Sports, Pants & Travels: A Boring Update

You were warned...

Sorry to be such a lazy blogger. I know I'm sure to get a kick in the pants note from BlogHer any minute now. We've just been super busy around here with all the minutia of life. Here's a quick sampling, you know, in case you have NOTHING else to do.

Fin and Dash just finished swim lessons. They do them boot-camp style out here - 30 mins a day, every day for two weeks. That's a lot of sunscreen, changes and schlepping for us. But so very worth it. Fin can swim just about across the pool and even graduated to trying out some "freestyle arms" by the end and Dash, well, Dash learned to keep his mouth closed under water. And THAT made for some terrifying diaper changes let me tell you.

Happy Swimmers

Fin has also been keeping us busy with Tball. I have to say that I LOVED football and REALLY enjoyed soccer. Tball is just not my bag. The games move slow, the field is hot and the season is long. Just to keep things interesting, Brooks is also coaching this season. We weren't sure there would ever be this level of planetary alignment allowing him the time commitment and so far it's been wonderful - I know it will be something Fin always remembers. And if he doesn't, you better bet your hiney we'll be there to remind him how his Dad gave up every Friday night for practice and got up at the crack of dawn every Saturday for his games. Snicker.

Happy Playahs

Dash is eager to do all the things that Fin is up to with one notable exception. The kid could care less about the potty. I know his general schedule, so to speak, and if I make him sit on the throne, he will deign to fill it. Otherwise? Doesn't care. That stack of underwear I tried to bribe him with? Sitting there. The stack of toys in the garage I told him would be doled out for clean-pants days? I don't even remember what the hell is out there anymore. I guess he'll do it when he's good and ready. But that better be soon.

Big boys are learnin' up a storm too - Fin has a renewed interest in all his "homework" books and will sit and do page after page. He's also asking more for us to help him read his books. All good things, but with his planned extra year in Pre-K, I'm in no rush. I know he'll learn it all in plenty of time. Dash is working on learning his colors. So far he has mastery of blue, pink, and purple and occasionally he'll pick out green. Anything else is black. That kid cracks me up. When Fin sits down to work, he asks to work on his "homework" too. He is beyond excited to start school next year and will get his first taste of everything when he does camp with Fin this summer.

Kell is sitting like a yogi and shows little interest in crawling. And who can blame him, he has four slaves who will bring him anything at the slightest hint of a whimper. He's loving all foods - and will get extremely jealous if he isn't offered tastes of everything the big kids are enjoying. He's a pretty happy little guy but still demanding of everyone's attention. He loves his brothers like nobody's business and is finally happy sitting and playing with them for stretches. I still get sad seeing small babes in arms, but I look forward to seeing how his personality fits into our family.

Happy Sitter

Brooks and I have been keeping ourselves busy too. Work has taken off for him and it's nice to see him coming home excited about what he's doing. We're also in the midst of the Couch to 5 K (C25K) challenge. The idea is to get those of us who think running is pointless and boring off our hineys. We're on week 7 now which has us running 25 minutes at a stretch. And what I mean by that is we're SUPPOSED to be on week 7 and SUPPOSED to be running 25 minutes at a stretch. Brooks thinks that the three-times-a-week-work-your-way-up workouts are for sissies. He prefers to just jump in when the mood strikes. And because he's NUTS, he goes with sharp inclines and hand weights. I'm following all the rules and hoping it gets easier soon. All this has of course inspired new attire and gadgetry. We both now don our Nike+ fancy shmancy tennies to do our runs so that we can track our progress through our i-devices. My first run I was reminded to "calibrate please." And this was a reminder for me that, although "the device is calibrated to average running stride", my stubby stumps are SO not average. The damn thing was a 1/4 mile off!! I also realized that while wearing your pants a smidge larger then necessary is comfortable, not so much when you'd like them to stay up while running. So I grabbed a pair of the tightest ones I could find off the rack (literally, I think they were called "super tight") and a size smaller than I'd prefer. I got them home and couldn't get them past my CALVES without doing a shimmy. I'm stubborn, so I finally got them on and started my run (hoping to regain circulation below the knees with some movement) and do you know what? The damn things STILL fell off my waist. But not my knees. Picture me running in bloomers. Yeah. So if you have a favorite pair of running pants, help a sister out.

So that's the update. We head out for our annual beach pilgrimage this weekend. I can already feel the sand between my toes...

Happy Mothers Day...

Young Her, Then Me

This week's challenge at I Heart Faces is Young Me, Now Me. If you want a good laugh, head over to this site to view the inspiration. I really wanted to play, had the Young Me photo all picked out and everything. Then I lost momentum and got too wrapped up taking pictures of the boys. So I decided to cheat. Since there's no prize or judging this week, I'm playing anyway.

The beauty of this entry is that it is totally unstaged and accidental. The first shot is of my mom as a girl. The second shot is of me in high school. When I found the photo of my mom a few years ago, it was just too familiar. I thought it was a Dejavu deal where I imagined there must be a similar photo of myself. Nope. I was right. Almost creepy...

Don't forget to head over to I Heart Faces and take a look at the rest of the entries!

My Favorite Things: Family Room

Our family room is generally a disaster area. Our couch and chairs are college-era Ikea. There are several competing colors of wood. The builders plan for the room itself is a bit of a mystery. It's really too big to be all family room and yet if you shoved any type of dining room furniture it would look like you'd tried to cram two rooms into one. We have neighbors with the same floor plan who use the non-family-room space for their piano. That looks perfect. But our reality is kids. Many kids. Kids who are rough on furniture. Kids with many toys. And suddenly the room is maybe not too large to be all family room. And there's something to be said for furniture that doesn't make you gasp when a child jumps on it. When you throw in all those toys, furniture and a treadmill (yes, we have a treadmill in our family room), I guess it almost makes sense. I think my mother fights off a coronary every time she walks through the front door. When I was a child we had all of our toys in a trunk in the garage and could only bring them in one or two at a time. (Yes we did also have a basement for big-wheels, but you know what I mean.)

I love this antique ice chest. We bought it at tiny antique store just outside of Mammoth. Brooks wasn't sure we'd be able to fit it in the car. I said we'd make it work. The poor dog (yes, we had a dog, no we don't anymore, don't get me started...) had to ride on top of it the rest of the way home. When we called a friend to help us move it into the house, his response was "You paid for this? An old, used, refrigerator?" Both our parents have one in their homes, so it was love for both of us. Now it happily holds a mess of junk etc. happily between the treadmill and toys.
For the life of me I was unable to get an accurate picture of this window. There are actually two of them. When we moved into the house, it was just one of many "why did the builder do this?!?" questions we asked ourselves and each other and anyone who would listen. Why so small? Why so high? Again my Mommy came to the rescue. She suggested that we find stained glass to hang over it. It took a few years, but she finally found a store back east with some great pieces. We bought these, shipped them here and then I sanded and painted the outside wood to match the room. Brooks hung them and suddenly the little windows didn't look so random - it's like they were made for eachother!
Ahhh, plantation shutters. I've always loved these, and was finally able to talk Brooks into getting them, all through the downstairs. We even got the slider in the kitchen. And I can't even put into words how much I love them. Not only are they pretty, but they keep the house amazingly cool! Which saves us a bundle in the 100 degree days of summer. When we go through the open houses on the weekend (we love doing it, even the kids enjoy it, I know, we're weird), I light up when a house has them. I don't know if I could live without them now.
This table still has the old sewing machine inside it. It warmly greets anyone who comes in our home and is happy to hold incoming mail and outgoing bills as well as extra blankets, the baby monitor...Yeah, this room could definitely use better organization :)

My Favorite Things: Kitchen

There's been talk of moving lately (don't worry, we're not going anywhere for at least another year). But it made me realize that if we did move, there are many things I'd actually miss about this house. Things that, for one reason or another, would be impossible/unreasonable to duplicate in our next home. So I decided I'd do a photo-doc of the things that I love in and about this house. I started in the kitchen. Because it was lunch time. Hope you enjoy it!
I cheated a bit, this is an older picture. I always loved this pitcher. Then Brooks brought me these flowers and I feel even more in love with it as a vase. It's from a set of antique china that my late Uncle Tommy collected. He gave me a tutorial on how to start collecting it myself - once I had any money to spend on it :) Knowing how much I loved it, my mother bought it from my aunt when Tommy passed away. A beautiful thing, connected to the memories of a beautiful person, filled with beautiful flowers = bliss. And toss in a bit of serendipity - what are the odds of china that exactly matches my kitchen?!?
Brooks and I got married 3 days after Christmas. My Uncle Bud and Aunt Beverly gifted us with a beautiful box filled with magical ornaments to begin our holiday collection (more here). This flying frog was in that box, but I just thought he was too adorable to only see seasonally. I've always had a fondness for frogs. On a whim, I had Brooks string him up with fishing line. And now he hangs over our dining table. Just to make me smile.
I adore everything in this picture. The lizard was just a spur-of-the-moment purchase at a roadside stand somewhere near Fillmore. I laughed that I liked it and Brooks bought it. And we laughed about where the heck we'd put it. I love memories like that. And I like how he hangs and watches me cook. The box is an antique repurposed as a recipe box. My mother gave it to me filled with all of her favorite recipes and those of Brooks' mom. Yes, she even laminated them so that I don't get them all grubby as I cook. I love having that little piece of her close at hand. Although I should have the phone next to it since I am completely lacking any culinary instinct and must call her at each step of the cooking process. The salt and pepper shakers are new. Brooks bought them for me at the La Cruset outlet on our way back from Palm Springs. He wanted to buy me a pot, but I just don't cook enough to justify that expense. These were just too cute to pass up.
Wow, I guess from these photos you'd think I had a thing for animals. Or even animals with inappropriate wings. I found this at a little local boutique a few years ago. I loved that the bow matched my kitchen. He's made of stone and is supposed to bring me good luck. Oink.
My apologies for the awful faux panorama. I had intended to use only one of the three photos I took, but then they just didn't tell the whole story. The entire border of the kitchen is decorated in antique kitchen utensils - with green handles. I can't take credit, it was my mom's idea. But I love it.

I think I'll always have a green kitchen...