Dirty Rice

Its only early winter and we have a foot of icy snow and sub-zero temperatures outside, so I'm already resorting to my best sanity savers.

This one is a favorite of the boys. I spread a blanket on the floor, and pour some rice on a cookie sheet.

 

 They find their favorite creatures and utensils to play with.

And when they are finished I pour the rice into its special "dirty rice" container to be used again on another day. The rule is that any rice on the floor gets swept up and thrown away and when all the rice is gone that's the end of it. No more rice.

This rice has lasted us a couple years--the threat has been enough for Bentley to be careful with it. But with Lincoln playing it may not last much longer.

Let it Snow

 Knee deep snow and a little sunshine.

 

It's all fun and games until someone gets cold!

Amelia, Amalia

The day before Deidra and Chris learned what their little nugget was I asked Chod, "What if they have a girl and they steal my name?"

You see, Deidra and I have been fighting over Amelia Grace for a long time with the agreement of the first one there gets to use it. Amelia and Grace were 2 of our great grandma's and Chod had a great, great grandma named Amalia (A-mah-li-a), so I figured we had double reason to use the name.

I guess to comfort me Chod said, "That's okay, she can have Amelia. We'll name our girl Amalia."

Cause that wouldn't cause confusion.

Giving Dad a Complex

Bentley and Lincoln were running around the house this morning, singing Jingle Bells.

At least the jingle bell part--they don't know the rest of the words.

Chod joined in. And as far as singers go he is one of the better ones I know.

Then Bentley turned to him and asked, "Please don't sing. You. hurt. my. ears."

And I think an ego was bruised.

So I stepped in with, "Even if you don't like Dad's singing it isn't nice to say it hurts your ears. You could have just asked him to stop singing."

Chod followed that with "but does it really hurt your ears?" (it was obvious he was hurt and a little shocked)

And Bentley sat glancing back and forth between us. Trying to decide if he should be honest or nice. You could see his little brain working. Nice. Honest. Nice. Honest.

He ended up following Thumper's advice and not saying anything at all, but that did little to ease Chod's concern.

Who needs a puppy?

Chod stayed home sick yesterday, and Lincoln insisted on wearing undies. We let him wear undies when he wants. Some days we are successful and others not so.

Lincoln told Chod that he was wet. Chod asked where he had peed and Lincoln showed him.

"My shoes! Holy shoot Linky, you're worse than a dog!"

Our Boodle

I suppose it's okay to be demanding if you are stinking cute.

Let's take Lincoln for example. He likes to wake up, sometimes in the middle of the night, sometimes in the morning, and as he is laying in bed yells, "Mom hold me! Mom? Mom hold me! Mom? I love you Mom!" And when his mom doesn't respond he moves onto to yelling, "Dad! Dad hold me! I love you! Dad hold me!" And it continues until one of us caves.

Stinking cute I tell you.

How to get the lowest possible rate

I'm pretty sure there's a note attached to all of our accounts. One that says "this lady is cheap". And if there isn't, there should be. Especially Comcast.

Chod thinks internet is highly overpriced, and I have many things I could spend the extra money on every month. So I call Comcast often, just to check and see if they are running any specials I'm not aware of. Often they are.

We've currently dropped our internet speed to the lowest they offer (1.5 Mbps), for $24.95 a month. And while we would both appreciate a faster speed, waiting a second or two for a page to load doesn't kill us.

Quest just made a courtesy call to see if they could save us any money on our phone bill. And like always, the caller found out we have the bare minimum they offer and I'm pretty on top of knowing how it all works.

Would you like to add Direct Tv? I'll pass.
Want to save $5 a month on your cell phone bill? Nope.
Internet for an introductory $19.99 rate for our 1.5 Mbps rate + $100 VISA card? Don't we have to buy the $99 modem to work with our Mac?
That really depends on what operating system you're running. OS X.
No, which version of Windows are you running. We don't run Windows.
Well then yes, you'd need the $99 modem. No, thanks.

As soon as I was off the phone with Qwest I'd dialed 1-800-COMCAST and using my info from Qwest asked to see what they could offer. And I ended up with a 6 month introductory rate of $19.99 for their 12 Mbps speed. Which is $5/month less than the 1.5 Mbps speed we currently have.

And they can expect another phone call from me in 6 months.

My house is bigger than your house

Today, Bentley told me that he wishes we would move.

Into a teeny tiny little house.

Because he is tired of having to live in a big huge house.

So there.

Tis the Season to be Thankful

I'm a quick pray-er. If we're in a hurry, I'm the go to. But Bentley. Wow. Not so short. Lincoln finishes his lunch just by sneaking bites during the prayer.

The entire prayer is being thankful for his iPad game. All of these animals and machines are part of his game -- except for the strawberry cow. It doesn't even exist in the game, but he really wants one. He only gets to play the game once every couple of days when he cashes in his marbles for precious iPad time. But because of this game he's insisting we get a cow so we never have to go to the store for milk again....

Whopee-ti-yi-yee

We'd like to thank Tammy and Linda for making our FHE a little more special.

Lincoln sported his hat in all different directions and worked his way up to the front of the wagon. Tameka says its the best seat in the house.

Let's note that Lincoln  much prefers to be on the end of the horses. They are big and scary up close.

Oh, and we'd like to thank this guy too--the driver.

Thanks Ty we had a lot of fun!