the beck family band rides again

spring break 2008 was an extra special one for my family. my baby brother mark returned home from his mission on tuesday and the whole fam damily reunited for the occasion. if you are not interested in an onslaught of beck family pictures. stop reading now. i won't be offended. however, if you can hold on long enough, there are some funny pictures of people being silly at the bottom.

mark is one of those special people that left on his mission when he was 18 and returned home when he was 20. he turned 21 on wednesday and we celebrated. reagan thought we were celebrating for him again. reagan also thought the welcome home balloons were for him.

some week highlights:

david arrived at midnight thursday. frontier airlines lost his luggage and he was scrounging for clothes to wear from thomas and mark's closets the whole time. at one point david had to resort to wearing his old mission suit for the family picture. he was wearing two different belts on top of one another to keep his pants up and he couldn't take his jacket off because of the holes in his white missionary shirt. by the time david left on sunday night to go back to utah, his luggage still had not been located.

another highlight was the warmer weather. we were able to go downtown and enjoy the crown center fountains.



another time honored beck family tradition was the group nap that took place at my house on saturday:

as promised, your added bonus! i am purposefully posting all these silly pictures with the everyone looking slightly ridiculous. these cracked me up. i hope it makes you laugh too!




frighteningly funny heather

once again, the scarlett/scarlett o'hara similarities are uncanny. i didn't purchase scarlett's easter dress for her, it was a gift from my mother. the fact that scarlett o'hara wears a tiered ruffled dress in the opening scenes of gone with the wind is purely coincidental.

the sickest party ever

for me, motherhood has been a marathon with several mad dashes sprinkled throughout the race. i am constantly behind, trying to close the gap between me and the endless lists of tasks to be completed. a prime example has been reagan's 3rd birthday. i feel like we had been celebrating forever but never quite getting close to the finish. for about a month i have been coaxing reagan through trips to various stores with the promise that eventually his birthday would come and whatever pined for item would be his. the most highly desired gift? a toy trumpet that can be filled with water to achieve various pitches. perfect for bathtime. by the time the big day had arrived, we had already celebrated the week before with mimi and bubba at grandma and grandpa's house. cake was eaten, presents were opened, pictures were taken, football helmets were worn to church.




of course there needed to be day of festivities. silly me completely forgets to buy decorations until about 10pm saturday. i turn to my trusty artsy fartsy box and cut out letters for some signage. in my birthday haste i did purchase some balloons, but no wrapping paper. the solution? spread the toys around the kitchen christmas-morning style and hope reagan doesn't think anything is off.

i forgo display of clothing gifts and hang them in his closet, because what little boy wants new clothes anyway? the balloons turn out to be water balloons and are nearly impossible to blow up. a successful leader always delegates, so thomas got the job of blowing up as many tiny balloons as he can. the tiny orbs mock me as i string them up in the kitchen.



the finishing touch is mickey mouse shaped pancakes that reagan takes one look at and says, "ooohhh toodles! i want some cereal." reagan munches on reese's puffs while thomas and i enjoy the unauthorized disney pancakes.


did i mention the whole family has been sick since tuesday? so, reagan spent the bulk of the day in his jammies watching mickey mouse clubhouse and napping while thomas and i took turns with church attendance and feeling awful.

later that evening we go to my parents house for a dual reagan grandpa celebration since they share the same birthdate. somewhere in all this birthday chaos i created a 55 and 3 birthday cake. not the prettiest cake, rather ronald mcdonald-esque. but i enjoyed making it.


lucky for us, grandpa and grandma had been sick too. they didn't mind eating a cake prepared by a cough and cold sufferer. we all revel in our illness.

more presents are opened and the highly coveted trumpet is presented. cheers abound. also, reagan has an affinity for scotch tape, so one of the gifts was a tape dispenser. simple pleasures.




my ultimate goal for reagan's 3rd birthday was small and simple. so much for that. through all reagan's flu symptoms, he did seem to enjoy his special day. thankfully the next birthday isn't until june...

sometimes you lose in order to win

i am sure that we were quite the spectacle when we walked into sacrament meeting like this yesterday:
but, after thomas and i finally stopped laughing, reagan was very quiet and attentive through the whole meeting.


score:
parents- 1 reagan- 1
it's true that sometimes you lose the battle to win the war.

name the next landfill after scarlett

disclaimer: this is gross and immature.

scarlett is a wonderful baby. sweet temperament, curious personality, fantastic laugh, beautiful eyes, superb sleeper. a dream of a baby. my precious little girl.

except for one thing.
she poops A LOT.
more like a TON!
sometimes 6 times a day. i keep diapers and wipes everywhere in anticipation of the next diaper dribbling or bomb dropping. she is 8 months old and only weighs 15 pounds. you would think that such a small baby wouldn't have it in her. and she doesn't. it is out of her in record time.

now don't get all in a tizzy that she might have some sort of pooping disease. she is perfectly healthy. we just know that her innards work like a well oiled machine.

feel free to be disgusted.

ocean not included

all outing plans were canceled today when i looked out the window and saw this: it may not look like much, but the street was pretty much a solid sheet of ice. and those bits of snow in the grass? more chunks of ice. snow is not soft and fluffy in mizzou, it is hard and crunchy. 13 degrees is not pretty.

what's a mama to do? crank up the heat, pull out the summer clothes, paint my toenails and have a BEACH PAR-TAY IN THE BASEMENT.

pale winter skin was exposed...

trashy beach novels were read...
scrumptious summer food was consumed...
color drenched espadrilles were brought out of hiding(but legs weren't shaved)...

faux shell earrings were worn...

and fun was had by all!

will the real heidi please stand up?

i was going to forego another "tag" since most of you have probably heard enough of my youthful antics and personal reminisces, but the content of this particular tag coincides with something that i was already planning on posting about. so here it is in it's entirety. lucky you.

ten years ago i was: a senior at blue springs south high school, home of the jaguars. which brings me to an important question, do you say jag-wire or jag-whar? anywhooo, at this point in my high school career i was very much disillusioned with the so-called "best years of my life". i was thrilled with my acceptance to BYU and couldn't wait to leave and start my "adulthood". to pass the last year of my adolescence as quickly as possible i was involved in such glamorous and highly enviable activities as singing in the chamber choir(surprise, i used to be quite good), working at the public library(sexy)and saving most of my money for college, perfecting my sewing skills in home ec and keeping my perfect seminary attendance record alive. also, i was really into my stake's youth activities. i was chair of the stake youth commitee and i planned the dances and youth conference. stake dances were the highlight of my month! rereading this paragraph makes me wonder why i had any friends at all. if i was a saved by the bell character, i would have played screech's little sister, squeek! needless to say, i was a nerd and i loved it!

this brings me to my next point. now that we have lived in KC for over a month, i have ran into a few people here and there that i knew in my youth. it has only been ten years since i lived here and i don't think that i have changed that much, but i few people haven't recognized me at all. one person gave me a blank stare until i re-introduced myself. these are people whose kids i hung out with for crying in the night! was i not that dazzling and unforgettable to them? this hasn't happened with everyone i knew but enough that i am blaming it on them and not me. they must have early onset dimensia. what do you think?
1998
2008















5 things on my to-do list today:
1. go to gym
2. pick up prescriptions
3. put together scarlett's bureau
4. make easy peasy chicken cordon bleu for dinner
5. go to the AT&T store and pick out my new phone

3 of my bad habits
1. passing gas in public and blaming it on the kids(that is so gross, i know! i am in a really crude mood).
2. letting people i don't even know have a say in my emotions. for example, people that are rude or unkind or don't even recognize me from 10 years ago
3. staring at myself in the mirror, or anything with a reflection really. if i walk by one, i have to take a look. i guess i am self-concious about a few things. mascara running down my face. boogers hanging out of my nose. the way that i walk. it's sort of duck like if you ask me.

places i've lived(mostly in order and avoiding the repeats)
1. provo, ut
2. prairie village, ks
3. blue springs, mo
4. jackson, wyoming
5. tuscaloosa, al
6. snellville, ga
7. northport, al
8. montgomery, al
9. savannah, ga
10. lee's summit, mo

things most people don't know about me:
9 times out of ten i don't open emails that are forwarded to me. if they have either "forward" or "you should really read this" in the subject line, it doesn't get opened. or if by some chance i do read it and it says to forward it to all your friends, that translates to me as delete immediately. i am a cold, heartless woman.

my fifteen minutes of fame

scarlett and i made the front page of the hugely important eastern jackson county examiner. i guess a little bit of fame makes up for a lot of crazy parenting.

http://theexaminer.net/stories/020508/new_243979811.shtml

i will being signing copies for anyone interested. one autograph per family.

democracy in action

i do not want any more children. i am done. through. spent. finito. i have tapped the mat three times, please let me resume my old life.

today i was feeling patriotic and bold. ann romney was coming to independence for a rally of romney supporters. i was determined to be there.

like any good patriot out there, i brought my children. mostly because there was no one to watch them. i naively thought it would be okay. these kids have been many places and sat quietly. we've even made it through the line at the post office at christmas time with flying colors. this could prove to be an actual learning experience for them. a stay-at-home-mom field trip entitled "democracy in action". unfortunately, the action part was reagan, not the riveting speaker. we arrive to the facility early and well snacked. the rally is being held at a reception hall owned by a local constituent. i stake out a table in a corner for us to occupy. reagan spies a grand piano. i redirect him to a granola bar. reagan starts sneaking off to the DJ equipment. i hunt him down and he goes as limp as a rag doll as i drag him back to our area. reagan notices a large window with lacy curtains and decides it is the perfect invisibility cloak. i allow it. soon, we get word that the romneymobile is approaching. reagan must have sensed the excitement and he decides to lay on the floor and pretend to be sleeping. as ann romney and entourage walk in the door, reagan rolls his little body over to the doorway that they are walking through. the first thing they see is him "sleeping" on the floor. real classy.



the following 30 minutes are not spent listening to the next first lady of the united states of america. they are spent plopping down each step on the staircase one thud at a time, dodging people actually listening to ann romney, going out the front door, dragging reagan away from the sign-in area(he wanted to draw pictures), coming back in the front door, searching for santa claus, avoiding the bumper sticker table and pilfering through my purse searching for a swim diaper. (there was a koi pond outside that reagan thought was for swimming.)
i never got to meet ann romney. everyone else in the room was able to shake hands and say hello. i even had a great question prepared. "mrs. romney, which designer do you plan on using for your inaugural ball gown?"(not really) instead, reagan bolted out the side door, ran past the koi pond, through the gazebo and into the huge wooded field behind the reception hall.
luckily, i saw someone i knew and dumped scarlett with them. i literally ran after reagan because he was about 100 feet ahead of me at this point. i could hear his giggles because this was aboviously a game to him. i was cursing myself for wearing a dressy outfit and high heeled boots. my heels were sinking all the way down in the mud and other types of forest splendor. reagan finally stops and sits down next to a wood pile, where someone had recently been chopping wood. i carry him across my arms like the dead meat that he is and i vow to never take him in public again.
my beautiful, clearance price boots will never be the same.

t-bone's top 10

the top ten signs that is was time for t-bone to go back to work.

1. thomas dug out his old high school football jersey and started wearing it to the breakfast table.

2. thomas watched the entire "one tree hill" 2 hour season premiere and spent most of the time wishing that "nathan" would roll his wheelchair into the pool.

3. thomas began meeting the mailcarrier at the mailbox everyday. 4pm sharp. they were practically on a first name basis.

4. thomas perfected his version of gourmet egg mcmuffins.

5. thomas floated the idea of being an at-home, freelance author/philosopher. i sank the idea.

6. thomas wouldn't stop laughing for 2 days when the kansas city chiefs hired chan gailey(former georgia tech head coach) as their new offensive coordinator.

7. thomas stayed on the internet so long one day that he made a $50 contribution to mitt romney's presidential campaign.

8. thomas scrubbed every cookie sheet and baking pan back to shiny, flawless condition.

9. thomas learned the theme songs from mickey mouse clubhouse, the doodlebops and my friends tigger and pooh. by heart.

10. thomas had started giving me blog topic, content and title ideas.

thomas, i loved having you at home with us the after the big move. i'll miss the fun days with you. but i think you are enjoying the time at your new office where there aren't crumbs on everthing. and there are no screaming children. and there are conversations without the word poo poo in it. and no one wipes his nose on your sleeve. we hope.