Counting the days to the Aurora Farmer's Fair

Driving home from Schmo's birthday party last night, our oldest and I were playing the alphabet game, where you name a category and come up with something in that category for every letter of the alphabet.  Our category was food, so we did apple, banana, cantaloupe, dragonfruit, eggplant, fennel (and on and on) and it just now occurred to me that we did eggplant and fennel instead of elephant ears and funnel cakes.  Clearly we need festival season to get here quickly!

Hungry, hungry hippos, er, umm, something funnier. I just don't have it today.

Wolfey is about the most impatient animal you've ever met.  When he needs outside he follows me around and whines until I open the door.  When he decides it's time to come inside, he stands at the back door and barks (not constantly, just every couple of seconds like he's rushing you along) until someone lets him in.  When he's hungry he grumbles (he seriously sounds like a grumpy old man) the whole time I'm making his food.  Man frequently tells Wolfey what a jerk he is being when he does these things and while I don't like the name calling, it's pretty much true, so I let it go.  Since we started giving Brady wet food he's started doing the same thing, though he meows instead of grumbles (by the way, we found THE BEST cat food).  Brady's food just has to be dumped into a bowl, but since it's refrigerated we have to let it warm up a bit, so even though his is the first I get out at feeding times, he is the last to be fed and he does NOT like having to wait!

As I was preparing the animals' food they both started in.  Man told Wolfey what a jerk he was being and I told Brady what a pain he was being and all the while Lolly was sitting patiently and the following ensued:

Man: "Good thing at least one of them is patient!"

Me: "There's no need for her to get worked up, she knows she'll eventually get some food."

Man: "Who would have guessed that out of the three, Lolly would ever be the good one?"

Me: "I meant she knows if we don't feed her she'll just go counter surfing!"

Man worked a half day today so he could go pick the girls up after school.  On their way back home we video chatted to say hi and let me know their plan for the evening, since I don't get off work until 8:00 tonight.  Man asked me if I had to do anything after work or if I would be straight home and our little one interrupted him, pointed at the camera and said in her best diva voice, "you better be home for cuddle time!"  I love the technology that allows us to communicate so easily and have those little moments, but even more, I love that the girls want me there and can't wait to get home and have even more special times!

Oh, and I spent the morning putting the finishing touches on several wedding things and now I've got subjects for several more "What I Like" posts.  This may not wait until Wednesday!

You'd think 3 weeks would be enough time to recover from having the girls for 3 weeks.

It's not.

And in two short days we'll have them again.  I miss them like crazy and can't wait to have their smiling faces and laughing voices filling the house again, but I also can't believe how these last three weeks flew by so quickly.  I'm still not back to myself after the weeks of our little one waking me in the middle of the night to help her potty, fighting with our oldest over makeup, clothes (did I ever mention that she has the immodesty of a toddler.  10-year-old body hanging out all over the place is NOT okay with me!) and anything else she could challenge me on and Wolfey and our middle child breaking my heart but I'm getting there.  I have high hopes that I will be back to blogging daily here shortly, but in the mean time I'm taking my New You to help me sleep better and my greens for energy and just plugging away!

M.I.A.

Ironically, when we have the girls and I have tons of silly/funny/interesting stories, I'm also too sleep deprived and brain dead to write.  I promise I'll be back to normal soon.

In the mean time, I did want to mention that one month from today, I'll walk down the aisle to my love, my future, the rest of my life.  I am truly a lucky woman.

Wolfey just choose or middle child over me. And now my heart is broken.

Calling all moms

And cosmetologists.  And wedding planners.  And anyone else who has an honest opinion on this one.

In many ways, our oldest is more mature than her age, but in so many others she's just a baby.  I think going through the divorce put her in a rough spot and she has sometimes been put in the position of being the other adult in one house or the other.  I have seen Man put responsibilities on her that I don't think she should have (little things like taking her sisters to the restroom when we go out to eat or being the one in charge while he works from home) and you can tell just from spending time with her that her mother has done the same, though even more so.  She is quite the mother hen to her sisters and doesn't call them by their names or "my sisters", but always calls them "the little girls" and gets upset if you remind her that she is little, too.

It's tough, because she's 10, so she's right at that age where she thinks she's big and she's well on her way, but she's still a child.  This is evidenced by the fact that she still needs tucked in every night, still wants me to brush her hair and still needs Man to make her plate and cut her meat at dinner.

So here's the deal: I'm battling our 10 year old on the makeup issue right now.  She wants to wear makeup for the wedding and I told her we could do a little.  Then her mom bought her clear mascara and she suddenly thinks that's an every day thing.  In fact, our middle child was going through the bag they took to the sitter's today (my awesome cousin has the girls today and was going to take them to the pool until the weather turned sour) and found a bag of makeup our oldest had packed, even though I've told her countless times she is not to take it places.  So now that the little bit of makeup I was going to allow for the wedding has become the norm, since her mom gave it to her without clearing it with Man or me.  This wouldn't be such an issue, except she thinks she has to do more than what she does every day for the wedding, so now she has decided she needs black mascara for the wedding.  Bear in mind, not only is she 10, but she's got red hair and a porcelain complexion.  Black mascara is going to make her look like a raccoon!

So today when we were duking it out in the car on the way to our dress fitting before I had to be at work, I got to thinking about what I did when I was 10.  And unfortunately, I'm pretty sure I had the clear mascara back then.  The difference was, BBS is 3 years older than me, so I pretty much got things when she did, so I was ahead of the curve, while our oldest is (obviously) the oldest and I am so NOT ready for the other 2 to be wearing ANY makeup!  So here's where I need help: do Man and I make her put the clear mascara away somewhere when she's here so it will be a special thing for the wedding or allow the clear mascara as a daily thing and then allow more for the wedding?  And if we go that route, just how far do I let her push it for the wedding?  I KNOW I'm not going to let her do black mascara, but does anyone have any other suggestions?  Help!

Shower report

The shower was awesome! :)  Of course I knew BBS and my aunts weren't going to torture me too much, but it was really a great day.  My foster friend came over to do my hair and we were almost done when Man got home with the girls.  We finished up real quick and ran out the door.  The girls immediately gravitated toward Princess and Miss Thing while I made my way around visiting everyone and when it was time for gifts, all the little girls (our three, Princess and my cousin's two little girls) swarmed around me and "helped" me.  They brought me presents, unwrapped things, held things up for people to see, wandered off with gifts (especially the really cool stuff I really wanted!) and photo bombed just about every picture.  It was crazy, chaotic and wonderful!  There was one time when I had to ask the girls to back off just a little because I was starting to feel claustrophobic with them all so close but there was another time when I said to my aunt "I certainly feel loved today" and our oldest piped up with "we love you every day!" and that made all the squishiness totally worth it!  I am so lucky to love such amazing women who want to throw a shower for me, more awesome women who want to attend said shower and a bunch of crazy girls who steal the show and make it such a great experience for me!

Many animals + hot summer = lots of water

We tried switching over to the big water dispenser but after two days Wolfey is still scared of it so I finally put his water dish back down. Goofy dog gets all freaked out if I even put my hand in the dispenser water while he's taking a drink.

I love the way she sleeps

Puppy risotto

Wolfey still has some icky tummy going on so its rice with just enough meat to get him to eat it for my poor pup tonight. I sure hope he feels better in the morning!

Damn dogs

And this morning Man woke me up around 5am to tell me one of the dogs had just thrown up. I put them outside (and if course couldn't put them on the tie out since Man mowed yesterday and forgot to hook it back up) and got to cleaning. Since I had to wait for the dogs to come back anyway I changed over the laundry. The dogs finally came back but I couldn't get back to sleep. Man says they're conspiring against me but I think they're just trying to help new use my time in a more productive way. It could be the lack of sleep talking.