Role play

Now I know how we fit into Sawyer's world:

Sawyer saying his prayers yesterday night - "Thank you for good food. Thank you for mommies who give us food and daddies who give us freezers for food."

We interrupt your regularly scheduled programming...

Usually my blog is about my kids and chronicling our (mis)adventures. But some recent news items are driving me a little bit crazy. Rather than upsetting people by responding to facebook posts I will just write my own views here.

1. It is NOT okay to stick your hands in my kids' pants. Or mine. Just because I bought a ticket to fly on an airplane does not mean I want to be radiated, or in the alternative, have your hands in my pants. Make me take off my shoes and sweatshirt. Make me take off my kid's shoes and sweatshirt even though he will immediately go into a screaming fit because he thinks the machine is eating his shoes. Do "additional testing" on my bags because of my son's suspicious Leapster gaming unit. Put me through a metal detector. If that goes off give me the old wand routine. If that still goes off give me a back of the hands pat down. If you still have a problem THEN give me the option of a dose of radiation or an "enhanced pat down." My kids don't need a dose of radiation every time they go see Grandma. And they definitely don't need minimally-trained-and-paid strangers putting their hands in their pants. Yes, I remember 9/11. No, I don't think it is an either/or choice.

2. I vaccinate my kids because I do not want them to die or suffer from preventable diseases. Imagine a disease is spreading through your neighborhood. 8 out of 10 kids that get it die. As in all my kids, and all your kids too. As in 300-500 million people. Then someone tells you "Look! One little poke in the arm and your kids won't get this!" Sweet salvation. Can you imagine the lines? That was called smallpox. Vaccines have eliminated it from our vocabulary and our lives. I won't tell you what to do with your kids and you don't try to tell me I am unintelligent/ignorant/naive/uncaring because I vaccinate my kids. Deal?

3. Leggings are not pants any more than my swimsuit top is a shirt.

4. Chocolate ice cream and vanilla ice cream with chocolate syrup stirred in are not the same thing. Please don't put "chocolate ice cream" on the menu if what you really have is vanilla ice cream with various mix-ins available.

5. If your commercial shouts "All jeans on sale!" and then underneath says "Select styles only" you are either lying or in need of a basic dictionary.

Now back to your regularly scheduled programming.

Sawyerisms

While my mom was visiting we took a road trip up to Idaho to visit Megan and see her new house. Trying to get the boys to go to sleep anywhere besides their own beds is always a lot of fun. One night I had put Sawyer back in bed about two dozen times over a two hour period. After being returned to bed yet again he called out that he "needed to tell me something." He came walking back into the living room and I asked him what he needed to tell me. He replied "Hold on. It takes a long time. It's loading." Then he busied himself with playing with the dog. I asked him again what he needed to tell me, but he informed me it was "still loading."

Nice try kid. Back to bed.

Then it was August.

We spent August pretending it was not the last month before the public school system would take over our lives for the next several decades.

We spent a weekend in Salt Lake and took the boys to a movie and played in the fountains at the Gateway. The fountains were great fun until someone got knocked down and someone else thought it would be a great idea to kneel on the ground and look down into one of the holes the water sprays out of...right before it sprayed out of it.



We also met up with Uncle Michael who was in town for a wedding.


The boys played in a summer rainstorm and I played with my new camera lens.


Sawyer got this little red wiggle car for Christmas the year we went to Idaho. He propels it with his feet rather than wiggling the handle. He has put many, many miles on it and destroyed more than a couple pairs of shoes in the process. He can get that thing going really fast!

Will has the prettiest eyes. They are green and blue and yellow and brown and look different from day to day. Bryce's are the same way.

Next stop: school!

Double the birthday boys

I fully plan on having a joint birthday party for the boys for as long as I can get away with it. We still do cake/presents/dinner for each of them on their own day, but the joint party is great. Especially since so many of our friends conveniently have kids the same ages as ours. So the guest lists would all be drawn from the same families anyways.

This year Will's birthday was the same day as Bryce's family reunion down in southern Utah. We brought the celebration on the road. I brought a box of supplies and made his cake down there and then he spent his birthday getting very, very dirty while playing with semi-cousins (second cousins?...1st cousins-once-removed? I get those confused).

I think Sawyer has rage issues. And *I* do not put his socks like that.

Some of the girls wanted to perform a musical number but were stalled by stage fright. Will stepped up and did some kind of impromptu dance solo instead.


When exhaustion was imminent we went back to Bryce's grandparents' house and sang and had cake and opened presents.

I think this is the last picture of Sawyer with a binky before it "got lost" (again...but this time for good.)

We got him a bigger bike for his birthday so we had it sitting out on the deck. The best part was when we told him to look on the deck and he ran right past the bike to an old Christmas decoration that was sitting in the corner.

The next day we headed home and got ready for Sawyer's birthday.

The boys both had very specific cake requests this year and I tried my best to honor them. Will wanted a cake that on the inside was "all the colors of the rainbow" and had "chocolate frosting with Fruity Pebbles and Batman on top."

Sawyer wanted a "pink cake with pink frosting and doggies on top."

Sawyer with his favorite present - a box of Rafaello chocolates. Those didn't make it past morning.

Their party had a (very loose) beach theme. They played in the pool and on the slip-n-slide and ran around like crazy things while the parents talked and ate...which makes for a successful party if you ask me. Of course I was running around crazy and didn't take a single picture. I made a sand castle cake using different-sized cake towers and sugar cones with everything coated in a vanilla cookie crumbles/brown sugar mixture. It was a really easy cake. Too bad I didn't take a picture to impress you all.

Yes, their birthdays were in July. Yes, it is now November. That's just how things go sometimes.