painful

poor zack and josh have hand, foot and mouth disease. it is a virus that causes sores/blisters on the hands and feet, but is especially painful in the mouth. i actually had this before. when alex was about 7 mos old, he got it. he was miserable. all he wanted to do was give mommy kisses (reason? mommy kisses always make boo-boos better). anyway, i ended up getting it too. couldn't eat anything but yogurt and pudding. i ended up losing like 15lbs. so now my littlest boys have it. they are miserable too. zack has been wanting french fries and nuggets, but when he tries to eat them, he just cries. his little feet look so sad too. sores all over the heel and around his toes. josh isn't as bad, but he hasn't been eating much of anything either. every time he tries, he starts crying too. man, it sucks. if i could only get it instead of them! i hate my kids being in so much pain, and nothing i do helps.

oh yeah, i went to the doctor today. i can start wearing a real tennis shoe again. no more boot. i will let you know when we have the ceremonial burning of the boot. no more bunions, no more boots, no more pain. now i need to start exercising.

what have you become?

i am still in a state of shock. my little turtles, no bigger that a silver dollar, killed the froglet. now, i feel horrible because i saw the warning signs. they ate some little guppies, but seriously, they're fish. i feed them turtle food. alex found 3 tadpoles in the pond and put them in the tank. one died within a few days. i now suspect the turtles may have been involved. i have no evidence, but it is a little fishy. anyway, the second tadpole and the recently departed tadpole grew and developed into froglets. basically they were frogs with tails. i looked over one day, while doing dishes, and the second tadpole was swimming around the tank...with a turtle attached to his back left ankle. i grabbed them both out of the tank...the turtle wouldn't let go. i tapped the turtle on the head...he still wouldn't let go. i tried to pull the leg (which was ripped open from the knee to the foot)...he still wouldn't let go, but i pulled the poor thing's leg from the turtle's mouth. i made alex let it go in the pond. now to tadpole #3. the last time i saw him alive, he was sitting on the turtles' log. i went down to check on the chicks, i was gone for about 20 minutes. i came upstairs to do some dishes, looked over at my sweet little turtles, and noticed something TORN UP on the bottom of the cage. not realizing what it was at first, i looked a little closer. NO FREAKIN' WAY. it was the little froglet. they were eating him. i feel so bad. i didn't get it out of there. but today, there is NOTHING LEFT. no joke. this made me think about all those people who swim in lakes, ponds, rivers, and streams. if turtles were bigger, we wouldn't be worrying about snakes, alligators, or even sharks. these little guys have proven what efficient killers turtles are. all this time i thought they were looking at me, and swimming to the edge of the tank to see me because they liked me, when all along it's been them waiting for me to make one wrong move!

have you ever thought about...

adopting a child from foster care? i have actually been thinking about this since alex was in preschool. he had a boy "andre" in his class. i was not exactly fond of this kid at first, he had a lot of social issues, like biting other kids, hitting etc. he never talked. adorable little boy, mixed race, gorgeous brown eyes, killer smile. and then one day he came up to me while i was holding haley (she was about a year), took her foot in his hand and said "shoe". he smiled so brilliantly, i couldn't help smiling back and telling him "yeah that's right". when i discussed this boy with the teachers, they explained to me he was in foster care, and didn't talk, like not just shy, but literally didn't know words. like he had never been talked to or something. after the day of the shoe, he always found me when i was up there and talked to me and haley. i could have easily taken him home then and there. but it wasn't to be. i actually went to a foster parent class, well the first one anyway. the man doing the instructing told me i needed to wait until our youngest child was older than the children i would be bringing in. his reasoning is that you want your child/children to be a role model of positive behavior, not this child being a role model of negative behavior. jeff was not keen on the adoption idea. not that he discouraged the idea, he just didn't want to have hypothetical discussions about something that would be so far off. when he started the job he has now, one of the guys was in the process of adopting a teen girl from russia. his immediate boss had just adopted 2 boys through the same church program. this totally changed his views. watching his friend go through all the work, traveling over there when they were having terrorist attacks, and then meeting this beautiful and bright girl, completely changed him. of course he was thinking about foreign adoption at the time, but there are so many kids here that need families. next time you are just wasting some time on the internet, go to www.adoptuskids.com . you can use them to look up kids from your own state, any particular state, or all the states. it breaks my heart. so many older kids wanting a family. i couldn't imagine not having a family, but to be a teenager with no one? please say some prayers for these kids, they need all the support we can give them.

have you seen this frog?

our african claw toed frog is missing. i couldn't tell you how long it has been gone, at least a month i think. he lived in the basement, or at least he moved down there. he is green, slimy, and has claws on his toes and fingers(?). if you see him or some frog matching his description, please let me know.
actually it isn't all bad that he disappeared, with him gone, i moved 4 baby chicks in his tank. they are really cute. 2 americanas and 2 little bantam chicks. the americanas are striped, one is like a gold and red/brown, the other is silver and black. grace and olivia (i watch her) picked out the bantams. grace liked the white one, and olivia picked the black one. they are soooo cute.
they are now living in the basement, next to the bearded dragons, and across the steps from the dog's crate. they seem to all be getting along well. the chicks are a little noisier than the last resident, but i think they will get better. i hope anyway, or jeff might try to evict them. did i mention that i forgot to discuss with jeff the chicks moving in? yeah, he was not exactly happy. i had to do some really unspeakable acts to get him to let them stay...please don't ask, i don't want to relive the trauma. no one should be forced to clean AND do the laundry. so now the chicks are allowed to stay another week.
i was actually worried about jeff's reaction. he came home about an hour late, and didn't call. turns out, one of the guys at work was outed for being a swinger. a friend of a guy new to the sales team, is also a swinger and he told the new guy all about him and his wife. now you would have to have seen the couple in question to really know why this is sooo gross. she looks like princess fiona from the shrek movies. not the cute princess, but the ogre fiona...well without the green skin. he is perfectly round, except for his large sharp nose. and weasel eyes. i know it is mean to say, but really, this is what they look like. they also have kids. the youngest is like 5. jeff has known about this for a while. apparently if you google some one's email address or a name they like to go by, you can get a lot of info about them. try it sometime. anyway, it has been a running joke since jeff started there almost 4 years ago. never a dull moment there.

they're here

my brother in law and alex, haley and 3 of their cousins went to get the chicks yesturday afternoon. 36 in all. 15 buff orpington (gold colored chicken with lots of fluffy feathers), 15 barred plymouth rock (black and white chicken...the kind you see on antiques with chicken motif), and 6 red rocks (not sure about these. heard they may not be the nicest chickens that's why they only got 6). now since they didn't get the kind i like, i am thinking i may go to the store and get a couple americanas (they lay colored eggs. i mean like blue, bluegreen, green) and maybe a couple of bantams (basically mini chickens. they are just smaller than the others, and are really pretty.). anyway, so far so good. alex will be going to my brother in law's house after school to see if there is anything for him to do. it will be a little tricky, with baseball and afterschool clubs, but i think he will surprise jeff. i really hope he does, otherwise i will be hearing "i told you so" for ever!
anyway, today is grace's last tball practice. games start next week. i am excited. why? i couldn't tell you. watching tball is like watching paint dry. this is why I picked the team. i picked all parents that i like. (the kids are ok too) paint is so much easier to watch when you have fun people around to watch it with. oh, i meant tball is so much easier to watch, sorry!
3 kids all playing sports. i never realized what a juggling act it was. especially if you have all 3 playing the same day at the same time at different places. luckily that is not me this year. but jeff and i were talking about how we will have all 5 kids playing baseball/softball at the same time in a couple of years. and again in soccer season all 5 will play at the same time again. i am sure i will be totally insane by then!

cluck cluck

yes, we are getting new "pets". alex has been working on the old chicken house for about a month. it had stacks of old tires taller than he is, old supplies, holes in the walls, and was needing new chicken wire. he has been over there everyday, after school, on the weekends. i don't think i have ever seen him this excited about anything. yesturday, jeff, nathan smith, my brother-in-law, and my father-in-law, helped the boys (and morgan and haley) finish up what needed to be done. today is the day they are getting the chickens. jeff is so not thrilled. all i have heard from him is "why on earth would he want those? they are smelly, nasty, disgusting". ok, maybe they are. when i was a kid i wanted chickens pretty bad. saved my money, drew up plans for a coop, even got magazines about chickens. my parents never got them for me. i know, i'm just doing this for the kids because it was something i wanted as a kid. it's true. i will admit it. but i didn't put the idea in their heads. they came up with it on their own. jeff's problem is the kids don't want the stuff he wanted as a kid. but he gets it for them anyway. then he complains because they don't take care of it/play with it. i can give you a few examples: a go-cart, airhockey table, foozball table, golden tee arcade game. these are just a few. these weren't cheap games, he spent way more money on this crap that they kids don't want, than was spent on getting the chicken house going. he brings up the dog we have to usually yell at the kids to take care of. i love the dog, but my kids didn't want a dog. my sister-in-law decided alex needed a dog at the ripe old age of 7. boys need dogs. did i mention she doesn't have any kids of her own? so how can i count this against the kids when they didn't ask for her. they didn't put any work into getting her. i guess that has been my litmus test for getting things for the kids. how much work did they put into getting it? has it proved they are committed to the responsibility? alex is going to be 11 in a couple of months. i think it is time to give him the benefit of the doubt. and if it doesn't work out, we go from there. but we have to give him the chance. i am not going to limit his possibilities at 11. he has been wanting to join 4H. i figured this would give him a chance to see how much work this may be. then we can go from there. with 4H, he can raise poultry, sheep, pigs, cows, whatever. if he is really wanting to do this, i am fine with it. jeff doesn't want the work. he had to do it as a kid. he didn't want to, he hated it. i wanted to, but wasn't given the chance.
it's amazing we ever got together. i have always been an animal person. he is definately not. (although he loved gimpy our cat. gimpy had something wrong with him. he couldn't walk right. when he tried to run he usually fell over or did a cartwheel. but he was a major fighter. he would be out there with 20 other cats at jeff's mom and dad's house, and fight them all off for a scrap of food. totally won my heart, then jeff's)
anyway, soon i will have chicken stories for you. i know how the bunny stories made everyone's day.

i miss having a baby around!

today was "mission carnival" day at school. basically, for a couple of hours, the kids play games (for prizes like candy) and try to win raffle baskets, you know fun stuff. all the money goes to whatever mission they are raising it for. i believe one year it went to a priest in africa for building schools, this year they are deciding between several different ones. the kids had a blast, haley won a cake at the cake walk. good time all around.
anyway, my friend jen was there with her little 6 week old girl meghan. i haven't seen her yet, and i couldn't believe how perfectly she fit in my arms. now you would think that after being pregnant 5 times and having 5 babies, i would be tired of kids. WRONG!! all of a sudden, i totally regret telling jeff it was ok for him to have a vasectomy. it is crazy to see so many of the moms at the kids school that didn't even start having kids until they were the age i am now. i would say a third of the parents in alex's class are old enough to be MY parents. in fact 2 of them have kids that are only a couple of years younger than i am. in haley's class, one of the dad's have 2 kids that are in their 30's!!
a little off the subject but bear with me, this reminds me of when alex was in kindergarten, one of the men at school (the janitor actually) said i looked very familiar, what was my family name etc. then asked what high school i went to. i said FZN, and one of the mom's overheard us, she asked what year i graduated. i said, " you don't want to know". she kept on asking said " we might know some of the same people". so finally i told her 1996. she answered "oh". one of the other mom's starts laughing, asking what year the other mom graduated. "1986, we don't know any of the same people". i can laugh about it now, but honestly, then i was so embarassed. i figured i would be one of the youngest mom's in alex's class, and haley's too. but i felt like i had tatooed "was pregnant in high school" on my forehead. it wouldn't be a big deal if the kids went to public school, but since they go to catholic school, i guess i was worried about people looking at me funny. i shouldn't have felt like that. i guess i was always one of those kids that felt like i was outside looking in.
ok i am getting a little depressing. i will try again later.

count down to first communion

saturday is the big day. haley's first communion. 40 people (give or take) in my house. luckily, that is just close family. thank goodness it is supposed to be beautiful that day. i don't really have much to do, well except clean the house. i have been working on that for about a week now. you know, with me being home all day, you would think it would be easy to keep the house clean. but with 3 kids home during the day, (not to mention any kids i watch being there too) and the 4 that come home from school, my house is constantly dirty.

rachel told me i should start this thing when i kept emailing her about the bunnies having bunnies. well, the bunnies are gone now. i guess now's as good a time as any. we are a bunny free home. i expect it to stay that way. jeff thinks we have too many pets as it is. like a dog, two bearded dragons, two baby turtles, and about 10 fish are too many pets. the baby turtles are the coolest pets though. when they see me in the kitchen, they swim to the glass and watch me, and try to get my attention. they even look at you when you talk to them! i know "what a freakin' geek". well i am rambling now. better get to the kids in the tub!