I've got a Temper, and I'm not afraid to use it.

Here's some pictures from chris' Birthday Bash we had last weekend. (thanks for the pics, Joel!) It was lots of fun and it was the first time we had a group of peeps over since we moved into the new house. We all hung out on the porch and ate and talked and had smokey-treats. It was glorious. Ezra ran around and had a grand ol' time. Even though it was daddy's b-day, he got an alligator/crocodile/monster/dinosaur(?) suit from Chase and Liv. Woo woo! Now I don't have to stress about the Halloween costume madness. I think he makes a cute alligator/crocodile/monster/dinosaur, don't you?






On an entirely different subject, lets talk about this temper of mine.

We listed a Dell laptop computer on eBay today that Chris' parents had recently given him. We are selling it because we're trying to pool money to get a Macintosh Laptop for him instead. eBay was acting funny when I was trying to list the thing, and none of the buttons were working right on their webpage. I was getting SO frustrated and I kept muttering how I HATED this new eBay listing page... "Oh it's HORRIBLE... I'm clicking the stupid button and nothing is happening! Who designed this thing, apes with toes for fingers?" and so on and so forth... spewing my hate onto the screen like liquid hot magma. (And perhaps a gleek or two.)

Now, keep in mind that Chris is "that gentle hearted kind of guy" who recently confessed to me that he'd only hit TWO objects in his entire life out of pure frustration. I, on the other hand, have usually hit two things out of frustration BEFORE NOON on a daily basis. (Short temper + Instant Rage + Ridiculous behavior = ME.)

I guess I was clicking the mouse really hard and rapidly because later, at dinner, Chris asked if I had ever been so frustrated to where I had actually hit the computer before.

"No, of course not honey..." I replied innocently. "...The worst I ever do is throw my cell phone."

"Oh, okay.", he replied and made some reference to my hyperactive clicking finger that startled him with its speed and intensity earlier that evening. "I was just wondering."

I left out the fact that my cell phone may or may not have been aimed in the vicinity of the computer once or twice before and that prior to the era of cellphones, video game controllers and computer joysticks would typically bare the brunt of my adolescent wrath. I remember getting SO MAD at this Mickey Mouse's Haunted House game I had on Sega Genisis that I would keep a pillow nearby when I played it so I could bite it and scream into it to try and direct my rage into the pillow and away from the video game console itself.

I don't know why I tortured myself with games like that. I hated playing them. But I hated LOSING even more. It was a vicious cycle that only resolved itself when new and exciting things came along- things like holding hands with boys and keeping a running tab of "HUGS RECEIVED FROM BOYFRIEND" in my little pink diary. Each post started out: Dear Matilda, H3!!!! or Dear Matilda, H4!!!! My diary always had a name because then it felt like I was telling my secrets to a real friend. (I wasn't the most popular kid in Middle School.) And, of course, the H3 stood for: Hugs=3. (Again, NOT A LOT OF HUMAN FRIENDS at that time. More friends of the stuffed animal and imaginary friend persuasion than actual human ones...)

I had this dresser in my room all growing up with little flower knobs on it, and on the bottom drawer, near the back, I kept a scratch tally of how many times my Middle School boyfriend had hugged me. The scratch tally stayed on that bottom drawer for years and years and years until just recently when Chris and I decided to paint all of our dressers white. You know, so that they would all be the same color instead of a lovely array of light brown, dark brown, lighter brown, and a medium brown with skateboarding stickers plastered all over them. Nothing says GROWN-UP like a reflective "Skate or Die" sticker on your undies drawer...

Sand that 'Hug Tally!'

When we painted over the scratch tally, I couldn't help but feel a tug of sadness as I said goodbye to another childhood memento. Buried under white paint. Plastered over by another grown-up decision. No more 'hug tallies' or stuffed animal concerts. No more secrets to 'Matilda' or playing with GI Joes. (Dibs on Ninja!)

But then I watch my son talking to the dinosaurs he's carefully set up on the piano bench, and I realize that those days of childlike wonder and discovery aren't over, they are just beginning.

*collective "awwww"*

Wait! Weren't we talking about my temper? Where'd all this mushy-mush come from?

Anywho, yeah, I've got a temper and I'm not afraid to use it. Do any of you have quick tempers? Is it just me? What do you do with them? Mine is quite unruly and needs a time-out. Suggestions?

blah blee bloo

You all should try this, it's so fun!

My #1 match was Julianne Moore...(huh?!) but I thought this was closer...



Sorry for the lack of blogs the last few days. I've been working on my vintage clothing site a bit this week...

I'll write more very soon.

Quick update: Ezra has discovered the rapturous joy of POCKETS. In his PANTS. He walks around with his ping-pong ball in his pocket all day long and pulls it out at random times with a big exaggerated gesture and a startling, piercing "GASP!" that could peel the wallpaper off of the walls. He thinks he's sooo funny.

And he is.

This is what he does whenever I say "airplane"...
or "Buzz Lightyear"...
or "elephant".
(your guess is as good as mine.)

Newness.

the outlandishly handsome buggaboo.

Chris and I went out on a date last night. As in a real DATE. Like, where you go somewhere and there is no little person running around like an un-caged madman, making a b-line straight for the fireplace as if he's running to meet his destiny and don't you dare try to stop him or you'll ruin his ENTIRE LIFE forever and ever... Like, where you get to wear clothes from your stain-free pile on the floor that's gathering dust from its lack of use and you get to eat food like a normal person without making airplane sounds or clapping everytime your toddler swallows a crumb.

It was awesome.

Yesterday was Chris' birthday and we went to a restaurant on the lake and sat outside by the fireplace and watched the beautiful sunset over the water. We drank wine and ate fatty chicken and garlicy mashed potatoes and amazing keylime pie. The food was delicious and Chris and I actually talked about important life things and had a chance to get back on the same page again after months and months of not being able to be alone together and be RELAXED at the same time.

It seems whenever we have a moment away from Ezra, it's either because we are busy doing something, or we're too stressed out to connect on any level because I left my cell phone on the piano at home and Chris' cell phone has a dead battery or we didn't plan anything ahead of time so we drive around for an hour asking "what do you want to do?", "I dunno, what do you want to do?" before we end up parked in the driveway at our house again after only 45 minutes of being gone.

So, last night seriously felt like a honeymoon for us again- even though we only managed to stay out for two hours before heading back home again because the movies we wanted to see didn't start until 10:00PM and that's WAY TOO LATE... what do we look like, teenagers? Chris would be sleeping halfway through the movie and I would be thinking of nothing but my cozy pajamas and my good book sitting on my nightstand. We're wild ones, we are.

We talked of the future and where we want to end up and what we want to do with this life we've been given and how we miss our families so deeply that everytime Ezra does something new, their faces are in our minds and we long to share these moments with them. Ezra is growing so fast and these are times you can never get back and it's hard to be away from the people we want to share all of this joy with the most.

And then when we got home, we watched a movie with Jacquie called 'Nomad' about the story of Sara Groves and her journey to Rwanda and her desire to live life to the fullest and her desire to RUN and not walk to help her neighbors. She spoke of how, a few years earlier, she was a mother with two small children and she felt herself go into this mode where she was just "hugging the wall" and "barley making it through each day"... but a couple of years went by like this and her children grew older and she realized that this way of life just WASN'T ENOUGH for her. She didn't want her boys to grow up watching mommy "hugging the wall" and being afraid of everything all the time, so she decided to let go of the wall.

She took her family on the road with her (she's a musician) and then she traveled to Africa where her entire life perspective was CHANGED FOREVER and she was never the same again. She spoke of how she'd always been afraid to go to Africa or do big things because then she would come home with an Africa-sized burden on her shoulders on top of all of the other burdens she already carried and felt weighted down by in her day-to-day life. But she said that instead of an Africa-sized burden, she came home with a new perspective on her own life, and all those trivial burdens she'd been carrying fell off of her shoulders and she could finally stand up straight. For the first time ever.

She had just showed up for her own life.



This movie was the cry of my heart played out on the TV screen in my living room and I felt so full and torn after watching it, I felt like I could just BURST at the seams with tears and laughter and I felt like screaming and getting it all out and letting God into that place of fear I so often (no, ALWAYS) am living out of.

Chris and I looked at eachother and without any words we asked eachother, "What are we doing?"

This, where I'm at right now, isn't enough. I echo Sarah's words of desiring to burn wick, wax, and all to the ground until there's nothing left at the end and I'm all used up. I'm so grateful that I have a God who desires the same and a husband who wants nothing less.

Lord, guide us into the rocky waters where only You will know what's ahead.

I refuse to be anywhere else.

Ezra VS. The Robot

If the video doesn't show up below, try this link: Ezra VS. the Robot!

The END of the WORLD.

Our digital camera got broken.

By a little someone who will remain anonymous. But I will say this... the suspect weighs about 23 lbs and has been known to get his legs stuck in between the slats of his crib in the middle of the night. Oh, and he was last seen wearing nothing but one sock and a diaper...

I know, I know... cameras aren't good toys for 19-month-old boys with peanut butter on their fingers, but it wasn't like that, I swear! We don't let Ezra play with the camera. But, a couple days ago I dozed off and Chris was busy on the computer, and before we could say 'Bob's Your Uncle', Ezra had crept back to the office, scaled the office chair, grabbed the digital camera (R.I.P.) and PUSHED the lens in really hard. It's jammed. Stuck. It makes a pathetic little clicking sound when we try to turn it on- like its last desperate coughs before it's trip to the camera graveyard.

R.I.P. little friend...

I tried to fix it. (and by "fix it", I mean pushing the lens in further and repeatedly smashing all the buttons.)

I got on Cannon's website and was so relieved to discover that our camera was indeed still under its warranty, and that all I had to do was send it in and they'd fix it. But then I started to read the terms of their so-called "Limited Warranty", and it turns out that they will only fix the camera under certain circumstances, including (and completely limited to):

1. If the box they shipped you when you first bought the camera was empty upon opening it, and in place of the camera you found either (a) one sock puppet, (b) a live snake, or (c) a dead rat.

2. If you received your Cannon camera in working order, but then, in the cover of darkness, an actual Cannon Employee snuck in to your house and hit the camera repeatedly with a hammer while you were in bed sleeping soundly.

or

3. If your camera was abducted by Martians who then implanted an alien SD Card into the card slot which contained sensitive information about their plan to take over the world in the year 2096 using nothing but spoons and old recordings of Michael Bolton.

the limited 'Sock Puppet Warranty Gaurantee'.

Turns out, this Limited Warranty is more limited than I had initially thought.

GREAT.

I would send it in anyways and pray that a Cannon employee would have mercy on our souls and fix the camera even though it had obviously been abused by a one-and-a-half year old child, and not by Martians or sock puppets, but I keep recalling a spooky incident my mom told me about recently that happened when she tried to send her 'Blackberry' in to get repaired while it was still under her limited warranty.

She called them to make sure she could send it back, and the person she spoke to at the 'Blackberry' headquarters proceeded to tell her that they couldn't repair the device for her because THEIR RECORDS SHOWED that this particular Blackberry had been DROPPED on such-and-such a date, and was therefore not eligible for the repair covered by warranty.

Oh, and also, we know WHAT YOU WERE WEARING when you dropped your Blackberry and WHAT YOU"D EATEN FOR LUNCH that day and we know what expletive left your mouth immediately AFTER such said incident because our records show ALL.... MWA HA HA HA!

CREEPY.

So, now I have a dilemma. We can't afford to get another camera just yet, but I've just started this online Vintage Clothing store that requires, um, PICTURES so that people will know what they are buying and can put their minds at ease that I am not trying to sell them my old Miami Dolphin Hammer Pants under the guise of "Amazing, VIBRANT trousers that offer extreme COMFORT and RANGE OF MOTION whilst supporting WILDLIFE VENTURES! MUST L@@K!#!"

Fortunately for us, we also have a video camera, so whenever Ezra does something cute and adorable, I am right there with the camera in his face saying (in my nasal tone) "AWWW GOOOOOOD BoYYYYYYY EZRA! GOOOOOD BOYYYYYY! HARDY HAR HAR SNORT! I hate hearing my voice being played back with the video.

It's enough to make me never speak again.

In the meantime, maybe I'll just post old pictures of Ezra with some "edited touches" added to them. (i.e. moustaches drawn on in 'Paint') to help you see how quickly he's growing.

Ezra at 4 years old...

Other than that, expect a lot of video clips.

With edited sound.

To spare you all my monster voice.

A nice, cool glass of FREAKING OUT.

It's so jarring sometimes when I take a step back and look at my life as though I were casually sizing up an outfit in my full-length mirror in the morning... trying to take in the 'whole picture'- the general effect it will have on those in passing...

But when I'm not looking too close, I still feel like that lanky armed teenager inside- the one who was suddenly too tall to be a gymnast but kept gymnastic-ing anyways. The one who wore bright orange t-shirts and danced like a chimpanzee on a bed of hot coals whenever music of any sort was within earshot. The sarcastic cheerleader who was well aware of how pointless her repetitive chanting really was but chanted her face off just the same.



I still feel like that person- struggling to know who the heck I am and why I'm here at all... Feeling my way through life like a game of Pin-the-Tail-On-The-Donkey gone wrong, where the donkey is on the wall but the wall is 15 miles from where I'm standing and there's a few bogs and forests between us but DON"T YOU DARE TAKE OFF THAT BLINDFOLD LITTLE MISSY because that's cheating and cheaters never prosper!

That's why it's so jarring when I occasionally step back and look at myself with those outsider's eyes.

Wife. (huh?)
Woman. *blush*
Mother. (uhh...)
Home Payer-Off-er. (with rose bushes! and a grown-up refridgerator!)

And every time I get a cup of ice water from the door of my grown-up fridge I find myself wondering how I got so far along the path of life already to where I have the option of crushed or cubed at my fingertips and am suddenly responsible for the life or death of some random rose bush I adopted when I signed the mortgage papers when I can't even keep a potted CACTUS from shriveling up and dying of thirst...

Wait!... Wait! I still don't know what I want to be when I grow-up! But, suddenly I'm here. I'm the grown-up... And there's a part of me that wants to pull the emergency brake on it all and catch my breath... because I'm feeling like I need to pay more attention and really appreciate things because now I see that it goes by so quick and then it's PAST. I need to start laughing more and writing more things down and savoring every lesson, every pain, every triumph! I've got to explore more and take riskier risks and spend less time worrying about gunk and more time picking myself up, dusting myself off, and stepping further! Because further is closer to something... I don't know what! But I know that's where I want to end up, so let's go there already!

*gasp. pant.* (end long-winded ramble.)

But, you know what? When all is said and done, I know I wouldn't take even one tiny step backwards again even if I had the chance. As I've been busy growing UP, I've also been busy growning OUT of a lot of icky things. (And I'm not just talking about my hyper-color pant suit or my Miami Dolphins Hammer Pants...)

I'm less selfish. (thanks, ezra!) I've gained little nuggets of wisdom. (thanks, parents!) I don't OBSESS over what to wear or who will notice. (except you, chris... hubba hubba!)

Sometimes I pass by those airy, "OMG HE SAID WHAT? OHNOHEDIDN'T" type girls on the street and I'm reminded that there's SO much more to life than what's directly in front of us. I'm OK with not having all the answers, but I'm not OK with completely giving up the search and assuming that all roads ended at my feet when I was born. Because, if I had everything MY way, there'd be WAY too many cheese puff factories in this world and fish would be illegal. (not fishing, but FISH.)

Afterall, I'm glad I still feel like that awkward, 'all elbows-and-knees' girl that I used to be. I know I'm still her.

I've just grown into my arms a bit... I think.


little me. AKA 'bean brain'.

Train Mania.

The master and his creation

He's really outdone himself this time. His toy-making skills are evolving into epic proportions now. I'm not talking milk jugs or even box forts here, people. This is the 'big time'. Chris created a TRAIN BOARD for Ezra. As in, the only kind of toy that entertains Ezra's busy little fingers for more than 30 seconds so mommy can read a page of her book kind of a toy. The most glorious toy ever made.

We haven't officially presented the train to Ezra yet... Chris has been working on it in the garage at night after Ezra goes to bed. Tonight we're going to glue all the track down. Once this thing is finished, I have a feeling we might never need to leave the house again.

Allow me to explain. Lately, my life REVOLVES around toy train sets. It seems I never go anywhere anymore unless I know for certain that there will be a train set there waiting for me on the other side. The bookstores I go to have one. The library I go to has one. The stores I shop at have one. Now, I just need to convince the grocery store down the street to get one, and I'll be set for life. It's all Ezra wants to do. EVER.



When we get home, he runs up to the shelf and grabs his 'Thomas the Tank Engine' DVD off the shelf and greedily starts trying to push it into the VCR slot. ("No, no, no, Ezra. That's a D-V-D. Not a V-H-S!", I tell him emphatically. When the other kids are reciting their ABC's, Ezra will be chanting D-V-D-V-H-S! D-V-D-V-H-S! and all the other mommies will know that my son watches too many movies.)

If we're not WATCHING Thomas or playing with Thomas, we're pointing to Thomas on our shoe or rolling our Thomas toy off the back deck over and over and over again. If I have to watch that DVD one more time where Thomas and Friends fight over who gets to pull the coach of the Queen of England, I'm going to go bonkers. I can handle George Carlin's voice for only so long... But he's the voice of every train and every person on that whole flippin show, and in my book, that's just a little TOO MUCH George Carlin.

Anywho, trains are IN and everything else is just white noise in the world of Ezra James. Oh! But in the midst of this crazy train craze, Ezra has managed to (finally!) learn another word. The word is BUBBLE. I was watching all the kids in the church nursery last Sunday, and I pulled out the bubbles (because the little ones LOVE the bubbles), and I was blowing bubbles and I kept hearing one of the little kids saying "BUH-BUL!" "BUH-BUL!" like he was stuck on repeat and when I looked down to see who it was, it was EZRA! woo woo! I was so proud. I've been running around making bubbles everyday since then using soapy water and WHATEVER I can find laying around with holes in it (the spatula works well, and so does my apple slicer)-- just so I can hear him say the word again and again. It's so cute!



The only other word Ezra really says is "Ball". And he sortof says "Bath", but "bath" sounds a heck-of-a-lot like "Ball". I'm ready for him to learn some new words. Like, maybe:

"Please may I have some more juice?", or

"Why don't you sit down here and put up your feet for awhile, Mom?", or

"You look tired. Why don't you go take a nice hot BUH-BUL BALLL?"

hehe.

What's In a Name?

Have I ever told you the story of how Ezra James Christopher got his name?

We (Okay, mostly I) was going crazy trying to find the perfect name for our firstborn son while I was pregnant. Actually, the intensive, mind-devouring name hunt started awhile before I was pregnant... and I may or may not have had about 30 pages of my journal sectioned off for names that had caught my eye...

This only started after I was married, when almost immediately after the words "I do" left my lips at the altar, my Maternal Clock started SOUNDING THE ALARM (MEEP! MEEP! MEEP! MEEP!). This was altogether strange to me, because before I was married I didn't think much of when I wanted children, and I really didn't think I'd want them so soon. But about 4 months into our marriage, it was all I could think about. And this from the girl who'd never really thought about it before. I thought I was crazy. I thought people would think I was silly or stupid for wanting a child so early into our marriage. I mean- geesh!- people wait AT LEAST 3 years now-a-days, right? I tried to suppress these intense urges I was having. I tried to talk some sense into myself. "People will think you're a doofus", became my daily mantra. Or- "I'm too young, right?". Or- "But, we don't own a house yet!", came from another corner of my brain. It was like a boxing match was being held on my Grey-Matter morning, noon, and night.

Afterall, I had DREAMS, you know? Like, dreams that were big and exciting, and dreams that didn't look easy or practical with a baby-in-tow. So, I felt like I had to pick between one desire (my dreams) and the other (having a baby)...

This. was. depressing.

So I kept my mouth shut.

Then, I felt like God started talking to me in the midst of all this brain-craziness. I heard him say to me one night while I was hanging out in our old apartment in California:

"I would never put two dreams in your heart and then force you to choose between them... That's not the kind of God I am... Do you trust Me?"

Things started to change in my heart after that. I began to believe in what He'd said to me. I started talking about my desire to have a baby. And Chris was right there with me. We felt like God was asking us to have this baby, and to trust that He had a good reason and a good plan ahead. So we said yes.

When I was about 6 months pregnant, I was still going crazy trying to pick a name for the little person growing in my belly. I believe that a name is more than just something you yell across the lunchroom to get your friend's attention, and I knew I wanted God to tell me what this kid's name was going to be, but I was getting a little impatient with the WAITING. I bought baby name books. (I know, I know...) I scoured the internet and scanned the credits after every movie I watched. (that's how my mommy found my name!). I obsessed. And made lists. Ridiculous lists. You can tell I was getting desperate when names like "Orson" and "Radio" were showing up on these lists and NOT GETTING VIOLENTLY SCRATCHED OFF immediately after I wrote them.

Then, FINALLY, I felt like I heard the Voice I had been "so patiently" waiting for. I was looking through an old journal from a really rough time in my life. I found an entry where I had written about something I felt God said to me, but didn't understand at the time. In my journal, on an otherwise blank page, I had written this:

"I felt like God just spoke something really clearly to me, but I don't have any idea what it means. I heard God say 'You have the Spirit of Ezra in you.'"

(Ezra is a book in the Old Testament of the Bible- written about a man named Ezra who was a scribe and brought the word of God back to the people after they'd forgotten about it.)

I started crying as I read these words years later- sitting on the floor of my apartment in front of my bookshelf, one hand resting casually on my prego belly. I immediately knew this was his name. So I called Chris. I was so worried he wouldn't like the name, or wouldn't understand the revelation I'd just had. But he LOVED it, and so we had named our son.

But the story doesn't end there.

I called my mom to tell her the name we'd settled on. After I said the name "Ezra", there was a pause on her end of the line. "Oh! Cool! Your Great-Grandfather's name!", she said happily.

"Huh?", I asked- completely shocked.

"Yeah! Grandpa Ezzie? His real name was Ezra!", she explained.

I was so baffled. We had picked my Great-Grandpa's name and we didn't even realize it. This was getting creepy. So, needless to say, my Grandma was THRILLED. (Ezra was her father's name). My whole family was excited. I felt more than 100% sure this was the right name.

For a middle name, Chris' family has a tradition of giving the son the father's name as a middle name, so we knew that he was going to be Ezra Christopher. I was visiting may family in Reno for Christmas when I was 8 months preggo, and one day I was driving with my mom when I casually mentioned that if I could pick any middle name that I wanted, I would have picked James. She was silent for a second.

"Honey, I think that was your Great-Grandfather's middle name too.", she said slowly.

Needless to say- I was SHOCKED again. How did this keep happening? What did it mean??

We double checked when we got home by asking my dad, and sure enough- That name (of all the names) was my Great-Grandpa Ezzie's middle name too. So Ezra's unofficial middle name became 'James', while his birth certificate only says 'Christopher'.

That's the story of his name. His name literally means:

Ezra: "Helper"
James: "Supplanter"
Christopher: "Bearing Christ"



This is my Great Grandfather Ezra James Fjeldsted. Ezra's Great Great Grandfather.

This is a Very Special Picture.

Allow me to explain why...

The camera was sitting on the coffee table and I watched Ezra walk up to the camera,

TURN IT ON like he'd always known how,

crouch down so he was level with the lens,

smile a big goofy smile,

and then TAKE A PICTURE OF HIMSELF.

I was so shocked.

This is the picture he took.

Now all he needs is a MySpace account.

Before & After: Master Bedroom

before....
(Chris was retexturing the walls in these pictures)






...and after!

Before & After: Ezra's Room

Before...
(also: while viewing "before" pictures, please try to imagine the horrible stentch of cat pee.)





...And after!
(while viewing "after" pictures, STOP imagining cat pee smell. Thank you.)

He's Even Cute when he's Blurry!

Bathing in Poo

An idea for a book series:

"Left Behind : A Poo in the Tub."

starring Ezra as "the Poo Maker"

Let's Talk Park.

We went to the park again today with Jett and Bekah. It was lots of fun!



Ezra actually stayed in the swing for longer than 30 seconds, and seemed to really enjoy it. He usually hates the swings, and I'm always so nervous when he's in them because the kid is TOP HEAVY. Where his head goes, he goes. So when he lets go of the swing and leans his head back to look at the sky my heart stops beating because it looks like the centrifugal force created by his large noggin is going to fling him from the swingset like a shot out of a cannon.

I call this "Reluctant Sharing"

After the swings, we moved on to the Huge Treacherous Slide. Jett almost flew off the thing and when I took Ezra up there to slide down with him, I got scared because we were like 100 feet in the air. I think I got a nosebleed up there. I felt like I was 11 years old again, standing at the top of the 'Black Widow' water slide at Wild Waters... there's no room for fear when there are 150 kids in the line behind you, pushing their way up the water slide steps with the unstoppable momentum of a pre-pubescent adrenaline rush. It's either go down the slide and risk death by the infamous 'Water Slide Wedgie', or take the grueling 'Walk Of Shame' back down the steps to solid ground. The choice was always clear: the Wedgie of Death was much more practical than the agonizing Descent of Shame. (and can we talk about the Wave Pool? I'll save it for another time...)



"Umm... are you sure about this mom?"

Next, we dizzyfied the kids by spinning them on the merry-go-round. We found out later that the merry-go-round was surrounded by little sticker bushes. After we plucked the stickers from Jett's butt, we explored the drainage ditch. (why not?) Where Jett promptly fell into a gooey, slimy mud puddle. (ohh...that's why not.)





Good times... good times.



I promise my next entry won't be about the park again. But I'm warning you now: It's pretty much either 'Park talk', or detailed descriptions of Ezra's never-ending bout with diarrhea and the subsequent diaper rash that makes changing his diaper feel like I'm wrestling with an ROUS (Rodent of Unusual Size) in a fire swamp.

(Ezra with a diaper rash)

It's your choice...