The procrastinator

I have some dee-lightful Easter pictures for all of you. What's that you say? Easter was over a week ago? I'm just trying to spread out some extra holiday cheer by procrastinating. Easter doesn't get nearly enough attention if you ask me.

I know I'm going to win the "Bad Parent of the Year Award" for admitting this on the world wide web, but this year was the first time I bothered with stuffing eggs with candy for Riley. This is was also the first year I realized that the annoying plastic green grass that accompanies easter baskets should be banned forever and the producers of it thrown into jail. Within seconds, Riley had it scattered in every room in our house, and I'm still finding some to clean it up.

But I digress. Back to Riley....he was absolutely blown away by the concept of an Easter Egg Hunt. "What this? There are plastic eggs everywhere and they are STUFFED with candy that you're going to let me keep and actually EAT??"

It was almost too much for him to handle. He was so excited, in fact, that he couldn't even be bothered by being slowed down by his basket.



See what I mean? Using this picture and a complicated, highly scientific age-projection tool, I have managed to obtain an estimate of what Riley will look like in 20 years.

Hehe. Am I weird, or am I the only one who thinks he looks like he's totally running from the cops in that first picture?

This Easter, we were also blessed with our very own Easter miracle. For the first time in approximately two years, we have managed to get a photo of all three of us looking at the camera WITH our eyes open. Riley is not screaming or hiding his head. I do not look like a complete idiot (a major accomplishment for an extremely un-photogenic person. Sure, there's a clothesline in the background and the scenery leaves something to be desired, but we'll take it.



And here's one more pic just for funsies.

The Most Exciting Things Happening To Me Right Now

1- My toenail fell off. Out of the clear blue. And I rejoiced greatly. Those of you who have seen my toenail would agree that it's a very good thing that it fell off.

2-Miracle of Miracles, Riley is now semi potty trained. I started working with him a few months ago and it was a complete disaster. So I gave up. Then, two weeks ago, Riley just woke up one morning and said, "I wanna wear unners (underwear)." Since then, he's been going to the bathroom all by himself, with an occasional accident here and there. Drat those pants with buttons on them.

Let that be a lesson to you, my friends. If something is ever too hard, just give up and everything will miraculously work out in the end.

3- I went to the gym last week for the first time in two months. That averages out to be a $60 visit. You may now commence on judging me.

4-I am vaguely pondering the idea of planting a vegetable garden. Or hiring someone to plant a vegetable garden for me.

5- I have discovered www.pandora.com. Go check it out. It's a free program where you type in the kind of artists you like and then it creates your very own radio station.

5-I may or may not be addicted to ice cream topped with hot fudge.

Camp O' Rama

This week is Sam's spring break, so we decided to go camping for a couple of days over the long weekend. Nothing brings a family closer together like those good old camping trips..... when you throw all your junk in a smelly car, drive for two hours, arrive at a not-so-scenic, really-crowded campsite that looks nothing like the online pictures, unpack your tent ......and discover that the poles are missing.

The pole incident was the first mishap of the trip. At that point, Sam's vote was to go back home but I talked him into driving back down to the nearest town, buying a new tent, and heading to a different campsite further down south at a place near the Ouachita Mountains (Yes, that's right people, there are mountains in Oklahoma. Remember, you heard it here first).

At that point, we were greeted by a police barricade. Officers were searching every car and taking down the drivers' license and insurance information. We weren't really sure what the deal was, but the minimum security prison not too far down the road led us to draw our own conclusions. Anyhoo, after giving Sam a ticket for "wearing his seatbelt improperly" the officers waved us on to our campsite.

Luckily, we weren't murdered in our sleep by any escaped convicts and we ended up having a pretty grand old time. The trip definitely got off to a rocky start, but it wasn't anything that S'mores and tinfoil dinners couldn't cure.





The beautiful Ouchita mountains--just big enough to make me homesick for Utah.

Zoo Pals

We love the zoo! Last Saturday, the weather was nice and I convinced (read=forced) Sam to drop his homework for a few hours and go to the zoo with us. Riley was more excited about seeing the animals than in the past, though if I must be honest, I have to admit he was still far more fascinated by the various sizes and shapes of animal excrement than any of the actual animals themselves. Imagine hearing the following phrase shrieked as loudly as possible about 20 times, and you'll have a pretty good idea of how our day went: "Wook Mommy! insert name of animal here Caca! It's Stinky! Stinky!"

We loved the baby chimp!

And the other baby chimp, too!

Sam trying his best to catch rabies.

A gynormous red lollipop, his daddy, best friend chase, and various loads of animal poo to examine. What more could a little boy want?