Sunday, November 27, 2011

what i'm most thankful for...

i am thankful for time.  better late than never, right?

i am most thankful for learning and loving.


learning that i can do things that i never thought possible.  like run.  i still dread it but am proud of myself for ever step.  i am learning to say no,  to not strive to do it all.  it is freeing.  i am learning to stop and breath when i am frustrated, when i am nervous, when i am overwhelmed.  i am thankful that nadia has made this an art form, this breathing through the hard stuff thing.  it is amazing what a little oxygen to the brain can do for a girl.  i am learning to look for the positives in even the most difficult moments and am thankful that aidan is learning that too.  i used to dread that the learning never stopped and now i am thankful that i get the chance to keep on learning to be better, to do better.  i am grateful for the opportunity to learn and i am thankful that my children love learning, book learning and life lesson learning alike. 

and the loving.  i am so very thankful that i have a family to love that is not perfect, but is perfect for me.  and that family includes so many beyond those in my home.  i am thankful for the loving kiss goodnight from my aidan and the full body wrap hug each morning from my nadia.  and the love i feel everytime aidan slips his hand into mine and everytime nadia tilts her head to the side and tells me i am the best.  i am thankful that i have a husband to love just the way he is and who loves me just the way i am. the kind of love that goes beyond words.  i am thankful for the love that my little spark gives me with just a little pat pat and a meow and the love on margo's big sloppy face and even for the love of the kitties that are knocking all of the ornaments off the decked tree. 

right this way folks...

for a tour of disneyland, bachart style.

here aidan and nadia are waiting in line for the haunted house which was all decked out 'nightmare before christmas' style.


here we are on the astrosomethingorother.  i sat this one out to save the nausea for bigger things.
and here are aidan and nadia just moments before we boarded space mountain.

and here is tony kissing me goodbye because he is sure i am going to puke and there will be no kissy face after that.

and here i am proving him wrong.  there was no puke for me, thank you very much.  although 15 seconds into star tours and my head was practically between my knees, which is were i kept it for the duration.
here are my children celebrating their first and only ride into the pit of space hell. 


and here is some sibling bonding.  part of disney magic is that brother and sister cease all fighting and become powerful allies.  they say cute things like thank you, and what ride do you want next and you're my best friend.  i think they put something in the ice cream. 



and here we are with crazy eyebrows on splash mountain.
and here we are having ice cream for dinner.

and here nadia is sans pants. splash mountain plus jeans equals certain discomfort.  one hoody from daddy to the rescue.



and here nadia and i are feeling particularly snazzy after she did some serious grooving on the tron dance floor.

this girl has more moves than disney has pixie dust.


and here my lovely family is riding the train around to the front of the park so we can hurry on over to california adventure to score some fast passes.


and here we are again after california screamin.  if i had longer arms there would have been four of us in this picture, all with thumbs up.  how this made it to the top of our collective favorites i will never understand.
and here nadia is clinging for dear life and i am trying desperately not to get sick on, wait for it...the ferris wheel.  that's right, the ferris wheel.  one line leads you to the placid gondolas that take you up and around all nice and sweet like.  nadia was too terrified of that idea, but was down for the swinging gondolas.  swinging equals motions sickness for dear old mom.  actually, we all hated this one.  

and here we are soaking up the compounded magical greatness that is disneyland times christmas. 
it. was. awesome.

and here tony is hanging on for dear life.  the rest of us loved the tower of terror.

and here i am lending aidan a hand so he can eat a chocolate chip cookie, a fortune cookie and a gingerbread man while sipping his sprite.  

and here we are enjoying the magical miniature models in mickey mouse's storybook land.

and here we are riding the carousel under the sea.  apparently the bachart's family crest has a blazin' green fish which made aidan and nadia love this particular carousel more than most.

and here we are trying on more hats. i spared you the other seven or so shots of various bacharts in various hats.  you are welcome.
 and here aidan is waiting like he belongs on the cover of country club kids monthly for the production of aladdin.  this was by far the longest wait we had and so worth it. 
 and here aidan and nadia are trying to walk straight after a trip on the tea cups.  i flat refused to go with them.  tony bailed on them too. it was completely weird not to have one of us on a ride with them, but they loved it.

i think the best part about the whole trip for tony and i was the surprise part. but then again maybe the best part was how little stress there was around the trip as a whole.  or maybe the best part was all of the thank yous we got, or all of the smiles from aidan and nadia.  or maybe it was all of the lights and sparkle.  or maybe it was that the two of them were appreciative of each others company.  or maybe it is that aidan puked like twenty seconds after this picture was taken but powered on to the finding nemo submarine without hesitation.


or maybe it was the just the magic of it all. 

Monday, November 21, 2011

so what did make my thankful list this year?

surprises tops the list. 

tony and i are terrible at surprises.  we always end up telling. 
not this time.  i have to hold my tongue for 22 more giggle-filled, cheesy-smiled, secret-rushing minutes. 



i can hardly wait!!!


Thursday, November 17, 2011

insert snazzy title that really means this is an update without sounding so lame

the dishes were stacked high this week.  that is a sure indicator that we are having a busy life.  we have been spending time at the gym.  i feel weird saying that.  last week nadia did a practice 5k to raise money for a cool foundation, fancy feet.  a local cancer surviving teen is raising money to send flip flops and care packages to kids with cancer.  nadia is participating as part of girls on the run.  if you have a girl and access to this program, hook your kid up.  it has been great.  nadia will be running the real deal in december and i am her running buddy.  her coach assured me that i better be practicing too because she can hold her own.



  
aidan has been hanging in there sporting his cast like it's no big thing.  i didn't punch a mom in the teeth for straight up making fun of him for having a girly cast.  i didn't think that would enlighten her much.  i did let her know that i have a stand up kid who wears a pink cast in honor of breast cancer awareness.  points for me because i didn't add, unlike her offspring, mine won't grow up to be an ignorant, intolerant scab.  he got it off yesterday and when i asked him how it felt to have it off after six long weeks he said he felt like a primate again.

tony is a ball of perfection, like usual.  he took time off of work to make sure he could capture aidan in his veteran's day assembly.  he has been working extra to please the man because of an arbitrary deadline they set. he finished the tile in laundry room and it makes me smile every time i walk in there. he fixed the mixer that he may or may not have dropped a spoon in while he was making pumpkin rolls he even helped me entertain noah last weekend.  and he has been planning...more like plotting, but that is a story for another time. 

we attended conferences for our kids.  angel's sing and light shines upon their very existence.  seriously.  i found myself wondering why i don't see these particular versions of my children very often at home.  nadia handled her student-led conference like she was a ceo.  so focused.  so meticulous in her notes.  she is still her silly self but she knows how to turn on the business when it is needed.  aidan's teacher had aidan smiling from ear to ear the whole time.  he has great marks, minus this little paperwork snafu that is mostly genetic, but he is determined to turn that around. he read us a story that had me choked up.  not because of the dragon meets duo of children storyline, but because of the sentence structure and elaboration and even the penmanship!  he writes like a flipping grown up! 

margo's been margo'ing and

spark has a bit of a cold. 



the weather is turning wintry.

and me...i am just playing it cool.  you know, in case something exciting should happen...


Monday, November 14, 2011

thankful...what won't make the list this year

:::grouchy mondays

:::tinted chapstick explosions all over our freshly cleaned carpets, courtesy of margo the destroyer

:::bags under my eyes, beside my eyes, on my eyelids and under my chin

:::wind that makes tony flippety floppity all night long

:::to do lists that are exclusively have to's not want to's...for a few days anyway.

:::the number 6.  i just don't like it. 

Friday, November 11, 2011

lucky duck

11 11 11... what a wishful day.
11:11 came and went.
i was busy being with my family and i missed the wish of all wishing moments completely.  heaven knows that i won't make it to 11:11 pm. 

but who needs the luck of the calender and the clock when you are lucky enough to have a family like mine?

a beautiful fall day.

chocolate salted caramel cookies.

kids who can find fun with rocks and sticks. 

a helpful husband.

cuddly kittens and a loving dog.

a toasty fire.

and dressed in pj's by 3:30. 



pretty lucky indeed. 

Wednesday, November 9, 2011

she keeps her crazy hidden well

my husband shared, that while cleaning up during a party a friend noted that i keep my crazy hidden well. 

that made me smile.  then i saw this on pinterest




while i think i am a beacon of freakdom, others don't see it. 

but i ask, how can they not? 

exhibit a:


yes i recognize that it is a bit strange to let the kitty sit on the dash as you drive down 68.  it is more reasonable to have her snuggled.  others question why i took a cat on an errand run to begin with.

maybe some think it is excessive that i label my dishwasher caddy with the type of silverware that goes in each compartment and i have little labels on the silverware caddy in the drawer too...(really, you don't want to hear about the amount of labeling in my first aid cabinet...or my laundry baskets...or the fact that i make my own lesson plan book so i have all of the tabs i want). little do they know how it freaks my business when i find one in the wrong slot.  not like spatula-wielding-rampage-freak-out but huffing and puffing while i put the dishes away freak out. 

it is well known that i have a very large and very in charge bubble.  i like my bubble.  the only people who are allowed in my bubble without any weirdness at all are tony, aidan & nadia.  sorry maxwell's, it's not that i don't enjoy hugging you, it is just that it has grown a touch of weirdness...like a weirdness mold but not the bad get in your lungs mold, the good kind that makes blue cheese and penicillin. i make no pretenses about the awkwardness that is me being hugged by friends..

i have a thing about little noises too.  clicks, clacks, smacks, taps, clings, clangs, snuffling,  slopping,  shlooping, slurping, banging, thumping, shushing, whistling and the sound of teeth scrapping on a fork.  but i love the sound of canned goods lightly clinking together and tee-hee-heeing and the dog sighing and my children singing. 

i am not a fan of being tapped.  (how exactly do you say that without it sounding dirty?) what i mean to say is that i don't like when people tap me on my shoulders, or arms, or niggle me repeatedly with their toes.  this, sadly, includes my children.  aidan is a shoulder tapper.  nadia likes to flick her toes over and over and over again on my leg. 


i own these, shall we say, particulars.  and i love it even more that i get to see little bits of freak-face in my children. 


oh...and one more thing... if your toilet paper is rolling from down under i will turn it over...just so you know.

Wednesday, November 2, 2011

get outta town

the johnsons coaxed us into a much needed getaway. 

and by coaxed i mean they said, "hey, want to get out of town without kids?", to which we said "be here in 5"...we left a bowl of cheerios out, click on the tv for the kids and crossed our fingers that the kids didn't notice we were gone.  so maybe not exactly like that...
thanks to my mom and dad, aidan and nadia logged many hours on the computer, 4-wheeler, horse and ate a healthy dinner of ice cream. 




it. was. awesome.  the food was great.  the conversation was great.  cramming brad and tony in the back of a 2 door was great.  the waking up whenever we felt like it was great.  and having 36 hours of free of all things whiny...unbelievable!