Christmas Eve

Merry Christmas Eve! Brad made me a Spanish coffee tonight.

Coffee+alcohol+fire=yummy.

And,best part, we still have our eyebrows.

While we were at church the Grinch stopped by our house and brought the boys some p.j's. They've got to be the cutest whos in all of Whoville.


The pic below is before church. Brody sang in the cherub choir. He told me on the ride to church he was "really nervous. Well, actually a little frightened."

He was the cutest cherub of all.


Today was a great day. The local movie theater had free movies all day. Can you say awesome?! Brad took the boys to see the Smurfs (sorry I missed it) and I made some appetizers and drank coffee (my morning coffee did not have any flaming alcohol). Then everybody took a nap and off to church to listen to my oldest lover sing. After church Grammie and Grandpa came over for a little while. It was a very relaxing day. My kids have been following Santa all day on the google map thing. They decided it was time for bed as "he's getting closer. Hurry! Hurry! Everybody get to bed."

They are nestled all snug in their beds dreaming of sugar plums.


If you look to the left of the Christmas tree you can see a small Santa suit. Brody wore that his first Christmas Eve. It is one of my favorite memories. Brad and I did rock/paper/scissors to see who got to carry him down the aisle. I lost. But, I walked behind Brad and got to see all the parishioner's faces when they saw a 5 week old baby wearing a Santa suit. I love being a mom.

Why am I posting a pic of me standing in front of the Christmas tree holding my arm up in the air you ask? Well...here's why. Because earlier today I decided to do 4 things. Actually 5.

#1: Shower.

#2: Put on clothes that aren't some type of work-out wear. And, they required ironing.

#3: Put on make-up including mascara and lip gloss.

#4: Fix my hair. Not just fix my hair, but blow-dry it and curl it all fancy like.

#5: Put on perfume. And.....and...accesories.

Why oh why would I waste 40 minutes doing this? Because I thought going out to dinner sounded fun. Fun until Brad and I ran some errands and I wanted to choke myself with a scarf in Kohls because Kohls is the only place to shop in this big city of Rhinelander. I love being stuck in a hot store with 839 people (while of course I'm dressed in a down coat and Ugg boots because I live in the tundra). For those of you that aren't sure....that was sarcasm.

So, after we left Kohls we decided some take-out Chinese was a much better plan than the Pub. But, here's the problem. As I said....I spent 40 minutes (that's like 3 days when you have little boys) getting myself fancied up. So, I posted a pic. Please comment how fab my beach curls and snake skin/rhinestone bracelet look.

P.S. I love yoga pants.

Wales family Christmas

Big boys swimming by themselves!

Best part of hotels....jumping from bed to bed.

Great "Superman" shots of the boys

Last weekend was the "Wales" family Christmas. My siblings and I each take turns hosting the fun and I LOVE this weekend and look forward to it each Christmas season. I have a huge family and getting together with 40-50 people, eating food till I burst, lots of fun laughs and kids enjoying all the fun things Aunts and Uncles let them do. I love, love, love it. We stayed at the Holiday Inn and the kids swam with their cousins until 10:30 p.m., jumped bed to bed, drank well over the legal limit of juice boxes, Hank slept with Daddy both nights and Brody slept with me. Heaven.

On our way home we stopped at Border grill...our family fav. Here's what Hank told me.

"Hey mom, just so you know, everybody loves Daddy and nobody really loves you."

let me remove the dagger from my heart.

Then Brody says

"Hankie, that's not a very nice thing to say. That's going to hurt Momma's feelings. We do love Mom....we just love Daddy wayyyyyyyy more."

A nice end to a perfect weekend.

Christmas program

The kids Christmas program was today. A-DOR-A-BLE!!! B was a wiseman and H was an angel. Aren't they just about the cutest things you've ever seen? I know! They are!
This one melts my heart.

Stay 5 and 3. That's what I want for Christmas. My kids to stay 5 and 3.

I believe God created each and every one of us to do something spectacular. Some of us may be "more" spectacular than others. Well, at least by our human on earth standards. But, each of us has a certain spectacular in us.
I've discovered my spectacular. I am glue. I hold things together. And I do it well. When I was a child I was the glue that held my dad together. Now I am the glue that holds my family together.
Lately I feel that I've lost some of my sticky. So, what does a woman do when she feels like she's becoming painting tape instead of gorilla glue? She hands it over to God. And, that's what I've done. Now, onto the dishes and laundry.

The bagel maker

Tonight Brody learned a very important life skill. How to make a bagel in the toaster!!!! Can you believe it? And, I'm proud to say...he nailed it! First try ladies and gentlemen. I helped him put the toaster on #4 setting. He grabbed the bagels out of the frig, pulled it apart, put it in the slot, and pushed down the button.
And then anticipation.....waiting for the circle of carbs to pop up. When his snack was finished he grabbed a plate, some honey nut cream cheese, and waited for the toaster to cool so he could grab his snack. I'd watch your back Emeril.

Elf on the Shelf

My in-laws have one of those "Elf on the Shelf" things. For those of you that don't know what they are, they are little elf dolls that you hide in different spots around the house. The kids have to find the elf, and of course, the elf reports any bad behavior to the big guy. In this case, Santa, not God. So, I should say the other big guy.
Well....Hankie was wound up last night. After dinner I had to ask him 8,349,763,092,538 times to put his p.j's on. For real. I counted. It was that many times. While he was getting on his p.j's (over a 40 minute time frame) he was also singing Christmas Carols. And, to make the Christmas Carols even more fun he was substituting words like "Holly" and "Jolly" with words like "backfire" and "poop". How festive!
As he is singing he takes off his batman unders and throws them at my Mother-in-law. Hank in hysterical laughter (and me as well) then says "hey Grammie.....I just backfired in those!" How adorable!
At this point, the craziness has gone on long enough and I say "Hank, "Alvin" (the elf) is watching you." Hank walk up to Alvin, picks him up off the stool, and punches him in the face. Take that message to Santa.
I love that kid. LOVE. THAT. KID.

For B.Herb's b-day this year, the big 5, he wanted a lizard. Never, ever tell your kids "if that's what you want next year, that's what you can get" while trying to get them out of Petco. As I did in November of 2010. Or, you also will end up with 2 leopard spotted geckos. Look at his little face. Isn't it just the cutest thing?! So excited!
C'mon Mom....stop taking pics and get in the store.

Which one.....?

I have to say, they are cute little guys. Or girls.

Best....day....ever!

Getting ready for the lizard release. Thank you Aunt SueEllen for letting the lizard spend a night at your house!

Brody named his Hollow and Hank named his Sponge Bob Square Pants Popcorn. The boys are thrilled and this is where I remind myself...they are kids, they are only kids once...and there are much worse pets then some harmless (non-smelly, I checked) leopard geckos. Did I mention they can live for 20 years?

Shrektastic

Grammie treated the boys to a night out at Shrek the musical at the Grand theater in Wausau. It was AMAZING!! They were in awe. The costumes were incredible! We loved, loved, loved it. As Brody said " thank you 530 times over Grammie!"
Waiting for the show to start.

C'mon Shrek

Have you seen cuter ogers? Didn't think so.

He's 5!

On November 19,2006 at 10:50 a.m. I became something I'd always wanted to be. A mother. B. Herb turned 5 today. Don't ya just love the streamer "car wash"?
Hankie giving B his Wizard of Oz music card

I just woke up mom stop taking my pic.

Cheesecake birthday cake

This is one of those Hallmark moments where I'm saying through gritted teeth "get in the picture Hank. I want a picture with you and your brother. It's your brother's birthday. GET IN THE PICTURE!" Notice any pics of the brothers? Didn't think so.

What 5 years of cuteness looks like.

I love birthday hats!

This is what he wanted for his birthday. Hunters orange. And a chameleon. Lizard details coming up soon. Stay posted.

God bless you B.Herb. Lover of baseball, golf, Star Wars, playing "Gunsmoke" dress-up, the White Stag, hair "jelly", guitar playing, singing, night time snuggles with snorter, and the best deer hunter in all of Wisconsin.

Hank "made" his own breakfast. Donut and Special K bar. What? It's made with cereal.
Nice cooperation boys. Thank you.

Having kids is like having an exotic pet. It's cool. They're beautiful. When you take them out places people oooggle over them. You get to pick really cool names for them. But. But. At any moment they can turn on you and bite your face off. Welcome to my day.

Ok, so as most of you know I now have the super stressful work week of Tues. and Wed. First of all.....let me clear something up. Being a stay at home mom is hard. Wanna know what's harder? Being a working mom. I'm gonna give a big ol' "You Rock" to working moms. If I had to do this s#&$ 5 days a week it wouldn't be pretty people.

The Kowboys go to school on the days that I work. My niece picks them up at 2:30, so really they don't have it that rough. But to them...tragic. They like their life of luxury. Wake up, mom makes some coffee, the 3 of us snuggle in the chair and catch up on Nick Jr. cartoons or read some library books. Then start our day around 9:00. They just aint havin' this out the door by 7:30 nonsense. So, here's how my morning went:

6:40 Brody walks into living room "momma do I have school today?"

Me "yes"

Brody "whahahahahahhawwhahaha" (that's screaming/crying) followed by kicking me in the shins and punching me in the stomach.

Hank "we do have school"

Me "Yes, it's Wed. today"

So, at this point they are both doing a run/scream combo move around the living room. Kind of like blowing up 2 balloons and then letting them go and at the same time pushing an air horn. I think naps are in order for tomorrow.

Why I'm cooler than you

Wanna know why I'm cooler than you? 'Cause I took AcroYoga with Chip and Laura tonight. That's correct ladies and gentlemen. ACROyoga!! See that lady in the cool pose on chips feet. THAT'S ME!!!
And this is me doing the really cool hold on to Chip's ankles and put my knee on his foot move. Impressed???

Smile if you like Yoga with Misel.

Any day now I'm going to tour with Cirque du Soleil.

I had fun. In case you couldn't tell.

3 hours of AcroYoga makes this momma sleeeepppyy.
Gotta love Hottie Eric. (That's his birth name.)

This is what I found when I opened my frig tonight. This is what sent me into insta-tears. If you don't have kids stop reading this blog because you'll think I'm a freak show. If you are a dad you wont understand, so stop reading this blog. Only read this if you are a mother.

The insta-tears was prompted by the bowl of cereal. With the spoon. On top of the cheesecake. Hank had this bowl of cereal for a snack tonight. I forgot all about it untill I opened the frig. Why did I forget all about it? How did I forget all about it? Well.....because when Hank was done eating it he put it in the frig. "Saved" it for tomorrow. Now why would that send me into tears you ask? Here's why. Score 1 for mom teaching kids to be responsible. He cleaned up his snack, put it where it goes, and didn't waste any food. He's 3 people. THREE. Some of his friends are still pooping in their pants. 3.

Sesame Street will never be the same
My kids share in my love for pumpkin carving. They don't. I'm sorry people, but it's boring and stupid and kept my kids entertained for about 27 seconds.


Transformer and Spider Man. Neither of which are the costumes we (Papa) bought them to wear this year. Oh well, I've spent the past few weeks at WalMart with Obi-Won and Cookie Monster..so..they got some good use. Even if they didn't make an appearance Trick-or-Treating.

Now that I've eaten all of the good candy out of the Kowboys pumpkins I'll fill you in on the super fun last few weeks. Last weekend I went to the MOA with some of my fav. gals. Lots of good shopping, great food, and of course laugh till I pee. This is a yearly thing for me. Laugh till I pee.....out in the parking lot.....or in the super high end part of Nordstroms. I'm sorry, even at 33 a guy with his zipper down showing off his polka dotted underwear is really freakin' funny people. A nicer women would of told him. One like me would laugh till she pees. And FYI the Nordstrom workers DONOT get a kick out of Libby and I laughing for 40 minutes in the chairs outside the bathroom. I almost bought a $400 shirt just because I felt so guilty. Almost.

Brad and I had a fun Halloween weekend with 2 fun parties and much needed margaritas for big bird. Kowboys had fun trick-or-treating. Hank made it 2 blocks, got freaked out and stayed at a friends house to help pass out candy. Brods loaded up the pumpkin.

And, just for fun, here are a few "fun" things that happened in our house this week:

Culligan broke

Microwave broke

Oven caught on fire (thankfully just bacon grease and after a good cleaning all was good)

The garage door opener broke and a cable snapped and a big metal rod thingy came slamming down. Thank God nobody was standing there and miraculously it missed both vehicles.

Brad and I were bringing a keg to a party and locked the keys in the car. With the keg in the car. And no spare keys anywhere to be found.

And.....I did something a women should never ever ever do. I had a moment of craziness. The kids were playing dress up. I had a dress in there from when I was a bridesmaid in my best friends wedding. For some crazy a** reason I thought "hmmm...lets see if I can still fit in this." O.K., here was my thought process....when I wore the dress I was 21 weeks pg with Brody. So, I thought if I could wear this thing at 21 weeks pg I better the H fit in it now?! Uhhhh huhhhh. What I didn't tell my crazy brain is that I also lost about 15 pounds during the start of my preg. and heaved my brains out the entire pregnancy. So, yes, I was in the smoking hot glory days of my body at that wedding. Huge boobs and not showing even a teeny bit yet. Unlike my just ate all my kids Halloween candy and had McDonalds for lunch because they were begging for it and I didn't feel like going through the effort of making grilled cheese body. Not. NOT the same body. So, I got the dress stuck. Couldn't get it down, couldn't get it up. Stuck. I had to cut the thing off.

Mountain Lion. Not really.

I am sitting here listening to my kids sobbing in bed. Papa left for Arizona. Damn you Wisconsin winters. Just so you don't think I am leaving my kids broken hearted in bed while I search pinterest, etsy and NieNie blogs.....I have been comforting them for an hour. Now, it's time for the little monkies to fall asleep. God bless them....xoxoxoxo
Since I am in need of a good laugh...I'll tell you a classic Ebeth story.

The other day I was driving home from Iron River and was about half way to Eagle River. For those of you that don't live here, it is a huge beautiful forest area. I drove past a lady speed walking (side note....that freaks me out. I mean, just jog. The arm swinging thing scares me.) I thought "weird?" I have no idea where she came from as it is the middle of no where. About 5 miles down the road I see something moving in the woods. MOUNTAIN LION.

I screamed. Slowed down and pulled over. Huge yellow tail. Pointy ears. I grabbed my Iphone tried to snap a pic and then realized "Oh my gosh.....that lady....I need to go tell her there is a mountain lion and give her a ride. I wouldn't be able to forgive myself if she got attacked and he ate her face off and used her jugular vein for dental floss." So I quickly turned the car around. Started speeding toward her and the mountain lion picked his head up.

Ummm...wait a minute? I didn't know mountain lions wore collars. Blue collars with tags. Dog tags. Ooopsie. Guess it was a yellow lab/germain sheperd mix.

Sorry lady. Enjoy your walk. In my defense...they have seen them in Eagle River. Confirmed sightings. With pictures. And no dog collars.

FUN

This weekend was brought to you by the letter F, U and N. We kicked off the weekend by having a baby shower for a very special friend who is pg with her FOURTH baby. That's like a million. Love that Katie Lidner. xoxoxoxo Aren't my table decorations just fab?
How cute is she? After the shower we went to mass and watched B.Herb sing in choir. His very first choir performance. Look out Justin Timberlake....


Then we went to the "White Steak" for dinner at B. Herb's request. Ya know, every 4 year old's fav. restaurant is the White Stag. They also had their cousin sleep over. Love that Milly.

On Sunday we celebrated B's birthday. A month early. He wanted Papa to be here for the celebration. Nothing says party like some pin the tail on the donkey.

Papa wanted in on the fun.

The almost 5 year old.

Lobbying for 2 cupcakes. I think he had 7.

Potato gun+my kids=hours of fun

Herb said this was the "best party he's ever had."