Haircut and Highlights

I got my hair cut and colored this week, and my head feels pounds lighter. My hair is so dang thick - my hairdresser has to thin it out a ton and can never get over how much hair is on the floor when we're done. She just has to point it out to everyone there. I ran into an older lady from church getting her hair colored also, and when she saw me she said, "Now you know my secret!" Heck, I'm getting grey hair too, and I'm only 32. That's why I have to highlight it - to cover up the yucky grey. That night at enrichment my friends were complimenting me and asking about my hairdresser. I told them I like her because she knows how to handle my crazy thick hair and because she's so cheap - $50 for a cut and color. They were shocked - one girl just spent $120 for the same thing, and she said her husband was ticked. Dave loves my hair and said I should go as often as I want to.

Field Trip

The theme in cub scouts this month is When I Grow Up. So for our den meeting today we took a little field trip to the fire station downtown. I ended up bringing Brennan with me because he woke up from his nap clingy with a slight fever - I didn't want to leave him with someone like that. But as soon as we got there he totally perked up and loved it.We had 7 cub scouts and 4 adults, and the boys did a really good job listening, being respectful, and asking/answering questions. Shwew! It could have gone either way - you know how 8-10 year old boys can be.
There was some excitement when they got a call during the tour, and it was fun to watch them rush off.

But there were more firemen around to finish the tour. They gave us a ton of free stuff at the end - frisbees, magnets, wooden airplanes, coloring books, tattoos and stickers. They even gave Brennan a little stuffed dalmatian. Next week we are going to have a policeman come to our den meeting.

Finally!

Dave and I are overly-informed consumers. We just have to research a product to death before we can actually choose one. Our printer broke a few weeks ago, but we couldn't seem to replace it because we had to read all the reviews first to get the right one. We recently discovered a good product research site, but the thing about research is that you'll find problems with everything. I kept copying down model numbers I saw at the stores then looking them up online. People hated them all. The ones that did get good reviews cost several hundred dollars - more than we wanted to pay. Finally on Saturday we decided we just had to choose one - I needed to print out my lesson for Sunday and Dave has to print out his talk for next week. I mean seriously - this is not a major purchase. We just need it to print. Plus my scanner broke awhile ago, so I wanted an all-in-one. We ended up with a Canon MP480 for $80, which got decent reviews and had a good resolution scanner. It works great so far - printers have really come a long way since the last time we bought one. Mostly it just feels good to have the thing decided. I had no idea how much we print around here. Spencer scanned this picture to put in his ocean book. He painted it in 1st grade, and it's hanging up in his ocean bedroom.

Random Updates

Tyler received an award at school today for being dependable. He is also the first one in his class to earn his Self-Manager award. It's a program they have at school in which the kids are rewarded for good behavior and get extra privileges. Like when it's time for lunch or recess and the class is lining up, the self-managers can just go and don't have to wait in line.

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I've started taking Brennan to story time at the library every Friday morning. It's so cute to watch him sit still, listen to the books, and do the motions to the songs.

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I went to the Scouting Round Table last night and won a free haircut at a barbershop, men only. What the heck am I going to do with that? Other people won fun things like free pizzas and gift certificates for a local steakhouse.

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Brennan learned how to climb out of his crib! I never look forward to this milestone. He ended up sleeping on his floor at nap time. This could be a problem at bedtime, though, since Dallin likes to keep the door open

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Dallin has decided to change his name to Mr. Dude.

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Dave & I went out to lunch twice this week. I love having him work closer.

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Spencer scored the most points when his class played basketball. Not bad for the shortest kid in the class.

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I finally got around to doing our taxes, and we're getting much less back this year. Dang those tax brackets. Plus we were getting so much back the past few years that we reduced our withholdings. At least we don't owe money - I was sweating it there for awhile.

Kindergarten Round-Up

Today was exciting - we registered Dallin for Kindergarten! He is so excited about going. But I think that when I register Brennan in a few years, I will pick up the forms, fill them all out at home and just drop them off at the office later. It took me 45 minutes, and the whole time Dallin and Brennan were running around the office like crazy people. The office staff is super nice there (can you imagine if that happened in Maryland??) and just smiled at them, but it drove me nuts. It was fun to see all the teachers come and go while we were there; everyone was happy to see we'll be having another student attending next year. Tyler's teacher came up to me and told me some of the cute things he's said in class recently. She's right - he is a sweetheart. I wonder what kind of student Dallin will be. One thing is for sure - he'll finally be kept busy enough. We made play dough today. He wanted to bake something, but we already have cheesecake in the fridge, and I don't like to have more than 1 perishable dessert in the house at one time. There's nothing more depressing than throwing away moldy sweets.

The Bay

After Saturday morning chores, Spencer and Tyler asked if we could go to the bay so they could spend allowance money on shells. We had spent the last few Saturdays doing projects around the house, so we agreed it would be fun to go somewhere.First we ate lunch at our favorite fish and chips/french dip restaurant on the embarcadero. It was so warm we decided to eat outside. In fact the boys complained they were too hot, the crazies.

Then we walked down to the Shell Shop where Spencer and Tyler spent a very long time deciding what to buy. Tyler ended up getting a huge sand dollar (upper right) and Spencer got choral and a shell. And we made it out of there without breaking anything, which is always an accomplishment. After Tyler bought this shell, he went around showing us all the money the cashier gave back to him "because she's so nice!"

Then we drove to the bike path down by the rock and road scooters and such. We ended up at a little beach on the bay side, where the kids explored, climbed on rocks and found lizards, hermit crabs, sea anemone and of course more shells. And no one got too wet, which is amazing.

Catching up.

The basic problem with blogging/journaling is that the more you have to write about, the less time you have to write. Quite the catch 22. So let me just summarize a few highlights of the past couple weeks.

Last Saturday (10 days ago) we got another load of wood chips and put it all around the front yard. We've been wanting to do it pretty much since we moved in, and it looks tons better.

Our frogs have returned to the backyard with the spring weather, and the boys are thrilled. They really are the perfect pets - sitting under our big rock waiting to be played with then returned when we're done with them. They require no upkeep on our part, and of course they stay outside. Recently they found 3 frogs, put them in the driver seats of some toy trucks and raced them around the yard. (See how yucky and weedy my herb garden is next to the patio? Well Dave weeded it and put down weed barrier and the rest of the wood chips there Saturday, as well as planting that rose tree his office gave him in memory of Kevin. It looks beautiful.)

Last week was the Cub Scout Blue and Gold Banquet.
Spencer earned his Wolf badge, a whole 3 months early! It helps that I'm his leader.

We went to the bay on Saturday. I'll do another post about that, since I took lots of pictures.I watched Kristen's boys while they saw Ben's play Friday night, then they watched our boys so we could see it Saturday night. My brother played Lysander in A Midsummer Night's Dream, and we really enjoyed it. They did it Bollywood style, and my favorite part was the big Indian wedding dance at the end. They did a great job of keeping Shakespeare easy to understand and interesting. You know how boring those monologues can be.

But our most exciting news is that we have started giving Brennan wheat!!! We just had a feeling that we should try giving his some to see how he'd do. So last week I made apple oatmeal muffins, which have flour, eggs and milk in them. We gave him one and he devoured it. It was like he'd never eaten anything so wonderful in his life. But the best part was that he didn't get a rash! A year ago he would have developed hives all over his face after just one bite. We were going to start him out slow with just one, but then he wanted more and more. Can you blame him? He ended up eating 4 or 5 that day - no rash. Then we watched for diarrhea, his other main symptom last year. He didn't have any problems. Since then he has had sugar cookies, wheat bread, regular pancakes, cake (homemade and store bought), graham crackers, and pizza crust. I walked through the grocery store Saturday giddy with excitement about all the yummy foods I want to give him. But I realize we should still take it slow, so I just bought fish crackers (not cheddar). We are still watching for eczema, but he hasn't had any so far. I'm so happy I want to cry.