As a child I hated to be sick. I hated to admit I was sick. I would try everything to hide that I was not feeling well. My mother is smart though and always knew when I was not feeling well. She would call me out on it and I would be so angry/sad that I had been found out. I still do it today. I don't know why I have such a hard time admitting that I might have caught a sick bug. A few years back I went months knowing that I had a hernia, but didn't go to the doctor to have them confirm this. I did eventually go and had to have surgery. I guess I think that if I ignore feelings of sickness/pain then whatever I may have will just go away. Sometimes I think this works, but sometimes it doesn't and I have to admit defeat.

It seems I have passes this "trait" onto Maxwell. He awoke this morning obviously not feeling well. When I asked him if he was feeling ok he would answer with "I'm fine". Eventually though he admitted (after crying for over an hour) that he had a soar throat and tummy. After getting a confirmation from the good old thermometer that he has a fever, he was tucked into the couch and will remain there for the day. When I check on him he quietly says, "I feel good", but he's not fooling anyone. This boy is sick...I just hope he gets over it by Monday so he can enjoy his birthday.

I don't want to blog today.
Really I don't.
R.C. leaves early tomorrow morning for NYC until late Saturday night. (for class) Ugh.
We are going to a show opening tonight and maybe stick around for some "open studios". Maybe not.
I'm tired.
Not one day this week have I been able to stay awake to greet R.C. in the evening (early morning) when we gets home. Oops.
My "baby boy" turns 4 in 4 days. Sigh. (Double sigh!!)
I'm determined to not miss a day. Yes, this counts.

This week we are studying Egypt. The boys love it, mainly because we talk about taking organs out of bodies and wrapping mummies. We have studied hieroglyphics, Cairo, and the Nile. Pharaohs and pyramids are the favorite topic though. After our lessons yesterday I asked Russell to build a pyramid out of Legos. He did an awesome job! This pyramid not only looks great, but inside there is a "pharaoh" and gold coins for his afterlife. This base was picked specifically because the Nile is running through it.
Since the taking of this picture another pyramid was added to the other side of the Nile. Both boys think we need to take a field trip to Egypt to see the pyramids and the Great Sphinx.

When I was in grade school there were several boys in my class who would read Goosebumps books. I never liked them. In fact, I hated them. I hated them so much that even in grade school I told myself that when I had kids (someday) they would never read these horrible books. I loved to read as a child (and still do) and hoped that my kids would loathe these books as much as I did and instead begin reading on Emerson, Steinbeck, and Shakespeare (only kidding! Stan and Jane Bernstein would do (and has done) just fine.).

Well, things have changed. Yesterday Russell was eying the Goosebumps section at the library and I found myself telling him that he could get one. WHAT!? He was so excited! He carried it home and immediately planted himself on the couch and began reading it to Max.

There is nothing better than seeing your 2 kids cuddled under a blanket enjoying a book together. Whether that book is by Tolstoy, Bernstein, or R.L. Stine, reading anything is better than watching mindless T.V., in my book. But, that's just me...

Yesterday afternoon I told Maxwell that I thought he looked nice. He picked out his own clothes and actually matched, didn't have on sweatpants, and didn't have 5 layers of t-shirts on, so I thought a compliment would do him some good.

"I've looked better other days."

That's the response I got from him. I guess he felt he could have done better.

It's nice having a husband who can fix anything.

A few weeks ago I was driving around doing some errands when I hit something. I have no idea what it was that I hit. I didn't see anything in the road, but whatever it was put a hole in the side of my car. Not a huge hole and not horribly noticeable, but it is a hole none the less and it also tore off some molding on the side of the door. R.C. told me it looks like I was in a battle on the high seas and a canon ball hit the side of the car. Luckily there was no damage to the car other than this cosmetic blemish. Performance wise it is still driving like a great little car with 100,000+ miles on it.

But, as I said, my husband can fix anything. Today he was kind enough to do his work from home so that he can take periodic breaks to go outside and "Bondo" and "Epoxy" our car back to it's beautiful self.

The bathroom door was also a big fix that R.C. completed recently. I'm usually not one to close doors in the house unless it is to keep smoke, due to cooking, from reaching the smoke detectors; but now I like to close the bathroom door just because it closes so nicely.

Thank R.C.

(I'm really running low on blog-able material)

We took advantage of "free day" at the zoo today. It was a beautiful autumn morning and most of the animals were still out for viewing, but some had already been moved for the winter months.

It was a good zoo. They had all the normal zoo animals, zebras, elephants, monkeys, etc. They also had "the farmyard". Many zoos have areas like this where they have cows, sheep, pigs, donkeys, etc. on display. I always thought they were kind of funny. Coming from a farming community I saw cows, sheep, pigs, etc. everyday. I assumed the rest of the world knew what these animals were and knew that they really were not that interesting. Why would people go to a zoo with exotic animals all around them and choose to stare at a beef cow instead? Today as we walked into "the farmyard" I thought I had figured it out. It made me feel at home. For ten minutes I felt like I was back in Wisconsin looking at John and Carrie's cows. I was just waiting for the puppy to run up behind me and start biting my pant legs and freaking the boys out. People like me who sometimes miss the smell of cows can be comforted for just a few minutes. How nice of the zoo people to think of others and want to comfort them in this way. That's what this area was made for, right?

Wrong. I was so very very wrong. They have these "farmland" areas in zoos because people really are clueless about simple, everyday farm animals. As we were standing at a fence looking at a pig, a woman came and stood beside us. She had a question she wanted answered and it went a little something like this:

"Is that a rabbit?"

REALLY lady (A grown woman in her 40's, and very serious. This was not a joke to her)? You are staring at an animal with a snout, curly tail, and covered in mud and you think it is a rabbit? The farmland area is important for people like this. I never realized that some people don't know what a pig is. Obviously she also does not know what a rabbit looks like. Maybe she doesn't know what a squirrel or a dog looks like either. What is this world coming to??

I'm trying to be more tolerant of Christmas before Thanksgiving this year. I am not accepting it, but I am trying my hardest to tolerate it. I've already seen a Christmas countdown, listened to my lovely husband hum Christmas carols, watched a family purchase a tree, heard a Christmas song on the radio and listened as people talked about the "Black Friday" deals that were going to be in stores this year. Christmas items have been in stores since September. Yes, September. As I was looking for school supplies the boys were ogling candy canes and stockings. I think the fact that I made it to November 6th without writing a huge rant about it is a good sign that I am tolerating it just fine.

I promise you this though...if I get Merry Christmas-ed before November 27th, I'm going to lose it. I'm hanging on by a thread as it is and that would push me over the edge.

My boys have put on some serious muscle mass in the last few days.

I can still pin them on the floor though. Even muscular Spiderman can't get away from fingers that know just were all the tickle spots are.

Today was an uneventful day.

• We went to the gym.

• The boys and I did lessons. Max is working on penmanship and can write letters A-G (capital and lower case) very nicely. Russell is plugging away at 1st grade. He is reading at a 3rd grade level and blows my mind with how well he reads.

• I got the boys snow pants and spent a whopping $5.50 total. On two pairs! That is a fraction of what 1 pair would normally cost. Now we just need snow.

• The boys and I spent 3 hours at the park today with some good friends, and made some new ones while we were at it.

• We had a delicious supper of roasted chicken and beet/goat cheese salad. If I had to choose one dish to eat for the rest of my life it would be beets and goat cheese. Hands down the best food combination I have ever had.
  

• R.C. has been working busily in his studio all day, and had an appointment with the eye doctor. His eyes have improved in the last year. (That is how uneventful our day was...things like this get a bullet on the list.)
  

• It is now 9:00 pm and I am just finishing a cup of coffee. Nice.
  

What would you do if you were at the gym, minding your own business, working out to your own music, when you notice a seemingly "crazy gym person" right beside you?

You all know the type. Flailing arms. Crazy "I'm going to beat my best time" smile. Feet moving so fast they are a blur and you are just waiting for them to trip. Eyes bulging and nostrils flaring as they concentrate as hard as they can so as not to fall. After this wild spectacle that you just witness, you watch as this person gets off the machine and casually looks around and does a little stretch as if there was nothing to see there. They then pretend to not be winded (which we all know is a lie) as they walk to get a towel to wipe down the machine.

You try not to stare. You try not to snicker. It's hard though because these people put on such a show.

What would you do if you knew all along that this "crazy gym person" was your husband on the machine right beside you?

You do what any loving, supportive wife would do and you laugh. You laugh until you almost fall off your machine. I am so happy that R.C. goes to the gym with me now and I hope that there are many more days of him trying to beat his personal best. These days are great for him because he feels "tough" and "fit", and these are great days for me because I get my fill of laughter in before I hit the showers.

Guess what this month is?
National blog posting month! That's right, for the month of November bloggers are encouraged to blog a little something each and everyday. Some days will be full of great information, other days you might need to listen to me ramble about absolutely nothing (there may be more of these days than you would like). Nonetheless I am determined to make it through the entire month, even though I am off to a bad start with missing the first day.
So, lets get started....
Last weekend my mom and dad came from Wisconsin for a visit. We had a beautiful weekend and kept quite busy. Here's a run down of what we did:

• I took mom and dad and the boys to Mystic Seaport on Friday. R.C. had to teach so he was unable to join us. We spent the day in the fresh air exploring boats and all the other shipping history. We have been there at least 6 times now, but each time we find something new to explore and always have a great time.
• Friday night mom and dad stayed with the boys and R.C. and I went out for supper and coffee. We had a great time out and the boys still have not stopped talking about the fun they had that night with Grandpa and Grandma.
  
• Saturday we spent a few hours roaming the RISD art museum, and gorging on free pickles at a little sandwich place.
  
• After lunch we walked down to R.C.'s studio so mom and dad could see his new space. They were very surprised with what they found. That's all I can say here. R.C. will reveal his latest piece to everyone in his own time.
• Mom, dad and I took the boys to a Halloween party at the park later that afternoon. The boys had a great time decorating trick or treat bags, playing some games, and listening to a band play music. They were most interested in seeing their friends dressed up also and getting to play at the park.
• Later that evening the boys got to go trick or treating. Max knew exactly what he wanted (candy) and he was not going to let scary decorations slow him down. He marched right up to each door and yelled trick or treat and took seconds and thirds from some of the treat bowls, while Russell was timid and hung back if there was something he found scary near the door.
  
• We ended the night with WaterFire downtown. It was a beautiful night and very few people were out for WaterFire so we had no trouble finding a place to sit for awhile or a standing place to watch the origami man. We walked from the very last brazier almost to the first and were looking forward to a good nights sleep.
  
• Sunday morning we had to head to the airport and say goodbye. I set alarm clocks the night before, but for some reason (I have since figured out the problem, but will keep it a secret since it was a very very stupid mistake on my part.) none of the alarms went off. Luckily, Russell truly is a human alarm clock. We were wanting to wake up at 6:30 am, and at 6:34 Russell climbed down from his bed and made just enough noise to wake me (I was sleeping on his floor) and realize that we had almost slept in. Russell saved the day! :)

Helping Grandma put the finishing touches on a Halloween costume.

Nate the Great (a detective from children's books. Although everyone thought he was Sherlock Holmes. At least they knew he was a detective.) and a skeleton who didn't want to wear his mask the right way.

One more thing for the evening. You know, while I have you here and all....

If you have the "Wild and Scenic Illinois 2009" calendar, then rest assured that you were not the only person thinking they got to sleep an hour extra this morning.

Yes, that's right, there is a typo (or something) on the calendar and we were told, by said calendar, that this was the weekend we were to turn our clocks back an hour. We had been looking forward to this day for the past week. Who doesn't love an extra hour sleep? The joke was on us I guess when we woke to find the rest of the world doing what they do at 9:30 am, when we were doing 8:30 am stuff. Things just weren't adding up for my dear husband, so he googled the time change and found we had been let down by our beautiful Illinois calendar. One more week to go until we are rewarded with our extra hour of sleep.

Illinois is scenic. I get that. But wild? When I think of wild I think of a lion prowling across the savanna. Not a muskrat slinking into Bond County Lake.

(Say hello to a super long blog that I really should have condensed into a few paragraphs, but didn't want to. Bear with me folks, or just skip to the pictures...I'll never know.)

Saturday we took the bus to NYC for another fun filled day. All week we had been watching the weather and kept hoping that the rain that was predicted would magically disappear before it hit the East coast. Unfortunately, we went to sleep Friday night knowing that there was a 100% chance of heavy rain and thunderstorms for the next day.

After a bus ride, that Max slept through and Russell talked through, we were dropped off at The Met (The Metropolitan Museum of Art). As we stepped off the bus into the drizzling rain, I had one moment of "ugh! This is going to be a crummy day." That thought lasted about 5 minutes and 5 minutes only. As we stood waiting in line to get into the museum, I looked at Max with ketchup covering his face as he enjoyed a hot dog from a street vendor and I realized that rain was not going to slow us down. He was unfazed by the drops of water falling from the sky, landing on his bun and making it soggy. He was enjoying his time in NYC already, and nothing was going to keep us from having a great time.

We spent a few hours in The Met admiring the art work. The boys had been given an assignment (Yes, there was schooling involved. Not all fun and games.) to complete during out time at the museum. They were to pick out 5 pieces that they enjoyed, draw it, write who it was by and the title, and then do research on them come Monday morning. Luckily we had an excellent tour guide (aka, RC) who also gave the boys a fantastic lesson on colors, shapes, perspective, etc..

(I could not use a flash, so these are a bit blurry.)

If you look at the pictures you will notice that Max really took his drawing seriously. He was always drawing and seemed so studious. When we were getting ready to leave the museum and I took a look at their sketch books I noticed that Max had been drawing bits and pieces of things he saw, and then drew a circle around everything and put arms and legs on the circle. He then wrote his name on each drawing several times to make sure we knew who it was by. Maybe someday it too will be in The Met...

Both boys LOVED the arms and armor wing of the museum. They bounced from exhibit to exhibit pretending they were knights using the swords and armor they saw.
We then took a walk down the street to see The Guggenheim. The line was out the door, around the corner and down the street, so we admired the building from the outside and then headed to the subway to catch a train to the Brooklyn Bridge. The bridge was definitely the highlight of the day. It was drizzling, then clear, then pouring, then drizzling, then pouring, and we were all DRENCHED by the time we made it across, but we had a great time. We stopped to watch cars whizzing below us, we were able to make out the Empire State Building when there was a break in the fog, and we were also able to see The Statue of Liberty in the distance. We quoted The Newsies movie and stopped for Maxwell to take our picture, which he had been wanting to do all day. He did a good job...
By the time we got to the Brooklyn side we were soaked and needed something to eat other than granola bars, nuts and dried fruit I had stashed in my purse (makes us sound like squirrels). We walked a bit in Brooklyn and tried to imagine ourselves living there. Some of us could picture this more clearly than others. We went back down to the subway were it was warm and dry and took the train back to the Manhattan side to grab a bite to eat. We ended up roaming the streets looking for something to eat that was not a chain restaurant and close to where our bus was to pick us up. We found a little shop, got some sandwiches to share and enjoyed a break from walking.

This video was taken by R.C. when I stopped with the boys to play a "guess what color car is coming next" game. The rain had let up for a few moments and you could see the skyline of the city pretty well.

By the time we were ready to head to the street our bus was to pick us up at, it was just barely raining. We grabbed a cup of coffee for the ride home and tried to figure out where in the world our bus was. As we were standing around waiting, a man walked up to Max and handed him a balloon, smiled and walked away. Later, as we were still standing there waiting, he walked by again, patted Max's head and expressed his joy in seeing he still had the balloon. R.C. and I were certain he was trying to impress the beautiful lady he had with him. Finally our bus came, and just in time. As we were waiting outside it began to thunder and lightning and we were not on the bus 5 minutes before it began to pour and really storm. Max was asleep along with R.C. before we left the city and Russell and I played the alphabet game. We got all the way to Y and then Russell got quiet. I thought he was asleep so I didn't say anything, but then he turned to me and said, "how about we tell people we got all the way through the alphabet, and just forget about Z." No sooner had I told him that we didn't have to lie, but we could be done playing, and he was zonked out on my lap. (R.C. did wake up shortly after he fell asleep. He did not sleep the entire way. If I don't mention that, I will not hear the end of it...:) ) The ride home was long and stormy. It took almost 5 hours due to the storm!

The boys did wonderful! I was so proud of them for walking so long and not complaining. Many kids would have wanted to be carried, but the boys were troopers and kept up with the hustle and bustle. Max would get bumped periodically while walking and we tried to instruct him (as all good parents would do, right?!) to yell out, "I'm trying to walk down here!" in an annoyed voice, but sweet Max would not do it. Good for him.

Random/pointless things I noticed, or thought of, during our trip:

1. I actually uttered the words, "Hey, R.C., did you notice how good that subway car smelled?" 98% of subways smell like pee (Sorry! I know! But it's true!), but for some reason on one of our subway rides we had a car that smelled like butterscotch. Yummy!
2. Scary, gangster looking people don't look so scary when they are using an umbrella to stay dry just like me. They may be tough, but they hate to be wet and soggy like the rest of us. It really knocks them down a notch or two.
3. On the ride to NYC there was a guy on our bus who had his hair "nicely" styled. It was flat all around, except for right in front. He had a patch of hair that he had spiked straight up. I wondered what he was going to look like when he got on the bus to come home after being in the rain like everyone else, but to my surprise he sat in front of me with his hair still standing tall. I don't know how he did it! Everyone else looked like they had a bucket of water dumped over them. This guy really knows what he is doing in the hair styling department.
4. Art students don't go to NYC to see art. They go to shop for clothes at stores that we have in the mall a mere 4 blocks from the school. (This was a bus charted by RISD so all passengers were students. That's how I know they were all art students)
5. I have gotten to be quite good at ignoring people yelling things in the streets, homeless people asking for money, and vulgar things happening around me when I am out and about. I did find it hard to look away when I noticed a man licking (yes, licking!) a bus stop wall though. I guess I am still a work in progress when it comes to gawking.
6. I'm not old, but I sure felt like I was when I listened to conversations being had around me on the bus. Was I really like these kids when I was 18-22 years old? Surely not, right!?? :)
7. All kids should be done with strollers before or by the age of 5. We passed a kid just chillin' in a stroller while his mom (poor thing!) pushed him and he looked to be about 5-6 years old. (I know some kids have health issues and need to be in a stroller/wheelchair. I'm not trying to be rude or insensitive to these kids. Stop writing your hate mail now, please.) It's strange to see a kid pass you in a stroller and give you the "I'm lazy and don't want to walk, you got a problem with that" look. I will quote R.C. and ask, "how old is too old?"
8. I have a super awesome little family!

I knew things would change once Russell turned 7. I was prepared for him to mature a bit more over the course of the year, but things seem to have moved in fast forward.

He hates to wash his own hair...I sure hope he can learn to shave his own face. I'm not ready to teach that yet, or ever.

Happy birthday Russell!

This is a little slide show I put together for Russell (and all of you).
Some pictures you have already seen on the blog, some may be new to you.
The song playing is one of Russell's favorite songs.
Enjoy!

Last weekend we wanted to get out of the house so we took a trip to......Bass Pro Shop. I never would have thought I would say that this was out big weekend outing, but there, I said it. We took the trip to look at their aquarium, animals, and hiking trails. The boys had a great time feeding rainbow trout, practicing their rifle shooting (no sure shot in this family!), looking at taxidermy, and looking through aisles of camping gear. After seeing all there was to see inside, we headed outside to walk through the Ocean Spray cranberry bogs. We enjoyed the fresh air, beautiful trees, and a massive acorn fight.

Russell's camo shirt was no accident. He wanted to fit in....

Throughout the bogs they had animal statues which were great for climbing on.
Max found a good spot to hold, but then realized he didn't like his position.

Recently I read an article about blogging. To sum it up: Women (particularly mothers) read other blogs and believe that other families are "perfect". No fighting kids, no tantrums, perfect marriage, always clean house, etc.. It told how unhealthy it is for women/mothers to think this way because, come on, no family is "perfect". But, when they read other family blogs they begin to feel they are failing because their family is not "perfect" like these others seem to be.

I'm sure no one thinks that my family is "perfect", but just to make sure, I wanted to share with you a few reasons why we are far from "perfect".

1. Our good ol' family rules sheet is smudged and wrinkled due to little boys crying on it while standing in time out so often.
2. Some nights the boys are in bed by 7:15 pm because I just need the day to be over.
3. I try to make everything from scratch, but I still have fish sticks and french fries in the freezer for when I just don't want to cook.
4. I do laundry on Monday. I fold it on Monday night. It usually doesn't get put away until Thursday...or the next Monday when I need the laundry basket to carry the dirty clothes downstairs.
5. Many family outings don't happen. People (I'm not naming names here...) get cranky so we turn the car around and go home.
6. School is a chore some days. Russell is good about doing work most of the time, but there are days when he cries and whines about every little assignment I give him. These are the days when I want to cry and whine too.
7. R.C. and I have a very happy marriage, but there are times when we argue and don't speak for days. There are days I am thankful he has a studio to go to. :)
8. I have told the boys we are going on a nature walk to find leaves, mushrooms, nuts, insects...but my main goal is to get to the pharmacy up the street to get a diet coke.
9. Max has rule #3 on our rules sheet memorized because he has been in timeout so many times for breaking the rule. ("Do what you are told the first time you are told.")
10. Russell is sometimes up for an hour before anyone else stirs in the morning, and I'm ok with that. He is the only morning person in this household.
11. I have thrown toys away in anger because they we being fought over/not picked up.

The list could go on and on.

You see, those things would not be fun to read about. But, even though we are not a perfect family, we are happy, have fun together, and love each other. I don't compare my family to others, so I hope others don't compare themselves to us. We are far from "perfect" and loving every minute of it!

Someday, this little fellow is going to have a girlfriend....
And he will regret posing for pictures this way...

Last week nothing exciting happened. I really shouldn't even be blogging now because there is nothing to blog about. We had a very uneventful week of school and living, which is not always bad. The boys are doing great in school. Russell has not been thrilled with the fact that I give him homework to do on his own after we are done with our lessons, while Max longs to find an extra worksheet hanging on the fridge with his name on it. R.C. is working working working. It's been hard getting used to having him gone a lot again. It is hard to believe that in 8 months he will graduate and we could be moving again.

Russell lost his 4th tooth. Once again, I am very thankful to see his new tooth coming in already because it's weird to look at your kid and see a toothless gap in their mouth.

Hopefully something blog worthy will happen this next week. If not, well, we have a birthday coming up, another trip to NYC planned, and my mom and dad are coming at the end of the month. Surely there will be something to write about then.