Please pass the salt.

I guess cravings have really set in because all I want is SALT SALT SALT..
Last night I was laying in bed CRAVING a LEMON along with a Salt Shaker...(great for your teeth, I know) I didn't have a lemon so I started perusing the kitchen for something else that might kick my craving. Pickles? None. Artichoke with Aioli? Didn't want to cook it (It was 10:30 after all) Mind you this is some kind of small miracle since I had an entire cake in the kitchen and it never crossed my mind ONCE to eat it. Remember: CAKE is my favorite thing to eat IN GENERAL.

Anyway.. as I searched for something salty the only thing I could come up with was a cucumber with Rice Vinegar and Pepper all over them... Oh, and throw some pickled beats on top. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm good... What is for dinner? Something salty... oh, and a steak would be good.

I had MANY a salt craving when I was pregnant with Abby, but not so much with the boys. Maybe this is a sign...

What do you crave?

Jaxonisms

(Jaxon on his first day of Kindergarten)
Getting the kids to school is complete CHAOS. There are a million cars a million kids and a million parents all trying to get their kids to school. They are supposed to "line up" on this tiny number on the playground to get to the right class. It took me three days to find Jaxon's "number" so, today, we found the number and got in line. The line started moving and I thought... I will just walk along until he gets to his class and then, let him walk in.. I mean, I wouldn't want him to dart off and get lost or something!

About 1/2 way to his class Jaxon looked up at me and said, "Mom, can you PLEASE stop following me!"

Aww, I guess they all grow up.

I can't believe

I have a 7 year old... I mean, it seems like just the other day we went to the hospital at 6:00 in the morning for a scheduled c-section. I have never seen my husband so excited. He was like a kid at Christmas waiting for his big present!(Can't you see the twinkle in his eyes?)We would stare at her in awe... we could coo and goo at her. Not to say the others aren't as special....
But there is something so amazing about your first.Her personality is infectious..She didn't have much hair, but we "worked" what she had.
She could engage ANYONE around her and make them smile.
And she has always loved putting on a show.

When I look at her now.. sometimes it seems like it was AGES ago... and sometimes it seems like it was just yesterday. I can't believe I have a SECOND GRADER!(Abby's first day of Second Grade)
I mean, cuz, I actually remember ME at that AGE!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ABBY! MY BIG 7 YEAR OLD!

Didn't you know? Summer is OVER!

Summer has ended.. officially.. tonight. Our kids go back to school tomorrow and I have had such a hard time wrapping my brain around that fact that I forgot about Kindergarten orientation AND meet the teacher. (I stink as a parent this week)

Anyway, moving on... I decided I better post about our GREAT summer vacation to Newport Beach! It has been a summer tradition for quite some time, but this year, the G-pa and the K-lo pulled out ALL of the stops and rented a beach house for all of us to stay in. It was right on the Boardwalk where we could watch all of the beach traffic go by.
Unfortunately, it was an interstate freeway where people were traveling at 55 mph and we did have ONE incident where this guy(my nephew Carson) Got run over by a very aware and spry biker who managed to bail off his bike as they collided. WHEW! Besides.. who wants to collide with the INCREDIBLE HULK??? (I didn't get any pictures of the carnage.. but everyone was ok)

We had a phenomenal view of the ocean every day and it made me realize why people put up with the prices and traffic of So-Cal... because the weather is HEAVENLY.
I mean, who wouldn't want to walk out the front door to THAT every morning!

We hit the beach every day and had LOTS of entertainment from all of the cousins. G-pa and K-lo even figured out a way to incorporate whipping cream into the fun. The only thing we could figure out is that they had a life long dream of spraying grand kids with whipping cream and letting them run around... Click on it if you want to see the whip cream heads up close!

All of my babies had the best time. As a matter of fact, Jaxon requested just today that we pack up our bags and go to the "cool house on the beach!" A boy after my own heart...


Trust me Jaxon, all I want to do everyday is lay on the beach too....

Some must have/dos for the beach?

Surrey Rides!

The Pageant of the Masters in Laguna Beach!


An Ihome Portable Speaker set that hooks up to ANY ONE'S IPOD. (I bought mine at Costco for $29.99.

A meal at the CRAB COOKER:

And SLEEPING IN THE CLOSET..Just ask Wade. :)

Indecent Exposure

I had an appointment today with the Department of Developmental Disabilities. It was at 1:30 p.m. I forgot until he arrived and I was still in my "house clothes" (pajamas)and hadn't taken a shower yet. I guess that is ONE way to let them know "we need help!" He told me that Jaxon needed to be there. I have never done this before (we are applying for Jaxon so we can get a case worker and have some assistance with all of his MEDICAL BILLS!!!!!!!) so, I wasn't sure what to expect. I mean, was he going to interview Jaxon? Or, did he just want to make sure he was a real person? I don't know.

What I DO know is that Jaxon made one HECK of an impression when he ran in from the pool and said, "HI!!! I'M JAXON!!! I WANT TO SHOW YOU SOMETHING!" And then promptly pulls down his swim trunks exposing...well.....everything. Welp, I guess that I ONE way to prove that he has a disability..

Anyway, I guess part of the problem is Jaxon and his understanding of anatomy. We were talking later as he was getting dressed and I pointed to it (you know what) and said, Jaxon.. What is that? (I am going somewhere with this.. I was going to tell him you don't show THAT to people!) He said... "MY BELLYBUTTON!" Humph.

Hopefully we can get that anatomy straight before he starts school on Monday and flashes his "Belly Button" to a whole class full of Kindergartners.....


Oh, and MANY Thanks to Pip, Mombabe and Gabi for coming to my house tonight. It is sooooooo nice to know that my blogger friends aren't imaginary.... my husband and I have that argument all of the time. :)

CALLING ALL AZ BLOGGERS!

Do you live here? Well, if you do, I am going to have a little bloggerella party. That is right. But you gotta be quick because it is Thursday night, and famous people will be here.. I mean FAMOUS. Let me know and I will get you the dets.

:)

WORST PARENTS EVER!

I am pretty sure we should put our children up for adoption and pack it in. Yep. . . We have failed as parents. Abby lost her third tooth.. We are still on our FIRST child and she lost one of her two front teeth and guess what... The next morning I found a letter from her on the kitchen table addressed to: Dear Mom and Dad: This is what it said:



When I asked Peter what happened to the "Tooth Fairy" he said, "I couldn't find my wallet!" And he knows darn well not to check my wallet because there is NEVER any money in there! The worst part is .... she woke up to tears this morning because WE FORGOT AGAIN!

Peter insists that I lose 25 % of my brain every pregnancy (it doesn't come back) and since this is number 4, you know what that means.. I forgot to remind him, and he forgot to do it.. But, NEVER FEAR! It will be done tonight. I PROMISE!

Can we have a second chance at parenting? PLEASE???

The Joys of Scrapbooking

Marta has been the inspiration for a COUPLE of posts lately... but when I read this one, I had to pop on over to my blog and share with the world one of my FAVORITE things..

MY PUBLISHER...

My Publisher+Years of pictures stuck on my hard drive=Guilt Free, Quick and Easy "Scrapbooking" with no painstaking decisions over what paper to use.

I got married..I bought a scrapbook to scrapbook our wedding.. I put 10 pictures in it.. it has sat in my closet ever since. :) Several years ago I came across MY PUBLISHER. I am not sure where I heard about it, but I decided to make a baby book for my oldest daughter Abby. I dropped and clicked pictures to my hearts content and made her a hard bound baby book. It wasn't until a few years later that I determined this was going to be the ONLY way to get the 1,000s of pictures I had taken over the last 8 years off my hard drive and on to my coffee table. Not to mention My Publisher Books come with a sleek hard bound cover with a picture window (if you want) and they keep your books FOREVER in case a page gets torn (I buy the 11X13 size for my year books-- and the 8 x 10s for gifts) or in case you lose them in a fire etc. Perfect. You just click the button and re-print. They are PERFECT GIFTS if you keep 'em small, and you can make a book and wait until they run a promotion for 40% or 50% off and then print them ALL! (That is what I do)

My whole family is in on it now, and my mom printed a book of things she *LOVES* featuring all of her grandchildren along with other favorite things and sent it to all of her grandchildren. Perfect. So, enjoy my favorite way to get out of scrapbooking...FOREVER! :)

To see my books go to Mypublisher.com Click on My Bookshelf and enter an order number:

For My MIL's Birthday Gift of the Summer Vacation:
Your book ID # is: R506094
Your password is: 1005643

For Our Second Year of Marriage:
Your book ID # is: M509426
Your password is: 1008689

For My Gift to My MOM for her Birthday:
Your Book ID # is: M273734
Your password is: 753098

My Favorite Year in Pictures (2004:
Your Book ID # is: M239286
Your password is: 716004
(We went to Hawaii and I had a digital camera for the first time!) PS- with my earlier books I scanned pictures and put negatives to disk. The image quality isn't as good with scanning, but it worked well for what I wanted!

Enjoy! Oh, and hey, if you decide to become a MY PUBLISHER FAN... tell them I sent ya..

Lindzstew at hotmail dot com

BLOGIVERSARY ANNOUNCEMENT

Ok, I know I said I was going to do a giveaway, but since I am on Vacation.. I am going to wait until I get back to do my giveaway.. I want it to be good and proper and all... So, instead, I will make an announcement....

Remember when I was doing this and this and this???


Well, I was this:


You might ask, What on EARTH? Who is crazy enough to have a baby while they are MOVING to another STATE, and BUYING a NEW BUSINESS and under EXTREME AMOUNTS OF STRESS????? Well, I guess we are.

Blogiversary

My Blogiversary is coming up! That is right! I started blogging 1 year ago on
July 15th. I can't help but think about how my family (and my blogging) has changed over the past year. Wade has gotten one year older (which we all know that first year of babyhood is PACKED with milestones)... Abby started First Grade, Jaxon ...well, he was Jaxon, and we packed up our life and belongings and moved to Arizona! In the middle of summer! (We crazy)

My blog originally started as a way to keep in touch with my family that lived out of state and keep them up on our family life. I also loved posting recipes (I just haven't been cooking new things lately folks..come on, I just moved) as a matter of fact, I posted SOOOOOO many, I started a different blog just for that! Then I found the "blogging" world and a whole new way of expressing myself emerged. It was at that point that my husband claims my blog became all about ME... yep.. It is.. because I am writing it.. so there. He claims that he is going to start his own "our family blog" but you know.. that will happen when pigs fly, so, until then, I still post from time to time about my cute, adorable FAMILY!

As part of my celebration... I will be doing a GIVEAWAY.. But we will have to wait until the 15th for that. Until then I had a fun time looking over my blog and picking out MY favorite blog posts... Here are my top 10.

**I loved calling out the lurkers and even got some new blog friends out of it!

**I love it when randomness happens around the house and you get to catch it for posterity... I mean, I would have never even THOUGHT of that before blogging....

**Being unable to sleep NEVER happens to me.. but when it did, this is what happened...

**I have a few obsessions and I enjoy blogging about them. Here is my favorite obsession.

**From time to time processing my feelings on-line really helps. On this one, I about had a nervous breakdown. I am glad I could share it with all of you.

**Blogging about Jaxon is just inevitable. Here was an epiphany I had about him.

**I have a house full of artists...really.. Abby is my favorite budding artist and here is why.

**Here is all of my deep dark secrets. Betcha didn't know I am best friends with Justin Timberlake, did ya!

**For those of you who think that miracles no longer happen on earth, I am here to prove you WRONG.

**I LOVE the funny things my kids do and trying to capture those moments. This and this are my favorite on camera and this and this are my favorite videos...

Which are your favs?

OBSESSION RECAPPED

You didn't think I would let the Finale of the Bachelorette go by without a recap.. DID YOU? :)

What can I say.... I wish I had saved it on my tivo, because I would have typed out exactly what Jason said in the limo... Something about Jesse being, "exciting and different" thus causing admiration. Then, once you get that out of your system, you go back to "safe". I don't think Jason was particularly safe. I mean, he showed his wild side.. his adventurous side.. How can anyone not feel totally heartbroken for him. He just, to me, seemed like the better guy to actually MARRY. But, I guess it is hard to see that unless you have BEEN married. Don't cha think? (What was up with the sister in law? She was ALL OVER Jesse... I think SHE wanted to marry him!) I think her actual sister had it more right, and I also think she DID have her mind made up by the time she brought them home (even though she CLAIMS she didn't) Because any time anyone would say anything derogatory about Jesse she wouldn't look at them.. .like she was mad and didn't want to hear what they had to say.

Just because DeAnna didn't choose who I wanted her to, I am not one of those people who say, "I AM NEVER GOING TO WATCH THAT STUPID SHOW AGAIN!" Why? Because I expected as much.. it never (Ok, almost never) turns out the way I wanted it to. I guess I just watch it for the ride and the human drama. We all relate to wanting to find "the one" and I think that is what makes it so interesting. To watch someone else go through that process (even though it is not REMOTELY like real life and it is on hyper speed).

There, I have recapped it for you (did I?) Or I guess more or less said my peace...now my stat counter will go back to normal (I was getting all of the googled Bachelorette Spoilers) It was sad to wake up this morning and see it back down to this:It makes my old numbers look soooooooo tiny.. Doesn't it? That is because I got over 1200 hits yesterday. WOW.

Now I am on to ANOTHER summer love... BURN NOTICE. It starts on Thursday night. If you have never watched it, it is on USA and I am sure they are re-playing old episodes until the new season starts. It is a super funny spy show where the lead actor is super easy on the eyes. Ahhhhhhhhhh summer.

Where Have all the Children Gone?

I am ashamed... I am ashamed that I have not posted any pictures of my kids in... months... Lets face it. My life has been consumed with packing and unpacking and generally trying not to kill the children as I endure all of this extreme stress. Needless to say, I haven't had very many "camera ready" moments in the past few weeks.. As I scrolled back, and the most recent picture I have is of Abby is at her fake birthday party. Then, Wade...I haven't even TALKED about him in months.. and I think the last picture I posted of him was here. And Jaxon? Poor Jaxon.. the most neglected of the bunch. I have INDEED posted ABOUT him (ps- the sneaking has worsened)... but, I have no idea where the last picture of him is! Never fear, we are on our way to a family vacation.. where I am certain MANY more pictures will be posted of the bunch.. but, until then, here is a little update on my peeps.

Abby: Our little Abby has been busy starting swimming lessons the day we moved in! YEP!
Crazy I know.. but, I wanted her to get a set of swimming lessons in this summer since we have a pool. Unfortunately, her summer of swimming has been way layed with a "pool accident" I am sure those of you with a pool have see this incident before, or warned about it happening.The redness on the sides is from the constant bandaid covering the 8 stiches..
She also has an EXTREMELY loose front tooth which is dangling from her mouth. No amount of bribery seems to interest her to pull it out, but I can barely stand to look at it because it looks so gross.....(Know any good ways to get that thing out? I'll take 'em!)

Jaxon: Jaxon's sneaking has risen to an all new high, and there has been soooooo many instances of it I can't even keep up with documenting them any more. I am on my way to baby proofing every cupboard in the house.. Latest heists have included a box of Cocoa Pebbles (strictly Peter's, he hides it BEHIND all of the other cereals), a 1/2 loaf of granny bread and a box of Nilla Wafers. Jaxon started swimming lessons after Abby and on Monday will be attending a special speech therapy camp near by our house. I am amazed at the resources that are available to us here. It is a blessing to have so much at our fingertips to help him out.These are pictures of him in my bathtub because he saw my camera on the counter, and because the light is GREAT in there! :)

Wade: Wade is some serious fun and SERIOUSLY LOUD. I guess that is what we get from the youngest of three. He is trying to talk lots and we are loving the words that he is starting to say. Today, I made a pie... Peter's FAVORITE dessert. Wade heard us talking about it and decided to try to ask for it by name. It was so cute, I had to record it... Here is Wade saying PIE (and doing a couple of "other" manly things... ahem)


Next week we are heading for Cali for a Stewart Family trip. It will be nice to hang out on the beach with the fam. I am sure 89 degrees will never have felt SOOOOOOOO good. Until then, my kids will do more of this which makes them feel like this...
Ahhhhhh Summertime.

Bachelorette SPOILERS

Alright, I know there are not MANY of you who are as into this show as I am.. but I found some fun spoilers today when I was waiting for the fireworks to start. (Kid 2 and 3 are in bed already and kid 1 went with a gaggle of girls to see some fireworks... Supposedly, we can see them from our pool, which is where I will be in a few moments.)

ANYWAY you can click here for some FABULOUS Spoilers. If you don't like spoilers don't read em! You never know.. the spoilers might be right!

HAPPY 4th of JULY! See you Monday!

50% off SALE

This cute girl JILL is selling her Lia Sophia for 50% off! (I knew that would get your attention.. here is the catch.. If you order, PLEASE tell her I sent you! She is doing a giveaway.. I am getting the Capri. Happy Shopping! :)

Not only that, but she is a little coupon crazy and she has some great tips! ENJOY! (I love referring bloggers...)

The Bachelorette

I was over at m.writes today and saw she posted about the Bachelorette last night! I was stunned! I thought I was the only reality TV junkie in the WORLD! It is nice to know I have the company of a very talented and what I would call great girl.. (I guess that means that I am not so bad).

I started to post a comment on her blog and it was a page long! So, I guess I need to vent it out a little here....

FIRST: Poor Jeremy. Ok, I know many people are creeped out by his perfection. His house was a little strangely perfect, but seriously... is that a BAD thing? (Maybe that shows some control freak issues.. but I live with a control freak (oh.. I mean myself) and I don't think it is THAT bad.. :) Ok, maybe it would be bad for DeAnna because SHE IS A CONTROL FREAK!

Now on to: Deanna! I can't BELIEVE she wasn't a WEE bit embarrassed by her rant on TV last night. I mean, "YOU GUYS SHOULD BE PAYING ALL OF YOUR ATTENTION TO ME!" Geesh.. I mean, can't people just hang out? I am with Chris on that one.. I mean, they are just a bunch of "guys" hanging out.. It is just me? Or is she turning into the above aptly named title..?Hmmmmmmm?? Just a weeeeeeeeeee bit??? She was AWFULLY cold hearted to Jeremy and it is not like he scorned her or anything like that! He gave her 100%!!! All the time! Even MORE sometimes! (Ps- let me just throw a little shout out to Chris Harrison. I love that man. He is seriously so funny. The whole mullet segment was so funny I had to rewind it and watch it again. He is great on the fly and the outtakes that they show of the bachelor, the funniest are always of him.)

Jesse... really? For real?? Do you REALLY want to get involved with a guy who is JUST NOW figuring out what he wants to do for a CAREER??? And who "thinks" he can stop "Shredding" for Love? Ugh. Really? Stop me now..

Now.. Jason I can see.. They had fun, he is nice guy, obviously sensitive.. great with his boy.. Ok, I can see it.. But I have heard of a spoiler out there.. and I want to know WHAT IT IS.. because you all know I HATE SURPRISES!!!

Oh, and I almost forgot to mention Graham.. That is because he is not worthy of mentioning. What an emotionally incompetent to commit poop with no upper lip. Seriously. Too strong? Oh, sorry. I guess I just think there are too many of THOSE in the world.. Sorry George. ;)