Today is My Birthday!

Disclaimer: Writing this before my birthday

Today is my BIRTHDAY!!!!

I am thrilled because I am all about birthday week.

Hopefully, we can do a beach day today.  That is my ideal way to celebrate my birthday, so thankful I was born in August so I get beach days on my birthday.

This year, however, I don't get a birthday week.

I get birthday WEEKS.

Seriously.

Exactly seven days from today, I am hopping on a plane and headed out to meet this family.

Becca.

Michael, Becca, Steve and Jack.

I just broke into a HUGE grin writing that.

Also, I have goosebumps.  I am all cold and jittery and hot and sure my neck is blotchy red because I am THAT excited.

In my senior year in high school, I hopped on a plane with my parents and brother and we flew to Hawaii.  Yes, Hawaii.  My uncle was stationed there so we spent some time with my aunt and family.  It is one of my happiest family memories.

I have never gotten on an airplane again.

So, for my birthday this year, I have told my husband not to get me a single thing.  Because he told me to go to Arizona.  Told me to go! Because he loves me so!

Whenever I go away on any sort of vacation or day trip, I always keep it as mum as I can.  I wait until I get home and say, "Surprise! I went away! Here are the highlights!"

Not this time.

This time I am going to share as much as I want in the moments I experience it.

I think Becca will too.

So you better be following her blog.

Seven days.

In seven days I am going to get on a plane.

Scares me to death.

Baby steps, baby steps...

And then I get to spend FIVE days with Becca.

There are NO words to how excited I am.  How thrilled I am.  How annoying I have been squealing around my house and to anyone who will listen to me.

Can. Not. Wait.

First Day Back to "Normal"

Today was the first day the boys went back to school.  It was also a work day for me.

Last night I had the boys find their back packs (they were gone for good, they were sure, assuring them that they could stay home longer.  Amazingly, S1 and I found them.  Also, we found the lunch boxes. One was hidden, I kid you not, behind a ten pound bag of potatoes.), pack their lunches, pick out their clothes and reacquaint themselves with soap.  Then we all snuggled on the couch, I got out a box of chocolates for the boys to pick through and I read aloud to them from a silly book we have been reading.

We all are really enjoying this book.

AND the main character is a girl....AND I did NOT pick it out (but I was pretty happy they did).

It was a good last night of vacation.

But this morning we woke up to temperatures colder than they have been all season - who wants to wake up to that? - and S4 literally bawled from the moment he sat down for breakfast until he sat down in the suburban.  We made it to school on time, braving roads of sheer ice, only to realize S3 forgot his book, S4 forgot his lunch AND his boots.

When I arrived home to get myself ready for work - and find all the lost items I would now be dropping off at school - my husband called to chat with me and ask me to go out and check our outdoor wood stove.  I did, got myself dressed in layers of clothes to ward off the cold, and headed to work.

As I was driving there, I realized something smelled burned just terrible.  I figured it was my coat from throwing wood in the fire, but it seemed worse than that.  I let out my hair from the bun it was in and then I realized....I had seriously singed my hair when I threw wood in the furnace.

The pharmacy was out of sudafed for my cold so I dropped the lunch and boots off, hurried into work and told Alicia my sad tale.  Because she is such a good friend, she painstakingly cut out just the single burnt hairs - as well as she could - so I wouldn't have to chop a huge chunk of my hair off.

My husband, who I had called so he would know my disgust rather than just sending him a text to tell him, laughed hysterically.  Alicia and I did not find it funny in the least.  Alicia painstakingly cut each individual piece of singed hair for me so I wouldn't be missing such a huge chunk.  When she was sure she had most of it she said, "I am so sorry.  Maybe heavy duty conditioner will help it?"

After work, I picked up the boys.  S1 was groaning over the pain of having homework again, S2 was starving and needed cereal post haste, S3 was jumping for joy to go home and S4 informed me he needed a little nap and time with his train tracks but he was NOT tired.

We had to stop at Weicks, the local grocery store, for sudafed for my now throbbing head.  But thanks to all the meth heads, they can't sell me any until the government gets some program done.  The pharmacist showed me the third best medicine for my sinus cold (since the second best was sold out) and wished me luck.

While I was doing all this, I told the boys to get themselves some bag juices for lunches.  I knew we were low.  S1 mentioned Little Debbie snacks and I just waved a "fine" to them.

As I was standing in line to pay I looked for the first time what they were having me buy.  Four boxes of pop tarts (real blueberries in two boxes, but chocolate fudge and s'mores in the other two), cloud cakes (think twinkies), chocolate chip muffins (for a healthy morning snack), zebra cakes, frosted fudge cakes and oatmeal cream pies - gotta have the healthy oatmeal.

But, just being glad we survived the day thus far, I paid and we headed home where S1 retreated to his new office spot in the landing upstairs, S2 devoured two bowls of cereal, S3 and S4 checked on the bunnies and are now building an elaborate train track.

I, my dear readers, am waiting for the third best cold medicine to kick in while I am  hunkered down in the laundry room with seriously singed hair.  Yes, the laundry room.  It's the warmest room in the house and I am terrible cold.  I also have been so on top of my laundry I have nothing soft to sit on.  But it's worth it to share with the world how my day went.

Oh, and S1 just found me.  I have to think through my foggy brain to figure out decimals.  Happy first day back to homework for me too.

How did YOUR first day back to "normal" go?

Cabela's Recap

Cabela's for a girl....

Was a ton of fun.

My husband informed me that was because I am not a girly girl. I wanted to argue with him, but I was just to heads over heels in love with the fact that we were on vacation that I didn't.

My hubby was a blast all weekend. When I found this nasty, can't believe they made that, stuffed opossum toy in the kids part of the store, I had to have him take my picture with it.

Because I hate and detest and loathe and can't stand opossums. Here are two stories about my life dealing with the nasty things (click HERE, one is one of the very first blog posts I ever wrote. And next Praise and Coffee the Magazine, you are gonna hear a whole long out saga about one.)

After we had returned to our totally boy themed hotel (it even had deer painted tiles in the shower), my husband went back to Cabela's and bought me the opossum.

It is sitting beside me as I type this and makes me smile and my tummy do little flip flops of love for him. Because it makes me laugh whenever I get over jumping in fear over the sight of it sitting on my desk and that he did that was so unlike him that I love him all the more for it.

He also got himself some fudge. My brother got me some roasted nuts that had smelled so good while we were looking around all day.

Jake loooooooooooooooooooooves fudge. He loves me more, but just barely.

This is adorable Jr. He picked a hat out so he looked like Woody from Toy Story, his ultimate favorite movie, and my brother than got him a gun. Because Jr needed to defend himself against S1 and S3 (or my brother needed to battle with them). They are just plain fun. Because they are loud. Really loud. And with all three of them going off, not a one of us wondered where our room was. We could just hear it.
The hotel was nice. The sheets were soft, the blankets were warm (they had a price list in the bathroom and all weekend Jake and I would tease "These sheets are soooo nice." "Are they 75 dollars nice?" Or, "I think they mighta overpriced this 15 dollar alarm clock, I think I can get one at Family Dollar for five dollars.")

We ordred pizza at the recommendation of the girl working the evening shift at the hotel. I for one could probably live on pizza and I will have happy dreams of River's Edge Pizza for a very very very long time.

The Holiday Inn Express had a tiny pool (but will soon have a water park) that the boys took full advantage of and Hubs had great fun playing chicken with the boys and tossing them in the air and all sorts of pool fun. Jr cheered when he was in the pool and cried when he left. The boys looked like prunes at the end of both nights.

It was just good to lay around being lazy and talking and catching up with my brother and sister in law and hearing Jr urge us to "come on!" so he could climb steps and see what cool things we had hidden upstairs in the hotel (nothing).

A truly perfect weekend.

CABELA'S

We arrived at Cabela's on Saturday morning at two minutes past nine am. Because we thought they opened at nine. They open at eight. Had we known that, the boys would have had us there at eight.

It is just absolutely amazing to see all there is to see. There is so much you miss because there is sooooo much. And it's all placed so well, as though you are truly watching these wildlife scenes play out.

They are so realistic, Abraham pulled the dramatic "I'm so frightened" card while the others were loving every moment. And I forgot to get a picture later when he was begging to just go look at the polar bear just one more time.

I think they were happy to finally really be there.

In Cabela's.

There are huge live fish in this pool. You can feed them and check out the mountain. I was snapping photos and praying they didn't fall in. Because I know my boys. They have some of my traits...they could have fallen in easily.

This mountain is just so impressive.

It was nearly impossible to see the fish. Andrew, taking after his father as he is the first born, suggested we should start picking up all the fish food people had dropped to get more food for our money.
The fish didn't care. They were happy to eat up everything. We have their happiness on video.

Okay, you have to admit, this is cool.

I found this to be the perfect place to pose for a photo. (My shirt says My Husband Rocks, you can find them here. Jake thought it was brilliant I wore pink, I was easy to spot wherever I wandered off to. I was happy to wear it, I was soooooooooo thrilled Jake was with us on vacation!)
All the aquariums were a blast. S4 met up with one of the family members of the rubber back turtle he met earlier this summer. The pictures were hard to take in that light...but we took video!

It's obviously an elephant and a fight in a tree.

I don't know what else to say.

Those two things were next to the Gun Library. Filled with Guns. Abraham (S4) did not get it. How do you have a library with just guns? He is still confused by this.

Andrew hopes to shoot a buck like this. Next fall. Or sometime soon.

Or anytime.

Here is a happy S4. All he wanted was a stuffed animal and he chose this Elk. And then he had to have him pose by his family. Elk has not left his side since he was placed in the cart.
These photos I love. Let me explain. We don't have video games here at home, no wii, no knex, nothing. So they were thrilled to try to play about every game we came across. S4 wanted to play this shooting game in the worst way and since he wasn't doing well - AT ALL - S1 bent down and helped him steady the gun.
All the boys were enthralled and it made my heart melt that they just all cheered for S4 in his "first hunt".

When they moved on to car races, I have made the decision they will never ever get their licenses. It totally cracked me up to see their different body languages behind the wheel.
It was a brilliantly wonderful fun filled day. We took the boys to Applebees for lunch where they had no idea how they could c0ok us all different foods and then they wanted to know what happened if they needed more food?

My boys, you can tell we eat home every night.

I did not take nearly enough photos of all the beauty of Cabela's. Because it truly was beautiful.

We let all the boys choose a gift to take home. Jake got a sweatshirt, I found a pair of shoes I had been drooling over in the bargain cave (score!), Andrew got a huge target for his bow and forked over his own money to buy a pop gun (and since that moment, all I have heard is pop guns.), Isaac bought a rubber band gun and we bought him an under armor turtleneck he hasn't taken off in over 48 hours now, Eli also found a pop gun - gleeful he has the one item he truly wanted - and, as you seen, Abraham got his stuffed Elk.

It

Was

Wonderful.

As we wandered Jake and I realized, in thirteen years of marriage, we have never ever been on vacation together with all our boys. We have never ever told them they could choose one gift.

It was precious.

4 Boys Reaction to "Surprise, we are going to Cabela's!"

Quite some time ago my brother asked me "Hey, you want to go to Cabela's in February with the boys?"

"Sure...if it all works out", was my reply, I believe.

So he got to work finding out when our mid winter break was, what hotel we should stay at and perfectly arranged the details of our weekend away.

He's good like that. Excellent, really. I would have had the best of intentions and never gotten to it.

And then, as the time came closer, we realized with glee that my husband had the time free to go with us. That we could, in fact, go on our first EVER vacation as a family together.

Of course, there is camping - but there he meets us and leaves us - this we would all be together for the whole weekend for the first time in a hotel.

Jake and I made the fun decision to not tell the boys. My brother and his wife worked diligently to keep it a secret. We schemed and planned it all out, we could not wait to surprise the boys with the news.

If you have followed the blog at all, you know fully that Cabela's is about the most wonderful place our boys could imagine being. Hello? Hunting? Camping? Camo? They have studied the Cabela's catalog for hours of their young lives, carefully marking dream items and becoming well versed on what page certain hunting items were to be found.

Years ago, my brother took our two oldest boys there for an afternoon and they talk of that day as one of the highlights of their lives. But the rest of us had never been there before.

The day we were to leave arrived, sunny and fifty but very windy. I kept finding excuses to get the boys outside (honestly, it wasn't too difficult, they were off of school for the day and it was warm enough to play football outside) and every time they would go outside I would pack something.

I folded laundry and pulled aside outfits for the boys to wear.

I snuck suitcases into our bedroom.

I dug through dressers for their carefully guarded cash so they could purchase new treasures of their own.

I even brought along their A.R. books the two oldest were engrossed in.

All my episodes of 24 were working in my favor as I would dash through the rooms for favorite stuffed animals and pack them away with no one catching on to Moma's strange acting behavior.

And I pulled it off, amazingly enough.

As we tried to get our times coordinated, I would hide in my soundproof (thanks to the packed racks of clothes) closet to work out the wrinkles. Jake wasn't home, but he was meeting us at home where we would all drive down together. My brother and sister in law were at an ultrasound to see if they should start picking girl or boy names for Jr's new sibling and I was in charge of getting us all on the road together. At the same time.

We had one dog staying home with our great neighbors to care for it and keep an eye on the stove for us (it heats our house and water and is our one and only source of heat) but our other dog, Sadie, was headed to Jake's buddy's house (one day I'll introduce you to him, he is a true dog whisper...I am not even slightly exaggerating. Sadie was at a literal doggie spa and school when she stayed with him and his wife.). And as it would happen, we had a bit of a glitch with the dog drop off so my brother headed off without us.

I waited for Jake to arrive home, we dropped the news on the boys.

This is how they took the news.......

Think they were excited?

So within five minutes of this, the packed suitcases were thrown in the suburban, we were headed in the complete opposite direction to drop of our Sadie girl, my brother ended up getting an hour head start ahead of us and we drove into the night to begin our Cabela's Adventure...........

All Alone

I am alone here on our little farm. I am still surrounded by the boys, still making coffee for Hubby and me, still cooking the big dinners, still listening to Mr. Goose and Miss Goosey playing with the rotting pumpkins outside but I am all alone here on our little farm.

My mom is on vacation.

We have a favorite aunt. To all my relatives who read this, well, you should have been able to tell by now that Auntie is our favorite. We love Auntie so much! All my life she has traveled with Air Force Uncle and this time she is in Virginia, and her oldest is getting married. Mom and my sister, DP, and Baby Backup headed down for the wedding and support for before, during and after the wedding.

I am a grown woman, I am happily married, I have all these boys who call me Moma but my Mom packs up to leave for ten days and suddenly I feel all alone.

I was okay with her leaving. Truly, I was. She and I had our crack berry’s (um, blackberries) and I knew she would be emailing me pics of where they were and what they were up to. I was just fine with them going, there wasn’t anything pressing for them here and I was happy they could go. I had tried to rack my brain for a way to go but there is no one who has a vehicle large enough for three extra boys to tag along to school and not to mention all the work there with them even if I took S4 with me. There was just now way.

And I was fine with that.

Until I was accidentally called.

Mom has a habit of accidentally calling me. She will not mean too, her phone just figures it had better call me. And so she did today. I answered it and heard them chatting in the back ground. I could here Auntie calling my mom “Sister!” just the way only she can. I could here DP singing some terrible awful song in some hideous opera tone of voice. I could hear my mom talking about some outfit and a fan. I just kept saying “hello?” over and over again. Backup must have heard me because she would giggle with glee and she sounded very close to the phone.

I hung up and would pick the phone up again and I could still hear them. They must have all been in the same room because I could hear their chatting even if I couldn’t make out the whole conversation.

This went on for a few minutes. I couldn’t figure out how to disconnect the call, and really, I didn’t want to.

It was then I realized how far away they were and all I was missing.

GM, Jr’s Moma, my sister in law, called to tell me she was on her way to pick up Jr and it was her call that disconnected the call with my mom.

So what did I do? I called my mom.

“Hi, Hon!” she answered cheerily. I knew she had had the phone near her because she got it on the second ring.

“Any chance Backup had the phone?” I asked.

“I don’t think so, why?”


“Well…..” I took a deep breath and rattled off, “I hope Auntie finds a fan for your room but glad to hear you have a nice breeze with the windows. DP should not be watching whatever TV show is on because her singing stinks. If Auntie is trying on a new outfit, I need pictures. Backup must be having fun or else she thinks I’m great because she keeps laughing at my hellos.”

By the time I finished my spleal, she and I were laughing so hard I could hardly breathe and I am sure there were tears in her eyes too.

And that is when I really missed them.

Family, I am so thankful for mine.