::birthday request::

So today is my birthday, and so far I'm having a great time. Kris and Max are taking very good care of me, and we're about to head out to lunch and some shopping. What could be better?

But there's something else I want for my birthday, and here's what it is.
If you visit our blog, will you leave a comment and say hi? Especially if you come and read it often? I'd love to know who you are and how you found us.

And all my friends and family that I already know read this can say hi too, that wouldn't hurt my feelings!

And in return I'll take some photos of the festivities, including Max frosting the cake and I'll post them later.
Sound like a good deal?

Oh, and thanks mom for giving birth to me! Now that I have a kid I think birthdays should almost be more for the MOM than the kid!!

And happy end of January, yay!

::25 things::

There's this silly facebook thing that's been rolling around. You're supposed to come up with 25 things about yourself, and then tag other people to do the same. I tried to resist. For quite a while. But finally I gave in. And I thought that since I took the time to think up all this stuff I might as well put it right here!

Enjoy or ignore, it's up to you. And consider yourself tagged if you want to do it too!


1. I get a lot of headaches these days. This is not a good thing about me, it's just a thing about me.

2. I hate American Idol, but I watch it because it's entertaining and it's a cultural phenomenon (or something) but I have a hard time watching it, and almost always disagree with the judges.

3. I'm finding as I get older that I like to cook but I hate to clean.

4. My new favorite food is Cara Cara Oranges. They're pink, not orange. They're delicious.

5. I met my husband in high school at band camp.

6. I hate being too hot and I hate being too cold. I don't know which I like less.

7. When Kris and I were doing study abroad in Austria I learned a ton of German. I could understand almost anything people said, but was still pretty uncomfortable speaking to people in German. People would ask me a question in german and I'd answer in english. It flustered people. It flustered me too.

8. My good friend and I drove over 6 hours to go to IKEA last year. And then when we got there we shopped for eight hours.

9. I've been in three car accidents in the last three years. None of them were my fault and all of them involved our Land Rovers. Sad!

10. I really dislike white cars, and two of the four cars we've bought since we were married ended up being white.

11. I don't like to drive. Could that have something to do with my accidents? Hmmm.

12. I haven't played my saxophone in way too long.

13. We've moved twice in the last two years. It's looking like we'll probably move two more times in the next two years. Yuck.

14. I have really enjoyed blogging in the last couple of years. It's a place for my photos and I feel so much more connected to my friends and family that are far away. I love it and I miss it when I don't do it.

15. I'm glad I have my MBA but I probably wouldn't choose to do it again if we were back at the start. It was just way too stressful.

16. I love Max. I really miss him when he was a little baby, but what can you do? They can't stay teeny forever.

17. I love the beach so much. If I could live by the beach for the rest of my life it would make me happy!

18. It's been proven through experience that I'm allergic to some dogs, all cats, horses, birds, rabbits and cows. I'm guessing I'm allergic to pretty much anything and everything else that moves and is fuzzy or feathery.

19. I loved the VW vans we had growing up. I wish there was a safer newer version out now. It would be the perfect family car.

20. I wish I knew how to surf.

21. I've been serving in one or another position in primary for the last 5 years. I'm guessing I'll be there for a while longer.

22. I love to take pictures. Sometimes I'm too busy taking pictures to enjoy whatever it is we're doing.

23. I've found in the last few years that I love going to kickboxing class at the gym. Well, I love doing it, not so much the going to it part. And I really love the part after I'm done.

24. I love to bake. I could make cookies, cupcakes and cakes all day long, and I could eat them all day long too. So even though I think I'm pretty good at it, I try not to do it very often.

25. I love going on road trips. Even when they're going to be long and crummy I can't help but feel excited about them.

and the extra: My youngest brother is 10 years younger than me. I dragged him around everywhere and took care of him a lot. I loved it. Max reminds me of him a bit, and when they're together I always always mix them up and call them the wrong name.

Well there we go. Phew, I did it!

::what?!?::

As Max is playing with his matchbox car I hear him saying to himself in a very official sounding voice, "This car game is sponsored by Visa.......and McDonald's."
What?!? Oh boy. Think he's been watching some football or something lately?

::familiar::

The last couple of days Kris has let Max keep a small light on for 15 minutes or so after bedtime so he could read.
Usually he only reads if I force him to, although he does love to be read to.
Tonight I was out at a meeting. When I came back home this is what I found.

He was reading Green Eggs and Ham out loud to himself, and had another stack of books on the side of his bed, waiting their turn. It was so cute.

It makes me really happy to see him enjoying books. I love to read. I always have. My parents have a picture of me when I was probably three years old, asleep on a really large stack of golden books. I'd still fall asleep on books if I could.
We've been reading to Max since he was just barely born. He's always gotten at least one bedtime story, sometimes many more. So I'm glad to see Max doing some bedtime reading, on his own.
And I've been working so hard on helping him learn to read, I'm glad he's still enjoying it. I don't want to feel like I've pushed him too hard. So far so good!
I think we'll keep up with the little reading time and see if he keeps it up. I sure hope he does!

::so good and tasty::

This is what Max and I eat every morning for breakfast.

Irish oatmeal, honey, strawberries and a couple tiny squirts of light aerosol whipped cream. YUM.
Well that's what we eat most mornings anyway. As long as we have strawberries. If we don't have yummy delicious strawberries we'll usually put a bit of brown sugar in, sometimes some bananas. I love raspberries with honey too.
This is why I've been able to eat healthy lately. Stuff like this tastes so dang good!

But an ethical dilemma has arisen concerning my oatmeal for tomorrow morning.
I only have two strawberries left. So do I split the skimpy amount of strawberries between the two of us? Do I take it all for myself and skimp Max out? Should I be a noble sacrificing mom and give them all to Max?
It's kind of a hard call. What do I do?
But keep in mind, these are not the only fruits or vegetables he or I will eat during the day. So no worries there.

Yum, I wish it was breakfast time right now.

::dog trails::

I went to let the dog out back the other day, and noticed that he had made some special Sultan trails all around the yard. He really needs them because the snow was pretty deep and our backyard is always in shadow so it never melts. In fact, the snow just freezes into this big ice block.
So he needs his trails in order to get around and see what's going on outside. And to use the facilities of course.

He hasn't hung out much in the back yard since it got really cold. He basically goes out, sniffs around, does his biz and then comes back and waits by the door to be let back in. He's totally a lazy house dog and just sleeps on his puffy bed all day.

The same day I noted his trails, we went to the zoo. I already told you about that, but I didn't tell you about the African Wild Dogs.
They're so weird. I really like them and they kind of creep me out at the same time.

They look kind of scary and hyena like, but at the same time they're really dog like, so it's a weird combination.

I wonder if they would get along with Sul. I don't think I'd risk trying it out honestly, but maybe they'd be good friends.
Anyway their snow trails reminded me of his.

They had trails all around their habitat, just like his, and all they were doing was trotting around following each other around these trails.
It also reminded me of the little sheltie our family used to have, Mickey. She had worn a trail like that in the yard too, but in the grass and dirt, not in the snow. She liked to chase airplanes and was a little bit crazy.

It's kind of weird that we have wildish animals living in our houses when you think about it, isn't it?
Oh, and I've almost forgiven Sultan for tracking a whole bunch of stinky poop into the house on friday. Almost.

::miff::

My brother Murphy (who is currently serving a church mission), emailed me a couple of weeks ago and told me he'd sent us a package.
So I was pretty excited to see something looking like this show up in the mail:

It just looked so exotic and exciting! And there were all sorts of crazy stickers on it that I didn't understand.

What does 32,00 mean anyway? And I love all the foreign handwriting.
We were very excited to open it up and see what he had sent!

He sent Max an awesome bracelet. Max was very proud to wear it to church today, and excited to tell everybody about his missionary uncle.

Max also got this really cool little coin purse that I think I may adopt for myself. It's just too cool.


He sent Kris a cool stripey tie, which Kris wore to church today.

I didn't get a very good picture. Kris likes to make faces at me. But I still think he's cute.

I tried anyway.

I got this really neat necklace. I really like it. I think it's my birthday present.

I also wore my gift to church today and enjoyed it!

What a great brother to send us exciting exotic gifts.
Oh, and as for the title of this post, we like to call Murphy Miff or Miffy. For no reason other than that Kris accidentally called him that once and it stuck, at our house at least.
Love you Miff!

::zoo::

We went to the zoo today. My friend Melissa has a season pass, and Max and I can get in on her ticket somehow. So we like to go there sometimes, it's a good chance for Max to run around and for us to hang out a bit.
It was cold today though. Freezing.

Max seems to turn into the worst version of himself though at the zoo. He's terrible. He can't seem to obey or do anything right. Luckily since we didn't have to pay $20 to get in we can always leave whenever we need to.
Check out the elephants' water.   Brrr.

It was no wonder they were waiting for us in the barn.

Along with the cutest baby giraffe you'll ever see.

Baby giraffe's mommy thinks he's pretty cute too.

Max was totally fixated on the the baby giraffe. He just stood there repeating "Baby giraffe" in this weird lispy voice.
It was cool though because there was nobody else in the barn. The whole zoo was so empty, which makes sense considering it's freezing. But it was fun to be one on one with all the animals there in the barn.



Until I felt like I needed to start sneezing, since I'm sure I'm allergic to giraffe and elephants. So we moved on.

Gorgeous snow leopards, huh? They must feel right at home now with all the crazy snow.

My favorite animal in the whole zoo though is the adorable little red panda.





Isn't he the snugglyest looking little guy you've ever seen? I'd definitely take one of those guys home for a pet if I could.

And after that we went home because we were freezing and because Max couldn't be even semi good any more. I think I'll try to go find a red panda stuffed animal to snuggle with.

::flight 815::

In celebration of the new season of Lost FINALLY starting tonight, in just a few minutes to be exact, I bring you our own family Oceanic flight 815.

Max got this awesome playmobil jetliner from his Grandma for Christmas. He'd been dreaming of it for a long time. Anytime we went into the toy store near our house he'd spot it, and dream. When he opened the package on Christmas he yelled, "MY Plane!" So obviously he'd already been the owner in his mind for quite a while.
But.
The plane is always wrecked.

It just can't stay together. I went in his room randomly to take these pictures, and there was the plane, lying on the ground, engines and landing gear strewn all over.



Sometimes Kris and I will be doing something else and then we will hear this horrendous crash, and it'll be the plane hitting the floor, splitting into a thousand pieces. It makes us think of the plane crash from Lost every time.
Not that he does it on purpose. He loves this plane. He carries it around like it was a stuffed animal or something.

(yes he is dressed as a giraffe today--don't ask me why)
The plane is just accident prone. It's those long wings, and the wheels that stick out from the bottom. It's the opening and closing doors.

This particular accident seemed especially rough--somehow involving a train engine as well as a plane. Yikes.
I asked him to rescue his plane, and he went and got it from his room. Somehow along the way the wings fell off and he had to reassemble.

The good news is that he's getting really good at putting the wings and the wheels back on by himself.

The bad news is that he's never going to figure out how to put the little cockpit door back on, and he's constantly popping that thing off. I replace that door like 50 times a day.

The other bad news is that the plane somehow seems to attract and gather dog hair. I have to vacuum it off. That's another story.

So enjoy Lost tonight. And think of poor Oceanic flight 815 lying on the floor of our house.

But at least it gets to have awesome sound effects while it flies. What plane could ask for more?


**I forgot to say, the plane evidently only flies to California--to Disneyland. I think it once made a trip to Florida for Disneyworld, but only once. So don't get any funny ideas about cushy international flights on our private jet!

::tagged::

My friend Amanda tagged me. And it's a photo tag, which are naturally my favorites!
For this one you're supposed to open your sixth folder of pictures, and post the sixth picture and tell the story behind it. Since I have WAY too may folders and pictures, I just kept choosing the sixth one until I finally reached a picture. And it's a good one.

It's cute little Max in 2005 eating an ice cream cone that Kris had brought home for him. He was making such a mess than we stripped him down to his diaper and had him eat it outside on the deck. He was having the time of his life.

This was back when we actually had a backyard and an awesome deck--two houses ago. And even though the yard was so slanted that it was impossible to walk down without staggering, we miss it. I think Sul and Max miss it the most though.

This is the same Max that when I was just hugging and kissing him a minute ago said, "Take it easy, take it easy!"
What a goofball. He was cute then and he's cute now, what else can I say?

Oh, and consider yourself tagged if you'd like to do this one. If you do it let me know!

::chess::

It's pretty hilarious to watch a four (almost five) year old try his hardest to learn to play chess.

Especially on a kind of weird chessboard we got from Mexico. We really like it but you can't tell what any of the pieces are supposed to be.

There's a chess board at the library that Max has seen a few times and was very interested in. So he roped Kris into teaching him how to play. So far so good. I think he's got the pawn's moves figured out. It might be the perfect thing to keep a guy like Max busy and occupied. Now if only I could remember how to play...

snow cave in the city

It snowed again, which gave me the perfect chance to introduce Max to one of the sweeter things in life: snow caves. What better way to feel like you're on an adventure than to have a snow cave in your front yard. We had to use the front because the back yard has too much Sultan poo.

Max, like me, takes his snow caves very serious.


Ginna--not normally a big fan of snow caves--came out and liked it so much, she had to get in. And she looked cute. And fun.


Sultan also got in on the action




I hope it doesn't melt too soon.