My Loves

We moved to this place called Hidden Springs.  It's a part of Boise that is over the hill from the city so it seems like we are in the country (because we ARE).  This place is like Mayberry meets Stepford meets The Truman Show.  It's kind of great in an eerie sort of way.  There is one store called The Mercantile and the next store is five miles away back over the hill.  When we first came to look at the house we are now living in I saw one of the neighbor women walk out of her house with an apron on playing with her 2.5 kids.  It was very stereotypical.  

Anyway, we live just down the street from the community barn and old homestead where a bunch of chickens live so we walk there every evening when the temperature has cooled off a bit (we're still hitting the 90's).  I decided to learn how to use Tom's nice camera with manual settings and all that jazz.  The first time I took it was not successful.  Let's just say I needed a tripod.  Badly.  This is the best picture I got...

Today we went and it was a lot brighter so I got some better ones.  Here are my loves blowing on a "baby flower," or dandelion, as it is known to most of you.

 

Morgan is so curious and checks out everything.  It is great and frustrating at the same time, but I'd rather have it this way.

No matter where we are, she is ALWAYS running away from us.  Always running.  That's my girl.

Morganisms

Last week I tried to potty train my big 2-year-old.  I had to pump myself up for weeks for this.  In fact, I wouldn't have even attempted it if it wasn't for the Disney cruise that we're taking in November.  The kids have to be potty trained in order to go to the fun kid play land and her cousins will be going.

So I bought some undies and let her pick the ones she wanted to wear.  Not surprisingly we went through each one of these... some more than once.

I had my laptop ready with movies (thank you Netflix!).  I had crayons, coloring books, books, juice, and popsicles.  I was ready to go.  The problem is that I absolutely HATE staying in one place all day.  Seriously, this is more "training" for me than her.

And it wouldn't have been so bad but his girl can hold it!  She would wake up with a dry diaper and not go for another two hours.  How?  I have no idea.  I go at least three times between hers.  So we sat there... and sat there.  I have All Dogs Go To Heaven memorized!  Yep, that's the movie she wanted to watch.  "Charlie," as she calls it.  Finally at the end of the movie her little potty cheer alarm would go off because she went.  That was the first day.  The second day was similar.  The third day I decided I couldn't stand that room anymore and we took the potty to the living room.  This is where all Hell broke loose (in my head).  She pooped once and peed twice on the carpet.  Don't tell the landlord!  I thought by then she would understand what it feels like and tell me when she needed to go.  Nope.

  

She peed on top of the potty when she used it as a stool.

 

And she peed on me.  Mmmm.

So, I threw in the towel (okay, lots of them in the washer) and we're waiting a few days weeks months years until we are both more ready.  Hopefully it happens before the cruise.

Some other things in the life of this amazing little girl:

 Her latest obsession is mommy's shoes.  She especially LOVES these pink ones (who wouldn't really?) and would walk around in them all day if I let her.

Morgan doesn't love looking at the camera when we take pictures of her but when we tell her to smile, she'll say, "smile!"  I guess she's confusing doing with saying.  Or maybe she's just tired of us wanting to take her picture all the time.

She gives me lots and lots of kisses then wipes them off and says, "yuck."  No idea where she learned it.

Sometimes when she's feeling extra lovey she'll kiss my hand or give me a hug and tell me she loves me.  That. Melts. My. Heart.

She doesn't like to say the prayer very often but sometimes when she's in the bathtub she grabs the faucet and pretends it is a microphone and says, "Dear, Heavenly Father.  Thankful for this day."  I'm not sure if you could understand what she's saying, but her mom and dad sure know.

Speaking of microphones.  One day at church we were out in the hall walking and she went into the empty primary room.  She stood on the stool in front of the mic.  I expected her to say, "Dear, Heavenly Father..." but instead she broke out in, "Old McDonald had a farm.  E-I-E-I-O."  Hil-stinking-larious!

She loves her hand-me-down Barbie.  My twin cousins had one they didn't want and gave it to her when they were playing one day.  She absolutely loves it.  Her dad took her swimming tonight and she HAD to take the Barbie.  She would bend down so Barbie could "walk" with her feet on the ground.  Then they would both jump in the water to daddy.

Gosh I love her.

My Hubs Loves Me

Today I realized how much Tom loves me.

Rewind 4 years and a few months to the summer after we got married.  I'm running with Tom and I blurt out, "Come on!  I'm not even getting a workout."  And there was the end of our running together and Tom's running, period.  No amount of begging, pleading or marital offers would change his mind.

Now come back to the beginning of this summer.  I was running with one of my besties, Angela, and I told her how much I would love if Tom would run with me again.  But I mostly just wanted him to work out for his own health.  That's when she became his trainer (remember, he refuses to work out with me).

She would wake up crazy early in the morning and meet him and our neighbor, Collin, in our garage for a training session.  Collin's wife, who is also a running buddy, mentioned that she would love if Collin would get in running shape as well.  So they all start working out.  At first they refused to run and they would do a lot of weight lifting.  Then they started playing racquetball and Angela made the losers run lines.  They eventually got their cardio work out going too but they refused to run anything that took more than 20 seconds.

Angela is also this super party organizer.  And besides training Tom and Collin, she organized a beginner, intermediate, and advanced running group, as well as teaching aerobics and organizing basketball group every Thursday.  Seriously, she was working out like 8 hours per day.  Amazing!  So, since it is the end of summer and she is a super party organizer, she decided to organize a race for all the runners she had been training/running with.

Yesterday we had packet pick up and got our t-shirts.  She flew a musician in from Portland and had a concert for everyone.  Then this morning was the race.  I ran the 1/2 marathon that started at 7.  The 10k started at 8 then the 5 k some time after that.  She had arranged for the husbands and families of the women that were running to set up water stations all over the route.  She asked Tom to help with the times at the finish line so I got someone to watch Morgan (thanks Tucker) and went on with the day as planned.

Almost at mile 10, I see Tom getting out of a car that Angela was driving.  He had on his running shoes and one of the race shirts.  He was totally there to run the last 3.1 miles with me!  I asked if he was going to run it all without stopping (I previously promised some pretty great things to him if he did) and he said that was his plan.

We ran together for about 5 minutes then I looked back and could see the first 1/2 marathon runner that was behind me and since he knows how competitive I am during a race, he told me I could go ahead so I could beat her (sorry Alison but you were my motivation).  It wasn't until I finished the race that I realized (with some help from Angela) that Tom had been training all summer to run a 5k for me.  They would get up and go play racquetball for like 5 minutes so they could tell us that they played but then they would really go running.  Oh my heart!  How sweet is that?!

I hitched a ride back to Tom so we could run the last 1/2 mile together.  I love this man so much and I appreciate what he is willing to do for me.  I also love and appreciate Angela (in a different way) for being there to be his Jillian and not let him give up.  I know there were some frustrating, yet very funny, times.

Now I owe him some promises.  And now I know he can run 3 miles without stopping so guess what he gets to do with me three times per week.  ;)

Leamorado

We went to Utah over Labor day weekend so we could visit family and go to Leamorado.  Leamorado is the annual celebration of the town closest to where I'm from (Leamington) and I kind of claim it for myself.   We stayed at my mom's house and a friend of mine came the night before Leamorado so Morgan slept with Shy and Tom and I got couches.  It was great sleep.   

Anyway, I got up and did the fun run at 7 but didn't take my camera.  I won.  

Then we went to the program and lunch and games and as luck would have it, I didn't remember my camera there either.  I did ask someone to take these pictures of Morgan on the "train."  And soon I'll get pictures of her running a race (I made my aunt take some). 

After the celebration we went to my mom's and Morgan went nudie swimming with her cousin.  They had a blast!  When she was all done with the water she went to the deck where a little play kitchen is and played for a while (still naked).  When we went to get her to get dressed, we found a big log of poop.  It was so funny.  I haven't seen Tom laugh like that in a long time.  I'm sure she was too busy playing to notice it slip out.  

Morgan's Hiding Place

If you have been reading this blog for a while, you may remember Morgan's obsession with the vent.  She loves to put everything in it, including herself.  I knew that when we left the house we were going to have to go into the crawl space and clean out the vents to recoup our stuff.  Well, Tom threw on some dingy clothes and got down there.  He made it to the first vent and pulled a watch out of it but he is a little too claustrophobic to continue all the way to the other end of the house (and I would rather cut my losses than go down there myself).  So my very smart husband decided to get the wet/dry vac and see if that would do the trick.

As you can see, it worked!  These are the things that we found in the vents.  Just in case you can't tell what they are... four shoes, two candle holders, two candles, camera battery charger, cow bell, three balls, watch, hair bow, and a toy disc.