Stayin alive

Holy smokes.  I can't believe it's been so long since I wrote on here.  The entire formatting has changed since I've been on here.  I am kind of scared to post this.  What if it totally blows up our entire blog? 

So life is trucking along business as usual. I'm still running, still reading, still writing (not enough though apparently) and still relaxing when life allows for it although not enough relaxation happening lately. 

Anyhow, we still haven't come to much of an agreement about the whole television issue at our house for long term, but for right now we have tv days and no-tv days.  The schedule goes something like this MWF/Sunday tv is allowed, T/TH/Saturday no tv allowed.  I do understand basic math and I realize I got the bad end of this deal. I get one less quiet, tv-free day each week.  However, I am home all day everyday with the kids and we leave the television off other than for a half hour at the end of the tv allowed days if everyone's been good.  Lately we have not been watching much afternoon television because my kids have been pretty much awful this week.  At least I get a break when I go to the Aquatic Center to work out!

A bit of a confession: I made the ill advised decision to get just two balloons at the store the other day.  When you have three kids, buying two balloons is a very bad idea.  Don't every do that.  Not ever. Anyhow, I had just two kids with me at the store so I thought (foolishly I might add) that my kids would be able to handle sharing these two beautiful balloons.  AJ has been wanting a balloon for months and he earned a dollar cleaning up trash at Kara's school trail clean-up last week.  A guy stopped and handed him a dollar.  Since he was the only one who came to help me since Kara was sick I felt he should get a balloon out of the deal.  He saved that dollar to get a balloon and so I ended up at the store with two kids buying the balloons.  Fast forward a couple of days and you will find me completely frazzled while listening to my three children fighting non-stop since the ill advised purchase had occured over the balloons and you'd have found me ripping the balloons out of their hands and throwing them out the door. 

But not before I explained to them the old program at Fremont Public Schools when I was a kid and we released the balloons each year with contact information on them hoping that we would receive a letter back from who ever found it.  And I even helped them to do the same and we had so much fun setting the balloons free! The kids watched them as they disappeared over the horizon and squealed with delight as they watched.  Who knows if we will ever hear from anyone, probably not.  But at least it solved my immediate problem without more crying and whining.  And it was actually a lot of fun for all of us and most importantly it didn't involve the use of the television. 

Tomorrow I get to run with  some of my running buddies!  I can't wait for the break from the kids and for the exercise, for the conversation and possibly most of all for the post run coffee since it is going to be cold and rainy!
Vern Out

Where the red fern grows

Since March is National Reading month (or something like that), Kara and I have spent even more time than usual reading.  If we are not outdoors playing with our rocks or otherwise enjoying nature, then you can bet we are indoors enjoying a good book.  Part of the reading deal is that we also have a chapter book we are working on at all times. At many critical point during the past few years I would recall lines from the book "Where the Red Fern Grows" by Wilson Rawls.  If you haven't read it, check it out from the library and read it at once.  Really no one should go through life without having experienced this one.  It was one of the standard issue reading books when I was in fifth grade, but I am not sure if kids are still reading it today in English class. But they should be if they aren't.  Maybe that is what's wrong with our society?

Anyhow, I hadn't read it since fifth grade, but the message about meeting God halfway and working hard to achieve your goals really stuck in my head even after all these years.  Plus I simply love dogs so I decided to get it and read it for our most recent chapter book.  Boy I am so glad that I did.  Even though I didn't get through it without some tears.  It really is an exceptional book. I still had my original copy from back in the day on my old book shelf at my parent's place. The last time we ventured north I picked it up and we read it quickly in less than a week.  Kara absolutely loved it.  And now when something is really hard she will say "Billy Coleman would ask God for help and then work for a really long time to do it".  Way cool.  Then Friday night we had movie night and watched the flick (thanks Kate for the loan).  Miraculously, Kara liked the book better than the movie!  I never thought I'd hear her say that as she is my biggest TV junkie (after Jeff).

Anyhow, that is what we've been up to not much happening on the telly although we did watch the movie and we did tune in to the NCAA games last night.

Vern Out