Boys = Pyromaniacs

We had an impromptu hot dog roast the other night. It's times like these that I'm glad we live out in the desert so we don't have to drive anywhere to have a desert cook-out. Works out pretty well. Josh and Su drove a whole 5 minutes and I grabbed my boys and walked out the back door to Cliff and Lisa's house and BAM the hot dog roast is on. Cliff got the boys all hyped up helping make the fire. Boy, were they excited. For a while there we didn't know if they were possessed or just doing a dance to the fire gods. For them, the fire was the best part of the night. Cliff was busy digging the hole, cutting his up his lumber pile, and helping the kids with kindling, while the moms all stood around giving out reminders to not get to close, be careful, fire is dangerous, etc.

Cliff is such a fun uncle/dad, he often reminds me of how Uncle Sam is with all the nieces and nephews, but in this case it was just nephews, and lots of 'em. It was a perfect night--another one of those times when I look around me at the people I love so much and just have to heave a big sigh because I feel so content and blessed. There are always things I could pick out of a situation that would make it better, but that will always be the case, might as well be grateful for what I've got in the here and now. And maaaaaaaaaaaan, am I grateful.

What are the odds?

I walked into Collin's room this morning and had to laugh out loud at his amazing bed-head. I have never seen it so wacky before and so I had to run for the camera (pictures never do it justice). I didn't get around to blogging about it this morning, which is a good thing because lo and behold, Lucas' morning nap gave him a 'do' worthy of documenting as well. Here are my bed-head boys:

Ode to my Angie

So I remembered another reason I love the change into Fall (including the smell of manure--but only in the cool air-transition stage) it reminds me of my last area in the Mission and my companera Angie Wilcox (well, manure doesn't remind me of Angie, it reminds me of where we lived). We were together for a long time and never got tired of each other. We got to be bridesmaids at each other's weddings and have both had two boys in the same years. In fact, I loved her so much that I made sure to find a guy to marry who had the same last name as her maiden name. We even got to visit our favorite family from the mish together. I had planned on blogging my ode to her on her birthday earlier this month but I missed my chance. Here are just a few things that come to mind when I think about Angela and the blessed September we met 8 years ago. These are for you, Ang.

~purple skittles and Reece's pieces

~gotta, gotta, gotta, gotta, yur CUTE

~ooh wee ooh wee ooh wee ooh wee

~scaring me to get rid of my hick-ups

~"oh dear"

~whatever the case may be, at any rate...

~syke, rreeeaaar (cat noise)

~hola, mi amor

~yatzee hand-held game

~muneca mi nina

~kid me not

~killing black widows

I realize that no one else gets any of this stuff and maybe no one has even read this far--sorry to bore you but I seriously love this gal and besides that she's my faithful commenter on all my blogs, she deserves a shout-out. I would have put a missionary pic. of us but my scanner isn't working. Anyway, thanks for all the memories--GOOD TIMES! Love ya dear, and happy late birthday!

It's in the air...

I swear, if my sniffer ever goes out on me I'll be miserable. So much of what I love about life are the smells, and so many of my memories are smell-linked. Isn't there something about how the olfactory senses are connected to some memory part of the brain? Yeah, something like that.

Anyway, I love the smells that tell me Fall is coming. I'm glad I still live in chile roasting country--that is probably the biggest "Fall is here" smell. And I love it, even though I was up until 11:00 the other night de-seeding and bagging and hating every minute of the aching back-so tired-is this bag of chiles ever going to end-experience. It also seems to me like the air smells a bit colder come September and I feel like I should be going to a football game. The other weekend when I was on my way to visit Jesse, I even welcomed the manure smell from the dairies I was passing, for some reason the stench didn't bother me--it just fit right in with the fall is coming mood I was in. Down in Cruces, I just LOVED when the Cal-Compact company got to packaging their spices because it filled the air. The Chile and Cumin--aaaahhhh, I don't guess many of you know what I'm talking about. I've gotten a bit carried away thinking about the changing of seasons, it just does something to me and I think I'll go have some hot cider and start reading Pride and Prejudice. Seems silly I know, it's only mid September and tomorrow may be blazing hot but I won't mind because it'll just give me the pleasure of the transition into cooler days all over again. I'm weird, I am aware of that, but I also know that there are some people out there (Sunni and Mom to name a few) who know exactly what I am talking about. I guess grouping myself with Su and Mom doesn't make me seem any more normal, does it now? Ha!

This one is for Jesse

I was telling Jesse just how cute it was to watch Lucas adjust to walking in shoes and I thought he'd like to see. There's actually only a second or two where his shoes are in view because he has recently discovered the magic screen behind the camera and would rather see that than perform on the other end. Here ya go, Lovey, you sure do have cute kids!

PS. I was also thinking about the grandmas as I took this video. This is for you too, Granny and Ma. Oh by the way Mom, there is a pause button on the music player (scroll down to your right) so you can hear the audio from the video :)

My Collin

This kid blows me away. Before becoming a Mom, I thought and worried so much about the "how to" stuff and I guess my mind was always on the nurture aspect of the nature/nurture debate. Now more and more, I am realizing that each spirit is different and while, as a parent, I have to nurture and teach things like obedience, self control, and life skills in general, each child is so amazingly unique and there are some things about each child over which I have only a slight influence. I will never have another Collin, neither will anyone else. Why am I so blessed?

It is daunting sometimes to think that as a mom I have a part (a huge part) in shaping this kid's personality, sense of humor, and overall functionality in society. Not to mention the monumental responsibility of teaching him the Gospel and helping him gain a testimony. I'm up for the challenge, though, I've never known anything more difficult but I have also never known anything more rewarding. Just yesterday I sat across the dinner table from Collin while we were eating and out of no where, Collin gets down from his chair and says, "I'm gonna give you a hug". Talk about rewarding. This mom-job is strange like that, I never know when pay day is, but honestly if I'm paying attention, pay day is every day. I could have used this perspective/reminder last week, but anyhoo...

Motivation

I'm always going crazy trying to keep up with baby books, blogging, scrapbooks, journals, and logging the cute stuff the kids do and always falling short. Now I hear tell that these here blogs can be put into book form, or something like that, and I'm thinkin' this may be a good way to kill a few birds with one blog stone. Good news for me and for the few of you that would like to hear/read more (I'm thinkin' probably the Moms, Jesse, and a few select others) for the rest of you that casually check in, it may get boring. Sorry, but I'm thinking about myself here and this just may work for me. We'll see...

There's also the consideration of going private--don't know how annoying that will make things, do you have to log in every time to view our blog? I'm thinking I might try because then I can actually write and not worry about the info. I'm passing on to the world. For example, I was starting to write more details about our current move/work switch for Jesse/living situation, etc. to keep everyone updated, but I didn't like having so much out there for just anyone to read and I hate having to filter through all that I'm writing. It's bad enough that I'm having to think about my poor grammar and sentence structure and how entertaining or boring my ramblings are to my family/friend audience, let alone worry about all the weirdos that stumble along our measly little internet space and read about our life. See what I mean about bad sentence structure? Anyway, might sound a little paranoid but Jesse (and life experience) have taught me well. Besides that, my personal info. is already floating around in the world with my treasured red leather purse that was stolen last March, people know enough about me already. But I'm not bitter.