Food and My Family; is there anything better?

So I pretty much have the GREATEST husband EVER! He goes to school, works hard, plays with the kids, fulfills his church responsibilities, and then he finds time to cook me AMAZING meals almost daily. On Saturday, he made me an amazing Avocado Bacon Burger and we ate outside. It was so much fun. We put down an old rug and some floor pillows on the patio and took the kids and our food out to enjoy. It was probably the greatest thing because I had everything I LOVE out there; food, my three favorite people in the world, and, oh yeah, FOOD.
So minus the startled expression, Max looked way cute for church yesterday. His tie kept popping out because he has no neck, but it was still way cute! His hives are back. I have an appt with the doctor on Wednesday. I'm totally at a loss for what is going on. Maybe pollen? We went on a long bike ride Sat and that night he screamed bloody murder all night. I gave him Benadryl and he eventually quieted enough to sleep. Yesterday, we went to Becca's and again last night he screamed his head off and had hives again. So maybe her dog??? I dunno. All I can say is POOR BABY. But I cannot keep pumping meds in him, it doesn't seem healthy... and I think I need some real sleep!

Maddie looked stunning for church as well. She's so stinkin cute that sometimes I cannot even get my words out to discipline her! She just flutters her little eye lashes, or asks for me to hold her, or apologizes and I still melt. But BOY-OH-BOY does she have quite the little attitude on her! She's convinced she's the boss. Last week she told me she wanted a cupcake. I told her she had to wait until after lunch. She immediately replied "Mom, I am the Boss! I make the rules! I told you I want a cupcake right now! Give me a CUPCAKE!" HA. All I could do is laugh. I was so dumbfounded that she would complete that entire thought like that. Hmph. You make the rules, do you??? I couldn't even reprimand her I was laughing so hard! Needless-to-say, there was no cupcake eating that happened that day and I most certainly addressed that attitude after I caught my breath!!!

Well, other than crappy sleep and a silly girl to deal with, there's nothing much else going on. Except that I'm feeling compelled to do the Triathlon THIS July. I kind of want to just try and finish; despite my finishing time. I guess we'll see how I feel about things in a few weeks, but I don't think it's a bad idea to try it out... even if only to see what I need to focus on to do well next year.

Randomness

Maddie got a haircut! I am so sick of the scraggly look, so I finally gave in and let Tiff chop it all off. It's cute, but I'm sure I won't be cutting it again for a VERY long time. I love when her hair is long.

So I have this new AMAZING spoon that's a life saver! "A spoon?!" you might be thinking?! YES! A spoon. It's so cool. You put the food inside the handle and squeeze to dispense it. It's genius, I tell you. Simply genius. No more messy Max. He loves to shove the food in his mouth so this eliminates the bowl and crazy mess from the bowl. Also, it gets the food in his mouth PRONTO so he's not freaking out between every bite. I can shovel by just squeezing more on the spoon. So great. Buy it for all your mommy friends, or for yourself! At $7-and-some-change it's totally worth it!
Last night we had over the Lambertsen Clan for dinner (9 adults, 4 kids). We try to do it on Mondays, but last Monday we celebrated Mother's Day solo at a nice restaurant here. Anyway, after dinner Maddie appears with a gallon of Cookie Dough Ice Cream. "Let's eat this ice cream now..." Lars and I look at each other like "Where the heck did that come from?" So we ask Maddie who replies that it's from the garage (like we're stupid) and leads us there to prove it. Oh, yeah, she pulled up Max's old carseat to the deep freeze, opened the lid, and dug in for the goods! Nice. I have great faith that if she were stranded alone for a month, she would survive!

Oh, that confidence high I had; IT'S GONE!

Have you ever been kicked in the face?! Oh, me neither on the physical kind, BUT I sure got an emotional beating today!

So at the pool today I decided, of the three lanes to choose from, to pick the lane with the slow, seemingly uncoordinated old lady to swim with. She already had another swimmer with her, as did the lane to the left, and with 2 people already in the lane to the right, it was circle-swim or do aquacise with the geezers... Wrong choice.

I got to swimming and passed the old lady a few times, but started to get slower as my adrenaline mellowed. Before too long, the "slow" old lady was passing me up. I was embarrassed and ashamed. I kept trying to push myself to go faster, especially because Phelps and his top two competitors were swimming in the lane to the left of me, but I had little success. I swear even the aquacise folk were pointing and laughing at my incompetence. So I just kept swimming and let the invisible tears wash away with each stroke...

About half-an-hour into my swim, girl #2 left our lane. It was me and the old lady for a minute and then she disappeared. I was elated to have the lane to myself and immediately dove (no pun intended) in to my normal "no people" routine which includes a lap of breaststroke and about 5 laps of holding my breath and swimming as far as I can to the other side of the pool, like some silly 5th grader. As I was completing my flip-turn I decided to push off the wall with as much force as I could conjure up and... CRASH!!!! I ran right in to Mrs. Slow-Stroke herself. Of course I should have known that the workhorse just hopped out for a quick drink of water. Nice. Now I'm slower than the old lady and retarded. That's just freakin fantastic.
Now I'm apologizing like crazy to the very sweet, too forgiving old lady and I've messed up my groove. My next 20-something laps are sloppy, uncoordinated and pitiful.

After my rhythm starts to rejoin me, a third party joins our lane. Great. Whatever. She is certainly one of "them" (the competitive swimming kind) and does several uncomfortable laps around me and Mrs. Faster-Than-Me. By this time my goggles are filling up with chlorine, sweat, or tears, and I've almost had enough. I pretend to not be bothered by my slow pace and meticulously execute another flip-turn opening my eyes right before colliding with the old lady again. Yeah. Of course. I nod, and apologize for my painfully slow pace, my inability to circle lanes effectively, the incoordination I was cursed with. On my next few laps I just THANK HEAVEN for not running into her again and try to remember my love for swimming.

A few more laps around the pool and it's already 6:25. I stand at the edge of the pool and pretend to be stretching, even though I'm not really even sure how to do anything that might help my muscle aches. I try to hoist myself out of the pool and my jelly-arms quiver, barely letting me leave the pool. Sweet. A grand exit. I grab what's left of my pride and head to the locker room where I stand in a lukewarm shower and watch the morbidly obese lady struggle to redress herself, like it's an eyesore. I take off my 2-sizes-too-small swimsuit and redress without enthusiasm, devoid of emotion. Maybe drained. Probably tired.

I hop in my car with a minimal amount of energy and sigh like my stinkin world is crashing down. I head back toward Logan. As I'm driving, beating myself up, questioning my ability to even compete in a triathlon, I watch the heifers at the dairy. One is pacing along side a fence and another is on the other side running madly all awkward-like and cattywhompus (which apparently has no 'S'). It's me. That stupid heifer is me.

I speed up just in time to meet eyes with a policeman in an unmarked car. sure. hit me. ticket me. make my day. BUT luckily he doesn't. Maybe you can read defeat on someone's face. Maybe he just saw a heifer driving a car and was too amused to chase me.

So I thank heaven for the second time today and head home to find Max has been screaming for close to an hour, and my Only Solace is off to go to his summer school classes. Why do I swim? Why do I bother? Why do I, the girl that has hated competition in any form ALL MY LIFE, want to compete in a triathlon? I dunno. I just don't know.

...And then Max giggles and laughs with me, maybe at me. Maybe he overheard me telling Lars what happened today. But he numbs it. The feeling of inadequacy. He's my little antidote. And I can't help but laugh.

I'm upset because I'm a slow swimmer. How silly. Who cares if I come in one hour after the last athlete at the triathlon??? At least I'll finish.

Confession #2

So my first embarrassing confession was Twilight. My second is High School Musical. We just watched the movie and loved it! So cute! What am I, 14 again??? (Although the actual play HSM was better!)

Weekend Down South

Well, Well, Well... We had a fantastic weekend in Salt Lake Thurs-Sun with the Petersens! They just moved in to a gorgeous house last Sunday, so we invited ourselves to be the first House Guests! The night before we left, I left Max with Lars while I went to my Young Women's Activity. He was SO HUNGRY (of course) that Lars decided to hold off his crying with a bowl of rice cereal. Apparently Lars was not quick enough and Max decided that not only could he spoon-feed himself faster, but he could also use his hands as a more effective way of shoveling his food in quicker. As Lars explained later: it was a very messy clean-up.Max now is a bit obsessed over what we are eating. When ever we are sitting down for dinner and he either smells it, or sees something go in to your mouth, he immediately gets very upset and either cries to be fed or reaches to steal what you are eating. I think he might be ready for a teething biscuit or something of substance while we eat dinner...

Back to being at the Petersen's...

We always have a blast seeing them and spending time together. We had a pretty hectic schedule with family plans, but the time that we did spend together was a blast! Their new HUGE, beautifully manicured lawn (in the backyard) had the kids running and playing until they were exhausted. Here's a pic of Maddie and Spencer taking a break.

The following day while Jeremy was in class, we took a much-anticipated trip to IKEA. I got a sweet looking room divider for my bedroom for Mother's Day! It is now in between my media stuff and my bed in our enormous bedroom. This should help diminish the gawking when I'm making out with the hubby and Maddie's watching TV HAHAHAHA! Really, I was just sick of seeing the TV from bed and our room needed something to divide the space. So now we have it and a nice little cove for our bed at the end of the room. It's pretty sweet! I love IKEA! Next trip I think I'll be getting the bench which is very similar but only two rows of shelving on it's side to put downstairs by my front door. I plan to use is as a shoe corral. (Yes, I DID call it that!) You get the picture, RIGHT??

That night, we had the 4th (I'm only counting the ones I've been to) annual "Kicking Off the Summer Friend BBQ" at Jer and Annie's. It was fun to see how quickly children grow and get a little caught up again. Hopefully we can do it again at the beginning of next summer!

Saturday was a big day... The actual reason for going to Salt Lake in the first place; Tiff's wedding shower. In the morning we all dressed up and had a blast at The Garden Park Ward where we took individual family and Lambertsen Family pictures. It was an amazing place to take pictures and I think we really got some good ones. As soon as Annie gets them to me I'll show you how sweet they turned out! Annie took the pics and jumped in the large family pictures by using the camera timer! Quite hilarious if you ask me! After a fun time taking pictures there (and trying to find a potty every 1/2 hr) we wend back and had a BBQ before the shower. Max chilled in his bouncer...

And Maddie played with Bryson and Drew's niece Maddie too! Maddie is a Madelyn also. Poor girl always thought I was yelling at her when I called my Maddie to reprimand or get her attention. My Maddie thought the other Maddie was just hilarious!

The bridal shower went well and was pretty fun! In one game, all the guys stood in a line and Tiff had to identify PG body parts; Drew's from the rest. It was an absolute riot!

The best part of the weekend was after our 3hour escapade to a Belly Dancing Indian Restaurant. Katie met a Belly Dancer at dinner that let her dance with her almost all night; in front of the whole dining crowd, which Maddie would never have a part of, mind you... Well, one dance she learned was called a "secret dance" by the Belly Dancer and Katie did it all night long. Maddie learned this one and the "Snake Dance" via Katie. They put on a show for us wearing gauze taffeta and such and danced to Ringa Ringa, an Indian Song at home:

It was so stinkin hilarious that even Max was laughing!!!

So, I finally got a new bike!! YAY!!!! Lars has been promising me one for a LONG TIME since mine was a backyard salvage from the Cottles that lived here before us. The bike I had was pretty awkward with two miss-matched petals, and well, there was that fact of it being a HUFFY that didn't help the quality any... So, I finally went out and fit myself on a Colombia Mountain Bike. It ain't no Specialized or anything, but it serves it's purpose. I'm going to ride as often as possible with Lars and try to get in shape for next year's Triathlon! I'm pretty stoked. I really wanted a street bike, but Lars thinks he'll convince me to go up the mountain with him and do the trails. I guess we'll see, right?

Max is still too little to enjoy the bike trailer, so I put him in the carrier and took him. It was pretty awkward, but doable.

About the end of our ride, Maddie decided she wanted to push the bike stroller instead of ride in it. So as Lars rode, Maddie ran her little legs off and it was freakin hilarious! I got the pic right after we headed home.

First Day of Swimming

Okay, FOR REAL?! Where have I been???? I feel like I've been a Zombie the last year and I'm FINALLY waking up!!! I woke up this morning at 4:45am, fed Max, went swimming for an hour, came home and got ready; ALL BEFORE 9am, my usual morning rousal time...

And ARE YOU KIDDING ME???? I feel like a NEW WOMAN!

I literally feel like I've been amongst the walking dead for a year and I'm now ALIVE! Call me crazy, but swimming is the best thing I could ever do. I'm so darn passionate about it, where I've really not ever had that passion for anything "sporty" before. I'm so excited! And it totally gets me wanting to go running, and biking, play tennis and a ton of other things that I would have normally passed up. So, I've decided to go EVERYDAY now (minus the weekends, of course)!

The "me time" is so nice, and the fact that I have something to train for is so much fun to think about. I feel like I have so much more time too. Ohmygosh, I feel like I just chugged 64oz of Redbull! I'm on cloud nine. Is this from the endorphins?? Well, seriously WORLD, WATCH OUT because I'm BA-A-A-A-A-A-A-CK!!!!

...Chug Chug Chuggin Along...

Well, things have simmered down quite a bit with Max and his CRAZY crying spell! He's back to his happy self and we found out it wasn't the teething bothering him but the anti-hive meds that he was on. They made him irritable enough to just scream all day long! He got his first tooth on Saturday and now has another one coming in right next to it. It doesn't seem to bother him at all, he just chews on his hands all day to sooth it. It's pretty rare to see him without his fist in his mouth! He's pretty funny...and definitely back in his giggle-at-EVERYTHING mode!

I'm taking up swimming again, starting tomorrow, and found a pass for a killer deal at the high school. I'll try to swim 3 times a week if I can. Once I feel comfortable, I'm going to start running also, in addition to my biweekly-many-hour-long walks with Becca. I'm hoping that soon I can be TRIATHLON ready and compete in a race within a year. Lars is also buying me a mountain bike so we can start training with the bikes too. I'm super stoked, but not 100% sure I'll be "triathlon ready" by the last Triathlon in Utah which is in November. I guess we'll just have to see. I'll put my heart into it and have a try, though. Oh, and I'm totally not competitive, so I wouldn't be doing it for 1st place, and I wouldn't even mind last place; I just want to complete it for myself and my own sense of accomplishment. So, other than a whole lotta nothin' going on, we're doing pretty well! I'll let ya know as soon as anything fun comes along...

PS. We're very VERY ready for summer and swimming and sunshine, HOW ABOUT YOU?!