Water

Today we...meaning me and the kids because Rob wasn't feeling well, went to Raccoon River Park for 2 birthday parties. My friend Gina's son Sean, and my friend Sharon's daughter Katie were both turning one. They did the typical one year old eating cake type thing, but it was so hot....like 100 degrees today, the frosting was completely melted. What a mess. I was glad I didn't have to clean it up. ;)
After the party the kids and I headed down to the beach. It was torture on our feet because the sand was on fire, even with our sandals on. The kids had a great time, but it was hard for just me to watch them because they both go in different directions and Emma is fearless, so at any minute I'm afraid she'll be drowning in the deep water.....speaking of, I forgot to post about a similar situation the other day at the Clive aquatic center. More on that later. So anyway, we swam for about an hour, got completely covered in sand, came home, showered and have been relaxing in the air conditioning ever since. Here are some pictures from today:




We went to the pool in Clive on Friday and they have a ton of stuff for the kids to do, but I was afraid that Kyle was getting bored in the little kid part so I blew up Emma's inner tube and we all headed over to the big kid pool. We were walking in a row, Kyle in front and Emma behind. I turned around to make sure Emma was following, and she was. The next second, I hear whistles blowing and right after I'd turned my head around, Emma had jumped into the 12 foot water, where they have the diving boards. Luckily she had on the tube, but it was a split second from when I had just checked on her. Even the life guard that had blown the whistle was like "that was quick". Ugh.....she wears me out!
On the topic of water, when we moved into our house, the sprinkler system wasn't working and with the heat, our grass was all brown. So a couple of weeks after we moved in, we fixed it and have been using it. I was kind of scared how much our water bill was going to be because the meter was going crazy whenever the sprinklers were on. But I thought, let's just use it the way we want and see how much it is. That news came in the mail last week....$99.66. Holy shit! Needless to say, there are no more baths every night and the sprinkler system has been downgraded to only 2 nights per week. Our grass is looking pretty green, though. ;)

Does anyone else.....

Have that Fruit of the Loom country song stuck in their heads?

"You Can't Over Love Your Underwear"

If not, get it

http://www.fruitcountryvideo.com/music.html

so I'm not the only one, damn it!

Cleaning and Halloween costumes

I've been a cleaning fiend this week. Monday I cleaned my realtors house, Tuesday was my inlaws house, yesterday was Tina's house.......I didn't get home until after midnight....whew! And today I cleaned mine. I'm looking forward to tomorrow, for a day off. We're going to the aquatic center in Clive and it has a lazy river. I'm ready to be lazy. ;)
Everyone thinks I'm crazy, but I always like to shop for the kid's Halloween costumes out of season. You always get better prices that way. So today the UPS guy came and brought a vampire and a witch costume. Super cute!

It just keeps getting better

Whenever I think the soap opera of our homes previous owner is over, along comes something else. He had never gotten his mail forwarded, so we've been getting tons of stuff for him.....bank overdraws, overdue bill notices, ect. Well today came a bill from the Pathology Labratory in Des Moines. I thought....oh I've gotta see what this is all about.....so I opened it to find a bill for fungus cultures and fungal smears. GROSS!!!!!! Thank God my shower was painstakingly Tilexed the day we moved in. That is so nasty! Then last night we were down at our newly completed neighborhood park and met a couple that live down the block. We got to talking and when when I told them which house we live in, they kind of laughed. So after a little more chatting about that, the girl said that she thought that "Pepper Jack" was still seeing someone in the neighborhood. Ummmm, yeah apparently someone with a fungal infection. ;)

A few more pictures

Some more of the kids on July 4th:

4th of July parade

We went to the Urbandale parade this morning and here are some pictures:



For the most part it was a good parade, and the people in the parade made sure that all the kids got candy, so that was nice. But next time we go, we'll make sure to sit somewhere other than in the residential area. People are so rude. We got asked to leave the front of someone's yard, so we wound up sitting in the street behind 30 other people. I realize that it's inconvenient to have people in your yard, but come on, it's a parade, and we were past the sidewalk. Next time I'll just go sit on their porch and help myself to their cooler.
Bitches.

Fireworks and birthday party planning

The end of this month is Kyle's birthday. He'll be 9. Damn, that seems old......in terms of being my kid and that we've been able to keep him alive that long. ;) We're having a tiki party with his Mt. Tiki Soki water sprinkler. We even got he and Rob matching Hawaiian shirts. How cute! I got his invites done yesterday and now all I have to do is get them sent out. Target even had decorations on sale....so I was all over it.
Tomorrow is July 4th and we are going to hit the parade in Urbandale. We're still not sure where we are going to go for fireworks, but I'm sure between tonight and tomorrow night, if we just get in the car after dark and drive around, we'll find something. I bought some sparklers too, so it'll be cute to get some pictures of the kids with those. Let's hope they don't set each other on fire. ;)

Scrapbooking photos and party photos

I went scrapbooking last night with Jodi and got some fishing pages done. They turned out pretty cute, but the pictures of the pages have something to be desired. Just ignore the flash and blurriness.



I also got some pictures from Holly from the housewarming party. Unfortunately, no real drunken or embarrassing ones, though.





Here is a kind of funny one of me, semi drunk, opening our gifts.

Discovery Health

I love that channel! We never had it before and I swear, there is always some freak show on there that I'm interested in. Mystery Diagnosis, Plastic Surgery before and after, Sextuplets, Skeleton Stories, Extreme Surgery.......you name it. Apparently, watching enough of these shows, plus working at the hospital and seeing gross pictures in books and charts, has made me numb to the gore of it all. Don't get me wrong, if I were to see any of that stuff up close and personal, I'd puke all over.....but on tv, it doesn't bother me at all. Even while eating. It's a sad day when I can watch craniofacial surgery while enjoying a bowl of ice cream. ;)

One month

Well, today marks our one month anniversary at our new house. Things are put away, everyone is settled, it's a good place to be. On a negative note though, Friday we got some crappy money information. Apparently Rob's job has changed the way they are going to do health insurance, so now we are going to have to pay 40% of our premiums instead of them paying for the entire thing. That equals about $200 more out of our pockets a month. Nice timing too what with the new bigger house payment. I am stressing about it right now. I'm going to try to line up some more cleaning jobs to bring in some extra cash, but that requires a babysitter....so it might be self defeating. We'll see.
My sister came this weekend and we went to see the movie "Click" with Adam Sandler. It was funny for the most part, but a little more emotional than I had anticipated. Then she left and Chris went with her to stay at her house for awhile. It seems weird almost, not having him here. Thankfully I got all the work out of him that I needed. ;)

Horses, yeah right.

This morning we went to Pairie Meadows to go on a tour and what we thought would be viewing the horses. Well after 30-45 minutes of hearing some lady blab about her job and how small the jockies feet are, we finally got to go to the stables. We had to wait for the 3rd shuttle though, because apparently everyone thought that a group of moms with small children should be the ones who stood on the sidewalk for 20 minutes waiting. ;) Then when we did get over there, Kyle was too afraid to touch the horses and Emma was alright. I had a hard time taking pictures because of the delay on my camera. It was a split second that I could get Kyle near a horse.....the same kid that rode a horse in Colorado last summer, and it was almost too late to even get a shot.
























On the crazy previous owner front, yesterday I got the Ankeny Press Citizen in the mail. I was scanning through it and noticed the Ankeny arrests. I thought "I gotta see if 'pepper jack'(as we've been fond of calling him)is in here". And sure enough I didn't even get a third of the way down the first column and there it was. Apparently arressted for domestic assault.

Nice.

13 hours, baby!

Emma slept last night from 8:00 to 9:00 this morning. Rock on! I love it when she sleeps that long.
Today is my brother's birthday. He's 29 and apprently never thought he'd ever be that old because he's bitching about it. ;) His big birthday plans are as follows:

Taco John's for taco Tuesday
Barnes and Noble

What a party animal! I will be purchasing whatever he wants though, so it's a win-win situation for him.
Here are some fence pictures as promised:



Looks pretty good, huh?











Here is one picture that I took from the party....of Holly taking a picture of me. We sure know how to party, don't we? ;)

Post Housewarming Party

Whew, what a night! It was so much fun having people over to my new place. Plus there was plenty of room to spread out. I have tons of food leftover and ugh...the kitchen was a mess this morning. We just kind of left everything and went to bed after everyone had left. I woke up this morning to a stiff neck from just sleeping on whatever pillow was available instead of my real pillow. We had some drunken mishaps with the carpet downstairs....no puke, just spilling, so even though I Bisselled it at 1:30 this morning, I needed to do it again today. I told the girls "it's a good thing I'm drunk, or that would have pissed me off". ;) Holly took a bunch of pictures with her new digital camera so I'll have to post some embarrassing ones when she sends them to me. I didn't trust myself to use my camera too late into the night as I was even having trouble holding myself up. I've always been the kind of drinker that even though I don't seem to be able to control my body at the time, I always remember whatever went on. So I've never uttered the phrase that I've heard so many times "I don't know how I got home", because no matter how embarrassing it may have been, I always remembered.

Swimming pools, fences, sushi and a flower girl

Let's see....what's been going on? We went to the pool for the first time this season yesterday. I really thought I'd have gotten sunburned, but I didn't. The kids had fun, and we got free lunch so that is a bonus.

The guys....Rob and Chris....got our fence completed tonight. I'll have to take some daylight pictures tomorrow. It really looks good and for the most part, you'd never know it's not professionally done. I love the idea that Emma is mostly trapped now when she's out there. I guess if I want to completely trap her, I'll have to electrify the fence. How many volts can a three year old take. ;)

Tonight was a birthday party for my friend Deb....she's 40! Can you imagine being that old?!!! ;) We went to a Japanese restaurant called Taki. It was yummy. I actually was talked into trying sushi. The thought of it is repulsive, but it really wasn't that bad. The kind I had didn't have any raw fish in it though, so I don't know if that really qualifies as "trying sushi", but I'm claiming it.

Here is a cute picture of the girl at Reiman Gardens. I love it when I catch a real smile instead of a posed, fake one.

Never shop with a 3 or 8 year old

So today Rob and Chris were working hard putting up the fence. I really needed to run some errands, Target, grocery store, ect. With the guys being busy, I had to take the kids with me. I knew it wasn't going to be good, but I had no idea I would have murder on my mind the entire time. Our first stop was Kyle's new school. I had told him that we could go there and check out the building and the playground, but when we got there, they had the orange construction fence around it as if they were working on it. Disappointment #1. Our next stop was McDonald's in Johnston. I had never been to this particular one, but it was the closest one to the Target we were going to, so I chose it. When we got there we realized it didn't have a play area. Disappointment #2. The kids were annoying while we ate....fighting over who got what toy, who was eating more of the caramel dip, who was sitting next to me, ect. When we left, Emma was running on the sidewalk on the way to the car with her drink in one hand and her toy in the other. She tripped and fell on what would have been her hands and knees, but since her hands were full, she fell on her knees and then ricocheted off the sidewalk with her chin. She was screaming bloody murder after that. I, on the other hand was laughing my ass off because it was the funniest shit I had seen in a long time. Smack....boing.
Then we went to Target. We got one of those carts that has the seating for 2 kids in the back. They sat in there for awhile but then kept unbuckling and getting out. I had to tell them to settle down, or get over here aout 200 times. The funniest part....again at Emma's expense....was that Emma didn't want to buckle, so when she was sitting down and I started moving, she fell out. This time Kyle laughed.
After that we headed over to Aldi's. This was really the test of motherhood for me.
I realized, a little too late, that I'd forgotten to give Kyle his pill this morning. So it was a contant battle for me to keep my cool and not strangle them. They were fighting, getting in and out of the cart, taking stuff of shelves...you name it. And Kyle thinks he is Emma's keeper, so he is always trying to discipline her. Ugh.....I had had enough.
I didn't even get everything that I wanted to get, but it was time to come home. Disappointment #3.

Naked party!

I forgot to mention this the other day when it happened, but here goes.
So Emma likes to sing a little song when she's naked, called "Naked Party". She pretty much goes around just singing naked party, naked party. So anyway, last Saturday my friend Sharon was here with her daughter, Emily that is Emma's age. The girls were upstairs playing in Emma's room and I heard Emma start singing the naked party song. I rushed up there to make sure they weren't naked, and they were both sitting on Emma's bed, reading her baby Bible. Apparently Adam and Eve only wearing fig leaves was enough for Emma to declare it a "naked Party".
Here is a picture of the girls at Reiman Gardens from the week before:

Metro, my ass

Today we went to the "Metro Waste Authority" landfill. You know, the Des Moines dump. It was waaaaaaaaay out in the middle of nowhere. It was crazy to think that it is the only landfill for Des Moines. It was the cleanest, most organized dump I've ever been to, though......because I frequent dumps so regularly. ;) I was expecting something a lot more nasty, so I guess it was worth the trip. We got our money from selling the house today. Too bad that money is already spoken for because I was feeling really rich there for a moment. ;)
Now that all the crap is out of the garage we can start the process of organization out there. Things are really starting to take shape. I don't know what I'll do with myself when everything is done. There will always be something else to improve on right?

More pics

Here are a couple more.
New bedroom and old bedroom:












Emma's old room and Emma's new room:


















Now that I'm looking at them, they don't look all that different. Probably because we are using the same furnishings. But they are much different...bigger, newer, carpet....trust me. ;)

Pictures

My brother hooked my camera up to my computer for me so I have a few pictures to share:
Here is my old dining room and my new dining room:



















Here is my old living room and my new living room:

I'm back.....miss me?

What a crazy week it's been. And I'm so accustomed to using the internet that I was so whacked out being in a new place without it. I even had trouble finding a Chinese restaurant that delivers because I couldn't just go look it up and I'm so not used to finding Ankeny stuff in the Des Moines phone book. Anyway let's see:
The guy who was living here was an even bigger knob than first anticipated. He still had shit here including his cat, the day we took possession. Then he told our realtor that the fridge that was sold with the house was broken and that he replaced it. Yeah, right. So we are now waiting to get a repairman out here to fix the leaking problem on it. Then, the night we moved in, we went to Walmart and came back to find that someone had run over our mailbox. What the fuck?! So on our first day as Ankeny residents, we called the cops. At first I was thinking "our neighbors are going to think we are such losers", but when the cop showed up he made some comments about being here before on "domestic" calls and being glad that someone else moved in. So needless to say, I'm sure the neighbors are used to seeing cops around here. ;) Other than that everything has been going along fine. We've had tons of help and we've been working ourselves and our family to the bone. I'm so tired of cleaning!!!!!! It's so nice to feel like I'm in the midst of everything though....like my friends can just stop over instead of planning ahead two weeks before. The house even feels like a better fit...we're outside more, we're eating dinner as a family at the table every night, Rob and I have our own private space, we've got enough room for everyone to cohabit without tripping over one another....it's just really nice.
I haven't yet hooked up my camera to the computer, so I don't have any pictures to share yet, but here is an old one that just makes me laugh because it reminds me of a picture that I took of a girl that we used to call "ketchup pants" and she used that picture of herself in a shopping cart as her sign in picture in every online group she belonged to.