Friday, May 30, 2008

she has returned!

Well, Rich and I took turns snoozing on the couch in the living room in hopes that she would come to the door... no such luck!

Well, I packed up the boys and left for school while Lucy continued to roam the neighborhood. Well, I got a message from him that she fell asleep in the front yard and eventually he was able to grab her.

I really don't know what we are going to do wit her...

As I sit here...

at 12:18 am, my dog is running somewhere around our neighborhood. I think it is time to invest in an electric fence!

So, I had a late game tonight (we won AND I scored 2 goals) when I get a text from Rich that Lucy got out! Ugh! So instead of hanging out at the bar with the team, I came home. The thing about late games is that I can't just come home and go to bed, I'm not tired!

But Rich is exhausted, so I sent him to bed while I sit up waiting for the dog to decide that she should come back into the fenced-in yard.

I hate to say it, but I think i realized from the time we got her, that I'm not a dog person. Love the cat, but the dog is just too much work and too much aggravation (sorry Lucy). So once she goes, we will not be getting another dog.

At least tomorrow (ok, today) is Friday!

Tuesday, May 27, 2008

here is what I promised..

Finally, here are the cruise pictures. Essentially, my trip started with my friends Tara and Shelley in South Beach, Miami, where we laid by the pool and had dinner st Danny Devito's restaurant.

Then we boarded the ship and set sail for Key West. We hit Key West on Friday morning and spent our time there walking down the main drag stopping in stores and heading to see Hemingway's house. You will see pictures of his house as well as a beautiful church we went into along the way. You'll also see pictures of us in some of the bars that were open at 9 in the morning.

Then we set sail for Cozumel Mexico. We spent most of the afternoon and evening in Cozumel shopping and hitting some of the bars there. I had to have my picture taken with the birds because they were so sweet.

Then we spend a day at sea, mostly laying by the pool, playing bingo and reading :) We had a total blast and I came home with a great tan. Rich even survived :)

Friday, May 23, 2008

welcome back to reality...

Mornings are usually fairly hectic with getting myself and all three kids ready, fed, and lunches packed to get out the oor. But this morning as I'm reading Tim's teacher daily letter, I realized that he had a lesson today where he needed 3 boxes of bandaids (of fcourse Ididn't have them in the house...

So I hurried them out of the house as quickly as possible to run to CVS. Well, the CVS closest to school doesn't open until 8. Ok, over to RiteAid, they open at 9. Back to Hannaford's, where we successfully have the bandaids and will still make it to school on time...

When Sammy says, "We didn't eat breakfast." What? I made breakfast, but now it seems that it is still sitting on the kitchen counter... so drivethru at Dunkin's is totally backed up, so I pull in a space and send Timmy in for 3 donuts. There was no one in line, so out he comes, and off to school we go. We made it on time, all three kids were still fed, and we had our bandaids...

Can I go back to laying in the sun now?

p.s. I still owe you crusie pictures, I just haven't had the time yet... will tonight.

Tuesday, May 20, 2008

I'm back...

Holy Cow, it's been a long week and the cruise was a ton of fun, but I'm just too tired from coming back to real life to post too many details :) Once I download the pictures, I'll post them and some stories.

My first kid story of coming back is that I walked in to drawings about my trip on the door. While they were all very cute, Tim drew me crying with a tissue and a talking bubble which said, "I miss Daddy, Tim, Sam, and Max. i want to go home". How funny...

The second story was tonight... at the end of Tim's baseball game Sam and Max weren't behaving very well. So I reprimanded them and made them sit for a while. Well, Max then walked over and threw his hat on the chair. I said, "wow, you must be angry" and he said, yes. When I asked how come, he told me, "You Lelled at me and called me poopy". there are no typos in that line... he can't say 'yelled' yet and he actually told me that I called him poopy (which I of course did not).

I really did miss them!

Sunday, May 11, 2008

Happy Mother's Day...

Happy Mother's Day to all the moms out there! I hope that you all enjoyed the beautiful weather and got to do something for yourselves!

I have to say that every once in a while, someone tells me that they "don't know how I do it." Raise three kids, work full-time, go to school, and run around doing all the kids activities... yes, its a lot, but I don't think that I would change anything about it. I think that every mom does what she can to get done, what needs to get done. We all have our different ways of handling things and we find what works for us. I by no means do everything right and probably do a lot of things wrong, but I'm doing as best I can. And for the most part, I think I do OK. My boys are pretty darn good kids and I haven't tried to sell any of them yet!

I got some time to myself this afternoon which was really nice. And it helped me get ready for my cruise on Wed.... oh, and that being said, I'll be gone for 6 days, so pray for Rich because I'm fairly certain he'll be pulling his hair out by Sunday. Thankfully, my sister is taking Max for an overnight on Sat., so that should give him a small break.

Ok, I think I'm going to try and chill out before bed.

Saturday, May 10, 2008

Mother's Day in First grade

As I promised, here is the full story and few pictures from the Mother's Day event with the first grade. Beware of a long post...

Like I said, this is a tradition that goes back almost the 30 years that Mrs. D has been teaching. Now granted, we as well as the kids were asked to wear our finest... which is how Tim ended up in a suit :) When we arrived we were asked to stand in the hallway until we were called. The door opened up and each child was standing there with a beautiful rose. (Ok, yes, this is when I started to cry and I didn't really stop most of the time).

So we were escorted to our miniature seats and all the kids ended up on the floor. At our seats were "placemats" which were portraits of us done on the computer. There was also a small candle rose, a 3x5 picture of the each kid, and a flower pot with three pieces of rolled up paper in them. Later we opened those to find sweet things written on them for us :)

The children then sang us a song and Mrs.D read us a couple of poems, one called "when you thought I wasn't looking" (Yes, more tears)

Then they put on a video montage of still pictures of each kid from baby to now. Of course, the pictures by themselves are just cute, but set to sweet music was even better. For people who want to see it, I'll show it the next time you come over :)

Then finally, each kid had written up some things about their moms. Here is what Tim wrote about me. It is titled... "My Mom":

"My mom is helpful and has a kind heart. My mom is a great friend. She has blue eyes and brown hair. She is a gentle person because she does not yell at us. She actually doesn't. My mother was sent to me by God. She likes reading with me at night. She has one sister and two brothers. She married my dad because she really likes tall people. She actually told me that! She does not like to wear earrings. My mummy likes to have quiet time because sometimes my brother and I can get a little loud. She is busy with my two brothers and me! The moments I like most with my mom are when mom tucks me into my bed and kisses me goodnight. My mom is thirty-one years old and she works on a computer for her job. She works at M*thworks. Oh, one more thing. My mom does not like it when Mrs. D sends homework! Too bad! I love you, Mom!"

He was totally prepping me for osme of this in the car on the way there. He said, "You don't yell at us, Mom... you scream at us."

Just as a quick aside... the photo of a drawn picture is Timmy's portrait of me. And the funny thing is he put 3 dangling blue "jewels" on me. Well that day I DID wear earrings it was the three dangling sapphires I have previously gotten for Mother's day!

Finally, they served us juice and home-baked breads. It was an amazing morning with Tim and as much as I cried, I can't wait to do it again next year with Sam!

Random pics...

Here a just a couple of random pics that were too cute not to post...

This one is of Max in his new pj's. He absolutely loves to fly around the house in them.



This is one of all my boys hanging out... The boys will typically line up at the end of my bed to watch TV to relax in the evening. This particular night Rich went in to join them... not sure he really enjoyed watching Drake and Josh on Nickelodeon, but he enjoyed chilling with the boys. I even felt left out and went in to join them.

Friday, May 9, 2008

just a taste...

It is tradition in the 1st grade to have a Mother's Day Authors Tea to honor the moms. I won't get into details, I'll just show you a couple of pictures that I took before we left for school this morning...




And, yes...those are Sam's legs upside down in the background...

Sunday, May 4, 2008

sassing...

One other quick story...

Sam has totally become a smart ass...

Yesterday, we were driving in the car, and he and Tim were totally messing around and I had about had it... so I sort of started watching them and said, "I saw that".

Sam's response... "It's not like you don't have eyes."

Ugh!

Max's birthday party...

Today, we had Max's first friend party... he had three of his friends, plus his cousins over for a birthday party and he absolutely loved being the center of attention :) I do have explain the first picture of the bunch though...

Prior to the party, Max was learning how to do somersaults... but he didn't understand what they were called and kept claiming to do marble sauce.

Friday, May 2, 2008

Service Award

This morning was our company's quarterly meeting. They go over how the company has done financially for the last 3 months as well as other things that the entire company would care about. At the end of these meetings, the CEO introduces all of the new people (hired in the last 3 months) by flashing up their picture and announcing their name and group. (This morning there were 99 names).

Then he calls everyone up for their service awards, so anyone who has been at the company for 5, 10, 15, or 20 years (our 25th anniversary as a company is next year!). Well, I got called up for my 10th anniversary and received my award which is essentially $1250. I can buy almost whatever I want and then get reimbursed. Fun, shopping!!

But it was all put in perspective by my friends Len and Olga. I have been getting congratulations from a bunch of people today and he called to congratulate me as well. And said, "Congratulations! 10 years at The Mathworks, that's a third of your life..." Holy cow, it is very weird to think of it that way. But its true. If I stay for another 10 half of my life will be spent here. Rare nowadays!

My friend Olga's comment was funny as well, "10 years and you are still very positive... that's good!" Luckily, it is my group that makes it so easy to stay positive and to enjoy my job :)

Plus, we just got free ice cream!