The World Needs More Trophies

I've read many posts and articles debating the practice of giving every kid a trophy, even when they lose. I've always seen the valid points of both sides but leaned more towards the tough love side. If you win, you win, if you lose, you lose. Suck it up and deal with it, right? Well, in this case I think I've changed my mind.

See this smile? This is just minutes before the start of Pablo's Pinewood Derby race. See the excitement, the hope, the confidence?


And we were all excited for him. And we all had our fingers crossed, hoping he would have better luck than last year. Alas, he once again came in dead last for every race. Poor guy. But he held it together (even though I could see him clenching his fists and mentally willing himself to not cry or run away). Last year when this happened his consolation prize was a paper certificate and a mini candy bar. It wasn't very consoling, but it was better than nothing, right?

Well, this year they gave each kid on of these amazing little trophies on stone bases, and they are even going to get an engraved name plate to put on it.

Pablo, who moments before had a face filled with pain, ran up to me with a big smile and showed me his trophy. I commented on how great it looked and he said,

"Yeah, the winners got bigger trophies. This trophy might be tiny, but I think it's a good, strong trophy." And then he gave me a big long hug and said, "Now I need to build a trophy case!"

And I think he totally deserved that little-but-strong trophy because I don't know if I could have come in dead last 6 races in a row without running away to cry in a closet somewhere. Pablo, you are one tough kid. I'm so proud of you.

And of course we went out for ice cream to celebrate the big evening. =)

Now, do any of you have some good tips on how to improve a pinewood derby car (that doesn't involve a premade kit or the parents doing all the work)?

The Sunday Nap

A typical day at church for the Ice Cream family:

(Pablo takes advantage of the quiet to draw without disturbances)

I've had several people ask me for advice on how to keep kids quiet at church. I've tried many things through the years, cheerios, hand puppets, coloring books, magnet sets, etc. I think I've finally stumbled on the perfect reverence solution. Let your kids stay up till Midnight watching cartoons and then wake them up at 6am Sunday morning. The only downfall to this is if you have a loud snorer. Cheeks snores louder than a rumbling volcano. And he drools.

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!!!

There is an ooooold joke that everyone likes to tell in Rexburg, Idaho that goes like this:

You know how Rexburg was founded, right? Well, the pioneers were trying to get to Oregon when a giant wind storm stopped them in their tracks. They had to stop and set up camp and wait for the wind to stop before moving on. But the wind never did stop...

These are some goofy photos I took of Monster Man trying to stand still in one of Rexburg's wind storms.



Yeah, it can get pretty windy.

Pardon Me Boys....

is that the Pennsylvania Station?

It was a cold, windy day at Gettysburg Field. We climbed this watch tower to look over the battlefield and spent the rest of the day laughing about how out of shape we are. Nothing like climbing 3 flights of stairs to show your friend the real you. =)

Everyone I see asks me, "So, how was your trip?" And I smile, and I sigh, and I say, "It was absolutely wonderful." It really was. It was also surreal, sad, fulfilling, validating, fun, educational, and beyond expectation. It was not your typical meet and greet, that's for sure.

On the plane I should have been all giddy anticipation, but really I was a tight ball of nerves. I couldn't help but wonder, "Will Tiffany like me after all these years? Will we really have anything in common, will our personalities clash?" Carrying my extremely heavy carry-on through the airport I heard a little squeal before I even saw her. Before she can even reach me I scream, "You are my size!" (After the onslaught of puberty it was obvious that Tiffany and I would no longer be exact twins because she was much teenier than me. But apparently sometime in her 20s she grew an extra 2 inches and suddenly we are close to the same height. What happened to my "Little Tiffany?") Then I pick her up in a tight hug and we jump around like school girls while her husband makes it obvious that he thinks we are crazy. And we are. Crazy in love with each other, even after all these years.

I had to apologize to Tiffany because I was finally willing to admit why we had fallen so far apart from each other. It had nothing to do with her and everything to do with my insane jealousy and insecurities. You see, when I was 15-16 my older, very pretty, sister went to live with Tiffany's family for a year. I had issues with this sister... lots of issues, and I don't think she even knew I had issues with her. It was the typical ugly sister/pretty sister psycho-mess. I felt that she took everything away from me as a kid, but really she didn't. I just never spoke up for myself and she was kind of the squeaky wheel. So I wove this bizarre internal reality in my head where people could either be on my side or her side. Well then my dad got sick with cancer so my sister came back home and then Tiffany came to visit for Thanksgiving (My father's last Thanksgiving) and, can you believe it, she was nice to my sister. NICE I tell you!!! So in my twisted head (which was in terrible shape going through puberty and the slow loss of my father) she had jumped ship and swam over to the dark side. How dare she. How dare she have an inside joke with my sister after living together for a whole year. HOW DARE SHE! I was polite but suspicious of her the rest of that visit. Bless her heart, she had no idea and just assumed I was being quiet out of sadness for my father. And then for years I just assumed she was one of "those" kind of girls. You know... "pretty."

But she wasn't, and she isn't. Oh, don't get me wrong, she is indeed pretty. In fact she is cute, hot, gorgeous, and skinny all rolled into one. I could hate her just for the fact that she's had 4 kids and no stretch marks alone. But I can't. And you couldn't either if you met her. She is just too real, too humble, too loving to ever make you think of her as a "pretty." By the way, I love my sister and am so over the whole my side her side thing... really I am. =)

And so we talked. We talked and talked and talked and filled each other in on all the missing and unknown pieces of our lives. And I was shocked. Shocked because I had always just assumed that we led parallel lives, that we had the same upbringing, that I knew everything about her childhood. But I didn't. We went through many similar things in life but if you take my life's troubles and magnify them by 1000 then you have Tiffany's life. And I never knew. This is another thing I love so much about my "little Tiffany." She was always a small child, she was always kind of quiet, and she had an adorable shy little laugh, more of a giggle really. And she grew into a gorgeous, confident, sassy woman, and a caring mother, who only shows the slightest signs of the trials she has had in life. And she can cook! Her kids thought I was joking when I said I would eat her Gumbo for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Well, I proved them wrong. And she is a fantastic artist and photographer. In fact, if you take all my talents and magnify them by 1000 then you have Tiffany. I'm serious.

I fell in love with her kids who are perfect doppelgangers for my kids. She is only missing a Cheeks and I'm missing a cute little dog or we would be perfectly matched. And I even got along with her husband, surprise, surprise. (Adam, you know I love you.)

(On the Gettysburg look out tower: Lillian (a female Pablo), Tori (a tiny version of Cookie), little Sabrina who can almost out perform Sweet Terror, and Dillon who can melt a heart as fast as Monster Man and get in trouble just as fast too. I MISS YOU GUYS!!!)

There was never any awkwardness between us, and we kept saying there should be some, but there wasn't. We were perfectly content to be ourselves around each other and just love each other for who we are. See? I even let her see my MORNING FACE. GAAAAAAAAA!

(Here Tiffany and I are enjoying our very last day together by lazily staying in her super niiiiice bed all day. Ok, so really I stayed in bed and made Tiffany go through all her boxes showing me all her memory keepsakes. But ya gotta love a girl who doesn't mind hanging out in her jammies all day.)

The only down side to the whole trip was saying goodbye. I didn't expect it to be so hard. I clung to her like a little girl saying goodbye to her 6 year old best friend all over again. I sobbed like a little girl, too. Friends like us should never ever have to be apart, it just doesn't seem fair. I love you Tiffany, with all my heart. Please come see me soon.

Posting

I almost snuggled into my busted, springy, messy bed when I remembered that I didn't write a blog post for today. Oh, where is an easy meme when you need one? Hmmmm, I know! I'll browse through my photos and see if there is anything blog worthy. Hold on just a sec... Ok, here we go...

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Someone has been using my 5lb dumbells to improve his "arm bumps"

Can you say, "Stud Boy in training?"

Here is why I'm so sleep deprived these days:

Sometimes my house looks like this:

And this: (and when it does it is guaranteed that 1 million people will decide to drop in on me and come in to visit.)

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Did you know that Sweet Terror used to look like this?

And before that she looked like this:

Which is why we haven't killed her or left her at a McDonalds yet.

Ok, can I go to bed now? Thanks.

Goodnight.

400

This is my 400th post. To celebrate I'm going to get caught up with all the things I meant to post this month and didn't (because I was too busy watching every episode of Dr Who that I could possibly get my hands on).
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First up is what would have gone in our Christmas cards this year... that is IF I had ever gotten around to putting them together and getting them sent. I'm putting all the blame for my inabilities on Cheeks this year. Yup, when in a fix, always blame the baby. =)

(It only took 17 tries to get this lovely photo. Mr. Hotness didn't want me to use it because he says it is customary for the wife to be sitting. I told him he didn't get a customary wife and I would likely kill my children if we tried to take one more photo.)

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Merry Christmas!.

Another year, another baby, another bunch of Ice Cream craziness. We’ve enjoyed a year of good health, a little wealth, too much food, and lots of fun. Now, with the buyout of Mr. Hotness' bank (Washington Mutual), we are looking forward to a new adventure. Mr, Hot will be staying with the bank till the end of April 2009 as he helps with the transition. After that... who knows, we might just end up knocking on your door, asking for a place to stay. =) No worries, though, we feel fine and prepared for whatever the New Year brings. And now on to the semi-speedy family update:
Mr Hotness has been learning all about Mozart this year and is fascinated with the idea of child prodigies. And he should be, seeing as how we expect all of our children to be prodigious.
Liz would be busy getting her degree, practicing her art, working on her abs of steel, and writing her own homeschool science curriculum if she weren’t so busy being a human wash rag. All bodily functions aside she is absolutely enjoying her new baby boy and trying to savor all the little giggles and delicious baby fat before they disappear for good.
Cookie is now old enough that she has asked me to call her by her real name when we are around her friends but is still sweet enough to forgive me each time I forget.
Pablo has found a passion for comic book writing and furiously doodles in his notebooks all day.
Monster Man has learned to channel his intense strength and energy to good things and is becoming my little knight in shining armor. He loves to open doors for me and is a super big brother to Sariah and Aaron.
Sweet Terror…. *sigh* What can I say? She is the most animated and entertaining spoiled brat I’ve ever known. We would have disowned her long ago if she weren’t so stinking adorable.
Cheeks is a super pukey, drooly, cutie pie.
And, th-th-th-that’s all, folks! We sincerely hope this finds you healthy, happy, and full of love this Christmas season.

Love the Ice Cream Gang

Here is the apron Cookie painted for her teacher. She was so sad that she couldn't get it to him in time for Christmas but they missed the last 1/2 week of school due to snow closures.



I'm very proud of myself for letting her do it all herself and not being a boss-hog like I wanted to be. She did a great job.

I got a little carried away with the pipe cleaners. *blush*

We made cookies

We put some on plates to give to our neighbors but Sweet Terror ate them for breakfast before we could deliver them. Sorry, neighbors!

This is the very first year where I let the kids decorate the entire tree themselves and haven't rearranged it. There are empty spots and all the stars are on one side of the tree and the glass balls are all hanging from the bottom branches and you know what? Christmas will still come and the world will keep turning.

This is also the first year where we have put up so many lights on the outside of our house. I love it!

3 words people: Truth in advertising!

We have snow!!! And not the usual inch or two that melts the next day. We actually have lots and lots of snow and it is staying!

We also have piles of wet coats, mittens, pants and shoes scattered all over the mud room.

And we have lots of kids screaming because apparently snowball fights are never very fair.

Merry Christmas everyone! See you after the New Year.

Cheesy Update

Hi. Anyone still here? I hate when people just stop blogging without so much as a see you later, it makes me worry. So what do I do? Just stop blogging without so much as a see you later, of course. Do as I say, not as I do! Actually I've just been busy (as I'm sure everyone is right now) and I've been trying to avoid my internet addiction by keeping my computer off. It is working. I've been crafting and cleaning. Today I even made "Barbie" clothes (if I type it in quotes they can't sue me, can they?) out of some of Cookie's old clothes. I found a fun trick that takes out half the work and I'm taking lots of photos so I can blog about it later.

So, have you been dying to hear about the Nacho Party? We had a smaller group this year (had major invitation problems using evite and old email addresses) and lots more kids than usual but it was a very enjoyable evening. The kids practically disappeared thanks to my basement and our new classic Christmas television four disc DVD set. I took pictures of the food but the party was almost over and it was looking pretty messy so I'm not posting those.

These were my favorite decoration. Some wooden peppers I found for 25 cents at a yard sale that I dressed up with a gold paint pen. I don't think anyone even noticed them but I LOVE them.

Here is Cheeks the reindeer. Egads he is so cute!!! He sat in his high chair being an angel until he blew out his diaper in a major way. Luckily I was chopping tomatoes so Mr. Hotness had to do the honors.

Here Mr. Hotness is being spoiled with female attention by his babysitter and her two sisters.

Here I am with Lucy from An Ordinary Mom (can you tell that I photoshopped my double chin out? I call it digital plastic surgery. Sure, if I didn't say anything you wouldn't know, but then you wouldn't know the mad photo shop skills I have either. Botox=$300 Having Liz digitally fix her face for free=priceless). I also removed all the shiny spots from my face and hid my bra strap. I LOVE the digital age.

Mr. Hotness hanging out with his trusty pal, Jason.

My blogging buddies: 32 flavors, Shark Daddy, Lucy Van Pelt, and Lucy.

I'm not posting photos of the rest of you unless I get your permission first, but if you want me to send you the rest of the pics from that night just email me.

Well, time to get back to the sewing machine to make very very tiny fashion ensembles.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Tueday Bertday

For a girl who has been talking non stop about her Birthday since Friday, and in great detail, she sure ahd a hard time talking about it that day.

Sweet Terror is such a poser it was hard to get a picture of her with her face normal. (Jenni, can you guess where we are eating? Can you guess what I ordered. That's payback for ordering Bambinos while on the phone with me!)

We tried to find a McDonalds as Sweet Terror requested, but it just wasn't there. Really, you can ask the kids, I drove all around looking for it, but it wasn't there. We just happened to be lucky that the very delicious Bahama Breeze was nearby with my favorite Roasted Vegetable and Portobello sandwich. I like that kind of luck.

Goofy Kids (Jenni, notice that luscious tomato Cuban Bread in the corner. Yeah, it was good, real good.)

Goofy Girl had to have a napkin tied around her neck, even though her shirt was already covered in mac-n-cheese.

We tried for take 2 on the birthday discussion but didn't get much better. Then I had to turn the camera off to save poor Cheeks from all the hands. (Candace, don't you love how Ian keeps whispering in her ear?)

Senior Photos

Last week I went scrounging around in one of my yet-to-be-dejunked closets to find some old pictures to share on facebook. To my horror I found that many of my old photos were curling in on themselves and sticking together. Let's just say I'm not the scrapbooking type and I'm lazy. So, in a mad rush I have been trying to get my photos into albums and I stumbled upon these beauties. The Senior Year photo shoot. I've always said if you take enough photos you are bound to get at least one good one and I think that is the approach they took with me.

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I think I was trying to look dreamy and introspective in this one but I just look dazed and confused.

Here I am trying to look dreamy and introspective with the cheap casino strip club backdrop.




Eh, boring white.
Here we have big dorky glasses in cheap casino strip club.

I really should take those glasses off again, and maybe try a different position.

Aaaaguh! My retinas are burning! What is with the eye scorching, color clashing, eighties even though it's the mid nineties, backdrop?

This must be the "Under the Sea" backdrop. All I need are some seashell cups and to be surrounded by singing fish.

Hubba, hubba. Here is Mr. Hotness 1992 (or '93?). So cute!!!

This is my regal, high society, pageant pose. The photo package I bought came with a ginormous 11x14 hard back mounted portrait and I picked this photo for that. I thought it fitting that an obscenely large picture be of an obscenely snooty pose. I wonder what ever happened to that? I think I gave it to my boyfriend as a joke.

And after all that we finally get it right. This one is my favorite. I felt like this one captured the way I really felt about myself: casual and happy, just hangin' out.

Now you know you want to go find your senior photos, don't you? If you find them I dare you to post them. I double dog dare you!