Nothing too noteworthy

This is my handsome boy. Since the weather is warming up and I am to lazy to do his hair every day it was time to buzz the kid. He's pretty cute hairless, I think. He's got a nice shaped head.









This is just another drawing of a "smile face" . He won't say smiley. Sometimes I call Tucker a ninnymuggins-from Elf. And a couple days ago after I said it, he called me a chicken nugget. I thought it was pretty amusing. The weather has been great lately so we've been going to the park a lot. Yesterday we drew on the driveway with sidewalk chalk, there are a lot of T for Tuckers out there.



This is Charlotte last Sunday. Trent was in AZ so I brought her to my Sunday School class. The girls had a great time passing her around. It's so fun to dress up a girl. I love shopping for her.

Well, the Will Cardon company still hadn't called, so Wednesday Trent called them and was told that things had been "really crazy" around there and they hadn't discussed his offer yet. They said "We should have called you monday, Will is out of town but we will be having that discussion "real soon" and get back to you. " I think they are really annoying and unproffesional about the whole thing, but what are ya gonna do. But Trent said to start packing up our things because we are getting ready to move and if he has to find a job somewhere else he will. I'm not sure exactly what he is thinking, but I'm gonna start packing and praying and hope that things work out in our favor. We have a couple of people interested in renting out our house, so that's good if we knew exactly when we would be leaving. I'll keep on updating my blog with new info as it comes to me.

A B C's of Robin's music

These are CD's artists or albums that I own or would like to own.

Avril Lavigne, Alanis Morrisette
Ben Fold's Five
Chicago
Dashboard Confessionals
Eighties mix
Foo Fighters, Foreign Holiday
Goldfinger, The Get Up Kids
Homegrown
I
Juliana Theory, Jimmy Eat World, Jewel
Kelly Clarkson
Lit, Lisa Loeb
Michelle Branch, Marcy Playground, Monster Ballads
No Doubt, No Knife
October's First Hero, Offspring
Promise Ring
Queen
Radiance- an album by Atheneum
Sting, Spice Girls
TLC, Tim McGraw
U
Video killed the radio star (okay that's a song), Pearl Jam's Vitology album
Weezer
MXPX (that's right, Christian Punk)
Y
Zepplin

I'm stumped on a few. I'll fill them in later.

I've been tagged, but I don't play by the rules

This may be a bit repetitive. I have done this in an email and have included much of these in my random robin factoids, so I have changed mine a little.

Four jobs I would like to try:
1. Art therapist-something I thought about going to school for
2. Food critic or ice cream tester
3. pole vault coach
4. children's book author/illustrator

Four movies I would watch over and over:
1. That Thing You Do
2. Empire Records
3. Napoleon Dynamite
4. Better off Dead

Four cars I have owned:
1. Honda CRX
2. Honda accord
3. Acura Vigor
4. Yukon Denali


Four places I have lived:
1. Mesa (ages 0-8, 15-21)
2. Chino, CA (ages 8-10)
3. Sandy UT (ages 10-14) Provo, UT (ages 21-24)
4. Afton, WY (ages 14-15)

Four or more TV shows I love to watch:
1. Gilmore Girls, Friends, That 70's show
2. Scrubs, ER, Grey's Anatomy
3. Wheel of Fortune, Seinfeld
4. Style network and Design shows

Four places I wish to go on vacation:
1. New York
2. China
3. Africa
4. a bed and breakfast-I've never been to one

Four websites I visit daily:
1. Blogs
2. MySpace
3. craigslist
4. Yahoo mail

Four or more of my favorite foods:
1. Burritos of all kinds
2. salmon, shrimp, prime rib
3. Cheesecake factory's Luau Salad, Sweet corncake tamales, avo eggrolls, I could go on
4. Cracker's spinach artichoke soup


Four favorite restaurants:
1. Cheesecake factory-obviously
2. Cracker's
3. PF Chang's or Pei Wei
4. Matta's, Rosa's, Cafe Rio

Five places I would rather be right now:
1. At Ross
2. Visiting Mesa
3. On a beach- Rocky Point or Lake Powell are favorites
4. anywhere with Trent
5. at a gym with childcare

Four things that annoy me:
1. Undercooked bacon
2. my temper
3. Cigarette smoke
4. my belly fat

Four things that make me cry:
1. movies and TV (example: Simon Birch, Swing Kids)
2. guilt and frustration
3. loneliness (talking to Trent on the phone when he's gone for a long time or missing my family)
4. anything when I'm pregnant or postpardum

Four favorite memories:
1. Trent proposing
2. Pole-vaulting strong and skinny
3. finding out I'm pregnant
4. giving birth



Also, we are still waiting to hear from the company Trent interviewed with! If they don't call today Trent will call them tomorrow morning.

Moving? continued

Trent flew to Mesa yesterday morning where he had his second interview with the Will Cardon company. He met with numerous guys who are high up in the company and spoke with Will Cardon mainly. He was told that yes indeed they would be offering him a position. The offer will be given to him by Monday, meaning they are discussing what they are going to pay him. Only a couple more days til we know for sure how much Trent will be paid there- which of course will affect weather he accepts this offer, and when they want him to start working. He told them we couldn't be there before June. Stay tuned. . .

Ear infections

They say breastfed infants aren't as likely to get ear infections, or get like way less. That rule doesn't apply to this houshold I guess. Tucker had terrible chronic ear infections and ended up getting tubes last September and hasn't had a problem since. Yesterday Charlotte woke up from her morning nap and wouldn't eat(very unusual) and was screaming for no apparent reason. I pretty much knew right then she had an ear infection. The doctor got us in at 2:30, my wonderful husband came and took Tucker to the shop with him, what a relief! Yes she is quite congested and has fluid in both ears, mainly the left one. If she still won't eat and starts showing signs of dehydration (sticky mouth, no wet diapers, or sunken eye balls) bring her back in immediately. I had to feed my baby breastmilk from a medicine dropper. I got a couple teaspoons in her after I gave her her medication. Then finally at 7:45 pm she breastfed, 10 HOURS after her last feeding. She did okay eating a couple times during the night, but is not wanting to eat again this morning so who knows how today will go. He said the antibiotic takes a couple days to really take effect. Well wish me luck, cause I will have no husband for the weekend, I hope she starts feeling better soon. Nothing is harder than watching your baby suffer and being able to do so little about it.

My comedy team

I love this picture, last night after Charlotte's bath I was giving her a massage and had to take some nudey pictures. What a face. I could stare it it all day and all night, preferably not all night though. Her sleep patterns are not quite predictable yet, last night wasn't great. She slept 4 hours at first then woke up every 1.5 or 2 after that. On top of that Tucker has been awake since 6:15 am! He ran into our room saying he was scared. I especially sympathized since I had been fighting psychokiller zombies all night in my dreams and was a little scared myself. At least I can count on him taking a good nap.
Since Emily had loved Tucker's drawings so much, I will post some more throughout my blogging. This is "T" for Tucker. Yesterday we went to Target and I was feeding Charlotte in the dressing room when from out of nowhere Tucker says, " I see you're drinking one percent, is that cause you think you're fat?" I laughed so hard that he was saying it for the rest of the day. He started quoting Napoleon a couple weeks ago by saying, "You ever take it off any sweet jumps?" We thought it was so funny that he's decided to continue the trend. What a stinkin hilarious 2 year old!
Trent heads down to Mesa on Friday morning, I am curious whar kind of offer he will be getting. The thought of moving is so bittersweet. I want to be closer to my family and have more playmates for Tucker and all that. But I know it will break my heart to leave the friends I have made here. Although there's not too many of them, they are really dear to my heart and I know it will break to leave them. Wow, I am just a mushy gushy sensitive woman. It's true. Now I must do robot voice to pretend I'm not.

Monday, Monday...

Yesterday it mostly rained and sort of sleeted all day, but around 5pm started snowing pretty good. This isn't a great picture, but I was holding a sleeping baby so I just took a shot out of our sliding glass window into the backyard.

Charlotte is getting so big, she probably technically isn't old enough to play in this toy and the first couple times we put her in it she thought we were crazy. But now only a few days later she is loving it, grabbing and hitting the toys and cooing. It doesn't last too long but it is great while I run Tucker to the toilet or something. Also on Sunday Gina had their Jonny Jump-up out and we tried setting Charlotte in it, she can't bounce yet, but she didn't mind "hanging" out in there, so when we got home we pulled ours out.
Tucker usually refers to our baby as Baby Charlotte, but lately he's been calling her his sister which tickles me to death. "Is my sister asleep?", "Can I kiss my sister?" It's adorable. He loves trying to make her laugh.
Last night was sort of strange and long. Sometimes Tucker has bad dreams and comes in our room reassuring himself outloud, "There's no dinosaurs," or " there's no doggies,". Last night he came in crawled in bed by me and said "There's no bugs, there's no bugs on my guitar (referring to his Wiggles push button guitar), those bugs went to Kmart." It was pretty funny and cute. After a minute of snuggling I put him back in his bed and went back to bed. A few minutes later, this was a little after 4 am he came back in and asked to go to the toilet. He has never requested this in the night, but I asked Trent to take him in the toilet and when he was done he said "It's good morning." " No" we said and took him back to bed. He stayed in for a little bit, but around 5 came in and said "okay let's watch cartoons." What in the world! " No it's still dark we have to sleep some more." I told him. He stayed in bed with us for a minute than said "Come on dad fall of (follow) me to the couch," I told him to go ahead and lay on the couch and daddy would be out in a minute. He went our and we could hear him," Come on Daddy." Trent was too tired to move and it payed off cause Tucker fell back asleep waiting for him on the couch. We slept in until 8. It was great.

Favorite Foods

This is Tucker eating his lunch today. He calls his ham sandwich a beef sandwich and eats his apples like a watermelon or orange slice, he refuses to eat the peel. He loves cheese and would eat it all day if I let him. Some of his other favorites include chocolate milk(it's actually carnation instant breakfast), baby carrots, steak, eggo waffles, bagels, ham, lately he loves salad (weird kid), and McDonalds cheeseburgers(not so weird). He also loves anything chocolate, shocking. He is a total texture guy and will not eat "squishy" foods such as pudding (even chocolate), applesauce, mashed potatoes, etc..
I don't know what Trent's number 1 favorite food is, pretty sad considering how long we've been married. I do know he loves steak, PF Chang's, that orange jello salad with cottage cheese in it, anything sweet, he likes to eat tomato soup with grilled cheese (Tucker likes that too) and he's never once refused to eat something or told me anything was gross that I've made-thanks honey.
I happen to love food and could write pages about food that I love to eat. So instead I will just say some places that I love to eat. PF Chang's (Honey crispy shrimp, Chang's spicy chicken, lettuce wraps...), anything at Cheesecake Factory, Crackers, Ned's Krazy Sub, tons of different mexican spots. A couple of my new favorite snacks are edamame (soy beans) and Kozy Shack rice pudding. As for Charlotte, she has only one food of choice-Boo boo milk.

Easter Weekend

Saturday Trent kept busy at the shop and then cutting cement on his home addition project for a lady down the road. Tucker and I colored some eggs and that's all I really did. I was super tired and went to bed pretty early. Tucker woke up and hunted out his eggs. He and I went to church while Trent stayed with Charlotte-she is getting over a cold. After lunch and naps we headed to the Petersen's for a delicious ham Easter dinner. It was a little weird to be without cousins or grandmas because we are used to being in Mesa this weekend because it coincided with Trent's track meets down there.
It was beautiful weather again this weekend. Today is not quite as nice, cloudy and rainy, but I don't mind. I kind of like it today. I need to do some cleaning. Charlotte slept four hours at a time last night, it was quite a relief! She is my beautiful, happy little chubs. I will try to get some cute pictures of the kids to post later.

Baby For Sale

What happened to sweet little baby? Okay, she's still pretty sweet and I would never actually sell her, but what the heck? She has been waking up every two hours for over a week now and has also decided to signal the end of her feedings with a nice big gummy chomp down on my nipple. Yikes! I hope the waking up thing is just due to a growth spurt. I wouldn't want to pull out my long beautiful hair..haaa. I've finally grown out my hair and I have to wear it back everyday so little cute fat fists don't get tangled in there. I can deal with that.

My funny little guy

Tucker cracks me up! He is learning to draw smiley faces and he sits there drawing and shows me, then says "That's a weird one" His drawings are getting better and funnier every day. Some of his favorite things to draw include bananas, circles, "a big square" which is him tracing the outline of the doodle pad, bugs- "I just poke 'em" that is his technique for making bugs, and smile faces. I also wanted to write down the fact that he calls nursing pads "Boo Boo Hats" so that I don't forget later on.

Random Robin factoids

You may or may not know or care that Robin:

• has never been stung by a bee, wasp, or scorpion
• does not like curry
• is a sugar fiend
• used to write poetry
  
• has worked as: a paperboy (delivering the Mesa Tribune with Abbie has left me with many fond memories), a floor associate at Ross, at Gold's Gym, a waitress at 4 restaurants and host captain at 1,and a receptionist at a hair salon for 5 weeks
• Loves Mexico for the beaches and food, not cheap beer and skanky tourist girls
• Has an allergic reaction to spider bites and perkaset-I have no idea how to spell it so I did it phonetically
• The only card games I really play and like are Uno and Skipbo and I recently learned Set
• Has a hard time falling to sleep most nights and can't shut up my brain, when I stop thinking about stuff then music pops in and sadly it is usually from one of Tucker's cartoons (for example today it's The Backyardigans song Eureka "Hey Eureka, when you finda what you seeka Eureka, Eureka.... I hope someone is singing along)
• used to be stronger at weight lifting than any other girls I know, and could beat a few boys in arm wrestling
• Has tried twice to donate blood unsuccesfully-I get sick from the dumb finger prick
• Has lived in Arizona (2 seperate time periods), California, Utah (2 seperate times), and Wyoming
• Sucks at miniature golf and bowling and countless other things
• Likes pancakes with sour cream and jelly
  

Good times

Yesterday evening Trent's grandparents-Grandma and Grandpa Summers came over on their way from their winter home in St. George to their home in Rexburg. We went to Cafe Rio for dinner(yummy). Tucker absolutely loves playing with them and seeing their parakeet Pepper. They stayed the night and left this morning after breakfast and a little more time with the kids. Since we went to dinner Charlotte missed a nap and then when she finally fell asleep around 9 she decided to wake up every two hours all night!Aaaargh. Not fun! She is the same as Tucker in that she will not take a binki (lid as Tucker says) and wants to nurse to relax all the time. I am so sore again lately.
Shortly after our grandparents left my friend Candace from Wyoming came over with her little boy Wyatt. He was darling and Tucker loved having a kid to hang out with for a while.
I felt really sad when she had to leave. I met Candace when I moved to Star Valley when I was 14. We have been good friends ever since. We don't talk all the time, but when we do it's always for like an hour which I don't do with anyone else. I wish we could hang out every week. Anyway I better go get a nap.

Moving?

Yesterday Trent rented a skid loader and smoothed new dirt around our house smoothing out the lawns. We are going to spread seed and our lawn should be picture perfect in no time. Trent has talked me into letting him buy a trampoline, Tucker loves Nana's and they aren't that expensive, so that will probably be our next addition to the yard. He also plans on finishing the rock on our house(since the bonehead who started it is no longer returning our calls) and a fence on the north side of the house to match the one on the opposite side. Will we be here to enjoy the best looking house in the neighborhood? Probably not for long. Nothing is set in stone just yet, but Trent is heading down to Arizona April 21 for a second interview and maybe one more with a different company and hoping to come home with an offer he likes. We miss our families, that's the bottom line. Trent is happy with his job at his own shop and I am happy with our home and our ward. However, we would really enjoy the company of our families more often than we can now. Tucker and Charlotte I think would benefit greatly from having all their cousins within a short distance.We are considering renting out this house and renting in Arizona until we have some work history and pay stubs for us to qualify to buy again and to find a place we really love. I'll keep everyone updated.

A great weekend

This weekend was so nice! On Saturday we actually had a couple in our ward watch our kids, yes both of them. At first we just figured we'd take Charlotte, but I realized that I would be holding her the whole time and I really wanted a little alone time with Trent. So I pumped some milk we dropped the kids off and headed out to dinner ALONE! It was so great to have a couple hours to ourselves just to sit and eat and hang out. I have never left Charlotte with a sitter and I was excited to get her back, but it was a great time out with my hubby. We went to Outback and my food wasn't great, but we split a sundae which was really good and it felt nice to be at a restaurant without a 2 year old.This is Charlotte in the dress Candace sent for her. Too bad the hat was too big. What a cutie.

Sunday after church Karen called me, it is always good to hear from her, she is so silly and cute. Then we picked up the house and just hung out until 5:00 when we had the Petersen's over for dinner. The weather was gorgeous after a week of rain. We grilled steak, chicken, pork, mushrooms, peppers, onions, yellow summer squash. We had rice, pasta salad, and fruit salad too. It was SO tasty. We even had peach cobbler and vanilla ice cream for dessert.
Ian had Charlotte laughing out loud with his little Baby got Back song and sound effects. Liam ("Baby Lamb" as Tucker says) is so happy and smiley all the time. I couldn't believe all the excited squeels he was doing, I thought it was Tucker for a minute. Then to finish off the perfect day, while I was feeding Charlotte and getting her to sleep Trent cleaned the kitchen spotless and took out ever trash in the house! Gotta love that guy!

Some things that make my life easier

This is my giant purse and my baby bjorn carrier. I got this huge purse at Target for less than 20 bucks. I love it. It holds all my stuff and I think looks much cuter than a diaper bag. This baby bjorn we purchased on ebay, it was faded so I covered it with some of the leftover material that I made Charlotte's crib skirt with. It is so handy. She absolutely loves facing forward in it when we go shopping. She can look at everything and it's even comfortable enough that she can doze off. The first 2 months or so after she was born I didn't get out that much, but when I did, it sucked. She hated being in her car seat and grocery shopping was so hard. I usually had to be holding her and trying to keep Tucker close and even when she was in my arms she was upset because I was trying to do other things with them, like load groceries. This thing has been a lifesaver and I can actually enjoy my time out.

Thank heaven for Wal Mart! These are some of my most recent purchases. I found out car seats expire 6 yrs after their manufacture date and since Charlotte's expired this month (it was used when we got it for Tucker but in good shape) we found this one at Walmart.com, it's great- I like Graco. Also since Walmart is the only place I get to anymore I am happy to say I have been finding some cute clothes there too. These shirts I love and I've also gotten 2 cute skirts there recently. It saves me when I don't have time for my much loved trips to Ross for clothes. I am due to go to Payless though and I need some jeans so I may have to venture elsewhere. Walmart, Payless, Ross-if you haven't noticed I am cheap. It works well for me, especially now that I've got 2 kids. Trent is the one who purchases anything over $100-and always without talking to me about it. "I know the finances." That's always his reason why he can spend 3 or 4 hundred dollars at once, but if I did I'd be toast. He went out and bought a $150 dollar humidifier the other day and doesn't understand why I am making him return it. Well I am going to return it. He is good with money and yes we need a warm misting humidifier(which you can purchase for 30 bucks on up). But to me that $150 would be much better spent on a double stroller. Not to mention the $300 DVD player that holds 400 dvd's. Yes it's a cool toy and keeps Tucker from messing with the dvd's, but what about the headboard that I've been wanting for our 5 years of marriage or nightstands. Not important, because Trent doesn't care about that stuff, he says no one sees our room except us so it's not a priority, but after this long I am starting to feel a tiny bit resentful at every largish purchase he makes that my opinion doesn't matter on.
Please forgive the turn this blog has taken. It was not my intent at all to say that stuff, but it's good to get it out. That's what blogging is all about right?

My Trent

I may whine about my husband being really busy and not getting to spend time with him. Or I may say that he doesn't care sometimes, but my husband is superman! I love him more than anything and let me tell y'all (that's for you Tori) why, well some of the reasons anyway. The first thing you may notice is he is physically very beautiful, I think stunning. What a great bone structure, the cheeks, the jaw, NICE. Not to mention his body is flawless. This man is an amazing athlete and his body is beautifully toned- I hope noone is gagging right now. He keeps in shape right now by lifting weights 3 times a week, but previously he has trained as a pole-vaulter for years. He ranked nationally ever since high school- his best height being 18'1". He may correct me if I'm off by an inch or so. In high school he also competed in wrestling and did very well, but his love is the pole-vault.He also claims that he was the best at baseball and soccer when he was even younger, but couldn't do all sports so he picked pole-vault and wrestling. He is great on a snowboard or wakeboard and learns things very fast and isn't afraid to try anything-hence ripping his shoulder out of socket while attempting an air-railey on the wakeboard. He is also crazy on anything motorized, four wheelers, motorbikes, golf carts, you name it. He excels at pretty much anything he tries, and he knows it. If you want to humble him, take him on in basketball; it's not his strongest suit, although I'm sure he doesn't absolutely suck, that would be unheard of. He is a gifted mechanic, a handy man of any sort, and he doesn't do a half-ass job on anything. He is meticulous. He cleans twice as well as me, especially when it comes to the cars.
He is a college graduate, which he likes to remind me when I correct his grammar. He is a grill cooking, frisbee throwing, doughnut spinning, good tipping, discovery channel watching, gun owning, tractor driving, early morning kinda man.
He has an amazing testimony, loves his family,and adores his children. He is generous, forgiving, even-tempered, humorous, intelligent, and all man. Trent I love you!

A day in the life of Robin

Although I don't work a 9-5 job, my days definitely seem to follow a pattern. I wake up each morning, several times in fact, to feed my beautiful baby. I don't mind feeding her, I enjoy it, but getting her to burp (which usually includes fountains of spit up) and fall back to sleep is the hard part. I usually am awakened from one of my vivid dreams. This morning for example, I woke from a strange, disturbing dream where I was traveling with my cousin Abbie in San Francisco. Well I think that's where it was, i've never actually been there. I was wearing a fake beard and strange disguise, suddenly I realized I had left Tucker behind. I rushed to change back into my own clothes where a strange centipede thing was in my sleeve which Abbie had to save me from. Then I ran down the steep hill and barely saved Tucker from the clutches of a very filthy looking man. Upsetting. I have always had strange dreams. Some of the recurring themes include me smoking cigarettes or drinking wine (which I have never done) and losing my teeth, which I usually try to jam back into my gums and make stick. Okay, I'm a freak.
So, on with my day. Tucker usually wakes a little before 7, requesting cartoons and chocolate milk. Trent takes care of this on Tues and Thurs when he isn't lifting weights to let me stay in bed a bit longer. It doesn't usually last and I come out and eat and get online to check my email,blogs, and the weather forecast. Then I feed and dress Charlotte and Tucker, sometimes I even dress myself at this time-if we will be going somewhere. That somewhere is mainly Walmart. I try to get there before lunch when we go. These days we usually take Trent lunch after shopping and then head home for naps. Sometimes I nap, sometimes I read or clean during this time. My cleaning includes at least one load of laundry a day, usually 2 or 3. I don't get it all folded at once. In fact our guest bed is a home for a never-ending pile of rotating clean laundry. I pick up the living room and kitchen, always littered with clothes (usually Tucker's and Charlotte's and occasionally mine that are drenched in spit up-okay Trent dumps shoes in every room too), diapers, food wrappers, sippy cups, toys, and other random items. Tucker is very good at entertaining himself with toys or coloring or books and singing to himself during my many feeding and burping times with Charlotte. His potty training does not seem to be moving forward anymore, when I put him in big boy underwear he seems to have more accidents and the changing pants all day is very tiring. But we go on. The weather hasn't really permitted us to play outside much although yesterday we went to the park which was great for all 3 of us. At about 4:30 I start looking at the clock hoping it is getting close to time for Trent to come home. He always says he will be home at 6, but it is always 6:30. I throw together some dinner, Tucker usually has to eat before Trent comes home. Trent comes home, eats, showers, and helps me get the kids to bed. The rest of the night we spend in front of the TV with really no conversation and go to bed. We don't seem to get any quality time together, but Trent doesn't seem to mind. He even has plenty of things to fill his Saturdays. So when I feel lonely or isolated I tend to call a friend or sister or my mom and then I have absolutely nothing interesting to say which makes me feel like even a bigger loser. Such is the life of Mommies. I have my good days too, don't get me wrong. This is just how it feels a lot of the time.