Pros & Cons

So I promised to give you a list of the pros and cons to having a roomba. (For those of you who like How I Met Your Mother, I'm totally picturing everyone cheering about my pros and cons list!)

I'll start with

THE CONS:

-It really only vacuums the floors. So if you're like me and you use the hose attachment to vacuum up cobwebs on the ceiling and stuff like that, you might still need a regular vacuum. In my case the hose attachment was the only thing that still worked on my old vacuum, so this was perfect.

-It also doesn't do stairs. But I just sweep all the dirt down to the bottom floor and let the roomba vacuum there.

-It's kind of slow. It probably takes Dustin' thirty or more minutes to vacuum a bedroom. You could definitely do it faster with a regular vacuum if you're in a hurry.

-It has to charge its battery after a couple rooms. If you're planning one of those marathon-esque, clean-the-whole-house-in-one-day sorts of days, it might run out of battery before you're run out of floor. (Um, not that I ever have one of those days...) And then you have to let it charge for a couple hours before it's ready to go again.

-You don't get those perfect little vacuum lines, because the roomba works in weird spirals and stuff. But recently when I vacuum the kids like to pull out their toy strollers and use those to "vacuum" along with me, thus destroying my lines anyway. So this one was a wash.

-You need to pick up most stuff off the floor before you run it. But that's true of any vacuum, really, and it does goes around electric cords just fine. So this isn't really much of a problem. The only time it's kind of a pain is when it vacuums under beds and I have to make sure the kids get ALL their stuff out from under the bed first. But this is directly related to...


THE PROS:

-It vacuums UNDER your furniture! So if you're like me, and that only happens when you move and it's really gross to see just how many dust bunnies were hiding out under there, this is totally awesome! AND totally worth having to get things out from under your bed. I just wish our living room couch were taller so it would vacuum under there, too! The first time we used it, Dustin' found Craig's headphones that had been hiding under his night stand. Who knows when we would have ever discovered them without Dustin'!

-It recognizes stairs and doesn't fall down them. It's kind of impressive to watch, actually. A little nerve-wracking, since it juts all around the top stair, but also impressive.

-It changes modes as it goes from carpet to hardwood floor. In our house, this is a must.

-The kids love watching it work, so it's both a vacuum and a babysitter all in one!

-It also follows walls, so it gets everything clean-- corners, walls, middle of the floor. You name it.

and perhaps most important...

-IT WORKS ALL BY ITSELF!!! So while it's vacuuming my bedroom (and under my bed and under my dresser and everywhere else!) I can be doing the dishes! Or taking a nap! Or watching TV, reading a book... The possibilities are endless.

So there you have it. It's not perfect. But that last point alone makes getting a roomba a complete win in my book. And all the other things listed under "cons" were things I didn't even care about to begin with. I mostly only told you so that you would be well informed. Now. Go buy yourself one today!

Have Baby Will Travel

So I went to San Fransisco this weekend.

Didja miss me?

It was a super quick trip, so if you answered No to that question, I'll forgive you. Just don't admit it to me. (Bentley, Kendra and Daddy all missed me, so that's probably enough, anyway.) I explained this in my last post, but my oldest sister lives there, along with her husband and cute baby who I had not yet had the pleasure of meeting. AND, a friend of mine from high school was getting married, so it was the perfect excuse to finally go.

This was how I kept the kids busy while I packed!

They loved it!

This was my first time traveling alone with a baby. And because Ryder is usually so easy-going, I wasn't all that worried about it until about 24 hours before my flight when I suddenly began panicking. This resulted in me throwing five times more of everything into a suitcase than I could possibly have needed: diapers, wipes, outfits, receiving blankets, baby food, bibs. I packed everything we had. And then realized that there was no longer any room in the suitcase for my stuff and that I couldn't possibly push a stroller, carry a diaper bag and backpack, AND pull two suitcases behind me. So I took out 2/3rds of that stuff, which still barely left me room for my own clothing. I crammed the diaper bag full of food, bibs, spoons, children's benadryl (my pediatrician recommended it for long flights, so I'm okay with that) and of course, toys. So many toys, all of which would be thrown on the airplane floor. And of course, at the last minute I got worried that we would be cold, so I frantically began cramming in sweatshirts and extra pants and socks...

And then I just hoped for the best!

And actually, things went really well. Except for at night, when Ryder refused to sleep. At all. He woke up at least every two hours, would nurse, and then cry when I tried to set him back down in his pack-n-play. This alone would have been pretty frustrating (especially since we were sharing a room), but when he cried, he woke up his little cousin Eliot (who is almost 14 months old), and then the two would have a great time crying and keeping the entire household awake. So it was a very sleepless weekend for all of us.

But. Other than not sleeping, everything went splendidly! Except that I took very few pictures. Here are the ones I did manage to snap, though:

Eliot and Ryder in their Hawaiian outfits.
They actually played together, I couldn't believe it! You don't expect that at this age!

I was shocked at how much alike they looked, too! I've always thought that Craig and my brother-in-law, Brian, could pass as brothers, so maybe it's not surprising if their kids look a bit similar...?

My one good time when I took lots of pictures was when we put the boys in the swings at a nearby park. I love these pictures so much:

I was totally proud of myself for catching both kids in the frame here

Love that face. Love it. And that's Leah in the background, pushing Eliot!

Happy Eliot!

Happy cousins!

Those are all my pictures. No, I didn't take a single one at the wedding. Yes, I'm a terrible person. The bride's aunt promised to put pictures on Picassa web, so maybe I'll try to steal some of those when they're up... But I will tell you this: the wedding was lovely. My friend Elizabeth looked every bit the happy, glowing bride. I met and talked with really great people and really enjoyed myself (which I wasn't expecting since the only people I knew were the bride, her immediate family and one other person from our island-- I was just assuming I would be kind of anti-social and bored the whole time!). And, perhaps even more important, Ryder was a perfect angel the entire 5 hours that I was there.

He was also super good for me on all four flights to get us there and back.

So I guess if he didn't want to sleep a single night we were there, I'll have to forgive him for it.

It was a great trip. I missed Craig and Bentley and Kendra a lot, though. It's awfully good to be home with everyone (and sleeping) again!

Recently...

-I noticed smeary marks all over the TV. I asked the kids if they were getting it wet. They denied doing anything, so I prodded a bit more, "Maybe, did you use a wet washcloth on the TV?" No, they answered, they just licked their hands and then rubbed their hands on the TV. My kids were literally eating dust... Gross.

-Ryder has figured out how to get himself in a sitting position! He's also been crawling for a few weeks now (did I already mention that one?). Not real crawling-- he's just scooting around on his tummy. But he gets everywhere he wants to go that way.

-Kendra is hoping to enter Olympic events for being the slowest at doing everything. Seriously. If she walked any slower, she'd be going backwards. I have got to learn to leave to pick up Bentley with an extra five or ten minutes to account for Kendra speed. Otherwise I spend the entire walk yelling at her/trying to urge her to just hurry up a bit. It's so painful.

-I got my roomba! I finally talked Craig into letting me buy one, only to discover that they didn't have any more at Costco. Before I threw a kicking screaming tantrum (a technique I've learned from my kids), I checked with the manager to find out if they'd be getting more. There wasn't an order for more, but he said that the Fairfax Costco still had 38 as of that morning, so off to Fairfax I went! I love my roomba SO much. We've named him Dustin'. And he's great, both as a vacuum and as a babysitter. I'll probably have to tell you all the pros and cons about him in a different post. One of these days...

-Ryder also loves Dustin'. He will crawl over to the roomba and then hit it until it turns on and mommy hears the noise and comes running. Then we build a pillow fort around Dustin' in order to protect him from Ryder.

-Also speaking of love, Bentley is loving kindergarten. His only complaint is that he wishes he could stay in his pajamas. My only complaint is that he keeps insisting that one of the girls at his table is named Hades. I really really hope that he's just hearing that one wrong. Because otherwise that's completely weird.

-Now that Bentley is gone for a good chunk of the day, Kendra is showing a little more interest in Ryder. Just now they were playing together while I typed this! Craig suspected this might be the case...

-The other night, I managed to run 1.5 miles without taking any breaks! Never before in my life could I have claimed to have that kind of stamina. I'm kind of excited about this whole "being in shape" thing!

-And even better than the run, when I came home, the house was super clean! I hadn't managed to do any cleaning all week, so this was a lovely surprise. Not only had Craig put toys away, run the roomba, cleaned off the table, and done all the dishes, he had also organized the shoes in the coat closet and put Ryder's baby swing and bumbo seat up in the attic! Clearly, I need to be away from home more often...

-... which I'm doing this weekend! Ryder and I are taking off for San Fransisco tomorrow! I've never been before, but I have a sister with a new house and a slightly-less-new baby to see AND a friend's wedding to attend. Both were good reasons to go, but put them together and I really couldn't say No. I hope Ryder can be as happy sitting on a plane as he usually manages to be...

-And last but not least, to begin thanking Craig for cleaning our home and letting me abandon him for a couple days, I made these cookies today. All I can say about them is: Wow. I should probably try to go running again tonight, huh...?

Getting Prepared

Remember all that rain we had last week? That was the first week of school, and it turned out that our one little, half-broken umbrella was NOT sufficient to herd me and three children to Bentley's school and back. We got drenched several times. Craig and Bentley got super-soaked once, and they'd driven! But the saddest was the day I got home and looked at how little Ryder's stroller's sun visor protected him from the rain: he was so wet, and had that shocked look that just screams, "Why is someone dripping water all down my face?!?!" So pathetic!

I finally found a chance on Friday to remedy all this: I managed to get to Toys R Us without any kids, where I found a plastic cover for the stroller, and two umbrellas as well-- one huge one for me and a kid, and a smaller pink one for Kendra to hold by herself.

I'm pretty sure that by doing this, I made the weather turn gorgeous all week long. I would not even be surprised if it hardly rains all fall and winter now. And I'm totally okay with that: $40 well spent, in my book!

So the next time you wake up and it's a beautiful fall day, all I can is: You're welcome!

A Coping Mechanism

I recently noticed a completely bizarre trend in my life: I miss out on major catastrophes. I somehow manage to either ignore them, or just don't find out about them until way after the fact. And then many years later, I finally read about them and cry a lot. I suppose this is some form of coping, but even I think that it's weird, and a little bit pathetic.

When Princess Di died, I had just barely moved into the dorms at BYU, effectively cutting myself off from all other civilization. I didn't have a clue about her death until a week after it happened, when my mom mentioned it on the phone in passing. I was shocked! When the brilliant movie The Queen came out, Craig and I were so impressed by it that I also went ahead and read the excellent book Monarch. While the book was about Elizabeth II, it also taught me so much about Di's entire history with the royal family.

When Columbine happened, I was still at BYU and at least aware enough by then of the outside world to occasionally grab a copy of The Daily Universe to peruse (although I will admit that I mostly read it for Eric Snider's column, Snide Remarks). So I did hear about Columbine. But-- because I'm a terrible person-- I quickly got tired of all the media attention it garnered and tuned the whole thing out. I just read a book about it (called Columbine, so that's easy to remember, by Dave Cullen) and was shocked by just how horrible the massacre was. How did I manage to be so blasé about it at the time?

When Aron Ralston got trapped in southern Utah and had to amputate his own arm to save his life, I had just arrived for a two-month stint in Namibia. The first I heard of it all was when the movie 127 Hours came out. I didn't bother seeing the movie, but I did read Ralston's book, Between a Rock and a Hard Place.

And most significantly. When the World Trade Center fell, I was on my mission in Japan. Aside from the fact that we weren't supposed to read the newspapers, there was also the glaring fact that I was incapable of reading much of anything in Japanese. So while I heard about it, and while my mission president called my family to make sure my sister who lived in New York was safe, I felt virtually none of the impact that most Americans suffered through. My only impressions of the whole nightmare were based on what I observed 6 months later, when I returned home. I remember being surprised at all the American flags and wondering when Seattle had decided to become patriotic. Once, my Mom asked me what the phrase "Let's Roll" meant to me, and was unhappy that I didn't recognize it as the phrase Todd Beamer had said shortly before he and his fellow passengers on Flight 93 decided to take down their hijackers.

A couple years ago, I finally forced myself to watch the footage of the towers collapsing. I sobbed for two hours. I felt like finally I was at least beginning to understand the tragedy. And while I'm sure that I can never fully grasp the aching sorrow and fear that 9/11 caused, I am still so proud of my country and the amazing stories of heroism and kindness that were born of it.

God bless America

More of Bentley's Artwork

Bentley continues to churn out artwork for us and everyone who will accept it. And I'm too impressed not to keep sharing it here.

First, we have this, from his first week of kindergarten:

I asked Bentley to explain his drawing of himself, and he told me that that's him, wearing his Batman clothes, and next to him is the Batcycle. Of course-- I can barely recognize the kid without his trusty Batcycle!

This is the T-rex attacking the stegosaurus from Fantasia

And, perhaps my favorite of all: he created a flower (complete with a bee-- the orange, pink & yellow cars) out of his cars.

Not only is he an artist, he's already experimenting with different mediums for his artwork!

And now, because they're feeling left out, here are pictures of Kendra and Ryder as we wait to pick Bentley up from school:

Conversations with Craig

We were talking about journals, and whether or not it's ethical to read your kids' diary. (Conclusion: it depends.)

I said, "Of course, most boys don't even write in journals anyway. Except you, I guess." (Craig used to be a great journal writer, until he married me.)

Craig responded with, "Yeah. Only the psychotic ones write in their journals."

Hmm...

Kindergarten, Here We Come!

I just dropped Bentley off for his first day of kindergarten. I have been looking forward to this day for about a year now. So I surprised myself by staying awake last night worrying about it all and then choking up as we approached the school this morning. (I managed to pull it together before Bentley could notice.) Despite my emotions running high, I still believe it was best to get him in kindergarten right away. Bentley is so ready to learn whatever he can think to ask a question about, and I never seem to get around to teaching him much of anything (I didn't even bother making him learn to write his name until twenty minutes before the kindergarten assessment! And he learned that so fast I knew it had been me holding him back).

Obligatory back-to-school pictures!

I cannot even begin to say how much I love this picture

In Craig's family, they took this picture on the porch, so I took a couple there, too

Too much nervous energy to smile like a normal kid!

We got there early (even walking at Kendra's pace the whole way there!) so we had to wait in the cafeteria for a few minutes

All settled in his place, and ready to color

Now Kendra was getting nervous. Bentley, with his crayons, was right in his element, so I forced myself to hurry out before I could make him more nervous.

It does seem awfully quiet now without him around. I'm already looking forward to 3:15!

Once More About the Diet

Craig and I finished our 6-week diet! I was very pleased with the results, although I still have a ways to go before my weight will be where where I want it to be. In that vein, we're now allowing ourselves to eat other foods, but we're still trying to stick to mostly salads and fruit, and save the not-healthy stuff for special occasions. Really special occasions, like birthdays or anniversaries. Not "Today is a day that ends with a "Y," therefore I need chocolate." Which was what I was doing before, and-- it turns out-- is not a good way to lose weight. Go figure.

Also, I ran my two miles the other day and only needed a few really short breaks to catch my breath (as opposed to walking two-thirds of the time, which is what I started out doing). I'm starting to feel like I'm actually getting fit! And while it's a big pain, it's kind of a nice feeling...

The Saga of Our Sink

When I was in my last trimester with Ryder, our kitchen sink suddenly clogged up. We called a friend of ours, Scott, who is a plumber, and he came and fixed it. We will be forever grateful.

10 months later, it did it again. This time I wasn't pregnant, at least. But it was right after my mother-in-law had (very generously) cooked dinner for us in our home. She had offered to clean everything up, too, but I felt like that would put me over the top in the laziness department, so I insisted that I would clean everything once they'd left, which ended up being around 8:00pm. I started in on the dishes, and within five minutes it became clear that our sink was not draining.

Craig took apart the trap. He ran out to Lowe's, and discovered that they closed at 8:00. And then we called Scott again. He gave Craig some tips, and Craig resolved to try and fix it the next day after work. Meanwhile, I had a kitchen absolutely FULL of dirty dishes, which were beginning to smell. And paper plates to live off in the meantime. Naturally, the next day Craig decided to work an hour later than he needed to (I'm still seething about that one). And by the time he'd tried out every trick he knew, it was (once again) eight o'clock and we still didn't have a working sink.

So Scott came over.

He used a huge motorized plumbing snake (any of those terms might be wrong-- you can talk to a plumber if you want the technical details!) and shoved it approximately 35 feet into our pipes before finding the clog. At which point he determined that he couldn't seem to make it go away. He had one last option-- a snake with what is essentially a drill on the end (he called it a "pig tail"). But he said if that didn't work, it probably meant that the underground pipes in our front yard had shifted from the earthquake and we'd need a better (and paid!) plumber to take care of it.

I cannot even begin to imagine how much that would cost.

But Scott tried the pig tail before completely giving up. And I whispered prayers in my head the whole time he did it. And he thought he got through. So he pulled the entire thing back out and examined the end of it to figure out what had caused the clog. This is the most disgusting thing ever: there was hair on the end of it. As far as we can tell, our shower drains do not connect to the kitchen sink drain in any way, and since I don't make it a habit of putting my hair down the kitchen sink, the conclusion was that probably a rat had gotten stuck in the pipes, trying to climb up from the city sewers.

Ew ew ew ew EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEW!!!!!!

I'm so grossed out by that. Anyway, with the clog hopefully removed, the next step was to test it. We plugged the sink, filled it with water, and then watched it drain. It began spiraling down like water should do. We got our hopes up. There was one little blip of water that splashed back up, but Scott said that could just be the clog flushing out more. Just to be safe, we decided to test it again. Again we plugged the sink, filled it, and watched it drain. This time it drained half way. And stopped.

And I nearly cried.

Scott decided to go look at the pipes in the crawl space. We heard him banging around below us, and suddenly he let out a wonderfully triumphant yelp, right as the water suddenly drained away. Apparently, when snakes, plungers, and a host of other gadgets don't completely do the trick, you might want to just try hitting the pipes to make the clog loosen up! Who knew?

Anyway, we have a working kitchen sink again. And I did all those dishes today (only 48 hours after they'd been used-- so gross!). And I'm feeling very thankful for friends who are so kind to us.

If it clogs up again, we may just have to give Scott our next child or something. Or something worth more...





Watch out for rats, huh?

For Grandma

These last couple of weeks, it's been crazy around here! Three of my four sisters were able to come and visit, we had an earthquake and a "hurricane," Craig's brother came to visit, and Craig started back up at work... So between the natural disasters, running a hotel, and having to actually take care of my kids, and of course, my kitchen sink clogging up (which will be the subject of a different post), life has felt very busy. But having all the visitors was fun, at least! And now I'm realizing that if I want my Mom to show pictures to my Grandma while they're visiting, I better hurry up and post a bunch of them!

This one's for you, Grandma!

My happy kids!

I was so proud of myself for finding matching shirts for Bentley and Ryder! Of course, before I could get a decent picture, Ryder spit up all over himself. Oh, well. I tried!

Bentley still enjoys putting hats on Ryder

And we're continuing to get awesome wildlife in our backyard!

Playing dress up, we have Captain Moroni (complete with Title of Liberty) and Princess Kendra

One group shot after church with my visiting sisters (notice Ryder's adorable outfit with SUSPENDERS!!!)

This cousin picture is so terrible it makes me laugh. Look at Ryder! He looks like a grumpy old man!!!

Tracy and Ryder

Uncle Jason is immediately coerced into reading books about the space shuttle to Bentley

Enjoying our hurricane

We're all smiles here! I think it's because Craig kept thinking of the Glee version of "Umbrella"

I've got more pictures to share, but I'm having a hard time getting them off Craig's phone. Next time...

Friday Thoughts

If you seriously consider cutting your toenails before you weigh yourself just in case it you will give you that extra edge, you may be too obsessed with your weight.

Firsts

I finally put Ryder in a real swing yesterday, and he loved it. Bentley and Kendra always did, too, so this wasn't a surprise. But it's still fun to hear happy baby squeals over such simple pleasures. Ryder is funny, though: while I was a few steps away from him, pushing Kendra, I suddenly realized that he was making weird coughing noises. I hurried to check on him, and discovered that he had leaned forward and was now choking himself on the swing, the hard plastic pushed under his chin and against his neck. I quickly pushed him back again, and immediately he began giggling and laughing and enjoying himself.

I think we repeated this drill three or four times before he finally figured out to just keep leaning back. I'm not sure if I should be worried because he seemed so unconcerned about the choking, or delighted that I have such an easy-going baby!

Pride

I have iTunes playing. Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony came on. Kendra immediately said, "I like this song! Turn it up, Mommy!"

My humanities heart is happy.

Thank you, Fantasia.




She's not the only one learning great music: Bentley knows "Rite of Spring" very well.

Looking Forward

Yes. I am one of those people who-- at the end of every month, without fail-- has to ask, "How did the time go by so fast?" So the fact that I feel this way today isn't particularly unusual. What is unusual is the intensity I'm feeling about it all.

Craig went back to work today. Seriously? Summer can't possibly be over already, can it? It's just too nice outside for Craig to be back at work! Normally Craig and I spend our last week in this weird panicky funk, trying to squeeze in as much last-minute summer fun as possible, while simultaneously trying to not think about why we're trying to do so much at once. But this year, with three of my sisters coming to visit during Craig's last weekend, we didn't even have time to be depressed-- we were too busy enjoying everyone's company! (It was kind of nice, actually. I think this should become a tradition!)

But it has been weird today. I want to sit around and mope and miss Craig. But I've been too busy taking my sister and her husband around, and grocery shopping, and trying to get my house back in order again... And honestly, we're having such gorgeous weather that it's impossible to not be happy! I think it was just last year that I finally figured out that August in Virginia is slightly cooler than July. (In Seattle, it's usually the other way around, as though it takes all of June and most of July just to warm up to summer at all!) And after dealing with July's 100 degree weather, it's amazing how nice the low 80s feel!

Also, as much as I miss having Craig home with me, there is so much to look forward to this year: Craig's brother coming to visit, Bentley starting kindergarten, Thanksgiving with Craig's family and then Christmas with mine, what will probably be the awesomest summer vacation ever next year with Craig's family... How can I not look ahead to it all with a glad heart?

One More

I told you Craig would know how to fix it. Here's that picture of everyone that I promised:

Sesame Place

Last week Craig's parents took us all to Sesame Place, up in Pennsylvania! It turned out to be the trip of things almost going badly, and then being just fine.

When we showed up, it was pouring rain. Not just that rain where it seems pretty bad while you're driving in it, but once you stop the car, it's really just a light drizzle. Nope. This was a LOT of rain. People were leaving the park in droves. So we went to the mall to hang out for a few minutes while I fed Ryder. And lo and behold-- within twenty minutes the rain stopped and it was sunny for the rest of the day. Yay for us!

Of course, we headed right back to the park, only to discover that Bentley had left Teddy (and those of you who know Bentley know that he is devoted to his teddy) at the mall. Craig went back to find teddy while we went into the park. And because this was the trip of things being just fine (eventually) he found teddy without any trouble and all was well. Here are some pictures of it all. Oh, wait-- first I have to explain that I would have taken more, but my camera battery died. Good thing Craig still had his phone or we would only have about 3 pictures of the whole thing! Okay, enough of me blathering, time for pictures:

At the last second, Kendra got shy, so Bentley went and met Bert and Ernie all by himself.

Riding the carousel with Grandpa...

...and Grandma!

That's a green screen behind Elmo. If you buy the real picture, they put a nice town behind you. One of these days I'll scan the good picture for you to see, too, but for now, this will have to do!

I guess Disneyland doesn't have a monopoly on teacup rides!

Happy Ryder!

The Abby Caddaby Show

We finally left the park, found some dinner (that Craig and I could eat on this diet!), and then checked into our hotel. Then we had another scare: our room was a smoky mess! Just as I was wondering how we would survive breathing air like that, Craig just marched to the front desk and demanded a new room, and GOT ONE! That was fortunate, because the hotel was pretty full. But our new room was lovely and smoke free and we had a good night's rest, which we needed for Day #2 of Sesame Place:

The kids loved this bouncey thing and probably could have spent all day here...

As a kid, Craig was afraid of this ropes course. Good to know he's conquered his fears!

Kendra eating her Elmo cupcake and refusing to smile for me

Tired Kendra as we drive home

Equally tired Ryder

And, as we were driving home, we saw this random tank next to us. It was a bit scary, actually! But impressive and cool all at the same time. We were stuck in traffic (gotta love I-66), so I had time to snap a picture

I have one other picture of the entire family with Big Bird, but for some reason I can't get it to upload and Craig isn't around to solve my computer problems for me. So it will get its own post soon.

For now, all you need to know is that we had a great time!

Thanks, Grandma and Grandpa!!!