How Do You Pronounce That?

Vacashun?
Vacaytun?

Vacation! Ah, yes, that's the word. It's been so long since I've had one..

...ahem...

That was so cheesy I want to die.

Moving on! Luke and I are going on vacaaaaation. To Chicago. For a wedding. By ourselves.

Sans kiddos.

And while I vacillated for quite some time about whether or not we should bring those crazy hooligans along, I ultimately decided that ummmm...nope. Sorry, guys.

Bringing a 2 and 1 year-old on vacation isn't exactly tres romantique, is it?

May can't come fast enough and my mom is a baby-sitting saint.
 .....
In other news, Finn is approximately 85% potty-trained, guys (!).

No accidents in 3 days and we've been going out every day with no diaper on. It's legit!

He's getting better at telling me every time he needs to go which means this whole business is getting a little bit less exhausting.

I've also been doing some serious research on preschools for when he turns 3 this fall.

I mean, these places have waiting lists, enrollment deadlines. I have to compare tuitions. Serious stuff! I'm waiting to find one that requires a talent show or something to get in. It has to be out there.

(The thing is, his birthday is only TWO weeks after the cut-off for starting preschool at 3 kindergarten at 5. Basically, they tell me he better be pretty effing smart to start early or I can wait a year. Here's hoping he's ready to start early)

What I'm getting at is that with all these big new developments present and future, I'm feeling super-mature-mom-sy right now. And I'm loving it.

I'm not a big fan of the little baby phase (sorry, Isla...you're almost out of it :). This toddler, potty-trained, school-age stuff.

This is much better.

Speaking of Isla:

She's a great little trooper. Teething like a demon, but here's hoping she makes it through. I'm just hoping she makes it to her first birthday. The girl is a furniture climber. Climbing down? She's all about the tuck-and-roll kind of somersault. Stressful.

And Jussi? The never-mentioned hairy child of mine? She's getting huge but thankfully the weather is now warm enough for her to be outside all the time. Like big dogs should be.

Plus, we dropped some major cash on a huge dog house, so she better be outside in that thing. Gotta get my money's worth, right?

Wam. Bam.

Thank you, m'am.

(David Bowie does the best introductions, non?)

The unthinkable has happened, guys.

I was accepted. To BYU's Master's Program. For English Literature.

!!!

I seriously couldn't believe it.

Granted, it is provisional that I get a B or higher in a Critical Theory class my first year.

Critical Theory?! I am the master of critical theory, guys.

Yep, that's what I'm telling myself.

(I'm not going to lie, though...when we decided to get a dog, I did it with the conviction that I wasn't going to be going back to school and would therefore have loads of time to watch a dog while raising two kids.

I'll figure it out, right?)

In any case, I've got a standing theory that someone on the Graduate Committee was either bribed or one of my recommendations was a blackmail letter that was accidentally uploaded.

But hey! I'll take it.

So, I am the goon squad and I'm coming to town. Beep beep.

Ok, maybe David Bowie isn't always the best for this kind of stuff?

Don't be sad, Bowie. You're still cool.

Master of Mayhem. Queen of Chaos.

That's me folks.

Adding a puppy into our (my) mix has been like adding a daily and constant tornado.

Toys! Scatter them!
Kids! Knock them over!
Walks! Do them all the time, always!

At the end of the day you will find me happily passed out in coma.

A COMA.

But seriously, these kids are keeping me on toes. I swear the minute I let up, they're all going to take over the house and Luke will come home to find me tied up in a closet.

(Well, that escalated quickly.)

But to make all the kid-induced mayhem more fun more me I make Finn push me on his bike:

I'm a real slave-driver, guys.

Really, I was trying to teach Finn how to ride the damn thing and after getting a teensy bit frustrated I kicked him off to show him how the pros do it.

Done and done.

As for Finn, he's like, really getting into this potty-training business (thank goodness). The end of diapers is so close I can taste it (that was seriously the grossest way to put it. Good job, me).

We went out twice today without him wearing diapers. No accidents.

Bam.

I am so very cautiously optimistic. I am a caution cone of optimism.

And Isla? She's getting THREE teeth at once. Her first three teeth ever. I'm like, really? Reallllly? I was sleeping for once and now you get three teeth? Great. The weirdest part is they're the same random top, side/fang teeth that Finn got first. Whatever, vampire baby.

But I dare say she is almost walking on her own.

How cute is that chubby little face? And she is such a little chubster. She weighed 20 lbs at her 9 month check-up.

Well, yep that's how much Finn weighed at 12 months.

And last but not least, Jüssi. My happy, little bundle of energy. Potty trained in 1 day and sleeps mostly through the night.

Hey kids, take a hint from your hairy, adopted sister, would you?

:)

We Got a Dog. Her Name is Jüssi.

And that's about it.

Bye.

Joke! Could I leave without a smattering of details?

No. No I could not.

We got the most adorable, mellow 9-week-old, purebred black Labrador puppy. Because what's another thing to take care of and clean up after and potty train? Bring it on.

We named her Jüssi (it's Swedish. Pronounced "you-see". We're just keeping in line with our European naming strategy for our kids, ja? Plus, I'm perpetually obsessed with all things Scandinavian.).

She is a super star. No accidents,  great with the kids, my new best friend, Luke's new best friend, sleeps better than Isla.

The works.

The only problem so far is that Finn is a teensy bit unsure about her motives. He starts running, she starts chasing and it all just goes a bit pear-shaped from there.

"No Jüssi, nooooooooo"

"Its fine, Finn. She's just playing..."

"Noooooooo"

You get the idea.

They get better every day, though. Today they were practically chums. It was brilliant.

As for Isla, she loves chasing Jüssi and Jüssi just looks at me like, "Who is this bald, slow puppy? I'm gonna go lick her face and sit in her lap. Yeah."

Bonus? She's Luke's first ever dog.

How cute is that?

So cute.

But really truly, it's just like having another kid. Gotta keep her on a schedule, make sure she's fed at the right time and then I have to get up in the middle of the night for one reason or another.

Best part is that it's like having a kid you can dump outside whenever you want to. And lets face it, that's the best kind of kid to have, right?

With no further adieu...les pictures:

Damn, Prison Changed You

This post is all bits-and-pieces, just a warning. Proceed with caution:

Let me first start out by saying that Luke and I watched Pitch Perfect the other night and at first I was like, “This is so dumb, let’s watch Taken 2 (because I’m sure that will be soooo much better. Right.)”, and then 20 minutes later I was like, “This is so dumb, but it is so funny. Let’s keep watching.”

And then later that night I kicked our dresser in the middle of the night and I’m pretty sure I broke something in my foot.

A bone, perchance?

Either way, the top of my foot is black, blue and gnarly.

Way to go.

I can still run. Which means my sanity will remain relatively intact.

But you know what is super cool and not at all gnarly? The fact that Isla slept through the night for the FIRST. TIME. EVER.  Eight and a half months in and it was the first time I’d had a five hour stretch of sleep.

Isla, you’re killing me, smalls.

The fact is, both kids prefer sleeping in our bed…who can blame them? I’m a snuggler and they can’t get enough of it. But I’ve set my snuggling tendencies aside and they’ve both been kicked to the proverbial curb and are sleeping in their own beds all night for the last month or so.

I’m the new sleeping tsar. A sleeping dictator. A sleeptator!

I don’t know, just go with it.

 

Finn loves our bed. He can’t get enough of it, as you can see.

He also loves dragging Isla around by the back of her shirt…its fine on the tile because she slides…but carpet? Not so much.

...

And now for something completely different!

Does anyone else get annoyed when some random person always (always) parks in front of your house/dwelling blocking half the street because they can’t park for shit AND they’re going to a house that’s  relatively far away but also has ample parking in front of it?

Because this has been happening over here and I’m not quite sure how to deal with it.

I’ve contemplated putting a note on her car saying “Stop parking in front of our house. It’s weird”.

I’ve thought about writing a letter impersonating the city.

Last, but certainly not least, I’ve paying off the snow plow guy so he'll 'accidently' plow the car since there's barely enough room for him to get by now anyway.

Ahem.

The worst part is that people have asked me if that’s our new car…and the car is pretty ghetto. So that’s embarrassing.

The passive-aggressive part of me hopes she’ll just read this blog and get the hint. I don’t know her, but maybe she’s stalking me?

And there you go folks, one of the most slapdash blog posts yet. I hope you all enjoyed and were confused by it. And to cap it off, here are my little kiddos being friends:

 

Like A Rolling Stone...Something Like That.

Here are some things...in bullet point format (because times they are a changing. At least for this post):

-I'm currently watching Pretty Little Liars, eating a HUGE Kneader's chocolate cake, AND talking to the TV. I'm the coolest.

- I submitted my grad school application yesterday and all of my recommendations were submitted today (!).

-The most awkward part of this whole application process? Having to literally beg professors who barely know me to write something good about me. Once again, I'm the coolest.

-Finn is ridiculous. His latest ridiculousness includes asking to watch the news on TV in the morning and yelling "Come back, Isla!" at the top of his lungs any times Isla goes anywhere. And anytime we go down a hill in the car he puts his hands in air and yells "weeeeeee!"...I may have taught him that one. Or maybe I already did that every time we went down a hill and he just caught on. Semantics.

-He's (strangely) getting very polite and says "Thank you, mommy" every time I give him something. It's weird. He even likes to hold Isla's hand and say "Don't worry, Isla" when she cries. Who is this kid?

How cute is this boy?!

BFF's...and football fans, apparently.

-And the most ridiculous of them all? Isla. She is seriously crawling up stairs. And walking while holding on to the couch. She pulls herself up on everything. She's nuts. I can't handle it.

(I lied. I can totally handle it. But really, I have to close the door to the stairs or else she's off like a rocket)

How cute is this girl?!

-I'm treadmill training for a half-marathon (or will be until its not negative whatever degrees out at 6 in the morning). So that sucks. I can read while I run but then I go too slow. Or I can try and watch TV but then the earphones shock my ears and I swear really loudly. But I did just got a new ipod...let the swear-free training begin!

-Ever since watching Les Mis a few weekends ago I've kind of been hooked on listening to the 25th Anniversary London cast soundtrack (it brings me back to my childhood when my mom listened to that CD ad nauseum).

Anyway, now teaching colors has taken on a whole new level...Hey Finn, what color is that?...Red. Nope, its the blood of angry men. What about this color?...Black. Wrong again! Its the dark of ages past.

Get it right, Finn!

-Now I'm eating Finn's fruit snacks and the 700 Club has come on TV and I haven't changed the channel. Things are getting pretty sad over here. Someone please come save me!

Bonne Année!

Welcome friends, to our New Year's rundown.

With no surprise, and for the umpteenth time, I fell asleep before midnight on new year's eve. The big surprise? Luke fell asleep before me.

For twenty minutes, I was the coolest person in our house. Stayin' up like a boss. That's right.

Please disregard the fact that I was staying up because I was piecing another beast of a quilt. That kind of takes away from the cool factor, right?

In any case, before my riveting night of quilting, Luke and I were afforded the rare and glorious opportunity to go see a movie.

We saw Les Miserables.

I've cried less at a funeral.

That's a fact. I was bawling and Luke was smirking at me while I did so. Rude.

I consider myself quite the Francophile, so the fact that I wasn't running down the street yelling, "Vive la France!!!" after the movie was quite the testament to my restraint. It was brilliant.

I am now currently reading the unabridged book... in French (the last part of that sentence is entirely untrue). 1800 pages, baby. Bring it on.

Perhaps this new burst of literary ambition has something to do with the fact that I am about 2 days away from finally submitting my application to the English Master's program at BYU.

It's like I think that maybe the deciding committee is watching me and if they see me reading some piece of garbage they'll be like, "Nooo waaay". But if they see me reading unabridged Les Mis, I'll be a total shoe-in.

This all makes sense in my head.

As for the kiddos? They don't really care that it's a new year.

I don't even think they've made any resolutions.

Except for Finn...he's trying to get buff like Shaun T when we do Insanity workouts on the mornings when it snows and I can't escape for a run: