Why I love my life:

A few of today's highlights:

Luke running into the living room and announcing: "we're playing 'wash kaden's face'...we're using wipes (holding up a giant wad)...it's a fun game" and runs away.

Kade finding the best hiding spot ever from Luke (apparently he didn't like the game as much) in their closet...where I prompted Luke a million times to get me stuff out of it...and on the million and first try--he finally saw Kaden--I was laughing a lot)

Lucas going to time out for a whopping 10 minutes (for turning the water on outside to play with not 3 minutes after I threatened both of the boys not to turn on the water or else....(long list of horrible things)) and doing a relatively good job sitting there. he usually screams and freaks out and just goes crazy--but he was such a big boy today!

Having "special daddy oatmeal" for dinner (yes dinner--I was tired and...we like oatmeal). The "special" part is loads of sugar, butter and awesome toppings....Luke added like 1/4 cup of sprinkles before we noticed. ha ha--he LOVED it!

Playing 2 person tag with Kaden in the kitchen. I don't know if mom remembers it, but B.J. Scott and I used to play it all the time ROCKED at hardly having to move! It's always been so so funny to me!

Kade calling out, "I accidentally put my foot in the toilet mom" Turns out it was before doing his business--so it was just funny---not gross.

Cuddling with Lucas while the family played Mario Kart after FHE.

Today has just made me smile....that's all

TYBEE ISLAND IN FEBRUARY

So, spur of the moment we decided to go with our friends the Johnsons to the beach (which was a huge deal for us, we hardly ever do spontaneous anything). YAY--so it was super fun--and still February so.....pretty cold--but so fun. They are amazing photographers and took some pictures of us while we were there. Thanks again guys, anyway, here is the link to their blog where they have some of the results!

Cabbage and Sick People Farts

(This was written by Jess, and here's a quick precurser from Cari. Jess is gross--and I'll have no part in his gross-ness. And---our house doesn't stink! (at least I think)

Apparently that's what our house smells like at three o'clock on a Saturday. The sad part of that is that I'm here by myself. I'm positive that I didn't make the whole smell by myself, but it would be silly to think that I didn't contribute in some small way.

With this whole 'job' thing, I don't spend nearly as much time at the house as I used to. Back in the heady days of childhood time at home was nearly limitless (much to my mother's chagrin). But now I'm usually out the door before the sun's up, and not back in until dinnertime. A guy just gets used to a routine. I don't necessarily like it, but I'm used to it.

Or I was. Now I'm stuck at home...it's day 2.5 out of 30. I got foot surgery to correct some minor, though incredibly annoying problems. The doc surprised me with a whopper 30 day penalty for...bad foot-ed-ness or something. He told me I have to stay home. And I'm sick of it here.

No jumping to conclusions! I love my kids, and my wife is the best thing since sliced bread. This house is a beautiful place and a wonderful blessing. But I'm going to scratch my own eyes out if I have to watch another rerun of Everybody Loves Raymond. (Proof that anybody can get on TV.)(C-and Everybody Loves Raymond is awesome)

So to keep myself from major ocular damage, and to save the TV Cari so thoughtfully bought, I'm preparing a short list of completely sedentary activities for the chronically bored. Maybe if it gets *really* boring I'll even let you know how some of my ideas turn out.


1- Butt Cheek Checkers. I divided the chair I'm relegated to into an 8x8 grid, and I'm seeing how long it takes each portion of the cushion to deteriorate under my fat lard butt. I haven't banged out all the rules yes, but it looks like there needs to be a contingency for different kinds of pants. I have this one pair that has a rougher fabric, and it might cause unnatural wear. That wouldn't be fair, so I'll have to monitor things closely.

2- Name That Smell. Cabbage and Sick People Farts are just two of the incredible odors I've discovered so far. Sick People Farts is from Lukie, who is sick. The Cabbage is a mystery. I'm certainly hoping its not something I did. There's an odor that reminds me of raw potatoes and something that mights have been Mexican food once. I can detect a cat, which may be wafting through from somewhere in the neighborhood. Later, I might smell corn dog, as it is currently doing its part in the Butt Cheek Checkers competition.

3- Making Up Bad Words. Earlier I called Cari a 'braf-dingling spornk.' She laughed...in that way that says, "Ha ha ha, (I hope that this person does not really want to kill me)." (C-or rather like--wow--already on day 2.5 Jess?) Then she walked away. But the joke is really on her because she doesn't know what it means. It's not all that bad, just for all you haters out there. But there are a couple of real dooseys. Nort, frambler, and greaough are all bad enough that I wouldn't say them to the Bishop. You might find them in the Bible if I were to translate it, but only way in the parts that no one reads. Leviticus and what-not. I'm working on a definition for cromp-face. I don't have any leads yet, but its gonna be good!

4- Mormon Drinking Game. This is a game that I hate. But I've been bored to the point where I've played it four times already. It goes like this. Find one of the channels that plays the daytime real-life court cases, and watch any show. They're all the same. (Plaintiff is claiming $547.27 for damages to his toupee, caused by the Defendant's pet weasel when they were sharing a dumpy apartment...or whatever.) Every time the judge has to lay the smack down on either party, in the form of life lessons preached across the pulpit of justice, take a big drink of water. This occurs about every two minutes when you include the teasers just before commercial breaks. Great for hydration, but hard for a be-crutched man hobbling to the bathroom every 10 minutes.

5- Where'd That Sticker Come From? I guess technically this game can be played at any time at the Winn home. But it's especially interesting to play in a confined space. I've located seven stickers so far, all from different sticker sets, several of which I'm positive we've never owned. There's a Barbie sticker from under grid square B7 that looks like it might be from the late 80's. I'm working to identify a small-ish sticker I located on the carpet which was either a type of fruit or a wildly inappropriate racial slur. It's probably too far decomposed to know for sure, but I suppose that's where lots of the fun comes from.

6- What Can I Trick the Kids Into Eating?! Points are awarded as follows. Five points for anything organic in nature. Seven points for anything obviously inorganic, ie. rocks, bits of plastic, toys, etc. 10 points for something that cannot be truly classifies as either organic or inorganic. 20 points if I can get Cari to taste it. My score so far is 1247 points.

7- Google People You Know. Alternatively known as 'I'm *Almost* a Stalker.' I whole-heartedly believe that most stalkers were originally pretty good people, they just got really, really bored. My only crazy results so far are that Cari was apparently part of the Wayland Baptist Flying Queens Basketball Team. I'll have to inform her of this later.

8- Name the Numb Body Part. When a body part goes numb, it's sometimes hard to tell. So the game goes like this; pick a random body part and touch it. If it's numb you get a point. If it's not, no points. Surprisingly, after sitting in the stupid Checker Chair for so long, the score so far is 15.

That's the last two days' worth. I really can't imagine what craziness will crop up in the next 27 days, but if it's good I'll let you know.

Seriously, I'm bored like it's nobody's business.

Hair Change

So...in case anyone was wondering, I changed my hair today! YAY! I love it! I love change. This blond is now a brunette! I'll add a picture sometime later....but I will let everyone know one thing. I've gone brown before and this is usually the reaction..."wow....you dyed your hair....", or "I just like it blond...." ha ha! It makes me laugh! Anyway--I love it and thanks Emilie!

Military Appreciation Month

Just letting everyone know, this month where we take Karate, it's Military Appreciation Month. So anyone in the military or married to the someone in the military can get 2 free classes! YAY! Seriously, Jess and I love it!--and hey--awesome date nights!


Also--Kade's second time at Karate is tomorrow! He loves loves it! I'll be teaching his class now and I'm soooooooo excited! I went with him last week and the class was so cute! (Do I overuse exclamation marks? ha ha--I totally do!) Anyway, he's so great at it already and I'm happy he gets to go--Hip Hip--Hooray!

Kaden's class had a "Pirate/Princess Pizza Party" today (on account of the letter this week was "P") and Luke wanted to dress up too. We didn't actually have any pirate stuff besides a sword so....extra fabric and my capri's sintched super tight= PIRATE!









For quiet time the other day Kade asked if they could build a fort...by themselves. I said that was fine. Kade ran back and forth from his room to ours collecting books and pillows and blankets....Then he told me his room was too big of a mess to do the fort--and WOW--he was so right.....


so (after the 30 minutes it took to clean it up) we tried it a different way...


As some of you know we got to watch our friends little girl for a few days. It was so fun (and so funny to see what two 2 year olds will do) Here are a few things that made me laugh.


One of the days I was busy with Kade for like 3 minutes, and came out to find Lilly and Luke had gotten into the fridge, found the yogurt, and amazingly enough, were eating them without making a mess--how pro-active are they?



Found Luke and Lilly sharing so well by passing my camera back and forth and posing. (Luke gets my camera oh...maybe 3 times a day...so he's had some great practice.)



Seriously...this is what I found in the fridge...little bite marks and everything...and cheese on both little one's faces--what a feast. (It's like I didn't feed them--but I swear I did!!!)




making cookies!



Frosting--wow---turns out he just kept going, and I wasn't paying attention--but he licked that cookie clean--gross!


---OOOOOH, and one more thing, so I'm a little bored with my hair...so tell me what you think. I really like the idea of blond on top and red underneath, or dark hair on top and blond underneath or brown with blond highlights.... Let's hear some opinions!