Best Date Ever

Y'all should be jealous of me and how rad my mom is.  This year she decided to stop being a boring adult and to do stuff, like kayak and play laser tag.  Seriously, my parents and some of their other empty-nester friends played laser tag for a date a while back. After making fun of her a bit for playing laser tag with a bunch of high school students, I became bored with me and Greg's typical date where a trip to Target after diner is living on the edge.  And then, I saw an amazing Groupon for a zombie hunt and sent it to Greg.  He didn't want to do it because he didn't want to get attacked by a zombie.  But I bought the tickets and invited a few friends anyway.  We went last Friday night (it's Friday, Friday, gotta get down on Friday.) 

And it was amazing.

Seriously this is what we did: first we waited.  For nearly three hours.  It was pretty crowded.   I had a pretty fun date and most of my friends were there so we gossiped around the bon fire and checked in with our babysitters every half hour (really, though, so lame--the checking in with the babysitters).   

After the waiting, things got real.  We loaded onto a truck, got our paintball guns, and set off.  As we were driving to the zombie infected areas, the tour guide asked, "How do you kill a zombie?"  Shoot it in the head, obviously.  "That's right," she said.  "You SHOOT IT IN THE HEAD."  And then we entered the infected area and real people (dressed as zombies--zombies aren't real) charged our truck and we got to SHOOT THEM IN THE HEAD.  And the best part--they weren't armed.  That's right, we got to shoot paint balls at unarmed people while they walked and we drove.  I got one guy in the eye--twice (he had a motorcycle helmet on).  Most fun I've had in a long while.

And then we went home and paid our babysitter a million dollars because I thought we'd be back by 9 at the latest.  We walked in at 12:30.  Ooops.

We bought these Groupons back in September, so I had plenty of time to plan all the awesome pictures I was going to take to post on Instagram and right here on this blog and all the funny things I was going to say to go along with them.

Get ready for them

Yeah, I need to work on that whole flash at night thing.  I still have the memories.

And then on Saturday, Greg found this video.  Looks like we have more to fear than zombies.

Mom of the Year Over Here

October 14, 2014: Rex's first field trip.  I tried to be a good mom.  My mom is a pretty good mom and she always went on my class field trips, so I decided to do likewise.  I sent Alice on an extra long play date and even hired a babysitter for Henry and off I went to be a good mom.  And then all my old insecurities from high school crept back in.  As an adult, in adult situations, I'm fairly confident.  But in a school, I'm 14 again.  I was nervous to walk to up to Rex and say hi because he might not want to be friends with me.  And then I didn't want to sit too close to him because I might embarrass him.  He didn't seem to really care that I was there and kept running off--he even rejected my offer of water because it wasn't cold enough and opted in wait in line at the one drinking fountain for a 3 second drink.  And then, at the end of the field trip, I just kind of left.  The other moms all held their kids' hands and took a billion pictures and walked them to the bus, but I was too nervous that Rex wouldn't want me around so I waved from a distance and left.  

In all honesty, I'm not sure how I'm supposed to act around Rex.  I want to maintain a certain level of coolness--not hot mom cool, but cool enough to be present so that I can keep my all-seeing mom eye on him.  So instead of hanging out with Rex, I returned to confident adult Heather and tried to actually be helpful to the teacher.  I put faces to names of kids in Rex's class and starting making mental notes of the kids he can and cannot play with--some of those kindergartners were mean.

And then I took this picture and I'm super glad I didn't look at it until I got home because I'm pretty sure I look like an 80-year-old.  I thought I was maintaining my youth and thought to myself that I look the same as I did when I married.  I was wrong.  Greg, so kindly, confirmed "Well, it's not the most flattering picture of you."  He's such a diplomat. 

Then on Friday, putting aside my semi-failure of Tuesday, I went back to the school to watch Rex run in the Fun Run.  Again, I asked myself WWMMD? (what would my mom do?) Answer: make a sign and bring Gatoraide--which she did for nearly all my cross country races.  So Alice and I made a sign for Rex and ran to the grocery store. Rex thought the sign was pretty cool and made sure to tell Alice that she should hold it up higher every time he ran by.  He also made sure his friends knew he wasn't drinking water like them.  We cheered for a few laps.  Then, because I was in my running clothes with my giant stroller, having just finished a run before coming to the school, one of the aides asked if I was going to run. I didn't know that parents were supposed to run too.  And out came 14-year-old, school Heather again--what if I embarrass Rex?  I do run a little funny.  And I've go this giant stroller?  And am I supposed to run my normal pace and run over all the kindergartners?  Or does Rex want me to run with him?  Ultimately I decided that the track was only an eighth of a mile and was full of kindergartners and I didn't want to run any over with my giant stroller and Alice wanted to participate too, so we walked 5 laps.  We tried walking with Rex a bit, but he just ran ahead of us and our 3-year-old legs.  And when it was over, I gave Rex a wave and left.  Very unceremoniously.  Was I supposed to hug and kiss him?  Not sure.  I'm just not sure how to be the mom that my kids respect but still let into their private lives.  I got in the car, feeling like I'd let Rex down for not smothering him with kisses and hand-holding like the other moms did to their kids, but he didn't seem to care.   Luckily I added a kid to my "do not play" list, so at least it wasn't a complete fail (and the teacher, aides, volunteers--basically all the adults--thought my sign was pretty rad.  Adults like me.)

The 0-3 for Alice

While we were in Florida, Alice had a birthday.  She's 3 now.

We started the day with the customary bathroom picture since she was born in a bathroom.  I wonder how long she'll put up with that one.

 Then she got to open one present.  She got 3 new Lego girls from Rex.  Alice plays with Legos like they're Barbies so she was pretty excited.

 Next was church, followed by a nap on the floor with her bottle, because it's totally normal and socially acceptable to drink out of a bottle when you're 3.  Actually, no it's not, but it's also not a battle I'm willing to fight.

Then we woke her up so she could throw a tantrum at dinner that I made her favorite food--mac-n-cheese.  I put ham in it so it was disgusting.

 I'm super into Fancy Nancy right now, so I talked her into Fancy Nancy cupcakes.

 And FINALLY presents and the end to the dinner/after nap tantrum.

 I must tell the story of this dress.  Alice loves to dress up.  Back in June, my mom bought her a princess dress that she shredded in a week.  I decided then that Alice needed a new dress up dress and was resigned to getting one of the million dollar Disney ones in order to have one that lasted more than 2 days.  Then I went to a consignment sale and just happened upon this dress.  It's a real dress--not dress up and was only $12 and looks like  and sounds like a princess dress.  I've been taking it out of the closet and looking at for the past month, I've been so excited.

 And this is what she thought of it.  (She's taking it off).

 Moving on.  Barbie's dream house, for Legos.  She was pretty mad that I made her wait until we got home to build it so as not to lose all the little pieces.  I love/hate Legos.

 And her favorite gift: the pink dump truck Greg got her.  Why do my kids always like the thing Greg gets them?  Why not the perfect, amazing, beautiful princess dress?  Why? Why?

Before we left, Alice and I had a little photo shoot.  Here are some of the out takes, but she's still pretty cute.

Happy birthday Alice.

NOT a family reunion in Florida

We spent last week in Florida with Greg's family.  On a vacation.  It was NOT, I repeat, NOT a family reunion.  Just a vacation where most of his family happened to go at the same time to the same place and do basically the same thing.  This, however, was NOT a family reunion.  Yes, Baker family, I am making fun of you, because most people would just be honest about this and call it a family reunion.  But we'll stick to vacation just for you.

Rather than give you the play-the-play (which mostly consisted of covering everyone with sunscreen, carrying a bag of towels, a bigger bag of sand toys, an umbrella and a baby down to the beach every morning to hang out for a few hours, then moving to the pool, then lunch and naps at the condo, then back to the pool or beach until dinner), I'll take the Leigh-route and hit just a few highlights.

• Forgetting my camera every day until the last and then lugging it down to the beach with everything else only to realize that I'd taken the SD card out and the battery was dead.  The remaining pictures are from my phone.
• Southern California sand mixed with Atlantic warmed ocean.  (Greg thought it was weird that I grew up in California but only swam in the ocean like maybe three times growing up.  And then he went to a California beach with me and understood.  It's cold.  Really cold.)

• Greg making fun of my hat and sunglasses all week (the hat was a Target clearance purchase after being nearly blinded by the sun at the Provo Rec Center in August, and the sunglasses are knock off somethings from the dollar store because Target didn't have any that I liked so rather than spend $20 at Target for sunglasses I don't like, I spent $1 at the dollar store), but having the last laugh when I didn't get a sunburn and he's now peeling like someone who went snorkling for three hours while the wifey watched the kids.  I, by the way, don't think my daily beach outfit merited as much mockery as it got--I'm no Merick but it could be worse.

• watching Rex play with his cousins--all day

• mini-golfing at the same gold course the Obama's did when they visited.  It was, by the way, the nicest mini-golf course I've ever golfed, and that's saying something since I do play quite a bit of mini-golf.

• catching crabs--the animal.  I didn't actually catch any but Greg, Allen and Erick spent several days looking for crabs.  Then boiling them alive and eating them.  I couldn't do it.  I just couldn't butcher my own crab.  Allen, on the other hand, had no problem.

• paddle boarding.  This maybe my new favorite water sport--one day I will paddle board away and have a picnic on the ocean on my board because I love picnics and a picnic on the ocean sounds even better.  Alice and Rex warmed up to them around 4:30--just before we had to return them.  Children.
• Not playing Euchre every night because it's too competitive for me and Bakers don't cheat.  But Robins do.

• Greg's grandma.  We have a lot in common.  Also for family night she told us some pretty awesome stories. (Speaking of which, I started another blog as a place to collect family stories.  It's a work in progress).

Kids are dumb part 2

Remember this post from last year--the one where Rex used a metal spoon to unplug Greg's computer

and then lied about it. (Excuse Blogger's formatting.)  

Well, this post is the Alice version.

Picture the scene: Wednesday, dinner time.  Rex is finishing his homework and cleaning up his school work, which, as you well may have guess had mysteriously tip toed out of his back pack and all over the room.  Greg had just gotten home from work so I was in the middle of my daily complaining session about how much I hate everything (I've recently noticed how negative I am about everything--EVERYTHING) and don't want to go to Mutual that night.  I am also trying to make dinner and feed Henry and leave for Mutual an hour early to pick up some girls on the other side of town.  If I haven't quite conveyed the scene by now, I'll just say it--it was chaotic.  

In walks Alice with her finger up her nose.   I remove her finger.  Finger back in nose.  Alice, knock it off that's gross.  She puts her finger right back up.  After several more rounds of this, I finally look in her nose and what do I see?  Something shinny and metal.  Luckily Greg was home, because I was about to stick her in the car and drive to Urgent Care and spend her college tuition money to get it out.  Greg, however, thought more clearly than I did.  First he tried to have her blow it out.  It made some movement.  Then he ran out to the truck and can back with a magnetic telescoping pole.  "I knew this would come in handy," he says.  Finally his impulsive check-out purchases paid off.  He holds the pole to Alice's nose and out pops the screw.  

The hero and his pole.

the offending screw and 3 washers

Kids are dumb.

Then this week.  We're staying in a high rise condo complex while we visit Greg's grandma at the beach.  On Saturday, we're wrangling kids, some aunts and uncles, pool toys and sand toys as we slowly walk down to the beach.  Greg is making good progress when I stop him to coordinate with him.  Alice and Rex do not stop.  And then Alice is gone.  We decide that she must have gotten on the elevator.  We then watch the elevator go up to the 8th floor (we were on the ground floor) and debate whether we should try to beat it up via the stairs all the while hoping she doesn't get off on any of the floors.  Then it starts back down.  So we wait.  And there was Alice, and a friend she'd made when she had gotten out of the elevator a little distraught on the 8th floor.

That's the most lost a child of mine has ever been.

It's a good thing she's so cute.

End of Summer

We finished summer last weekend.  It was Labor Day, the unofficial end of summer.  And we finished the last thing on our bucket list, which means summer is over.  We did the entire bucket list.  I feel accomplished.  Really though; I shouldn't have made fun of bucket lists because it was nice having a series of goals.  Even if they were small ones, they got us doing stuff instead of just sitting around.

Our last thing was camping.  I tried to reserve a spot, but the camp site wouldn't let us reserve one for only one night, so we just had to get there before every one else.  But there were 25 empty sites, so we were good.  We planned to leave at 3, but weren't ready.  We left at 3:40.  Greg got a very important business call at 4:30 that continued as we drove into the campground, and then dropped so we turned around to redial the call.  After about five minutes, the kids and I abandoned Greg in a parking lot to get a site.  We walked into the camp office as the people who got the last site walked out.

This is where I'd like to give myself a big pat on the back.  If this had happened when Alice was a baby, I would have cried.  A lot.  I went to all the work of planning and packing for not.  It's odd now to look back on what a mess I was when we moved here--pregnancy hormones like crazy mixed with the "I don't want to live in Charlotte" anti-endorphines running around my brain.  Things are better now.  I've regained control, but there was about a year and a half in there--remember that one time I packed up our house and made the family live out of boxes for five months?  Things were not good.  I was not functioning well.  So pat on the back for me.  I put the kids back in the car and went to pick Greg up.  We quickly reviewed our options having added in the additional complication of having forgotten our camping stove.  We decided to drive the hour home and camp there...in our neighbor's backyard.  Their fifteen-year-old spent the summer building a pretty rad campsite; they went to the mountains for the weekend' and they invited us to use their pool.  And it turned out to be the best camping trip ever.  Seriously, I forgot we were in their yard it was so "campy" and Rex said it was his favorite site.  The site was great--really though, a nice site.  It was isolated so no other crying babies.  And there was a pool.

So we set up camp, roasted hot dogs, Greg picked up some outdoor lights from the Big House, put Henry to bed, and the rest of us spent a few hours night swimming, which wore the kids right out and made for a lovely night.  I will say that Greg cheated and went home to change out of his bathing suit and into his jammies, and decided to take a shower while he was at it.

The next morning, we used our forgotten stove to make bacon and eggs, cleaned up camp, took Henry home to take a nap in his own bed, then swam the morning away.  We were home from our stay-(in our neighbor's backyard)-cation by noon, which left enough time to unpack and go grocery shopping.

Sunday was church and dinner with friends.

Monday we swam more with more friends.  Henry even made an appearance after his morning nap.

All in all, I may need to repent of my previous statement that I will never have a pool in my backyard due to not wanting to upkeep it and the liability of have a drowning machine so near children.  It was really nice not having rules and running around the pool if I felt like it dang it.  I'm just going to have to be rich enough to get a pool and a pool girl (Greg said I can't have a pool boy).

So happy end of summer and welcome fall.