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Maggie slept with us tonight.

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So it was raining and lightly storming again when it was bedtime. We put Maggie in her crate and went upstairs. Within minutes she was clawing madly at her crate again making all sorts of racket. We went down to check on her and her paws were already bloody. 🙁 We couldn’t leave her in there so we thought maybe if we put her in our room in a different crate it would be better. But first we had to bandage her paws. (I didn’t think when I bought the self-adhesive bandages I’d be using them on the dog first.) Then we put her in and tried to go to bed. Nope. She clawed like mad to get out of that crate, too. And knocked her bandages off. So we had to clean her up (again) and bandage her up (again, better this time) and figured the only way this was going to work was to just let her sleep with us. We figured we wouldn’t get any sleep because she moves constantly… and snores loudly. But amazingly the weather calmed right as we were getting back into bed and she layed down and didn’t move all night.

The kids picked their own reward for “not bothering me” when I’m working.

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So last month when I was in the middle of crazy work mode trying to do umpteen things at once, I needed a way to try and keep the kids from bothering me ALL. THE. TIME. I mean yes, I still had to be around for them, but they are old enough to understand “Mom is working, you don’t need to interrupt me every 13 seconds with something stupid.” The final straw came when, one day, I was trying to watch a training video and the kids were playing near me and kept asking me things which meant I had to stop the video then rewind it—over and over. And Owen finally asked me why the lady kept repeating herself! And I had to tell them that she was NOT repeating herself—I just had to keep replaying it because they kept interrupting me.

So I came up with the Family Reward. I set a sales goal for the month and told them that if I (we!) met that goal, we got to go on a reward that they picked. So every time I was working or told them I was busy working they would know that I was working toward the FAMILY GOAL and they shouldn’t bother me. They picked McDonald’s, bowling, and video games by dad’s work. Fine, great, easy peasy. And within the first 10 minutes of showing them the page I had printed and tacked to the wall, Katie was interrupting to ask me something and Owen shushed her, pointed to the sign, and said “MOM IS WORKING!” 🙂

I managed to reach my goal before the end of the month and they made us crazy wanting to go RIGHT THEN AND THERE. But we could obviously only go on the weekends and then we had company so it didn’t work out right away. So this weekend was the first real chance we had. So it was off to base for their reward for “helping mom reach her sales goal” in April by “not bothering mom when she’s working.”

The fancy pants bowling alley lets you take a photo and put it on your scoreboard!

Katie wanted them to be judges.

I came in last place. But I didn’t get to use the bumpers. And it takes me a full game to get warmed up and we only played one game. Yeah, that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

She wanted to play basketball and I begrudgingly let her—it was her reward, after all (they each for $5 in quarters for the games). And holy crap can she throw! I was helping her out, but she was making baskets! It was something to behold.

They had a great time and we are glad we did it. After, we went out and got lunch for us (we weren’t wasting calories on McDonald’s)…

HOLY SHIT WE’RE AWAKE NOW!!

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It had been storming all night—lots of thunder and lightning—with some being extremely loud (close). Then about 6:20am I was awoken by THE. LOUDEST. NOISE. I’ve ever heard in my LIFE. It literally jolted me out of bed and instantly set my heart racing. Obviously it was a bolt of lightning but I didn’t think much about it other than Wow, that must have been pretty close. I knew Katie would be in our room pretty quickly so waited for her. Yep, within a minute. So while we were cuddling (and I was trying to fall back to sleep), Owen came up to ask if we’d looked outside. Well, no…I was in bed. He excitedly said we had to look at the tree. So I got up and looked out our second-story window and…

Well then. That would certainly explain the super loud crazy lightning strike we heard! YIKES!

Then Tom came up and we ooohed and aaahed and then we thought “Hmmm. Maybe we should check our electronics.”

Yeah. Most everything in the living room was dead. The amazing 55″ Pioneer plasma TV that Dad and Lin had handed down to us nine years ago (that they don’t make anymore). The 2-year-old Yamaha receiver. The lifetimed TiVo. The new-in-January Roku HD. The Xfinity cable box. The cable card.

Oh! And two UPSs/surge protectors (the damage came in through the HDMI cable so the units didn’t protect against that surge).

Needless to say that is not how we envisioned our morning starting.

And how sad is this? Our master bedroom TV moved down so Tom could troubleshoot.

Our first thought was making an insurance claim because the damages totaled about $3000… But it’s always nerve-wracking making a claim on something that isn’t major (and while this felt major, it wasn’t catastrophic). So we just went about gathering receipts and prepping just in case.

Owen’s Open House

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Owen got to show is a bunch of stuff they’ve been working on…

But first a photobomb.

I am Owen.
Sneaky, kind, helpful
Child of Tom and Jen
Who loves video games
Who needs family and money
Who feels happy
Who gives help
Who fears being alone
Who would like to be a gamer.
I am Owen.

They did a unit on the Oregon Trail.

Look at how little he looked at the start of the year?!

Lunch with Katie!

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Katie had been wanting us to come eat lunch with her all year but it’s harder to do here because the school wants 24-hour notice!! Plus Tom is rarely off during the day—and if he is, it’s last-minute. But since he was going to be off for Owen’s Meet the Principal, we decided to kill two birds with one stone. I made sure to ask the teacher over a week in advance and she said she’d let the office know.

Fast forward to walking in and…we were not on the approved lunch list. WHAT?! Let’s just say it was a tense few minutes as the front office staff conferred with the principal to see if we could come in. They even called Katie’s teacher to confirm and she obviously told them yes and she had forgotten to forward my email. The assistant principal eventually came out and told us that our daughter shouldn’t be punished because the adults couldn’t get their crap together… So then it was off to the lunchroom with 100 kindergartners. YIKES!

When Katie saw us walk in she got all shy and red-faced! It took her a minute to get excited about us being there.

Visiting Owen’s new school!

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Fourth grade here means a new school—Intermediate (grades 4-6). This morning was a Coffee with the Principal and we got a tour of the school. It’s another huge school with room for 2100 students (I think they said) but the school will only be at around 1700. Yikes. While this school does have an East and West side (just for directional sake because it’s so large), the kids are not actually split into East and West like they were in Elementary. The downside? He has to get on the bus around 7:40am.

Owen’s belated birthday trip with Gramma Jean!

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Owen loved Katie’s day with Gramma for her birthday and wanted to do it for his, too! Since Gramma was in Florida for his birthday, they did it this trip.

Gramma says:

Owen and I had a belated birthday adventure today; three parks, shopping for picnic lunch goodies and a stop at Dairy Queen for birthday ice cream treat.

Gramma even tried the roller slide!

SURPRISE! Daddy and Katie just happened to show up at Dairy Queen at the same time Owen and Gramma were there—totally unplanned. They sang Happy Birthday to him!

Our typical date night.

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The kids had Parents Night Out and my mom and stepdad were here… So we went out for dinner and realized as we sat down in a crowded and loud restaurant/bar that it was both A) Cinco de Mayo and B) Kentucky Derby day. Thankfully it cleared out within 20 minutes because the race was over.

After, they went home to get the kids while Tom and I did our normal kidless shopping excursion.

Our first stop was Ross, where I saw these hideously hilarious “Protein Snacks” underwear for Tom. I queried Facebook to see if we should buy them and the answer was a resounding YES.

So we did:

Then it was down the parking lot to TJ Maxx (we shopped, but nothing as picture-worthy as the underwear) and then to Trader Joe’s (since we hadn’t been there yet).

And look what I fell into?! Teeny tiny margarita shots! So I succumbed. Yes, it was technically still against no sugar rules but I allowed it.

And then this…

But we didn’t get any chocolate.

And then we weren’t sure where to go and I said “Hey! I washed to try an Everything Croissant at Starbucks—let’s go across the street to check!” So we did and they did so I had a croissant for tomorrow.

And then we realized we were next door to a grocery store so we went in to look for polish meatball ingredients so I could make them with Mom.

Bonus Star Wars Lego Build

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At the regular monthly build, they invited us to the special Star Wars build… The kids are fans so I said yes.

I thought it was a walrus and I wondered why we were building a walrus during a Star Wars event. It’s Porg, which the kids have since told me. #idontdostarwars