Tuesday, August 26, 2008

Vacation Time (Part 2)

Pretty much all of Friday was spent at the zoo.
It was too hot to sit on the lions, but I was still excited to get a shot without nine other strange kids in the picture.

Jack and Jay in the rainforest


They have recently added a butterfly and insect building.

I love the aquarium. They have penguins that you can also see online.

Getting up close and personal with the wildlife

Us


Friday night we went to Sheli's house to have dinner. They have a new dog, Norman, who quickly became Jack's new best friend.

Splashing with Aunt Delpha

We pulled out Saturday morning at 7:00 and pulled into my parents' driveway at 2:00--excellent time. I made a point of not looking to see how fast Jay was driving. We are still catching up on housework and computer stuff--hopefully we will be ready by the time we go camping this weekend!

Monday, August 25, 2008

Vacation Time (Part 1)

Last week we took our first real family vacation--back to Omaha, where we lived for three years.

Crossing the state line, we noticed one big change right away--the speed limit has changed from 55 to 60. Those 5 miles make a big difference after five and a half hours of driving 65-70.

We stayed on base. Jack really liked our suite--he asked if we could live there forever.

Thursday morning we went by the clinic where Jay used to work. Doesn't every family do that on vacation? The hospital (where Jack was born) is closed now, so it appears that they just call the building "Ehrling Bergquist" now.

Another change: the new hospital they are building directly behind our old apartment. I am really glad they weren't building it while we were living there!

After the clinic, we headed to the Omaha Children's Museum, where Jack played in a fake corn field. Only in Nebraska. And maybe Iowa.

The light piano

The museum currently has a neat exhibit of robotic dinosaurs. Jack really liked these!

The ball area was also a big hit--literally.

I so think we should use this as our Christmas card picture this year. We had a ridiculous amount of fun playing with this thing. So ridiculous that I would even say it was worth the $27 for the time we spent playing with it. Seriously. (Maybe this should be on my list of quirky things?)

Jack seemed to like it as much as I did.

What is a kids' museum without face painting?

We wrapped up the day with dinner with some of my friends from Grace Abbott. These ladies are the best.

Now that I don't have to live there, I will admit that I really like Omaha--probably much more than Jay does. I'm sure this has nothing to do with the fact that his time there was spent with lots of late nights and body fluids while mine was spent shopping and reading. Nothing at all. Even though we were only there for three years, there was so much going on during that time that it really seems like a big chunk of my life was spent driving on Highway 75 (
How on earth did I ever make that commute every day??) and quizzing fifth graders on Nebraska history. And while almost everyone Jay knew then has moved on, my friends are still there. Which is why I've started the campaign for a yearly trip to Omaha. We'll see how that turns out.

Stay tuned for pictures from Day Two!

A Little Something for Me


Michele at My Blessings from Above gave me an award! I am so excited! Thanks, Michele!

The rules for the I Love Your Blog award are:
1. Link back to the person who gave you the award.
2. Include the award on your blog.
3. Pass it on to 7 worthy bloggers with links to their blogs on yours.
4. Notify your recipients.

There are a lot of blogs I love, but I since I can only pick seven, I am passing this award on to: Heather, Heather, Deleise, Candace, Julie, Rachel, and Alana. : )

Time to Eat! (And Eat and Eat and Eat)

Normally we don't do a lot for birthdays around here, but somehow we celebrated Jay's birthday four times. Oh, well. He deserves it.

Aunt Delpha's carrot cake at Sheli's house

Custard at my parents' house

SpiderMan cake at the office

Mars cake at home
(I have no clue why there are anywhere between one and five candles on the cakes. I guess when you become an adult you can just put a random amount on and call it good.)

Half My Life

Today is Jay's 32nd birthday, and I met him on his 16th birthday, so I have now known him half my life. Actually, now that I think about it, that's half his life, and it would be half my life in about 4 weeks or so since I am older. I think. But that's way too much math for this early in the morning, so we're calling it half. Happy Birthday!

Jay in 11th grade

Me in 11th grade

The only picture of us "together" in 11th grade--good thing we were both in NHS, huh?

There will be more pictures of birthday festivities posted tonight!

Sunday, August 24, 2008

Six Quirky Things Meme

Heather at Blog, She Wrote tagged me for a little meme. Here are the rules. First, link back to the person who tagged you. List the rules in your post and tell about your six quirks. (This is hard for me because I am so normal.) Then tag six more people.

So here goes:
  1. Like Heather, I am an every day leg shaver. If for some crazy reason I cannot shave my legs, I am cranky. It has to be done. Every. Day.
  2. I always carry Blistex with me. It's in my right pocket all the time, and if for some reason I don't have a pocket, I still keep it close. I even had someone carry it for me during my wedding. Right now it is on the desk in front of me. I love my Blistex.
  3. I don't like to drink bottled water. I do, however, like my water to be portable, so I will open a bottle of water, dump it out, and refill it from the fridge.
  4. I only like to use round silverware. We have had this silverware for the last 8 years, and now it hurts my hand to use flat silverware. Even I think that's a little strange.
  5. I don't like to lean against the sofa pillows when I'm sitting on the sofa. They are immediately put at the other end or on the floor.
  6. I've never taken off my wedding band. At this point it's been on so long I get a little panicky at the thought of it coming off, though I'm not even sure I could get it off anymore.
Ok now for the tags. Julie at Cultivate Gratitude, Edwena at Only One Life, Amber at These Small Hours, Heather at Sweet Simplicity, Michele at My Blessings from Above, and Rachel at Ruf Tuf Huf.

Monday, August 18, 2008

My Reader

Not much is going on to blog about right now, so I thought I'd make a list of some of the blogs on my reader. Enjoy!

A Year of CrockPotting: Stephanie is using her crock pot for something every day. Doing anything every day is hard enough for me, let alone dragging out the crock pot, so this is interesting to me. I don't actually read this every day because I can't figure out why it is not automatically updating for me. I keep it anyway because I will forget about it if I delete it.

Blog, She Wrote: Heather is a FIAR friend and has awesome ideas. And she was willing to beat a squirrel to death in her very own hallway. Awesome.

By Sun and Candlelight: I think everyone reads this blog already, but I thought I'd list it just in case. Think homeschooling meets Martha Stewart.

Deleise Overcome: Denise is another FIAR friend. Her boys have awesome hair and she always finds something touching and/or hysterical to write. She also has a homeschool blog, Fireside.

His Mercy is New: I hesitate to share this one with you, because I am always jotting down Candace's ideas to use in a year or two. Or sometimes later that day. Now you'll know I'm not creative. Oh, well.

In the Heart of My Home: This is another one everyone reads, but I mention it again because I am amazed that someone can do as much as Elizabeth Foss does. I read a post and I feel like I need a nap. "I'm Right Here!" (the August 15th entry) is especially good.

matt, liz and madeline: Matt's wife, Liz, died in March, a day after giving birth to their daughter. This one makes you cry a lot, but oh. my. goodness. that baby is soooo cute. Even Jack says so.

My Blessings from Above: A strange little story about Michele's blog: One day my real-life friend Kimberly sent me a link to Michele's blog because Michele homeschools and does all kinds of creative stuff (she's another one I steal from!). I clicked the link and started reading. It all seemed familiar and then I realized that I "knew" Michele from FIAR. That was really strange. Or as strange as my life gets, anyway.

Sweet Simplicity: I linked this before when I won Heather's giveaway of all the cool scrapbook stuff, but I'm listing it again because I love looking at her ideas and her pictures are gorgeous.

Three Plus Two: I can't remember how I happened upon this one, but I'm always amazed at how much stuff Angela manages to try out.

Walking by the Way: Ami is in charge of HomeschoolShare and is about the most helpful person I've ever met. She has lots of pictures of her two cute boys and all the fun stuff they do.

Those are just a few of the blogs I read. Any more you think I should add?

Thursday, August 14, 2008

Shopping Time

Over the last couple of weeks, we have been experimenting with giving Jack an allowance. Though we'll probably move to a lump sum each week, right now we're giving him quarters for various chores. He's been saving them up to buy the moon guy from Planet Heroes, his current obsession. This morning he earned the last quarter he needed and he was ready to hit the store!


As soon as I opened the car door he said, "Run, Mom!!" He was so excited he could barely stand it.

The first thing he wanted to do when we got in the car was open the package. The second thing was to start calling people to share the good news.
He's still trying to decide what his next savings goal will be--he's got his eye on Red Giant, but he wants to check out the selection at Toys R Us this weekend to be sure!

Tuesday, August 12, 2008

Here You Go!

As requested, here is the recipe for Indoor S'mores. As for how I know about these things, I usually read about them on other people's blogs--though I can't remember where I saw this one. There are also sites that have all kinds of time-wasting information like that, but I am rarely organized enough to look at them!

Sunday, August 10, 2008

National S'mores Day

August 10 is National S'mores Day--did you eat any? I was making a meal to take to a friend, so I made a batch of indoor s'mores for the dessert. And of course we had a few here, too!

Saturday, August 9, 2008

Party Time

Today Jack went to his friend Kira's 5th birthday party. Her party had a bug and butterfly theme, so Jack decorated her bag all by himself. With every sticker in the pack, of course.
Jack loves Little Gym parties. This morning (at about 6:45) he was telling me about all the stuff he was going to do--especially the balance beam.

I think Jack has sat in this same spot for cake at every party he has attended there.
Boris loved the balloon Jack brought home. As long as we kept it in Jack's bedroom it was just low enough for him to grab it and run away. He never mastered keeping his mouth shut, though, so the farthest he was ever able to take it was the hall.
Jack and Grandpa took the bug container he got as a party favor and went to the creek. They managed to catch some little bugs and a big grasshopper, which we let go in the yard before bed tonight.

Wednesday, August 6, 2008

It Took 3 Years and 1 Month...

...but I am finally an official Oklahoman again. Today I spent four hours (yes, four hours) waiting at the Department of Public Safety for a piece of paper I could take to the tag agency (where I could wait some more) to get my license.

I am never moving out of state again. No job opportunity or huge salary or amazing house is worth spending half of an August day sitting thigh to thigh with a room full of people who look like they are headed for the state fair. Foolishly, I thought this whole thing would take about an hour. Silly me.

Upon finally being called to the window, I was thrilled that I passed my vision test and had all of the correct documentation on hand. As I was driving to the tag agency, though, I realized that the examiner had listed my Nebraska license as a New Brunswick license. Thankfully, the lady at the tag agency didn't mention it--otherwise there would probably have been footage of my breakdown on the news.

I did see some things Jack will never be allowed to do (think holes big enough to drive a Hot Wheel through in your ear lobe) as well as a woman who looked like Steve Carrell's twin, though, so at least there was something mildly interesting about the afternoon. And in case you're wondering why I don't have a shot of my license to show you here, it's because I look like I've just spent four hours at the DPS.

Next it's Jay's turn.

Tuesday, August 5, 2008

A Little Birdie

Tonight we had a visitor at our hummingbird feeder! Actually, we have had visitors before, but this is the first time we have gotten to see one since we moved the feeder next to Jack's window. We were pretty excited about it, and thankfully the little guy (or gal?) stayed long enough for me to grab my camera.

We moved the feeder here to keep it from Bobe's favorite resting spot. You can see how well that worked. The bird didn't seem phased by him, though.



There are over 300 different kinds of hummingbirds and our books were not too helpful, so if you know what kind this one is, please let us know!

Monday, August 4, 2008

Beating the Heat

No, this isn't a fark. The temperature here was 106 today--actual temperature, not the heat index. At least some relief is in sight--after this, 89 will seem downright chilly!

This morning we stopped by the splash pad for a bit after storytime. There were only about 10 kids there at the time, so it was nice.


When we got in the car to go, it was about 11:00 am and already 98 degrees, so we spent the rest of the afternoon watching cartoons with the blinds drawn and the fan on high. This is why I'm always ready for fall after the Fourth of July!

Sunday, August 3, 2008

Planning

I haven't posted much lately because I've been spending most of my time planning--units, vacation, how to renew my teaching and driver's licenses...fun stuff like that.

This weekend Jay's parents came down to go to the zoo, and while everyone else traipsed around in the heat, I stayed home and printed stuff until I ran out of paper. Seriously.


As he will tell anyone who makes eye contact with him, Jack has "gone crazy about outer space," so that's what we're starting with. This is one of several piles of space books around the house. More are on the way.

My Rainbow Resource order came a couple of weeks ago and I have been letting Jack play around with a few of the things we'll be using. Tonight he got out the Funtastic Frogs. They were a hit, although he was more interested in playing Frognapper than anything else.

On the vacation front, we are going to Omaha at the end of the month. I am the kind of person who finds this pretty exciting, so I have our time pretty well planned out. More on that later...

And in the world of license renewal, I was excited to find that my teaching certificate is good until 2010 instead of 2009. That gives me an extra year to figure out what I need to take in order to renew it. My driver's license, however, does expire in 2009, so if I want to vote or drive I am going to have to become an official Oklahoma resident.

This week we have several outings planned, so hopefully I will update a little more frequently!