her after that.  She was in the back row, behind other kids, and everyone in the front row of adults thought it was a brilliant idea to bring balloons and not hold them down so they were blocking the view of everyone behind them (myself included).

Taylor got in a fight with her cap about half way through the ceremony.
The cap one, so when she went up to get her "certificate" she was capless.

After the ceremony she got some goodies and some pictures with teachers and her best friend Isabella.  That was the best part in my opion.

We headed to Cheesecake Factory to celebrate (ie use a gift card we had).  I haven't been to Cheescake Factory in awhile and I must say I was rather impressed.  The portions were massive so really Justin and I had food for lunch and dinner that day, plus the kids, and 2 slices of cheescake for $60...not to shabby.

Overall it was good day minus the sunburns.  And I'm proud of my baby girl - we got her report card and she consistantly improved in every area this year!

Now let the mom led "summer school" begin...yes I AM that kind of mom and I'm ok with that.

What Happens in the Car Doesn't Stay in the Car

I am blessed with a great job that allows great flexibility because of my great boss.  That means I get to work from home a couple of hours every morning so I can drop Taylor off at school since she doesn’t start until 9:30.

This also means I get to be the one to take her to school almost every day.  So many odd conversations happen on this drive in the morning.

We’ve talked about genetic disorders

We’ve talked about physics

We’ve talked about why people use money

We’ve talked about how much smarter daddy is then mommy (only because daddy can look stuff up on the internet and she’s adamant that I cannot accomplish this task)

Recently though I found it quite entertaining and felt I should share (preface this by saying our Dryer hadn’t been working so Taylor’s choice of clothing was limited since we couldn’t dry (therefore wash) clothes in a couple of weeks.  AND Taylor hates wearing jeans which is all she had left).

Taylor: Mom can’t papa just fix our dryer?

Me: No baby

Taylor: Can you buy a new one?

Me: Probably, it just costs a lot of money.  Daddy will do some laundry today though and let the sun dry the clothes.

Taylor: Will you put them in my closet? I don’t like digging (Bad Mom confession, I have all the clean laundry sitting in one giant mound on my bedroom floor since I’ve been too lazy to fold and put it away).

Me: Maybe when I get home from work daddy can take you and Jordan to the pool and I can put away the laundry

Taylor: Why don’t you do it after we ALL go swimming

Me: Because then I’ll be too tired.  I work all day, and then make dinner, then go swimming and I won’t have time or energy to do laundry.

Taylor: Sometimes daddy makes dinner

Me: Yes he does

Taylor: Why doesn’t he make dinner all the time?

Me: Because he doesn’t know how to cook a lot of stuff only some stuff.

Taylor: But he makes the stuff with the hamburger and macaroni and cheese and that’s my favorite.

Me: Hamburger Helper?

Taylor: Yeah that

Me: Well you can’t eat just that all the time.  So that’s why I make dinner

Taylor: Well then could daddy do the laundry while you are at work?

Me::… Well… that’s not daddy’s job (although I was thinking Heck Yes he could but we both know that isn’t going to happen he hates doing laundry as much as I do)

Taylor: Can you make laundry somebody’s job and you can give them money

Me: No if I pay somebody to do our laundry we won’t have any money to do fun things

Taylor: Like go to Discovery Science Center! When do we get passes again?

Me: Well we have to wait to see if we can get passes.  A new dryer costs lots of money.  And we might go to San Diego with Aunt Tawni and Uncle Rob so we can go to Lego Land

Taylor: I love Lego Land! I’ve never been there and I want to go.

Me: Well if we go there we can’t get passes for Discovery Science Center

Taylor: Can’t everybody just pay for their own so it doesn’t cost a lot of money?

Me: Well, no.  I pay for our whole family.

Taylor: Can daddy pay too? He has lots of money.

Me: No, daddy doesn’t have a job so I pay for it

Taylor: So you give him money?

Me: Well…sort of. 

Taylor: I don’t understand

Me: What don’t you understand?

Taylor: Well if daddy get’s a job then who will stay home with Jordan and Elijah?

Me: That’s why daddy doesn’t have a job, but when Jordan and Elijah are in school too then daddy will get a job and make money

Taylor: Wow…then we’ll have a lot of money and we can buy a dryer, and go to Lego Land, and go to Discovery Science Center, and give somebody money to do our laundry.

Me: Probably not, but it’s a nice thought

Taylor: I like thinking.  It makes me smart.

Jordan Wants A Doggy

It all started this weekend as we ate ribs for dinner.  Jordan looked at me very seriously and said, "Don't throw away the bones, we need to save them."

I asked her why so she told me it was for when she gets a doggy some day.

A few days later she asked me, "When our house gets old where are we going to live?"

So I told her we would be living here for awhile and then buying a house someday.

Jordan: Can you buy a yard too?  For my doggy.  And lots of bones.  Not giant bones, but regular bones.  And I want to feed my doggy food and give him water.  And I want to buy a thing that can go on his neck so we can walk around with him.  And I want to buy a puppy that grow big.  And mommy and daddy can open the door for him so I can give him bones.

Mommy will a bad guy come to our house? Because my doggy will get him and we'll be safe.  I wont be scared if we have a doggy.

Can you buy me a doggy now?

Year of Disneyland

So those of you who don’t know (or merely don’t recall) about a year ago the Davis’ were planning a trip to good ol’ Beloit, Wisconsin.   Justin has family there and about 4 years ago we had the opportunity to fly out there and spend a week.

It was awesome to meet a lot of his family and I also got to make a trip to Chicago to visit my aunt Jeanine.

So the intention last year was to do the same.  We’d been setting aside a little bit here and there for a over a year to save up for the hotel/plane tickets.  However, as the time approached we came to the realization the little we saved up still just wouldn’t be enough.

We were definitely bummed.

I still had to take time off work and we still wanted to do something with our family so we decided to get Disneyland Passes.  Elijah was about to turn 2 so he would be free and we had just enough saved up to get the cheap So Cal Passes so we did.

So over the last year we’ve had the opportunity to spend some family nights there.  It was fun.  It was exhausting.

On our last day of our passes we planned on heading to Disneyland one last time.  I started this blog with the intention of telling you what we did instead on that Friday night since it sort of involves Disneyland, but I’ll save that for another day.  Instead you get some pictures of the fun times to be had over the last year:

And Then There Were 3

About 3 ½ years ago Justin and I found out our family was soon to be complete.  We were having another baby.  Was it the plan at that moment? No way! But still, inside me grew the little human that would make our family complete.

As you recall (or don’t recall and you can now be surprised) the pregnancy started out rough.

1. I was nervous about having another baby – I was terrified it would be another girl and felt I wouldn’t be excited for a girl and that wasn’t fair to the baby
2. I had a tear that caused heavy bleeding around week 10 and we thought we were about to lose the baby
3. I had to switch doctors and my new one knew nothing about my blood disorder and made me do all kinds of stupid things that made no sense because she thought she was helping

At first we decided not to find out the sex of the baby (see #1 above).  But I caved and when we saw it was a boy we were ecstatic.  So as his due date approached we prepared our family for its completeness.

The girls both came early so as May approached I knew my little mama’s boy would be here any day.

He had other plans.

But finally, a few days “late”, 3 years ago Elijah was born. My baby is 3 today! Where does the time go?

People frequently ask me (us?) if we are “done having kids”.  The answer is always YES!  We could have another kid someday (it’d have to be adopted), but for now our family is complete.  Elijah was the last missing piece and he was the perfect little piece to the Davis puzzle.

So in typical birthday blog fashion here is a note to the birthday kid and a picture for every month of his 3^rd year of life.

Elijah,

You are my momma’s boy even though you don’t know it yet.  Daddy may be your favorite person in the world (although it might actually be Miss Amber), but nobody walking this earth today loves you more the mommy.  You are a boy to your core and love to run, and throw, and if a toy has wheels you are on the ground with it.  Your joy is contagious.  When you are happy it oozes from ever part of you and makes those around you happy.  You are kind and loving and always take good care of the little ones around you (mostly Sophie…she might be your favorite…no it’s definitely Amber).  I am so glad God blessed our family with you.   You were the perfect addition to our family.

I love you baby boy! Happy Birthday