A case of the grumps . . .

Today I have a bad case of the grumps. It started last night when I was watching the news and saw that we're already being given a heat advisory and are expected to hit the 100's in the next few days. Yuck. I was enjoying the weather so much! A couple nights this week it was even chilly! Then there were 2 days when the wind was blowing so bad that I thought my house was going to be sucked up into the land of Oz. Sounds odd, but I loved it. Now it's back to that good old Arizona heat. Again I say, yuck.

I also finished my book (Stephenie Meyer's The Host), which makes me sad. I really liked it, but now I have nothing to read. I just love a good book! I will stay up until 1:00 in the morning reading a book until I finish it. It's so much better than the crap they have on TV. Unfortunately, now I have to go find another book to read and I have a hard time picking one out. You never know what you're going to get. I'm always afraid I either won't like it or it will have something naughty in it. I usually end up re-reading my favorites (Harry Potter, Twilight and now The Host).

I was also disappointed in the Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian movie. Randy and I went and saw it the other day. It was good, but it was quite a bit different from the book. I never like it when they differentiate from the book. Oh, well. It was still entertaining.

Good grief, I'm such a whiner. It might have something to do with a lack of sleep and an energetic 20 month old. I had to sub in the nursery again today, which always leaves my nerves feeling very frayed. My husband had to teach the gospel principles class, so he wasn't there. I'm disappointed I couldn't go listen to his lesson and support him, but your calling comes first I suppose. Anyway, we had 14 kids in our class. All 18 months old. We had a major poop accident (I literally had to carry the kid to sunday school by the wrists, looking for his parents, because he had pooped up the back of his clothes. I felt like everyone gave me the evil eye when I interrupted the lesson!) Then there was a bunch of hitting and crying (most of it done by my child). For some reason, Cooper was really attached to Randy today. Usually he's a mama's boy, but today he didn't want anything to do with me. The last half hour of nursery he sat at the door crying "Daddy! Daddy! Daddy, bye!"

Anyway, add it all up and you've got a nice case of the grumps. Luckily, I think my case is fairly mild and I should be back to normal by tomorrow. My symptoms are already starting to lessen. :)

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day to all you mothers out there! I hope everyone had a marvelous day! Especially my mom and my mother-in-law. I love you guys! Thanks for all you love, support and advice. I had a pretty great mother's day myself. My husband bought me the new Stephenie Meyer book The Host. I just started reading it and so far so good. I was a little hesitant to read it because it has kind of an "aliens from another planet" theme, but so far it's pretty good. And I loved the Twilight series, so I'm betting this one will be pretty good, too. We spent Saturday shopping at the new Kohl's by our house and then went and had frozen yogurt with our friends at The Golden Spoon. Yum! On Sunday we went to our Sacrament meeting and then headed out to Glendale to spend the afternoon with my mom and the rest of my family. After a delicious roast dinner made by my mother we walked down the street to see the goats. Cooper had a blast feeding them leaves from the trees. I'm going to have to take him to the zoo one of these days before it gets too hot. He'd love it!

Anyway, I want to say 'I love you' to my mom and thank her for all that she does for me. I'm so happy to be a mother myself and I hope that I can be as good a mom to Cooper as she is to me and my sisters. Thanks for setting such a great example for me, mom. Happy Mother's Day!

Always & Forever

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

May Day

I can't believe that it's May already! Holy cow! The weather has been so nice here in Arizona the past month or so, I guess I didn't realize how close to summer we are. Staying home makes me lose track of what day it is, too. All I know is that it's Monday if Dancing with the Stars is on and Tuesday if the results show is on. After that it's all kind of a blur. Not that my days aren't jam packed with fun and action. . . .

Here's Cooper sticking his mac & cheese in his nose. Don't ask me why!

While I was doing the dishes Cooper was shredding my brand new box of tissues. Good thing I got the Target special.

More of the tissue mess . . .

Cooper is getting really good at folding his arms. He even does it during prayers now!

Randy was made a ward missionary this past Sunday (thankfully, I was not). We're still in the Nursery, though. In fact, we had to substitute Cooper's class. I didn't realize how good we had it with the 2 1/2 - 3 year-olds. The 18-months are utter and complete chaos and my son was right in the thick of it. I tried to give the lesson we were assigned (it was on bugs and birds), but I think I got as far as "Our lesson today is on bugs--" before someone threw a toy and someone else screamed. It was all downhill from there. On a less chaotic note, I heard about the new temples they are going to be building in Gilbert and the Gila Valley and I'm so happy. I can't wait. Of course, this means that my husband is even more determined to move us to Thatcher. Sacrifices must be made, I guess! :) j/k.

San Diego Temple

I really like this picture. It's probably my favorite temple, even though I've only seen it from afar.

Pease!

So, Cooper has a new phrase that he uses all the time.

Pease, Mommy!

It's so hard to tell him no when he looks up at you with those big blue eyes and starts pleading "pease, pease, pease!" (Which, in case you aren't sure, means please). He knows that he'll get his way if he says please and he uses it to the best of his little 18-month-old ability. I never thought I would have a hard time telling my kid no, but there it is. I have a hard time getting after him when he folds his arms, too. He just started going to Nursery this month so we've been working on folding our arms. Now he walks around the house folding his arms. I started to get after him the other day for climbing into the pantry, but I stopped mid-sentence because he came out of the pantry with his arms folded. It took all I had not to laugh. What a kid! He's also gotten into this phase where he likes to pinch people on the bum. It's funny when he does it to daddy. It wasn't so funny when he pinched the bottom of the lady I baby-sit for. It was actually quite mortifying. Oh, well. She'll understand someday when her son is running around pinching people on the bum. :)

Clueless

Do you ever have one of those days where you just feel totally clueless? I'm having one right now. I swear having kids fries your brain. It did in my case anyway. I had to take Cooper to the doctor today for his 18 month well visit. Of course, that means he had to get a shot. Just one, thank goodness. For some reason, he was really clingy at this appointment. Usually I have to chase him all over the doctor's office to prevent him from walking into some other patients room, climbing into the fish tank, or sticking a thermometer in some poor kid's ear, but today for whatever reason he wouldn't leave my side. He had his arms around my neck in one of his incredible Hulk grips. It took both the doctor and myself to get him to lay down on the table (I should mention that he's in the 90th percentile for his weight and the 97th for his height. He's a big boy). I hate the well visits almost as much as Cooper. There has never been a time where I have felt so wretched as when I am holding my son down on the table in the doctor's office so the nurse can give him a shot. He knows it's coming and he just looks at me like, "why are you letting her do this to me? You're my mom!" And I have to smile and tell him it's ok. Yeah, right. Like getting a sharp piece of metal jabbed into your thigh is ok. Anyway, after some screaming and many tears (his and mine) we were leaving the doctor's office, lollipop in hand. Of course, when we reached the car Cooper no longer had his lollipop. Where could it be? Why, on the back of mommy's sweater of course! There it was, stuck to my left shoulder like some evil little sign telling the world "if she only had a brain . . ." I can only imagine what I must have looked like standing there in the parking lot of the doctor's office, twirling around like a dog chasing it's tail as I tried to pry the sucker from my sweater while my son stood next to me screaming bloody murder because his mother took his sucker. After I got Cooper in the car and the sucker detached from my sweater we set off for home, only for me to realize that I'm driving in the wrong direction. Like I said, clueless.