A Movie, Water, Running, and more Water!

While we were in CA for Thanksgiving, we went to go see the new Muppet Movie.  The kids mostly enjoyed it, but the water fountain just outside the exit was also a hit.

Shelly, Emily and LIzzie staring at the water

I think that's Grace in the pink - those girls all look similar from the back

Jason running

I don't know the kid in front, but Jason had fun running

Grace and Lizzie

And the peanut gallery

Gardner Fun Family Pics

My mom loves to take pictures, and she loves her grandkids.  Put the two together and she's in pig heaven (a phrase I heard her use many times growing up).  I'll have you know, it was quite hard cutting the 30 or 40 pictures of these same shots down to the 2 of each you're about to see.  I finally just picked them at random.

Grandkids hanging out on the porch swing.

Granddaughters sitting along the fence, trying to sit nicely for a picture

Everyone who was within ear shot all squished together for a 'smashed face' shot.

I assumed some were missing, but I counted just now, it was really just baby Robby (and those who weren't in town - and Jason was missing in the one above).  Wow.

Sunset on the Farm

I think these speak for themselves

What have I done wrong?!

I made a horrible discovery today... Emily likes black licorice. I'm not sure what happened - she was showing such promise! :)

I had bought one of those huge family bags of licorice with both red and black licorice to help keep us awake for our drive through the night down to CA for Thanksgiving.  We did not eat it all, and there was some left over.  I was snacking on a piece of red one afternoon and had set the black aside for Mark to eat later (because I'm smart enough to not like that gross black stuff).  I left the room for some reason of another, and she came in and found my small pile of black licorice.  She loved it.  I was horrified.  It was tragic.  The pile is now gone - she ate it.  Sorry Mark!

Adventures...

So, the good news is that the bathroom floor is now clean. The bad news is that almost every single towel we own is now in the wash - or maybe that's good news too. The puddle of water from the toilet overflowing helped push both of those along a bit sooner than I had intended. I'm just glad the water was clean (at least what I could see of it). Emily is ...helpful... :)




Our toilet has a slight design error in the tank.  Occasionally (actually fairly often) when the toilet is flushed, the chain that connects to the plug at the bottom gets flipped up and stuck on the rod attached to the handle.  This means that the plug does not always go down and plug the hole that allows the tank to fill back up, but it does not mean that the water stops flowing into the tank.  What this often results in is the toilet bowl constantly trying to fill back up, but never getting full because the water is running into the bowl.  So, our toilet runs.  Normally, just a lot of wasted water, but not a huge deal.  When it is a big deal, is when out cute 2 1/2 year old is pretending to potty train (I really should start that, but I'm not feeling well enough at the moment to take that on) and somehow manages to clog the toilet, and then by an unlucky fluke, the chain gets stuck when she tries to flush it...  There was water everywhere. At least a 1/4 inch of standing water pretty much everywhere inside the bathroom (1/2 inch in many places) - and we don't have a small bathroom.  Water running out the door and down the hall towards the closet/Shelly's room/pantry/storage room.  All of the rugs were soaked.  


If I had been thinking more clearly, I would have taken a few towels and mopped and squeezed them out in the tub or something.  But I was in panic mode, and may I remind you of the kitchen fire and how well my brain works in panic mode.  I did manage to get the water turned off at the source, and fix the running toilet, but that's when my brain power gave out on me.  I used every rag towel in the house that I could find, and several non-rag towels.  I have a stack about 2-3 feet high of rag towels.  We're not talking about just a few towels here, there are many.

Oh Emily...  It's a good thing you're cute.

And that I have a washer.

Thanksgiving, here we come!

We went to CA for Thanksgiving.  Mark had to work on Tuesday night, but we thought that spending all day Wednesday driving did not sound like fun, so we packed the car before he left for work and drove through Tuesday night.  Mark was supposed to get off at 11:00, but another guy there covered his last hour for him so he could be home just after 10:00.  We did some last minute packing of the car, got the sleeping kids loaded and left just after 11:00.  It was a nice calm drive down, since the kids slept pretty much the whole way.  Mark did almost all of the driving, and I napped a bit so that I could take over when he got too tired to drive safely.  He's good about waking me up so I can entertain him when he's having a hard time staying awake, and we're not afraid of napping on the side of the road if we need to.

We pulled into the driveway just after 7:00 in the morning, unloaded the kids and a bit of the car, rested for a bit and then Danielle, the kids and I all walked over to Meadow Park to visit Grammy at work while Mark took a nap.

I think we made a decent decision as far as driving through the night.  I know it doesn't work for everyone, and it's not usually my first choice - although I do like driving when the sun isn't in my face, and the kids are tired (they are easier to entertain when they are asleep :) ) - but it was much better than arriving with tired and grumpy kids late Wednesday.  This way we got to play with family for most of a whole day before the official holiday!

The kids got to help Grammy make rolls...

Well, either that or make a mess, sometimes it's hard to tell the difference when kids are helping...

Grandpa Schofield's Birthday

It was Mark's dad's birthday yesterday

The kids had fun decorating his birthday cake

Yup, Transformers (maybe...)

I'm sure he was super excited!

He was a good sport

His grandsons sure love him!

His granddaughters likely love him too. :)

Happy Birthday Grandpa!

Win some, lose some...

While we were living with my parents in CA, we planted a few trees in their backyard for them.  Officially we had their approval, but I've often wondered if we maybe didn't pressure them into it a little bit...  One of the trees that we planted was an avocado tree.  Avocado trees take years to produce their first fruits, and I had been nervous for a year or two that we had done something wrong with the tree, and it would never produce.  So, it was exciting to hear Mom tell us that she was excited to see an avocado on her tree finally!  She even sent us pictures of the new addition to the tree.

Here's the cute little tree.

And there, hiding behind the leaves is the lone avocado.

It's so cute!

This is a schefflera plant that Grammy and Granddad got for Kathy's funeral, and according to my mother, it sat on their kitchen table in a tiny pot for decades.  Mom re-potted it, and it grew, and grew, and got cut back, and grew some more (kind of reminds me of the tiny goldfish Otto, who got fed too much - kids books, what can you do?).  It seems to be doing well.

Not quite so tiny any more.

Then there's this orange tree - or what's left of it.  This used to be a gorgeous, full and plentiful tree.  I've eaten many an orange off this tree, and made many a gallon of orange juice from it's fruits.  No one knows what happened, but I think it's produced it's last orange...  Tragic.

Random shots from around the house

Some random pictures that have no other discernable connection, other than they are of the kids and were taken in the house.

They asked me to take a picture of them inside the tracks (they made train tracks and then laid down inside of them)

Shelly wanted a picture too

I took this picture for blackmail purposes.  Socks and flip flops.  Sometimes I have to try really hard to keep my rule of letting them be responsible for their own choices...

Jason on his bike (pretend it's not pink)

Emily calls this her 'bike'.  I've let her pretend that it's close to the same thing, mostly because it keeps the peace when the other kids are on their actual bikes.  She doesn't seem to notice the difference.

Emily found one of those self inking stamps.  It went in the trash moments after this picture was taken.

Aunt JB is teaching Annie how to play the piano.  With Annie's long fingers, it might be inevitable.