Liam is 6

My little Liam. He is such a beautiful little man, with so many things going on below the surface. He is loving and sensitive and fun. He loves shopping with me, eating breakfast foods, playing with Ray and making people laugh. I went with him on his class fieldtrip a few weeks ago and realized he makes his friends laugh and he acts silly to get them to giggle. Funny little man. For school, we brought in army men cupcakes. When you bit into them, they were various colors of green:

He loves the movie “Frozen” and sings the songs from it! He reads books now, has about 50 sight words memorized and does very well in school. Most of all, Liam loves to dress up. I will regularly walk around the corner in our house and see Liam walking by normally with a mustache and hat on. Just another day … wandering around the house in a cape and gloves, or with a helmet on and a belt. He’s hilarious. So we had to make his birthday a dress up birthday!

But when I googled “dress up party” it brought up a bunch of girly parties. I needed a manly, dress up party and this is what we came up with:

I don’t know how this happened in my house … I never imagined we’d end up with quite so many weapons.

But my favorite part of the party was the photo booth …. huge success. I took a million pictures of the kids dressed up and posing. You should know there were a million pictures and I narrowed it down.


Noah, Luca, Liam and Enzo


For Liam’s Birthday Dinner he asked for – German pancakes, bacon, strawberries and OJ.


opening presents – I thought I had some awesome pics to show the Grandparents … but all of them were blurry. really blurry. But he has already worn his CAL shirt Gammie and was wearing the costume you got for him in the picture! And Grandma and Grandpa – he looooved the little Lego guy with a holster and the Lego battle pack! You guys had to know he would love it because he picked out everything on his Amazon wishlist himself! he was delighted to get all 6 things on his list from parents and Grandparents combined! Lucky kid.


Here’s a bonus – I’m actually in this picture. Do you see my torso on the left?? Also – there’s the cake. Liam dictated what it was. He asked for a two layer round cake that was blue with yellow stars on it and a 6 on top. He said he’d position his own Lego guys on top of it, but then he didn’t and then the blue and yellow turned out more pale than I planned and well, it turned out looking a little like a baby shower cake. But whatevs.


The little girls got separate favor bags than the boys. In their little bags they got a ring and tiara. Good dress ups to go home with, huh? For the boys’ favor bags they got tattoos, a stick on mustache, silly glasses with eyebrows and nose, an eyeball ring, fake money, a sheriff tag and chocolate coins.

Happy Birthday my Liam!

DISNEYLAND!!

WHAT?? We went to Disneyland about 5 months ago .. wha? I know. I’m ridiculous. There seems to always be stuff going on around here these days (and by “these days” I mean, since we moved to CA). This week we have the Ward Talent Show, in which I am singing in 3 acts, Daniel is singing with me in one act and I am entertaining all the kids during the … wait for it … THREE intermissions, by singing “wiggle songs”. Also this week, is scouts, practices, I’m teaching the activity day girls how to sing, our AC died, ants are invading … yeah. That’s this week. And I haven’t blogged about Liam’s 6th birthday .. blah blah blah … we went to DISNEYLAND in January :)

Liz came into town and made this all possible. She’s the bomb.

We did two days. Day one – Disneyland, Day two – California Adventure. We stayed at a Marriott next to the parks. The parks are right across from one another and both are spectacular, as only Disney can do. Ya know, as I was experiencing Disneyland and all of its grandeur, I thought, if there is anything that is “overdone” it’s Disneyland. I have been teased for doing things a little overdone myself and have actually been quoted saying, “the art of overdoing things is a lost art!” Sooo, this was right up my alley. It makes me think I would looooove to do this as my job – to be on the creative team at Disneyland. I could come up with all sorts of craziness. It would be great. Anyway, back to January.

We left Ray with Christina because he naps and wouldn’t fully appreciate the experience at 18 months, so we were free to hang out until all hours playing at Disneyland. We went on a Mon and Tues … or a Tues and Wed?? Can’t remember, but it was the middle of the week in January at Disneyland and you’d think it would be totally dead … but it is like NYC, Disneyland is the amusement park that never sleeps.

We went in with a plan though. I had been prepped and trained by Christina and Aria, who are SoCal, Disneyland Annual Pass Holding vets. Christina and Aria planned out which rides were most worth it and which my boys would be most interested in, then Christina sat me down and trained me … for days. seriously. We watched youtube videos of certain rides, I memorized the map, we had teir 1, 2 and 3 rides and alternates. We had a plan from the moment we walked inside the gates. I had to know where to go and when for Fast Passes and make sure we hit the busiest rides first before they got crazy long lines. And I’m happy to report – it was a success! And all of the planning was worth it!!!

We rode everything we wanted to and some favorite rides twice! I think the boys’ favorite place was Tomorrowland in Disneyland because that’s where Jedi Training was, Space Mountain was Noah’s favorite ride and Liam begged to go on the little rocketship ride there all day and loved it. Gammie bought them awesome weaponry there too. Noah got to build his own light saber and he made Mace Windu’s purple one and Liam got Zurg’s gun. The coolest ball, popping rotating gun ever.

My favorite ride was Space Mountain too. Alright, here’s the story in pictures:


The boys walking together while we stood at the gate to get in.


The picture with Daniel is showing how many people were waiting for the park to let us in to Tomorrowland. This is Disneyland on a Monday in January, mind you. The picture of me is when I went to save a spot at the front of Jedi Training while Gammie, Daniel and the boys rode some rides.

And then there was Jedi Training …. I think I was more excited for this than the boys. Liam was flat out too nervous to do it, so it was just Noah who went up. But I just wanted this experience for him so badly! They LOOOOOOOOOOOVE star wars. This was like a fantasy coming true, and I was all pumped up for them.


Gammie getting love as we walked out of Tomorrowland.


On Tom Sawyer’s Island. I have to be honest, I thought this would not be too exciting or cool. But then we went and I was wrong – the boys loved this too! It had a myriad of caves and hiding spots and places to climb and it was all contained on this one island. You’d think you couldn’t get lost … but Liam proved you can. Liam got lost on one side of the island. We got pretty nervous when we didn’t see him after a few minutes and started looking around for him, calmly at first. We sent Daniel into the caves, but he couldn’t find him, then Liz and I split up to find him and in doing so, we left our backpack on a bench. We found Liam, who was crying, and turned back to the backpack and Disneyland workers were standing next to it radioing to others that there might be a bomb threat. We assured them it wasn’t and we were just in a panic because Liam was lost. It all worked out. Scary moments though.


Glad to be together and on the way back from the island.


This was from lunch … but what I didn’t get a picture of was dinner ….. somewhere in the New Orleans area of Disneyland, there is this place, a cafĂ© where you can get these garlic fries with magical sauce that is laced with crack cocaine (just kidding), but really!!!! I couldn’t get enough of them. The tragic ending to this fry story is that I had Daniel hold the to go box of fries while I took Liam on one more ride at the end of the day and Daniel put them down on a bench and forgot about them. We walked out and I asked where they were …. my mouth died a little inside. It was so sad. Saddest part of the two days – no question.

Then – California Adventure – Day Two!


Yes, I was there!! There are only a few pictures of me and here are two of them :) I actually have more pictures that Liz and Daniel sent me of the two days, but I don’t know where I downloaded them …. anyhow, here’s me! On the left, Liam and I are waiting to do “Turtle Talk”, awesome. And then we were on the carousel in the right hand picture, obviously.


Taking a breather in Radiator Springs.


Daniel and I ran off by ourselves to do the scary ride … forget what it’s called (Hotel something)


And World of Color. I wish I had more time to write more, but Ray is standing at my side crying. Disneyland – it’s all it’s cracked up to be! Thank you Gammie!!!!

Camping at Joshua Tree National Park

This past weekend we went camping. Daniel has been referring to it as “glamping” (glamorous camping) … because he’s a punk. For some reason, it is the Forsyth way to not call it a vacation unless you are hurting yourself in some way. Daniel only calls it camping if you are suffering. Evidently, we were not suffering sufficiently enough to call it camping. Moving on …

Joshua Tree is a pretty cool landscape. We took lots of pictures (is it “glamping” because YOU brought the tripod and nice camera, Daniel?? hmm?). I’ll stop harping and let the pictures tell the good story:

Uncle Jeff told stories to the boys and then we put everyone to bed and the parents had fun around the fire, talking, taking pictures of the night sky and then playing with the camera. We used Walter’s phone for a tiny light and then kept the shutter open on our camera and drew all sorts of fun things …

Then we slept … not for very long. But we slept. Daniel slept like a log! I did not. I can now officially deem myself a “light sleeper”. I used to sleep like a log too, when I didn’t have kids, but ever since Noah, I hear everything. I heard the kids moving in their sleeping bags next to me, I heard coughing and sneezing and I heard Ray moaning in his sleep (he does this a lot). I woke up about 7 or 8 times over the span of 5 hours. I kept moving Ray under his sleeping bag covers and moving Liam off the tent floor and onto his mat and pillow … I was exhausted when I woke up the next morning, but that didn’t stop me from making awesome camping pancakes!!

I think it’s my mom’s fault that all of us girls do this. We love breakfast. Whenever we went camping as a family when I was younger, my mom would make an incredibly delicious breakfast of eggs, bacon and pancakes cooked in the bacon grease, so they were like fritters! I didn’t do the whole sha-bam, I just did Blueberry Cornmeal Pancakes. They are Daniel’s new favorite breakfast. It was so much more fun to make all this side by side with my sisters. They appreciate it.

But even before the morning scene got cooking, Daniel and Walter went hiking around the boulders in our campground and Daniel took pictures of the camp site.

Then Emily woke up …

And now I have to make mention of something genius I saw on Pinterest … a hand washing station. It was so useful and since a picture is worth a thousand words here it is. The only difference between this one and mine, was that I didn’t bungee cord the paper towels tot he container. I hung paper towels from a bungee cord hanging from the easy up.

After we packed up camp, we went on a short hike to see an arch.

The boys asked if they could climb on top of the arch and I said no because it was too dangerous, then we looked around for where Daniel had gotten to … and he was on top of the arch.

motherhood

So, it’s Mother’s Day on Sunday and today is Wednesday and I am just sitting here, eating my egg whites and drinking water and thinking about how people should be more afraid of moms.

I just started (again) on the 17 Day Diet today. I’m supposed to eat mostly veggies and protein, some fruit, tons of water and no sugar or bread … for 17 days. I’m only about 3 hours in and I’m angry. Also, I have spent the morning cleaning. I became intimately aware of my half bath’s floor this morning and I figured something out. I’ve been annoyed for some time because I can’t seem to figure out why all of my bathrooms (I have 2.5) smell like urine. I thought I was cleaning them well and yet, they always smelled like pee. Well, this morning I realized why – because they have urine on the floor and around the under side of the toilets. Fun tidbit of information to pick up. Also, I am not feeling well. Just a cough and headache, but it’s enough to bug you. Also, Ray is sick … he’s kind of taking it like a baby too. Yelling, squawking and whining about everything, doing diarrhea in his pants every 15 minutes (not really, but man it feels like a lot of poop lately) and the snot strings are flowing down his face all day.

And I’ve been contemplating all of this while eating my tasteless egg whites and I thought that I might not be the only mom in the world doing the stuff I’m doing. There are probably thousands of hungry, angry women out there on the edge of screaming and since they can’t scream at their children because it’s not their fault they are 2 and sick … these women must be looking for outlets to scream and punish people around them. People should definitely be more afraid of mommies. If I were a thief or hoodlum of any sort, I would steer clear of moms. I’d be afraid they would not only have the nearest police station on speed dial (which I happen to have), but they are dieting and angry, they probably have pee or poop on them or at least under their nails and are ready the hurl something at the nearest person who looks at them wrong.

On a separate but related topic. I’ve often thought that the worst kind of torture would be to put a two year old in the same room as the person you are trying to torture and the two year old would take care of the torture. An especially effective torture would be to put a sick two year old in the room. There would be no “good cop, bad cop” it would be total chaos – yelling, screaming, crying, scratching your eyes out, crawling on top of them and pooping and throwing up on them kind of torture.

The day before yesterday I had a poop incident, while we’re on the subject, which we usually are on this blog. As I have been mentioning Ray is sick. He couldn’t wait for dinner, so I had fed him in his highchair, while I finished up with dinner. When he was done, he screeched at me until I picked him up to wash off his hands in the sink. As I was washing hi hands, I felt something fall on my toes. I thought, “oh great, the juicy tomatoes he was eating must have been in his lap and now it’s all over my feet!” … it was much worse than that. I looked down to see diarrhea on my feet, all down the front of my clothes and coming out of Ray’s shorts. I froze. This is the moment I am most familiar with as a mommy; the one where you are at a loss for what to do in this situation because you are not prepared for this kind of predicament. I did an awesome yoga move and stretched my feet, one at a time up to the sink where Ray was and rinsed my feet and Ray a little, then I scooped him up and we walked up the stairs to the bathroom where everyone disrobed and washing and bathing ensued. It was gross.

Anyway, these are the thoughts swimming around my head this morning.