Kid Tidbits & The New Family Van

My toaster has seen things no toaster should ever see like transformers, cheese, and ballpoint pens. I hate toasters and the way they just seem to beg for misuse by unattended children. I guess I'll plug the toaster in the garage and let the cheese burn off... 
  Layla (8) is the cheese culprit lol. At least she's at a reasonable cooking age, unlike Everett (2.5) who just burns toast and throws pens in, narrowly escaping getting burned. From what I gather she was trying to melt cheese on bread over the toaster and the cheese fell in. How do kids think of this stuff!?

 Yesterday I started cleaning out the upstairs seasonal clothes closet (an attic like room). This is a huge project and is going to take a few days. Each year by the fall and winter I get totally lazy and don't care the room gets trashed with clothes piled high, and then each spring I sort through everything and get it all organized again. I'm really busy trying to bag up giveaways, sort clothes by age group and hang up some stuff. Suddenly I hear from downstairs, "Mom the toilet won't flush anymore." The three youngest kids are in the bathroom together, ages 2, 4, and 6. Then I hear it half- flush four times in a row. I yell for them to stop flushing it and that I'll fix it in a little while. I know they can hear me. Then it half-flushes again. "Mom, it's clogged I think."
I say again, "I.Will.Fix.It.Later." Then it flushes again. "Yup it's clogged, mom." Then I VERY loudly yell, "DO NOT FLUSH THE TOILET ANYMORE I WILL FIX IT LATER! DO YOU HEAR ME? DOOO NOOOT FLUUUSH ANNNYMORE. DO NOT FLUSH IT."

The boys and Charlotte come out of their bedrooms a couple doors down smiling at me. They have been listening to me this whole time and all they hear is me yelling about flushing and not the other end of the conversation, and it is pretty funny. They laugh and I laugh and say, "Like how hard is it too just stop flushing the bleeping toilet!?!"

The TMI part:
I check the toilet a little bit later, which I knew wasn't clogged and sure enough it wasn't. They think when there's a messy poop and some sticks to the side of the toilet bowl (usually because Everett misses the water because he's little and has to lean forward) and all of it doesn't get washed away that it's clogged. They did this last week too. It actually makes me laugh because they act so "OMG the toilet!" about it.

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Penelope has crayons in the shape of animals and other things. They were handmade in silicone ice tray molds. Many of them are broken and so she likes putting them together so they look whole then she asks us if they are broken or not. This was cute at first, especially since she marks your guesses on paper. (She does this with crude jumbo tally mark lines and in no real order, but this is a great intro and beginning of data collection and graphing. Us homeschoolers value everything as learning!) But this has been going on for days and I don't want to guess if crayons are broken anymore, and actually most the time I can tell so I have to lie so she can feel good about tricking me. LOL. I want to tell her that I'm done playing this crayon game but she gets so excited when she 'tricks' you. She's such a 6 year old. : )

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Spring here means outside time, digging, planting, pruning, and lots of yard clean up. Ricky has been busy putting some fence up and fixing it so the chickens will stay in their pen. (We have some unruly hens that keep escaping and laying eggs at at least one nearby neighbor's house! 

 We have geese sitting on eggs and wonder if they are fertile! I avoided buying new animals this spring just barely. I think we're in the clear now. I refrained from bogging us down with barnyard  critters, at least until next year when the desire will start all over again! I'm now focused on the yard work getting done and the new baby coming. Each season seems to bring an adjustment to new schedules and expectations. We expect kids to help outside and we all have many added on outdoor chores. The kids even need to get readjusted to prolonged outdoor playtime; which is usually a welcomed thing by them, but not always. 

We are getting as many things cleaned up and done as we can before the new baby arrives. The list is crazy long and all of it -inside and out- won't get done. But we'll work until we run out of time. Since I'm going through the upstairs closet it also means I'm going through newborn clothes! Baby girl, baby boy...cooing over onsies and taking inventory on things we need (like newborn baby socks, cloth wet wipes, new baby blankets...maybe a new PRETTY ergo I've got my eye on hopefully...our other is so stained up.) And I'm daydreaming about some new things I want but might not need like new cloth diapers.

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On Saturday April 6^th we left the kids home alone to "run an errand" and surprised the kids by bringing home a 15 passenger van!!!! We kept this secret from them for 2 weeks and planned on surprising them the entire time! They love it and so do we. We took them for a spin in it, went to a favorite park, and had a happy lovely time gorgeous time.  We love our Excursion for so many reasons, but actually outgrew it one baby ago.  We fought getting a passenger van for so long! But such is life, if you have a gaggle of kids you need something to haul them all in. We can now seat  14 seat belted in! Already we tend to go more places together. Usually on a donut run just Ricky and I go with a couple kids and bring donuts home. Yesterday we all went together! So fun for us all to be able to pile in and we have tons of room! Now I’m car seat shopping. Life is so expensive!  

 When I pulled up to the house the day we brought home the van a bunch of kids huddled over to the window to see who was in the driveway and I totally teared up! I was overcome with emotion. This was a really big deal! This was going to change all of our lives. We already needed a bigger vehicle badly, but the new baby sealed the deal. We went from big family to jumbo size! At first they didn’t know it was me in the driveway (tinted windows). They just thought some stranger pulled up, and then they saw their dad pull up in his car too. I got out and slowly a couple of kids at a time wondered outside to see what we were up to. The joy on their faces was so much fun!

The kids riding in the van are SO quiet! Everyone has so much room and no one has to sit next to somebody if they don’t want to.  Ricky and I look at each other amazed…hardly any sound; just content riders. We love it. 

In other news I'm 33 weeks pregnant and feel awesome.