Happy 9th, Madison!

Today was Maddie's birthday and it started out with a request for breakfast in bed. She said she actually woke up around 6am wondering if she would get her wish. How could we refuse? Actually, Mike wanted to hold breakfast off as long as possible to see how long she'd stay in bed before finally coming down to eat with us. We didn't though - 8am we woke her up and she got pancakes and grape juice.

I know a lot of you parents are thinking, "grape juice??" Yes, and I was holding my breath the entire time waiting to make the leap to catch it before it somehow tumbled off the tray and stained everything. Luckily that didn't happen because as she opened her gifts I said, "watch your elbow" about every 5 seconds.





Breakfast was accomplished while opening gifts. Yesterday about killed her because she received about 5 cards in the mail and already had a package from Grandma Murphy waiting for her that we didn't let her open. The suspense was awful and, of course, we couldn't help but wonder about what was in that darn gift for a couple days to torture her! Jake got her a Generation Doll outfit which she was very happy to get. She wanted to hold off on the gift from Mike and I until the family party Friday night. But, an hour later she couldn't stand it and begged to be able to open that one too. It was a Generation Doll Beauty Shop Chair. Can you sense a theme here?
After gifts Maddie's only other request was a trip to Petland. She wanted to play with some of the puppies there. She swore she had done it before with her friend, Rachel. I honestly didn't believe they would just let us play with a puppy without some kind of assurance we were seriously interested in buying one (which we aren't)! But, sure enough, once there they asked if she wanted to play with one. She picked out some small dog that I can't remember the breed of. But his name should be Kujo. That dog was a lunatic. He was all sweet at first, then he turned into Jaws. Snapped at everything. Maddie and Jake ended up standing on the bench so the dog couldn't get to them because he either scratched or nipped at you. Then he latched onto my capris and I honestly could not get him off. I don't even know how I managed to get him loose finally, but of course the salespeople had all disappeared and I was going to feel really stupid standing on the bench as well. So I kept my large red purse between me and Kujo and I think my purse suffered. Finally we escaped him and I thought we were in the clear.

Then they offered to get a second dog and Maddie picked out a little dog like what is on the Taco Bell commercials. Only this one was a chunk. Since I wasn't using my purse as a defense mechanism I was actually able to get the camera and take a picture of the kids with this dog. He still nipped a bit, but was more careful to keep it to the sandals. Jake loved this dog. Maddie did the inevitable and asked if we could buy him. I said, "sorry - but dad's allergic to dogs."
Now, this is our saving grace. My mom never wanted a dog, but frankly, she was ransacked; four against one and she lost. For us it's two against two and we have allergies on our side. But the saleslady was so helpful to let us know that there were hypoallergenic dogs that wouldn't be as bad for a person with allergies. I just looked at her and said, "huh..." but I hope she read it as "you are absolutely NOT helping...walk away." Luckily no child asked what hypoallergenic meant.
After that it was pretty anti-climatic. The sky turned green, the sirens went off, Maddie and Jake were both really scared and wanted to be in the basement. Maddie informed me this storm was ruining her birthday. 15 minutes later the sky cleared up and she saw the sun and the day was back on. Dinner was at Applebee's where they sang to her and we were home and in bed around 10pm.

There's still a family party and a friend party so she's got lots to look forward to, but hopefully her actual day was full of some great memories.

Slow & steady wins the race...but is so frustrating!

Tonight was baseball night. I have yet to bring the camera to one of Jake's games - this is shocking to me that I keep forgetting it, but I do. So a post in the future will actually discuss his game skills. Tonight we are going to discuss speediness - or lack thereof.

In my family we often joke about Jake living in "Jake's World". He moves at his pace, when he wants and you CANNOT rush him. It's next to impossible. You can prod, you can strongly suggest he move faster, and in a real pinch you can get irritated and loudly tell him to move his rear. Rarely does it produce results. He'll turn around and tell us that he just doesn't like to rush. He's even told us it's unhealthy to rush.

Before leaving for baseball one of us takes Jake aside and calmly discusses how he needs to move a little faster when playing. He can't saunter in from the field when they change innings. If his coaches say "hustle" that means "move fast". We've even defined "fast" for him. It just doesn't matter. During the game as he meanders out to field we'll yell, "Jake - get a move on!" He just looks at us like we are speaking a foreign language.

ONE day my efforts paid off. I explained to Jake how if he is the last off the field, he'll be last to bat and may not get to bat that inning if they get all the outs. For that one game he actually ran in from field and the first inning change I was shocked and thrilled! Not ten seconds after the kids were in the coach decided this was the game he was going to produce a list with an actual order to batting - guess who he put last?!? I kid you not - Jake ended up last in the batting order that day; this did not produce the see-what-happens-when-you-move-at-the-world's-pace lesson I had hoped to get through to Jake - and we are back to lolly gagging.

However, he does actually run around the bases so we know he's capable of that action. I guess we'll have to be happy with that for now.

Some people hope for world peace - we'll keep hoping for world pace.

Photo Shoot

This past weekend we headed to the Minnesota Arboretum to try my hand at taking family pictures. I think it went fairly well; I still have many things to learn about taking pictures, but each time gets better. I remembered my tripod and even brought a comb to fix hair. The comb was never used, but the tripod worked great!

There were several visitors and I'm sure they got a good chuckle out of watching this whole escapade. Here's how most shots worked: I advised everyone where/how to stand. Then I told them where to leave room for me. I focused and hit the picture button that set the camera for taking a picture in 10 seconds. That may seem like a long time, but when you have to run 20 feet (barefooted!) it gets a little crazy. Then after running I wasn't supposed to look haggard or have my hair out of place - oh yeah, and smile. This produced a great deal of work on my part - and a little sweat. At one point I set up the shot and took off running only to have a car drive by. The passenger leaned out the window and offered to take the shot. Being "Minnesota Nice" I didn't want to be rude and ignore her, so I kept jogging and tried to answer over my shoulder that we were good. You would think this routine would have made my kids laugh and produce these fantastic smiles. Nope. They are used to their mom being just this weird.

So, here's some pictures from our time at the Arboretum. You can double-click on the slideshow to see it bigger. Sorry for the last few with just us and the kids separately. The file size was too small to produce good pics and I'm too exhausted trying to figure out how to get this slideshow done. I guess I better add "computer work" to my list of how to make a better picture.

Summer Must-Do

I'm not totally sure what the appeal is for kids to wash cars, but I remember loving to do it too. I guess it's the getting hit by the water spray and the suds and, of course, revenge on whoever did it to you. Last week out of a necessity to cure boredom I offered our cars to the kids to clean and they took the challenge.

Mike's truck had made a recent visit to the dump and was very muddy. They took on this vehicle first. I think this is also the first time either has washed a car so I coached them through the process. I think it took 30 minutes for them to get the first side "done" - and I use that term very loosely. I believe Jake spent 10 minutes on one spot - and really didn't accomplish much. Maddie wasn't much better. She didn't like her sponge to get dirty - that presented quite a problem when she was put in charge of getting the mud off the bottom of the door.

Eventually both kids were getting into the spirit and water revenge began.

I think this was after Maddie had "accidentally" sprayed Jake with water. Soon both kids realized how much they loved spraying the water rather than using it to actually wash the car. The result was often one of us screaming. Yes, I mean "us". I was standing around in my non-car-washing clothes and managed to get wet too. Mostly because whenever the kids dropped the hose, it would land on the handle of the sprayer and suddenly we would have a gusher of water flying up into the air. The first time this happened I was completely unprepared - I was just about to take a picture and Maddie threw the hose down. We both screamed - I ran for the side of the house and she ran down to the street. After that I made sure to yell a warning - from far away - when I knew they were going to be done with the hose.
Jake was Jake. He managed to get some suds in his hair and decided to take it to the nth degree. I just cringed. You have no idea how dirty Mike's truck was.

After awhile they decided Mike's truck was finished and started on mine. But, the fascination soon wore off and halfway around my car they said they were tired of car washing. However, I didn't want a car that was only half "clean" and told them that if they committed to doing something they had to finish the job. Can I find a lesson anywhere or what?
The results? When Mike saw his truck he asked me, "did they really clean it?" The quarter inch of mud had been removed, definitely. But what was left in it's place was a million dried-up water droplet spots. My car hadn't fared much better. The sun roof is actually more difficult to see through than it was before they "cleaned" it.
The things parents will sacrifice in the name of relieving summer boredom!

Happy Birthday, America!

What a great day! The early part of the day everyone did their own thing - Mike worked in the basement, I worked on some of my projects and the kids played with friends. At 3pm we headed over to my parents' house for a BBQ and some swimming.

My parents' are professional pool accessory collectors. When the kids arrived they immediately asked grandpa to blow up the large whale - I didn't even remember my dad having this, but out it came. And grandpa kept them rocking -and tipping - for quite awhile.

After swimming we had a delicious meal that mom and dad prepared. Maddie and Jake had received that mysterious note to head to the library and when we got there the librarian had a message that they were supposed to get a magic book and learn 3 tricks each by the end of the week. The kids provided the after-dinner entertainment by performing one trick that they had each learned.
Maddie had her wrists tied together and after saying the magic words "abracadabra - peanut butter" she was able to make a bracelet that I had handed to her appear linked on the rope!

Jake amazed us by pouring water through a tube and into a cup - but the cup was empty afterwards! Then he poured the water out of the tube and into a separate cup and it had turned green! We were all impressed but they stuck by the magician's creed, "never tell your secrets" so we don't know how they did this!
We got home, changed and the kids lit some sparklers and ran around - then we headed off to watch the fireworks at Valleyfair. Mike was able to find a parking lot that we had sat in a couple years ago. We liked it because it was quiet - there weren't any people around us so the kids could run around while we waited and there were no smokers like last year! As a bonus it's way faster to get out of this area than where we were last year.
By nights' end Mike was miserable from being around dust and outside all afternoon so he headed inside and the kids and I walked down the road to see some fireworks that the neighbors were shooting off. By the time we got back inside, took some showers and watched more fireworks from our room it was 11:30. And Jake summed up the night by telling me before bed, "I love the fourth. I really enjoyed it. Happy Birthday, America."

G.N.O.

Maddie asked me awhile ago if we could have another Girl's Night Out. I saw that the American Girl movie was going to be coming out soon and so we decided we would go see this. Maddie invited all the girls in our family that were old enough to sit through a movie. Mom and Tracy were available but Kelly had to work. It will probably be awhile before Maddie's female cousins are able to join us!

We started with dinner at Applebee's. While it was nice to eat out, it certainly wasn't the greatest service. It took almost a half-hour to get our food out and when we did we had about 15 minutes to eat before we had to leave. On top of that my mom's steak (which the waitress explained was the reason our food took so long - to fully cook it) was very red on the inside. Mom's not really fond of red meat and as Tracy said, "she took one for the team" and ate around it and we all shoveled the dessert in and headed out.

After that it was to the movie. Shakopee theater is great in that no one really ever goes there. I feel bad for the owner - I'm sure he'd appreciate a bit more patronage, but when you want to see a popular movie, you can generally count on not having to deal with crowds here. There couldn't have been more than 30 people in the whole theater.

It was a good movie. I highly suggest it if you have girls - or grandmas. My mom was crying at the end. I even had some welling up in the eyes. But most important Maddie had a great time hanging with the girls.

Pseudo-country living

When we first moved to Shakopee, there were a few things we had to get used to. One is the wind. It is so windy here. We are constantly battling this regarding the pool - the cover blows into the pool every couple weeks. We've learned to collapse all outdoor chairs before heading inside for the night.

Another thing we had to get used to - and one we still struggle with if the wind is blowing just right: the smell of fresh air. And I mean fresh...cow fresh. Manure fresh.

But with this comes a couple things that I'm sure won't be around forever and a few things I'm sure we'll miss someday; I know I will. We have farms relatively close to us. So, it isn't uncommon for us to be driving down the road whenever and see how all the cows are doing at the corner farm. And it's a thrill each time the kids pass the horses; they never get tired of it. Today we saw the two horses out and when we got home the kids wanted to walk over and see them. I think it's cool that we can walk over to see horses!

Unfortunately they can't touch the horses. There's an electric fence that runs along the top of wooden one. I've often wondered if it really does run electricity or if it's just for show, but I'm not about to try it out. I'm also not about to verbalize my curiosity because there are those of us who would go ahead and test the theory. Jake is his name and while he's come close to maxing his deductible for medical stuff I'd just rather we stayed under the limit.
But, it's still fun to walk over, visit and walk back. Even if, occasionally, we do have to hold our nose while doing it.