Nemo has arrived

Well, we began swim lessons last week. Max, of course, is part fish. If he could sport gills, he would. Most of what follows below refers to Davis and the twins because it was too funny not to share. Here is a summary of the first week.

Monday-The first day of swim lessons. Being the great mom that I am, I don't tell Davis what is going on. He has on his swimsuit but has no clue. This was a smooth move on my part because we just showed up and then he figured it out on our own. We get the kids on the steps and bolt. We drive to Marshalls and look out towards Martinez and the sky is black so we keep on driving back to swim lessons. Total time in the pool was about 15 minutes. Bummer.

Tuesday-The first FULL day of swim lessons and not a cloud in the sky. On the way there, Davis starts with the stall tactics. My tummy hurts, I think I am going to throw up, etc. I am on to this kid. He and the girls start to whimper. Miss Teresa's rule is that if you are crying it is your turn. They ALL got alot of turns. Mom and I left and returned at the end of the lesson.

Wednesday-Day two...All kinds of drama that began the second he woke up. "I don't want to go to swimming. I think I am going to drown" and the like. We had sobbing tears and whining all the way to the lessons. The girls also added to the drama and Madison even ran for the gate.

Thursday-AKA hell day...Screaming, tears and every excuse in the book starting in the morning. Davis told me that he wasn't going. Yeah, right. As if I am going to let him have his way given what my occupation is!! I strapped him in the car and dragged him to the pool and got out of there as fast as I could.

Before we left, Megan started to negotiate with Teresa..."It's Davis' turn". Davis looked at her like he could shove her under and pronto. Madison kept crying and got 3 turns in a row. Davis figured out that if he kept his mouth shut, he would never have a turn. After all, if you are crying, it must be your turn. If you are mute, it will never be your turn. Yep, this is my kid!! I am so proud. At the end of the lesson, he told me that he wanted to stay. Do what?????

Friday-Hallelujah day. Davis got up asking when we were going to swimming and that he was going to jump off the side all by himself. Who is this kid?? He talked about swimming all day. He voluntarily got in the car. Again, who is this kid?? Nemo has entered the pool. He holds his breath, he kicks and swims and ASKS to do it AGAIN. He jumps off the side of the pool with a smile. Go figure!

Not wanting this to be a fluke, we went to the pool Saturday morning. Again, Nemo. The child swam until his little 35-lb body could do no more. He even jumped in the pool when we weren't looking. This, of course, scared the hell out of me. He loves swimming after 4 full days of lessons. Just like Marlin, I am proud of my Nemo.

Wastin' away...

Well, not really. I am certainly not wasting away by any means BUT the concoction maker has arrived.

I do have to say that QVC is pretty awesome. I ordered the MFCM last Friday and it arrived Tuesday afternoon. I was very excited about its arrival as was Michael.

It was very easy to assemble and came with a salt rimmer, recipe book and a shot glass.

After the assembly, we realized that our concoction materials were quite inadequate and old. I mean, we have little bitty liquor bottles that we bought when we went on our cruise for our 1st anniversary....over a DECADE ago!! We had a full bottle of Kahlua that had never been opened that we don't even know how long we had it. We obviously do not use spirits often. Perhaps we should.....there's a thought!!

Anyway...this led Michael to make a trip to the local liquor store. Upon his return, we now have the materials (so many that they were packed in a wine box WITH dividers) to become raging alcoholics. Seventy-five dollars later and we have margarita mix, strawberry daiquiri mix, banana (ew, gross) daiquiri mix, hurricane mix (I have no clue what this is), lime juice, orange juice, rum and tequila. Can you say party??? Well, we can and will!!

We did the inaugural blending using the Margaritaville recipe for the perfect margarita. This consists of tequila, Margaritaville mix, lime juice, and orange juice.

Here are the results. (Please note that we used the one glass setting to do individual servings so that we wouldn't have to crawl up the stairs.)
Round one was a litte watery. Round two was perfect with just the right amount of shaved ice and liquids. Michael decided to let his manliness down for round three and made some kind of strawberry-banana drink. Yucko for me but he enjoyed it.

Today, we were able to rise with no problems. We were whimps with the levels since this was our first time using the machine.

I went to Target this morning during VBS and purchased snow cone materials. The kids had them after lunch and loved it. I used the remaining ice and shaved it into a big glass and poured diet coke over it. It made a fabulous slush.

Overall, I LOVE the MFCM and would recommend its purchase. I guess after we perfect the concoctions, there will be "a woman to blame" and that, would be ME!!

Updates to previous blogs

Here they go...

I did the Wii fit body test and guess what??? I ROCK!!! I am now 33 in my wii fit age. This is much better than the 45 I initially received. Of course, my mii character is still "curvy" or as Davis puts it so delicately..."Momma...your mii is fat." Nice. Just when you feel like you've done something good, your 4 year old bursts your bubble. And I got stretch marks because of this kid. Not fair!

VBS is a hit. At the moment, Davis can barely hold his head up and asked when nap time was. Cool. Max, of course, is already gearing up for the whining session of "Do I have to take a nap, too??" Um....YES!!

Swim lessons start this afternoon and they are very excited. Davis doesn't have a clue about what is going to happen. I plan to run out of there like the place is on fire so I don't have to listen to the screams. Max is delighted to see Teresa again since he has already endured initial swim lessons.

The Margaritaville Concoction Maker has been shipped. YEAH!!! This thing better be awesome or I am really going to use ALOT of inappropriate vocabulary.

Have a fabulous day. Later!

Margaritaville...here I come!

I just broke down and purchased the Margaritaville Frozen Concoction Maker. I refused to pay the full retail price locally (299...ouch!) but QVC had it on sale yesterday on easy pay. In true "Marcy" (my mom) fashion, I ordered it online.

Of course, if you know my mother, she wouldn't have ordered it online by herself. She would have driven over here despite the gas prices and the fact that they own a computer to make me do it. It is kinda like the times she "drops by" to take me to the store with her and all of the sudden needs gas. Would you mind, I am almost on empty??? I can here her now. I end up pumping her gas.


Anyway, I am too excited for its arrival. If you visit www.margaritavillecargo.com, you can see all the cool things this maker does. Margaritas,smoothies, snow cones and the like. I used the snow cone angle to get Michael to agree to its purchase. It's for the kids.....yeah, right!

It was meant to buy because I was at Target yesterday and guess what they had on sale??? Margarita glasses!! Yep, and they were plastic and in bright red and green. This will keep my friends who imbibe too much...and you know who you are...from disrespecting the maker.

It should arrive in a week. Just in time for the 4th. I will keep you posted on its progress. Until then, I will have to use my blender or make a trip up the road to Mi Rancho.

Throwing them under the bus...

All I have to say is that Monkey Joe's rocks. If you have never been, it is a huge room filled with various inflatable jumping things for kids. My boys and the twins (my nieces) played for about 3 hours. Considering that you pay 7.99 a head, we were getting our money's worth. When it was time to leave, there were no complaints!! As soon as I can figure out how to load pictures on this thing, I will have exhibits to this effect.

Of course, you cannot leave Harley hell well enough alone. So, being the mean parents that we are, we took our kids on a sunset boat ride. By the time the sun went down, they were dead on their feet.

Bedtime was later that usual but resulted in wake up times around 9:30. Awesome. As far as sleep goes for me, this is the best summer. Ever.

Wii fit

For Mother's Day I asked for the Wii fit. I made Michael go to Walmart at 7:30 one morning to purchase it. Little did I know that it would tell me that my BMI was overweight (duh...like I didn't know that one), I was unbalanced AND my Wii fit age was 45. Ninety bucks to make me depressed...Sweet.

All in all, it is a cool game. My kids love it and you actually work up a sweat without meaning too. I am getting better at the balance games but I am still overweight and older. That part sucks. In addition, the game will scold you if you have been gone too long. I am not too concerned about this but Max is adamant that we do it every day. My rule following child will pester you into caving in. I do it just so he will stop talking to me about it. If you know Max, he can talk a dead person alive.

Davis tries to do the activities but he is 4, skinny and uncoordinated so I end up having to help him. He loves the basic run. I, of course, do not run. I have ZERO attempts on this game!!

More updates to follow...

Here it goes...

Okay, I have now decided to get with the year 2008 and start a page. I mean, if my sister Catherine, with no high school education can do it, so can I. My sister Melissa has one on myspace. Then, Amanda Chack sent me a link to hers and Denise Pressley has one and I was feeling a bit left out. So, here I am.

Today is a lazy, hot summer day. The boys are up and arguing. It is a typical morning. Mornings like this are reason enough to keep my job. How many weeks of vacation remain???

Next week (thank goodness) is Vacation Bible School at Wesley United Methodist Church. I do feel a wee bit guilty about not helping out with VBS but there are plenty of parents who help out who do not work with kids for 205 days a year.

In addition to VBS, we start swim lessons with Miss Teresa. She is the swim lesson guru and I am looking forward to early bedtimes for 10 straight days.

I am hopeful that I can keep this up and not turn into a blog slacker. If anything, I can use this for venting when my kids drive me crazy which at the present moment is about to send me over the edge.

More whining....I have 2 kids because........