Gloating

gloat: intr.v. gloat·ed, gloat·ing, gloats: To feel or express great, often malicious, pleasure or self-satisfaction.

So since this is in no way malicious it's ok, right? I'm totally not going to say "neener neener neener" or anything like that. Just state a fact and let it be.

Utah beat BYU.

Oh and it felt good. It was satisfying, but not maliciously satisfying.

I'm going in...

Luc loves his bath time! But he has to be watched really closely, he has no fear. He sticks his head under the running water and lays down on his tummy like he's swimming. I've tried to tell him he's only 9 months old and he can't do that yet but he doesn't listen. So when I can't sit in there with him, the girls bathe while he stands outside and reaches in to splash. Well today he decided he was sick of watching the girls have all the fun.

The girls started screaming "mom Luc got in the bath!" I assume he went in head first but he wasn't crying or upset. Just a little smug. I think his expression was saying "just try to keep me out of the bath."

9 Months (and a week or so)

If only the 9 months he spent in my belly would have gone as fast as his first 9 months out. This little guy has definitely won my heart. He can be such a pest yet we still love him more each day.
So here's what he's up to:

• Crawling like crazy
• Cruising around on furniture
• Standing for short moments by himself
• Climbing

Notice the food storage he's climbed on to get to that ball, at least it's being used for something

• Tackling (his sisters mostly)
• Blabbering (no mamas yet but an occasional dada)
• Cleaning

• Sleeping in 4 hour segments and wanting to eat all night long
• Eating anything and everything
  
  
  
  
• Playing the role of the family dog, begging for food and eating any food the girls happen to drop or leave lying around.
• Cat-napping (he loves a nice little 20 minute nap - you can guess how much I love that)

And he does an excellent Urkel impression with the help of Papa - If you don't know who Urkel don't is then you're too young to be my friend ;)

FYI

If you ever happen to use your brother's computer to check your gmail just remember that gmail and blogger are one in the same, in that if you login to one you're automatically logged into the other and when you leave your brother may just happen to notice this and he may put a nice post about himself on your blog. Just FYI.

My Wonderful, Incredible, Fabulous Brother and Sister in Law

I just wanted to take a few moments today to express my deep love and admiration for my Brother and his beautiful wife Sarah. They are the best people I have ever known (no offense to all my other friends and family). Their generosity and selflessness are an incredible example to me and my family. Every time we spend time in Tucson they take care of us better than our own parents. I don't know how to express my gratitude for all they do. THEY ARE THE BEST!!! We spent the weekend with them and when we left they gave us $1000 just because they felt we needed it. It came at the perfect time. Mckay and Kimball ask everyday when they can go back to Aunt Sarah and Uncle Bj's house. Just the other day Kimball and Seth had this conversation:

Kimball: "Dad you know what?"

Seth: "What dude?"

Kimball: "I love Uncle Bj more than you. I want to go live with him."

They are so cute. If you haven't had a chance to get to know the Bisel family, you really should. We love you Bisels!!!

I'm coming...

I have become my mom. My mom is wonderful in so many ways. Her faith is astounding. She is a loving and kind person in so many ways. She's about as innocent as a person at her age can be. Too bad these are not the ways in which I am emulating her. Not that she has any huge faults or shortcomings but the little things that she did while I was growing up that drove me nuts because I was a really really smart kid and I knew that my way was better... well now I've taken to doing those "little things."

There are quite a few of them but lately one has been overly apparent. I cannot for the life of me say "time to go" and walk out and get in the car and drive away. Seth's work is approximately 10-12 minutes drive from here so why do I have to "start" leaving at 3:30 in order to maybe get there by 4:00.

Let me just tell you why... here's how it goes: I send the girls out first because it takes them so long to get buckled (or because they have me figured out.) Grab Luc and my first load of "whatever" take him out (I don't even bother shutting the front door on this first departure.) I buckle him in, yell at the girls to get buckled and go back in for whatever else I forgot, usually a bottle or sippy cup, come back out and lock the door (which I know is a bad idea but I do it on the off chance that I might actually get in the car and drive away.) I then get in the driver seat, ask the girls why they still aren't buckled and promise something if they can please buckle before I start driving, and either rifle through my purse looking for my keys or get back out to see if I'm sitting on them which I usually am. Then I start the car, here we go, oh wait I promised the girls a movie if they buckled themselves before I was ready to drive away. So I get out of the car go back inside search for a dvd that they will both be happy with, run to the bathroom (because when I started leaving I didn't have to go that bad but now I'm pushing my luck), and then it's back out to the car. On a good day, that's it. On an average day I'd probably go back inside at least one more time and on a bad day at one or both of the girls also needs to use the bathroom and we start the whole process over again.

So I concede. Mom, you win. In this case, you were right. Or justified or whatever. I will hold on to hope that when my kids are old enough to be annoyed by this I won't do it but I'm assuming that by then it will be a habit and I won't know how to walk out of the house and get in the car. What now bugs me to death will probably be my norm. Such is life.

Pretzels

I know I said I would post this forever ago but I wanted to get a beautiful picture to go along with it... too bad I keep forgetting to snap a shot of them. So here's the picture-less recipe.

INGREDIENTS
4 teaspoons active dry yeast (I haven't tried using half yeast yet)
1 teaspoon white sugar
1 1/4 cups warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)
5 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup white sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 tablespoon vegetable oil

1/2 cup baking soda
4 cups hot water
1/4 cup kosher salt, for topping

DIRECTIONS
In a small bowl, dissolve yeast and 1 teaspoon sugar in warm water. Let stand until creamy, about 10 minutes.

In a large bowl, mix together flour, 1/2 cup sugar, and salt. Make a well in the center; add the oil and yeast mixture. Mix and form into a dough. If the mixture is dry, add one or two tablespoons of water. (I've found it needs about 4-5 more tablespoons of water) Knead the dough until smooth (or just let it mix in a stand mixer for 5 minutes or so.) Cover and let rise in a warm place until doubled in size, about 1 hour.

In a large bowl, dissolve baking soda in hot water. When risen, turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface and divide into 12 equal pieces. Roll each piece into a rope and twist into a pretzel shape. Once all of the dough is all shaped, dip each pretzel into the baking soda solution and place on a greased baking sheet. (Don't skip this step, it's what makes the pretzels golden brown)Sprinkle with kosher salt.

Bake at 450 (425 if your oven cooks hot like mine) for 8-10 minutes, until browned.

ENJOY!

PS. Don't you just love it when you hit spellcheck at the end of a post and it says "no misspellings found." It's my favorite. It doesn't happen very often for me.

I know, I know, you DON'T care!

I can't help myself. Regardless of my readers indifference on the subject I have to do it. I am incapable of letting the moment pass without sharing my feelings about it.

Last night I almost peed my pants. It's been quite some time since I've actually wet myself.

But last night I came really, really close. I was inside, there was a bathroom close by but it really had nothing to do with the proximity of a toilet or my ability to get to it. It was more a "scared into uncontrollable urination" moment.

Just picture it, Seth, my father-in-law, my brother-in-law and my three sweet children all sitting around a computer, listening to a radio broadcast and thinking, nay,believing that all of our hopes and dreams are about to be crushed just a few short minutes...

Are you on the edge of your seat? Are you wondering what could be that BIG?

With only 2 minutes left the Utes were down 10-6 to TCU, I could hardly bare the thought. Seth literally gave up. Said "it's over!" But not me, I told Seth to take his negative pants off and get back in the game. And, partly because of my positive thinking I'm sure, they did it!! They marched down the field and scored with just 47 seconds left. And then they held them. Intercepted and WON!!! 10-0!!

Do any of you comprehend what that means? Let me just tell you, right now in college football there are only 6 undefeated teams, SIX. (Oh and by the way BYU is not one of them, in case you were wondering) (Oh and also, BYU lost to TCU a couple weeks ago.)

I can still sense a little bit of indifference from you all.... Humor me. Pretend you care.

And no I didn't end up peeing my pants... is that all you care about?

Halloween with Nana Betty

We spent Halloween in Tucson with my parents and my sister's and brother's families. The kids had so much fun being with their cousins. It was a bit nostalgic for me. When we were little we always trick or treated at nana's house with cousins. So it was good to see my kids get that experience. And as an added bonus we took all the kids over to see Nana at her nursing home. I thought at first that she was a little overwhelmed by all of us but when my mom told her we had to leave so she could go have dinner she said "to heck with dinner!" I wish we were closer so I could take the kids to see her more often.

Nana Betty with 9 of her ??? great grandchildren. I thought I could figure that out but it would just be a guess, ok I'll give you my best guess 33-35?

Ready to go get some candy. They brought in quite the haul, the younger one's didn't last quite as long but McKay outlasted all the other littler ones, what a proud mommy moment.Luc lasted about 40 minutes. Every extra piece of candy helps. My little fairy princesses. Aren't the adorable.

Seriously, have you ever seen a cuter clown? Can you see his red hair? How did I get a redhead?