Privacy and Wide Open Spaces

Lately the weather is getting warmer. There is starting to be more days with sun and less with clouds. It's starting to feel a bit like spring. If you get rid of the allergy season that usually attacks my family this time of year, then I love it. I love all the blossoms and flowers and birds chirping. I love finally being able to go outside without all those bulking coats.

We live on a pipe stem with a bunch of kids and my boys love having friends to play with. I usually love that they have instant play dates most of the time they walk outside. I will say it is sometimes unnerving to just open our garage door and find kids already there waiting to play with them because they have been watching our house.....but my kids love it.

Lately though....(and this could be due to my hormonal state right now) I would prefer a bit more privacy and some wide open spaces with a little less neighbor kids banging on my doors. The last couple of weekends I have been greeted on my deck door by kids asking my boys to come play. They have stopped going around to the front door that isn't see through. They have started going through my yard, up my deck steps and have started banging on my see through glass doors.

One particular time, I was in the kitchen cooking dinner, talking on the phone with my kids playing in the basement. I didn't want to be bothered and probably wouldn't have answered the front door. All of the sudden I hear this banging and I couldn't figure out where it was coming from at first until I see these kids looking into my house through the glass. I tried to shake my head no and wave them away but they wouldn't take the hint. It finally took me getting off the phone and opening the door. That's when they came right in the house and invited themselves down in the basement to play. I didn't want them in my basement. I had no idea where their parents were to even know if it would be okay for them to be in my house. They started asking about dinner and telling me they were hungry too.

I can imagine that there are plenty of you out there that wouldn't mind this at all. Maybe one day I will have more of a "open door, all are welcome, anytime" policy but I'm not there yet. These kids are young. They are 4, 5, and 6 year olds and I feel like if both sets of parents have agreed that it is okay to go inside someone's house for a bit then that is okay. I don't let my kids go inside someone's house whenever they want and I don't like it when other kids don't have parents watching them either.

I guess this thing actually used to happen a lot a couple of years ago. My kids would be out in our backyard and I would be out there on a lawn chair watching them and reading a book. It would never fail, that if we were out there long enough some neighbor kids would come over and ask to play in our backyard too. The mom would come over with them for a minute and then mention she needed to run in her house for a second only to come back a couple hours later. Here I am with double the kids I started with, in my backyard, wanting to now go inside and prep for dinner but I'm stuck because of these other kids. Again...these kids are not very old so I don't feel like I can leave them alone.

Both of these scenarios have happened to me over and over again. I know my boys love having friends to play with but it really has been driving me nuts lately. I feel like covering all windows and doors. Turning off all lights and signs of life and hiding in a our basement just to be able to have some family time alone.

Do you all have any suggestions besides move out to the country? I'm about ready to go find my wide open space!

New Family Member

So my boys have always wanted a dog. I know I know ...crazy timing since we are expecting our fourth kid in a couple of months but I thought it might give the boys something to do since I will be so busy with the new baby. Now if you know my boys, you know they don't always take to every dog. We searched really hard for a dog that would fit in with our family and almost become another human. We found a new mixed breed of dog out of San Diego through my sister's in-laws and we are really excited about this new little guy. We just got him yesterday and wanted to share his first photos with you. Isn't he a cutie??!! What should we name him?

SPACE DERBY 2009

I grew up in a family of all girls. I didn't even participate in Girl Scouts except for eating their yummy cookies. I had some younger sisters that did a little bit but that was the extent of scouts in my family. Now I have three boys and my oldest started scouts this year. It is right up his alley because he loves learning new things and especially getting to do cool projects with his dad. I'm just so grateful his dad is an eagle scout and knows how to figure this stuff out. I swear it all sounds like Chinese to me!!

About a month ago we were handed a box that said "Space Derby Rocket". I had no idea what this was. I had only heard of the Pinewood Derby races. This box was placed on my son's dresser with the intent that we would one day soon figure this thing out. Basically inside was two blocks of wood and some other plastic equipment. (Like I said...I don't even know what was in the box to tell you!) The day of the space derby was quickly approaching so T and his dad decided to take a look at the directions. The next thing I know things are being glued, sanded, shaped, and painted into this rocket thing. T knew exactly what he wanted it to look like. I guess my husband told him that Chuck Yeager's rocket that was faster then the speed of sound was bright orange. That sold T and his had to be orange too.
They had such a fun time doing this together that the little brothers want to do one too now. Of course I was there for moral support!!

Race day came...T was nervous....T did great...T won 4 out of 5 races. Not bad T!

Suckerd In

Today my 3 year old had his yearly checkup. He did great and we had a little time to kill before it was time to go get his brothers from school. I looked across the street and noticed there is a cute little place that sells cupcakes. Now to any of you who live near me and love this place, stop reading now.

It's called Cupcake Heaven and I thought it sounded heavenly. I pictured nice big cupcakes with cool frosting designs coming in all types of flavors. I have seen this sign before and always wanted to stop but I rarely stop in little places like this. I had about 20 minutes and only one child with me so I thought it would be fun to reward the little guy for being so brave about his doctor's visit. We walk in and it looks nice enough. I didn't realize that it's also a coffee shop so I'm sure that is how they get a lot of customers. I start looking around and that is when I realize that these are not big cupcakes. These are normal made in my own kitchen size cupcakes. These are not creatively decorated either. Some have a couple of sprinkles but for the most part they just have frosting and that is it. There aren't even creative fun colors for spring.

Now I must mention something. A week ago my RS put on an enrichment and we had cupcakes for dessert. I should have taken pictures of them. In fact in anyone has pictures, send me a copy. They were straight out of a Martha Stewart magazine with amazing sunflower creations on top made of oreos and orange striped frosting, there were owl faces, alligators, drummer boys etc. You get the picture; they were beautiful and creative and amazing in taste and HUGE! Not to mention free...just pure delight!!!

Now back to my lovely stop into Cupcake Heaven. It was not cupcake heaven. I could have easily made these cupcakes...my 8 year old could have. They definitely left me wanting and here is where I totally got suckered in. Each cupcake cost $ 2.75!!!! Are you freaking kidding me? They were maybe worth .25$ if that, but my 3 year old didn't want to walk into a cupcake shop and leave without a cupcake. So six dollars later I leave with two wimpy looking cupcakes and a promise to myself to never set foot in cupcake heaven ever again. Whoever made the the RS enrichment cupcakes should open their own cupcake heaven and I would gladly pay 2.75 $ for it.

Ugh!!

C is 3 and the Cake That Almost Killed Us!!

I have to say that my boys are pretty laid back. When it comes to choosing clothes for the day, I just hand them a shirt and they are fine with it. I've met moms that travel to 3 stores to get just the right Valentines for their kids to give away. I just hand my kids whatever I happened to find at the store and say "Sign your name...this is what you are giving to the class" and they are totally fine with it. When it comes to cakes and party themes they have mostly been the same way. Pretty easy going and always happy with whatever picture we can draw on their cakes.

This past Friday was C's 3rd birthday. Hmm..where has the time gone!! I love so many things about C. He came to us so early and tiny that I've always had a soft spot in my heart for him. He sure did bounce back though and you would never know he was a preemie. He gives the best kisses and hugs and my day isn't complete without a dozen of them. He can't wait to be a big boy like his brothers and go to school, so he packs a backpack and takes it in the car when we drop them off. He is so proud of himself when he says his prayers all by himself. He has a gift for memorizing and loves to know everyone's name and never forgets it. He does get awfully frustrated with me when I don't know the name of all the people in Target though. One of his most favorite things is Thomas the Train. He can't get enough of it. He knows all their names and it freaks me out to take him to the isle at the store that sells the trains and he can tell me all their names even if I've never seen them before.

About six months ago he decided that when he turned 3, he wanted a Thomas Birthday and wanted the Thomas cake at Shoppers. I must say this cake was impressive because it was 3 dimensional and quite big. Every time we passed it in the store he would remind me that it was "his cake!". When the time came to start getting ready for his birthday, my husband went to put in the order. Now normally we make the cakes at home but when a kid has wanted something for that long we figured we could do it. My husband came home later that day to tell me that the cake cost 48$!!! I'm sorry but even a huge Costco cake costs 15$ so we weren't about to spend 3 times that just to get this Thomas cake. We set out to figure out how to make one on our own and hopefully make it close enough that he wouldn't care that it didn't come from the store. I studied how-to cake sites for days and my husband became the architect behind the whole thing. I ended up making three separate homemade cakes completely from scratch because they tend to be a bit sturdier (not to mention taste better). I was totally depressed when they mostly broke into pieces as I removed them from the pans. I have never had such bad luck in doing something like this. We almost gave in at this point and just headed to the store to buy the cake. We decided to try freezing them together in the hopes that it would help. It worked great and adding a ton of frosting as glue didn't hurt either. The night before the big day it only took four adults (me, my husband and his parents) to come up with this masterpiece. Not bad, eh? And the birthday boy loved loved loved it!!

I will say we were dead tired. Our backs killed us and the hours it took might not have been completely worth it in the long run but hey we can say we did it by ourselves... and that we will never do it again!! hee hee.