Thursday, May 29, 2008

I am so ridiculously behind...

Actually, it's not THAT bad. But still. :-P

I'll start off with the current news and move backwards I guess. Why?

No idea.

Today maintenance showed up to help us with our latest problem. We have a roommate, and a startling before 7am roommate that isn't exactly welcome...

Meet JO:
Jo is a European Starling who has decided to try and raise, what I'm guessing is her second, brood in my bathroom fan vent. Pleasant isn't it? She was named Jo because it's one of those delightful swing-both-ways names. You could be Josette or Josephine as a lady bird, or you could be Joseph, Josef, or... uhh - JOSE. There, lol. Of course that's "hoe-say" so we'd then need to call the bird Jo aka Ho. Not nearly as exciting.

Regardless, after trying to find out what type of bird Jo was I emailed my Gpa who owns a Stokes Field Guide to Birds and he looked it up from my three photos and dubbed Jo a European Starling. They were introduced in 1890 in New York from Europe. They change color in the winter and will nest just about anywhere that is a "cavity". They can even imitate other birds. Jo, YOUR SPECIES ROCKS.

I, after thanking my blessed stars that my grandparents exist (okay, well, technically they must exist for me to exist) ;) looked up online more information on my new bunk invader.

Jo, is in fact, a female - the males can begin the nest building before finding a mate and then show his new bundle of love where he's like to build a nest. However, Jo gets the last word. The females "approve" of the site and begin to build the real deal. It takes 2-3 days to complete the nest and the male partner will hover around, watching his mate build the nest to make sure she isn't coupled by any invading male Starlings.

This is normally done late February to early March -BUT- due to circumstances, weather being one, sometimes the couple's brood isn't successful and they will try again at a new batch of babes. Considering it snowed up until and through May 1st, my guess is that they weren't successful this season and have decided to try again.

Regardless, sad but part of life, she can't try again in my vent as that could cause huge problems and according to Hubbs may open into part of the heating closet. Last thing we need is Jo stuck in a closet or getting too hot. Today maintenance came and looked at the wrenched off vent cover and pushed it closed. He's going to look for a new cover and come back later.

While today is day 3 of nest building I am glad that we're not catching her laying her eggs. I don't know what I would do if I was responsible for her abandoning her nest because of peoplesmell.

Anywho, in memoriam of Jo. Who I have no doubt will continue to sit on my fence and throw every type of birdish call my way.


Friday, May 23, 2008

Castles & Spiders

Today Andrew came over to play and he and Duncan made "a castle" out of the little nook made by the sofa chair and sofa. I got some photos. They were so cute. I tried to "boy"-ify the thought of it and I would refer to it as a "fort" thinking that was what they would call it - but no, it was A CASTLE. I got corrected many times, LOL. :)


The Castle. from Melissa Wagner on Vimeo.
I think Duncan thought I was going to take a photo, lol.






Later, after lunch, we decided to make spiders and a butterfly. My camera, sadly, was dying so these photos are NOT the greatest. But they were just so cute I couldn't help it. I think we sang "Itsy Bitsy Spider" like 50 times. :D


I'm bummed that my batteries died but at least I got a couple of cute ones. :)

Enjoy.

Thursday, May 22, 2008

Duncan and his new bike!

Check him out! He's got some work ahead of him pedal-wise, but he's getting there. :)

Enjoy!



Duncan riding his bike. from Melissa Wagner on Vimeo.

A peek at the garden soon! :)

today.

After all this heat we've finally gotten some rain! It's weird because rain in Oregon is so normal. Here, during summer (we moved here well after Spring had ended last year) the rain was rare in Magna but when it came it was in the form of huge blowing thunderstorms. Yesterday and today have been interesting - almost like Oregon. We had the sliding door open in the morning over breakfast and it smelled exactly like my mornings in Oregon.

That random point being made, onto more exciting things. Like my garden, haha. :) I'll be posting some photos I took a couple of weeks ago (I think) and some recent ones I'll get today of how much everything has grown, blows me away. The beans, by far, are doing the best. We've got 4 plants begging to be put into their new place and connected to a cage and one wee one that's just starting out. I think I'll wait until Saturday and hopefully the baby one will have matured a bit and I'll transfer them all. I can WAIT to get beans from these guys. :)

Well, that's my cue, Duncan just smacked Olivia on the head with a Barbie. When I say smack I mean, aimed, swung three times, and then finally got a full-strength hit right on the noggin. Like I said... WWE reruns in this place, I'm telling you...

Off to find the SD card...

Wednesday, May 21, 2008

D27: My sweet boy

You are SO sweet, Duncan.

I don't know that you'll ever fully realize that.

This month you are 27 months old.

I've been so awful about keeping up my journaling in the past. Highschool was fine, I did pretty well but that was mostly because I was such a depressed anxious teenager full of angst that I wrote it down so I could remember it all, because who wouldn't want to remember. Phhfft. But once I grew out of my phases it became harder and harder, wasn't any drama to report on, day-to-day became increasingly normal, and I had children to raise. No time to worry over hair, appearance, or who broke up with who.

Until I started this blog, and mostly just until this month, have I really begun to blog on a normal basis. It may be a little, may be a lot, but I feel like it's getting me closer to journaling daily as I should. So in efforts to continue that and to make it a point to journal specifically about my children as well - I'm starting a new monthly blog tradition for each of you. I'll start with you (because you're my second and because you're so easy going you get lost behind your hormonal sister).

It's weird to think that you're only 27 months old. For some reason, all of your life, I've always felt you were older than you were. When we were getting ready for your 2nd birthday, it was so "young". I just felt as if you had already passed the age of 2. Mostly because you never seemed 1-year-old. I remember you seemed so tiny to me when you were a baby. But as soon as you began to grow it happened entirely too fast. Suddenly you were walking and wrestling and playing with cars and choo-choos. :) You're only 2 and I'm already reminiscing on the baby days.

Focus, focus momma. Okay, month 27. This month has been an interesting month. It started of course with SNOW. Ever since we moved to Utah, I think EVERY story begins with snow. You've developed a new "look" for yourself, every time I say "SMILE!" you respond with this:


You've grown so much this month and it's not even physically. I know you've gained some weight, grown a few - but your vocabulary has skyrocketed! You think more about the things you say, you love answering questions (even to Diego or Dora on NickJr.) and you are obsessed with repeating just about everything anyone else says.

You got your first bike this month, and right before we bought it you got a Buzz Lightyear helmet and knee and elbow pads. We picked the bike up for you when we were out on our last date night and when we picked you up from Mimi & Papa's house you were so excited to see it! You rode it for a few feet and then disregarded it completely to go play with the other cousins. :)

Here's a video Daddy shot of us outside, you riding your bike, and me attempting to get you to pedal forwards instead of backwards.


Duncan riding his bike. from Melissa Wagner on Vimeo.


You're such a sweetheart, and I know one day I'll tell you that and you'll complain "Aww, Ma," and run horribly embarrassed out of the room. At which point your father will tell me to stop being so sappy to the boy, cause he's a man. Tough. Built Like a Rock.

But for now I'll sap it up and continue to kiss your little cheeks, nose, toes, fingers, arms, neck, head until you finally push me away. Ahh, babies. :)

Monday, May 19, 2008

australian delicacies.


Upon waking this morning I fed the Husband, children, and not myself. Since this lactose intolerant thing started I haven't been in much of a mood to do so. Normally I would have cereal with milk, toast with butter, glass of milk, etc. One of the above. But lately, without that my options are non-conventional breakfast foods or oatmeal. And after 2 weeks of oatmeal... yeah, so done with that.

I fell asleep again, while watching Cars with Duncan while "Her Highness" was doing something or another upstairs. She came down wearing a Sunday dress *fumes* and asked me to tie the sash. I did and then went into the kitchen to retrieve a perfectly good, untouched apple from the sink that Duncan has put there. I washed and sliced it, grabbed the crunchy peanut butter (thank HEAVENS I realized that's not dairy, lol) from the cupboard and sat down to blog. That was 2 hours and 20 minutes ago. WOW, distraction. The peanut butter was good and I think I needed the protein. I know protein isn't a vital characteristic of milk but I was so tired, it helped to wake me up. I can't think, off the top of my head, of any characteristics of Vitamin D loss or calcium loss except for the obvious one of my bones turning into Vegemite. Yes, Vegemite, you know - the Australian wonder owned by the American company, Kraft.

My humor has been a wee bit dark lately and it's been getting the best of me. Sarcasm can take a bite out of someone's mood if used incorrectly and lately I'm been a bit mouthy. Avoid this by not encouraging me and eliminating contact. Easy enough, right?

The children have been an absolute mess this morning, both in awful AWFUL moods since waking early this morning. Liv absolutely lost it when Cam walked out the door screaming that she hadn't had a "kissy and huggy" to which I had no choice but to tell her too late. He was late to work and she was going to take ten years to get off her chair to get what she wanted. So, really, there was no option and I told her exactly that. I offered to let her call him on my phone so she could send a kissy over the phone, etc. But no go. She then began the huge monologue "Why aren't you ever nice to me? I just want to say bye to Daddy but you are a mean mommy! Why don't you make me happy?" If you haven't noticed, the drama queen has only gotten worse. She's in tears half the day over the most absurd things and 99% of the time she doesn't even need another person involved to justify a melt-down. It's a lovely arrangement.

On the bright side, on Saturday we had a very successful shopping trip. Liv wore her very cute new outfit yesterday and yes, I'm awful, I didn't get any photos. I do have photos of Duncan riding his new bike though, those will come soon. We also got to see the Oscar Mayer Weinermobile or whatever they call it, and we have photos of that. :) Duncan was delighted to see a hot dog 3 times the size of our truck.

More later when the kids are occupied.

Friday, May 16, 2008

"YAY! SPRINKLES!"

No, this isn't about sprinkles as I'm sure was originally thought, it's about my beautiful children running in diapers and bloomers through the sprinklers as they tested them all out. I swear, I've ever seen her so happy and cold and wet - all at the same time! These photos are silly since they were obviously all over the place. Enjoy!


playing in the "sprinkles" from Melissa Wagner on Vimeo.





Real Life Caption: "MOM. This water... it tastes like dirt."










My cute babies. *sigh*

Thursday, May 15, 2008

Wooooodeeeee!

Today we colored Disney pictures. Duncan and Andrew did Woody, and Liv did Alice in Wonderland. (She's currently pouting in the corner with her hormonal self and coloring at the same time - major multi-tasking.)



K, right before I was going to push "post" Liv came out of her hormonal corner and wanted me to take a picture of hers as well.


Me: That was such a good picture Liv, good job.
Liv: UGH 13-year-old's sigh FINE, then take this one!


What a photogenic little darling she is.

Thank you vlog to Bonnie.

The kids received their packages in the mail today! Thanks!


Presents from Melissa Wagner on Vimeo.


The Royal Children from Melissa Wagner on Vimeo.

Today.

Hasn't been a bad day today, house is clean, weather is good, spoke to an old friend from highschool this morning via MySpace. She's such a sweetheart and I'm glad I decided to comment on her page and say hello. :)

I am on the other hand, NOT glad, that since the events in March I've become horribly lactose intolerant. I don't know if that normally includes all dairy products or anything with any type of dairy product in them (i.e. eggs, butter, sour cream, pudding) but my version of it certainly does. I began to notice in April that I was getting sick an awful lot in the evenings to the point where I could hardly stand to have pajamas on or Cam anywhere near my side of the bed. I would sweat and my stomach would cramp. I'd have to sit up in the middle of the night because the pains would make my stomach hurt so badly they'd wake me up.

At first, I just assumed it was an awful stomach bug, as I'm a baby when it comes to anything GI. So I stuck through it, didn't change anything. The next morning I had my cereal (with milk), had a normal lunch, had dinner (chicken crescents which includes cream of broccoli or chicken, milk, cheese, and of course the cheese and cream of whatever gravy for the rice and on top of the crescents). That night after the kids went to bed, we watched TV together and had ice cream.

That night was one of the worst I've ever had GI-wise. You don't want details, believe me.

Since then I realized, after my pleading with God to just help me through the night and I'd never touch a glass of milk ever again, that I was going to have to make a change. Since then life has been considerably better. I no longer drink milk - at all, eat eggs (I'll eat them in something like fried rice or a small small slice of cake sans frosting, but not alone or in omelet, etc.), no more buttered toast in the mornings, no more sour cream or cream cheese, no more frosting (that hasn't been a huge deal since I'm not too big on frosting), pretty much anything dairy. Even macaroni and cheese, it's like my body can sense the dairy and suddenly things don't taste as good. Well, not that M&C ever did really taste good in the first place, lol.

So not eating the dairy, and allowing myself to some ice cream once a week in smaller amounts (because ice cream is pretty much my LIFE) I've come back to the human world where we all are normal and bent over in pain, sobbing.

So in addition to my regular eating habits of no ground beef, don't like chocolate, and cutting out the preservatives of "pre made" meals or "freezer dinners" (essentially anything not fresh or made from scratch) I'm adding no dairy. This ought to be interesting at family dinners.

I'm making some more changes to the blog today. Nothing horrendously interesting to the likes of the rest of the cyber world. No worries. ;)

Now go clean your room.

Tuesday, May 13, 2008

Updates.

Not a whole lot to write about today. This morning we all watched "Barbie and the Magic of Pegasus" in 3D! I KNOW, JUST SO COOL. Regardless, the kids enjoyed the fact that I sat with them, wearing the silly Barbie decorated 3D glasses. Poor Duncan didn't quite get it and I had a hard time seeing anything because I had to turn my head to sort of look at an angle which then acted up my astigmatism, lol. Liv of course was all "IT'S NOT POPPING OUT! WHY?" So we were quite the group.

Now with a mild headache, the kids are at least leaving me alone for a few minutes while watching The Little Mermaid II, with Ariel's daughter Melody. Poor Duncan can't say his own name but constantly says "Eric" because during our days when we're not watching a movie or fighting over whose turn it is, they're reenacting movie scenes - and Duncan is "Eric". After the Barbie movie, Duncan is "Aidan". (Funny because that would have been his name if we hadn't changed our minds 2 years ago, lol.)

Here's Duncan's new namesake:
On the left we have Aidan, Annika (Barbie) and Shiver (the polar cub) looking at a map.

On the right, we have Annika riding with Aidan on her sister, Brietta, who has been turned into a Pegasus by the evil Wizard Wenlock because her father wouldn't allow Wenlock to take Brietta to wed her. And then of course, the Cloud Princesses on their baby pegasuses for fun apparently. This photo makes no sense of course because Annika is wearing her "beautiful gown" that she had magically put on her after she used the Wand of Light on Wenlock to brake all of his spells. But of course, that was WAY later in the movie, prior to which Annika had already changed Brietta back into a human... oh my. Am I real debating this?

Onto other news:

  • Our tax stimulus is coming. Should be here on Friday.
  • I made 3 sales over the weekend totaling $51.48. Not all profit but with 9 bows sold I'm hoping this is a pickup for the site.
  • I got a new planner. (Yeah, "haha" mom.)
  • This weekend Hubbs and I are finally going to Iggy's. It's not that we have been wanting to go there, just simply that it's a place to go out and he had a small gift card from work to there. AND, while looking at their menu, we saw for a limited time you can order two entrees and get a free slice of cheesecake! Woohoo!

Monday, May 12, 2008

my mother's day.

And why am I showing you this wonderful new table with a fresh vase of beautiful red roses on it (from Cam)? Because...


Sunday was Mother's Day! (PS: You should have already been aware of that fact.)

We had a good day, not wonderful due to children in Sacrament, but good. :) Church was at 9, got home and Cam sends me inside alone. Any of you with children know that not only do you ever not get to leave in a car alone, come inside the house after being in a car without chickens tagging along behind, or arrive inside alone to find yourself STILL alone... amazing, isn't it?

So I was a good wifey and argued with him, saying just because it was Mother's Day didn't mean I couldn't help Liv out of her seat and walk to the door with her. He insisted, I listened and secretly cleaned like a mad woman once I got inside. I'm sure he meant for me to relax but everything was so close and not where it was supposed to be and if he was going to take pictures I wanted it to look good (which he didn't, sorry, I was crying anyway, wasn't a pretty sight). I did everything in my power not to unload the dishwasher while I waited, and before they came in I actually sat still on the couch for a few minutes waiting.

Well, they came in with cards. :) Olivia had written "Mommy" with a heart on the front of one of them and the other was from Cam. How cute are these?




Cameron's was funny and I had to share the inside. :) Daddy ran to get the gift they had for me and we waited downstairs. This is the COOLEST gift, I absolutely love it.


This was one of the gifts, he bought me the set but the one was out of stock. Darn you, Amazon! So it's on its way! I'm so excited for it to arrive as well!


Here's the inside flap and first page with a COOL layout sketch ruler. It allows you to scale down to the correct size for your layouts and sketch ideas in the back of the book. So cool. (Next to the book are the "wooden" roses that Mom (Cameron's) gave to all of her daughters/dils that were moms.) :)


As an example as to what it does - she sketches out ideas that you can use in your own scrapbooking. Such as titles. At the end of each chapter she has a couple pages, one is a fold out, where she pairs sketches with examples of real layouts using those ideas and sketches. It is SO much fun! I can't wait to get myself back to a real schedule during the week so I can scrapbook more. :)

Saturday, May 10, 2008

Our trip to the Zoo.

Our first trip to the Utah Hogle Zoo! We had a great time and got to see the fun animals. It wasn't as large at the Oregon Zoo but PACKED today. We inadvertently went to the Zoo on Macy's "Mom & Me" day. Oops.

Here are some highlights:

Dunky on Daddy's shoulders watching the presentation by the Elephants.

Duncan giving me "the look".

Playing with fruit snacks.
I told him like 18 times per fruit snack how horribly dirty the table was.
Did he care?
No.

The cutest water fountain I've ever seen, standing next to the cutest girl I've ever seen. ;)

Could she be ANY cuter?

Mommy and Duncan outside of the Zoo by the fountain. Liv was passed out asleep in the umbrella stroller, LOL. She had walked most of the way in the Zoo, she did a great job but WOW it wore us all out doing all that walking. The Hogle Zoo has a LOT more hills than the Oregon Zoo does. We definitely were not used to it.

We had a great time and can't WAIT to sleep tonight, lol. A long day in the sun, followed by more time riding bikes in the sun... we're pooped.

Happy Mother's Day to all the Mom's out there! :) Have a great day tomorrow!