Tanner, you have been banned

I love my children. I do! I try to be patient with them and show them that I love them often. But sometimes they do things that push me to the edge of my patience...

Tanner is a habitual bath pooper. It seems like almost every bath he's had in the last 2 weeks, he's pooped in the tub. Oh, and didn't just start 2 weeks ago, this has been an ongoing problem since his early months. Needless to say, it is disgusting. It makes me gaggy just thinking about it. Thankfully Paul cleans it up because I can't handle it. The one time Paul wasn't home and I had to clean it up I scolded Tanner until he cried. I know, not my proudest motherly moment but it was gross and I was mad because I had to clean it up.

So, Tanner, I hereby ban you from baths until you understand that pooping in the tub is unacceptable. You are still an enormously cute kid and we love you, we just don't love cleaning up your poop in the tub.

Day of Service

Yesterday our Stake participated in "Day of Service 2009". You can click here and here for more information. We had a lot of service projects going on in the area (and a lot of Eagle Projects getting done).

We went to the local Primary School (which consists of Kindergarten and 1st Grade). There we planted shrubs, flowers, laid pine straw, built flower beds, built and painted benches, organized art closets and cleared out a whole lot of trees and branches.

Paul worked on clearing debris from the nature trail and rebuilding the bridge at the back of the school. My service mostly consisted of moral support (and taking of a few pictures) since someone had to keep tabs on the little ones. Tanner decided to catch a cold the night before so he was slightly crankier than usual. Unfortunately we only lasted about 2 hours and 45 minutes until Tanner had a complete meltdown. So I brought the kids home, Tanner slept for about 30 minutes. I figured I'd go back after I fed the kids lunch, but as soon as I was ready to go I look for Lana and she's fast asleep on the couch. Oh well. It was a good thought. 3 hours later when she finally wakes up, Paul calls to tell me he's on his way home.

Planting shrubs.

Tanner completely mesmerized by the little Bobcat pushing dirt around.

Building and painting benches.

Lana and her friend playing in the sand.

Clearing debris and rebuilding the bridge.

Garden Update

We have greenery! All but 3 squares have sprouted. I'll have to ask Paul what was in those squares because I can't remember. Beans maybe?





The radishes have gone a bit psycho. Radishes anyone?

Hi, what's your name?

"Lana...no, Tinkerbell!"

"Really? Oh, okay. Well my name is (insert normal name here). Come on Tinkerbell, let's go run around."

Such has been the last few overheard conversations Lana has had with other kids. Of course they tend to vary but the end result is the same. She convinces the other kids that her name really is Tinkerbell. Perhaps we need to cut back on all the Tinkerbell stuff...

Easter 2009

For Lana, Easter began on Thursday. Her preschool had an "Easter Field-day". They asked the parents to provide an Easter basket and they had some fun and games outside. She loves preschool now. Every Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday she wakes up and tells me that it's time to go to school. And if she wakes up early then I have to get her ready and then sit her in front of Handy Manny or Imagination Movers until it's time to go or else I am inundated with "Mom, I'm ready now... Let's go... Why aren't we going? Mom, let's go to school! It's time..." It's enough to make any sane person a little bit crazy.

We opted to do Easter on Saturday since we have early church, I had to be extra early for choir and Paul had early meetings. (Oh, and not to mention the fact that I have a hard enough time getting to church on time on regular Sundays...9am church is not my friend.) So we stuffed and hid the eggs Friday night. Tanner was the first one up on Saturday. He really didn't know what to think of Easter.



He's thinking "did you want me to pick these up? This is a little lame, mom."



And here he's telling me about the meaning of Easter. Such a deep thinker this one is.



And this is where he figured out that there was candy in the eggs.



I love this picture. Lana had just crawled out of bed and there's Tanner-the-blur going from egg to egg. Lana's just trying to figure out what's going on.



It didn't take long.

Today (Sunday) we enjoyed a beautiful Easter Sacrament Program. I am so thankful for all those fabulously talented people who are willing to share their gifts to bless others!

Square foot gardening

We really felt like we needed to do a garden this year. So Paul, as the EQ President planned a "Manrichment", did some gardening research, got together the materials and we put together these gardens. Everyone who showed up took their gardens home to their own backyard, but since we don't have one we are borrowing the church's for now.

Hopefully in a few weeks these little squares will be full of veggie goodness.

We planted things like tomatoes, romaine lettuce (we hope those take, but I think we might've planted too late), red/green/yellow peppers, jalapenos, cantelope, watermelon, carrots and even beets (only because Paul wanted to be a "Beetdigger" literally). For those few readers who didn't know me in high school, my mascot was a Beetdigger.

Let's just hope that Paul's thumb is greener than mine because I am a plant serial killer. I have killed every plant I have ever owned except for an ivy. And that sweet plant could go weeks without water and look like it was dead, then I'd water it and it would miraculously come back to life. Sadly it didn't survive the move to Mississippi.

Lana was a super helper in planting.

Tanner...not so much. His type of gardening mostly included the throwing of dirt.

This is the other ward's garden, it's already starting to sprout. Unfortunately a big chunk of it got washed out from all the heavy rains we had last week.

Lana is obsessed with picking flowers. She is not picky even if it's a weed. If it looks like a flower then she has to have it. Lana told me she picked these "very boo-tiful" flowers for me so we took them home and put them in water.