The Thanksgiving feast.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Our Thanksgiving was great!. I worked the night before, getting paid time and a half to sit on my duff and talk about the shape and consistency of a healthy looking shit. Nope, not with my patients but with my awesome friends at work. Justin stayed at home slaving over our hot stove making pies, sweet potatoes and cleaning the house. I pretty much contributed nothing to our Thanksgiving feast, this is probably for the best. I got home Thanksgiving morning and saw this:

and this

and this

I took a quick shower and headed off to bed, while Justin did other Thanksgiving things. One might think this is a sad scenario, but quite the opposite. Justin and I are both thankful for my non involvement in the holiday cooking. So I woke up at 1 and my Mom, Marty, Kelly, Erick, Dylan and Logan joined us. We stuffed ourselves silly with sweet potatoes, turkey, stuffing, rolls, cranberry sauce, green bean casserole and mango salad. Don't be fooled there is no "salad" in Mango salad. It's just mangos, cream cheese, lemon juice and lemon jello pureed together to make the most heavenly jello goodness ever. Why it's called mango salad beats the shit outta me, I just go with it. In fact we didn't even come close to eating salad. Pretty sure we didn't have any vegetables. Oh yes, the green bean casserole. Once canned green beans are covered in cheese and cream of mushroom soup I believe they no longer make it into the vegetable category, but whatev, close enough and oh so delish.


Jaxon stuffed himself full of rolls and cranberry sauce and then the kids left the kid table to go do some unsupervised swinging off the bunk beds. Bodhi ate his weight in sweet potatoes. FYI, if you eat nothing but sweet potatoes your poo will look EXACTLY like sweet potatoes, you should try it out sometime, its fantastic!


It wouldn't be Thanksgiving without the booze so we had a couple mimosa's, bloody mary's and lotsa wine.

Jaxon, Dylan and Logan played in the backyard while poor Bodhi longed for the day that he too would be able play with the older kids. The perks of outside play being a bat to the head and dirt in the eyeballs of course. One day Bodhi you too will be running into the house screaming in pain because either your brother or cousins have taken a bite out of your left arm. Then you will be wishing that you stayed inside with the drinking grownups.

After everyone left Justin and I watched some football and had grown up conversations on the deck. It was awesome.

I hope everyone had an equally great Thanksgiving. Now bring on the Damn Christmas Cheer.

Oh the fun...

Because being a drunken groupie is fun

Poker in the...

I had the great opportunity to play some poker last weekend. I would love to say that I knew what the fuck I was doing, but I didn't. I really really really didn't.



Oh look I have a 2 of clubs and a 5 of diamonds, I'll raise you this green one. Oh green is $100, Ok I'll raise you two. I shockingly was out of the game by round 5.


I grew up in a house with a poker room. You would think that my skills would be impressive. Above our dinner table from age 7 to 18 was a glossy wood plank with little mini cards showing poker hands. Of course as a teenager I was too cool to make conversation so I sat at the table, eating my pork chops while staring at the full house and royal flush. So why do I have no game?


When I was 7 my mom took my sister and I to Las Vegas. Who would take their small children to Vegas? Yeah, that would be my Mom. My sister and I stayed up all night "gambling" at Circus Circus while my mom spent the big bucks in the Casino. I say this to prove to you that it's in my blood.



We had so many poker chips in my house when I was kid that I would make castles and forts with them.


I need a poker coach. Anyone willing to give me the time, I am willing to show you my game, or lack thereof.


This is what you have to work with:


My winnings!

and their's

Scooby Don't!

So on Monday Jaxon decided he wanted to change up the nightly book reading routine and instead of me reading him a book, he decided he wanted to read me a book. I was thrilled about the prospect of just closing my eyes and letting him read to me. I settled in as he picked out his favorite Scooby-Doo book. He opens it and begins.

"This is a story about mystery and ghost friends"

he turns the page

"WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON HERE!!!!!"

Now I've read the book before and I'm pretty sure Scooby doesn't use the word hell to hunt down groovy ghosts or save the Palace Theater. So we talk about his potty mouth and he apologizes and promises he will never say those words again. Alrighty, so back to story time.

He turns the page and continues reading,

" Scooby says aw hell, what the
hell is going on in here?"

Plan B: Ignore it and hope he never uses the phrase in public.

The rest of the story involved ghosts and baby marmosets and airplanes and spaceships and Halloween decorations, and something about a cake covered in syrup. Scooby never questioned where the hell he was or what the hell he was doing again. So I figured that plan B worked and we were moving on.

Till today. An issue developed in the sink and the water was coming up instead of going down. Not really what you want to see when you just wake up. So Jaxon is washing his hands and notices the water rising, jumps back and says

"what the hell is this water doing?"

So on to Plan C... I say

"How the hell am I supposed to know Jaxon?"

I'll get back to you on how well Plan C works.

Rockin' Out sans Tom Bergeron.

Yes, I do realize that this will cut into your Dancing With the Stars however I spoke to Tom Bergeron this morning and he assures me that seeing the Authors play at The Hole In the Wall is much more important than watching his fellow "stars" strut around on a stage in sequins. So come out to see the most rockinest of rock and roll bands in rock history. ROCK ON!

Just wanted to give a shout out to Mr. Winter for providing me with the weather in which I can finally wear my winter gear. My boobs look great in sweaters! Just sayin..

I may have been a lil pissed at you earlier in the week Mr Winter. I just got really excited about wearing all my winter accessories when you farted out some cool weather a couple weeks ago. I broke out the gloves, scarves, boots, and hats only for you to take it all away the next day. I kissed my sandals good bye only to place them back on my sweaty feet the next afternoon. I see you laughing. Perhaps snow comes out of you mouth as you whisper to your warm weather friend to blow a kiss in my direction. I realize that in about a month I'll be wishing you never came. I do it every year, you should expect it by now. I realize that 60 degrees probably isn't scarf weather but fuck it, I love my scarves. I know that I could have probably worn a t-shirt today but I didn't. I wore my sweater and a jacket and a scarf. Damn straight I did. And you know what, tonight I may even break out the gloves!

Oh and of course Jaxon is thrilled that the colder weather is here. He's been begging to wear a scarf since mid August. It isn't so much a fashion statement as it is a lasso but whatev, he is trilled to wrap it around his neck and attempt strangulation anyway. At Target this morning he managed to whip it around an old lady's wheelchair wheel, while knocking down about 10 tubes of lipstick.

Oh Jaya it could have been worse.

You could have been a Duggar

Dinner

Would you care to join?

The rise and fall of acorn baby

Went to lunch with the kids yesterday. On our way back to the car Jaxon spotted a lonely little half rotten acorn in the parking lot. Apparently he felt it his obligation in life to nurture this acorn back to life. I had other plans for the acorn. I strap him in the carseat and acorn, now named "baby", fell under the car. You would have thought the child lost a limb. In fact he threw such a fit that I thought I snapped his boyhood in the carseat clip. Justin gets to the car and I explain that he needs to pull out so I can collect "baby acorn" from its near death experience under the car. Those of you who know Justin well can probably guess the look he gave me. Hey but I was Grandma now to this sorry pathetic little acorn, I had to stand up and represent.

When we get home Jaxon tells me that Baby needs a diaper change. Yep....sure did...I put a diaper on the damn acorn, some double stick tape and a piece of paper and acorn was good to go. He then put acorn baby to sleep in Bodhi's crib. So as to not have my 9 month old choke on a acorn during nap time, I told Jaxon to find a new spot for Baby. This is what he came up with.

We all take a nap. I awoke to find Justin babysitting acorn still in its bed but now sitting on the couch next to Grandpa acorn hater.

Let me tell ya keeping up with a half rotten acorn is not an easy task. Especially when his irresponsible "father" keeps leaving him in places that Uncle Bodhi can easily access. But we managed to keep acorn alive all night. In the morning Justin was able to escape the half rotten acorn sitting duties by telling Jaxon that acorn baby was asleep with me. However when I woke up Jaxon was very eager to wake up acorn too. So acorn baby went to the store with us today, acorn baby played outside with us today, I had to feed acorn baby dinner, I had to change acorn baby's diapers, I had to give half rotten acorn baby a kiss! I had to tell Jaxon to keep acorn baby out of his mouth. "Please don't put acorn baby down your pants, Jaxon!"

* Please pay no attention to the very nutritious chicken fingers and french fries on Jaxon's plate. I was tired and didn't feel like cooking. Sue me.

**and who can turn down a bowl of cheese anyway?

Then comes bathtime. Acorn of course had to take a bath with him. Unfortunately acorn wasn't loving his new life and decided to hightail it down the drain. I braced myself. I was expecting to see tears for the next 2 hours. I was convinced this was going to be the longest and saddest night ever. Jaxon says " ah I will never ever see baby again". I braced myself for the breakdown... here it comes... He says

"oh well"

SWEET!!!

He then grabs the letter Z and says "oh baby, I missed you"

Fortunately Z is potty trained.

Oh the life of a 3 year old.

Jaxon had his 1st dentist appointment today. In preparation we made sure to talk to him about the dentist, you know teeth doctors. So all week he's been thinking his teeth were "sick". He has obsessed about them falling out. Yesterday he was hanging out of my bathtub, like he always does when I'm getting dressed, and all of a sudden freaked out, jumped up and screamed " WOW! My teeth almost fell out!" So rather than ease the child's mind, we managed to freak him out. Perfect parenting.

In the waiting room, making sure his teeth were still there.

Too cool to crack a smile.

The glove was a big hit, as was the chair that went up and down. The only words that came out of his mouth the entire 20minutes were " bubble gum", when the hygienist asked him what flavor "toothpaste" he wanted. He couldn't remember his name, his age, or his favorite movie, but he was definitely able to specify what sugary flavored fluoride he wanted. That's my Jaxon.

Healthy teeth and no freak outs. It was a success!

Halloween Part III: CUTEST ROBOTS EVER!

So we finally made it! After a chaotic day it all pays off. Jaxon's friends joined us for a fun night of tricking and treating. Kelly and Erick brought over Logan ( a super duper cute dragon) and Dylan ( a Star Wars character that I'm totally unfamiliar with and can't remember the name of, sorry Kel). Erick and Billie brought over Chloe ( a beautiful little princess, OMG she looked so cute). Nick joined us dressed as Hunter S. Thompson. And Grandma T and Grandpa Marty joined in to watch Bodhi while we hit the hood gathering up candy of all sorts( when I say all sorts, I'm including the Highschool Musical Strawberry pop rocks milk chocolate candy bar)
Here are some of the Robot pics. Justin made the costumes. I know Bodhi's "costume" is pathetic but the poor boy can't stay up past 6pm for the life of him. We went the no one will see him anyway route. Sorry. Adorable anyway.

Halloween Part II : Can you carve out my eyeballs please?

Pumpkin Carving:
I DESPISE carving pumpkins. It hasn't always been this way. I have great memories of pumpkin carving as a child, which is probably why I insist on OUR family doing it every year. I probably enjoyed it as a child because all you had to do was draw some triangles, a couple teeth and then pass it to mom so she could do all the hard work. The digging, the scraping, the carving, the punching, the cussing, the hitting, the yelling... So this year lived up to my high expectations. We spent $26 on pumpkins about a month ago. We put off carving them till Halloween day. We brought the kids outside. For some reason Justin thought it was a great idea to do this in the garage with a crawling baby who eats anything he can get his little fist over. Bodhi was also hungry, it was nap time and Jaxon was in some sort of post cupcake decorating-sugar induced- manic phase. In other words we couldn't have picked a better time. We gave Jaxon his permanent marker and he made sure to draw the "face" he wanted carved. Because he is 3 and knows how to draw a face? Nope, because he's 3 and he knows how to draw squiggles and circles and zigzags. So with this marker Jaxon drew his "face", he then drew on my jeans, on his brother, and on all the other pumpkins. Meanwhile Bodhi's crawling around the garage floor looking for all kinds of fun stuff to put in his mouth. Justin was standing back not speaking and waiting for me to blow at any second. It was only a matter of time. I swooped up Bodhi, threw a handful of pumpkin guts onto the floor and migrated inside where I could set Bodhi on a floor that wasn't covered with screws, mower blades, and knives. Next thing I know Justin in his oh so calm, never getting angry or irritated with me attitude,(damn him for being so zen) began carving and digging and scraping and in no time at all he had a masterpiece. Oh yes, another successful pumpkin carving year. I Can't wait till next year!

Although it appears that Justin just got back from a trip to Pro Nails, his nail its actually silver from the spray paint on Jaxon's costume.

Clearly Bodhi takes after me.

Jaxon was not impressed at first. However he quickly became a fan when he realized a marker was involved.

The finished product.
Don't ask about the other 3 pumpkins.

Halloween Part 1: Good Riddens Sprinkles!

Halloween 2008

The day started with Jaxon trying to remove his thyroid with the pliers. We threatened to take away his trick or treating privileges for the first of about 100 times that day.



We then baked and decorated cupcakes. Jaxon picked out a red velvet cake mix at HEB. Turns out red velvet is just white cake dyed red. No velvet at all. Who knew? Jaxon was very impressed with the red batter and was convinced I was baking blood. I'm really not a big cupcake baker but about 2 years ago I found these Halloween sprinkles at Target. They were a dollar and I couldn't turn them down. I realize that sprinkles probably aren't that expensive but I'm a sucker for the dollar spot. If Target sold a pile a crap for a dollar I would probably buy it. So the sprinkles sat in the pantry for 2 years, just as Justin had predicted. Almost every morning since, Jaxon opens the pantry door and asks for the sprinkles. Rather than throw the damn things away I save them, hell I spent 2 freaking dollars on them. And God forbid I use pumpkin sprinkles for the 4th of July! So finally I remember to use them this Halloween. I also got some yummy trans fat "chocolate" icing. We baked, iced and sprinkled. Jaxon had a blast.




One of the cupcakes got got a little more love than the rest. Jaxon quickly claimed it as his.

I spent the rest of the day telling him to get his fingers out of the cupcakes.

Oh and of course Jaxon made Jaya her very own "special treat" cupcake. Such the giver.