everything is coming up green! literally!

i was doing so well and now i'm so behind!  the last few weeks got away from me. 

we celebrated reagan's 11th birthday. what in the world do you buy a kid like reagan? i go through this rubik's cube of thought each birthday or holiday. i feel like i've exhausted my creativity. i think rolls of one dollar bills are going to be the next thing i try with him. 

he still seems somewhat interested in great britain, so a union jack emblazoned mug went over pretty well. i also got him a family size box of double stuff oreos and a 5lb bag of m&ms among other things. 

my mom was clever and got him several swimming related items. swimming is always hit with him. 

i also brought cupcakes up for his class at school. as i approached the school, i saw that everyone was streaming out of the school onto the lawn. a FIRE ALARM! reagan's nemesis. he has a love hate with fire drills. he has dedicated entire puppet shows to fire safety and fire drills. but an actual alarm sounding? quel horreur! i quickly saw where his class had congregated and my sweet little boy front and center trying to hold it together in a moment of anguish. poor thing. 

reagan, with his best friend, jeremy, and his wonderful, dedicated, loving teacher, miss posey. reagan and jeremy recently declared each other "best friend" status. they stand near each other in class and occasionally play near each other on the playground. autism is a beautiful thing. 

we all filed into the school in enough time to have lunch with scarlett. it was "mexican" day. pretty sure the cheese was real if nothing else was very identifiable.

reagan's birthday dinner requests were also a culinary delight. hot dogs wrapped in crescent rolls, boxed macaroni and cheese, and last but certainly not least, bacon. this isn't the only time in this post that you'll be hearing about this meal. 

athena blythe was practicing letter T on her arm. except that it made her look like she had never bathed because she had used a sharpie so for the next week, athena blythe had the letter T all up her arm. her first tattoo sleeve. 

we went to cub scouts that night and we took cupcakes there too. reagan ate and ate and ate. which is what i plan on doing on my birthday too. except i just want to eat nachos and pirates booty. 

reagan wanted one final birthday photo and bedtime. what a weirdo. 

later that night. his cupcakes and birthday dinner revisited us. direct quote, "mom, my bottom won't stop throwing up." autism speaks! i was gifted on his birthday too. i do consider myself a illness cleaning genius at this junction in my life. rather than barf buckets because aim is at an all time low when sick, i double layer old towels on and around beds and in other strategic parts of the house.  i have many special home ec tricks like that. thomas was also exceedingly helpful in the poop and vomit department.

saint patrick's day finery and reagan the sick grump in the front seat. too bad reagan was sick because he has the most extensive collection of green clothing of anyone i know. "because green is my favorite color, mom." i know, reagan.

finally, we got secret cupcakes while scarlett was in drama class. compounding the good eating choices from the day before. 

athena blythe schoolwork, complete with bite marks on marshmallows. still hates coloring, doesn't mind a project.

new jammies that have been on repeat for more days than is hygienically recommended. 

hersh has discovered a few solids he likes. gnawing a peanut butter sammich with relish!

being adorable. hersch is not a napper but has lately gotten a little better at it. can i say how much i don't like onesies! down with snaps! diaper changes are hard enough! only nerds tuck their shirts!

the least helpful helpers of all time.

in trashy news updates, we had an old mattress in front of our house for a whole day. it's a humbling experience when the tutor has to come and that's front and center. the neighbor kids were sad to see it go. it had been hanging out in the garage for so long that it was an impromptu meeting and hangout place.

i am so tired tonight that if i don't wake up, i want everyone to wear giant hats and bright colors at my funeral. have the pallbearers carry my coffin out of the chapel to the strains of the beatles, golden slumbers/carry that weight/the end. then frosties for everyone. start the hashtag, #sleepforheidi and then take afternoon naps on the lawn. i'd also like a memorial 5k. please call it "the back in black, slipped loose from the noose 5k". everyone will want that t-shirt.

the end. 

typhoid blythe and the happy family

march, in like a lamb out like a lion. and we're only halfway through!

scarlett finished up volleyball. it was a mixed success. she learned a lot of skills and she learned that the ball really hurts. there were some tears, from her and me. she had sports anxiety. i had sports anxiety. we all had sports anxiety. i did meet several other special needs moms while chatting one the sidelines. it's nice to know that we are everywhere. 

athena blythe is a pretty good sleeper but lately she just wants to sleep with everyone else. which is cute until it is you she wants to sleep with. she also likes to sleep in her church dresses.

if you're wondering how our daily scripture reading is coming along, it's definitely coming. a work in progress, but we haven't missed a day in a while. we even started reading before school. it's a miracle of miracles and it has enabled us to get to school on time on a few days when it would have been mathematically impossible. God is good all the time. 

we measured scarlett's hair. it's officially bum long. just like claudia kishi. clap once if you know who that is and wanted to be just like her in the 5th grade. 

spring school pictures since the fall pictures didn't turn out so well. 

reagan the dingaling was determined to wear his texas shirt in the photo. i'm just thrilled that everyone is smiling.

we had no school on friday so we went to the park after drama class and had a delicious dinner of mcdonald's. clean kitchen always trump deep fried food selections.

friday night after ghostbusters part 2, athena blythe put herself to sleep and then proceeded to barf in her bed all night. her bed and then her favorite place on the floor and then in scarlett's bed. it was a fun night.

however, the next morning when asked, athena blythe would say she wasn't sick, she said she was happy. no one in this family likes to seem even the least in the wrong. and by the end of the weekend, each and every family member was "happy" too. 

saturday morning, i spoke at our stake relief society conference. my topic was parenting. they must have drawn straws about topics because parenting wouldn't have been my first choice. i enjoyed preparing and told a lot of stories about my own parental failings and triumphs. someday i'll write a post about the "parenting church of false expectations" and the difference between a cat person and a cat liker. i promise it made sense, at least to me. i did share 3 poop/barf stories and said the word "whore", but in a biblical way. 

 some of my favorite quotes i shared.

 post relief society conference, we found a babysitter who doesn't mind watching barfing 3 year olds and thomas and i did more house hunting. athena blythe actually slept the whole time so it was probably quite the easy job. 

this was this weekend's house hunting gem:

an oven in the wall of the basement. no kitchen in the basement. no countertops in the basement. just a bathroom and an oven next to a TV room and a bedroom. i'd love to meet the basement dwelling bachelor who designed this love nest. my guess is that he "met" his girlfriend on the internet and her real name is walt. 

by sunday we were all as "happy" as athena blythe with a stomach bug. 

"gilbert blythe says being smart is better than being pretty." 

my darling(hersch) was even throwing up.

"must touch herschel at all times"

monday morning. 5436 hours of movies watched later. 2 happy kids.

the anticlimactic end.

scouts and wednesdays always get me down

 i don't like most days of the week but wednesday really takes the cake for me. it's already scouts day and then everything else seems to pile on. i never schedule anything specifically for wednesday because it's always crazy day. 

1. dress like a hippie day at athena blythe's preschool in honor of the book fair. capitalism and hippies don't exactly go hand in hand but it is physically impossible for me to ignore a dress up day. 

2. i wore a dress over jeans. i love this look. i want to buy more dresses to wear over jeans, but i shall refrain. 

3. wednesday mornings i have to drop scarlett off at 745 for drama club and reagan at 830ish for school and athena blythe at 9 for her school. my least favorite morning. reagan "cannot smile when we are almost late for school." me neither, reagan. 

4. i had to run all my errands in the 45 minutes i had before meeting my realtor. fun. 

5. saw 5 houses in 2 hours. today's favorite includes this steel beamed tree house, complete with trap door and interior hammock. God bless the old people who built this. 

 6. i get notes from athena blythe's teacher, including frowny faces, about how she hates coloring and never does her coloring pages so i always try and get her to at least paint the pictures when she gets home. a temperamental artist. 

7. bathtime wrangling for 4 kids at 5pm because of scouts at the church at 7. it's as terrible as it sounds. 

8. scouts was the blue and gold banquet. we had to make both a pan of baked ziti for the dinner portion and the traditional blue and gold banquet "cubcake". the theme was "friends around the world". reagan was plum out of ideas so i went to hobby lobby and got several sheets of london, paris, rome, and texas scrap book stickers and i had reagan and scarlett attach them to wooden skewers. we also gently squished star wars character graham crackers to the sides of the cake. friends, europe, texas, done. miracle of miracles, we arrived on time and neither food item we transported got squished or spilled. 

 thanks to my superior photography skills, i took not one but TWO pictures of the back of the cake.

the world will never know the true magnificence of this cake. 2nd place!

the whole donate money to scouts schpiel took sooooo long that we finally ate a 737pm. a travesty! i don't think the program organizers realize that my scout donation gets smaller and smaller with each minute i have to wait to eat. then it was definitely time to go because i wanted to clothesline each kid that ran around like an idiot while we were supposed to be listening to the awards. i can't handle that. 

9. scripture reading at 930 at night because of scouts. very fulfilling and enriching reading at that hour of night. 

hurray for thursday. the end.