Funny Funny Kids

These are all worthy of their own posts, but I'm SO far behind, it's going to have to be a group effort. 

Isabelle had her first "Stand."  She "sold" 6 pieces of Grandma Sycamore's wheat bread from our driveway. And by sold, I'm pretty sure she just gave them away, 'cause I didn't see any money.  Haha!  Three of them were buttered, and 3 not.  SO funny!  She asked me if she could do a bake sale.  I tried to talk her out of it until I realized, Why not?!  So I said, "Go for it, kid!"  And sent her on her way.  She made a stand with a box and a sign with her friend Avery who at least had homemade banana bread, but they had a blast.  

Isabelle also discovered a pair of "high" heels in the hand me down shoe box.  I didn't think they fit her yet, but she found them, do fit, and she has yet to take them off. She's been prancing around like hot stuff and it makes me chuckle.  She's so cute and growing up so fast! 

Michael insisted these clothes were his.  Well they were, a few months ago.  Now they fit Luke.  The clothes don't seem to make it into a bin between boys.  Clothes go from Michael's drawer to Luke's drawer, and REGULARLY Michael still thinks they are his since they don't disappear from the laundry cycle. 

HILARIOUS!!!!!  Luke.....A couple of Sunday's ago, I was getting kids ready for church and Luke asked for me to fix his hair. He said, "Will you fix my hair?  I want a MO-hawt (mo hawk)."  Giggling to myself, I assumed he didn't actually know what he was asking for, so I just put some cute little spikes.  He looked in the mirror and slumped his shoulders down, "NOOOOO!  Dat not a MO-hawt!  Like dis!!!!!!!"  And he put his hands together at the top of his head making a mohawk motion.  So I fixed it the way he wanted and he looked in the mirror...oh his face was priceless!  I wish I had my camera.  "Oh yeah!  Dat a mo-hawt!  BIG mo-hawt!"  It was ADORABLE!!!!  He asks for one about every day and is very particular about people touching it.  He is pretty dang cute with it. 

 Asking him, "How do you make a mohawk?"  And he says, "Like dis!"

Isabelle is usually pretty responsible when it comes to responsible things.  Like, "please finish feeding Spencer while I get ready to go."  I came down and found this.  Yeah, she claimed he wanted to do it himself.  This baby seriously LOVES food!  He is a bottomless pit.  He will eat a huge bowl of rice with a jar of baby food in it, then a banana, and cheerios, and still want to nurse when he's done.  He is still so tiny! 

Grandma and Grandpa

I have been "internet-less!"  Its been killing me and now I'm super behind on my blog and journal.  Time to play catch up. I'll eventually finish up Baskin and all the other exciting things that have been going on. Here's a start!

A great perk of living it Utah, is LOTS of people make there way here and there.  I get to see them as they strop around. I have not seen my dad's parent's in a long while.  They are 94.  My grandma broke her leg back at Thanksgiving and has recovered!!!  Her and Grandpa drove up from Gilbert Arizona for a week.  Amazing, if you ask me! She now has to walk with a walker, but she gets stronger every week still. I found out they were in the neighborhood and went to visit them for a bit and then the next day took the kids to my aunt and uncle's house for a longer visit.  I loved seeing my kids get to know them a bit better.  Isabelle remembers them, but none of my other kids do.  

Isabelle and Grace made a "Celebration!"  And brought it to share.  Looked like a tea party to me, but whatev. I loved getting to spend time with them!!!!

Stow Away

Unpacking, we found a little Florida sand.  I had a slight tinge of wanting to go to the beach, but then I noticed it on my floors that I love and went to the pool with my friends and the feeling went away. :) I have pictures on my walls and 98% of my boxes unpacked.  We just need some furniture and I'd say we are moved in!!!

And a quick picture of my baby that is getting too big too fast. :(

Playing Week 2

So also week 2....On Saturday of week 1, Mike's mom left.  On Sunday of week 2, Nadine showed up.  She was our nanny for the rest of the time. She's one of my cousins and just graduated from BYU in Math Ed.  Her graduation was during week 1, so that's why Mike's Mom came to help out until she could get there.  She was a great option and definitely an answer to many prayers.  She did the grocery shopping, played with the boys, and made meals.  It felt like I was in college again with a roommate, oh and a couple of kids.

We took the kiddos swimming...

Spencer's first time swimming. He didn't love it, but didn't necessarily mind it either.  I'm just going to say after swimming with my big kids, taking a very UN-adventuresome toddler and baby swimming is somewhat boring.  Haha.  But it was still a nice way to spend an afternoon. 

I brought home those cute little clown cones for Nadine and Luke.  He loved the little cherry nose.  When I brought home the roll cake that had 3 cherries on it the next day, he said, "It has 3 noses!!!!"  

Cute messy ice cream boy. 

On Saturday, we went to the LA zoo.  Of course!  Gotta add it to my list. :)  It was a really great zoo.  On the pricey side, but really nice.  We had a blast!!!!  I told Mike, "2 kids is SOOO easy!!!" 

Week 2: Desserts

Week 2 was cakes and pies.  We made 1 pie and 10 different cakes. I went into this week SUPER excited.  My mom had taught me quite and bit and I felt like I was going to do awesome....yeah, well....I'm a "sloppy" project person.  I always have been.  I complete something and it never looks "finished" just somewhat sloppy.  ALL PROJECTS.  I'm not quite sure why, but for some reason, I thought this wouldn't be the case in cakes....Needless to say, it was a rough week.  Haha! The first day was cake building and playing with icing on waxed paper.  One of the guys in my class made beautiful shell borders (the border you use on pretty much EVERY dang cake!).  Mine were, oh, sloppy looking.  The building part was put a slab of ice cream on a piece of cake and shape it to have nice corners.  Sounds easy enough, right?  Oh wait, I said corners with ICE CREAM.  It goes from too hard to shape to too soft to shape in the blink of an eye. The other guy built perfectly square cakes (of course he did).  Making corners on starting to melt ice cream proved to be trickier than I had imagined, along with my sloppy shell borders.  I left day one somewhat deflated. 

Day 2 was more playing with icing and this time frosting the cakes.  Baskin uses 2 types of product to ice the cakes.  Ice cream and this stuff called Pastry Pride which is pretty much like Cool Whip, but tastes better, same consistency.  So then you are covering your frozen cake with soft ice cream.  The ice cream freezes to the cake while the ice cream underneath is starting to melt.  Now frosting is supposed to cover up flaws, however if you don't really know what you're doing, it only exaggerates them.  Day 2 I left completely bummed. 

Day 3 arrived, and I was absolutely not excited.  That morning we didn't do anything with the cakes, just a bunch of prep and demonstrations from the instructor. It turned out to be a great morning....but then it was time to start decorating.....

Once it all came together, It wasn't completely horrible.  I really did enjoy it, and could see I was finally starting to improve a little....minus my handwriting.  Seriously if I can't make letters look good with a paper and pen, how in the world am I supposed to make them look good with icing?!??!  This one started out ok but somewhere in birthday, I apparently switched to Chinese.  :) 

AND THEN, WE MADE FLOWERS....AND I WAS GOOD AT IT!!!!!!!!!!  The light at the end of my tunnel.  Adam has his perfect shell borders.  Zia had his great shaped cakes.  I had my pretty flowers. :) The week picked up for me.  My borders and handwriting were always still a little lame, but I finally got the hang of building, frosting and decorating.  I was excited to keep practicing.  I didn't take pictures of all of them, but here's some more. 

My "Final"  The picture hid my cute sandy beach, complete with "sand"

Cake "Graduation" with my instructor, Norma.  I loved her!  She was so fun!

A good problem to have...there's so much ice cream, nothing else fits. :)

By the end of the week I could see how with lots more practice I would eventually be able to make cute enough cakes to sell, but was really really really glad we had great cake decorators already at our store. :) 

Week 1 Baskin Training

Baskin Robbins has a 4 WEEK training program that the owner has to go through before you can be a franchisee....I drew the short straw. It was kind of fun and exciting to do something so different, but also really hard at the same time.  The material was not hard at all.  Being away from my kids and being so spread out for so long was REALLY hard.  One thing I noticed when I got home in the evenings, I had missed my kids and wanted to be with them, but was tired and had little patience for them.  I completely understand the comment that working moms have said to me, "I couldn't be with my kids all day.  I would go crazy."  If being a stay at home mom was anything like the 3 hours I got to see my kids, I wouldn't like it either.  I gained a very different perspective on being a mom, that's for sure.  Anyway, it was fun to use my brain again and feel like a competent adult. 

I could not have done this first week without Mike's mom.   She was a saint to watch all 3 of my boys in a small 2 bedroom apartment without a car for a week!!!!  The playground for the apartment was on the exact opposite side and on a MASSIVE hill.  Mike's mom is amazing! I left for class in the morning, drove home for my lunch break to feed Spencer, and then I drove back for the second part of the day. Came home, played with the boys, ate dinner, put them to bed and then had lots of homework after they were in bed.  It made for a long and crazy day. That first day was HARD!  I was so tired from the move, and getting used to sitting in a classroom for the entire day was such a change.  

 I was in a very small class.  There were just 3 of us.  That first week we had alot of homework. 

When we are apart from the kids, we do "Picture of the Days" alot.  This was my first one to Isabelle.  It was nice to wear a hat and ponytail, jeans, t-shirt, and tennis shoes every day.  Made for easy mornings getting ready. 

The flavor of the Month was Amazing Spiderman 2.  It's bright red and blue vanilla ice cream with a fudge ribbon colored black and has pop rocks candy in it. I brought some home for the boys.  They LOVED it! 

Remember how this cuteness is allergic to dairy?  Yeah, that was the hardest part!  We learned to make everything and everyone else chowed down, while I got to just throw mine away. SO lame! It's a good thing he's adorable. Daiquiri Ice is completely dairy free, and a fruit blast is also dairy free, so I did have a couple of things.   Oh, and their gummy bears are delish!!!

The only thing fun I got to do with the kids was the playground on Saturday morning and a fancy pizza joint on Friday night.  It was DELICIOUS and they made mine cheeseless.

On Saturday, Mike's mom flew back to Salt Lake and took Michael with her.  A HUGE, GIGANTIC thank you to Mike's mom!  We couldn't have done this without her. 

From Sea to Shining Sea

Yep, I drove my three boys from Jacksonville, Florida to Burbank, California by myself.  So this all came about....Mike was told MONTHS ago his job was going away.  We were holding out for a severance package.  Finally we had to give up and Mike went in to give his 2 weeks.  Turns out that day he found out if he stayed until May 2, he would get the severance.....That was awesome and all, except Baskin Robbins has a 4 week training program in Burbank, Ca and the class Mike was signed up for started April 21.  So after much thought and lots of lists, we decided to stay for the $$$ and I was going to go to training.  There were SO many details to figure out to make that happen. Mike was staying to work and for Isabelle to go to school.  They were going to pack up the house and I was taking the boys with me to California. So I left April 16 with the three boys. It went phenomenally well. The award for best riders go to Michael and Spencer....are we surprised?  Luke is still a pretty crappy traveler. The award for best listening ears at our stops goes to Spencer and Luke....once again, are we surprised?  Haha! 

But really it went so well.  I was nervous about getting everyone in and out of hotel rooms solo.  Just so happens, I have a best friend in Houston, an old roommate in El Paso, and a cousin just outside of Phoenix....PERFECT!  It was so fun to see them and have good stops.  The downside was wanting to stay up late talking and catching up. 

It was SO fun to see the scenery change literally "from sea to shining sea."  I took pictures of my view out my windshield.  Ignore the increased bugs as the pictures go along. :)  

I cannot believe how good my boys were.  Now, granted we had an iPad, a tablet, a Leapster, and a DVD player among other books, coloring things, action figures, cars, and whatnot.  Oh and food....tons of food! I gave them food anytime they asked for it.  

"The Wall of Trees"  This is the view pretty much from Jacksonville until Alabama/Lousiana-ish

Then it opens up to lots of water

Just so happens mid-April is the PERFECT time to catch all the Texas Wildflowers.  It was GORGEOUS!!!  It was actually so sad driving around and through Houston without my parents there anymore.  

Spencer was perfect.  He just sat there sucking his thumb and sleeping.  He rarely made a peep. 

This is close to my parent's old house exit....sad to keep on driving. 

I stopped at my best friends mom's house. This was my second home as a teenager. Just so happened it was Easter weekend and Ashleigh was coming for the weekend anyway!!!!! She has a 5 year old and a set of twin babies a month older than Spencer.  Luke and Michael called this "The Baby Party."  I got in early in the afternoon and loved every second of being with my "aunt" and life long bestie. It was TOO SHORT!  Aunt Joy even made me home made bread and a loaf for the road.  DELICIOUS! 

More Texas WildFlowers

Texas has some awesome upgraded rest areas with playgrounds.  I sat on benches and fed Spencer while the boys went crazy and got some wiggles out. 

The part of Texas between the super green and the dirt. 

More Texas

Texas

And More Texas. :)  It was my longest day from Houston to El Paso.  This is what it looked like until California. 

I got in super late, but stuck around Saturday morning at my roomie's house, Nicole.  She has adorable kids.  My kids had a blast.  Somewhere I have a cute selfie of Nicole and I. 

Back in the car

Then we made it to the other side of Phoenix at my cousin, Lissa's house.  It's been YEARS since I've seen her. She was one of my closest childhood cousins.  It was so fun to catch up!

California, baby!

We rented a furnished two bedroom apartment for the month.  Moving in by myself with three kids was....an adventure to say the least.  Let's just say I was really glad I found the elevator after a couple of trips to the third floor. The strollers proved to be handy tools for the job. 

It's a strange picture of me, but after 5 days in the car....yeah.

Some fun facts from this trip....Glow sticks are SUPER fun for kids in the car at night. I don't like driving more than 12 hours in one day by myself. Individual hummus and peanut butter for baby carrots, precut celery and apples were fantastic snacks and completely worth the splurge on price for road trips.I didn't have that gross roadtrip feeling, we all kept up on our fruits and veggies and in general were happier. The bluetooth in my van is AWESOME, however, with children it's somewhat difficult to actually have a conversation with someone. I listened to 30 whole MINUTES of the 30 HOURS of audio books I had downloaded for me. I heard the movie Frozen at least 11 times....I quit counting after that.  We live on a beautiful Earth filled with variety.

All in all, it was a fantastic trip.  I gave myself a long time to get there for fear of something going terribly wrong and it was nice to go as we pleased. I had a fun time with just my boys.