Gingerbread Houses

LittleMan's:

Perhaps LittleMan is disturbed in some way, as you can see that he has depicted a murder scene in front of the house, what with the dead snowman and dead tree. I assume that the snowman was chopping down a tree, and an environmentalist came along and killed him for it.

BigGuy's:


What's left now:


And last year's houses for comparison:
Mine:


BigGuy's:

I lied

I was going to post BigGuy's birth story, but I can't find it anywhere. It's probably sitting on an old hard drive somewhere. The basic story is 18 hours labor, posterior presentation, 4 hours transition-type labor, manual rotation, 3.5 hours blue-faced pushing, no medication/epidural, tiny tear, healthy mom, healthy baby. The end. Here we are the day after he was born:




Here's BigGuy's cake this year:


He asked for a chocolate cake with chocolate frosting. I planned to make a homemade layered round cake with homemade frosting, and then put Lighting McQueen & Mater on the top. But then I decided I didn't have enough time, so I let BigGuy choose one from the store. He chose Batman. He pronounced it "gross", but I think he just got a taste of black frosting or something.

Another Happy Firthday!

Today BigGuy is 5 years old! At this time 5 years ago, I was beyond exhausted. I had been pushing with all my might for 2 or 3 hours and still had another hour to go! I turned 21 just one week before BigGuy was born. I felt much better being a 21-year old mother than a 20-year old :-)

BigGuy was disappointed this morning. He thought that when he turned 5 he would look different. We asked him to explain more, and he thought he would be bigger. BigDaddy and I are both small/petite, so BigGuy has almost no chance at being big, lol. But you never know. My dad is 5'11", and BigDaddy's father was over 6 feet, so maybe there's a slight possibility that someday he'll be a "big" guy.

Cake pictures and possible edited birth story later.

Copying Smitten Kitchen

For today's post, I'll be copying Smitten Kitchen, except with poor photography and generic recipes.

Secret Recipe Chocolate Chip Cookies
(From a recipe card I got in the mail)





Secret Recipe Chocolate Chip Cookies after my 2-year old gets ahold of them while I'm downloading the previous pictures:



I like these cookies because they stand up tall (I measured them, and they are 0.5" to 0.7" high). I don't know if it's all the chocolate chips and nuts, or the huge scoop size, or what. The recipe is similar to Nestle Toll House Cookies, but Toll House Cookies don't stay big like this - they fall after you take them out of the oven, unless you use shortening, which I won't do.

Here's the recipe:


(Click it)

Veterans Day - Herb Ruth

This is my grandfather - Herb Ruth.



Herb joined the Navy in 1947, at age 17. He served for 4 years, left for 4 years, then re-entered. In 1964, he trained at the Naval Amphibious School in Coronado, California, as a member of UDT-R Training Class 32. He was the second oldest individual to be accepted into the training program at the time. He served as a Navy UDT/SEAL with UDT-11, SEAL Team One, and SEAL Team Two.

During his time in the Navy, Herb served in Korea and Vietnam and received numerous awards. He retired from the Navy in 1976. My uncle's website gives more details, stories, remembrances, and pictures and was the source of my information. (The site is newly under construction, so some pictures and content are still missing.)

After retiring from the Navy, Herb worked as a truck driver and then was a Utah Highway Patrolman (UHP). He suffered a heart attack in May 1980. The EMTs and paramedics who responded to the call were friends he knew through the UHP. While he was in the ambulance, the defibrillator would not work. As soon as they got Herb to the hospital and out of the ambulance, the defibrillator resumed working properly. He was meant to be taken at that time. I was born 6 months later, so I never knew my grandpa. My mom is sure that my younger sister must have known him in heaven, as she has some of his personality quirks.

Today I'll be remembering my grandpa and all the others who have served or are now serving our country. Thank you for your sacrifices.

Schedules

If you were to go back and read my first posts (which I recommend NOT doing), you would find that they were filled with "ideal schedules" and then lamentations that I had not followed the schedules. Rather than break from that boring tradition, I figure I'll continue it at least one more time.

Here's my ideal schedule:
5:00 wake up
5:00-5:30 study scriptures
5:30-6:30 do contract work
6:30-7:00 get ready for work
7:00-7:40 get kids ready for school
7:40-8:00 take kids to school
8:00-4:30 work, taking 1/2-hour lunch (or less*)
4:30-5:00 pick up kids, go home
5:00-6:00 make/eat dinner
6:00-6:30 clean house
6:30-7:30 have fun! play! read! do errands!
7:30-8:00 get ready for bed, set out things for tomorrow
8:00 go to sleep (me too - I need my rest)

*nearly every single person at my company eats at their desk, like hermits. So I would not be unusual if I did this.

Here's my REAL schedule (semi-worst case)
5:00 alarm goes off
5:00-5:42 hit snooze 10 times
5:42 stumble into bathroom, look at clock, think bad words
5:30 time goes back because alarm is set ahead
5:30 think - "Ok, if I start working now, I can keep on schedule. But maybe I could quickly check my email, blogs, and news sites"
5:30-7:10 - 'quickly' surf internet. keep putting off working until it's too late to get anything done
7:10 - suddenly think "CRAP!! we're going to be way late!"
7:10-7:30 get ready as fast as humanly possible
7:30-7:40 try to get kids up and ready in 10 minutes. kids fall apart when you do this. freak out because the kids are "making us late"
7:40-8:20 get kids ready, get breakfast ready, try to calm down because we're already late anyway, what difference will 20, 30, or 40 minutes make?
8:20-8:40 get kids to school
8:40 get to work. Take at least 20 minutes to "check the news" and calm down. Don't get started working until 9, which means I have to stay AT LEAST until 5 or use vacation time.
6:00 leave work
6:30 get home
6:30-7:30 sit around like a zombie, eat dinner, etc.
7:30 decide to do something - errands, cleaning, etc.
10:00 notice that it's way too late and we're going to repeat this over again tomorrow

Sometimes I actually do pretty well and keep on schedule. Other times the whole day is just bad. If you are a working mom, especially a single mom or with a traveling/military spouse, you know how it is!

Time

Due to time constraints, I have decided that we can only do two activities on any given night. Our choices are:

eat dinner
clean house and/or do laundry
read - chapter books & picture books
have family worship - read scriptures, sing hymns, write in journals
play
exercise
run errands - go grocery shopping, pick up milk, etc.

If we can just figure out a way to go without food, we could do so much more -- that would eliminate cooking dinners AND grocery shopping!

I've been leaving work around 6 pm, and I'd like to get the kids in bed by 8. There isn't time to cook and eat dinner and get ready for bed in that much time, let alone do anything else.

I guess the real solution would be for me to get ready on time or early in the morning, get to work early, work hard all day, and leave at 5 or earlier! Also, it would help a lot if I used the Crock-Pot more or made dinners on the weekends.