It has come to my attention...

I have had a couple realizations in the last 2 months.

1. Something will be neglected. Always.

 For a while, I was REALLY good at blogging. I did it once a week, or even a couple times a week. But I tended to fail at doing dishes, or laundry, or entertaining my kids. I am not sure I vacuumed for like a month while you all enjoyed reading witty quips about parenting.

 This is what my laundry room and kitchen look like right now, whilst I neglect them and blog for you. My house smells funny and Loopy doesn't have any folded shorts or underwear. But YOU shall have ample reading material.

This is how I have been spending my days
instead of blogging.

2. A surprising number of people read my bog. 

Friends and family (some of whom I had NO idea were interested in our lives) let me know they miss reading it. So to those of you in "Why Kids are great withdrawals" I  apologize. I'll try to get my shit together and fit this hobby in a little more often.

Here's what you missed... 

School Daze

Kendal got enrolled in a pre-k for the fall. She'll be going to a Methodist preschool in town. She was pretty excited and brought her Dinosaur and Imaginary Umbrella.

Starting sometime in August she will be gone from 9am-2pm three days a week. I'm not sure what I'll do with myself.







Logan made it through the rest of 1st grade. He is pretty excited to be going to a new and closer school next year. We are embracing summer and just forgetting about that hiccup in the road of childhood. We celebrated by getting him his annual mohawk.

This is just a cute picture of Kendal pouting after Logan got a mohawk. She thought I was going to cut her hair.

I DID cut her hair, but just a little bit. there were a couple really long bits that kept getting tangled. It wasn't perfect, but curly hair is pretty forgiving. Here she is with Logan's friend Chandler, who she loves. Chandler's dad works with Loopy

We've got crabs

Hermit crabs that is. I don't know if I mentioned it before, but Logan's buddy Nick lost interest in the little critters so Logan decided to adopt them. There are two of them, now renamed Mr and Mrs Crab. We are original, no?



Susan was (not) oh so sad to see them go. So I try to give her regular updates on how things are going. It tends to turn into a pubic (ish, cause its facebook) conversation for everyone's reading amusement.

Dear Susan,

Thank you for the hermit crabs. They are hours of amusement... like 3 minutes at a time because really, they don't do much. Here is our latest update: The large crab finally emerged from the coconut, he seems to be wearing the same shell and looks huge. He is ridiculously skiddish and rarely come out for us. Loopy is scared of him. (Seriously) The green shelled crab suddenly shell hopped yesterday to a larger more swirly shell. Today we checked on her and she has moved BACK to the green shell. This is not normal (I think) Logan is mad because she has pinched him twice. What should we do while we camp this weekend? Leave them a larger water dish?

Nina: Have you seen coconut crabs?! Google it and allow your mind to be blown. I almost threw up.

Susan: What?! They aren't the most awesome pets EVER?! I'm. shocked. First, I don't blame Loopy, the big one is pretty big and very creepy. Did the big one molt? Did you ever see the skeleton laying next to him? If he did, he will be skiddish for a little while as his new exoskeleton continues to harden. The green-shelled one has hopped a couple of times to a new shell, and then always goes back to the green shell. I bought those shells in the cage trying to find one that Princess Crab likes. Maybe that's the problem, she won't be happy unless it's blinged out. Maybe you could bedazzle one of those.  While you're camping, yes, I would just put a bunch of water in there. Leave it on a screened back porch if you have one, so the humidity stays high. Maybe wrap a lot of the screen with saran wrap, to keep the humidity high since you won't be there to spritz their high-maintenance a**es. Love them! Miss them!

Me: I never saw the exoskeleton, he never came out of the coconut. I am not going to 'bedazzle' my crabs shell, you spoiled her and now I have to de-spoil. Thanks for that. Maybe if she stops pinching people and flipping her food dish I will reward her with a newer more fancy shell from Pet Smart, right now she is a bitch.

Susan: Maybe she'd quit being a bitch if you bedazzled her shell.

Me: oh sure, I'll get right on that. What's her favorite color /eyeroll

Susan: Green.

Me: ugh.

Susan: I'm loling

Me: I'm shaking my head in disgust.

Me: Dork.

Susan: Dork lover.

Me: Guilty.

Andea: best conversation I've seen on my FB newsfeed today.

Me: If you tell me I won more fucking hermit crabs...

Joan: This made me laugh out loud ...  thanks girls, your more fun the a couple of hermit crabs:)

Candice: I love this

Me: This is what Parenthood will do to you Candice. Just a heads up, welcome to motherhood.

Heather: This is hilarious!

I haven't updated on them in a while, so here's the latest... Mrs. Crabs kept hopping from shell to shell without molting but always went back to her green sparkly one. The most recent move was into a pointy shell that makes her look quite intimidating. I took her green shell away. Mr. Crabs is also a chronic hopper and I'm not sure what shell he's in today. They drink more water than I thought a tiny thing could (or spill it) and enjoy filling their salt water dish with mulch.




Once Logan took Mr. Crabs out to show a friend and forgot about him. He was found several hours later by the sliding door under the blinds.

Oh yeah, I went up in a tiny plane!

We all had those friends in high school that were ALWAYS getting into trouble with you. I had lots of them. Come to think of it, I certainly was the common denominator...  Anyway. One of my best trouble making friends was Wendy. Oh the stories I could tell (but won't tell here for incriminating reasons) She was in town from Atlanta to photograph some race in Daytona and wanted me to come over and hang out at the track. I am morally opposed to such nonsense for reasons I won't list here. (because some people like race stuff and I don't want them to stop being my friends) She happens to know and was staying with a dude who is a pilot (in training apparently, we'll discuss that later) on  Memorial day I get this text "hey, we are thinking about renting an airplane, wanna come flying?" I think yeah, ok.. whatever. Then I get another text telling me to be down there asap, the plane is rented for 3pm. Wait, really?

Yes, Really. 

So, after we selected this pristine vessel and did all the safety checks we went flyin' around Volusia County. 

Here are the things that I consider highlights of the flight
1. We got up around Daytona Beach without incident when Scott, our pilot noticed someone (Jason, the instagram master) had not closed his door tightly. You know when you're driving down the road and notice there is a door ajar, so you open and close it real quick? Its sorta like that, only a few hundred feet up in the air.. with wind resistance.
2. We enjoyed the view over Daytona, south to Ponce Inlet to see the lighthouse and Disappearing Island and the winding waterways. It was amazing!
3. Somewhere over Deland we were enjoying some free falls and tight turns when this noise went off, LOUD in our headphones "DING!! TRAFFIC. DING!! TRAFFIC" apparently this means there is another plane really close by. We ducked and weaved and couldn't find this plane that was supposedly within a couple hundred feet of our roof. That was less awesome, but everyone loves adrenaline, that is why we are in a cessna with a dude I just met!

Once safely on the ground our Stellar Pilot Scott informed us he's never flown with people in the plane before. In hindsight I am glad he waited to tell us and I didn't ask earlier. I might have missed out on that experience. Wendy is lucky I trust her with my life. I highly recommend giving this a shot if you ever get the chance! We all went out drinking after this, it was well deserved after our first experience with airborn evasive maneuvers "DING!! TRAFFIC"

"Camping"

I say "Camping" because to me, Camping is in tents. I am not going to complain about this adventure, because it could not have been more awesome. It was planned months in advance for my friend's son Ben's birthday weekend. We rented a bunch of cabins over in Flagler Beach at Bulow Plantation. 

I got there a day later than the others because Kendal was sick. Oh, and THIS was happening. ---->

Loopy had to work Thursday and Friday so I took the kids down alone. He is also pretty sure that camping in Florida in the summer isn't fun. He sees it as an endurance test and wants no part of it. One time about 10yrs ago I got all our camping gear together for Labor Day and was ready to go. He decided he wasn't up to it and so I called Joe and who went out, got a tent and some supplies and we went without him and sweated our asses off on our own. It was hot as hell, hiking was ridiculous, the water was too warm and brain eating amoebas were taking over the lake.. but we had a good time anyway.

THIS was nothing like that. Each family had our own air conditioned cabin with bunk beads and a double bed. We brought sheets and pillows and food. Heather brought a microwave, Carol Ann brought kiddie pools and screen tents. Her brother brought more booze than we could drink in several sittings.. it was my kinda camping!



The location was stellar as well with putt putt golf and volleyball right across the dirt road. Oh, and an unoccupied cabin filled with Legos.

Our first day there the kids were playing in the "kids cabin" and jumping from bed to bed, wrestling around. Dylan pretended to be dead at some point during rough housing. My Hero Boy swung into action and checked for breathing. Dylan was holding his breath (for optimal effect) and Logan started CPR. Dylan came running out of the cabin coughing and spitting. Logan came out all upset because he "was just trying to save his life!" Clearly mouth to mouth is effective. I guarantee that boy will never fake death again. At least not with Logan around.

Kendal was fighting a fever and had allergy issues. I kept her drugged with tylenol and Clariton all weekend. She was a trooper and did very little whining. When she got hot or tired she'd go lay on her bed and watch movies on Carol Ann's portable DVD player. She spent most of the weekend putt putt golfing.

Also some bowling.. 

She was upset with Jenna the first day but they made up and played really well together.


I didn't see much of Logan. Like I said. There was an entire cabin designated to LEGOS and boy stuff.


Loopy showed up and some of our other Palm Coast friends came out to play too. They brought guitars. Even the kids had some guitars. I LOVE when music breaks out at a campsite.

Uncle Chris and Beth over for a while. With Leah of coarse.

Trouble. 

I was intoxicated. 

Because of this:

and also Heather makes strong drinks. 

I super hope we can do this again soon. Time for some more party planning! 

Deadline

Well, I promised there'd be a blog posted by 2am and I am getting pretty close to that deadline so I'll quit for the night. There is SO much more but I'm tired and that laundry ain't gonna fold itself!