Christmas FUN

A new video camera (thanks Mom and KC) and a Wii should make for some good blog postings. We've had a few Wii injuries so far, most of them minor. I pulled a leg muscle bowling, and an arm muscle boxing. Geez, someone's out of shape! The boys are teasing me, but really I'm the only one who "gets into" playing. You can't bowl standing still, you've got to get some form going! Cody caught a bowling arm to the head last night, courtesy of his big brother. But we've yet to punch through the big screen or take a trip to the ER. Stay tuned....

Merry Christmas

Wrastlin'

Wrestling season is under way! Chase is 6-2 so far. He's done really well, and is wrestling "clean" and "technically" according to Jess. He'll continue to practice during Christmas break, miss 3 matches while we're in Mexico, and hopefully get to wrestle once more when we get back. The video isn't great...sorry. But you get the idea :)

41--0!!

Whoo hoo!!!!!!!!!! The Beaver River Beavers won their last game 41-0. The season is now over, and I believe their final record to be 6-2. Not too bad! Wrestling starts Thursday! I'm ready to watch a sport indoors :)

Pumpkins!

We carved pumpkins tonight. They all turned out awesome. Cody didn't like sticking his hand in the pumpkin, but it was hard to capture his disgust on film. I LOVE my McCain pumpkin. I carved out VOTE on the back, so it shines on the wall behind the pumpkin. I can't wait to light them all on Friday.

However, I may have to shovel off 2 ft of snow to find an area to put the pumpkins! We are getting snowed on big time right now. Looks like a delay for school in the morning, if not a cancellation. Hopefully it doesn't stick around too long!

Credit

Oooppss! Forgot to mention in my last post that Chase made an AWESOME tackle in the game. The pass was intended for Chase, and was intercepted. The kid took off like a flash. Chase was the only one there, and ran the kid down and stopped them from scoring. SO...if Chase hadn't made that tackle, and the team scored, the Beavers would have lost. Hmm.. Chase saved that game!----Is that a biased mom or what?!!!

What a day!

Whew, what a day! Chase had football in Alexandria Bay tonight. The drive up was beautiful (1 1/2 hours), but it was cold! The game was a real barn burner. The Beavers had control most of the game. In the 4th quarter, it was getting dark, and the opponent scored with 23 seconds left, leaving the Beavers trailing by 1 point. We got the ball, and our running back ran a 70 yard TouchDown with 7 seconds left!!!! It was a-m-a-z-i-n-g. They had lost thier last two games, so this win was important. Only one game left, then straight into wrestling.

On the way home we stopped and got Chase some wrestling shoes, and picked up a pizza. He remembered at this point that he had a lot of homework that was left at the school. We had to be there by 8:00 before they lock the doors. I got a call on my cell phone, and pulled over to talk. A law in NY that I rarely obey. 15 minutes later, I was off the phone, and back on the road. We weren't going to make it by 8:00. So I might have been going slightly over the speed limit. Slightly. But it was important to get that homework.

Oh No. I'm getting pulled over.

Yep, caught speeding. NY police in this area are known to be "anti-military". Oh great, a speeding ticket, plus whatever else they can add on. Oh No. I found the one and only Military Friendly cop in this area of the state! He didn't even bother to run my license. I got off with a warning. As he put it "Alayna, I'm going to give you a break. Got to look out for my military families. Enjoy your husband coming home, tell him thanks for me". WHAT?!! I've never heard of anyone giving a warning here. I felt so lucky I wanted to stop on the way home and buy a lottery ticket!

And as luck would have it, the school was still open at 8:23 and Chase was able to get his homework!

Now the bad news: We have a storm warning. 8-12 inches of snow between Tues. afternoon and Wed. morning. NO! I don't have all my leaves raked yet, or the table put away, or the snow blower out!!!! ha ha. Hopefully if it does snow, it won't stay. Praying it won't stay. Although it could make for a fun final football game on Saturday!

Getting old?

Ok, I need to find something else to talk about other than leaves and football huh? Seems to be all the occupies our timree as of right now. Well, we're plenty busy, but it's all rather boring. I re-caulked the shower this morning! See what I mean.

Cody and I had a fun afternoon today raking and burning leaves. I was VERY careful. My firepit is rather small, so I think I bagged more than I burnt, but it kept us occupied. Cody loves to run and jump/slide into the leaves. And he is very helpful with his rake and shovel. And by helpful, I mean he likes to take my piles and rake them back into the area I just cleaned up. You know, 2 year old helpful!

The BEAVERS won again on Saturday!! 34-0!! It was a great game to watch, I felt bad for the other team a few times, it was just too easy. Chase got lots of play time. I think he played every play on Defense, and every other on Offense. Only older kids played this game, and they were spent by the end of the game. We needed to run a few errands in town after the game, so he rode home with me. He got in the car, WHEWW. That kid smelled! I had to drive home with the window down. I later got in my car, and his gear was still in the back. It smelled so bad, I couldn't figure out what was smelling SO bad. Then it dawned on me. I later re-enacted the Febreeze commercial! :) Love ya Chase!

Chase is in Mexico (the town) picking apples today. I told him not to bring any home. I ordered like 15 pounds from the school. I didn't realize how much a "bussell" was. Opps. I'm searching for applesauce recipes! Apple pie, apple cobbler, apple bread, apple muffins......

Watching airplanes

Cody LOVES Gary Allan's song "watching airplanes". I don't know why, I don't know how. I personally like the song, but don't listen to it all day everyday. He just started singing it the other day. Everyday the performance gets better and better. Incase you can't hear him, this is what he's saying "I'm sittin here watching airplanes, take off and fly, figuring out which one you be on, and WHY you don't LOVE ME any MOOOORRREEE".


Beavers football won again on Saturday!! 30-8! I only was able to stay until 1/2 time, at which they were losing, so I was very thrilled to hear they won. They injured the QB in the first quarter, and the opponent never recovered! Do what you have to do I guess :P

#88

Football season at Beaver River Central School is finally here! They won their first game today 13-7! Of course, it poured on us the entire game. Ahh, Fall football!! Chase is #88, he did awesome and played a little of each position. At one point, he was the punter...had a nice run for 13 yrds, and barely missed a great pass. I'd ask for more details from him, but he's sleeping, so I'll say he mainly played Safety...and Corner. Oh hell, I don't know! He played more today than he did all of last season, which is great for both of us! Keeps me more involved in the game that way :P Now I just need to figure out what the positions are....ha ha Due to the rain the pictures aren't great, but there are some pretty fall trees in the background.

Trees they are a fallin'!!

I love looking at leaves. I hate raking leaves. Bagging leaves. Dumping leaves. Oh, how I loathe fallen leaves. Half my problem was solved today. Doug! A friend my neighbor Donny. Hmm. He was going to "limb" some of the trees that line our driveway. I was unaware that he was going to cut off every limb on the tree! After a few minutes of shock, I realized those were just leaves I wasn't going to have to rake up!! Keep cutting Doug!! And he hauled them away! Double bonus for me.

When all was said and done, it does look nice. Our driveway looks much bigger, and we won't have to drive through the limbs this winter when the snow and ice brings them down.

Now if he could find a way to make 1/2 as much snow fall in my driveway......

Alvin or Theodore?

Isn't he cute??!! Not really. Chipmunks have to be the sneakiest, meanest little critters ever. I have a garage full of them. Ok, so not full, but there are 3 that I know of. It's getting cold out now, so they are hard at work making their homes for the winter. I sit and watch them all day, run in and out of the garage, cheeks stuffed full of whatever chipmunks store in there. I'm worried Jess's jeep may be a nesting spot, though I've yet to see any evidence of that. Apparently there is no real way to kill them, other than a "410". Alright, but if we start shooting at them, we will shoot other things. So that won't work. I hate going into the garage because I keep see Clark W Grizwold and the squirril attacking him out of the Christmas tree. I often feel like Clark, so I'm not convinced that wouldn't happen to me. Hmm...what to do??

Donny to the rescue!! My neighbor is currently working on a chipmunk trap for me! He claims they are so tricky they can get in and out of a regular trap without setting it off. So, being cleaver, he is re-vamping a trap that they won't be able to get out of. I was very thankful for this, until I realized if it works, I'm going to have to dispose of a dead chipmunk. This bothered me for a few minutes, until I realized that what I have a teenager for!!! He just doesn't know it yet.

Stickers!

I need to get Cody into daycare so he can start playing with kids his own age! His best friends are Chase's friends. I love it though, those kids are so great with him. Today "Big" Cody was over. They decided to play with the sticker book. I kept hearing Big Cody saying "That's a lot of stickers, that's too many stickers." This is what I found. Both of them covered with stickers! Apparently Big Cody didn't know the stickers go IN the book, not on each other :) Another friend, Trevor is hiding behind the chair, hoping not to get covered also. Cody loves this friend. They live down the street from us, and if we are outside when they drive by Big Cody always yells "HI Cody". Cody just loves it, and tells Chase "My friend Big Cody say hi to me!" I guess, regardless of age, a friend is a friend.

End of Summer

It's no secret that I'm not a fan of NY. Sure it has the 4 seasons, but all four seasons bite. The summers are hot and muggy. Fall is pretty but entails hours and hours of raking, for weeks on end. Winter is just miserable, and Spring is rain 24/7 for 16 weeks.

Summer is coming to an end, and I'm starting to panic a little about it. Each day the sun shines, I'm positive it may be the last time we see blue sky for months. So we're enjoying every minute of it we can. The leaves are turning, the nights are getting cold, and the sun goes down earlier each night. Winter is around the corner...

But the days right now are beautiful, so I'll take it, and worry about the pending snow later! Cody and I walked Wyatt to the park today. I don't know how it's possible, but I think the road there is up hill both ways. Maybe it's pushing a 20 pound stroller with a 35 pound kid, while pulling back on the leash of an 80lb dog. So here are some pictures of our trip to the Beaver Falls Park.

Also....I feel as though I've let Chase down in life. He knows so little. On Monday I was cooking dinner, and realized the potatoes I bought were really small and it would take me for ever to peel them. So I asked Chase to come help me. OMG, he has never used a peeler before. He had NO idea how to peel a potato. For the love of God, the child is almost 14! He got the hang of it, but it was pretty slow, and really didn't help out that much, but he did learn a valuable lesson :)

Finally, 1st day of 8th grade pictures. These crack me up. I think it's the angle of which I took them. (too early for me to get off the couch) So he looks super tall, and like his head is about to touch the ceiling.

Sept 29 2001 ~~ Sept 1 2008

I've always had abnormal cats. Misty had 8 toes...on each paw. Jazzy had these huge alien like eyes. Phoebe was fat. And not just "that's a fat cat". It was like "WOW-that cat is HUGE!" At her heaviest, she was 23lbs. At the beginning of the summer, she was 20.5 lbs. She started a diet, and I laughed and was so proud the first time I saw her try to chase down a chipmunk!

Phoebe was also abnormal, because she didn't mind taking a bath. She had no problem riding in the car. Miss Girl was one of the most traveled animals. Numerous car rides from WA to MT, on which she would just sit on our laps. Perferrably the lap of whoever was driving. MT to AZ, AZ to MT, MT to NY, flight from NY to MT. And back to NY again. We would open her carrier and she'd crawl out, but always went back in when we stopped. She was an ideal cat to have when living the Army life style.

Jesse finally decided I could have a cat soon after 9/11. We went to the pound, and I picked out my cat. Then on our way out of the room, this tiny little girl stood on her back legs and pawed at the cage. Jesse stopped, and said "I want that one". I put the other one back and home went Miss Phoebe Ann Sandefer. She loved her daddy, I think because she was smart enough to know that he was allergic to her. We once did a test, and both laid a shirt on the bed, she went straight to his to lay on!

I will never forget the look on her face the day we brought Wyatt home. She looked at me like "how dare you bring a dog here". Oh she was mad, as you can see in one of the pictures. Who knew that within months they would be best friends. When Phoebe was really getting heavy, she couldn't clean her back, so Wyatt did it for her. There were times when Wyatt would be sleeping, and Phoebe would go over and lick his nose and rub her face on his.

Phoebe became sick this last week, and today I got the bad news from the vet. She had severe liver disease, and was a really really sick kitty. I had to make the hardest decision of my life to have her put to sleep.

I know, I know, it's a cat. But my pets are extra special to me, being that I'm home alone so much, they really do become my best friends. Phoebe got me through many lonely times when we lived in WA and Jesse was always gone training.

A little piece of my heart if broken, I will miss her.

Count Down!

Photo's gone wrong

Since it's the last day of summer, I decided it was a good day for a few pictures of the boys. The best place to take pictures in our yard, is in the back at the tree line. It's a nice back drop. The worst place to take pictures in our yard...is in the tree line. The mosquitos were so bad! I only took 4 pictures and we literally ran back to the house. Chase and I got hit the worst. We are covered in welts, and itching like we've got the pox! I would like to spray down with Off and try again, but neither boys are in a picture taking mood anyways! The first day of school is on Wed, maybe I can try again then! In the mean time, here's a few that I did get!