On the road again...

On the road again
Just can't wait to get on the road again
The life I love is makin' music with my friends
And I can't wait to get on the road again
On the road again
Goin' places that I've never been
Seein' things that I may never see again,
And I can't wait to get on the road again.

--Willie Nelson

Like the song says, we're headed out onto the open road again. Same destination as the last two weekends, but this time both the kids and I will be staying five full days! I'm taking them out of school for three days next week. I've never done that before so I just hope the homework overload isn't too great.

{The Very Trusty, Yet Very Dirty, Saturn}

We'll be back sometime on Wednesday evening. Hopefully I remember this time to take at least one picture every day for our 365 blog.

For the first few nights we'll be using a friends apartment who is not home. This is great! I'm glad we'll have some place where the kids can just chill and be themselves. Then on Sunday night -- I'm not sure where we'll be. I guess we'll figure that out as we go along. We have lots of visiting with family to do. We're going bowling at least one night. And we'll be spending time with my special someone before he heads off to Korea.

It's going to be an excellent weekend. I hope I've taken so many pictures that I run out of space on my SD card in my camera.

First Day Back to School

Well, this morning was our first day back to school after 2 weeks of vacation.

To say it was hectic would be an understatement. Two weeks of not setting an alarm made it nearly impossible for me to get out of bed this morning. In fact, I hit snooze for 36 minutes.

When I finally got out of bed it was already about 20 minutes to 8 and we normally drop them off at 8:15AM. I got Lorelei some clothes. And I rambled about for a bit. I don't wake up so quickly in the morning. After trying to rouse George I went and found Caleb some clothes. He was highly resistant to getting out of bed himself.

George got them some poptarts for breakfast since we were short on time. They ate, brushed teeth and it was already time to walk out the door.

When I picked up Lorelei from school, I had walked. I do this if weather permits to give me some exercise. She cried almost the entire way home. She was just beat after a half day back to school. In fact, she spent most of the afternoon sneaking Reese's Peanut Butter Cups and marshmallows from the pantry while sitting on the couch vegging to some cartoons she was interested in.

Both kids were upset when I decided that walking was also best for picking up Caleb this afternoon.

Apparently though, they had good days. Caleb was glad to have had a nice recess and to see his buddies again after the long break. Lorelei I think was also glad to see her friends, but was too busy sneaking snacks to say so.

I'm hoping the rest of the week isn't quite so difficult. George flies out to Las Vegas early Wednesday morning and won't be home until next Monday.

Vacation is getting B-O-R-I-N-G!

I'm pretty sure the kids are getting sick of their vacation from school. Not because they want to go to school necessarily - but because we have no routine when they aren't in school. There isn't anything concrete to take up all those hours in a day when they'd normally be at school learning and spending time with other kids of the same age.
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This week will be crazy.

Somehow, I'd like to go and visit my family. Then I'd like to visit my very good friend and her family for an overnight and have a friend from home come over with her kids later this week. I'm not sure how to accomplish that all in four days time without driving myself completely batty. The visit to my family is a four hour trip. Visit to friend is at least two hours from my family. Trip home from friend is roughly another four hours. Any suggestions?
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We took a family trip to IKEA this afternoon.

Mostly, we were looking for a storage solution for Lorelei's toys. She ended up just getting a purple bin with everything shoved into it. So, we found something we liked and ended up getting it for both kids because quite honestly -- we weren't satisfied with how things were working out in Caleb's room either.

We're also going to be getting the kids some new bedding. Something they can grow into. To get started we got Lorelei some cute pillows to go along the back of her daybed -- though we now realize we need one more. We're hoping to find a bedding set that will go with these because they are super cute. I'm not sure yet what route we'll take with Caleb's age.

It's hard having two kids with opinions. They both tend to want to keep what's familiar even if realistically it's something they've outgrown.

Snow Day!

We got our wish and school was closed today. We actually got more ice than snow, so I'm sure the roads just weren't good enough to haul all the kids in. We had another warning out too apparently, but it's been canceled now.

The kids are enjoying the fact that they get an extra day off, but I'm wondering now what we'll do for the next two weeks? I've got to come up with something to keep them from driving each other, and me, absolutely crazy.
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So, it's time for a puppy update.

Max is assimilating well. He and Duke are still working things out which can be funny and annoying all at the same time. I believe for the most part Max is willing to give Duke all leadership roles, but he still occasionally gets feisty and fired up.

We've had some accidents in the house. The only plausible explanation we can come up with is that Max finally started eating regularly (as he adjusted to his new environment he didn't eat much) and so his former ability to go 4 or 5 hours inbetween potty breaks just isn't cutting it now. He does tend to go and sit by the door if he has to go, so we just have to make sure we are diligent in watching for his signs.

He's figured out how to jump on and off the couch now. He's also figured out the evil stairs. He has not figured out, or gotten brave enough, to jump off our bed yet. It's pretty high and intimidating for a puppy. He's not having accidents overnight while sleeping with us, so that's also very good cause I don't think anyone wants to wake up to puppy poo or pee in the middle of the night.