This Minivan Life

Zach is starting to give up one of his naps. I knew this day would come eventually, and I have been dreading it since the day Zach was born but I'm just not ready! The one problem with Zach giving up his nap is that instead of ditching the morning nap he wants to ditch the afternoon nap... and then by 5pm he is exhausted, angry, and just lays on the floor and cries until he goes to bed. Which means Zach has been going to bed around 5:45pm which also means he's been getting up around 6:15am... This just starts the whole cycle over. He wants to take at nap at 9:30am and then skip the afternoon nap. Poor little tired buddy, growing up is hard work! Right now he is in his room not sleeping... great.

I don't know how food works at other people's houses but this is how it works at mine- I cook and it's pretty much a crapshoot whether or not people are going to eat it. By people I mean the under 4 crowd, Brian and I eat our food. So here's a typical dinner at our house- vegetable, starch, protein, and what its pictured, typically a fruit. That night we had kale salad (from costco), butter noodles, salisbury steak meatballs, and some kind of fruit not pictured. Ok not the healthiest of dinners but in fairness it was homemade, I rolled those little meatballs myself, there was chopping and raw ingredients involved. Yes there could have been fewer carbs and what there was could have been whole grain, but give me a break sometimes you need butter noodles. This is pretty typical of our meals, lots of chopping, lots of fresh stuff... and lots of fasting on the part of my 3 year old. I comfort myself by saying there is no way he is going to be 35 and trying to live on a d

My 3 year old loves to wear his pajamas or "comfies" as we call them at our house. He refuses to change out of them in the morning and at the first indication that we aren't leaving the house for the rest of the day the jeans are gone and replaced with "comfies". We have a big fight about comfies every preschool day, and today was no exception. Threats were made, tears wear shed, but jeans were found and put on. I informed him that no one wears comfies to school and he couldn't either. And then we got to school... and it was pajama day. Yep, it was pajama day and everyone else including the teachers was dressed in you got it comfies. Michael looked at me incredulously and then almost cried. Needless to say I went home quickly and returned with two pairs of pants for him to choose from. He changed, and just about the time we were done changing I remembered his emergency pants... you know the ones they require you keep in their cubbies just in case of an accid

There are jus a few shows out there that Brian and I like to watch together. We havent had cable in almost 9 years so I couldn't tell you where to actually find them except to look on hulu. We found a british show called "outnumbered". It's on hulu, not hulu plus, so it is totally free. But it is the hilarious story of a family with three young children and just their daily life. I think I wrote about it before, but just in case there it is. There are lines that will make parents of young children just cringe, things the kids say, things the parents say, things you can imagine happening in your own life. It is just painfully funny.  That brings me to my next story. Michael recently started attending preschool at the local Methodist Church. As part of their weekly activities they have a short "chapel" time on Thursday mornings were the pastor visits and chats with the kids. He sings a few songs (most of which Michael knows from church) and tells them a bibl

Wouldn't it be great to have a self cleaning house. I mean really, wouldn't it? The new season of Downton Abbey started a few weeks ago and with it the questions about how life would be without all the business of actually living. What if your house cleaned itself, your meals prepped and cooked themselves, and someone watched your children 24 hours a day except the rare moments when you wanted to visit them. While it initially sounds inviting I have to wonder what the heck would you do with the rest of your time. I mean sure there are people that have some of that, but they also tend to have well... jobs. But what if you didn't? What the heck would you do all day? I mean if I hadn't spent the morning cleaning, cooking, wrestling children to school and down for naps what would I have done? Imagine how much you would read, sleep, and well probably just waste away and do nothing. But it is an interesting thought a self cleaning house. I think I could live without the rest,

As out first year in Austin draws to a close I think I would be remiss if I didn't write a few things about the experience. And maybe too much has been written already, but oh well.  I have to admit that when we first found out we were moving to Austin I was excited, the prospect of moving to a new place and meeting new people was somewhat exciting. We were comfortable in Dallas, we had friends and a routine and while I loved all of that there were times that it was stifling. So when we moved I was of course sad to leave everyone and the life we had built but I thought that the experience might be good for us. And it has been good, we no longer have the close friends, the expectations, or the routine, but losing that was harder than I had anticipated. Losing the ability to call a friend and just escape when it has been a rough day has been harder than I would have thought. Losing the expectations from friends that you will be at certain events, that you will pull your life tog

Uncle Muggle is a really good sport with Mikey. I know Mikey is well 3 and he can be a handful but Uncle Muggle is great with him. Come to think of it Emmy is also great. Mikey has a bit of a problem now that Emmy is married, he keeps telling me that she is his Emmy. He is getting less upset about it, but I think he still has a bit more maturing to do.  Anyway, Uncle Muggle and Emmy played dress up with Mikey. and then for some reason Mikey attacked Muggle. Good thing he had this tiny foam shield to protect himself.   We decided to have a "Wine" and cheese night. Basically we collected as many flavors of Martinelli's sparkling cider as we could find and bought a bunch of cheese to test.  Grammy was nervous about some of the options. Oh and we tasted the apple cider in classy owl patterned Dixie cups.  we sent our dear brother Bardy a number of photos of the night, because let's face it this would have been one activity he may have liked.

At the risk of sounding mildly annoying we took some "portraits" right after christmas. Ok they aren't portraits but some of the people were mildly matching and they were less candid than our normal photos.  but first these. It turns out that you must actually meet the weight requirement for the plasmacar or it isn't fun.   Zach likes the empty cupboards, good thing I have more space than stuff right now.  Mikey and his ever patient Uncle Muggle Seriously Uncle Muggle is just so good to him,  Im sure he's always thrilled to leave us.   We tried to get a picture with the boys and Uncle Muggle. One would think that Zach would be the issue... nope. And Uncle Muggle was even accidentally matching them!  Yeah... This is how they are in every picture these days.  Look at that patience...  I may have to frame this one.  Mikey and Uncle Muggle  Grammy and Poppy also wanted a photo with the boys. Uncle Muggle's photos came fir