Simple Math

Young Women's activity + Kong cones at Macey's with the YW + watching American Idol on DVR + showering = five hours of sleep.

But, I liked how my hair turned out after sleeping on it wet.

Bigger hair = better hair.

BTW, should I cut bangs? Side, swoopy bangs?

Finally

Ah, the moments I've been waiting for -- the Salt Lake auditions of American Idol are tonight. I was so happy when this season started. Finally, something to gush about for a change.

I covered the cattle call of Salt Lake auditions that first day and had a blast. I wonder if some of the singers I talked to will make it on tonight's show. But I wasn't able to go back the day a month or so later that the judges came to town (they edit it on the show to make it look like one day, but it's not).

I'm also looking forward to the Super Bowl because I like Cardinals' quarterback Kurt Warner. Oh yeah, and there are those commercials that have been fun in the past. Plus, a new one-hour long, star-studded "Office" after the game.

Cookie monster

Ben has a new word and it's cookie. He also has a new love -- cookies.

"Tuhtie, tuhtie!"

Shorn

Get it? Mary had a little lamb; shorn sheep...

Anyway he wasn't all the way shorn, just trimmed. I had to keep the curls. Max had his first visit to the Barbershop today. We've been trimming his hair ourselves for three years, but with those fuzzy curls, we thought it was time for a real cut.

JB has been going to the same place for 20 years. It used to cost $2.50 (no, JB isn't ancient, this place really is just super cheap). Now it's six bucks for a haircut, and Dale was really nice to our little man.


Max wiggles and cries when we snip around his ears, but he sat tall and smiled big in the barber's chair.

I think it's because he wants to be just like daddy. Like this morning when I took the boys to watch JB's basketball game. Max wanted to wear shorts just like daddy's basketball shorts. When we got outside in the cold he started to rethink it, but it was too late then.

Night Terrors

Max looks so peaceful when he's asleep, doesn't he?

Too bad his REM time has become a time of terror. Three to four nights a week he'll start screaming, kicking and thrashing, all while still asleep. We'll go in there and try to calm him down but it's like he doesn't recognize us. It's always about three hours after he's gone to bed, and it usually lasts a half-hour.

Reading in all those handy-dandy reference books I've found out these are called night terrors. Sometimes he has nightmares, with different screaming and crying. During these he can be woken up and will recognize us.

He had a nightmare last Thursday night, so I broke all my rules and allowed him out of bed. I took him with me to the couch and we watched The Office together. Now he keeps talking about it -- "Remember when I was scared and I sat on your lap and we watched The Office? The man was stuck in the bushes and the other man pushed him with his car." It was a good episode, but maybe not appropriate for a toddler.

Anyway, I don't know what to do about the night terrors. They make us all sleep poorly. The books say they are rare and kids grow out of them, but it's been a few months now.

My helper

Ben wanted to help me sweep. So I grabbed my cell phone and took video. If one of my genius younger brothers wanted to come over and show me how to input better video from my camera into my laptop, I would be forever grateful.

Ben can say ball, down, night-night, and bye. But book, broom, button and basket all sound similar. He loves those b words.

Costco

I promise they love going to Costco, even though the picture looks like they are grumpy. Max was in the middle of saying, "What's that car doing there?" They have a shiny new car parked by the front door. Ben was contemplating grabbing Max's blonde curls again. He likes to hear the squealing.

I just think they are so cute together in the cart. They start out happy, kicking their legs. But shortly, oh so shortly thereafter, it can turn bad. The aforementioned air pulling, etc. That's when we go around looking for samples. Another trick is going in and out of the Dairy section. "It's cold! It's not. It's cold! Now it's not." You get the idea.

You are getting sleepy

Heard this week: "Mom, wake up! You're saying the wrong words."

Explanation: Every afternoon I put Ben in his crib for naptime, then lay down on my queen bed with Max. We read a few books, and lately they are in the same order. Clifford Goes to the Circus, Elmo's ABCs, and The Saggy Baggy Elephant.

By the time I get to the story of the wrinkled pachiderm, I am nodding off. Most of Max's books I can recite with my eyes closed by now. Apparently so can he. He started to poke me -- "Hey Mom! That's not right!" I had started to mumble about the Saggy Baggy clown who knew the letter Z because he saw it at the circus. I must have thrown in something about cheese too because he pried open my eyelids and looked at me funny.

Also heard this week: "I want to watch Nochio again." Pinnochio is Max's movie du week. He borrowed it from Nona and wants to make sure he gets it good and memorized before it's time to return it. He and his cousin Emily also love watching Cinderella on Sundays after dinner up there. I've been wondering what films to add to my library for him -- we have Lady and the Tramp, all three Shreks, but not much else. Benny could care less about movies right now. He toddles past and pulls Max's hair to see what reaction he can get.

Doodling with the Snicker

I accomplished a New Year's Goal. I made a cake from my new book, and used my new cake stand.

Say hello to the Snickerdoodle Cake.

Now what do we do with the rest of it?

Pens update

(Thanks Jackie for the picture)

After the last blog post fondly remembering the pens, I suddenly found one in our kitchen -- I hadn't seen one in months. I said to my wedded one, "Hey! Our wedding pen! Where did you find it?''

He looked at me funny and said, "It's been in our checkbook all this time."

Oh.

Hmmm.

Apparently I don't really notice the financial comings and goings in our household. Bills, schmills. Thankfully I have a check-book balancing, sharp, on-time-bill-paying, math-doing husband.

But I still have a new goal to pay more attention to the checkbook. I may run into an old pen.

Writing memories

You guys remember these? Anybody still have one?

It was my mom's idea. She had pens with her business name, address and phone number on them. The Amish apparently also love personalized pens too.

Ours were yellow and red for our wedding colors, though not quite the same shade.

By the way did anyone else get Cheerios pencils with their names on them? We had them when we were younger. It may have been a special off the back of a box, but I don't remember.

Resolved

I make my major goals/plans on my birthday eve in July. But that doesn't mean I have some ideas for resolutions this January.

One is to make more cakes with my new cake cookbook and my new cake stand I got for Christmas.

Another resolution is to find people to share said cakes with. As much as we love cake around our house, it wouldn't be good for us to eat that much cake in one sitting.

I also want to read more. Sometimes I think, "I have no time to read!" That's usually when I'm playing Brickbreaker on my cell phone again. Darn level 10.

I want to travel to Missouri, Seattle, and/or Phoenix to see family -- if airline tickets weren't so high, and if I wasn't afraid of flying or driving with a toddler and a baby. Shoot, I'd settle for making it a few miles down the road to see Autumn.

While I'm at it, and this is rather un-important in the big picture but still something on my mind, I need to do something about my eyebrows.