Poof! The kitchen is magically clean!

My PSA for the day:
Let me make this perfectly clear, THE OVEN IS NOT A DEVICE FOR STORING DIRTY DISHES. Let me say that again just to be clear. THE OVEN IS NOT A DEVICE FOR STORING DIRTY DISHES! For those of you who don't use your ovens this may be a perfectly fine solution, but I USE my oven and need it to be dish free when I go to preheat it. See that device just across the way? The one with the baskets that roll out for convenient placement of dishes? The dishes get much cleaner if you put them in there. Oh, and if that device is already full? The dishes come out of there and get stored in the cabinet up there (where you usually find them when you need them.)

Thank you. I now return you to your normal programming.

Chickens are evil

Poor little Sammi woke up last night howling. All she could get out at first was that she had a bad dream. Finally she was able to tell us that she dreamed chickens were pecking out her eye. Where would she get such an idea? I haven't a clue. We have most definitely not been telling her stories about possessed chickens. Now possessed goat? That's another matter. ;)

So this is what a quiet house sounds like?

In an effort to actually achieve naptimes today I ended up splitting up all three girls. Val was the first to fall asleep in her crib, then the girls had to be seperated which left Riley in her room (I think she's finally asleep) and Sam sleeping on the couch. As an added bonus (if you could call it that) Stacey also fell asleep, on the family room floor.

Me? Wide awake enjoying the quiet while doing dishes, making a cake, folding laundry, emailing, blogging, and IM'ing. Whew! Maybe I should nap too.

I'm a jockstrap?

Thanks to Wen I had to take thMyers Briggs personality test.

Apparently my personality style is "Supporter". Unfortunately I'm not surprised by these results. What are you?

Bell Break

Today I took the girls around the block on their tricycles. They wanted to go because they got bells for their bikes and wanted to try them out.

Now around the block doesn't sound very far, but it is when you're only 3. To motivate them I had them pedal, pedal, pedal til they got to a shady spot. When they reached the shady spot they got a bell break meaning they could ring their bels as much as they wanted to, then it
was off to the next shady spot. Fortunately there are many trees on this block, so lots of opportunities for bell breaks.

Sam, then and now.

This is Sam in a solidly built wooden cradle that used to belong to my MIL when she was a child. Sam was so tiny when she was born that she actually looked small in the doll bed. At 3 years old she has overcome the small size issue.

Psuedo Camping

Today was a very busy day for me, cleaning, sorting, organizing, recycling, and generally cleaning out a bunch of stuff I didn't need. At the end of the day it didn't look like I did much, but I knew I had, so I decided I needed some relaxation and my girls needed some fun. As a result we took the best part of camping to our backyard, somemores. Mmmmmm.

Bill went to the store and obtained the necessary ingredients, and then built a wonderful fire in our firepit. The girls were so excited when we told them what we were going to do. They roasted their first marshmallows, and constructed their first ever somemores. None of this mattered to them however. What did matter was the delicious eating of the somemores, and then making more. Their eyes however, were too big for their tummies as neither one of them could down the second treat. More for me. ;)

Just in case you're curious, this is the perfect somemore.

They'll be hockey players yet.

Friday I had the pleasure of skating with all 3 of my girls. While Stacey is adamant about not playing hockey, Sam and Riley keep saying they want to play hockey with Mommy. (Proud smile on face.) They're still a long way from being able to play a game, just the fact that they asked to go skating made my day.

Trains, Busses, Bikes, and more...

Wednesday found us with a free day, so off we went to surprise Bill and take him to lunch. The girls were excited because we were taking a train. Little did they know that was just the beginning of our transportation for the day. From the train we hopped the muni bus which dropped us fairly close to where Bill works. We walked on up only to discover that he had already had lunch (it was just before noon when we got there.) Oh well, the girls and I still had to eat, so after meeting some co-workers we were once again on our way. We had a quick sandwich for lunch, grabbed a Jamba Juice, and decided to head down to Pier 39.

Getting to Pier 39 could be accomplished in many ways, but only 2 were viable for us, or so we thought. We could walk the 2 miles (we've done it before) or we could take the trolley. For those of you that have been to SF, have you ever tried to get on the trolley with 2 kids and a stroller? Let me tell you, it's not possible. While we were waiting a Pedicab came by, and I thought, "What the heck? The girls will get a kick out of it", so we hopped on. For those of you unfamiliar with Pedicabs, they are basically adult sized tricycles with a back seat for passengers. They are a little pricey, but let me tell you this man earned every penny. He had to pedal into a headwind on a single geared vehicle while hauling passengers.

After the ride we walked to the far side of the pier to see the sealions, took in a street show where we had the privilege of seeing a dude from the audience wearing boob dingers (desk bells on a necklace), stopped in the puppet shop and picked up a few additions for the girls puppet theater, took lots of pics including one of an R2D2 mailbox (just for McJedi), then walked the 2 miles back to Bill's office.

Once we reunited with Bill we walked another mile to the train station and took the train to Menlo Park where we had crepes for dinner, and then headed home. It was a very long day, and I was exhausted. Bottom line is that we all had fun, so that made it all worthwhile.

Weekend/Hubby update

This was one of my long weekends that I work all night, and sleep 1/2 the day so I can go back to work again. I don't know what got into Bill but he deserves a big thumbs up for productivity this weekend. By my count (and it may be off) he did 2 to 3 loads of dishes, 4 loads of laundry (even put some of it away), made me 2 very thoughtful (and yummy dinners), took the girls to the park, to soccer, and to the store, and to top the weekend off he even brought them and Harrison to my hockey game. We lost 4 - 2 and I was -3 for the game (boo), but it was nice to have them all there. The people on my bench kept commenting on how cute they were and how nice it was to have my family there cheering for us. I agree.

So proud of my girls

Banner day in 2 sports today

1. Swimming - both girls put there heads underwater. By themselves.
Laughing, smiling, and having a good time. Woo hoo!

2. Ice skating - there's a new little girl in their class that was
having some trouble. Riley was right next to her so she took her hand
to help her out. Then Sam skated over to them and took the girls other
hand to help out. It was so cute to see the three of them stepping
across the ice together.

Mommy beaming with pride.

Just a passing haiku thought

Just thought I would try,
Totally comfortable,
no metal in sight.

Welcome back to the 1830's

As much as I dislike Barbie, at least she always had a career in mind that was suppose to inspire young girls. (Yeah, I don't believe that either.) In any case, did we really need this? Sorry girls, you're only allowed to be pregnant, barefoot, and in the kitchen now. Forget those voting rights, women's lib, and the like. Now don't get me wrong. I cherish my role as a Mom, and I hope someday my girls will too, but there's so much more to life before then. Do we really need our children pretending they're pregnant?And what about the kids that don't have the pictured "Happy Family"? Does that make their family wrong? There is so much wrong with this product that I can't even scratch the surface.
This makes me want to write a letter.

Lest you think this is a hoax that I found on the internet, be assured this is a photo I snapped (see flash in upper right corner) in a toy store window. So not only is it being sold, but it's being promoted as one of the best, most desirable toys out there. Ugh.