Reason 231....

why I hate moving. I can't find Sara's kindergarten picture ANYWHERE! I did find the luggage tags though. Too bad I couldn't find them last Friday before Joe left...

Saint Louis

Most of the time I've spent in St. Louis has been at the airport. When we lived in the DFW area we would fly home via St. Louis on TWA. Hey, it was cheap. We spent A LOT of time in that airport during a four year period. And saw lots and lots of stuff and have many, many stories that include things like Karen's first plane flight ever! possible sighting of Slobodan Milosevic in the late '90s, a for real sighting of Troy Aikman & Jason Garrett, storms... Those are for another post. Today we went to the zoo. I think I've been to the zoo before, but it was right after we got married so there is very little chance that I remember anything of it. We had a really awesome day and I thought I would share the highlights with you:

• On the way there--Nathan: "How old do I have to be to drive a semi?" Mom: Umm, 21. (where did I get that number???)
• I got completely nauseous watching the 3D movie and this was even after I took the motion sickness medicine before I got there.
• The train, the train, the train--we rode it so much I'm surprised they didn't kick us off.
• Ashley really, really wanted to see the snow leopard
• Nathan really, really wanted to see the camel--odd? I think so.
• John didn't care what he saw as long as it was huge and made a cool noise.
• Sara got to see tons of butterflies. She was in heaven. It was great.
• John can do a great elephant imitation. Not real sure the others on the sidewalk completely appreciated it
• The hippos were swimming around. They are HUGE!
• We managed to avoid the carousel as I wasn't sure I would have been able to ride it with them without throwing up.
• We also managed to avoid the snake house--yeah, me!
• The appearance of a seeing eye dog drew the male lion out of his cave...that was entertaining.
• Sara's quote(s) of the day : "Oh, yeah I know that. I learned that in school." yeah school!

And now I'm off to find my monopoly pieces (if I can move). I may have won...

What are the odds?

Between Joe and I there are a combined 9 siblings on both sides of our family (including spouses and us). Right now 6 are (or soon to be) out of the country. And they are not traveling all together on the same trip. Okay, so in this particular family the odds of that happening may be greater considering we have both a military family and another family that lives semi-permanently out of this country. But still...

It was an interesting morning...

I had to figure out how to explain to John the difference between a 2-wheel drive vehicle and a 4-wheel drive vehicle. I just hope I was right. I could have really messed him up. I can hear him wrongly correcting the son of a car buff in his kindergarten class next year. (Mrs. Horn, your son got into a fist fight today...)

And then I had to subdue Nathan in the doctor's office while I got John checked out (his allergies have been absolutely horrible). Nathan is usually really, really good in the doctor's office (actually they all are at this point), but I evidently didn't prep him enough today. Why was he upset? He wanted to get checked out and was very upset that they didn't look in his ears. (Definition of very upset: laying on the floor kicking and screaming and very verbally expressing exactly why he was upset) Yes, I think I sometimes work too hard at making my kids enjoy things that most kids hate. I tend to pay for it later.

The nurse at the doctor's office was shocked that the boys knew who Eeyore was on her shirt. I guess the Disney channel version doesn't have Eeyore anymore. What's Pooh without Eeyore? It would totally take the fun out of reading it if you didn't get to do (as my sister-in-law puts it) the Debbie downer voice of Eeyore.

On the way home John paused and took a breath between questions. After we all enjoyed a moment of silence John proclaimed : "I ask a lot of questions, don't I mom."

And in the last 5 minutes I have realized that I have done something to my finger. The crazy thing is that I have no idea what or when. I've narrowed down the time frame to carrying the groceries in the house. It is throbbing at the top joint and starting swell. I think I pulled something. Is there anything up there that can pull?

So What's Up?

I haven't been real diligent in keeping you up to speed with the happenings here. So I'll give you a brief update while I wait for my coffee to finish brewing. (I really slept hard this afternoon and need a pick me up. I also missed Peyton bringing the Colts from behind. I should have known not to fall asleep. It is the Colts afterall.) Anyway, here's what's up:

Ashley lost another tooth. This one is on the bottom. There is absolutely no sign of any teeth emerging on top. In case you didn't know, I am missing two top permanent teeth as is Joe's sister (the same two teeth--what are the odds?), so anytime the permanent ones are a little slow in showing themselves we tend to worry, panic and continually question how in the world we are going to pay for implants. Then one day we are proven that it was all for not--here's hoping that is the case here.

Sara is enjoying getting letter grades in 2nd grade. This is the first year that she doesn't get a E, S, or NI. She actually gets grades and she is thriving on it. She is studying for her pretest spelling tests so that she can get a whole new set of challenge words for the actual test on Friday. She's very driven--not really sure where she gets that from...

John is, well, John. His current passions are batman, star wars (he alternates between Luke & Darth Vader), and basketball. He also experienced a crushing moment the other day when he found out that he doesn't actually get to start kindergarten the day after his 5th birthday. I think he cried for an hour. He's most recent stumping question: "Why is honey sticky? Bees aren't sticky so why is the honey sticky?"

Nathan is almost potty trained!!! I'm not sure how many posts I have begun about the transition of our family now that we are diaperless and he literally proves to me while I am typing that he is not fully potty trained. He turns the big 3 the end of the month.

For those of you who are interested, Joe has made it to where he is going and we are all doing fine. I'll try to add some pictures later. I'm still have problems getting them to upload.

The laundry needs to be folded...

so I think I'll post here on my blog. There's always laundry to be folded and I've had something bugging me, so you'll have to bear with me while I vent. As you regular readers know, I usually let my astute and wise husband handle all the political stuff for our house on his blog. (Actually he has posted several really good completely non-political stuff the last couple of days that you should check out). He's much more well read on the topic and can debate on an intellectual level with the best of them. I, on the other hand, tend to think more with my gut. I know what is right, but usually can't explain it or defend it. Well, my gut has been doing loops of frustration the last couple of weeks. I've had two interferences into my life that signify to me the change in our country. One was on a state level and the other on a federal level.

I'll deal with the state level first--I got a call from the school two days ago informing me that they didn't have the dental forms on file for my girls for school. And they didn't have the vision form on file for my 2nd grader. Yep--they have to have proof of both a dental exam and a vision exam for school. And I know from experience with a letter I received last year that if you don't provide proof that the sheriff will show up at your house. It's the law and they mean to enforce it. (As a point of clarification, the sheriff did not show up. It was just threatened. And I am a fairly responsible parent--our school just doesn't do a great job of communicating what is needed each year--especially when you've just moved, but that is for another post.)

The federal level--we don't have cable TV. We don't want cable TV. This is not because we have a moral issue with it. It is because we honestly don't have much time to watch TV and it's expensive for a pastor's family of 6. We also do not have a new TV. I think our TV is probably around 10 years old. All I remember is that we bought it at Sam's Club when we lived in Dallas before we had kids. Needless to say, it's analog with an antenna. Yep, we are impacted by the whole digital TV conversion in February (or is it January...). So we got our $45 converter box so we could watch Sid the Science Kid on PBS once February hits. Yes, I know about the coupon, but who are we kidding--the government provided the coupon. I pay the government. So I paid or will pay the full price for my box and probably someone else's box as well. Then I hooked it up and realized that to watch it correctly we will probably have to invest in a new atenna that has much more power than ours does--not sure how much that will cost but I'm sure at least around $50.

My point: do we truly want a government who will regulate when my child should get their eyes and teeth examined or determine what kind of TV I should watch? On the slippery slope, what is next as it relates to just those two topics? And now I leave you to chew on that food for thought while I go fold my laundry...

The depth of my competitiveness

My husband added a blogroll to his blog (the Bullhorn). When I first glanced at it I was a little miffed that my blog was not at the top of his list. I am, afterall, his wife. Then I realized that blogger put them in order based on the most recently updated blog. So this post is solely for the purpose of being on top of his blogroll. Seriously, how lame is that..even after realizing how competitive it is, I am still, obviously posting. So now you truly know the depth of my competitiveness.

I want to play football

John wants to be a football player when he grows up. You may wonder what has caused this recent phenomenom--perhaps we got to go to a recent football game, maybe he has a buddy who plays pee wee, or maybe he just really enjoyed watching the Colts play last week. Nope--none of those things. Honestly, I'm not sure if he could even tell you what football is. (Sunday is a work day around this house so we don't always get to catch the games.) So what has caused this new excited anticipated career for him? The homecoming parade...you see homecoming is a HUGE deal here. In what small town America is homecoming not a big deal? The weekend of homecoming here they let school out early on Friday, people take off early from work and everyone gathers downtown for a huge parade. Candy, candy & more candy was the driver of most of the excitement in my kids. The band ranked up there on their cool list as well. But then the football players arrived--the stars of the parade presented at last at the very end of the parade (well, in front of the horses of course!). The football players come in on the the ladder fire truck and they sit on top of it in between the rungs on the ladder. I pointed this out to John and told him who they were and he was immediately sold. With eyes wide and complete awe in his voice he declared "I want to play football."

Rabbit

Winnie the Pooh was on the reading list tonight before bed. We had just returned from the library and I actually found a Winnie the Pooh book in which I hadn't read any of the stories. I was pretty excited. It was about halfway through the second story that it was determined by the reading group (who happened to be all my family) that I am a lot like Rabbit. Now in case you haven't read Winnie the Pooh lately, I will share a few Rabbit quotes and descriptions so that you can fully understand who I am being compared to:

A Honey of a Cake "Let us help you, Rabbit," Pooh pleaded...."No,no,no" Rabbit insisted, lining up his mixing bowls on the kitchen table. "I want this cake to be the best--and too many cooks spoil the honey cake."

The Best Gift of All (Roo is in search of the perfect gift for Kanga for Mother's Day) Roo hopped off to see Rabbit, who was busy watering his garden. "Careful!" he (Rabbit) called..."Stop jumping about there! A garden is a very serious place."

Rabbit's Reunion "Rabbit was always a very busy person..."

You get the picture. It isn't the most flattering comparison. However, after that one was made it was determined that Joe was like Owl. That made me feel better....

If you feed a cold and starve a fever...

what do you do if you have both? I mean, does the runny nose trump the shivering fever? Or does the fact that you have both mean that they cancel each other out and you have the flu?