We like to move it move it

So I've been a little busy lately, I guess. Doing stuff. And junk. And other stuff. Oh, and buying a house. And stuff.

Jessie and I decided to bite the bullet and become indebted for the rest of our lives, in the hopes that a) someday we won't have to pay rent and b) no one will yell at us if we stick nails into our walls wherever we want them. We're buying a townhouse in Lehi. That is, we're buying it if everything goes through alright and it doesn't burn down and we don't blow our down payment money on a trip to Sweden to stay in the ice hotel. This is all very exciting and stuff. But it means we're very very very busy. Doing things like cleaning the apartment top to bottom every day for potential renters. And getting tax returns and pay stubs and bank account information from the last 73 years. And trying to find boxes that are cheap/free. Because seriously, why does one large moving box cost five freaking dollars? At WALMART, of all places? My go to store that always gives me cheap, flimsy products for, well, cheap? I'm disheartened. Luckily, WalMart doesn't know we have hired Jessie's brother (who works in their produce department) to steal their used fruit boxes and we're not paying a cent.

I know, you're all very excited, but hold your applause. Sometime in the range of the next 2 days to 2 months I'll post some pictures and give you details on how amazingly awesome my new house is and which of its features Madeline has permanently stained with strawberries and/or juice and/or crayon. But first I have to pack. So don't count on hearing my witty little expositions on my life too often the next little while. I shall miss you. And probably procrastinate packing in favor of telling you twice a week how much fun packing is. Until then.

I don't see the family resemblance.

So yesterday I was watching a couple of my sister-in-law's kids while she was at Lagoon. One of which is a nine month old with amazing talents. Here are some of the amazing, phenomenal, astonishing things my niece can do at nine months that Madeline has never quite got the hang of:

-Hold still while you change her diaper
-Hold still while you put on her clothes
-Hold still while you wipe her face
-Eat all of her food without making a mess, and in record time
-Stay in one spot when you set her down. (Not because she can't crawl. Because she likes to sit in one spot and play with a toy or watch the things going on around her. I thought to myself, oh. This is how people bring children to sacrament meeting without sedating them first.)
-Cry at a decibel level under 1 million
-Stay away from the dishwasher when I am loading it and making fun clanking sounds

In other words, I discovered the reason why people have multiple children. And how they don't die when said multiple children are less than ten years apart. Fortunately for me, my child is not obedient or quiet. But hey, what can you do? I love my trouble maker child and wouldn't trade her, because she's so cute when she's getting into mischief. Remind me of that on Sunday when she's playing under the bishop's chair. (Note: This has never actually happened to us. Yet.)

Dinner and Dad's Day

I love being a stay at home mom, but there's one task that really bugs me sometimes. (Okay, maybe more than one, but I'm only going to complain about one here. Maybe I'll complain about the dishes tomorrow, if you're lucky.) I hate deciding what to do for dinner. I don't even really mind making it. But you have to plan it, and try to decide what will sound good to everybody, and make sure you have all the ingredients, and then you have to do it all over again tomorrow. This is why in college I ate nothing but mashed potatoes, sausage, and Sunny D. Not necessarily together. Luckily, Jessie isn't too picky, and if I have something on the table when he gets home, he's happy. Maybe today we'll just have Trix yogurt. Do you think Jessie will say anything if I just put some yogurt on the table?

I also haven't decided what to get Jessie for Father's Day yet. That's right, I'm a slacker. It's in four days and I have no clue. The problem is, he got me a pretty good Mother's Day gift. He lost a couple points because he didn't order it until a few days before, so it came a little late. But he still set the bar pretty high. So now I have to find something that says, "Jessie is freaking awesome, and Cami is the best at picking out Father's Day gifts." But I thought that would look a little long on a t-shirt, so I need a gift that just implies it instead of saying it outright. Problem is, apparently you are supposed to buy tools or furniture for Father's Day, and Jessie already has ample amounts of both. He just wants a big screen television, but since our tv fund is only up to about 40 bucks, I'm thinking we still have a while before I can use that as a gift idea. So I'll probably just aimlessly search the internet for the next three days and go pick him up some socks at WalMart Saturday night. Maybe they'll seem cooler if I get muti-colored ones instead of white.

Adventures in house hunting

So we went out with a realtor looking at houses today. It was kind of exciting. Mostly because the world is full of crazy people. At one house, we drove up and there was a drunk guy in the garage talking to the lady who lived there. He swore at us, and our realtor got up in his face and told him to respect women and mind his manners generally. I thought he was going to punch him out, but then the drunk guy decided to be nice and apologize and try to be social. Turns out he lives across the street. Score one for the neighborhood. Note to the world: if you're trying to sell your house for more than it's worth, don't have your wasted neighbor in the garage when prospective buyers are around.

Things got more exciting when we finished looking at houses. We were talking to our realtor in front of a bunch of townhouses, when his four year old son decided to he had to go really bad and peed right by our car. We were too busy laughing to keep him from stealing a ball out of someone's yard and throwing it on top of the carport. Our poor realtor just turned to us and said, "Dude. Don't have boys." Words of wisdom.

Moral of the story. You should go house shopping. Make new friends. See the world. Swap stories with your realtor to see who got robbed at gunpoint more times on their mission. You'll be glad you did.

Rain, rain, go away

I am usually a fan of rain. But for some reason, when your nose is all stuffed up and your throat aches and your head hurts, rain isn't fun anymore. Therefore, I politely request that the rain go away until I can breathe again. So that I can use my new umbrella instead of staring outside thinking that I'm going to myself sicker if I go out there. And coincidentally, as I predicted, I was out and about last night without my umbrella during the rain. Granted, I was riding in the car most of the time, so I probably couldn't have used it anyway, but it would have been comforting to know it was there. In all its new, pristine, chic glory.

A few random thoughts on scouts, my exciting life, umbrellas and footwear

So, I'm a slacker. I usually don't like to mention when I'm a slacker, in hopes that the world at large won't notice. But I've been a bad blogger lately. And I have no excuse. I have not been sick, I have not been vacationing, I have not been busy beyond all belief magnifying my callings and hosting enrichments and working in my extensive garden, and my internet has been fully functional. I'm just a royal slacker. Tell your friends.

I have been doing a few things though, lest you think I sit at home and watch soap operas all day. I don't even like soap operas. If I wanted all the drama, I would have remained single in a ward at BYU forever. No, I have been doing other stuff. I went to cub scout camp on Saturday. Boy, was that a lot of fun. If your definition of fun is chasing ten year olds who hate boondoggle all day. I'd blame it on the short attention spans of prepubescent boys, but the majority of the other dens attending had twice as many boys and half the amount of disobedience. I prefer to think of our boys as "high energy". I'm trying to figure out a way to hook them up to my car and save the environment. Chew on that idea, Mr. President: Cub Scouts are the solution to the energy crisis.

But that's not all folks. Surely you didn't think my week consisted solely of cub scouts. I also bought myself an umbrella. Exciting, no? Actually, I bought Jessie one too, because I suddenly decided umbrellas were a necessary commodity for every successful home. And for some reason we haven't owned an umbrella for the past two years. Despite this egregious oversight, we managed to survive. Now it probably won't rain for a month. But if it does, I have an umbrella. Which I probably will have either left at home or won't be able to find when a sudden downpour does arrive. I also bought shoes, which won't help at all in a downpour and are actually not sensible for bad weather at all. But they were really cute and they were on sale, and if I learned anything from my sister, it's that those are two really good reasons to buy shoes. And you really only need one or the other to justify yourself. Hope you enjoyed your fun and exciting week as much as I enjoyed mine. I'm going to go pick out outfits that match my shoes. (Jessie doesn't understand this urge. Poor Jessie. I think he only owns four or five pair of shoes.)

A story about my husband

So, my husband gave me permission to share a funny and somewhat embarrassing story about him on my blog. Mostly after I assured him it was definitely the sort of thing I would do all the time, in my dizty mode. Then, in the interest of total honesty, I also assured him I would be mocking him for the rest of the week because it WASN'T me this time, and I was going to take full advantage of that.

Anyway, on Sunday we were back in actual classes instead of nursery, which was sad because Madeline had grown accustomed to doing whatever she liked. So we were chasing her all over gymnasium, pulling her out of other people's scripture and diaper bags, taking away other kid's bottles, pulling her off stranger's laps, and trying to keep her out of the front of the room where our obvious lack of parenting skills would be much more visible. I finally had her somewhat content, coloring on our Sunday School handout, when I turn and realize that Jessie disappeared. Since Madeline was contained, I had no idea why he would leave. I finally spotted him in the back of the room, talking and laughing with this couple we have never met. Great, I thought. Jessie has finally made some friends. Why he felt social in the middle of the Sunday School lesson was a bit perplexing and distracting. He came back a minute later and explained the whole thing to me. Turns out he had no idea Madeline was right next to me (which was an understandable mistake, since her success at staying in one place for more than thirty seconds is lamentable). So he turned around looking for her, and spotted a little girl with short brown curly hair going through the couple's diaper bag. So he did what any sensible father would do, and booked it over there to grab her. Except after he grabbed her and tried to drag her back to his seat, the couple was nice enough to inform him that it was their kid. Just a few seconds too late to save Jessie's dignity.

Fortunately, apparently they've made that mistake a few times before themselves, because they thought it was pretty funny. Me, I was thinking: wonderful. I married a kidnapper. The ward is going to start locking up their toddlers when we come to church functions. I tried to point out to Jessie that they were wearing completely different color dresses, not to mention that other than the hair, they look nothing alike. He fed me some hooey about the other girl's dress being remarkably similar to a yellow dress Madeline owns. (Oh, but I checked her closet, dearest husband. She only has one yellow dress, that she hasn't worn for six months because it's way too small. You just had a moment. Where you lost your head. And yes, we're still within the week period that I'm going to mock you about it.) So the moral of the story is that Madeline is so naughty at church that we reflexively discipline any other child within twenty feet of us. Everything is her fault. Not Jessie's. I repeat- Madeline's fault, not Jessie's. Because she can't read my blog yet. Then I'll have to find another scapegoat. Drat it all.