Bunny Lovin

For Christmas I got a bunny. She is a holland lop and is adorable. She is an indoor bunny and she is suppose to run around being happy and good. However I seem to be terrible at potty training her so she is sadly limited. My boys adore her though........poor bunny. We got her as a baby in hopes that she would think it was normal to be malled by children. She is a good bunny but does bite occasionally and can poop everywhere at times when she is out. Yesterday as I was at work, I called to check in at home and Ryan declared, "I want to kill the bunny! She is very bad." If Ryan didn't have a history of killing my pets I might have given a chuckle to such an extreme comment. Apparently she bit Soren quite hard, but in her defense, Soren, no matter how frequently I tell him to stop because bunnies does like that, he tries to bouncer her up and down like a fussy baby. I think it is a good thing that the boys get feedback about what the bunny will tolerate. Unfortunately Xander heard how Ryan felt. Today Xander was telling the neighbor, "My Dad wants to kill the bunny. I like killing bunnies too." Awesome. I am a little worried for the next time I go to work.

They really do love her. Surely she won't die right?

See, isn't she cute. How could anyone want to kill her?

Red Wagon

By 3pm on the icey day of the snow storm a few weeks back, my family had had enough of each other. If action wasn't taken soon bodily harm was going to occur and since the roads were so bad, I knew the medics would have a hard time getting here. So I brainstormed a way to prevent such an act of violence and knew we need gross body movement to steam off energy. So I began calling friends. "If we walked to your house, would you let us in?" I half begged half joked in a fairly desperate voice. I quickly found a taker. This friend was 1.5 miles away and half of it was down hill - which meant walking home might be painful. I decided to take our sled so that if situation arose we could sled down, but really it would allow me to drag the kids up the hill in a worse case scenario. Then I realized I forgot my sled at my sisters house. We had purchased this awesome red wagon just weeks before on a great super sale. I was so excited about this wagon. I had purchased it for several reasons. One being to help facilitate the boys doing more yard work. They can't really manage our wheelbarrow, but they could drag all sorts of things around the yard with a wagon. I thought it might work as a substitute. So off we went, bundled up and toting a shinny new red wagon. It worked well on our street, but once we got the hill, it had been plowed so the sides were not smooth enough for a wagon. I decided to ditch the wagon off the road under a tree. There was no one out except some cars so I thought this was safe enough place. Xander on the other hand felt I had bad judgement. "Don't leave the wagon there! It will be stolen." I tell my kids all the time that their stuff will be stolen - but that is just because I am trying to motivate them to put their things away.

"It is not going to be stolen Xander." I protested.

So we continued on our journey. I had told my friend to expect us in 30 minutes if every thing goes well, and an hour if it didn't. But as we continued and Soren would gather every 3rd icicle, I knew we were on the 60 minute path. It was snowing and quite magical. The only real problem was we started at 3pm and it gets dark around 4:30 this time of year. I kept crunching the numbers, but no matter how short we stayed at our friends house, we were guaranteed a walk in the dark........a detail that the more I thought about, became a worse and worse idea. By 4pm we were about 4 blocks away, but my rational self got the better of me and I turned us around - as failures. But were we really failures? Every single one of us had all our limbs and all our pints of blood. The boys surprisingly took it well. On the way up the hill we took a couple breaks as I told them tales of Narnia and the White Witch. Towards the top of the hill Xander was slacking a bit. I promised him a ride in our wagon the rest of the way if he could just reached the top. As we approached Xander says, "Mom, it is gone. Someone stole the wagon." Mid rebuttle I stopped cold. "Oh my gosh! You are right! Someone stole it!!" I said in horror and disbelief. "See I told you Mom." Xander said half smiling. It was almost worth loosing the wagon to be right over his mom it seemed. He kept saying it over and over again. "I told you not to put the wagon there. I knew someone would steel it......" blah blah blah. In frustration and anger I spat out, "Your right Xander. There are evil people in the world who just want to steal your stuff." I sort of felt bad after saying that but it kept Xander quite so it seemed worth it at the time. A block more down the road there was a older man out shoveling his driveway. "You kids enjoying a walk in the snow." "Yup" I replied with no joy in my voice. Then Xander informs the the guy, "Someone stole our wagon."

"How did someone steal your wagon?" inquired the man with a confused look on his face.

Then in true Xander form, he tells the man a whole long story that you can barely follow about our walk and how we ditch the wagon and walked forever then came back and then the wagon was gone. He pipes in, "My mom left in under the tree and I didn't think that was a good idea." The man chuckles and say, "Well I guess you were right."

Then without missing a beat Xander says, "There's evil people in the world you know."

I giggle a nervous giggle but the man full on laughs.

"Yeah, well my wife says I am one of them." he adds.

As we cover the last few blocks we try to make ourselves feel better by imagining scenarios were people need a wagon so badly they steal it. I think we decided it was a Dad with lots and lots of kids that he needed to take places in a wagon because his car broke down.

Farewell wagon. Enjoy your new owner.

I woke up today and Soren had already made his lunch.

So today, Soren will be eating

Tortilla jam and honey sandwich ( said he couldn't find the bread that was right there on the counter.)

tortilla chips

dried apricots

and for desert a taco shell drizzled with honey and a layer of chocolate chips and seaweed.

He is really excited.........and we will revisit nutrition tomorrow.

Christmas 2011

We had a busy Great Christmas this year. First we did a gift exchange with the Thompson's at my house earlier in the week. Then on Christmas Eve we went to Zaron's house and enjoyed a lamb dinner - Christmas dinner New Zealand style - I love it. Reminds me of Dad. The boys loved being with their cousins and palling around. They did lots of dress up and play. We did the Christmas story with a flanel board and sang some Christmas carols. The boys got to open up their new robes on Christmas eve. They both loved them but as I guessed, Xander in particular was huge fan. He loves clothes and accessories of any kinds - more then toys I think.

Then we had Christmas morning at my house with my in-laws. I did a yummy breakfast with puff pastry, and eggs benedict. Erica and Theo couldn't make it but Todd and Kari did and that was nice. My favorite gifts were the wall hangings Howard made for the boys. I am sure I love them much more then the boys. They are just such beautiful works of arts. And of course i love anything home made. We finished off the day at my in-laws for dinner where we saw the whole family. The boys were had gifts all day long. In fact they were opening up gifts all week long. It got to the point that whenever they saw a human they would ask where their gift was. Hmmmmm, seems like a flaw. Something to think about.

Well it was a fun, festive filled day. But know that the true season is to celebrate Jesus Christ and I am so grateful for his love and sacrifice for all of us. Happy Birthday Jesus.

Gingerbread House Extravaganza

We invited our neighbors the Walther's over for gingerbread house making. I made all the gingerbread houses by scratch earlier that day. When Mike saw them he said, "Wow, you have been busy. That must have taken a long time." I said, "I have never made gingerbread houses form scratch..........and yeah, it took me forever." 6 hours to be exact! I wanted to make a house per kid but it took so long that 2 had to share. Soren was more then happy to share with McKenzie. In fact we was so happy to be working with her, he was more then happy to let her have the gingerbread house when they were done.

I was so impressed how well all the kids did. Xander, Brandon (who are 4) and Craig (who is 2) stayed focus on their houses for about an hour. It was amazing. And to boot they only ate every 20th candy. Is that not amazing?! All in all it was a really great night until the the Walters were just leaving and Xander grabbed his house, slid it off the table and then proceeded to drop it. It shattered into 1o0 pieces and tears began to fly. So, after 6 hours of sweating over these houses, we had nothing to show for it because Soren gave his to Mckenzie and Xander's was now a complicated puzzle. However when the Walther's were leaving, Katie (the Walther's oldest and 7 year old) came running back in and gave her house to Xander. Isn't that so sweet! That dried up all the tears and I didn't have to spend the rest of the night trying to put back the house. Yeah for charity!!

Ooops

A couple of days ago I randomly and spontaneously remembered Rescue 911. It was my favorite show as a kid, and when I say kid I mean like 7 yrs old. I was a fan the moment I saw an episode. I loved everything about it. So I decided to google it to see if there were any episodes on line. There are a bunch on you tube so without thinking I said, "Hey boys want to watch my favorite show when I was a kid?" I didn't think much about it, I mean I watched it as a kid and loved it so surly it will be fine for my boys. I clicked on an episode randomly. It was about a little 4 year old who got sucked in the escalator. Some unknown way, the kid sleeve of this shirt got caught and then the back of his shirt got sucked in. They didn't shut it off for awhile and it continued to suck his shirt down that it started to strangle the boy. The pressure was so high from the strangling that it popped many of his superficial blood vessels on the skin of his face. It was actually quite traumatizing to watch. Soren started to cover his face and started to moan, "Mom, how can this be your favorite show as a kid?"

That question sort of made me laugh. I mean, he had a point, but it was. I loved this show. "Uh, well, I know he is in a lot of danger right now, but he is going to be alright in the end. Look, see all these nice strangers trying to help the boy? Isn't great to see people help each other?"

Soren still covered his face in horror with occasional moans of distress. I wondered if I should shut it off. I debated what was worse - seeing something traumatizing that isn't resolved with a happy ending or seeing something traumatizing and having that be the last thing in your mind. I decide to let them finish watching it. Xander never moaned, cringed, or covered his face. He laughed a forced laugh at times and pronounced his love of the show. It was all a little forced and I wondered if this was how he was dealing with stress. Xander happily reviewed how good he is at using the escalator and what he does to prevent problems (jump the gap).

Right after watching this show we went to Winco to pick up a few things before our trip to Whistler. On our way home Xander said, "I can't get that show out of my head." "Yeah me too" Soren joined in. That is when I figured I really screwed up my kids. Ooops.

Well today we were at the mall and took the escalator up to the second floor - per the request of both my kids. Soren jumped on with no problem. But Xander hesitated and I don't know what came over me, but I said, "yeah, that is the spot that little boy got stuck on." I was saying it more like a guided tour then to freak out my kid. I had already hopped on the escalator at this point and started going up. Xander stayed stationary and then cried out in horror terrified to go on by himself.........Yup, I screwed him up. You see, Xander is the one you have to watch. Soren wears all his emotions on his sleeve and hides nothing. Soren is comfortable being emotional. Xander on the other hand will act one way to cover his true feelings, so he doesn't really deal with his feelings until it all becomes too much. It is really strange. Who would have guess. I would have definitely thought that would be the other way around for the boys.

For the next 30 minutes we talk about how it is actually hard to get stuck in an escalator and if you use it correctly (standing) then you won't get stuck. Anything that helps promotes the proper use of things is always a bonus for my family. Then Xander began to review general emergencies.

"When I get my arm cut off I am going to call the policeman and not the fireman. I like policemen more then firemen."

"If I can't wake you mom, I will call 911, but I know how to wake you right?"

"Where is the stop button on the escalators? Can kids push them?"

"Do you know anyone that got their leg cut off an uses a fake leg. Can I see them?"

Ect.

Well, they seem to be dealing with it well....... I think. I just keep staying factual and give them options on how to deal with situations and that seems to keep them on the question side of curious instead of the emotional side. I can't help myself.

Oh Rescue 911, why do I love you so?

A Thompson Thanksgiving

This Thanksgiving was the best ever. It was a Thompson Thanksgiving and my sister-in-law Liz reserved a cabin about 1.5 hrs away from home up in the snow. The roads were fine getting up there, but there was step driveway that was covered in snow and ice and it took us over 2 hours to get everyone up there. However, once up the driveway, it was a beuatiful home. Wow! Huge and top of the line. Every family got their own rooms and there were 3 fire places. The best part was it had the best sledding hill just outside the house on the property. We had SO MUCH FUN! The kids played in the snow for 3 days straight. When we got cold we would just jump into the hot tub. The place was enchanting. Ryan was only able to come up for Thanksgiving day for the 4 day trip, but it was great when he came. The boys really loved playing in the snow with him.