Some Days Are Better Than Others

My mom once got a Mother's Day card that said  

Good moms let you lick the beaters. 

Better moms turn the mixer off first. 

Today I felt like being one of those better moms, As opposed to yesterday when I probably would have kept the mixer on.


It's a good thing that you don't usually feel like making cookies on the bad days.

Here's to licking the beaters.

5:52 PM Addendum: Is it Murphy's Law that says whenever you blog about having a good day, the Universe will immediately right itself in a glorious blitzkrieg of chaos, whining, and meltdowns? Or is just the Law of the Witching Hour?

 

...Cookies for dinner anyone?

Olympic National Park

Mark here...this is my first guest post.
We camped at the Olympic National Park at the start of summer. It was amazing. We had fun. Below are pictures that prove it.






Our campsite was nice. The kids enjoyed playing on/in all the old growth trees.





Our rock stacking put us in contemplative moods.













Why yes, that is the biggest, gnarliest, tree root thing you will ever see. I am fairly certain this thing comes alive at night and eats other trees.



Picture Taking 101 - Rule 1: Make sure nothing in the background appears to be sticking out of the main subject's head.



Yes actually, people do kind of ruin this photo.





We drove through Forks on the way home. Donna got a kick out of all the Twilight tourists. We stopped and ate some very, very bad Mexican food. The bad Mexican food alone will be enough to re-wipe Forks off the map...until someone writes another book about the place.

Pssssst

Are you still there? 'Cause guess what?


I'm baaaack!


In case you were wondering, I spent my Summer taking really artsy pictures at weird angles of all the AMAZING things we did all Summer long. And when I wasn't being an INCREDIBLE semi-professional photographer, I was super BUSY creating PRECIOUS memories for my kids with all of the crafts/outings/singing/family-togetherness that we did. And when I wasn't building and/or documenting our UNBELIEVABLE Summer of Fun, I was probably just relaxing, or yelling at my kids/wading through endless messes/reading blogs/packing/cleaning/shopping/unpacking/repacking/yelling some more/ and probably crying. But until I get around to posting the thousands of pictures and memories, I've posted a little something for your reading pleasure. You know, in case you'd been missing your sporadic doses of cynicism. (That's for you Katy).


Enjoy.

The House That Sam Broke

I just wasted away a few minutes of my life taping up a paper lamp from Ikea. I know, that's what I get for thinking that a lamp made out of paper for $2.49 from Ikea was a good idea and/or in good taste right? But really, it fared quite well for a long time.

Until Sam came along. Lamp, meet Sam. Sam, meet lamp. Lamp, so sorry about that big gash. Sam, go to your room. Self, get out the tape.

So I taped up the lamp and put it back on the side table, next to the frame that no longer stands up by itself, thanks to Sam.

Just before fixing the lamp, I picked up Sam's toy rocket that we've had for one week and is already broken in two places.

I put the rocket on the counter next to the pile of Tupperware lids that don't have matching containers anymore, because they are probably out in the yard being used as snail houses.

Before that I was wiping off our table that now has nail polish, permanent marker, paint, and (Sam's) bite marks on it.

On the table was an assortment of broken crayons and dried out markers with no caps that I stashed away in a cupboard with a door that won't close because somebody (guess who?) was swinging on it.

I won't even tell you about the state of the games, toys, and miscellaneous items inside of said cupboard. Well, OK, I will: 2 board games missing pieces that render them pretty much useless, a ripped parachute, about 8 containers of dried out, mixed up play dough, and a stained Aqua doodle. And that's just off the top of my head.

In the same room as the cupboard is the TV/DVD player that we will someday have to remove from the Armoire with a chain saw (our fault), which we have to use the plug to turn off and on, and no longer plays DVDs (both of which are Sam's fault). Not that we have any DVDs that Sam hasn't scratched or bitten or drawn on anyway.

The tale of destruction continues throughout the house.

Here's the moulding that he took a bite of a few days ago.

And our piano that Sam broke over a year ago? Broken even a little bit more now.

This is the most recent pile of casualties from his room: 5 books ripped apart.


And here's something fun: a box of baby wipes that he got to with a pair of scissors, AND ONLY STABBED THE PICTURE OF THE BABY, REPEATEDLY. (What he was doing unsupervised with a pair of sharp scissors is a very good question and is currently under investigation. I'm sure there is some body/thing to blame besides me. Probably corporate media, but that's a blog post for another day.)

Disturbing? YES.


I'll stop there, but trust me, I could go on. And on.

Some people can show you their collection of highly prized curios, or rare objects from their travels around the world. If you come over to our house we'll show you our taped up Ikea lamp and our mutilated baby box. It's an art form in and of itself.