Happy Father's Day!!!!
Spending a family day, together. Well, actually, it was a family four hours. Then we came home and the Sunday Night Carnage started up: homework, dinner, baths, dishes, finishing laundry, Mom typing (or not, as was the case THIS Sunday) ... and then I climbed into bed at 10:47 p.m., fully expecting to get through the two movie reviews and book review I have started, but I fell asleep.
Happy Dad's Day, babe. Some Bunny loves ya...
You have no idea how hard it is to get this kid to smile for photos...
Just for the record...this is Barnet Marine Park in Burnaby. We're so lucky to live so damn close to gorgeous stuff like this, even if the taxes are putting us in the poorhouse and the teachers are a bunch of sniveling whiny asses.
You heard me.
If they strike this fall, we're going to private school. (I just have to find 15,000 extra dollars lying around.)
(There is something up with these post formats...I keep trying to put spaces in between paragraphs and it is ignoring me. Maybe the Blogger programmers were edjakated in B.C.)
Once again, I give you...Yaunna...
But you can't really keep her. Just remember that she's 12-1/2, and she usually acts like it.
However, she told me yesterday she wants to earn some more money. "Could you and Daddy go out so I can babysit and earn some cash?"
"Why, of course, my darling!" I said. "I'd love to go out and part with my coinage so you can mind your charming little brothers. Whatever will you buy with your riches?"
At this point, I sorta cringed, fully expecting her to say that she would hit the mall for make-up, earrings, fashion magazines, a belly piercing.
"I want to go to Build-A-Bear," she said.
Damn, that rocks. "Sure, Yaun. We'll go out this week, I promise."
Still my wee girl for another moment or two.
Could she BE any more gorgeous????
Yup. That's my kid, playing in the sand. She's so purty...I so proud.
To Daddy...Love Kendon
We have the world's GREATEST sitter. This was the card Kendon made for Daddy at Bena's house. There is also a laminated paperboard tie that fits around his neck with elastic, decorated with a monster truck sticker and some stars and hearts.
Gary is going to wear it to a pitch meeting, just for luck.
What did YOU do for Father's Day?
Yaunna is feigning a punch. Brennan is protecting himself with feathers infused with magical powers (and bird parasites, I'm sure).Yaun freaked when she saw we were taking the feathers home with us...she was afraid we would get BIRD FLU.Gotta love her...(illegal to trade her in...).
This is my baby boy...now 16...we love ya, Blakey...
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BLAKE!I never thought, 16 years ago today, that things would turn out as brilliantly as they have for you. You're an amazing, intelligent, handsome, compassionate young man, and I'm so proud of the human you are becoming. It's been a challenging road behind us, but the journey ahead shows great promise.
I love you, Blake (a.k.a. Nuba)...
Mom
xoxo
P.S. The rest of the family adores you, too, and we will call and sing to you tomorrow when you're not surrounded by family and friends. One of these days, let's have your party at OUR house, 'k?
This is the BEST photo...
Don't you agree?
If I'd only known then what I know now, would I change anything?
That is my man. Being adorable. He's a total momma's boy, which is fine. Kendon is the burdened child, I must say. So far, he has exhibited qualities that will lead him down a road less traveled, unless his dad and I pave the way for him first. He will be a writer or an artist. Put money on it. Poor kid... Blake has joined the fire cadets. He will be playing varsity football this fall. He will be driving on his own in two months' time. He is considering a career in the Coast Guard. And he talked to "That Girl I Told You About" the other day for the first time. I told him to keep It in his pants. He said I was disgusting.Yaunna will be a dog handler and breeder. I think she'd be a great dermatologist because she loves to pick at things and inspect wounds that ooze. (Gross.) Whatever she does, she's not gonna take any crap from anyone. Yesterday, her best friend (who stands 5'3" tall) was not feeling well. Upon asking the teacher to refill her water bottle, said friend was denied permission to leave the room, despite her raging sore, dry throat. So Yaunna, in all of her 4'2" fortitude, marched to the teacher's desk and made an argument on her friend's behalf. "Oh," the teacher said, "I didn't realize she was not feeling well. In that case...". The water bottle was refilled, the friend was grateful as her aching throat was soothed, and Yaunna proved herself as a Champion of Friendships. Perhaps she should be a lawyer...Brennan will be a professional gamer. Or an athlete. You should SEE that kid with a hockey stick, or with a baseball, or with a football. He's fast, he's agile, and he's a natural. But, he's also a computer geek. Smartie pants. If, perhaps, he blows out his knee or develops a debilitating case of carpal tunnel preventing him from reaching his potential in the tech sector, he could always do stand-up. He'll be Class Clown. And then there's my sweet little Kendon. (And for the record, today Kendon is not my favorite child. Brennan is. Tomorrow Blake will be my favorite because it's his 16th birthday. And so on. It changes every day, depending on who has pissed me off the least, who made me laugh the loudest, or who asked for the least amount of cash.) Kendon isn't little anymore; he's nearly 2. But he's sweet. Look at those cheeks. And he's the kid who always has to have a pen in his hand. His LEFT hand. I have TWO lefties...three, if you count Husband. Weird, eh? Kendon concentrates like no other kid I've ever seen. And his brother has introduced him to the world of puzzles. I'm so lucky to have such smart brats.Man, this is getting all 'motional, so I need to go shower or kick the dog or something. (KIDDING, Yaunna. I'll go pluck hairs out of the cat's tail instead...).
It's fuzzy, but it's ACTION!
THE SLIDE IS ATTACHED!"It WORKS, Mom! WATCH!"
You can only see the soles of her dirty feet, but Yaunna is in the background using POWER TOOLS to bore a hole through the wood to install the captain's wheel. She pulled it off and now the boys can sail the high seas in style. (The fort will be frequented by multiple members of the family (and her friends) as it places a body high enough to be able to see into a certain someone's yard and spy on them with love goggles, er, I mean binoculars. Ssshhh...our little secret.)
Whaaat?
What did I say?
The Life of Beagles
In my next life, I'm a beagle.I want to spend my days lounging on the giant crab sandbox, sunning my fat gut and licking the parts of my body that I can FINALLY reach (hallelujah).
We see who the Queen of the Crustacean is around here...notice Lila's perch atop the crab and Nat's assignment to the turf. That's OK. He soon tired of lying around and resumed his efforts to dig a hole to China.
I'm thinking, Mom...hang on...
Being 4 is tough. There are so many things to think about...like when/if I will ever get a haircut, if I should pound my brother into the sandbox, whether I can hide some ants in my sister's bed, whether I'd be willing to get close enough to the ants to capture them to transport them to my sister's bed, whether I'd have enough Cootie Spray to be adequately and safely protected from touching my sister's bed...
Mom: "Hey, Bren! You're my favorite...?"
Bren: "FOUR-YEAR-OLD!"
Four is great. Two, not so great. Twelve and a half, even worse. Sixteen...oy vey. (Happy almost birthday, Blake.)
Brotherly love...for a moment...
Sssshhh...they're playing
together. That's a rubber skeleton in Brennan's hand, and soon after this photo, Kendon discovered it and decided he wanted it. That led to a break in the cease fire, sorta like Hamas and Fatah. Or whatever they're called. Just a lot of shouting, hollering, some sand throwing, then it was over.
And of course, Kendon is wearing the Obligatory Thomas the Tank Engine shirt. He can't live without one on. (Our house is a sick testament to the will of our children...trains and hedgehogs, baby. That's what life is made of.)
Daddy built us a TREE FORT!
Testing out the tree fort before the slide was attached. There's Bren, his usual maniac, high-intensity self. And Yaunna...reading her Seventeen magazine, doing her best to pout. I think I will be sending her to California until she turns 22. Mom?
Eat your heart out, Little Mermaid...
Yes, it's blue. It looks green in the photo, but it is really two shades of blue.
Blake, don't freak. It washed out. (DAMMIT!)
I just was tired of looking like a soccer mom. My nose piercing is long closed up and I'm bored of being "one of those hens" that clucks her way up and down the street.
And that's not a cold sore on my lip. It's a pimple. Proof that I'm still young...enough.
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