Conversations with Connor at the Cinema, Part Two

Connor and I went on a Mommy-Connor date to see Pirates yesterday.  And as always, Connor proved to be a most entertaining date.

Connor:  Those pirates really need to learn how to share.

Mommy:  Well, that's true, but that wouldn't be a very entertaining movie then, would it?

Connor:  Doing the right thing is not always the popular thing!

Mommy:  {speechless}

Connor (keenly interested in the voodoo doll segment):  Why can't they make a nice voodoo doll?

Mommy:  Ummmm, what would you do with a nice voodoo doll?

Connor:  I'd be nice to the person's voodoo doll!  I'd get it dressed and comb its hair and brush its teeth!  That would be nice.

Mommy (VERY proud Mommy):  It surely would, my goodhearted little son. 

Connor:  I know if they'd asked the mermaids nicely they wouldn't have behaved like that.  All they have to do is say please!

Mommy (happy to hear that my harping on saying please for YEARS is really getting through to my kids):  True that, my little Padawan.

Connor (after watching Captain Jack Sparrow jump off a cliff):  Well, he's lucky he didn't have to jump off Angel Falls, the highest waterfall in the world, which is in Venezuela, measuring 3,212 feet.

Mommy:  {speechless}

Mommy:  Hey Connor, did you catch that cool booby trap where he grabbed the icicle-thing and the other dude died?

Connor:  Mommy, that wasn't an icicle!  It was a stalactite!

Mommy:  {stuffs mouth with more popcorn, afraid to speak further}

As you can see, since my last documentation of an entertaining date with Connor (click here for that), our conversation....level?....quality?.....has changed drastically.

As my mom said when I relayed her grandcherub's comments, "Well, it's a good thing you have someone keeping you educated!"  Indeed.  I think, anyway.  There's definitely nothing like realizing your 8-year old is smarter than you are.

She-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named

So, Tuesday, April 19, might have been my worst day as a parent ever.  And it pretty much revolved all around my little darling….She-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named.

Actually, that WAS indeed what we called her yesterday.  Today, I'm *almost* over it, and can go back to calling her Shelby.  Besides, typing out She-Who-blablabla is way too much hassle.

Tuesday morning I found myself messing around on my computer (no surprises there).  Connor was home because it was spring break, and he was messing around on his computer next to me.  Shelby was upstairs, and to my knowledge, playing in Connor's room.  I was looking forward to a very quiet and uneventful day, given that Noah was at Zoo Camp all day.  You see, in our household, if there's a ruckus or argument or any kind of noise, Noah is involved.  I had a friend recently express surprise when I told her that Noah was at the heart of most of our kid ruckuses.  Yup, cute little, wide-eyed, usually smiling and joking Noah.  He's trouble.

Anyway, back to my Noah-free, trouble-free morning.  Shelby was VERY quiet upstairs.  And I KNOW I KNOW!  It's the first rule of parenting, right?  When they're being quiet, it usually means they're up to no good.  I called out to her every 15 minutes or so, and each time she'd answer me, "I'm okay, Mommy!  I'm not done yet!"  Yes, the "I'm not done yet" should have tipped me off.  But it didn't.  I even had a little conversation with Connor that went something like this, DURING THAT very time she was upstairs:

• Mommy:  You know, Connor, they always say when a kid is too quiet it means they're doing something bad.
• Connor:  *smiles*
• Mommy:  But I never had to worry about that with you.  You were a great kid.  So is Shelby.
• Connor:  Noah would get in trouble, though!
• Mommy:  Yup, true that.  Are you sure Shelby is playing with your pyramid set?
• Connor:  Yeah.  She's kind of making a mess, but that's okay.

Yes, that was Connor leading me down the garden path.  No, I'm not blaming him.  Not very much, anyway.

So, after about 90 minutes of quiet from upstairs and quiet computering between Connor and I, I finally decided I'd better go upstairs to check on Shelby.

HOLY FREAKING HECK.

HOLY FREAKING HECK.

That's not really what I said.  If I type what I really said, I think Blogger would flag my blog and delete it.

HOLY FREAKING HECK.

There is cat litter.  EVERYWHERE.

It's in the hallway.

It's all over the laundry room (where we keep the litter box).

It's all over Shelby's room.

It's in my master bathroom (clear on the other side of the top floor of our house), all over the floor and piled 3 inches high on the windowsill.

It's in Connor's room, all over the floor and a nice little pile on Connor's lower bed.

In each pile of litter is one of Shelby's stuffed animals, also covered in litter.

HOLY FREAKING HECK.

The only place unscathed is Noah's bedroom.  I can't figure that one out, other than the fact that he left his dinosaur set out and it was kind of blocking the door.

For her to have displaced as much litter as she did, she must have carried at least 50 scoops of litter OUT of the litter box in her little VERY BAD hands.  It must have taken her….well…..about 90 MINUTES!  90 minutes of unsupervised time by a VERY BAD Mommy.  No wonder she "wasn't done yet!"   We do have a child-lock on the laundry room door.  And still have baby gates at the top and bottom of our stairs.  Of course, they don't do any good if THEY'RE NOT CLOSED!

HOLY FREAKING HECK.

From my perspective, the only break I caught with this was the fact that the cats had not yet done poopies in the letterbox that morning.  Who knows where those would have ended up.  *shudders*  I can't even go there...

So, I snatch my VERY BAD little She-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named and wash her hands for at least 5 minutes and then stomp downstairs with her where I firmly plop her in front of the TV and tell her that SHE WILL NOT MOVE HER BODY WITHOUT MY SAYSO. 

I then realize that I cannot reclaim my upstairs without a Diet Coke to sustain me.  A HUGE one.  Probably 2 of them.  And besides, it's almost lunchtime.  And if nothing else (can't claim to be a great hands-on Mom, can I??), I am a champion procrastinator (and justifier).  I need nourishment and Diet Coke if I am to tackle what has happened to my house.

Thirty minutes later and we're back home from a Taco Bell run.  I'm sitting on the living room couch eating my 7 Layer Burrito, and dousing each bite with lots of TB's Hot Sauce (which I LOVE).  I'm also watching Tori & Dean's new wedding plan show.  Told ya - I'm a champion procrastinator.  What better time to catch up on the 3 DVR'd and unwatched episodes of Tori & Dean than NOW, when the upstairs of my house is virtually uninhabitable (for anything other than cats)?   There's one particularly tender moment when the bride comes out and looks so very pretty and everybody starts crying, so naturally I start to shed tears.  This blurs my vision, right in the middle of a douse of hot sauce on my burrito.  My hot sauce MISSES my burrito and lands on my couch.  THE VERY COUCH that just 4 weeks ago I took apart from top to bottom and spent an entire day cleaning and painting and fixing.  ^@%$^^#&^&#!!  The very couch that I FORBADE anyone to eat anywhere NEAR it.

HOLY FREAKING HECK.

And yes, I blame that on She-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named.  I wouldn't have been eating a burrito to drown my frustrations if she hadn't done her litter box relocation projects!

Okay, hot sauce mess gets scrubbed out and I'm back on the couch watching my Tori & Dean marathon, trying not to sit in the wet spot.  Shelby comes in and says (I thought), "My teeth hurt."  She looked so sad that I momentarily forgot about how VERY BAD she'd been and I wrapped my arms around her to hug her and hold her.

HOLY FREAKING HECK.

I feel squishy stuff on my arms before I catch the smell.  THIS VERY BAD kid has just had the worst poopie blowout of her little life, with it going all the way up her back and up to her neck.  And now it's all over my arms and shirt.  I know if I ungrip her that it'll get on my AGAIN freshly cleaned couch.  !@$%^&%$^&!$%&^!@%$&!!  So, still stuck together WITH POOP as our glue, Shelby and I make it upstairs to the kid bathroom.  I strip down to near nothingness and then I strip her down, although I just threw her shirt in the garbage.  No way was I even going to try and get the huge globs of poop off of it.  Besides, I just placed several kid clothes internet orders.  She has plenty of shirts, dammit!  I then open the toilet up so I can start wiping her down before I toss her in the bathtub.

HOLY FREAKING HECK.

There is poop smeared all over the toilet!   NOAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  @&*$%*&@#&*@#&!!  Noah, who lately has been VERY BAD about wiping his bum BEFORE he slides off the toilet, has left a nice little surprise for me to find later, as if to leave me a memento of him while he's gone away from me at Zoo Camp.  So, I have to hold Shelby with one hand so she touches NOTHING, and use my other hand to scrub down the toilet.

I clean the toilet.  I clean Shelby.  I clean myself.  I clean the bathtub.  I do 2 loads of laundry (despite the cat litter everywhere which I must walk through and which is sticking to my feet - and at this point I'm really wishing I'd cleaned up the ^#@^&$! litter BEFORE eating lunch).  I sweep all non-carpet rooms of litter.  I clean our master bathroom (which was hit particularly hard by litter, for whatever reason).  I vacuum.  And vacuum.  And vacuum.  I get a new vacuum bag out once it's full of litter.  I do this TWO times.  About 4:00 I'm finally done cleaning and I come downstairs, only to discover that there was POOPY on the chair Shelby was sitting in during her blowout. 

HOLY FREAKING HECK.

So I clean up MORE poop.  Because it's what I do.

 

At this point, I call Mark and tell him to pick up Noah and then meet us at Twin Trees restaurant.  Now, just that very morning, we'd agreed to curb our eating out at restaurants to save money for our many trips planned this spring and summer.  Mark naturally begins to protest, at which point I say, " DO. NOT. QUESTION. ME.  DO. NOT."  Mark then wisely agrees to meet us there.   I should explain that I've been researching "true New York pizza" since in our 8 years here we've never had a good pizza.  I know, right??  Anyway, I've compiled a list of 5 supposedly must-try pizzerias in Syracuse, and Twin Trees is the closest.   It's not the #1 choice but I seriously canNOT eat one more time at Chilis or Olive Garden without going postal with a fork.  Seriously.  Syracuse is renowned for bad food (as I've discovered in my pizza research, and after 8 years of my own dedicated research to this cause).

Unfortunately, Shelby wants to sit by me, shrieking "I WANT TO SIT BY MOMMY!  I WANT TO SIT BY MOMMY!"  Yup, a bond forged in poop (literally) is VERY STRONG.  For the rest of the meal, Shelby behaves like an utter terror, so much so that we must have said her name so many times "SHELBY!!!" that one of the waitresses (who was NOT ours) notices one of Shelby's absences (Mark has her in time out) and says, "Oh!  Where is Shelby?"  BUT, She-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named is on Mark's clock now and all I have to do is pretend that I don't have any kids and that all I have to do is eat this fabulous pizza.  And order 2 more Diet Cokes.  Bliss achieved.

Happily, Twin Trees is very family friendly (meaning it's plenty loud so your kids can be loud, too), AND the pizza actually tastes kinda like my beloved, long-lost pizza from Fredricos in Logan, Utah!  I'm pretty sure it's not genuine NY style pizza, but I'm happy.

HOLY FREAKING HALLELUJAH!!!!!!!!

And today, with Noah at Zoo Camp again, actually DID turn out to be my quiet, relaxed nirvana day.  'Course, I DID buy Shelby a new DS game and let her play on Noah's DS all day long.  And locked all of the baby gates.

And um, yeah, I did end up booking my road trip shopping spree for next week that I'd been delaying booking because I felt kind of guilty about it.  Maybe by next week (when I'm 1000 miles away from her), I'll be thanking She-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named.

Happy birthday cute little freckley Noahdude!

(Noah saw his name on my computer and asked me to insert "cute little freckley")

And I'm even blogging about it in the SAME month that it happened!  Woohoo Mommy!   Sorry, Shelby & Connor, that I haven't gotten around to your January birthdays yet.  But I'm aging and I gotta go with what's fresh in my memory.  It's tough being……29.

Anyhow, here's my happy little 6 year old Noahguy.  Boy oh boy do I love this kid.  I love his goofy personality and his little elf face and his huge blue eyes.  I love that he's all boy and tells obnoxious poopie and toot and burp jokes.  I always wanted boys and BOY OH BOY did I get lucky with my 2 fabulous boys!

Moving on, NO, this is not a photo for "Find the kid in all the mess, if you can!"  But I think it's really fun when people put baby photos of their kids on their birthday blog entry.  Unfortunately, I'm not that organized at the moment and all of our old photos are still on our old computer.  However, I came across this gem, from when Noah was about 2.  Obviously, he'd tipped over in his little toddler rocker and was too lazy to get up by himself (or stop drinking from his sippy cup).  But you can tell he'd been crying about his predicament since his face is pretty red.  Springing to action is SUPERMOMMY, always ready with the camera to first document the treasured and potentially embarrassing moment and only THEN offer assistance.  So, that's that for the baby photo.  I LOVE this photo!

Back to the morning of April 6, 2011 - marking the 6th birthday of NOAH!  Here's Shelby and Noah running into the kitchen first thing in the morning to see what the birthday table looked like.  I LOVE Shelby's face here (click to blow it up).  Oh, and I take no responsibility for Noah's attire (or lack of).  He likes to dress himself and on his birthday morning he deemed underwear and his Yankees cap Dressed Enough.  Yes, Noah's little 6 year lifetime dream is to be able to live naked.  We worry for his future sometimes.  But at least he had on underwear, so we counted ourselves as blessed.

Speaking of worrying for the future, check out this shot of Mark and Connor.  It's worth clicking on it to blow it up bigger.  Are they exact replicas of each other or what? Ay yi yi.  I don't know whether to laugh.  Or weep?

Okay, a couple of notes here - 1) YES, this is still the camera from Christmas (oh wait, you didn't read about my new camera from Christmas that I don't know how to use because I haven't blogged about Christmas yet either!  Crap!) that I don't know how to use and everything inside with a flash is always yellow.  2) YES, our family birthdays look the same every year.  A few party store decorations around our kitchen table and balloons.  You've seen this scene at least a dozen times here on our blog over the years, right?  We seriously need to remodel.  Or move.  Or celebrate a birthday somewhere in some other way that is NOT in this room.  Tell ya what, our next birthday celebration blog documentation will be in our laundry room.  Or Tahiti.  One of the two.

Back to Nakey Noah (one of his many nicknames, though this one was most apropro for today, no?), here's him working on his MarioKart cake.  He looks so skinny!  I think I caught him right on the inhale.  Someone get that skinny kid some birthday cake!

Speaking of apropro, I saw this book and immediately thought of Noah.  And yep, it was a hit. 

What was NOT a hit were the 2 sets of nighttime goggles!  Neither Connor nor Noah liked them.  Yeah, Noah, using your goggles to look at the downstairs bathroom wall is NOT really what they were intended for.  What the heck is wrong with these kids?

At least Shelby liked the goggles!

And no birthday would be complete for Noah without a video game gift...

Another birthday treat for Noah was being able to watch TV BEFORE school.  This is a VERY. BIG. DEAL.  And whaddya know?  Spongebob is on at 8:00am.  Happy birthday to Noah!  (Notice Noah also wearing his favorite bright green argyle socks - aren't they magnificent?)

Unfortunately for him, having a birthday did not exempt Noah from school, so we brought the birthday to him at school with some MarioKart cupcakes that were a big hit in Kindergardenland.  We also met Noah's intended, Adrianna.  They've been engaged for about 3 months, as it turns out.  Evidently EVERYONE in Kindergarden knew about it, including Noah's teacher.  Welcome to the family, Adrianna?  I guess??  I bet he hasn't told you about his dream to live nakey, has he??

We'd told Noah all morning that he had to wait to get his "big present" until after school.  So, speeding out of Kindergarden, Noah and I headed for the mall and went to Build a Bear Workshop!  Yup, Noah's dream (aside from being naked in public places) for the past few months has been to have a teddy bear.  I ignored that request at Christmas, figuring he didn't really want a teddy bear - I mean, huh??!?  Anyway, no wonder the stupid $99.00 Big Foot Robot he got for Christmas was played with only once and just taken to the Goodwill last week!  *grouch grouch grouch*  I guess he was serious about a teddy bear.  Fortunately, Build a Bear was hit and Noah built his dream teddy bear.

So, Noah's dream teddy bear wears a Harley Davidson t-shirt, camouflage shorts, has a skateboard and skateboard helmet and related gear, features a Light Saber on his wrist and plays Star Wars music from his foot.   Noah couldn't decide what macho theme his bear should have so he picked some of everything.  Oh, and……..wait for it……..Noah named him…….CAREBEAR.  Yes, Carebear.   The Build a Bear clerk about choked on her drink when Noah told her the name of his macho-looking bear.

To follow up on how Carebear has adjusted to life, the bear itself costs $18.  All the accessories and clothes and crap took our total up to $72!!!  Carebear is now living Noah's dream for him by residing on his bed NAKED, with all the stupid clothes & crap lounging in a drawer.  Yep, another $50 well spent.  NOT!

Another birthday tradition for Noah is seeing a movie.  And he always wants ME to take him (as opposed to Mark).  I generally hate kids movies.  BUT, I won't pass up an opportunity to drink a 64 oz fully-loaded Diet Coke, so lucky me got to see Hop with Noah. 

And, another Noah birthday tradition, Noah wanted to leave the movie halfway through.  Well, BELIEVE ME, so did I, BUT I hadn't yet finished my Diet Coke or popcorn, so I made Noah & Carebear stay for the whole glorious dumb movie.

Finishing up our birthday day, we celebrated in fine style at Dennys, Noah's favorite restaurant.  There's not much I can say about this.  It's Dennys and it leaves me completely uninspired and even a little nauseous.  But hey, it's all about the kids, right?  *plasters on fake smile*

Sadly, in the end, April 6, 2011, was a bittersweet day for Noah.  It was the birth of naked and overpriced Carebear.  But we also had a death that evening.  Our Wii died.  On Noah's birthday.  Could that timing be any worse?  Oh, I don't know, let's see how Noah handled that:

 The weekend before Noah's birthday we did a little getaway trip.  We went to see a production called "Joseph" (not the Technicolor Dreamcoat version, but it was still fabulous) down in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, at a phenomenal theatre called Sight & Sound with a stage twice the size of any Broadway stage (plus they use the side walls, the ceiling and the aisles) and JUST as spectacular as any Broadway show I've seen.  Seriously, New York peoples, get your tushies down there and go see a show at this theatre.

Naturally, despite the sensational show and even tooling around Hershey Pennsylvania for a bit (yes, HERSHEY as in chocolate - no the town does NOT smell like chocolate, but the Hershey-kiss shaped street lanterns ARE really cute), the highlight of the trip was staying in a hotel with a swimming pool.  Oh, and watching TV from bed - the ultimate luxury:

I want to write more about Sight & Sound theatre, but I'm pooping out.  I stayed up too late last night drinking caffeine and shopping online.  Here's some more pics.  They're pretty self-explanatory and you don't really need me to blab more, do you?  You just lost another 20 minutes of your life listening to me blab.  And yet look.  I'm STILL blabbing!  And you're still here!   *evil laugh*

A few days AFTER Noah's birthday, Noah got a second birthday cake!  Noah's church class teacher, Sister Theler, made him a cake!  Aside from a naked (but camouflaged!) bear and a hotel with a swimming pool, getting a SECOND birthday cake was one of the most fabulous things to happen to Noah for his 6th birthday.  Wowie!

Happy birthday to my little awesome Noahdude!  (and yes, that is his DS, pretty much permanently attached to his arm)

Mourning...

Last week we had dinner and a group Family Home Evening lesson with the Lentz family and most of the younger kids didn't know what "mourning" meant.  Given our company for FHE, I immediately piped up with, "Mourning is what we're going to be doing when the Lentzs' move away."

*heavy sigh*  Yes, one of our favorite families for which we have a supreme affinity (thanks, Mike - you say ice cream, I say YOUR FAMILY!), are moving 2000 miles away.   I'm excited for them because they're moving back to be close to their families and I TOTALLY understand that.  But goshdarnit if it doesn't just break our hearts. Because they are OUR family, too!

My first memory of the Lentzs was them attending one of our New Years parties and they immediately jumped into the party and had a great time doing karaoke for all.  That's when I had inklings of their grooviness.  But we hadn't yet become friends.

The next memory I have is a strong and significant one.  We'd just returned home to New York from a year's sabbatical of living in southern California (5 years ago), and during that time one of our "best friend" families, the Birds, had moved away to Idaho in our absence.  It took me weeks to not cry when I drove by their old house.   Anyway, within a few weeks of returning to New York, I became severely ill.  When I realized how sick I was, I knew that we were going to need help.

Here's the thing about non-Utah LDS wards (LDS is Latter Day Saint, aka Mormon).  A ward is a geographical group of families that are LDS and wards attend church together and do other activities together.  At least half of the families in our ward are what I call transplants, meaning we moved TO New York for jobs and we don't have family nearby.  By my deduction, our family and the Lentzs were the unlucky members who were furthest away from any speck of family - 2000 miles (Pat Browne now wins that unfortunate honor with her family being in Chile).  Anyway, in these situations, your ward becomes your family - in good times and in bad.  You rely on each other *profoundly* and in so doing, become actually closer than in areas/wards with thick concentrations of LDS.  My humble opinion anyway, don't flame me, Utah Mormons!

Back to me getting sick.  When I knew how sick I was, I remember crying to Mark, "What are we going to do?  The Birds moved away!  Who can help us???"  Now, I knew that at that time, we could have called ANYBODY in our ward and they would have helped us - LDS wards tend to be like that, and we really did have more friends than just the Bird family.  But within in our ward boundaries,  we lived on the outskirts of that boundary, with only a couple of LDS families nearby at all - the Birds were closest, followed by the Lentzs.  But it's still hard to ask for help, ya know?  Anyway, after I cried that to Mark, I distinctly remember him saying, "You know what?  We're going to call the Lentzs because I have a feeling they are SOLID GOLD."  Yep, Mark called them Solid Gold.

A few minutes later Eric Lentz was in our hallway, just having finished giving me a Priesthood blessing, when I did him the favor of puking all over the hallway and bathroom right in front of him.  For all I know, it was on him, too.  Like I said, REALLY sick.  I then remember Connor or Noah coming into the hallway, very scared, and Eric immediately taking him away from the situation so they didn't have to see me bent over the porcelain throne making all manner of noises, not to mention making sure my little fellow didn't step in the mess already in the hallway.  Eric then immediately took Noah and Connor to his house, and that's the last I saw of them for several days.

 

Over the next 5 days in the hospital, all I knew was that the Lentzs (with the help of another friend, Karen Walsh) were taking care of my family.  My boys even slept over there at least a couple of times during that time.  It's still strange to me to know that there were 5 days of their young lives that I have no idea what they did or ate or where they slept.  But I knew I didn't have to worry about a thing.  And friends with the Lentzs we became, forged in the grossness of pukery!

 

Is there a higher metal than gold, something more fabulous and more valuable and more treasured?  The Lentzs were not just solid gold, but solid *PLATINUM*.

Connor ADORES the Lentzs.  And what kid wouldn't?  Their house is full of kids and toys and pets, and outside they have a swimming pool, a canoe pond, playground, trampoline, horses.   HORSES!!   Actually, my kids don't even care about the trampoline or playground or pool or horses - they care about just BEING with the Lentzs and all their positive energy and fun.

Connor has begged me several times over the past few years to have 6 siblings, "just like the Lentzs!" 

A couple of years ago, we were car shopping.  Connor pleaded with us to get a limousine so that "we could fit all the Lentzs and take them with us!"

Also, a while back, we needed Connor to get to church when we couldn't go.  We called - wait for it - yes!  The Lentzs!  Connor was a little nervous at first to attend church without us, but after we told him he got to be "Connor Lentz" for the day, that sealed the deal!  He was thrilled to be able to go to church with them and sit with their family and indeed was broken-hearted the next day when he asked us if he could still be Connor Lentz, and we had to inform him that no, actually, we wanted him back in our family as Connor Ritchie.

Jamie has been our only babysitter for nearly 5 years!  I'm sure all parents everywhere understand the terror that goes with "Our babysitter is moving away!"  Jamie, our kids adore you and the kids always cheered when they found out it was Mommy & Daddy date night because they knew they would see you.  And I don't just think it's because they associate you coming with Little Caesars pizza.  I think they love you anyway, Jamie, pizza or no pizza!

The Lentzs are, without a doubt, one of the BEST families we've ever had the privilege to know.  As Mark and I were talking about their upcoming move, our conclusion was that their leaving is going to leave a huge HOLE in the Liverpool Ward.  Not just for us, but everyone.  Where are the Scouts going to do their winter camping?  Where will we ice skate?  Where will we spend our Thanksgivings (at least half of our Thanksgivings here over the years have been with the Lentzs)?  Who will befriend those who need friends?  One of the traits I most admire about Julie especially, is her ability to befriend everyone, with no regard to cliques or status and all that nonsense. 

 We just finished our Family Home Evening this evening, and it was kinda sad and lonely with just us, and no Lentzs.  Noah even tried to make the joke that he wanted to sing Womanizer (an old joke amongst our families - we attended a FHE at the Lentzs house a year or so ago and when asked for song choices, Noah immediately piped up with "Womanizer!"  Yup, a proud parenting moment for me.) - anyway, it wasn't the same without Mike & Jamie cackling about it again.

We love you, Eric & Julie & Jamie & Mike & Rachel & David & Megan & Daniel & Kiplyn.  And Coco & Prancer, too - you've been part of our family on several occasions, too!  Thank you for always being there for us no matter what, and for being such great friends and examples.  Our only consolation is that at least you're moving to a state which we visit somewhat frequently, and we already can't wait for our Lava Hot Springs date with you this summer!

Crikeys people!!!!

44 pageloads of my blog yesterday and not one of you lazy patooties can leave a comment?!? Pffft!! Was it the 4 paragraphs devoted to my cat in my last entry??? You could comment about that, too, ya know. Any semblance of even a PEEP would be appreciated!


Whooooooo is out there looking at us? Show yourselves and be proud! And even if you're not proud to admit you're reading our blog (though this makes NO sense whatsoever!), at least say SOMETHING. Please!

Just squeakin’ this one in!

Okay, if I get our 2010 birthdays blogged about the DAY before our 2011 birthdays start, it still counts, right? Whew!

Connor turned 7 in January 2010 in grand Egyptian style!You may remember that last year was the year of Egypt and hieroglyphics studies for Connor and he even has his own Egypt room now – check out THIS coolness by clicking here. Okay, moving on, we celebrated with a fabulous pyramid cake, Egyptian masks, statues, jewelry, etc!!



Now we have the arrival of the grandest birthday present – lllaaaaaahhhhhh! - a Nintendo DS – Connor’s dream come true at last!! Egypt was quickly forgotten (although all the kids wore the jewelry pretty much all day, and Shelby still does!).


Here’s Connor showing the prized DS to Shelby and Noah.


And here’s the inevitable (you saw it coming, right?) screaming when Shelby and Noah discover that the DS is NOT for them.


But later all was quiet on the Ritchie front as the three kiddos were happily engrossed in their games – Connor on his DS and Shelby and Noah FINALLY content with playing on their old, nerdy and soooo uncool Leapster game units.


But hey, the good thing about the DS was that the kids were so engrossed in it that we did NOT have to go to Chuck E Cheeses later! Yessssss! Our evil plan worked!

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Moving on to Shelby’s 2nd birthday a week after Connor’s – it was all about Dora! Dora cups, Dora plates, Dora cake, Dora presents. Shelby is a cake-eating machine and outdoes her brothers (and previous cake-eating machine champion Grandpa) with ease. Here she is pointing at the cake.


Here she is pointing at her plate. Cake. Plate. Cake plate. CAKE ON PLATE, people!!!!!!


In addition to cake, Shelby REALLY likes those music-playing and talking cards. She was *very* irritated that the card from Grandma and Grandpa did NOT serenade or talk to her:


And here she is, Shelby now (well, then, but you know what I mean) AND I’m certain this is also a glimpse into her in 10 years. Here she is strutting her cute little stuff in her birthday pink tutu and her new birthday pink Vera Bradley purse, complete with pink phone, lipstick, credit card, etc – everything a girl could need! Yes, I *may* have gone a bit overboard.


This is one of my all-time favorite photos of Shelby with her purse, tutu, jewelry galore and talking on her phone, and yet I wonder, what am I creating??


As a matter of fact, just this morning Shelby "called" me on her pink Disney phone and said, "Hi Mommy! I'm a princess! Goodbye!" click. And speaking of what am I creating????, here’s Meatball dressed up for the occasion. It was all very undignified and embarrassing and I’m pretty sure he then hid upstairs for the next 3 days.


And finally, if I were writing the caption to this photo it would be: “Yeah yeah, you have to be nice to me, but it’s not like I got a DS or something cool like that.”


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I’m afraid that Noah’s fifth birthday wasn’t well documented. Mommy fail! Especially after his fourth birthday escapades were so memorable (click here to get some of THAT fun). But maybe after that traumatic birthday Noah needed a low-key birthday. So, this is all I’ve got for ya, folks.

Spiderman was our theme of the day. And YES, that’s Dora wrapping paper you spy on the presents for Noah. What? You didn’t know that Dora and Spiderman hooked up? Mmmm hmmmm, it was all very scandalous.


And once we realized how FABULOUS DSs are for entertaining kids (yes, I said it, everybody knows it and everybody does it so don’t act like you don’t), naturally we got one for Noah’s birthday! Peace was restored to the Universe at last. But only AFTER Connor complained for HOURS about how HE didn’t get his DS until he was 7 and why did Noah get to have one when he was only 5?!??!?


And since Shelby and Connor’s birthdays had fairly decent photographic representation, I feel compelled to put this photo in along with this equally scintillating description – On Noah’s birthday we went to Carousel Mall to ride the carousel. That’s my dad (aka Grandpa) with Noah.


That’s it, Noah’s birthday 2010 folder only had 5 pathetic photos in it – these 3 were the best. Yeah, I know. He was gypped, to be sure (although he DID get a DS two years earlier than Connor). I’ll do better this year.

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As many of you know, Mark had the BIG ONE this year, warranting its own extremely lengthy (but quite entertaining, if I do say so myself) blog entry – refresh and relive the memories by clicking here.

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And then there’s Mommy, last on the totem pole. Last birthday every year. Yup, you mommies out there know what I mean. Look at my birthday table. No Egyptian or Spiderman or Dora themes for me. Not even a birthday cake.

BUT in my family’s defense, I don’t even like cake (but I do LOVE those little mini Wegmans brownies) and the partyware WAS red, my favorite color. And I don’t even care much about Egypt or Spiderman or Dora. Mark evidently couldn’t bring himself to do me a Clive Owen-themed birthday party. Whatevs. At least he didn't put out 42....no wait, I mean.....29...birthday candles.


All was redeemed later when Mark blindfolded me and put us all in the car to venture out on a mystery trip. Well, it was a mystery for about 10 minutes anyway, until Noah piped up, “Hey, this is the way to Zoo Camp!”

I’m not a zoo person. I don’t like animals in captivity. I’d rather they be in their natural environment even if it means I never see them for myself. All the talk of conservation, bla bla bla. And yes yes yes I know most zoo animals are bred in captivity and can’t survive in the wild on their own, but I’ve never been to a zoo that didn’t make me feel horrible for the animals, not even the renowned San Diego zoo. HOWEVER, absolutely nothing is more important to me than teaching my kids the value and gift of animals and the meaning of stewardship. SO, go to the zoo we will until they make their own decisions and opinions about it. *insert Heath Ledger’s Joker face (RIP Heath – LOVED ya in Ten Things I Hate About You) here* Oooooo Estelle why so serious? Okay, enough of that.

Yep, little bigmouth Noah was right, we went to the Zoo, where I was unblindfolded and discovered that I had become an adoptive parent to the sandcats! Well, yay!! I LOVE the little sandcats!! They have a horrible environment, and every little bit of donation helps, I guess. I hope. Here’s Connor and Noah looking at my sandcats. It was a FABULOUS birthday present – ya did good this year, Mark!!! This seems an appropriate time and place to mention that Tahiti would be even better for next year. Just sayin'.



And finally, a new family member was added to our family for my birthday – say hello to FINNEAUS! BEST PRESENT EVER! Well, after getting LASIK eye surgery. And after getting my BMW. But….THIRD BEST PRESENT EVER!

Okay, three funny stories about Finneaus. Noah and I (Noah is my fellow animal-loving little fellow) were in Petco probably buying litter and pet food and whatnot when Noah sped over to the cat cages (organized by Syracuse’s fabulous CNY Cat Coalition). He completely ignored the funny, cute kittens playing and focused only on this sedate orange cat. Now, we already had 3 cats with no intention of getting a 4th, I mean we’re not CRAZY, ya know. Not too much, anyway. After Noah playing and talking about this orange cat for about 20 minutes, I finally had to appease him and told Noah, “Look I’m writing down his phone number, okay? Maybe we can call about him later.” And Noah then INSISTED that we leave the cat HIS phone number, too – TOO CUTE!!!

Anyway, I couldn’t get that cute little orange cat out of my mind (and neither could Noah). I told Mark about him and then….SURPRISE! New cat for Mommy’s birthday! YAY!

2nd funny story – I named my birthday cat Finnick (after one of my favorite characters in The Hunger Games book series). HOWEVER, upon finishing the series, it turns out that Finnick …ummmm..err….. doesn’t make it! So anyway, Finnick’s name quickly and quietly was changed to Finneaus. Cool enough, right?

3rd funny story – less than a month ago (meaning 5 months now that we’ve had Finneaus) I was reviewing my cat adoption paperwork and discovered that Finneaus is a GIRL!!!! Now SHE is a lovely (and strangely-named) Finny and I ADORE her. (seen here with Indiana – unseen are my two other little cat-loves Meatball and Pequop)


And, somewhat tragically and surely frustratingly, Connor has figured out my true age. For years I was able to tell him I was 29 and he believed me. Well, one year anyway. And when 29 didn’t change to a different number the next year, my then-too-smart-little-three-year-genius-son figured out something was amiss. And sometimes I keep funny Facebook conversations to put in my scrapbooks (which actually don’t exist yet, therefore I blog), such as this one on my birthday last year with my friend Betsy:


But at least all THIS year Connor was convinced that I was actually one year younger than I actually am. I’ll take it!


Alrighty then, it's time for me to quit blabbering now and I'm certain you are thinking to yourself "Did I really just spend 20 minutes reading about Estelle's new cat?!?!??" I need to go prepare for Connor’s eighth birthday which is TOMORROW!!!Told ya I squeaked this entry in!