My Laundry Pants

I greatly dislike wearing my laundry pants. There are a number of reasons but the big ones include:

• they start off being a size too big and within ten or so minutes have stretched to two sizes too big
• I compensate by rolling the waistband and then feel like a teenage boy with low-riding pants
• they are very see-through and, inevitably, I only have bright pink or polka-dotted panties to wear

The biggest reason I dislike my laundry pants, though, is because wearing them means I am THAT far behind on laundry. This then means that whatever plans I've made have to be scrapped as my day has suddenly turned into load after load after load. Since I need to switch loads every fifty or so minutes, which isn't enough time to run any errands, I'm stuck inside the house. Being stuck inside the house means I'm faced with all the cleaning that should be done but that I haven't had time (or inclination) to do yet. Being faced with the cleaning usually ends up with me actually cleaning. So laundry pants means I'm deep cleaning the house. 

See, you'd dislike wearing my laundry pants, too! :-)

Feathery Friends

I happened to glance out the window and saw an exciting site. A covey of quail. There was a Momma and  Daddy followed by five or so little chicks and bringing up the rear were Grandma and Grandpa. They walked across the back yard, hung out by the morning glory for a bit, then flew up and over the fence to their next adventure. They had traveled quite a way, too, as I saw them earlier about three blocks up from where we live walking along the sidewalk. Too bad we had already run out of birdseed. I would have enjoyed having them hang around for a bit.

Lightning

I've lived in the Tri-Cities (Southeastern WA) since I was four and I don't recall a time where we've had this much thunder and lightning in our area. The month of July started out pretty yucky with low temperatures and rainy weather. Then, seemingly out of the blue, we got notices of thunderstorms heading towards are area. These notices just keep coming. I honestly believe we've had a thunder and lightning storm every three days for the past three weeks. And these aren't itty-bitty storms that last just a few minutes, but rather strikes that light up the sky while pictures shake on your house walls lasting for hours. Thankfully the few fires that have been started from lightning strikes have been contained before much damage was done. As far as I know it's been desert that's burned rather than crops or houses. God willing it will stay that way.

Amanda Logsdon of Kennewick provided this photo. No editing was done  so the colorful clouds are how they actually appeared.

Read more here: http://www.tri-cityherald.com/2012/07/10/2016233/reader-lightning-photos.html#storylink=misearch#storylink=cpy

Paul Shoemaker of Richland supplied this photo of lightning strikes over the Tri-Cities

Read more here: http://www.tri-cityherald.com/2012/07/10/2016233/reader-lightning-photos.html#storylink=misearch#storylink=cpy

Sharon Worlund of Benton City supplies this photo of storm activity.

Read more here: http://www.tri-cityherald.com/2012/07/10/2016233/reader-lightning-photos.html#storylink=misearch#storylink=cpy

Ashley Schneider of Benton City supplied this photo of lightning over the Tri-Cities.

Read more here: http://www.tri-cityherald.com/2012/07/10/2016233/reader-lightning-photos.html#storylink=misearch#storylink=cpy

Capp Moncrief of Richland took this photo.

Read more here: http://www.tri-cityherald.com/2012/07/10/2016233/reader-lightning-photos.html#storylink=misearch#storylink=cpy

A local professional photographer took this picture near the Hanford site in Richland, WA.

The Amazing Power of a Nap

These past two weeks have been a struggle for me as a Mom. Nate has been out of town for work which meant that I was on 24x7 duty for Abby. Don't get me wrong. I absolutely love my daughter and do not regret for a minute being a stay at home Mom. That being said if someone had offered to put me up in a hotel while they took care of Abby I don't think I would have even paused to pack in my rush to get away.

Last week Abby noticed that Nate was gone but took it mostly in stride. She took shorter naps than normal and was a bit more inclined to bring out her shrieking but overall we did pretty good. I ended up spending the majority of the evenings at my parent's house as those last hours of the day seem to drag on forever but overall my mothering bucket was pretty full. You know the bucket that's filled with patience, kindness, willingness to play games, ability to laugh at messes, etc. That mothering bucket. Then Nate came home for the weekend and, while he did spend a decent amount of time with us, he also worked a fair amount. Sunday came and he was gone again for the second business trip this month.

I should have known that things were not going to go well this week when we locked Abby in the rental. (See previous blog post Car Manufacturers and Kids.) Since that fateful moment Abby has refused to nap (Sunday she threw up in her crib to express her unwillingness to nap, Monday she exploded out of her diaper, Tuesday she cried and cried but no crib messes, and Wednesday she fell asleep for 20 minutes before waking herself up by pooping), has pulled out her shriek whenever she wanted to vocally express herself for anything good or bad, decided that individual play is so old-school and, when she wasn't playing with someone else at one of our many, many play dates, she needed to be physically touching me while I entertained her every wake moment, and (through no fault of her own) has had a horrible diaper rash such that any time she wets or soils herself she screams bloody murder while going, while I'm changing her diaper, and after she's all clean. (I know that she's in pain and I truly felt for her - but this was just another negative in a week of what seemed like only negatives.)

As each day progressed my mothering bucket got emptier and emptier until we hit rock bottom yesterday. After one particularly nasty shrieking session I just picked her up, hugged her with all my might, and then started to just sob and sob. A visit with my sister and niece helped brighten the day a bit and I'd hoped that this morning would be a new leaf. Instead, Miss A started making noises at 6am (an hour and a half before normal wake-up time) and my first thoughts were of how horrible this day was going to be. As nap time got closer and closer I could actually feel myself getting tenser and tenser. I just could not bear another no-nap day. The thought of dealing with the aftermath of Abby missing her nap was making me misty eyed. But something amazing happened! On our way home from the water park Abby fell asleep in the car (which she had done earlier this week but to no avail). I went through our bottle and rocking routine before putting her in the crib. Sure enough she bounced up and started to cry as I walked out the door. Then, miracle upon miracles, I heard her stop crying and then...silence. Blessed silence. Abby was sleeping! At the 20 minute mark I grinned. At the 45 minute mark I did a happy dance. At an hour I was giggling like a fool. Finally, after an hour and a half Abby woke up. Sure, she was still an hour and a half short of a normal nap but after the week of no naps this one felt like an eon.

The rest of the day was spent babysitting my niece and having a play date with a friend from church. Then we headed out to the backyard to play. I was amazed at the difference in my attitude. I actively enjoyed playing with the girls and wasn't overcome with frustration at the shrieking and multitude of questions. It made me realize that I'm not a horrible mom and I don't need to rush back to work. Instead I'm a mom that needs a recharge in the middle of the day and if I don't get that recharge I have to work extra hard to pull good things out of the mothering bucket. The power a nap brings is amazing. Hopefully this napping session was what was needed to get us back on track to a normal schedule, a happy baby, and a happy mama. At least until the next business trip!

Car Manufacturers and Kids

Nate and I recently learned that car manufacturers don't necessarily have children in mind when developing their latest and greatest car gadgetry. Earlier this week Nate had rented a Suburban for an out of town trip. Since he'd just gotten back from an out of town trip Abby and I were hanging out near the SUV soaking up as much "Nate time" as we could get before he took off again. Abby's had a thing for playing in cars lately so I tossed her into the driver's seat and let her 'drive'. Nate finished packing up his stuff and came to talk to me on the passenger's side of the car. After saying his good-byes to me he, as he was closing the passenger door, made a quip about how funny it would be if the SUV had auto locks when all the doors were shut. Ha ha. Right.

Suddenly we looked at each other and realized that this car very well could be like that! Sure enough, after checking all four doors and the back we realized we'd locked Abby in the car! Thankfully the car was running and the air conditioning was on so we didn't have to worry about her getting too hot inside. At this moment I panicked and started excitedly exclaiming that we needed to get a locksmith out here STAT. Added into the confusion of the moment was that Nate needed to be leaving to pick up the rest of his co-workers for their trip and any delay would be a big delay for everyone. I ran inside, as my phone was the only available one, and started cursing out the Internet as Google couldn't give me a simple answer for "24 hour locksmith Pasco, WA". I actually wished we had kept a copy of the phone book that was tossed on our door a few months ago. Never did I think that a hard copy page would be needed over the entire world wide web. Just as I was starting to move from panicked into freaked out I heard Nate yelling my name.

I came outside to find Nate holding Abby who was looking like she was befuddled by all the commotion. After grabbing her in my arms for some big hugs Nate explained that our daughter is a master at working buttons. While the multiple number of buttons on the driver's side had stumped her (she kept locking the door and putting the window up) the passenger side buttons were right up her alley. She found the window down button on her first try and created her own freedom. Our adventure was over in less than five minutes.

This is another example of how car manufacturers don't have children in mind when they create cars. No car should automatically lock just because the car is running and all doors are closed. I mean, this couldn't possibly be OUR fault so it must be theirs, right? :-) I do think I'll add "key less entry" onto my wish list for our next vehicle, whenever that may be.

First Official Word Word

Abby has (finally!) decided to start working on her verbal skills again. Yeah! She's had Mama and Dada down pat for quite a few months but just this week she said her first official word word. I call it that because Mama and Dada, while words, started out as babbles. This official word word is a non-babbling word. Got it? :-) Without further adieu it's "hot". Yep, hot.

For a while now, when I'm holding her and we're cooking together, I've told her "hot, hot, ouch, ouch, no touch" so that she doesn't try to touch the oven door as I'm putting something in to bake or the pan as I've frying something. She's such a smart cookie that she learned early on to fold her arms and keep her hands close to her. Now she will fold her arms, look at me and say (in her cute little baby voice) "hot" (something the 'h' sound is there, others not) and then blow out this tiny puff of air to try to cool down the 'hot' thing. It's just too adorable! This morning I was cooking her eggs and cheese and she was just so proud of herself for saying hot and then blowing on her eggs to cool them down. I just had to give her lots of snuggles and "good jobs" right then and there. So at just shy of17 months we have three official words: Mama, Dada, and Hot!

Happy Independence Day!

Land of the Free and Home of the Brave!

Today was a different holiday celebration than what Nate and I are used to as it was the first time we've celebrated a major holiday without being surrounded by other family members. Normally we either head down to Portland, OR to visit with Nate's Parents and Grandparents or we would be hanging out with my family here in town (occasionally tossing in all the relatives on both sides celebrating at our house). This year we had in fact planned to be gone camping at Lake Pend Oreille with my family and my sister's boyfriend's family (say that three times fast!). However, after reviewing our summer schedule and realizing that Nate has an awful lot of travel and work craziness coming up, we decided to spend the 4th of July at home on our own.

The morning started with Nate sleeping in and Abby and I heading to our neighborhood park to attend a Freedom Festival put on by one of the local Mormon wards. We didn't hang out for too long as we'd gotten a later than expected start to the day, but I enjoyed watching the Boy Scout troop raise the flag, singing the anthem, and hearing a pretty nice opening festival speech while Abby enjoyed playing on the playground equipment. Then we headed back to the house to wake Nate up and head to East Pasco for the Pasco 4th of July Celebration parade. I had only a vague idea where the parade route was (only knowing where it ended actually) so we were pretty lucky in not only finding a parking spot within a decent walking distance but also a nice parade viewing spot with only 10 minutes to go before the parade started. A welcome addition to the festivities was that Mary Aardal and her four kids joined us (her husband was back home fixing up a car to sell). It was nice that Abby had some friends to play with, I had a friend to talk to, and Nate got more time to wake up before the craziness of the day hit. Finally the parade started!

The parade begins!

First up, after the American flag I should say, were the Freedom Riders. Having experienced a Westboro Baptist Church protest at the funeral of one of our town's fallen heroes, I am very grateful for the support these men and women show our Veterans and our military men and women who have been killed in the line of duty. I had to take this particular picture as the gentleman seated on the white motorcycle in the middle of the picture is probably the oldest man I have ever seen. And he was on a motorcycle! Shows that you're only as old as you feel!

As I am part of a Marine Corps family (Father retired after 30 years of service as a Lt. Col and my brother is currently in the Reserves) this was a much required picture of our town's Young Marines.

My high school friend, Stephanie Betcher, and her daughter, Sierra, marching in the parade with Sierra's Girl Scout troop. Yeah, Girl Scouts!

This poor little guy had had enough of parading for one day. He'd fallen asleep in his car stroller! Every once in a while you'd see his head do the bob thing where he'd jerk up awake for a second before slowing falling back asleep and dropping his head down.

While Abby did get a little bored of the parade at the beginning (what was the deal with car and car after car of state representatives with no throwing of candy!) she did get into the parade once the 'real' parade action of floats, bands, and animals came through.

These little girls were adorable dancing down the street.

An old police car. I thought Mary's comment was hilarious. I mentioned something to the affect of how it was a neat, old police car and she responded back with "Yeah, neat because you could easily outrun it. Wait. I shouldn't be outrunning a police car!" Maybe it was a had to be there kind of moment, but I thought it was a great comment from a Mom of four who tries so hard to install good morals into her kids.

  

The tractors were a big hit with all the kids. It was interesting seeing all the different types of tractors, too. I love that my town is small enough that you'll still have the occasional Tuesday night traffic jam as a convoy of harvesting machines are making their way down the freeway at 30 miles per hour. 

This guy was showing off as he was coming down the parade lane. I did not know how these big, hulky machines could pretty much turn and spin on a dime.

The Pasco High marching band. Just as we were thinking that this parade was missing something, along came these kids and reminded us that every parade needs a band!

I love seeing Clydesdale horses. They're simply huge! I think one of their hooves could easily be bigger than Abby's head. :-)

This poor kid had the 'fun' job of picking up any droppings left by any of the horses of the parade. He got a thunderous applause, and a few jokes about his job, as he came by our area.

These miniature ponies were also a hit with the kid's in the crowd. 

All too soon it was time to go. We actually left early (I think there ended up being an additional ten floats that we missed) because Abby was starting to get fussy at being cooped up in one spot for so long (at this point we'd been there almost an hour and a half) and we were running into lunch and nap time.

  

It ended up being a good thing we left when we did because Abby fell asleep on the ride home. 

 After the parade we ate lunch and then Abby and Nate went down for a nap. :-) I finished up a few items that were to be eaten at dinner time and then had a bit of 'me' time. After nap time we worked on the house a bit more (touching up paint inside the house and painting our newly fixed gate in the back yard) then it was break time with phone calls to Nate's Parents and Grandparents. After catching up with family it was dinnertime! I am pretty impressed with the success of this meal. Normally holidays mean that everyone brings a dish to share so it was unusual that I had to prepare everything for the meal. I decided to have a little fun and try a few dishes that I've never made before as well as some tried and true recipes.

First up were Deviled Eggs as an appetizer. As hard as it may be to believe I've never actually made these before. They've always been an item that I've requested others to bring but never got around to making myself. They turned out pretty good! That Betty Crocker sure knows what she's talking about. (Nate and I had to sample them just to make sure they were worthy of our dinner table!)

The other new item I tried out was a recipe I saw on Pinterest. After seeing a few Facebook pictures I think a lot of people made these this year! The premise is simple a strawberry dipped in white chocolate then dipped in blue sprinkles. I had to improvise a bit and use a spoon to spoon the sprinkles on the chocolate as dipping the strawberries into the sprinkles created a mushed up mess. I also learned how to make colored sprinkles when I discovered that the enormous amount of blue sprinkles I thought I had in my pantry was actually a very tiny amount. But after learning that sugar mixed with food coloring can create such a nice sprinkle mixture I don't think I'll be buying colored sprinkles again! I also think I'm going to try these again but with blue-colored melted chocolate. The sprinkles were a fun way to add the blue but they also added a grainy texture to the strawberries. Still tasted good but I think the overall awesomeness of these strawberries might be improved with just chocolate (white and blue colored) and no sprinkles. Next year!

Dinner for 2.5 was very relaxing. Marinated steak, corn on the cob, salad with homemade dressing, Deviled eggs, and patriotic strawberries for dessert. Nate and I had a relaxing time talking to each other about the day's activities and other random topics and Abby had fun going between her booster seat and the other available chair eating the strawberries and then sucking off the chocolate when she realized she didn't have to eat the strawberry to get to the chocolate!

This Fourth of July holiday may not have been filled with lots of people, noisy fireworks, or an enormous amount of activities but it was filled with lots of laughter, family togetherness, and good home-cooked food. We are truly blessed to live in a country where freedom means something. God bless America! Happy Independence Day!

Arlington, OR

Prior to having Abby, taking a trip down to visit Nate's parents in Oregon always included an adventure on the way home. Sometimes we would divert off the freeway to take one of the 'Historical Highway' exits, visit and hike up Multnomah Falls, check out the scenery from Vista House, or even cross over to the Washington side of the Columbia River to climb Beacon Rock. These adventures could take as little as a 15-minute detour to a pit stop of a couple hours. Regardless of what we ended up doing we always enjoyed the little bit of non-driving time on the way home as well as the 'togetherness' that each opportunity brought us.

After having Abby these side trips fell by the wayside. Instead our driving strategy on the way home took on the mentality that we wouldn't stop for nothing, nobody, no way, now how. You had to be bleeding for us to even contemplate pulling over, and even then we'd try to determine how badly you were bleeding. Amputation smamputation. Driving home with a screaming baby was way worse. :-)

So on this last trip driving home from Portland I had fear in my heart when I realized we were still an hour and a half from home and Abby was up from her too-short nap and started to fuss. Nate had the idea to stop at the next town and let Abby get out of the car and run around for a bit in some random school field. (On a different trip our Miss Abby would NOT go down for a nap so we ended up hanging out in the Boardman,OR school's soccer field for a half hour or so to get the wiggles out. While Boardman has a great diner that serves amazing Chocolate Peanut Butter milkshakes their kid friendly areas are few and far between.) I was nervous when I saw that the next town coming up was Arlington. Arlington, OR, population 586 in 2010 (yep, you read that right!) is a teeny, tiny town in the middle of Eastern Oregon. It's literally a town you pass by on your way to bigger and better things. I knew there was a gas station, but that's about it. I had visions of trying to entertain Abby in a gas station parking lot, in a desert field, or in the back of our SUV.

Imagine my surprise when I saw a park with green grass! A playground! A lake with swimming area! It was this perfect play spot in the middle of tumbleweeds and wheat fields!

We hadn't thought to bring Abby's swimsuit, so we just stripped her down to her diaper. She's my little water baby! Charged right into the lake without hesitation, not even hesitating at the semi-cold water.

She loved stomping the water with her feet and making splashes.

There was a family of ducks swimming out in the middle of the lake that caught her attention. After that it became an adventure on getting as close to the ducks as possible as they made their way to shore.

Abby is thankful her Daddy is so tall as he was able to wade out pretty close to the ducks.

Swishing the water with her hands was also another favorite game. The bottom of the lake was a nice sand so each step stirred up a soft cloud of dirt. It made for a fun 'toy' to interact with. I also love this picture as it shows as hands-on a Father Nate is. He was actively playing and talking with her while she went 'swimming'. Such a great Dad!

I got my turn to roll up my capris and get a little wet myself. Of course it was on my watch that she took a misstep and almost tumbled in!

After swimming we decided to walk up towards the playground area. Here Abby is waving "bye" to her duck friends.

The sand made walking a little difficult. :-) 

Nate doesn't get as much playground experience with Abby as I do so it's fun to watch the differences in how we parent. He really joins in on her adventures whereas I find I circle the grounds keeping her out of harm but rarely get up on the playground equipment with her.

My honey bunny loves to drive!

We probably spent 45 minutes or so enjoying the break from driving/riding and enjoying our time playing together as a family. When we were finally all back in the car we both noticed that Abby was much more content to play with her baby doll and stare out the window. While she didn't fall asleep we didn't hear hardly a peep out of her for the rest of the trip. I kept thinking she'd passed out only to have Nate tell me that she was just watching the world go by (we'd switched drivers during our stop). All in all we were very surprised to see this park in such an obscure location, but have added it to our list of stops should one become necessary (and recommend that others stop by and check this spot out). I think we may even find ourselves getting back into the habit of taking side trips on the way home from Nate's parents again. That is, of course, so long as Abby is awake. If she's sleeping it's a race home like usual!

Exterior House Remodel

After waiting and waiting for the Spring rains to end, Nate and I were finally able to have the exterior of our house repainted. When we bought the house in 2010 Nate noticed that a good portion of the fascia boards were beginning to rot, and that the paint on the house was so thin that he was worried that the actual house itself would start showing weather damage. However, we knew that the inside needed more help than the outside so that's where we started. After redoing the inside of the house and thoroughly enjoying those updates we were just itching to get the outside looking as pretty as the inside (okay, I was itching for that...Nate was itching to get everything sanded and repainted so he didn't have to worry about our house rotting down around us).

We were thrilled with the job that Chris from Color Effects did on the inside so we hired him for the outside work as well. Due to the rainy spring our painting date kept getting pushed back and back so when we finally did get the call that Chris could paint our house in three days, we were caught unprepared as we hadn't yet officially picked out our paint colors. No worries, though because I figured that I'd learned so much from my previous painting job (Baby's Room) that there would be no problem with this paint job. Boy, was I wrong! Nate and I picked the color of our house by actually driving past a house one day and both commenting on how much we liked the colors of the house. Nate stopped by and asked the owner for the name/number of the color of paint for the main part of the house and I figured we were done picking colors (as I knew I wanted true black and white as accent colors). So when Chris called saying he was really to paint that week I went to the paint store and picked up samples of each of the paint colors, brought them home and put up a small amount of paint on the house to confirm colors, and promptly forgot about checking on the colors after they'd dried. I noticed that the main house color looked a little green but figured that that green tinge would go away when the paint was dry. That evening when Nate came home I mentioned that I painted a sample of our paint colors and had already given the paint numbers to Chris who had called earlier in the day to confirm colors. Upon Nate going outside I knew I'd gotten myself into a mess when I heard "Um, honey? Have you checked on the paint colors since you painted them?" Uh oh.

I walked outside to view the nastiest color of baby poo green I'd ever seen! Obviously, the color number we were given by the homeowner was either a different color's number or a dyslexic moment. Either way this was NOT an acceptable color to paint on our house. A quick call to Chris worsened the situation as he'd already put in the order for our paint with the paint store. Eek! I then looked at the clock and realized that I only had 30 minutes to drive from our house to the paint store and pick out a new house color before the store closed. I had no choice, though, as Chris was set to come over to our house the following morning to begin the painting. So with a rush of wind I flew out the door and drove as fast as I could without getting a ticket like a responsible adult and obeyed all speed limit signs. I literally picked up every swatch of brown color that the paint store had, rejected all those I didn't like at first glance, and picked out three new paint samples from the only three colors I found acceptable. Upon arriving at home I painted some sample blocks and Nate and I picked out the color we both liked. The next morning I drove back to the paint store to see if they could turn my yuck green color into my new pretty brown color. The sales person was so cute as he looked at both colors and tried to find a polite way to tell me I was out of my mind if I thought I could turn A into B before telling me that it simply wasn't possible. :-) So I ordered another 8 gallons of paint in the needed color and got this paint mixed up just before the painters arrived to pick up the paint on their way to our house. Whew! Dodged that potentially nasty bullet!

I'm ever so pleased with how our new house colors turned out, but was once again reminded that I need to think, think, and think again when it comes to painting projects! I have a tendency to be to last-minute with these decisions and it ends up creating so much extra work. Hopefully, the third times the charm so that whenever this third painting project comes up I'm prepared and thorough and will have a much easier time of it. :-)

A view of the house before painting. Grey with white trim. Boring, boring, boring.

A little closer of a view.

My new house! I never seemed to be able to get outside at a time without shadows so  here's a picture of the color in the sun. Brown house with white and black trim. Notice the black front door? We decided to get a new front door that had a small window in it to help light up our front entry way (as it was pretty dark when compared to how light the rest of the house is).

Here may be a better view of the house with it's new colors even though it's a bit darker without the sun shining on it.

Here's a closer view of the house with the new door and flower box up.

Here's a closer view of the house minus the shadows/sunlight.  

Now we just need gutters on the outside (it's like running the gamut to get inside without having a huge waterfall run down your back every time it rains) and our exterior house remodeling project will be complete! Hopefully those will go up by the end of the month. Ahh, it's a great feeling to check off another project off our To Do list!