An Apology and a Tag

First of all, I'm sorry. I'm sorry that I have left you, my friends, family, etc. out in the cold, dark cyberspace with not even a hint of our goings on. I'm weak. I'm only human. The truth is, that I have been a tiny bit busy. "Whatever, Katie!" you are all saying, "everyone's busy!" That's probably true, but it's really my only excuse. We've been up to our eyeballs in events, occasions, toddler shenanigans, packages to mail, dishes to clean, sickness to clean up (Ben and I were sick over the weekend) and more toddler shenanigans. We've just been busy. Oh, and I could not find a memory card for the camera. And I was reading New Moon and Eclipse. It's been crazy.

And that's my final word on my terrible blogging lately. I hope you can accept my apology and stop guilting me.

Anyway, moving right along, My loverly friend Theresa tagged me with some crazy eights tag. And I intend to answer that tag. But, I modified it a little bit because I don't have eight answers for some of the questions. And here we go:

8 Favorite TV shows...

1. 30 Rock
2. The Simpsons
3. Jeeves and Wooster
4. What Not to Wear
5. Good Eats
6. Arrested Development
7. Ugly Betty
8. Pushing Daisies
   

8 Favorite Restaurants...


1. Cafe Rio
2. Burger Supreme
3. Granny's Drive-in
4. Ottavio's
5. Fortune
6. Bombay House
   
7. Tokyo
8. Doner Kebab
   

8 things that happened this weekend...


1. I finished reading Eclipse (and then started it again. Crazy weirdo.)
   
2. Ben and I were sick
3. We had a babysitting exchange with Todd and Betty (who are awesome)
4. I learned how to knit from Bronwen at her Craftea party.
   
5. We watched General Conference (though, because I was sick, I did sleep through a hefty portion of it)
6. Zach and I went out to eat at a yummy Mexican restaurant
   
7. I picked the first strawberry off my strawberry plant.
8. It rained for the first time in months
   

8 things to look forward to...


1. The weather starting to cool (it is just barely happening)
2. Halloween and getting the boys dressed up for trick-or-treating
3. Getting the house back in order
4. Start decorating, which is dependent on #3
5. Seeing family at Thanksgiving
6. Reading Breaking Dawn and finishing the Twilight saga
7. Start working on some of the story ideas I had over the summer
8. (In the very distant future) Being done with school. Someday.
   

8 things on my wishlist...


1. A bright red KitchenAid mixer
2. Black XS Perfume (I used to go into a store and spray it on myself everyday when we were in Spain. It's lovely.)
   
3. The Bob Weather Shield for Duallie Strollers.
4. A Can opener that leaves a smooth edge (like this one.)
5. The A&E Version of Pride and Prejudice on DVD. (And a gazillion other DVDs, but we'll leave it at that).
6. A huge bookcase to organize and control Zach's ever expanding collection of books.
7. A really hefty pastry cutter
   
8. Shikai Borage Facial Cleanser & Face Lotion (Actually, I kinda want the whole line, but these would be a good start).

So, there you go. Because I don't want anyone to be upset with me in anyway, I'm only tagging the people that fill this description:

1. You want to be tagged
2. When you saw that I was tagged, you hoped that I would tag you
3. You weren't relieved when you didn't see your name here.

And there you have it.

Conversations with Little People

A lot has changed since we left for Spain. For instance, the boys are bigger. They can now open all the doors in the the house, except the front one when it is locked (thank goodness!) and they can climb up on pretty much everything. They are also taller, which means there is an even smaller amount of "safe space" for me to put breakables and the like. Oh, and here is a big difference for you: They are chatterboxes. They love to talk. Love it. And we love to hear them talk and hold little conversations with them. Because you don't ever really know what they are going to say. Or what they are saying, sometimes. So, here are a couple short conversations that I have had with the boys.

Me: (After hearing Sam hit the wall with something) Hey, be careful in there!
Sam: No.
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Sam and Ben are walking up the stairs. Sam slips.
Ben: Okay, Sam?
Sam: Ya, I okay.
Ben: Okay.
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I am sitting at the computer and Ben and Sam bring me a bottle of chocolate syrup (also, they can now open the refrigerator by themselves - terrible news!)
Sam: Mommy, chocolate milk.
Ben: I want chocolate in cup.
(they repeat various forms of this for several minutes)
Ben & Sam: Peas! (translation: Please!)
--- This is a constant conversation we have. All the time. ---
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We were on a walk when we saw three black squirrels jumping around in someone's yard.
Me: Look boys! Squirrels!
Ben & Sam: (excited laughter)
Ben: Hello, squirrels!
Sam: That so funny. Mommy - so funny!
Me: Are those squirrels funny?
Sam: Yes. So funny!
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Ben and I are sitting at the kitchen table eating our cereal. Sam is still asleep because he was up late the night before.
Ben: Where Sam?
Me: He's still asleep.
Ben: Asleep? Why?
Me: Because he's still tired.
Ben: I not asleep. (Pause) Cereal.
Me: Uh-huh.
Ben: Gabbers incoherently about Sam being asleep and cereal - I think his point was - Sam had better wake up or he not going to get any cereal.
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Later when Sam wakes up we have this conversation:
Sam: Hey! What's that?
Me: What?
Sam: Hey, get out a house!
Me: Who are you telling to get out?
Sam: (Pause) Tiger get out. (Growls) Tiger get out my house!
Me: Is there a tiger in our house?
Ben: No tiger in house. Outside. Go get him, Mommy. Go get him.
(This conversation repeats several times in various forms.)
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Thanks for reading. I'm sure there are more to come.

Slow Going

Our progress of getting the house set up has been hindered from several different fronts. First of all, we are reveling in our connection to the Internet a wee bit too much. Because the Internet is awesome, people. And now we have it all the time. It's amazing. Second, we are all still overcoming our jet lag. This is the reason that we have eaten a pasta dinner at four in the morning and the boys current nap time is around 9 a.m. Craziness. And third is our constant hindrance, the boys. I believe I have whole posts on here about just how distracting the boys can be, so I won't elaborate. Also, to add a lovely monkey wrench into the mix, I have one of those annoying head colds that occurs when you spend 12 hours playing Russian roulette with the recirculated air germs on airplanes.

I also wanted to show you the blog header I made for our trip. I probably spent about five hours putting this silly thing together. It's a combination of several pictures of the Costa Brava that I went Photoshop-crazy on. I liked it. I still like it. But, I forgot to upload the file here before the computer had been shut down, disassembled, and packed away, so it never was. But I wanted you all to see it. So, I could somehow justify spending all that time moving various elements back and forth two millimeters to see which looked better.

We're Home!!!

Ben, Barcelona to London, playing with toys

We are finally, finally home! And it feels good, people! We got home safe and more or less sound after a grueling trip. Though we are extremely jet lagged. And I came down with a cold (stupid recirculated air!). The boys did great on the plane, by the way. Except that they kept hitting the French lady's seat in front of them. And she kept turning around and glaring at me. Lovely. But they both fell asleep at the beginning and end of the flight and let us rest a bit. And jumped around on the seats and watched cartoons for several hours in between. When we finally got into San Fransisco, we were sooooo ready to be off the plane and sooooo freakin' ready to be home. Unfortunately for us, they left our stroller in London, where we connected, so we had to wait around for two hours or so while we figured that out. It was exhausting. Especially since it was about 4 in the morning for us and Zach and I didn't sleep on the plane at all (Because we're stupid, that's why not. Thanks very much.)

Sam, London to San Fransisco, sleeping.
(Zach added the eye mask)

Anyway, we finally got home, (and it is great to be home) got all our luggage inside, made sure nothing was broken, and then we all fell asleep on the couch and floor. Really. Until we woke up again around 3:00 a.m. and put on the Wiggles for the boys, who had been hitting me in the head with the DVD case since 2:30. But we've already foraged out for food and provisions and have probably 75% of our luggage unpacked and put away. And I've read a billion blog posts that I haven't checked all summer. And now that we have the internet readily available, I'll probably be posting some after-the-fact posts about our Spain trip. And you really can't stop me. But for now, I'm going to bed, because everyone else is sleeping, and when we wake up again tomorrow in the middle of the night, wide awake, we will start unpacking boxes.

And by the way. It is so good to be home.

The Weiner Express

This is a little video of one of our last nights in Platja d'Aro, when the boys decided to take the cocktail weinies and make a train. It was glorious.

One Week and Counting

As of yesterday, we have one week left in Spain. We fly back next Wednesday. It has been a fun ride, but it's almost over.

We're comin' home, America! Roll out the welcome wagon and have plenty of chips, salsa, and root beer ready. 'Cause I've missed you.

Tales from the Bus

We've ridden the bus a whole lot the last three months. It's really our only form of transport other than walking. And as anyone who takes public transport knows, it can get pretty interesting.

Usually, when we take the earliest bus to Girona on Sunday morning we are accompanied by hung-over teenagers crawling back home after a night on the town. You know that summer break is over now because this time everyone getting on the bus was disturbingly sober. Two weeks ago we completely missed church because we missed our bus by a minute. Actually, it was pulling away as we arrived. It was our fault though, because we were betting that the bus was going to be fifteen minutes late, which is pretty standard, and this time it was only five minutes late. Slightly annoying. Last week on the way to church, the bus got a flat tire and we had to wait about fifteen minutes till a new bus could come out from Girona. It's an adventure.

A couple of weeks ago we sat behind a four-year-old British girl, (who was probably the palest person I have ever seen, by the way. Almost translucent.) who kept shooting questions at the boys and I. My favorite conversation was the following:

Little Girl: Do you know what?

Me: No.

Little Girl: I fart a lot.

Me: (stifling laughter) Oh really?

Little Girl: Yes. I do.

Me: Well, that's good to know.

Little Girl: Do you fart a lot?

Me: (Stomach hurts from trying not to fall over laughing) Well, I try not to. Too much.

Little Girl: Oh. I do.

Good times. There was also the time that I thought Ben was walking right behind me on the bus, but he had actually stopped to try and drive the bus. Luckily Zach was bringing up the rear and got him, and still more luck, the bus driver thought it was cute. Another time Sam tried to grab a handful of coins out of the bus driver's till. This guy did not think it was funny.