Wigs

Levi and Noah found the wig from my Halloween costume tonight, and thought it would be funny to try it on. I guess this is a preview of what they will look like in 10 years, if the hairstyles for teenage boys are the same as they are right now. Freakin' long haired hippie kids these days...

Levi


Noah


Ella had to try it out too...


They all made me try it on...


Even Banjo got in on the action...


And finally, the best lookin' one in the family. I guess we'll find out tonight if blondes really do have more fun ;)

Easter cookies

The kids got a cookie kit from Great-Aunt Janna for easter. The dough looks like playdough, but actually tastes good. They also got frosting to put on top. Yesterday Grandma came over to watch the kids so we could get some things done around the house. They all decided to make the cookies.

Levi


Noah


Ella


I snuck a few of the cookies from the tray. They tasted pretty good. Unfortunately, I only saw Ella doing this between frosting each cookie AFTER I had eaten them...



Lovely...


Consider this your warning if we ever offer you cookies at our house.

The bunk house

So Paige's nesting instinct is kicking into overdrive now. On the last go round, we ended up buying a new house. At least this baby has just been limited to re-arranging furniture. Today we decided to change the rooms around to get ready for the new arrival. We have two sets of bunk beds. Until now, one was set up as bunk beds in Ella's room, and the other was set up as two single beds in the boys' room. Today we moved one of Ella's beds into the boys' room and told her she was going to move in there for a while when the new baby came. At first she was excited, thinking it would be fun to have a sleepover with her brothers every night. A little while later, she started realizing that this meant her room would no longer be the same. Her bed got moved out, her little playhouse got taken down and stored in the closet, her dresser got moved into the boy's closet, and the crib got set up in "her" room. She was not too pleased about this. We had a heart to heart and explained that the new baby needed somewhere to sleep, and that as soon as it could sleep through the night, she could move back to her room. If it is a little boy, it will go sleep with Levi and Noah, and if it is a little girl, then she and Ella get to share a room. This seemed to sooth her hard feelings. By bedtime, she was excited to sleep in her new room with the boys. Overall, she took it like a little trooper. We'll see how it goes with three kids in the same room. Tonight wasn't exactly smooth, but they are all sleeping now.

Here is the final result...

Ok ok, not really. But three beds in one small room feels like it...

And here is the new baby's room. I am really hoping it is a girl, because I can't hardly contemplate my boy sleeping in this...

Pink walls, butterfly rug, flowers on the curtain. It would probably permanently warp the poor boy. So let's hope it's a girl. Plus, another boy means that all three of them will spend the rest of their childhood crammed into a single room. A girl just works better...

Paige is feeling guilty over the whole thing. Ella was crying, and Paige said it was breaking her heart. "I'm a mother, it's my job to feel guilty over how I have wronged my children." Then she felt guilty because the new baby doesn't get it's "own" room, it gets a mismatched collection of leftover furniture crammed into Ella's old room. Pregnancy hormones. I don't feel sorry for the new kid at all. She (?) will be the only one in the house who gets a room all to herself.

So after a late kiddo bedtime tonight, I better get to sleep. Because 6:53 AM will come to soon. Why 6:53? That is approximately the time the garbage truck will roll past our house tomorrow. The truck will wake up the boys, who will barrel out of their room and into ours, still half asleep, screaming half with excitement and half with pure terror that they will miss seeing the garbage truck go by. Heaven forbid they actually do miss the truck going by, or they spend the next 30 minutes sobbing until he makes his second loop through to collect the other side of the street. Definitely no need for an alarm clock on Monday mornings in our house...

Aye carrumba...

Aunt Angie babysat the kids yesterday afternoon. I came home from work to find Noah dressed like this...

Sheesh. Angie's excuse was that he wanted to wear it. I suppose if he wanted to play with matches, she would let him do that too. It's bad enough that Grandma taught them to call their diapers "panties." Now I come home and the kid is wearing a girly skirt.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Ella saw this and said "Dad, when was this? When did we dance like that?" They all had to watch it 10 times before bed. Every time the intro ran, they all shouted "Jib Jab!"

Don't send a lame St. Patrick's Day eCard. Try JibJab Sendables!

Weird, weird dream

I didn't get much sleep last night. At least not much good sleep. I had the weirdest dream. Twice. Normally I only remember bits and pieces of my dreams. This one I remembered the whole thing. Twice. Although the details are fading now.

Paige and I lived in a house, only it wasn't our house. The rooms were all in different places. And Paige didn't really look like Paige, although she still looked like someone I know, although I can't quite put my finger on who. We also only had one child, a boy instead of Ella. Again, it wasn't any of our kids, but somehow looked familiar.

In my dream, I kept waking up all night long because the baby monitor was making weird sounds. Not the normal baby monitor squeaks and squeals, but bumping noises... and footsteps. Like someone was in the baby's room. I kept getting up to go check, but there was never anyone there. It did, however, creep me out to go into the baby's room.

I woke up the next morning (in my dream) and went to go get the baby. He was happy and playing, and all the sudden froze. He stared straight past me, into the room, looking intently at something. And from the other room, I could hear the same bumping and footstep noises over the baby monitor. Only I couldn't actually hear them inside the room. The baby just kept staring past me at something... or nothing. The hair on my neck was standing all the way up, so we got out of there as fast as we could.

For some bizarre reason, at naptime, I put the baby back to sleep in the room, even though I didn't want to stay in there any longer than necessary. And for some reason, my sister was over. We were sitting there talking, and the monitor started making the creepy noises again. My sister jokingly said "Sounds like a ghost in the nursery." I just looked at her and said "I think there is, and I'm not sure what it wants."

Then the dream just ended, and I woke up in cold sweat. Twice.

I have no idea what this is supposed to mean.

(However, it could have something to do with the fact that a certain friend of mine came over, and told me this creepy story about his sister-in-law. And then joked that we should harass his sister-in-law about letting her baby sleep with a ghost. Sorry sister-in-law, I couldn't resist. I didn't really have any weird dreams. Seriously though... uber creepy.)

It's... ALIIIIIIVE!

The Bronco moved under it's own power today, for the first time in nearly 2 years. My repairs appear to have been successful. No coolant leaks, no vacuum leaks, timing appears correct and the engine is now harmonically balanced. Took it for a few loops around the block... and the dreaded death wobble has returned. Front end shakes at about 45 MPH. So I have to figure that out, before I can drive it over for registration. But it runs! I had a big grin on my face the first loop around the block!

One of those days...

The Bronco has been out of commission for almost 2 years now. That is depressing. It died the same day Tucker did. We were headed out to go camping at Lake Pleasant. Paige and the kids were up at my moms, and I grabbed some last minute supplies and loaded up Tucker in my Bronco. We were cruising down the highway, and all the sudden Tucker gets all woozy and can't stand up. By the time I get pulled over on the side of the road, he was dead. No heartbeat, no breathing, nothing. Just a limp dog and the rancid smell of death in my passenger seat. So I pulled off the freeway to turn around and go to the pound. As I pulled up to the my truck started making awful clanking noises. Sounded like I had a wrench bouncing around the oil pan. Not good. I made it to the pound, dropped off Tucker, drove home, parked the Bronco, loaded everything into the Escape, and went camping. The Bronco has sat in the garage ever since, because I was too scared to to find out how bad the repairs were going to be.So last weekend Levi and Noah and I did a little investigating...

After some dead ends, I finally discovered the harmonic balancer had failed, and the outer ring was just bouncing around, making a huge racket. Not such a bad repair after all. So I ordered the balancer from Auto Zone, and wen't to go put it one. Wrong part. My old one has three bolt holes for the pulley, the new one has four. Crud. Finally thanks to searching classicbroncos.com, I find the part number I need (of course the Autozone monkeys aren't able to do this.) Order that one, and wait for it to show up. Since I've got it torn apart anyways, I decided to pull off the water pump and replace the gasket, since I have a small annoying leak somewhere in there. Start pulling that off (last night), get to the last bolt holding it in, and... SNAP! Freakin' bolt snapped off! Great, so now I have to pull the timing chain cover off as well so I can remove the bolt. So I pull all the bolts out of that, but it is hung up on the one that snapped off. So I pry a little with a screwdriver, and... CRACK! Freakin' timing cover crumbles to pieces. Oh lovely. Guess the coolant leak wasn't from the water pump, but the corroded cover. Now I have to find one of those as well. So I get the cover off, and take a look at the timing chain. It is really loose. So might as well replace that too.

Progress as of this morning, with new timing gear installed:

So this morning I call Driven Auto Parts, and they have a timing cover. NAPA has the timing chain and gears. So I drive from Gilbert to 35th Ave, in morning rush hour traffic, pick up the parts, and head back home. I pull off the old timing gears, slide the new ones on... and the fuel pump eccentric doesn't fit back on. Argggghhhh!!! Call all over town, try to find anyone who has a different set. No one does. So I swing by All Mustang Performance. They have a set, but it still isn't the right thing. So I head back to NAPA, this time in afternoon rush hour, to try my luck at finding the right timing gear. The first lady is completely useless, just looking up the part number I already have. Finally some guy comes over, takes a look, and suggests looking up the part for a '74 Bronco. Sure enough, that is the right part. Totally logical... '74 timing chain in my '70 engine. Get the new gear and head home. Pick up the harmonic balancer on the way home, and it actually looks like the right one!

I got the gears installed, timing cover back on, new water pump back on, radiator and fan back in. Now the final task... to remove the other bolts that I broke off in the intake manifold (for the water neck.) I broke them last night, tried to removed them this morning and they wouldn't budge, so I soaked them in oil all day. I tried to back the first one out slowly with an Easyout... BANG! Easyout exploded. Great, not I have the Easyout stuck in the broken bolt, so I'll never get it out. Guess I will also be getting a new intake manifold. Let's hope I can find one in stock somewhere tomorrow.

So the simple job of just the harmonic balance turned into:
- new timing cover
- new timing chain and gears
- new water pump
- new intake manifold
- and who knows what else will go wrong tomorrow...

My goal was to get it running tomorrow and head to emissions and MVD and get it re-registered. Chances of that happening look slim now...

Progress as of tonight...

Slovenia?

So I added this ClustrMap thing to our blog, that shows where people are visiting from. So far we've got what appears to be Arizona, Utah, Iowa, and Michigan. These make sense, as we know people from there.

But almost immediately, someone from Germany shows up, followed by what appears to be Slovenia. What in the world? How does someone from Slovenia stumble across an obscure blog with pictures of our kids? So if you visit from Slovenia (or anywhere outside the US) leave a comment. I'm curious how on earth you got here...

SB 1214

I had President's Day off, so I spent half the day at work, and the other half at the state capital listening to testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee on SB 1214. This is a bill going through the senate that would allow concealed weapons permit holders (CCW) to carry a gun concealed on all school campuses in the state. For a gun geek and political junkie, I actually had fun at this (yeah, yeah, make all your jokes now.)

Senator Karen Johnson sits on the Judiciary Committee, and is a sponsor of the bill. I always see her name attached to pro-gun bills, and am even more impressed after seeing her challenge some of the people opposed to the bill. Ron Gould also did a good job challenging the anti's, and Chairman Chuck Gray seemed to do a good job allowing both sides to be heard.

Testimony started with those opposed to the bill. First up were the litany of police chiefs, from the Arizona Chief of Police Association, NAU, ASU, and U of A. They gave the standard police chief line... guns on campus will slow police response down because they will have to check every gun, guns could be stolen on campus, etc. Chairman Gray asked every chief what their response time would be. All said somewhere between 3 to 5 minutes. The senators pointed out that in almost no school shootings have the police arrived in time to stop the gunman. The spokesman for the Arizona Fraternal Order of Police was even more hysterical. He imagined CCW holders having gunfights at football games, gunmen targeting teachers first, and others I didn't write down. Basically painted CCWs at raving lunatics who shoot people at the drop of a hat. Senator Gould asked him if he could cite any instance where a CCW holder had pulled a gun on another parent. He could not. Next up was the spokesperson for the West Valley Chiefs of Police. He was also opposed. After citing his reasons, Senator Johnson asked him if he had taken an oath to uphold the constitution. Yes. Does the constitution include a right to bear arms? Yes. Again, Senator Johnson is awesome.

After the police chiefs were the ladies from Arizonans for Gun Safety. Talk about out there. The first was appalled that this bill even was being heard in committee. Her solution to gun violence in schools was metal detectors at all schools, additional police at all schools, more psychological counselors, and all gun purchasers must pass a psychological evaluation. Who pays for all this? Taxpayers of course, with a special fee levied on CCW holders. The second lady was sure that devious little children would somehow steal guns from their teachers and shoot their fellow students. Senator Johnson pointed out that from 1977-95 there were 15 school schootings, with 19 dead. In 1995 alone, the year that the Gun Free Schools Act passed, there were 5 shootings. So the laws prohibiting guns obviously did not make schools the safe havens these ladies imagine.

The young man from Young Democrats of Arizona claimed that all the students and teachers in AZ were opposed to this bill. Contradicted later by students and a teacher who testified in favor of the bill. He also stated that a place saturated with guns can be more dangerous that without guns. His evidence? His time in Iraq with the National Guard. There might be a few differences between Iraq and the US other than the number of guns.

Next up were those supporting the bill. Unlike the antis, who mainly represented police chief organizations, city governments, or anti gun groups, most of those supporting the bill represented only themselves. There was passionate support from a former Mesa police officer, and now high school history teacher. Also another teacher who pointed out that the current response plan for teachers is to huddle their students in the corner and HOPE the gunman doesn't come into the classroom. All she wants is the chance to fight back. Several college students testified.. one who has been mugged twice at U of A, one who has had several friends raped at U of A, one who has a CCW but can't carry on campus. All said they just wanted to have the right to defend themselves. In all, some 18 people testified for the bill, and addressed every issue that the police chiefs and worried women raised.

Like I said, as a political junkie and gun nut, I was fascinated. Unfortunately the committee did not vote because one senator was missing. Hopefully they pass the bill from committee, then the senate and house. Of course, I imagine the chances of the Governor signing it are slim to none.

One... two hands

Paige just relayed the following story to me. She was getting laundry out of the dryer, and Noah walked in...

Noah: "Mom, I need a popper" (one of the pop guns we got a Cabelas)

Paige: "Here you go"

Noah: "Mom, I need another one"

Paige: "I just gave you one. Why do you need another one?"

Noah: "I have one, two hands... I need one, two guns!"


Warms me down to the sub-cockles of my heart... :)

Random Quotes...

from our kids:

1) This morning, as Paige comes out of the bedroom after getting reading for the morning.

Ella: "Mom, you look like you are going to church. And you smell like it!"

2) Noah, last night, completely out of the blue:

"Grandma is cute!"

We called Grandma so he could tell her. Apparently he was supposed to tell us that Grandma was "smart" because she used tape and a feather duster to get a balloon of the ceiling the other night.

3) Virtually every night at bedtime, for the past month.

Noah: "DAD, I DON"T LIKE YOU! YOU ARE MEAN! GO BACK TO WORK! SHRIEEEEEEEK!!!"

The kid only wants his mother at bedtime. They have been going through a round of evil bedtimes, where we have to sit outside the door to keep them in their room. If Paige sits outside the door, they just cry and eventually go to sleep. When it is my turn, Noah yells all sorts of things at me. The last few days they are doing much better (I have no idea why) and there hasn't been any yelling. Hopefully they are over whatever was going on...

2007 Review - Jib Jab Style

I just found out that Jib-Jab posted a 2007 Year in Review video. Hilarious!

Video

Of course, then I had to go and re-watch the classics. These were hilarious 4 years ago (and still are.) I can't wait to see what they come up with in the run up to November '08!

This Land! | Funny Jokes at JibJab

Good to be in DC! | Funny Jokes at JibJab

Second Term | Funny Jokes at JibJab

An article worth reading

In keeping with the boys weekend posts...

"In this place, risk and manhood are to be glimpsed in an instant, with beauty and folly, and pride and love, hard to extricate the one from the other. It is a strange and bold witness of life. Like life, it is heartily unsafe. It brings no therapy, no anodyne; it is not the dose of nepenthe that Helen of Troy, the essential matriarch, slips her semivirile husband; it is not the lotus; it is not what we whimsically call Higher Education."

"To be a man as Christ was is to embrace the danger, not in bravado but in deep humility."

Link...

Day 3

They boys started the day with a healthy... two doughnuts each (specifically just the frosting part.) Then they went to church with Grandma and we all met up for lunch. After lunch and a nap, we headed to the bowling alley for some fun. Levi and Noah celebrated with gusto on each roll of the ball, whether they knocked pins down or not. Levi especially showed off some of his madd dance skilz every time he rolled. The pictures stink, because they are zoomed, cropped, and in low light.



Then home and tucked into bed. Paige and Ella come home tomorrow, so there is one more day of fun in store. I'm thinking a hike in the White Tanks, since it rained all day so the waterfall should be flowing strong. But we will have to see if it is raining tomorrow, and if I can figure out how to make the 1 hour drive out there workable.

Day 2

Morning bed head...





As soon as the living room got light this morning, the wrestling began. We had a big bowl of oatmeal for breakfast, and then headed outside to do the yardwork. Hauled all the bulk trash out to the burb, mowed the lawn, and picked the entire DuPont factory scattered across the yard.

Then we went inside for lunch, and brought with us some of this year's crop...



"Do you think Dad is really supposed to be giving us shots? I'm not sure Mom would approve of this..."


"But this stuff sure tastes good!"


"More please!"


"Man this stuff puckers you up. I'm not sure I can finish it."


After a lunch of pizza and a big nap, we headed off to the car show at Scottsdale Pavillions. During high school, I think we came here probably every other Saturday night to drool over the cars. Grandma Addink met us at the car show. We enjoyed some "chicken" nuggets at McDonalds, and then walked around and drooled. Grandma was especially fond of the Chevy Bel Airs.





Then Grandma took the boys to her house tonight for a sleepover. They were planning to watch The Littlest Polar Bear, which they watch every single time they go to Grandma's, and then go to sleep in a big pile of blankets on the floor.

I'm off to enjoy a movie as well, Cloverfield, all by my lonesome... :)

Day 1

10/22/08 - Lots of people have been finding this post lately, all through Google image searches, all of them finding the picture of the elk and the mountain lion. Someone PLEASE leave a comment and tell me what on earth you are searching for. The curiosity is killing me!


I had a great day yesterday with Levi and Noah. They both slept through the entire night with no crying or fussing (either that, or I slept through the crying.) Regardless, we all slept in until 8:30 and then rolled ourselves out of bed. We got dressed for the day and then headed off for breakfast at the Farmhouse. The boys did great, sat (mostly) quietly in their seats, built pyramids with the creamer packages, and ate breakfast like little gentlemen. The each had a tasty pancake the side of their head (literally) and two breakfast sausages that even Jonathan Bakker would be proud to serve at the Little America restaurant (no little sausage links at the Farmhouse. These things were a cross between a breakfast sausage and a bratwurst.) I was amazed they could pack that much food in, but they both declared their tummies were finally full.

Then we head off to Best Buy and picked out some new computer games. Ended up with Half Life and Call of Duty 4. All through Best Buy they kept asking when we were going to go to "Ella Cabelas" to see the animals. So we loaded up and made the long trek out to "Ella Cabelas." We got there and Jack Links beef jerky had a giant truck outside they wanted to see. Noah declared "That looks like Grandpa's truck!" Since Grandpa drives an F150, I'm not sure why they thought that. Grandpa's truck is apparently MUCH bigger in their imagination...



They were fascinated by the moose...



Levi said that this zebra was "sleeping." Ummmm, not quite buddy. They also declared that he had "poopy" on his bottom and on his feet. I'm not sure exactly why they thought that.



They also like the mountain lion attacking the elk. At least with this one, they knew the mountain lion was going to eat the elk.

10/22/08 - Lots of people have been finding this post lately, all through Google image searches, all of them finding the picture of the elk and the mountain lion. Someone PLEASE leave a comment and tell me what on earth you are searching for. The curiosity is killing me!


After a healthy lunch of pudding at Cabelas (hey, at least I didn't give them a cookie, which was the ONLY thing they said they wanted to eat) we packed up and headed home. I managed to throughly screw up Noah's nap time, and he did not want to go to sleep when we got home. He kept saying that his "tummy wasn't sleepy." He finally did fall asleep though.

After nap time and dinner, we set up the highlight of the day... the tent. They were so excited about it, they could barely stand still. We put up the tent, rolled out the sleeping bags, and played with our new flashlights from Cabelas (hopefully they will stop playing with MY flashlights now.)









After some puzzles in the dark, a nice hot bath, and some fuzzy warm pajamas, we settled down for a night of "roughing it" it our tent...



OK, so setting the tent up in the playroom isn't exactly roughing it...



I realized that if we set it up outside, I would have to stay out there when they went to sleep around 8:30. That would mean I wouldn't get anything done around the house after bedtime. So I thought if we set it up inside, I could sneak out after they went to sleep and clean up (and play my new games.) Of course, it didn't work out exactly that way (you knew this was coming, right?) I was the first one to fall asleep. So much for that plan. But we all had a mostly restful night in the tent, and the boys are still in there talking in their sleep.

Hopefully today is just as much fun!

Yikes...

Of course, then I read this two minutes later. This weekend could go south in a big hurry...

Boy's weekend

Paige and Ella headed off to Michigan this weekend to visit Justin and Lindsey and Isaac. So I took off work Friday and Monday, and the boys and I are looking forward to a fun weekend of manly activities. Tomorrow we are headed for a hearty breakfast at The Farmhouse and then to Best Buy to pick out a new computer game (thanks Tim!) We might head over to Cabelas in the afternoon to check out all the stuffed animals, and to pick out some fancy new flashlights. We will need them, because then we are going to go camping (in the backyard) and sleep in a tent! Saturday morning, who knows... maybe a trip to Von Hanson's (mmmmmmmm meat!) Saturday night is the big car show at Scottsdale Pavillions, so we may head over there, enjoy some McDonalds, and drool over all the fancy cars. Sunday we will head to church, cause real men love Jesus. Then maybe to Grandma's in the afternoon. And Monday the plan is to get on some grubby clothes and start taking apart dad's truck to see if we can fix it.

Who knows what else we may find to do... hiking, a trip to the shooting range, drinking, smoking (kidding!).

We shall see who wears out first with all this excitement... me or the 2 year olds. I'm not even sure which way to bet.

Hand picked by Juan Valdez

 So Paige went to the grocery store and bought a coffee maker tonight. We don't drink coffee. But she "saved" sixteen dollars! Grandpa and Grandma Addink are coming over for lunch tomorrow (or Sunday dinner, as they would call it in Iowa.) They are coffee drinkers, so Paige thought it would be good for us to make coffee for them. We have also noticed that on occasion when my mom comes over, she takes along a thermos full of coffee. I think she needs the coffee just to keep up with our kids, and it's a subtle hint that we are not providing an adequate caffeine supply.

I love the smell of coffee, but never have acquired the taste for it. Apparently coffee is one of these foods that tastes awful, but you are supposed to like. So the nice way of saying that it doesn't taste good is to say it's an "acquired" taste. So I decided tonight to become and adult and to acquire the taste. Paige picked up some fancy chocolaty coffee (I figured this might make it more palatable.) I brewed up four cups. It smelled wonderful. I poured all four cups into the giant Dordt college mug (previously used only for childish hot chocolate.) I added a copious amount of creamer, again hoping this would improve the taste, and took a sip. Ughhhhh. Still tastes like coffee. I added some sugar, starting with a small amount and working my way up to an entire plantation. Hmmmmmm, starting to taste better, but still not what I would describe as "good." Figuring that "acquiring" a taste takes some effort, I kept drinking until it was all gone. By the end of the cup, the taste actually was acceptable, probably because coffee has some numbing effect on your tastebuds.

So, four cups of coffee and a pile of sugar later... I am still wide awake. And jittery.

Next week maybe I will try to acquire the taste of beer. I think the stuff tastes like dirty sweat socks...