I ramble.

You know sometimes you have so many things to blog, that it really doesn't make sense. Or maybe that's just me? I ramble.

Our weekend has been good. Friday night I cooked meatloaf and we just hung at home, nothing too exciting. However, Saturday morning was Pierce's testing to become an orange belt. See him there in the middle?

Please look at that table of judges. Karate is intense for these little people! You have to perform, all on your own. There's no relying on teammates for help. You are singled out to answer questions, and of course have to show you know all your forms.
Pierce told me as we were heading in, "I'm nervous, what if I forget an answer."
But I think that he did a really good job. Paul and I are really proud at how well he's done at Tae Kwon Do. We will find out soon, if he's moving up to orange belt, and then sparring. YIKES.

Lately when the kids are watching "toons" they snuggle up to one another really close. In my mind that sorta makes up for all the fighting they do the other times. :)
Also, sometimes on the weekend the kids will get up before me. I might lay in bed for about 10 minutes or so. It's a mighty sweet sight to see them coloring and patiently waiting on me. Ahhhhh. :)
Onto yet something else. Paul and I got to go out last night. When you move away from all your babysitters, that sorely cuts down on dates. We now have a babysitter we trust (thanks Brittany for letting us use your cousin :)) So we ran out of the house as fast as we could!

It also doesn't hurt, when the kids LOVE the babysitter. They were pushing us while we ran. The babysitter, sent us this pic :)We went to a wedding reception for a firefighter. We got a good free meal, and I got me a piece of wedding cake. We were all winners. I wanted to get a picture of Paul and I, like standing up. You know since all the ones we have are those self portraits. Anywho, we were photo bombed on attempt 1...
And attempt 2.....
Finally :)
And lastly, we are on FULL BIRTHDAY COUNTDOWN!!! Pierce's sweet Sunday school teacher gave him a gift today, since she would be gone on his actual birthday. So sweet! I cannot believe that in a mere 13 days my firstborn will be 7!!! years old. That's ridonkulous people.

Finishing up fall break.

Technically we still have the weekend left, but fall break is coming to a close. :( It doesn't seem like it's been a big humdinger, but I guess every day can't always be jam packed. Sometimes I feel like I'm teaching my kids they ALWAYS have to be entertained, but that's a whole different subject matter, for another day. :)

It's been nice having them both home. We've done lots of reading, coloring, pretend play, dancing, all those little things you miss when the kids go to school!!

I also took them to a park one day to play and feed the ducks.

Then we went to see the planes, AGAIN. We do this a lot. The kids ask all the time if they can take pictures, so I let them this time. I'm not in the process of falling down, just in the process of giving instruction. :)
Planes make us break into dance.
Speaking of breaking into dance. You know we spend a lot of time in the van, running errands and the such, and I just wanted to document my dancing babies. I'm not sure how much longer they will want to dance with me. I'm sure that in a matter of years, I will be a dork in their eyes, and my dancing quite embarrassing. However, for now, we have a blast busting a move.
And I LOVE IT!!!!
One last thing. I may have also had the kids helping me clean.
Don't judge me. They actually love it. :)
For those of you that live on my every move (mom and dad) we aren't camping this weekend. We didn't realize that Pierce's testing in karate coincided with the dates. He really wants to become an orange belt, because then he gets to start sparring. Heaven help me. So, no camping after all, DARN. :)

Look at how exciting fall break, day # 3 has been!

'Tis the season for the sickies, fa la la la la, la la la la.'

We recovered from the pukes, and managed to get in one well day. Then Pierce came to my bed last night, hacking up a lung, and wheezing. Baaaack to the doctor we went.

Pierce has always kind of dealt with 'chest' issues, and been sorta prone to asthmatic behavior. Poor thing! Doctor said it's a virus and needs an inhaler for a few days, and also no playing outside or being around other kids until tomorrow :(
But we did have something to brighten up our day! Daddy is back home!!
Paul was in Chicago for business. I never blog or Facebook when he's gone, because I want everyone to always assume my gun toting, kill you dead in a heartbeat husband is here. Anyways, he left on Sunday and was fine, then on Monday was in Chicago and sick with the pukes!!! Awful! He's fully recovered now and thankfully back home with us where he belongs.

So, here's to hoping we stay well and can enjoy the rest of our fall break.

Fall Break

We are on fall break this week. No school for a full week!! Woot! Considering we all have just recovered from the pukes, we took Sunday and Monday and just stayed home because A) I wanted to be sure we were fully recovered B) Not to spread on our nasty germs to innocent bystanders. I don't want to be the blame for an epidemic in BG. ;) Even though we didn't do anything 'fun' Monday, it was nice to sleep, and just take our time getting ready. No rush. That I really enjoyed.

I wanted Pierce to experience Jackson's Orchard too, so we headed there today.

Fun stuff!!

Let me complain now about the weather. I'm like an old woman. I spend half my life complaining about the weather, it's either too hot or too cold for my liking. Today it was too hot for old Bertha here.
Look at Pierce! Even the young whippersnapper was too hot. Picking pumpkins, should be chilly, but since I can't control the weather, we forge on. Like our past forefathers, we survive the extreme conditions. Who's dramatic?
All kidding aside, it was fun!
We scoured the patch for the perfect pumpkins, and I kept an eye out for the THE GREAT PUMPKIN. Jo, I know you understand!
Cute little pumpkins, for my cute little pumpkins. :-)
Oh, and just wanted to add this. Pierce asks me daily to work on math homework. It kills me! We are on fall break, and he still wants to work on his math. Hope and I are watching Curious George, and he wants to be doing math. I hope he always feels that way about it! :)

I was supposed to be Tracey's Stacy.

Tracey and I have been planning this weekend for months. Literally months! She's been saving her hard earned kid watching money, and had big plans to shop, shop, shop.

And I was going to be Tracey's Stacy. You know from What Not To Wear?

Pierce was doing better by Friday, and no one else had any symptoms, so I headed on up for our very well planned out weekend. On the agenda for Friday was sushi, which Tracey assured me she would try. But when it came down to it, she wimped out, again. You would have thought it was Fear Factor, and I was asking her to eat snakes brains.
We managed a little shopping on Friday night, and I got myself yet another pair of sunglasses. Pair 67866734 for this year alone.
However, the really big shopping day was to be on Saturday. We would get up bright and early, and head out!! Woot!!!

Does anyone see where this is going?

I woke up at 5 a.m. Saturday morning, feeling VERY nauseous. I laid in that bed for an hour and a half, trying to convince myself that it was all in my head. I AM NOT SICK. I said that to myself over and over again. I finally came out of the room at 7 or so, and Tracey was sitting in the living room with the kids. I just looked at her and said "I feel sick" I soooo did not want to break that to her. I sat on the couch for as long as I could, and then it happened. I couldn't lie to myself anymore, I was sick.

I felt bad, literally and then felt bad for Tracey. I knew how long she had been planning on this shopping trip, and I just was sick over the fact that I was messing it all up.

I texted Paul, and told him, and he told me how sorry he was, and asked what I would do. At that point I wasn't sure, I thought maybe I could just suck it up and go anyways. Only about 10 minutes later Paul texts me back "can I wash our comforter on our bed?" Uh, exsqueeze me? Paul wanting to wash?? Something had to be wrong. I said "No, why, what happened?" "Hope threw up all night long."

Well, that was it. I had to go home. I was sick, Hope sick, and now I had the fun 2 hour drive to make back. Lovely. So our supposed to be fun filled weekend has turned into this, Hope and I laying around, being all pitiful. 3 out of 4 Bush's sick, and yet somehow Paul has still avoided it! I hope it stays that way!! It's MISERABLE.
THANKFULLY, Tracey's mom stepped up and filled my shoes yesterday. I was so happy for that!! Tracey did get to spend her money, after all. However, it turns out that Maggie is sick too, not with what I had, but something else, so I guess it was for the best I had to leave :(

Next time Tracey, I will be your Stacy.

I've got several things to share.

Our week, starting with Wednesday had some exciting things planned. A birthday get together for a 10 year old on Wednesday, Hope's very first field trip on Thursday, and me heading out of town for some BFF time on Friday. Shaping up to sounds like a fun week, right?

Let's start on Wednesday. After Jazzercise, Liz and I took Hope and Lily Grace to Jackson's Orchard. Really cute place!

Reminded me a lot of Huber's, minus a restaurant.

After a rough start (Hope punching Lily) these two have become really good buddies.

The whole reason for this get together was to celebrate Liz's 10th 27th birthday.

Of course the girls benefited from this child's party.

And so did I!! Tried my first ever apple cider slushy!
And ate my first caramel apple of the season. Can anyone say, 10 pound holiday weight gain? I particularly like Liz's horrified face. Is she impressed at my big mouth or disgusted?
Liz is a blogger too, only she does it for a news station and actually gets paid for it! Thanks Liz for showing me Jackson's Orchard, and a fun day!!

Wednesday night I tucked the kids in bed, and Hope and I were pretty darn excited about the field trip on Thursday!

Insert 2 a.m.

I hear a cough in my dream, and then I hear "mom, my stomach hurts" dream quickly turns to reality, and I'm yelling, "run to the bathroom!!" I followed the shadow in the bathroom and turned on the light, and there was puke every.where. Pierce had thrown up on the floor, the walls, the sink, his self, BLECH. Poor little guy. This began an all night experience of getting sick off and on. Of course I felt awful for him, but I also kept thinking about how upset Hope was going to be when I had to tell her she wouldn't be able to go on her field trip.

Insert super Paul.

He originally said he wouldn't be able to take Hope, it was an office day, and he had a doctor's appointment, it just wouldn't work out. :( Phone rings at 7:30 a.m., Paul says "have Hope ready by 9, I'm going to take her." SUPER DADDY TO THE RESCUE!!!

Me and sickie have hung out all morning long, and thankfully he hasn't been sick since about 6 this morning.
In the meantime, Paul was filling my role. I was bummed I couldn't go, but not near as bummed if I would have had to tell Hope she didn't get to go!

I get a text from Paul, "there are 20 women here and 3 dudes." HA!!! I know he just loved that.
I asked Hope when she got home, what did they do with the cow? "They milked their thingies."
Uh, cute.
She also said, her favorite thing was spending time with Mya.
Paul said they saw each other from across the field and ran to each other like a movie.

So thankful that Paul took Hope today!! :)))
And now we wait. Will Paul, Hope or I get the pukes? Will I get to go spend time with my BFF this weekend? Stay tuned.....