Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Being President's Day on Monday it was a holiday for everyone. When I mean everyone I mean that the boys didn't have school and Justin didn't have to work and I was lucky enough to have the night off before. So, we headed up to the charming town of Midway to see the ice castles.

We stopped and ate at the Dairy Keen in Heber before we began our adventure. I love the Dairy Keen. I have been super good about fried foods and fatty burgers and rarely consume them but I went all out. I totally recommend the Train Burger when you go...a delicious fatty burger topped with TWO kinds of cheese, thinly sliced ham, and the right amount of sauce. Add deliciously perfectly cooked fries dunked in fry sauce and a cherry diet coke and you have officially created a homage to the food gods.

There was a house right next door to this lovely establishment and Luke told me he thought it would be cool to live there so we could come to the Dairy Keen for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. I guess that would be okay until you needed a lift to get me out of my cut out front door when I am featured on that show the 600 pound woman. But I think, maybe, it would be worth it.

Then...off to our destination.




The ice castles were beautiful! It was pretty amazing to see these structures made entirely of ice. At one turn there was a stunning large open area and I commented to Justin that I felt like an ice princess. Justin replied with "You didn't just say that" and then I was teased by him and Nicholas the rest of the time there. Hey, a girl can dream right?

We had fun exploring and the weather made it especially enjoyable. We almost went up on Saturday but it was a blizzard so I am glad that it worked out that we could go another time when the weather was more cooperative. As if to add to the beauty of it all, little light snowflakes were falling as we were walking around.



Luke liked looking at the deep recesses of the castles and seeing this blue color.







We ran into one of my darling high school friends up there and she snapped this cute photo of our family.


If you want more information, go here. They originally were just going to be open through the 28th but it looks like the date is extended to March 5. It is worth the trip!

Monday, February 21, 2011

stuffing

I have never had a child who has loved stuffed animals. Or even liked for that matter. No one would even give them a second glance. Until Liam.

He has become quite obsessed with them and finally received his beloved pillow pet dog for Christmas. Then came a little beanie baby kitty and then a dog star pet thingy. I then made the mistake of mentioning the mecca of all things stuffed animal related. Build a Bear Workshop.

It was probably one of the stupidest things I have ever done. I heard about how he wanted to go to Build a Bear about 1000 times a day.

So for Valentine's day we gave him a gift card to take a special trip to build his very own friend. When he opened the card he hugged it and said "This is SO cool!" over and over.

Geez...if opening the card was this awesome, I couldn't wait for the acutal day to come. Luckily, it was just the next morning and holy cow--10 a.m. could not come fast enough. I had high hopes that this would rock Liam's world. I am not going to lie...it totally did.

He was the only one there so he had extra special attention from the cute employee there. She was adorable and Liam grinned from ear to ear the whole time.

I think seeing all of the stuffed animals all flat and looking more like a skinned animal than a huggable friend made him a little nervous. Once he got over it though, he picked out his buddy. His name is Tootsie. Which is also the name of his pillow pet.

Putting in the heart and making a wish...

...helping put in the stuffing so it was just right...

...and giving his new friend a bath. He took this very seriously.

Voila! His very manly Tootsie bear who plays football. He called everyone he knew to let them know about his new friend.


As we left the store he told me that he thought it was real. I love his little imagination and had so much fun being a part of his little world for a morning.

It was SO cool.

Friday, February 18, 2011

random thoughts by liam

I picked up Liam from preschool on Wednesday and he handed me a heart that said he had counted to 109. He was so proud of himself and we got buckled in and started heading toward the aquarium to spend the afternoon.

After a minute he announced that he didn't have to swallow spit or even breathe.

I was a little bewildered and asked him to repeat that.

He said: "I didn't even have to breathe or swallow spit when I counted."

He then asked if swordfish had to be careful in the ocean. I realized he was worried that the swordfish would spear an unassuming fish and hurt it--which in reality is probably what happens. I told him that the swordfish swims slowly and tries not to bump into the other fish. He replied with a very serious tone that every fish in the sea was probably the swordfish's best buddy.

A few minutes later he sighed and said that he wished he could have a baby beluga.

I don't think our bathtub is big enough.

Wednesday, February 16, 2011

v day

Although I do think that Valentine's day is a little overhyped and just another day created by businesses to increase their sales--I mean, really, do you have to have a day set aside for love to let your loved ones know how you feel about them?--I really look forward to the visit from the Cupid.

I love decorating in red and pink, I love hearts, I love all the little valentines that get handed out in class. I just think it is a fun day.

Last year when I was helping out with Luke's valentine party I realized that I was a slacker. Everyone had these cute boxes and all Luke had was a plain white sack with his name on it. In my defense, the boys' school is weird when it comes to holidays. They can't bring treats on their birthdays, no costumes on Halloween, and I just assumed that bringing anything cute and fun on Valentine's day would be frowned upon. So this year was going to be different.

I went out and bought decorations: glitter, stickers, pom poms, buttons, jewels, the list was pretty long. I also had construction paper ready and enough glue for each of the boys. I was set.

The decorating of the boxes took all of 10 minutes. There was a drawing made of a transformer, a few sprinkles of glitter on the box, Nick actually did cover his box in pink paper but it didn't even go to the top so you could still see much of the Cheerios box underneath. So much for having cute boxes to show off at school but at least they did them with their own individuality.

But they did have fun decorating themselves.

It all started with this:




and then this:






and then things got a little crazy...







Needless to say, I have plenty of leftover decorations for next year.

The actual day was low key but fun. The boys had their parties and then off to the various activities after school. For dinner I made a new recipe which was absolutely delicious and I also made the rice that is paired with it and asparagus. We had virgin pina coladas in clear cups with cute grey and white striped straws, ate off white plates, with cute heart napkins and fresh purple tulips on the table. Then we had fondue for desert. I splurged and bought the "good" chocolate from Orson Gygis and it was worth it. Nicholas actually let out a sigh of contentment. It is hard to get these boys full and I think I accomplished it this night.

I love my boys (all 5 of them) so much and it was so nice to have a fun night together.

An absolutely perfect Valentine's day.

Monday, February 14, 2011

mishmash

Playing catchup over the last month.

Here goes:

I had a fun farewell lunch with some of the gals from IMC. They were so nice to plan it for me. We ate at the Olive Garden and I downed diet cokes and breadsticks like they were going out of style.


maren. me. suzi. stephanie. kim

heather. libbey. melanie. laura. traci.

angelise. donna. aimee. reg. wendy. laura. melanie. lisa

Although IMC was not the perfect fit for me, I learned a lot about myself there and met some amazing people. I will miss these girls!

Luke played another season for the Jr Jazz.





To be honest, I am amazed that kid still has his tounge.

Nick and Andrew had their Suzuki graduation for the year. Nick graduated from Book 3 and Andrew from Book 2.



And we celebrated Chinese new year. It is the year of the rabbit. I was born in the year of the rabbit and I am the most fortunate of all the animals! In our home we also have two tigers, a horse, a rooster, and a dragon. I loved learning about all the traditions that go along with this holiday so I think next year I will kick our celebrations up a notch to incorporate more of them in. This year it was pretty low key (and seeing how I really didn't research the holiday much until the day of) we just learned about our animal we were born under, the story of how the Chinese zodiac came to be, ate stirfry, and watched The Karate Kid.



Other random happenings:

-Liam can do the chinese splits. All the way to the ground.
-Andrew passed off his divide by 11s.
-Luke wrote the most absolutely cutest valentines. I will save them for the next post.
-I need to read up on my space trivia. Liam asks some pretty hard questions. He also told me the other day that Neptune was grumpy. I asked him why and he replied "Because he is always so cold and not close to the sun."
-Nick asked to sit by his teacher so he wouldn't get distracted by the other kids in his class. He is quite the social butterfly and was getting in trouble quite a bit and this was a good move on his part.
-I have a new favorite word that Luke says: scorch.
-Andrew went snowshoeing on a fieldtrip.
-We are getting excited about our trip coming up in July going back to Cooperstown. It will be here before we know it.

Have a happy love day!