The Reunion

Riley and I have now returned from our month-long sojourn of vehicular togetherness. Over the past two and a half weeks, we have spent approximately 62 hours in a car together. First, we rode with my aunt to Utah for a week-long reunion at my Grandmas house (which Sam managed to weasel out of coming to). Then, we were home for an entire three days before we packed up again and took a family vacation to South Padre Island. ANd the best news of all??---we are doing the Utah trip one more time in just one short week for Lake Powell. Fun times, eh?

Anyway, here are a few pics from the family reunion. Stay tuned for the South Padre Island pics. I'll post them tomorrow (or whenever I get around to it).

The Guitar Heroes


Riding in Gramps' convertible
Construction Workers


After a Hard Day's Work
Playing with the relatives

The Traditional Eating of the Smores

On the way home, my aunt and my cousin decided we were going to stop off at one of the random prairie dog towns you can buy your way into on the Great Plains. We paid $9 for admission, and our money bought us a chance to:

1- Step in lots of prairie dog poo.
2-Feed the goats
3-Take a gander at the only living, six-legged cow in the world. I feel sorry for her, don't you? Look how she's hanging her head in shame. "Stop looking at me already. I know I'm a freak, you know I'm a freak, why can't you people just leave me alone??"
4- See the biggest prairie dog in the world. I hate to bust your bubble, but it's a statue.

And while I was muttering under my breath the whole time about the ridiculous admission prices, Riley seemed to be having quite the grand ol' time. And I guess that's all that matters.

More of the Same

We went camping again last week, because let's face it: When you're poor and desperate to go somewhere, there just aren't that many options, especially in Oklahoma.

But lest those of you out there are thinking, "Great, another lame camping post," don't worry. Apparently, weird things happen to us when we go camping, and I plan to tell you all about it. Last camping trip, we drove all the way to our spot, unpacked our tent and discovered our poles were missing. Sam also got a ticket for wearing his seatbelt "improperly" and then we ended up in the middle of some sort of escaped convict manhunt.

This time, the campground where we stayed was pretty much empty. On our second night there, around 11 p.m. a truck load of teenagers pulled up and camped in the spot RIGHT next to ours. They immediately started hacking on every tree in sight with their axes. Around 2 a.m., we woke up to their music blaring and Sam decided he was going to go over there and tell them to be quiet.

When he came back, he looked a little flustered, so I asked him what was wrong. Turns out they were naked. And, well, doing the sorts of things that drunken naked teenagers do on camping trips. Anyway, I'll spare you the details but needless to say it freaked me out and the rest of the night I didn't sleep because I kept imagining they were going to come and murder us in our tent.
Other than some sort of hour-long, break-up brawl, the rest of the night was pretty uneventful and we took secret delight in letting Riley's hoarse yet still unbelievably loud little voice wake them from their drunken stupor at 7 o'clock in the morning.

This trip taught me two important things.

1- When it comes to camping, I'm in it for the food. Why is it everything tastes so much better when it's cooked outside? I made the best shiskabobs I have ever made, out of the two total times I've cooked those things during my lifetime.

2-I have let the TV become a surrogate parent to my child. All Riley wanted to do the whole time we were there was watch TV. Luckily, I managed to find some dangerously-sharp shiskabob sticks for him to play with. Do you think I kid? Here's the picture to prove it.
Riley kept trying (unsuccessfully) to bore holes in the rocks with those sticks. And then we used them to fashion a "Tower of Power" for the Backyardigans, so he could re-enact his favorite video, which we both have memorized. Then, he conveniently left the stick right under our tire, successfully puncturing it and necessitating the purchase of a new one. Who knew shiskabob sticks had so many uses?

More random pics of our adventure:







P.S. Oklahoma is pretty. I'm not kidding.

Newsflash

Drumroll please.

After my ultrasound today, the doctor notified Sam and I that McMurry baby numero dos is going to be a....................

BOY! (probably).

The doctor was 95 percent sure and I guess he would know what he's talking about since he's been looking at ultrasound machines since 1980. His office machine was on the fritz though and none of the pics he took looked much like a baby to me.

I still remain ever so slightly unconvinced about the baby's gender, mostly because I don't want to swallow my pride and admit my so-called mother's intuition was not so intuitive after all.

I'm having a second ultrasound in a week or two on one of the hospital's heavy duty machines, so I guess they can finish convincing me then.

Helping Hands

I am happy to announce that all those lessons about the importance of cleaning up messes are finally sinking into Riley's little noggin.

Observe: Riley's yogurt and cereal spoon, neatly placed back in the silverware drawer after use. WITH the yogurt still on it.


Maybe I don't really want him to learn to pitch in and help after all.

Big Rigs

Just some fun pictures from when Riley and I went to this big truck show in Jenks a couple of weeks ago. They let all the kiddies climb into the ambulances, firetrucks, diggers, semis, etc. and pretend like they were driving. Riley loved it! My favorite part was that they let any of the hundreds of children there blast the horn and turn on the shrieking sirens ANY TIME they wanted. No wait...that was the worst part.

Riley and Tressa, a friend from church.

Mmmmm.....Ice Cream.

Officially announcing

I realized today that I haven't yet made the official announcement. And since I can no longer hide my pot belly, I figured now is probably a good time to make sure you've all heard the news: I'm getting fat. And also, I'm pregnant.

I'm three and a half months along and had my first doctor's appointment last week. Apparently, it takes a long time to get your medicaid case worker to answer your phone calls here in Oklahoma. I've discovered the secret though--On the 20th voice mail message you leave, burst into uncontrollable tears and mumble something about some sort of unfounded concerns you're having. Double bonus: your hysterical phone call may also qualify you for free psychiatric care!

Anyway, I'll probably find out if I'm having a boy or a girl at my next appointment in a few weeks. I'd be perfectly thrilled with either of the two, but must admit to having some hopes that baby number two will be slightly more mild-mannered than Riles.

Playin' Catch Up

Pardon the month long abscence in posts. We've had a lot going on here at la casa de McMurry.
The newest and grossest thing (which you may or may not want to read about) is that Riley's body has been invaded by a throw up monster. Riley walked into our room at about midnight Thursday night and proceeded to puke all over our bed. I was up with him all night long, and let me tell you, I had no idea that it was physically possible for that much vomit to come out of one kid's mouth.

His timing, as always, was impeccable. I was supposed to leave the next morning for Oklahoma City with some friends from church for a weekend of eating out and then eating out some more, staying in a hotel, and going to these wonderfully inspirational and possibly slightly intimidating classes about how to be a good mom (I' m a little confused about why they didn't ask me to teach those, by the way.) Anyway, that didn't happen. Instead, I stayed home and washed every blanket in our entire house at least three times.

Today is Tuesday, and the kid is still kind of sick. We thought he was feeling better, so we sat him at the table to eat with us last night. He took three bites of his soup and well....lost it. All over the table. And some of it splashed into my soup bowl. If any of you are looking for a fabulous weight loss program, talk your kid into getting the stomach flu. It is one gigantic appetite killer.

In other news, Sam and I celebrated our birthday week earlier this month. I woke up the morning of his birthday with plans to make crepes, only to discover that was not one drop of milk in the entire house. So he got to go to school on an empty stomach. Then, on the morning of my birthday, I woke up smelling something yummy. Sam had already left for school because I was too lazy to get up to see him off. But he left me a feast of sausage, biscuts, hashbrowns and eggs. Yum! I'd say I got the better end of the deal.

My grandma also watched Riley one night AND gave us some money to go out to eat at PF Changs. It took one blessed bite for me to fall in love.



My friends also threw me a birthday bash at the park. You guys are awesome!



And the childrens all feasted on cupcakes.


I also got to go to Utah for a week to visit my fam. It was delightful, especially the part where Riley and I were stuck in the airport all day because of weather delays. And I gave him two entire packs of lifesavers to quiet him down and keep him calm. And then all the sugar went straight to his head and he started running around like Speedy Gonzalez on drugs and I had to chase him all over the place carrying both of our bags and then I started crying and my masquera dripped all over my face and then Riley's training pants leaked and he peed all over both me and the airplane seat and then he threw a 10-minute long tantrum and everyone on the entire plane was staring at us. Whew.

Anyway, other than the airport part, the trip itself was really fun. We got to go snowmobiling and I had the revelation of my life. Beavers are flippin' huge! We saw some up in the mountains and my sister actually thought they were bears. I wish I had some pictures to prove their gigantic-ness to you, but you'll have to settle for some pictures of us instead.

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?

Star Wars according to a 3 year old.

I love it.

Valentine's Day Post

My friend Natalie challenged all her blogging buddies to fill in the questions to this Valentine's day meme. And, since I'm totally out of ideas about things to blog about, I figured, why not? So here we go...

(answer these questions for you and your spouse/significant other)

1. Your Song: "More than Words" by Extreme

2. Your favorite feature of his: I love his brown eyes and brown skin. I have always been insanely jealous of people who have nice brown skin because I never tan. I always am and always will be one of three possible colors: red, white, or splotchy.

3. His favorite feature of yours: My eyes and my smoking hot body (I added the second part myself because I thought eyes were too boring).

4. What drives you crazy about him (not the good stuff): He's very particular about where he wants to keep his stuff, and it's usually in places that I think are absolutely ridiculous. Like one time, when we were first married, I was setting out my cute little homey knickknacks on our bookshelf. He came over and plopped his wrench set right in the middle of everything and was blown away that I didn't want those wrenches right in the middle of our framed photos. He wanted them in plain sight so he'd always know where to find them in case of some sort of crazy wrench emergency.

5. What drives him crazy about you: It's remotely possible that I am occasionally a little moody. And I steal all the covers at night and kick him in the shins. Or so he says.

6. Favorite trip you've taken together: Definitely our trip to Kauai last April, sans Riley. It was awesome! I discovered that I married a surfer boy at heart. Our honeymoon trip to Playa Del Carmen, Mexico was pretty great too.

7. How do you picture your lives in fifty years: Well, hopefully we'll be rich (or at least have our millions of dollars in students loans paid off). Why else would we both be suffering through this lousy medical school business? I envision that we'll have traveled a lot, since it's something we're both passionate about, and have made some life-long family memories in the process.

8. What was your worst fight over: Once, I tried to throw out a bunch of his old holey shirts and millions of pairs of shoes and some stuff from high school that I felt like was a bunch of junk. He wasn't too fond of me deeming his treasures as junk.

9. Most romantic thing he's ever said to or done for you: A year or so after we'd been married, I came home to find the apartment completely cleaned and decorated. He had set up a table with some candles and even made me dinner. Granted, his idea of making dinner was to cook ramen noodles, drain out the juice, then add a can of beef stew and some scrambled eggs. Random huh? I remember saying, "Hon, this is...ummm...good. I'm just wondering if you've had this particular culinary combination before." His answer was, "No, I was just thinking about it and it sounded really good to me." Surprisingly, it didn't taste half bad.

I also love, love, love the way he proposed to me. He wrote me the most beautiful song ever and drove me up into the mountains to play it for me. He had been working on the song for months and actually pre-recorded himself singing and playing a second part on the guitar. So, when he proposed to me, he sang the song himself and turned on the prerecorded tape, so he was harmonizing with himself. It was awesome.

10. Favorite "down time" activity: We love to exercise together and go to movies.

11. What celebrity most reminds you of him: Everyone always says he looks like a smaller version of Tom Welling (If Tom Welling has brown eyes and darker hair that is.)

**Bonus** post one of your favorite pictures together

This isn't necessarily my fave pic, but it's a fun one from our trip to Hawaii. I was too lazy to dig through our stuff to find my absolute favorite.

Food, Glorious Food

For the past six months, Riley has been turning up his nose at 99.9 percent of EVERY. SINGLE. THING. I make. He'll take one, snobbish glance at whatever it is that I sit on the table and say, "EWWW Mommy, Caca!" And if I ever trick him into opening his mouth to shove in a bite of food, he spits it out in half a second. It's simply delightful, and it's starting to give me quite the complex about my cooking skills.

Right now, Riley is being kept from wasting away entirely by a mere half-dozen foods (which I sing praises to on a daily basis). 1-McDonald's hamburgers and fries (I guess he's a fan of the fake meat) 2-Corndogs 3-Cheese and crackers 4-v-8 Fusion (I love this stuff--it's how I get those veggie servings down him) 5-Yogurt 6-Oatmeal, granola bars, cereal, and bread (he's a fan of carbs). Pretty appalling, huh?

Needless to say, I'm always on the lookout for recipes that have a litte more substance in them and that Riley will actually eat. That's why I was so excited to find this pancake recipe on my friend, Diane's blog.

1 cup rolled oats
1 cup cottage cheese
1/2 of a bananna (i actually put in nearly a whole)
3 eggs
1/4 tsp vanilla
1/4 tsp cinnamon

I modified the recipe just a tiny bit and put in about 1/4 cup of brown sugar and 1/4 tsp salt.

Blend everything up in a blender. Then, cook on a buttered griddle.

I topped them with some strawberries and whipped cream--Give 'em a try! They're super tasty and Riley actually ate them, which is always a plus. Because let's face it. Anytime I make him a snack that he refuses to eat, I end up snarfing down the whole thing myself.

The Ins and Outs

Riley has been remarkably well-behaved lately. His tantrums are down to the bare minimum of one or two (or three or four) per day, sharing is now occasionally a feasible concept, and his words are actually starting to sound like, well, real, English-language words. Within the last couple of weeks, Ee-I-E-I-Os has become McDonald's and putnos are now blankets. And as eager as I've been for him to start talking like a real person, I'm now pretty darn sad that his baby lingo is starting to go out the window. (I know, I know, decide what you want already, lady).

After reading over my blog one night, I realized that 90 percent of all my entries are entirely based on Riley and his savagery. Hey, you've got to stick with material that works, right? Stories about how Riley flung his food against the wall at a dinner party are definitely more exciting than stories about how he sat on the couch for an hour and watched TV.

But, lest some of you out there are starting to think my child has no redeeming qualities whatsoever, I thought I better focus for at least a couple of paragraphs on the sweet things Riley does every day that absolutely melt my heart. Don't worry though. We'll continue to our regular programing of savagery, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, at the end of this very post.

First, for the sweet stuff. Every time I stub my toe or drop a pan full of food upside down in the oven or slam my elbow in the car door (those things all happen much more often than you would think possible around here), Riley immediately runs up to me with the most concerned face possible and says, "I'm sorry mommy, I'm sorry mommy!"

Earlier this year, at the state fair, a giant statue of a driller man that haunts our town as a monument to the oil gods was clothed in a huge t-shirt as part of the fair promotion. They took the shirt off the statue after the fair, and every single one of the hundreds of times we've driven past the statue since can be met with Riley's cries of "Uh-oh mommy! Uh-oh! His shirt! His shirt! Man so cold." If it weren't for all of the stealing of toys from helpless, smaller toddlers, I would swear Riley has all the makings of a great humanitarian.

Riley also does this completely adorable thing where he cuddles up to me, puts his little hand behind my ear, and then pulls my face close to his. It's pretty hard to resist.

But, resist I must, because now it's time to move on to talk of more savagery.


The other day when I was in the shower (that's the most dangerous time of day), Riley crumbled up an entire box of graham crackers and put them in the driver's and passenger's seats of every one of his dozens and dozens of toy cars. Well, and why not? Graham crackers occasionally want to go for car rides, too.


Next exhibit:


Riley flushed all my makeup that was conceivably flushable down the toilet. Then, he drew all over himself with my eyebrow pencil and looked like a goth for three days because that stuff was darn near impossible to scrub off.


The great thing about having Riley around is that every day really is an adventure. There are the ins, and then there are the outs, but I wouldn't trade either of them for anything.

The Anti-Blogger

So, as you can probably judge given the fact that my last post was a month ago, I have been in a serious blogging funk lately. Don't be too shocked here, but I even debated giving up blogging entirely. And out of guilt for these feelings of infidelity, I haven't checked any of YOUR blogs for the past month either.

So what's been filling my time these last few weeks, now that I'm not blogging nine hours a day? Crossword puzzles. Yep. That's right. I am now a crossword master. And I was happy with my new status in life. But then I realized something: Being addicted to crossword puzzles is even MORE boring and MORE pathetic than being addicted to blogging. So, I have repented from my wayward-ness, and here I am again!

I guess I should start with a few catch-phrase re-caps of Christmas break. Hubby's broken collarbone induced by close contact with a ski slope. Wife going crazy because hubby can no longer change diapers, help with the dishes, or dress himself. Flight delay caused by Colorado Blizzard. Riley's gets the croup, vomits repeatedly for two weeks because he does not understand the concept of coughing. A full-blown tantrum on the airplane because apple juice is not a viable beverage option.

Don't worry, there was plenty of great, wonderful stuff that happened too, including, but not limited to, the following: Lots and lots of yummy food, playing in the Utah snow, laughing with friends and family.

We spent the first week of Christmas break in Texas, then flew to Utah for a week. Santa was a little too generous with Riley this year and brought him his own train set which, when set up in its entirety, is big enough to require its own area code. Sam put the thing together on Christmas day, and I'm 100 percent sure it will never be completely assembled again.

Riley was thrilled by the concept of presents, and there were lots of smiles.


And lots of excited shouts.
And lots of playing with cousins.
And cuddling with Grandma.
But then, the presents were gone. And Riley started making faces that looked like this:

Only much, much grumpier. Because let's face it, no matter how much you try to drill into your two-year-old child's head that Christmas is really about giving and love and togetherness, they're only thinking one thing on Christmas morning: "Presents, presents. I've got to grab as many of those things as I can in the shortest amount of time possible!" Anyone want to guess Riley's most oft-used phrase of the holiday season? "I yan't dat putno." For those of you who no-speaky Riley-ese, putno= present.

I guess we'll have to work harder on that for next year!