This Minivan Life

We took a very quick trip to San Antonio this week. It was our last "hurrah" as a family of 4, to celebrate we even took Brian's zippy car.  We started our trip with dinner at Golden Corral. Classy, I know. We thought the boys would love it, and to be honest it is just one of those childhood experiences that you need to have. They did love it, we didn't, but this was a trip for them and it was so fun to see their faces.  We stayed in a hotel. We thought this was a good idea... until bedtime. The boys ran in, claimed beds and were so excited. I don't know how I didn't get a picture of Michael, but he was thrilled. Zach got a spot and then got really upset that Poppy wasnt there and kept telling me that Poppy was coming and this was Poppy's bed.   He settled down... until it was time to actually sleep.  So here's the thing about Zach. If he could never leave our house he would. He might leave for church, the occasional park trip, and gym

So I turned 30 on Wednesday. It was... well what you would expect from 30. We are going to celebrate in June. Something about being 36 weeks pregnant makes celebrating... less fun. 

I'm a little worried about Zach. See here's the deal. When we had Zach I was mildly worried about Michael, I thought the transition might be a little tough. No need to worry, we moved, it threw getting a brother right out the window. But I was only mildly worried about him because he preferred Brian to me. I didn't think he would get too jealous because well he didn't like me that much. But Zach... this kid is a mama's boy by default. Because his brother loved Brian so much he got stuck with me, and let's just say he is my little buddy. He may be two but he has no problem voicing his preference... during sacrament meeting, at full volume. So I'm a little worried. If he won't let Brian put him to bed, feed him, read him a story, or help him, how's he going to do when mom leaves for two days, brings home a baby, and then has to take care of that baby. He already has some rivarly with Grace. He likes to poke her and squish her and say things like "

Since we found out that Michael was a boy (over 5 years ago) I've been a boy mom. I don't know that I ever thought about it much either way, but when we had Zach I definitely identified with the other "boy moms". I carry trucks in my very tiny bag, I don't know how to do hair, I consider jeans perfectly acceptable every day clothes, I only wear a skirt to church, the girl section of the store overwhelms me, at this point I'm not sure I even know how to play with dolls but I can build a heck of a train track. I know all about Wild Kratts, Star Wars, and Thomas. I have been known to participate in a lightsaber fight or two, I don't find it that unusual to say something like "do NOT pee on your brother", I expect the fighting to begin when they wake each other up (usually violently) and end when one of them collapses in exhaustion. So now I'd say I'm firmly in the boy mom camp, but the other day it hit me... I won't just be a boy

I turn 30 on Wednesday, yep remember when 30 was old? And I thought this probably deserves some reflection and maybe even a post. I want to say that I have reflected... but that would be a lie. So let's just go with it. So 30, I want to say that as this milestone has crept up on my I have spent time thinking about the previous 30 years and making plans for the next (yes I may have listened to that Tim McGraw song one too many times over the past decade, speaking of, where is that song?), but I haven't. To be honest I have been far too busy counting the days until Grace comes (I'm a tiny bit tired of being pregnant). So here's my poorly thought out reflection: This last decade, let's just focus on that. Well it's been a good decade. We got married (a decade ago), graduated from college, finished graduate school, started careers, bought our first house, learned to live far away from the people we know, had our first two kids, moved, bought a second house, and

Grace's room is almost done! Almost ready for Aunt Em and Uncle Colin to come stay for a bit, because they couldn't live without pink walls.  Ok but really the room is almost done. I will say that poor Grace has a "home jobby" room. The boys (ok Michael, Zach had the same stuff but it was not quite as well organized) had coordinating things for their room, I bought it all their stuff and it actually matched. Grace didn't get that privilege. Anyway so here is the beginning of the end.  The pink walls turned out MUCH better than I initially thought they would. We decided to paint one all grey... much much better than all pink. It turns out that just a little bit of pink is actually a LOT of pink. My favorite part of this room is the dots on the wall. Brian laughed and told me the boys had a theme of transportation and Grace has the theme of circles, it's true, our theme seems to have downgraded, but still I think the wall is great.   We've always