Growing WarriorsJust your typical family…

Here’s a picture of the girls’ Halloween costumes – this was actually taken at the neighborhood Halloween parade, where Meredith won second place for her wizard costume – I didn’t take any pictures on Halloween night, although I wish I had.

Just had a few pictures to share with you…I fell behind in my picture stuff. I have been adding pics to flickr from our CO trip, and I’m still not done. My plan was not to upload anything from my camera until I was done with the CO pics, but I got impatient with myself tonight, so until I get back to the CO pics, here you go:

A few weeks ago we went on a field trip to Missouri Town its a living history museum of an original 1800s farming community. They have people dressed in period garb and all sorts of things to explore. Maybe, if I ever get around to it, I will post more pics of this outing, but in case I don’t, I offer you:

In addition, I also offer you Lydia’s new outfit. She got this outfit last Monday, and wore it every day since but today (its in the wash). As soon as we got it, she demanded I take her picture:

And finally, two weddings in our house. Jess got married to Bryan last week:

Not to be out done, a webkinz wedding took place a week or so earlier:

The girls tattle on each other. Don’t tell that lady that wrote the book on siblings without rivalry. They just do.

They apparently are also planning to run away and join the circus to be circus clowns.

Just now Lydia came in, and in that tattling tone of voice, said, “MOOOOOOMMMMMMMYYYYY, Meredith threw pie in my face”

and she had that pie-eating grin on her face as she said it.

So playing along, I yell, “MEREDITH, Did you throw pie in Lydia’s face? That is NOT ok!” Of course literal Meredith takes it too seriously and starts getting defensive (which for Meredith usually involves this pathetic weepy victim voice), “I didn’t throw pie in her face, and besides it wasn’t real pie, it was just pretend, and I was just trying to be funny! I didn’t mean it!”

Yeah, ok joke’s over.

Still…what game were they playing in there to begin with?

I’m going through photo withdrawal. Until I get a new computer, I am not uploading any pictures from my camera, and its really starting to get to me. I had many many many shots from the CO trip I wanted to play with and upload to flickr and blog about, and I can’t do that until I get a new computer – they are safely waiting for me in my online backup. Now I have a few hundred new pictures just laying in wait on the camera too…from Missouri town, etc. I need a Flickr fix….comments, participate in new challenges (ps, the nikon 40/x challenge this week is/was food, and even though I KNEW I wouldn’t be competing, I still found myself taking pictures of food…)

So in the meantime, did you see this one:

I love this picture. If you are able, click on it and view it in flickr, and then view it larger (I think you can only do that if you have an account and are among my contacts – shoot me a line if you want to be my contact!). That’s Lydia on the swing. I have some companion shots for this…but yes, can’t play with them at the moment! Argh.

And how about this one:

I think this is a great portrait of my dad, stepmom and the girls. My complaint is that hair in Allison’s face, and what was Lydia doing? But that’s the way it goes.

And then this one:

The light was harsh at noon in Redstone, but this is my grandmother with my girls. I think they all look beee-yooo-teee-ful. Wouldn’t you agree? You can see that hair in Allison’s face is kinda the norm.

And then there are the few scenery shots that I got uploaded before the computer died:

Even though these were uploaded to Flickr a week ago, I feel better……

Computer shopping this week. Pictures next week??? One can only hope!

1. When we were in Denver, we went to the Denver Natural History Museum, and shelled out the extra bucks to see the amazing Titanic exhibit. Just now I overheard Meredith saying, “And I was on the Titanic, and when it sank, I didn’t drown, so I went to Disneyworld!” – see, learning all the time…..

2. We had a very long power outage the other day, and my computer did not survive. I am currently using the kids’ unreliable laptop until we can find the time to go shopping. This expense was not one I needed right now (right after a big trip and a huge expense of replacing the pool cover). Nor did I need the hassle of getting set up on the laptop and next week, setting up a new computer.

3. Since the computer died, I haven’t updated my pictures. I’ve posted a few from the CO trip, but the rest are safely waiting for me in my online backup account (Said before – online backup rocks) and after I get the new computer set up and all that, I will post more pics from our trip…but that could be a few weeks, so be patient with me.

4. We went to Missouri Town the other day with other homeschoolers. It was such a great day and the girls had a good time. Its a farming town from 1855 and they have people dressed in period dress to answer questions. The girls got to meet with a woman who was appalled that Allison was showing her knees, and all the girls were showing so much skin. They also got to see a blacksmith at work and attend school in a one-room schoolhouse with a sweet teacher. It was all in all a very cool day. I did get pictures, but again, you must wait until the new computer is set up….

5. As soon as we got back from CO, Eric had to rush to Orlando for a business trip, I had to immediately tackle the work on my desk. Eric gets home from Orlando, and immediately has this big training thing at work, that involves dinner, and tonight he is heading to Oklahoma with OU football tickets in hand. Its been a crazy couple of weeks for that poor man. I haven’t seen him much at all since we got back from CO.

6. I’m feeling burnt out with my work. You’d think I’d feel refreshed after just coming back from a two week vacation with no work, but I don’t. I want to get to a point to where I am only doing one project a month, I think. I don’t see that in the cards for at least another 3-5 years though. I’m frazzled, tired, lost, frustrated. My kids are suffering. I’m a poser when it comes to homeschooling because frankly I don’t have the time or the energy for it. I (unfairly, I realize) resent the time that Eric gives to his job and to football, and truly feel alone in all of this endeavor. My house is a disaster – I have no time for myself, and that includes self-care stuff like exercising and cooking healthy…I have external demands (baby showers, homeschool groups, etc.) that I just don’t have the energy for….

Yikes, where did that come from. I’m leaving it in though…cause I dunno. At some point when the kids are gone and I’m feeling that empty-nest thing, I may look at this and laugh and laugh and laugh…..right?

More later, but I wanted to mention a few things:

- The girls and I were gone for 12 days.
- We spent appx 40 hours total in the car
- I took appx 5gigs of pictures (will sort through later, so stay tuned)
- had gorgeous weather the entire time
- saw some snow (over Vail Pass)
- reconnected with several great friends
- even though I was on “vacation” – I still did 5 loads of laundry while gone.
- realized that even though I’ve lived in Kansas for 2 years now, my car’s radio is still preset to CO radio stations (that should tell you all a lot about how well I’ve accepted Kansas as my “home”)
- more homesick then ever