Shredded Cheese... The new sedative

Spring Break anyone?

So I know it's not March anymore.  I know it's barely April.  But in an attempt to get back on track with my blogging I'm going back and highlighting a few of our high points over the last month- starting with my little Spring Break trip.  I won't go into great detail except to say it was nice to get away, the kids had fun, Aidan learned the car seat wasn't always his friend, I wish it had been a little warmer down by the water, and Daniel made me glad I wasn't in Germany because they would have made me eat pigeon.  Eeeh.

Kate & Aidan enjoy riding my poor Dad like a horse the night before we left

Aidan and my Dad on a balcony at the beach house

Always ready to pose for a picture

Not so eager to pose for a picture but was eager to get at the camera

Posing inside a touristy shark's mouth outside one of the stores

Thanks Dad for cutting out my butt

Did I mention she likes to pose?

Enjoying his 1st beach trip and new sand toys

Recreating a similar picture I have with Kate from 2 years ago

Mom & Dad- Can you tell she probably wasn't amused by something he was doing in that moment?

Getting dirty

He loved driving with my Dad on the beach

Group shot-not so great

He's a cutie

So is this one

They play so well together until he realizes she's stolen his toys

Who Knew

Who knew we were operating a safe haven/boarding house for all the kitties of the neighborhood?  The little guy who frequently sleeps on our front porch wasn't even involved this time or the Sammy look alike that picks on him occasionally.  I dropped Kate off from school and looked out the back window to discover this little cat pow wow.  I've never seen any of them before but 1 of them could have been a different Sammy twin and the other Mr. Kitty's.  Eventually they all sat down and sunned in our back yard.  Maybe it's more like we're operating a kitty day spa.  It was weird.  Then our cats started freaking out at the front door and I started smelling cat pee.  I opened it to watch yet another cat run away that I've never seen before who had apparently sprayed our front door.  So I figured as I explained to Kate one of the kitties is a girl and the other cats want to be her "boyfriend."  So then I guess we're kind of running more of a cheap motel.

"Over my dead body."

Beach or Bust

Well since Saturday I have spent all my free Internet time searching the great www for a place to rent for Spring Break.  Apparently I am going to be a bad Mom and take my Kindergartner out of school for the week before Spring Break and head down to the Texas coast with my parents while my husband lives it up in Germany.  Have I mentioned that he will be touring castles and gets 100.00 for just himself for dinner?  Did I also mention his boss might have told him on more then 1 occasion that prostitution was legal there but that he couldn't expense it.  Really?  REALLY? (insert disapproving tone and face when saying the "Really")  Anyway....

So my parents have graciously provided a sponsorship for a beach vacation for me and my kids and my husband's work is sponsoring a European one complete with glowing hooker endorsements for him.  Everyone wins!  I actually am excited to be going.  I got the OK from Kate's teacher, got Aidan some cute swimwear last night at trusty Target and if I can survive a 1 day car trip to Port Aransas, TX from central Oklahoma then I'm set.  I'm going to get to relive my youth and travel in the backseat with not 1 but both of my children.  So I guess if my children start hitting me and burping a lot then they'll be an equal trade for my little brother.  With stops we're predicting it to take about 12 hours.  As in half a day.  Are we insane?  I'm very interested to see how well we're all going to fit and which one of the 5 of us cries first.

I learned a lot during my searching.  For one, there are almost no properties left for the week of March 15-19 when apparently everyone except the state of Kansas is on Spring Break and apparently also wants to be at the beach.  Somehow we managed to score a pretty nice little house not too far from the beach.  I personally think it was just because it wasn't really well advertised on 5 different sites like a lot of the other houses.  But someone else's loss is another one's gain right?  I also learned google maps shuts down and gets very irritated when you put a space in between 2 words that shouldn't have one.  It refuses to show you anything that might possibly be what you're talking about.  I also remembered how much I want to live in a tourist town.

When we went to Hawaii and few years ago I remember thinking how lucky the girl who rented us our car was.  I mean sure she's stuck all day renting out cars to tourists but she lives in Hawaii!  She gets to stay there and so many people have to go back home.  That IS her home.  I can just imagine whenever someone returns a car because they have to go back to their boring lives in Kansas she's thinking, "Ahh. Poor midwesterners.  Poor babies have to go home.  But not me!  Ha Ha Ha Ha."  That's how I'd be anyway.

So yee-haw!  Texas here I come!