A favorite picture of mine!

I've had absolutely no time lately to blog. Frustrating, but I haven't forgotten about you all! Here's one of my favorite pictures. I titled it "Nerds" because of the glasses and retainers. Check back for a story soon.

The Cleaner

I'm loving this show so much! I record it (of course, because I'm never at home to watch it during it's normal time). Just watched this week's episode this morning and it choked me up.

Soccer tournament this weekend for both of the boys. It's here in town for a change so things will be a lot easier than usual.

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Our fridge went out Tuesday. What a way to clean out the darn thing! It's been repaired and new groceries have been stocked but I can't get over that fear of opening the door to find a puddle of water in the bottom pouring out onto my feet. First the a/c, then the fridge, what's next? They come in 3's right?

10 yr old emails

Yesterday was one of Tristan's friend's birthday. His mom asked that the soccer team send him a birthday email message. Here's Tristan's:

Hey Gidi,

I just wanted to tell you Happy Birthday and
you are a great soccer player.

From Tree [Tristan]

Here's Aidan's:

Happy Birthday Gideon!

Hope you have a great day today.

Tell Huddy I said hi.

Aidan

Here's the friend's reply:

Sent: Tuesday, August 18, 2009 8:02:20 AM

Subject: Re: Happy Birthday!

hey thanks tree and little man it means a lot and hudson says hi back

Don't you love the nicknames?

Crushing

Here's something that happened to us this weekend that was a first for us!

Tristan had a pal spend the night on Saturday. It wasn't our idea, the other boy mentioned it after soccer and I was fine with it. His mom was willing to give it a try but had reservations because he has called her in the past from other sleepovers at 2 a.m. wanting to come home. Fair warning right?

We ran errands, went to eat, went to see Imagine That at the movie theater, fun, fun, fun! (The movie was a disappointment though. It wasn't really a kids movie because a lot of it was about business stuff, working and what not.) We get home at 7 and the boys hit the park for an hour. 8 o'clock comes and they are downstairs playing games. Tristan and Aidan are so excited because their friend says he's having fun, blah blah. 9 o'clock and I'm making them a snack when his mom calls and wants to chat with him. After they talk, he hands the phone to me and she says, "I'm going to have to come get him. I just asked him if he felt comfortable staying the night and he's not so sure." I really didn't know what to say other than okay.

Of course, I understand her situation and ours really. I would rather it happen now then at 2 a.m. She gets our address again and says that her husband will be over in a bit to pick him up. I hang up and think about how I'm going to tell Tristan and Aidan who have no idea this is happening.

"Guys, ____'s dad is going to come and get him in a bit so let's start helping him get his things together."

Aidan says, "Why is he leaving now?"

I just shrugged my shoulders (yes, it was the easy way out right at the moment!)

Aidan says, "that sucks!!" I couldn't even correct his language because it did suck and you could see in his face that he was crushed.

In the end, he was picked up at 9:50 p.m. and I explained to the boys what happened. They couldn't understand it at all; they really take a lot of pride in being a good friend and making sure that their company is having fun. Our house is usually the place to be!

My theory is that if his mom wouldn't have called, all would have been fine and we would have made it through the night without a problem. But, one never knows.

It's hard having big ones.

This is a funny story!

This morning on our drive to school, out of nowhere Tristan says, "Mom, yesterday you should have pulled your shirt out."

I was confused because I didn't have my shirt tucked in, it was a v-neck, beige t-shirt. I asked, "What do you mean? It wasn't tucked in."

He says and demonstrates with his hands, "No, pulled it out away from you." He pulls his shirt out away from his chest.

I say, "Why?"

He says, "Because I could see everything. Your whole .... you know!" He demonstrates with his hand cupped over his chest and then points to the nipple area.

I laughed!! I asked him if I embarrassed him? He told me I did! Who would have known that wearing a regular old t-shirt was embarrassing to a 10 yr old?

We have a little code now that he'll pull at his shirt if I'm ever showing too much in public. This is hilarious to me because I'm a pretty modest person. But I will admit, it's tough to have big boobs. Obviously, you can't even wear a t-shirt!

Work, work, work.

I bet you thought I was going to complain about my job huh? Nope, it's actually going pretty well. I'm very thankful for it actually; it's really flexible and hasn't been too busy lately. I've worked less hours in order to be with the boys more with their busy schedules.

The above picture is what it looks like at my house right now everyday around 4 p.m. 4th and 5th grade is no joke! Homework everyday so far. They are both doing really well. The only thing is that they are the only ones from their soccer teams who have started school already so it's affected their social life. Ha! They've had to miss several sleepovers.

1st day of school!

Yes, it's that time again. And it's too soon as far as the boys are concerned. They are not happy about it in the least. Here's a lovely picture though (even with the forced smiles).

State Games

Okay, I got the boys involved in something without much information and it turned out we were way in over our heads! The State Games of America were here in town this weekend with every sport you can imagine. Archery, basketball, soccer, gymnastics, track and field, ice skating. It's like the Olympics but I thought on a much smaller scale. They advertised that anyone could participate so I signed up the boys and thought to myself, "Let's go out, run some races, and bring home some medals." I had no idea that people traveled from all over the U.S. to come and compete - and these are kids who do this all summer long!

The first race was the 100 and you are running against the clock basically. The top 3 times get medals. There were two heats and although Tristan ran his race well we had to wait an hour for the times to come in and see if he placed. Not this time, he didn't make the top 5 by .1 second. He shed some tears over this but it fired him up for his next race with was the 200.

In between Tristan's races, Aidan ran the 400. He fell in the 8-10 yr old bracket and poor guy must have had to race all 10 year olds. He came in dead last and very upset!! He didn't even want to run his 200 next, he wanted to go home. I had no idea this is how it would be. I really wished that I would have asked more questions so that I could have prepared them better.

After lunch we went back to the track to wait for the 200. We got to watch some awesome long jumps from the older boys. It's time for the 200 race and wouldn't you know they only have 6 boys racing so that means that Aidan has to run against Tristan. Again, the poor guy doesn't stand a chance. He does run his race though, he didn't quit. Tristan had some steep competition but will you believe that he came away with the bronze medal?????? Just a kid who came out to run for fun? Unbelievable!!!!!

To see the results from the track and field competitions you can click here. Scroll down until you get to the boys and you'll see his name under 10 and under Boys 200m.