KE in NH, CT, & NY

My oldest, Michaela, is 19.  

Weird. 

She was home for the winter break and hung out with us for a while and that is always fun.  Andrea and Scotty LOVE her and think she pretty much god's gift to our family ...and in some ways she is.  :)

I'm kinda three steps behind where I should be at any given moment in life ....of course there are occasions where I really step up my mom-game and prepare in advance for something...  I'm getting better!  Anyways, sweet Michaela had the joy of being the first one ...and I'm confident it was meant to be this way.  

She's figured things out on her own, signed herself up for things, harassed me to not forget deadlines, and covered for me when I did.  She has pretty much done what she needed to do to get to where she is and for that she is awesome!

Well, she has survived her first year and a half at RIT and thanks to her AP high school credits and a BAE systems internship she managed to secure because she signed herself up for a Women in Technology program in high school ...she is ahead of the game and started early on her first co-op job of college!!!  At Datto.  I have no idea what that is...  They deal with data.  On a computer.  My knowledge of data pretty much tops out at access databases!

Paul and her are now able to have conversations about ...ummm, see I can't even think of fancy computer words to insert here.  Let's just say that the computer science major and mechanical engineer have lots of conversations about lots of computer stuff.  I work in a forest so I just listen and nod.

Since she isn't going to classes, just working this semester Michaela has found herself an apartment, signed the lease, paid a deposit and is now living with random strangers in Rochester, NY.  It just got real.  

See, when your oldest kid is at college with other college kids you still think of them as a kid ...after all they are still running the halls throwing bouncy balls at each other and chasing each other spraying grape soda.  They are for all intents and purposes... giant, stupid kids living unsupervised.

Now she has a job.  She will go to work. Go grocery shopping, shovel her own walkway, check her own tire pressure, and hopefully make her own lunch to take to work...  :) AND pay her own college bills next Fall when she returns to RIT for classes.  WHOO HOOO because $5000 a month is getting pretty tiring.

What was also very weird was watching her drive away when she left.  She was headed to Connecticut to a hotel on a "business trip"...  then to New York to start work this week.  She took her stuff, loaded the car, and left in the car we took her to elementary school in.  

Weird.

Good job KE.  You are kicking butt at this life thing.  We only harass you so you keep going...  :) xoxo

Crickets

Well, now I see why I stopped writing ...in Denmark and Germany I could write about the weird and interesting things I was experiencing and here in New Hampshire life has become pretty normal ...but as I type that I realize that maybe my normal has changed...  I am, after all, from California.  (kinda) 

Which, had I been a good little writer when we first got to New Hampshire I might find more things that are weird and interesting, but now they are "normal".  Like a Jug Handle.  Oh look though...  I thought I might have written about that a long time ago ...and SEE HERE ...seems I didn't have much to write about then either.

Okay, well, enough about NOT having enough to write about.  How boring is that.

Okay.  Saturday.

Saturday I bought crickets.  I had a million errands to run.  I literally went to nine different stores doing the dreaded "after-Christmas-returns"...  UGH.  While returning guinea pig treats ...because we had to put down Buttercup, our last, little guinea pig.     Side Note: Talk about a tough day.  We are screwed when it comes time to lose a cat or a dog.  Our family was devastated to lose Buttercup, including me at the vet holding little Buttercup with her sad squeaks.  The worst part was making the choice to put her down and being the one involved.  She was almost 8 years old, which is like 104 in people years.  She became paralyzed and then stopped eating.  Super sad.  We miss you Buttercup!

Anyways ...it just occurred to me that buying crickets might seem weird.  (Which again justifies my prior thought that my "normal" has drastically changed since moving here.)  We have a crested gecko named Squishy.  Squishy likes to eat crickets.  So I have to buy crickets.  Live ones.  Which at first it was really hard to feed a live animal to another live animal, but we've adjusted.  New normal...  seems to be a theme here. **sigh......

SO.  I buy 15 live crickets in the middle of my return-o-palooza, but then I realize that it's too cold to leave the crickets in the car to continue to returning things... and going home is NOT an option.  I can't stop.  My new 32 hour work week has me totally booked Monday through Friday ...and I can only keep track of receipts for so long. 

SO.  I have to take this bag of crickets into every store for the rest of my day.  Which, honestly, I've done before (new normal), but the bag was always small enough to put into my purse.  This bag was huge!!  ...aaaaaaaannndddd thinking about it now, I guess I could have just let some air out of the bag, but that didn't occur to me at the time.

I "had" to hide the big bag in my coat.  So I walked around stores and stood in lines holding a big, fat, air and cricket filled bag in the side of my coat.  It looked like I was stealing things.  One man at Lowes asked me if there was anything I wanted to buy and looked at my coat and I figured out that he thought I was a horrible shoplifter so I said, "oh, it's just crickets" and pulled the bag out.  He didn't say anything.  You're welcome Squishy.

Well.  That was a lot about nothing.  Isn't that like Seinfield?  I hate that show.  Mostly because of Jerry's voice.  It's ridiculously annoying.  Almost worse than a British accent....  or maybe worse?  I'm not sure.  Maybe someone should make a sitcom about my life...  for reals. 
 

It's not a new years resolution.

I promise that it's NOT a New Year's Resolution to start writing here again.  I am well aware of my inability to keep up with life much less create new goals!  Maybe my New Year's Resolution can be to vacuum every day ...like for reals, not just program the Rocky the Roomba every night and call it a day.

Happy got me a fancy, cordless vacuum for Christmas and it literally propels me around the house, my arm is tired from "holding it back".  Anyways, I'm not sure at what point a vacuum fell into the "Christmas gift category", but it did ...oh well, what can I say, I'm 40.  This is my life!  Today I walked around barefoot without dog hair sticking to me and I was happy.  Turns out a cordless vacuum makes me happy.  Know what doesn't make me happy? ...spelling vacuum.  It's a stupid word.

Anyways, I miss my family.  That is why I've decided to write again.  Thanks Grandma...  :)  ...or Bruce and Ingrid.... maybe a combination of you both. :)

Well.  That said...  I literally have nothing exciting to write.  Aside from accusing a Verizon call center employee from sitting around with his finger up his nose today, I've had a pretty normal day.  It was -11F so my nose hairs froze on the way to the bus stop, I wore snow pants to work all day (because I work in  barn), and to end my day ...as a big middle finger to the state of New Hampshire I bought popsicles for the afterschool club to eat as a "snack" as they sledded into the below zero temperatures of the dark night.  It's funny to "hear" kids, but not really see them....  :)

The kicker is.... my kids think this cold is normal!!  Andrea bangs on the frozen mini-van door as if it's a normal occurrence in life and Scott has yet to wear a coat to school... Two days ago we had a COLD DAY ...not a "snow" day, but a "cold" day ...a day in which it is SO cold that school buses can't start and frostbite will kill small children in a matter of minutes.   ...and my son is at the bus stop....  In. A. Sweatshirt.  Really?!  I think his brain froze a couple winters ago...

Ok.  Sappy alert.  My life has taken me to an awesome place where I have an amazing group of friends.  My kids are being successful-ish, my house is warm, and I work in "barn/forest" full of kind, compassionate people who would do anything for me.   My husband literally just handed me a bowl of Doritos as I sit by the fire.  If *needed* a gallon of milk tomorrow, which is going to be the biggest snow/cold storm ever, I know I would have 15+ people willing to bring it to me ...and that's cool.  This is what I hope for for my own kids.

...Oh, in my defense the Verizon guy deserved it.  The conclusion of my three hours worth of phone calls ended with me having to get a letter from my bank stating that they will pay Verizon $32.00.  What?!  So they have banned my credit card and Michaela doesn't have a working phone....  LONG story, but I'm right; everyone else is wrong.

Pictures really don't show the cold.  Trust that it is seriously cold!!! xo

My real Mothers Day

Ever wonder what an entire gallon of milk looks like on the floor?  This happened as we were sitting down to dinner... If you spill this much milk you are totally allowed to cry over it!  

...and I guess it wasn't so much of a spill as it was an explosion and then a "glug, glug, glug" as it flowed out of the broken plastic container while we all watched in silence.

Green Day. :)

I have tagged out of a lot of things, but I hold onto a few holiday traditions no matter what ...and Green Day is one of them.  My only concern on St. Patrick's Day is that we eat green food.

We had green pancakes, kiwi, spinach and green peas ...and Sprite ...in a green bottle.  All kinda gross together if you think about it, but oh well.  :)

Child Labor... My gift on Mother's Day.

Happy Mothers Day to ME!  My day started off at Scotty's football game at 8am...  Football is obviously run by a man.  Soccer on the other hand is literally run by a few moms so we of course did not have soccer games today!  Yay!! ...not that I hate sports, but sometimes it's just painful to sit through, especially when your kid's football team is losing 36 to 6 and the other coach is being a punk... like a full on "should be punched in the face punk".  That bugs me.  A lot.

Football wasn't that bad; Happy brought me a chair and a blanket and super hot coffee so I didn't freeze and we sat with friends and laughed off the patheticness of our team.  :)

Michaela and Sierra took Andrea to her football game later in the morning.  Andrea was being grouchy about going so I thought if her sisters took her it would be more fun.  Nope.  Apparently she stood there the entire game ...wearing the coaches coat and informing everyone that she doesn't want to play football anymore.  For Andrea, I think we can pretty much cross off any sports that require running. 

Anyways, back to my magical day.  My kids were nice.  My husband was nice.  I saw some of my nice friends.  Pretty good day ...until I heard the chainsaw.

Who chainsaws things on Mother's Day?  

My husband of course.  I'm not quite sure why "operation clean the yard" started, but I guess in the end I'm glad it did because stuff got done and it was easier to convince the children to all help since it was MY special day.  As I was explaining to Michaela how to dig a hole she got out her phone and reminded me that last Mothers Day was a "work day" too ...seems she saved a picture.  :) 

Of course last year I do see that I am working on my special day.... Hmmmmm....

This year I worked much less...mostly I meandered around the yard telling people what to do and making sure the chainsaw was kept under control.  :)

Sierra was being difficult so we stuck her in the air for a while ...but we could still hear her so it really didn't solve our main problem...

Do you see the joy in their little faces?  Awwww....

You can't see Andrea's joyous face because she snuck back inside every chance she could. 

Yay for Mom Day!  :)

Easter Hunt and Hike!

Second Annual Easter Egg Hunt and Hike!

- yes I realize this is old, but my blog is going to go backwards for a while...

I have no idea why I am slightly obsessed with Easter. I think it has to do with the fun, bright colored eggs ...and I've realized I like hiding things for people to find.  :)

Anyways, I've started an "event" at Beaver Brook where we hide eggs on a trail and the kids hike along and find them.  It's actually a super awesome idea if I do say so myself!!

I started it because regular egg hunts stress me out.  First of all you HAVE to be there on time.  A minute late and you've missed the start ...and you are left with a crying child.  Besides you aren't really "hunting" for anything, you are literally running around and just grabbing ...and having to often fight off psychotic parents to get any eggs. I hate psychotic parents ...like a lot.

Anyways, MY awesome egg hunt is an ongoing hunt where eggs are rehidden along the trail for two hours straight ...so no stressful start time! ...and no psychotic parents to fight off...for the most part.  :)

The first year we did it was sort of a fiasco.  I had 70 kids sign up so I planned for 150 and the following happened.  I am just copying and pasting it from the email I sent a long time ago.  :)

----  Easter 2014.

Well.  That was fun.   : )

I am in awe of what happened today.  I still can't believe it!  It's my estimate that the Wildflower Trail probably saw around 500 kids today ...plus all their accompanying grown ups.

The egg hunt went exactly as planned for the first half hour, keeping in mind that I actually started at 12:30 with the thought of, "Well, I'll get these few people done and moving through" ...but people just kept coming!

By 1:20 we had gone through all 1412 eggs, (ten eggs a kid)  ...and re-stuffing with the extra ~1200 pieces of candy was going slower than anticipated.  We removed bunny pictures to lower the number of eggs to eight per kid and eventually we just started putting candy out sans the egg. Everything was gone by 2:00 and I had an hour to go and the place was still packed.

The Beaver (my husband) had already been sent to the store for more candy so we waited....   Kids played tag, ran through the gardens, poked at the compost, played with frisbees, looked for bugs, and dug holes with sticks.  We entertained with puppets and had live entertainment by yours truly: hokey pokey, Easter jokes, the wave, sing alongs, simon says... at one point I had everyone look at the clouds to see what they could see.  Everyone was happy and there was still not a piece of candy in all of Beaver Brook. 

As I talked with the 100+ people in line I learned that our egg hunt had made it ALL OVER the internet and that the Beaver Brook emails had been forwarded and forwarded and then forwarded again... turns out preschool and daycares had been busy advertising for us!

The Beaver finally returned at 2:30 with ~2500 more pieces which we quickly threw all over the trail and the last of the line was able to make it through by 2:55!  We only had a handful of candy left.

Today was controlled chaos at it's finest.  I saw only smiles and heard only positive comments. Everyone was so encouraging!  For many it was their first time to Beaver Brook ...so mission accomplished!  

Out of curiosity I just googled  "egg hunt new hampshire"  and ALL of these sites had Beaver Brook's event listed and most had omitted the RSVP portion of it!  HA!!  :)

-----------

That is what I sent to "Beaver Brook" after our first hunt to explain the day since it was just my family and some friends running the entire thing because I thought it sounded like a fun idea.

It was obviously popular so I upped our egg count to 3000 and we were ready this year... Or so I thought!!  :) Actually, the day went well, but with a lot more restuffing than I anticipated!  

This is my favorite picture...

It's of my brother in laws entire family plus some random friends who offered to help ...they are stuffing eggs ...which they did for 90 minutes straight... While I popped my panicked head in every now and then to confirm the were stuffing as fast as possible.

Some of them would leave to go re-hide or collect empties.  They pretty much saved my butt, because even with my 3000 stuffed eggs we were struggling to keep up with the crowds.  We had 1000 people hike that small trail in just two hours.  Insane.  Luckily we had opened the whole barn and had crafts going on and the bird museum opened... It turned into a huge day and tons of fun for everyone.  ...but it would have been a MASSIVE fiasco without my family and friends!!

After Easter I bought another 1000 so we are ready for next year.  :) 

PS.  Both hunts were free and I was pretty bent on keeping it that way, but even without a specific cost people donated over $600 each year.  See.  People are nice.  :)

Spring Break - Waterfall!

We went hiking!  I realize I hike for work ...and even get paid to take my kids hiking every Wednesday afterschool for "Forest Freetime", but I never take them just for fun. Oops.  Bad mom.

This Spring Break while everyone went to Florida and the Bahamas and other warm places, we stayed behind in cold, rainy NH.  Oh.  Yay.  :)

It wasn't that bad sticking around; the kids had friends over and camped in the backyard, I worked a few days,  we planted plants and Scotty planted a watermelon farm, and we hiked to this waterfall ...twice ...because it was so awesome we had to take our friends back!

It was just a small waterfall, but the kids said it was better than Niagra Falls because you could play in it ...and the stream we hiked along to get to the bigger waterfall had lots of rocks and stuff to jump and play on.  Blue had a great time too!

Even Sierra liked it.  When you get a 15 year old girl to say "cool" it's as good as hitting the lottery...  So.  That was our exciting Spring Break.  Except for the part I had to go to the ER because I ate almonds.  Apparently, now that I'm old, I can't eat Almonds!  Lesson learned.

Winter Fun! :)

I remember posting about ski club last year and how I had originally thought it would involve a bus whisking my happy children off to a ski hill and return them three hours later, opposed to what really happened... which was me wrestling skis, boots, coats, and snacks to a frozen mountain top to endure a polar vortex of frozen-ness for two hours.

Yah, it's kinda the same thing this year.  However, at  this year I knew what I was getting into so I can't really complain!  See, the thing is I don't hate winter as much anymore.  Don't get me wrong, I still hate it, but just not as much ...maybe it's because winter hasn't really came this year.  I haven't even switched to Celcius yet!  There isn't any snow and that's been kinda a bummer, but oh well.  :(

Anyways... Even with the lack of snow here, the kids have still been able to go skiing, but technically Andrea and Michaela snowboard.  :)  Andrea traded in her skis for the cutest snowboard on earth...  A little Burton snowboard covered in cupcakes.  It is so tiny and adorable!!    Here she is in her green helmet, because I guess now is a good time to mention she hates pink.

Scotty is still a great skier.  He's kinda more awesome because he's totally self sufficient.  I could drop him off and pick him up and he could totally manage himself.  This is probably because when I'm off dealing with his less sufficient little sister he is on his own.  :) 

Yes, in this picture Andrea is on skis.  She's not quite ready for chair lifts with the snowboard ...we switch back to skis after her leasons for that. :)

Michaela also loves snowboarding, but she doesn't come with us during the week to ski club.  She likes to snowboard until 2am with her boyfriend and friends...

Yes... I know I haven't mentioned Sierra, but she hates the snow and everything about it.  After forcing her into ski lessons for a year I decided to tag out of that and leave her at home with the dog.  :)

Christmas in Canada

We went to Canada for Christmas.  It was cold.  The kids got gifts.  There, I posted something.  

:)

Happy Birthday Blue!

It was Blue's birthday last week.  He's two!!!! 

Two Pet Birthday Rules:

1.  Kids are in charge of Pet birthday cakes.

2.  Same species have to share their birthday AND their cake.  We are not making three cat cakes and having three cat parties.

This rule goes for stuffed animals too, because a while back when Andrea decided it was Bunny's birthday we all thought it was cute so we bought presents, hung streamers and made a cake.  ...the next day she told us it was Cutie Pie the lobsters birthday.  Turns out she just wanted to eat cake.

I just did the math ...we eat 11 birthday cakes a year.  That's a lot of cake!

Here is Blue's cake.  It's our yard and pond because Blue loves going outside and getting muddy and eating sticks.  It also has peanut butter poo on it.  Nice.  Good job Sierra.  :) 

Blue invited his best friend Tucker over and they had the best time ever.  Tucker belongs to Michaela's boyfriend and we can't even say his name in the house because Blue goes crazy.  Blue loves Tucker!!

Can you even tell which one is Blue?  :)  Funny huh?

Blue's birthday dinner was roasted hot dogs on the fire.  Well, he didn't officially get fed any hot dogs, but we drop enough to make the two dogs happy.  :)

The amusing part of the night was when the two dogs snuck out of the house and to the pond.  Soon eight muddy feet were running through the house.  Party over. :)

My mornings...

Sharing this is almost embarrassing, but maybe a mom somewhere will find it and realize she isn't alone!  ...and if I wasn't so opposed to posting things on Facebook I would post it there to show a realtistic view of a mom's life.  I dislike Facebook because it's just become a place to openly brag about all the crafts you make or board games you play with your kids or simply how magical your husband is because he put love note in your lunch ...and if you've posted any of these things recently, sorry.  ...but really? ...do crafts and love notes give an accurate description of your day or does throwing a box of frozen shrimp at your temper tantrum throwing kid hit a little closer to home?  Be honest.  :)

I have a love hate relationship with Facebook, similar to my relationship with Walmart.  Anyways....

This picture sums up my entire day ...which is fine; I'm happy to be busy and stressed and overwhelmed, because in the end my kid makes it to the bus stop on time, dressed in an adorable outfit she picked out, and eating a healthy egg.  So 👊🏼💥.

Great.  That sounded like a Facebook post.  Ugh.

Nana and Papa are Here!!

Nana AND the kids LOVE raspberries so as soon as Nana and Papa arrived today we quickly whisked Nana off to pick berries.  Okay, that's a lie; half the kids LOVE raspberries... As we were getting ready to go Andrea and Sierra informed me they HATE raspberries, but I informed them that I didn't care and they were going to go and pick berries with a smile.  They both gave me identical scowls, but once we got there Andrea realized she did in fact LOVE raspberries!!  Yay!  Sierra... not so much.

Sierra said she wanted to like them because they were small and cute, but she just couldn't.  Oh well.  Sierra still had fun picking up other things...  This particular little toad peed all over her and she didn't even flinch.  Ewwwww.....

Papa is on team "HATE raspberries", so he tagged out of the picking, but later he was involved in some competitive games of Go Fish and Chess.  :)

We wished Nana and Papa lived closer and we decided they just need to come out here more often!  

Senior Pictures

I am awesome.  Yes, I realize these are pictures of Andrea and Michaela, but this is all about ME.

Since Michaela is a SENIOR this year she apparently require many things ...one of those things is senior portraits!  If you have been in my house you will know that I do not have any "portraits" of any kind hanging on my walls.  I think I was traumatized at the age of 16 with a "Glamour Shots" photoshoot and I never recovered.  Plus I think Senior Portraits was made up by a group of bored photographers....  whatever.  She needs a picture for the yearbook and it has to be "special".

PS.  I'm not a uncaring mom.  I happen to have pictures that Michaela and Sierra painted in Kindergarten ...framed and hanging on some of our few remaining walls.  ...just because I have zero pictures of Andrea and only two of Scotty in the entire house means nothing.

Anyways, I was overwhelmed with back-to-school-everythings-times-four, so I scheduled a senior portrait photographer for the low price of $150!!!  Then I smacked some sense into myself!  $150 for a yearbook picture (that's it)??  Uh. No.  So I cancelled, and I felt bad, but I have mouths to feed ...alot of them.  :)

I decided with my fancy camera I would take my own pictures.  So I called my real photographer friend from Germany and got some tips then I bribed Andrea with fruit snacks and I practiced....

She's not smiling, but she's not giving me the evil eye so it's a win ...and her eyes are the perfect mix of everyone in the entire family.

It was Michaela's turn and here is what I came up with!  I love it.  It looks just like her.  It makes me smile.  I was looking at a college website today and started to cry.  I will miss her.  Okay.  Moving on.  So.  I'm not going to try and "Glamour Shot" her; she is Michaela and she is almost a grown up!  AHHHH!!!!!!  I guess technically the least of my problems are senior pictures.  Now I just feel the need to take a nap and stare at my phone...  Ok.  Moving on.

Senior Pictures.  I took them and I'm awesome, but I have no idea how to submit the photograph with the right digital pixels per inch whatever, BUT I do know I saved $150 so now I can pay for ten minutes of college!  

...and yes, mom, I'll print you whatever size you want of it!  :)  xoxo

$5

Hey mom!  I just bought an app for your birthday!

See, I figured out the problem of why I can't seem to continue to write on this wonderful blog.... I never use my computer; I do nearly everything on my phone!  Weird huh?  :)

Finding my computer and then finding a charger is apparently too much of an effort for me!  Sad, but true. 

...and one of the very, very few things I do regret is NOT writing on my blog for the past two years.  I missed some good stuff!  

So.  Thanks to this handy little $5 app I can now post from my phone.  

I can sit here on my phone, drinking my coffee and watching the news AND then if I decide I want to share something I can!!!!  As Andrea would say, as the good New England Kid that she is, this app is wicked awesome!

So on that note, here is what I've decided to share...

Bunny had a bubble bath.  Andrea has always said that "bunny smells like the best smell in the whole world", but yesterday she decided he needed a bath.  

I had to agree and said I would wash him when I washed clothes next, but she clearly had a different plan as her eyes filled up with tears and she explained that bunny is her best friend and we can't put him in a washing machine with dirty socks and underwear.  I suggested maybe he rode along with only soft fluffy dirty towels, but no way.

That led to a bunny bubble bath and I am sure glad we cleaned her best friend!!  That water was disgusting!!!  Bunny actually had THREE bubble baths ...and he might still take a ride with the towels as soon as a certain little girl bounces onto the school bus one morning!!!

xo

First Day of School!

Senior!!!  Can you believe that?  Feel free to forward any college fund contributions our way!  :)  KE is excited to finish up one more year of high school and the other kids are already fighting over who gets her room!

Sophomore!!!  My little girls are big, well they are still little, but you get it.  Sierra is thrilled to leave the house at 6:40am every day now!  Not really, but she is happy to get to play indoor volleyball again ...and she even made the varsity high school team!

Fifth grade!!!  My boy!!  This kid is the best boy ever! ...even though he refuses to hold my hand or give me hugs in public.  :(  He still loves me though ...he told me so.  :)

Second grade!!  Wow huh?!!!  This cute one is by far the biggest challenge in the house.  :)  She cracks us up continually with her "boss skills", "hard core", "cray cray" and "wicked awesome" comments.  

I'll try again...

Like the good daughter that I am I called my mom on her birthday a couple days ago and she finally made me feel sufficiently guilty for not sharing any pictures for the last however many years.  oops...

I quickly text-ed her three pictures, but the guilt remained ...so here I am.  But even as I try to post pictures I realize ALL my pictures are being backed up by my wonderful husband who claims I have about 4 million too many photographs.

Anyways, these old iphone pictures will have to prove my dedication!

Michaela is a SENIOR in high school and Sierra is quickly following as a SOPHMORE!   Scotty starts 5th grade and Andrea is in 2nd!!!  Everyone is growing up!  Ahhhh!!!

Yah, I don't know why Michaela and her boyfriend, Kyle are upside down.  I can't fix it.  Kyle should just be happy he made it onto my blog after nearly two years of hanging around my daughter!

For reals...

This time it's for real.  I'll write more.  HA!

Okay, so who wants to know about my day yesterday?  It was a normal, boring Tuesday.  Michaela did run her first light, but I'll spoil the surprise and tell everyone I forced her to do it.  Yep.  Michaela is driving.  I really do need to write more....

I feel like Michaela driving in and of itself needs some explanation.  Here in lovely New Hampshire a CHILD can drive the day they turn 15 and a HALF.  So on the half birthday during their 15th year of life they simply put their birth certificate in their pocket and WHALLA, instant driving permit.   This means Michaela has been driving with Happy and me since May 10th, a day when the roads of New Hampshire became a little more dangerous.  I'm also pretty sure my usage of bad words has significantly increased during this time.

Not true.  :)  For the most part Michaela is pretty good ...especially considering she has been learning how to drive a stick shift.  That's been all Paul's doing so far.  He has a level of patience that simply doesn't exist within me.  I can hardly handle the stress of easy driving on the back roads of Hollis in my automatic, let alone shifting and stalling and grinding gears...  I can honestly say she is getting better though.  I can also honestly say that 16 is crazy young to be allowed to drive around one of the most dangerous things on earth!!

Back to my day yesterday...  and the running of the red light I'm sure everyone is dying to know about.

5:55am
I woke up, made four lunches, and sent four kids to school.
I took the dog to doggie day care.
I went to work.
I worked ...which entailed hiking 4.3 miles on a fitness hike.
I worked more doing random office things.
(PS.  I've upgraded from just being a teacher at Beaver Brook; I have my own desk!)
I went home and painted some walls, which I am desperately trying to finish in 40 minute increments.
I picked up Andrea from school.
I picked up Scotty from school.
We went to the pet store to get Blue a present and some pretty cookies; it's his birthday today!
We went to Andrea's dance class.
We picked up Sierra from volleyball.
We picked up the dog.
We picked up Michaela and a friend from crew.
We dropped off Michaela's friend at the library because we didn't have enough time to take her home.
We went home.
I fed everyone dinner in eight minutes.  Go leftovers!
I left Sierra, Scotty, and Andrea at home and took Michaela to her driving class.
I got coffee.
I went to my college class.
I finished at my class and went to grocery store for an 18 minute shopping spree to get bread and milk.
I picked up Michaela.
We got home at 9:30 and was thrilled beyond belief that Sierra had picked up the house and the kids were asleep.
I went to bed.
11:45pm

Oh, I didn't mention the red light anywhere did I?  :)

When I picked up Michaela from her driving class (she was driving) we came to a light on the edge of town that was red F O R E V E R.  We must have sat through four light cycles of being skipped.  The line of cars was backed up for days and now everyone was starting to honk.  I thought it would be a good time to learn how to honk so I told Michaela to join in.  Thankfully there was one car in front of us that was feeling most of the pressure of being the first to run the endless red light.  I told Michaela that if the first car went we might need to run it too ...or sit there forever.  She just stared at me.

The car before us decided to go for it so I told Michaela to follow him and pay attention to everything around her.  So we ran it.

Now that was an anti-climatic red light story wasn't it.  HA!

First thing Michaela said to Sierra when we got home was, "Mom made me run a red light!!"  Super.

I guess Michaela's excitement at the event made me feel the need to record the event in history so that in eight years Michaela doesn't alter any of the facts to make it seem like I was some crazed and impatient mother in a hurry, forcing her to risk our lives and run a red light through a busy downtown intersection  ...even though that's kinda what happened.  :)

PPPs

I can't even think of anything to write about this; nothing I can come up with really does the event justice.  Sierra is nuts!!  Her friend is crazy too!  This water was melted ice and when I say "melted ice" I seriously mean melted ice!  Ice chunks were floating in the water and that white stuff they are standing on is the lake ...the FROZEN lake ...which is ICE ...FROZEN WATER!

It was seriously that cold, don't let the blue sunny sky fool you.  I touched the water with my hand and decided that if I jumped in I would have instantly died, like frozen to death immediately, like my body would have shut down and that would have been the end.  There is nothing short of saving a drowning child that would get me to stick as much as my toe into that water.  For Sierra and her friend all it took was a little dare...  :)

I guess it was more than a little dare.  I have no idea how it started, but how this whole thing works is that one kid jumps in and "calls out" five other names.  The "rules" are that those five kids then have 24 hours to jump in a lake, video it, and post it online.  In their videos those five kids name another five other kids and the insanity spreads just like an evil  pyramid scheme...

Eventually someone decided to turn it into a fundraiser for a local food bank and sold PPP stickers to those who jumped in.  PPP = Polar Plunge Participant

It was actually a cute event.  What you don't see is that the shore is full of people watching and cheering each other on.  Grown ups are jumping in, people are BBQing to warm up afterwards, everyone is laughing and screaming and having fun...  It's been a terribly long winter and this was a cute way to tell all the snow and ice to suck it.  :)

...and here is the best part.  Remember the before mentioned "rule" that you have to video the jumping into the lake and post it online later?  Well I was in charge of the phone that was taking the video AND the camera because I wanted actual pictures too.  I did good on the pictures, but the actual moment that Sierra's little head went under the water I may have maybe missed it kinda missed it.  Oops.  It kinda looks like she jumped off the screen and then two seconds later she comes back into the screen and her hair is wet.  So she and her friend had to do it again.  HA!

All in all, I was proud of Sierra for going along with the crowd.  YES, that's what I just said.  My kid did what everyone else was doing just and she did it only because everyone else was doing it. It's one of those crazy, stupid things kids do and I think it instills a sense of team and loyalty among all of them.  PS. This "going with the crowd" only applies to jumping into frozen lakes, not anything else.  Understood Sierra?  Be you.

That said, I will now mention that Michaela did NOT jump into the lake, which makes me equally proud because she did not go along with the crowd.  Doing something you don't want to do is never a good idea. Understood Michaela?  Be you.