Calendar

   I just found this great calendar I had to share.  I found the link through FlyLady which I use in our home in different seasons.  Sometimes it works... sometimes not so much, but great ideas.  Anyways, while visiting their site I followed this link to Cozi which is an online calendar.  I'm LOVING it!!  You can color code your family members, put it as a sidebar on your desktop so you can always see what's up for today and tomorrow, you can access it if you have a smart phone (which I don't) and it will send you reminders on your cell phone if you text (which I do).  It's so nice to see it all laid out.  You can print it by the day, week or month if you're so inclined and you can even set it up to send reminders to others in your family on their cell phone.  You can set up school routines that will show time and days on or off... I'm loving it!  You can make a To-Do list and even a grocery list.  What I love most is having it on my desktop.  I am one of those people who may take time to check my emails but sometimes skips the two minutes to check my calendar!  As you know if you write it down but don't read it... it doesn't help!  If you want it also will let you link up to Flylady and it will tell you what Zone you're working in that week and that days "mission" in your zone.  I've been trying to get into the habit of checking their "missions" each day because they are easy and right on for our house but now I don't have to!  It's right there.  Ahhhh, I love technology sometimes!

3rd Shift

   You may not know this about us but in 18 years of marriage we've only been a "normal" 1st shift family for 2 years.  Paul has always worked jobs that don't account for holidays and "normal" working hours.  Lately he's been under a ton of stress at work.  They are WAY understaffed and over worked.  They are being asked to do things that use to be the job of 3 people... literally.  Then they are putting huge rules upon him as to how to do it. They have now fired 3 people in the last 3 months for not doing their job right.  Paul is a #1 worker.  He enjoys doing a job well even if no one is looking and the crazy demands are stressing him out like I've never seen.  He's in a dangerous field of law enforcement and being understaffed and constantly distracted is not a good combo.  As shift bids came up this year and his blood pressure is normal at home but over 200 ON blood pressure meds at work we decided it might be time to go back to the old days of 3rd shift.  It's not the best for families but we figure a dead dad would be worse right?

  I spent sooooo many years trying to figure out how to live a "normal" life in the crazy 3rd shift world and really struggled.  Ironically as we are looking ahead and make plans there's almost a comfort in going back.  What I didn't realize is we really did adjust quite well to that schedule/shift, it just didn't feel like it because no one else lived like that!  As I'm looking at wake up times, meal times and how we're going to go about things I'm thinking...."why didn't I like this??"  I know one reason, if he only had 1-2 days off it's too hard for him to adjust his sleep so he stays on his normal schedule.  This means for me I only had a "full time" husband with me 2-3 days a month. And we only had one long weekend a month to do anything with.  That was hard.  And what made it harder was since he didn't adjust his sleep and there's not much to do in the middle of the night he would game or watch movies or read and it looked like a fantastically wonderful break that I NEVER got!!  We're talking about how we will handle that when it comes.  If you have any wonderful suggestions pass them on.  He's going to take the time to workout and help out with laundry.  He could do some late night store runs to a 24 hour "super store".  I know now that the boys are older he'll pull them out for some all nighters which doesn't sound so great to me but the boys think it's awesome and I know it will build memories for them all.

   The other thing I learned is having your husband home more...isn't always a good thing!  LOL!  Don't get me wrong, I love having him here but it's next to impossible to get anything accomplished!  He gets in the way of our routine and the house is a mess, baths aren't done and there's a lot of movie watching and rough housing going on!  It's very hard to keep a routine (not that I've ever been that fantastic of a routine keeper anyway).  While on 1st shift he was on 12 hours so he had a lot more days off.  It's been fun but I will say it would have been more fun if our kids were in school or all older and gone... or all younger...it was just hard to  homeschool with him home more often.

  Oh well, I guess the grass is always greener on the other side.  1st shift 12 hours I thought was going to be the best but it too brought some scheduling conflicts and issues.  And as much as I thought it would turn my night owl husband into a morning lark, therefore transforming ME into the morning lark I always wanted to be, it was not to be.  We would wake early and go to bed early on "work" days but on days off we'd both be up way past midnight and sleep in until 9am!  I hate that about us, and I totally blame him for making me this way!  I don't recall being like that until we married and I adjusted to his nutty ways!  I guess if he can put up with all my crazy I can put up with his as well ;0)  The secret to a happy marriage... put up with each others crazies.

Football

   Football is done!  Woo hoo!  Carter played his first year of tackle ball and it was a lot of fun and VERY busy!  I've told people if it weren't for the fact that we LOVE football it would have been horrible, but we love it so it was a ton of fun.  We learned some interesting things about Carter.  He is very unsure about tackling.  He doesn't mind getting tackled but said he just has a hard time convincing himself to run full bore into someone else!  He was a great quarterback.  He's smart and sees plays well.  He did really well at QB.  He is NOT aggressive. While enjoying playing quarterback he never told the coach he wanted to play more because someone else really wanted to be QB, so he just went with the flow.  At the end of the season several parents said they wished he would've played QB more often and that seemed to boost his confidence a bit.  And last but not least, he is not afraid to try anything.  We would just crack up laughing during games.  Kicker hurt?  Carter will do it.  Kick team missing a player?  Carter will do it.  Someone's not playing their position well?  Carter will do it.  While other kids were afraid to try the coaches knew if they needed to fill a space Carter would do it.  He wasn't always great but other kids were too nervous to even try.  The one game he ended up kicking because the kicker was hurt he did awesome!  Who knew??

   I realized as I did this post I don't have any pictures of him all suited up!  Oh well.  Here he is with two of his coaches at his banquet and a whole mess of hormones... I mean team mates!

5 Little Pumpkins

  Well, they're not all so little anymore but they're still my pumpkins ;0)  Being Halloween yesterday this post is a little late but hey, better late than pregnant right?  Hee... I mean better late than never... I'd probably take the pregnant thing!  This year because of our organic farm co-op each child was able to get their own pumpkin!  That doesn't sound like much but getting 5 kids their own pumpkin can easily wipe out $25 we don't have on something that rots on our front porch!  A few days ago it was nice not freezing out so I let them go to it outside!  Here's the pics and the end results.

 The blonde in the picture is our "blonde brother".  He's our next door neighbor and practically lives here so he's always just part of the crew.  He helped Hannah while I helped Addie.

It was dusk and for some reason it looks blue!  The peace sign looking one on the far left is pretty funny and creative.  That's what was left after the rest of the pumpkin rotted!  So they call it their "pumpkin lantern" which is what it looks like in person, but in this pic it looks like a pretty cool peace sign!

We roasted the seeds using this http://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/recipes/83 recipe.  I didn't boil them though.  Very tasty!  Hope you had a great Halloween.

Sandbox Fun

   Last year we discovered our little Addie did NOT like sand when we visited Lake Michigan in the late summer.  Thinking that was long ago when she was 1 I had the grand idea to get new sand in our sandbox for her on her 2nd birthday this spring.  Kind of kill two birds with one stone, we need more sand and she could care less at the age of 2 what she gets!  It was great, the relatives had cheap and easy options for presents (sand toys) and it was going to be great!  Or not.  She STILL hated the sand!  She wouldn't touch it!  So all summer it sat untouched.  What a bummer.  Then all of a sudden a couple weeks ago she out of the blue ASKED to play in the sand and... the rest is history!  We've had some pretty muddy water after baths some nights but I'm so glad she's playing in it I don't even care!

Sister fun! 

Hannah was burying her feet. (Confusing angle I can't figure out how to flip it for you!) 

 Here I was trying to show how dirty she was, not sure where all the silly faces and poses came from but it was cute :0)  

 Love this pose!  She was so funny... and filthy!

Dirty ladies headed straight for the tub.  Too bad she didn't figure out this love when it was still warm enough to rinse off in the hose or kiddie pool first!