Olivia and I are lying on the floor and I'm holding a ball above us to look at when I accidentally dropped it on her face.

Olivia: (shrieking laughter) "Do wit agin mommy"

Ball drops on her face again.

Olivia: (shrieking laughter) "Do wit agin mommy"

Ball drops on chest rather than face.

Olivia: "No mommy, on my face, on my face"

Ball drops square on her noise.

Olivia: (shrieking laughter) "Do wit agin mommy"

Repeat. Repeat. Repeat . . .

You would think parenting would be easy if even this is hilarious.

Addison sharing a smoothie with Grandma Hatch . .

Grandma: I can't take it anymore, I keep getting a brain freeze.

Addison: I'm not getting a brain freeze because my brain is smaller than yours.

Watch for me in 2012!

After watching the Olympics I decided that I wanted to be a Beach Volleyball Player. Then Kristen stated on her blog she wanted to be a Olympic Gymnast at 6" taller than the tallest gymnast. So, I thought I would just put my new ambitions out there too . . . .

I want to be a Beach Volleyball Player. Actually, I just want to look that good in a skimpy swimming suit that rides up and I feel no pressure to re-adjust because I just look THAT good. Plus I want to run, jump and bounce around in that swimming suit with no reservations. A Gold medal, endorsements and TV time would be bonus! (Oh, and obviously I'll only be wearing the skimpy swim suit because it's required for the sport.)

(There were a billion pictures of these athletic behinds, but they were borderline pornographic so I went with the safe picture . . . you can still get the picture)

I'm going to need to move to the beach, stop with the whole mother bit because I'm going to need lots of training time, and then somehow get a tan. That is all that is holding me back from achieving new dream.

P.S. Why do the men beach volleyball players have so much "coverage" with their little outfits? This was my question to Ansen for the entire 2 weeks of Olympics. We have come up with nothing logical.

The Evolution of Play Dates

We had out last big play date with Tori, Mason and Luke last week before Addison started school. We've had a regular play date with Mason (and probably more importantly Tori) for 2 1/2 years, but school and pre-school schedules are conflicting this year so it's over. Ansen likes to tease me about my play dates that are "for the kids." I always tell him he's welcome to as many golf play dates as he wants as long as he takes the kids. Anyway, our last big day was Backyard Adventures and lunch at Zupas. Now we evolve to girls night out (that are so much more irregular) until we get Addison and Mason in school and it's Olivia and Luke's play date.

The Battle I choose . . . for now

Apparently no one at Huggies ever had children because otherwise they would have just stuck to Mickey and Minnie for the front of the diaper and not made diapers with "character choices". Olivia has decided that the Mickey and Pluto diaper is unacceptable so given that 1/2 the diapers in the box are Mickey and Pluto we've run into some "difficulties" as of late. If by some small miracle I am able to wrestle (yes, physically wrestle) a Pluto diaper on while she's screaming "NO PLUTO MOMMY, NO PLUTO" it's only a matter of time until she finds me naked with a Minnie diaper in hand. I am fighting the urge to beg another mother to trade me all my Pluto diapers for her Minnie diapers (since I unfortunately have boxes of pre-bought sale diapers), but I am trying to hold strong . . . she will not win this one!

First Day of School!

First day of School! So exciting! My family always went out to breakfast for the first and/or last day of school (depends on who you ask since we all have a different memory) so we thought we'd start that tradition too. It was a great idea until we were in the car on the way to school and Addison said she was too full and asked if we could pull over to throw up. First time parents, a rookie mistake . . . maybe. Ansen tried to blame it on me though I don't recall him putting up a good fight (or a fight at all) against the breakfast idea. She didn't throw up in the end and now we have an even more memorbale memory.

Anyway, we made it and Addison was thrilled! She has 2 friends that she knows (Reagan and Chase) and is determined to make new friends. We went to Banana's (Grandma) house for lunch afterwards to tell her everything she did the first day. Addison is pretty sure she's going to love her teacher and did find out that she's actually a grandma AND a mother (funny how that works out). Olivia spent the morning asking me "Addison, School? Get her."

Good Enough . . .

The plan was to go camping this year, real camping (Ansen's idea of camping is a night at the Marriott). School starts in a week, never made it to the real outdoors so we're in the backyard with our "temple" as Olivia calls it, a TV and movie. Good Enough.

Here's the kids sitting outside of tent while Dad picks up the first mishap of the night. He unwittingly left the bowl of popcorn on the air mattress just long enough for Olivia to start jumping on the air mattress. Ansen loved that - he doesn't seem to have my theory that a picture is necessary to commemorate the disaster and then we can laugh.

Provident Living

I have put 100+ hours into our garden and have now been able to provide my family by the sweat of my brow with 38 jalapenos, 4 green peppers and lots of big green vines that smell like tomato plants though there has been little evidence to support it.

Granted the other 1/2 of the garden was trampled to death by my neighbor (don't even get me to go there) and then never re-planted. I think jalapenos are about 17 cents so I'm looking at about a .06 cent per hour rate of return, assuming I'm able to use that many jalapenos with no tomatoes. Better luck in 09. Olivia in her gardening shoes.

Raging Waters

We went to Raging Waters for the summer company party. I really couldn't think of a better way to socialize with Ansen's co workers than in my swimming suit. It was probably the coldest day in August, so not so great since the water was numbing for the first 1/2 of the day. Addison had a blast and Olivia finally had fun when we were ready to leave so we stayed.

P.S. I spent a good 30 minutes doing both their hair into those little spider web things with a billion rubber bands so their hair would stay back all day. When we got there I sprayed sun block on all the little hair parts and pop, every rubber band popped open. 30 minutes well spent I'd say.

P.P.S Raging Waters, not as cool as when I was 10.

Back to School night with Addison . .

Me: What did you think about your new teacher?

Addie: At first when I saw her I thought she was a Grandma.

Me: She probably is a Grandma.

Addie: Well, but then I looked at her and she just has wrinkles like you. So I don't think so.

Oh, it's you again . . .

After an extended leave of absence, "The Destroyer" is back for hopefully just a quick visit . . . .

It sort of blends in with my walls, but it's red crayon up to as high as Olivia can reach on her tippy toes. When Ansen got home she reviewed with him what we learned today . . . "Paper Only, No Walls."

Let's hope she gets it.

Weekend with Chris!

Chris was here again for the weekend! We went to Jump On It and it was quite the workout for me, but fun. Ansen and Chris went to Cabela's, Unita golf, Golfing, Shooting and had a real "boys weekend." We love it when you come Chris! Thanks for coming and we really think Vegas (or Salt Lake) is calling your name when you graduate!

Nine Years Baby!

(Posted weeks late . . . . ) Today (July 22) is our anniversary! Nine years! Makes me sound old, but not quite the case since I was only 19 when we got married. Amazingly we both still graduated from college with a Master's each, we have two beautiful, smart kids and ta -da . . . we're still happy together!

I used to think that there's no such thing as "the one" but after 9 years with Ansen I know he is and was the ONLY one for me. Sad as this is Ansen, my favorite thing to do with you is big projects together. Ahh, I know it's sad. But I love lots of other things too!

Ansen, I love you because . . .

1. You support me. You have never held me back from anything I wanted to accomplish. You're my biggest support system and I love you for that.

2. You're a great dad! Our girls love you! I love that you play baseball, hide and go seek, the Clifford game (that I hate) and horse with them. I love that you even put your swimming suit on to go swimming in the kid pool. I love that you're just as capable of a parent as I am and that you step right in and we're equals.

3. You are competitive. I'd hate to have to play games with someone who didn't care who won my whole life so I'm glad we found each other!

4. You're patient. I like the calendar full and the days packed and then eventually it all falls apart, but you're patient with me and put it all back together.

5. Your commitment to the gospel. Life can be busy and hard, but I'm grateful I know that the gospel comes first. I'm grateful for your testimony, your mission, and the daily commitment to keep at it.

6. You love music. Though you can't appreciate the array of music I do, I love that we love music. I love that you actually know the words (every word with perfect exactness). I love that the first time I drove in your car you sang "Amanda" by Boston at the top of your lungs.

7. You work hard. You work hard at work, you work hard at home and you work hard on us. Thank you.

8. You laugh and you laugh loud. I love that we understand each other's humor and we still think things are funny the 20th time around. I hope I'm always afraid to bend over in front on you because I know you're probably going to poke me in the butt.

9. Your enthusiasm. I'm glad you're celebrating the day that some guy had pine tar too far up his bat and caused a huge fight in baseball 20 years ago. I love that you love the Yankees, I love that you love golf, I love that you love Nascar (I'll never say that one again), I love that you love your concealed weapons permit, I love that you love to be surprised. I love that you're excited, little or big.

10. Your random knowledge. Though I'm usually made to look like a fool, I love that you know a little bit about everything.

11. Your shopping skills. I love that you understand bulk shopping, clearance shopping and you're always up for the hunt. And I have to add I am SO grateful we see eye to eye in our finances.

Ansen, you're the one for me always, forever, no matter what. Look how far we've come, can't wait to see what happens next!

. . . about Stephenie Meyer's new book Breaking Dawn. . .

Addison: You know what I think is funny mom?

Me: What Addison?

Addison: She wrote the book from Jasob's expecta (perspective) and not all Bella's expecta. We're all used to reading it from Bella's expecta so people just don't like reading Jacob or Edward's expecta.

Me: Oh, is that what you think?

Addison: Yes, don't you?

I guess she heard me on the phone last night.

(By the way . . . finished the book. Reading is always "feast or famine"for me and I had to finish so I could be back to life and work by first thing Monday morning.)