So, yes...I suck!

I realized tonight that it's been a month since I made any updates. My how time flies!! As I sit here typing this with one hand, the other occupied by Jacob and his bottle, I understand that this blog comes as a failing second to me...as it should be I guess. My life is filled with loveliness--5 kids, a wonderful husband, an awesome house I never thought I'd have--really, should I be so concerned with a blog that others read at their leisure? Not particularly. In any case, let me attempt give the updates of the last month's happenings, for those that don't get my facebook updates!

I turned 35! This in and of itself seems odd to me. 35 always seemed so OLD, and now I'm there. Officially mid 30's. And you know what? It's not OLD, and it's not bad. This I can deal with! To celebrate this milestone, I did not go on some lavish vacation. I did not throw a big party. I did not buy myself something extravagant. No, none of those would do for me. I, my friends, ran a marathon. And so did Sean. We finished said marathon (which was my ONLY goal I might add) with times that I feel were good enough. Well, mine was good enough. Sean's time was awesome--at least I think so. He ran in 4 hours 45 min. I ran in 5 hr 45 min. Or at least somewhere in that neighborhood. The official times are listed on the marathon website for anyone interested in minute details. (www.wineglassmarathon.com) We have decided to continue this tradition next year. I don't know that we'll run the same one, but we will definitely run another. We've also got Taylor on the running bandwagon. She's decided now that she wants to run a half marathon. We will be doing that in April, for anyone interested. It's local--right in Newark, DE. Childcare will be needed (*wink *wink, nudge nudge).

After the marathon, we muscled thru the rest of the month and made it to Halloween. I'd love to say I have an awesome pic to post to show everyone the 5 coolest kids ever. However, my oh so lovely camera decided it was not a good night for flash. I think we got a decent one on Sean's phone, but we have not yet been able to get that on our computer. So, until such a time...we are without our yearly Halloween pic. I will say that the kids looked awesome! Taylor was a geisha girl (Mulan when she was getting married at the beginning of the movie); Alexis was Little Red Riding Hood, and I actually SEWED her cape, without a pattern. I was quite proud, as was she with the results. Connor was a cowboy, with a gun and a badge; Keira as a fairy princess; and Jacob was a turtle. They all looked so darn cute! It's a far cry from the original "Superhero Theme" we were going for, but all in all, it was a good night despite the drizzle and we ended up of course with far too much candy for my liking. The kids however, we quite happy with their loot.

Now we are moving into November, and looking forward to the beginning of the holiday season. Thanksgiving is just around the corner, and we are psyched to be having dinner at our house this year! Christmas will be fast on its heels, and then BAM! We will be starting 2010.

For now though...as I mentioned at the beginning of this post...my life is filled with loveliness, and I'm going to sit back and enjoy it.

This is the age of technology!

I'm sitting at home tonight after all of the kids are in bed except for Taylor. Taylor has gotten to the age where I can actually have a conversation with her and not get bored or feel like I have to repeat myself 15 million times. It's kind of nice, to have a semi-adult conversation with my teenager...kind of because this also means that I'm losing my little girl. But that's another story. Tonight's story is that of the age of technology...and so it begins.

My story starts with a fresh new teenager asking her mother to teach her to type. My older girls have always been astonished at the speed of my typing. Seems second nature to me, since I do it every single day. But to them, it is an amazing feat. So I mention to Taylor that I can try to teach her. Everything I learned, I learned in my Senior year of high school...17 years ago! Yes, that's right...17 years. Suddenly I feel ancient. So, I tell her that I've had quite a few years to practice. I explained to her that I learned to type on an actual typewriter. She says "you mean one of those big, clunky things?!?!" Yes Taylor, one of those big, clunky things. And I had to use white out to fix my mistakes. And there was no backspace, and no way to save your work. You finish what you start-period! She looks at me in amazement--"You mean, you didn't have a computer??" At this question, I tell her that the first computer I had was when she was about 1 year old. She seems puzzled by this, so I go on to tell her that we had internet then, but not like there is now. No google, no wikipedia. Just your basic email, and it was dial up. Which meant that you chose, either phone OR internet. Not both at the same time. This seemed unfathomable to Taylor. "Wait, you mean you can't be like talking on the phone and sending email at the same time, and looking something up on google?? You mean like you had to open the internet, and then go do something else waiting for it to load?" Yes Taylor, it really was THAT slow. "Really? I didn't realize that computers were that YOUNG."

Feeling old yet??? I know I am!!

Happy Days are here again...

Taylor and Alexis are back in school.
Connor starts pre-school next week.
Keira turns 2 in 9 days!
Jacob is so big, we had to get rid of his sling chair for fear that he'd plummet to the floor from leaning so far forward.
Sean loves his new job.
Rachel WANTS a new job.

So goes our life. That's the 30second update. If I weren't so busy, I'd write more...but seeing how I am...this'll have to do for now!

Awesome week!

My girls come home this week!!! I'm so excited I can hardly wait. We have all missed the teenage chattering in the house. It somehow seems to quiet (yes, even with the incredible noise of toddlers). Connor and Keira have been under the impression all summer that they were at school. And just last week finally asked where the heck they were. I told Connor that Taylor and Alexis were in Georgia, and he told me that he wanted to go to Georgia's house too.

So they come home on Wednesday, and we'll get things back to normal I'd say by the end of September.

Watch out for rocks!!

Anyone who has children or a significant other knows that whenever you leave you have to say goodbye in your own unique way. Maybe you tell each other you love them. Maybe you say see you later rather than goodbye. At my house, the going phrase as we walk out the door is "Watch out for rocks!". Where did this come from?? My eldest son, of course.

For whatever reason, my son has coined this phrase and tells everyone this as they walk out the door. To my older girls as they leave for school for the day. To me as I am walking out the door for work. To my husband as he leaves for Kung Fu. Everyone gets a kiss and a hug and as you are on your way out the door...here comes the preschooler telling you "Watch out for rocks!". It is such a common occurence in fact, that my youngest daughter (who turns 2 next month) has picked up the phrase. Of course, that has prompted him to change his a bit now...now we have to watch out for rocks from volcanoes!

In any case, it's this simple phrase that lets us know that we are loved and will be missed in our absences.

Watch out for rocks everyone!!!

My baby...

I'm not doing so good at this whole, keep up with the posts thing...

Time just gets in the way, doesn't it?? Anyway,

I thought everyone should know that my now 5 month old little boy, rolled over yesterday. The first of many monumental milestones in his still so new existence. He was quite proud of his accomplishment, and followed the roll with lots of kicking and flailing hands, and trying like heck to get back from whence he came. He rolled from his belly to his back..we'll see how long it takes him to figure out how to go the other way! I have no doubt that in a few short months, he'll be right in the thick of it with the rest of the crew. But for now, I'll reminisce with the thoughts of them all with THEIR first rolls...

My kids are awesome!!!

I have the most awesome kids in the world! I'm sure of it! They continue to astound me on a daily basis. Whether it be with their wild and crazy anecdotes, or their amazing abilities....they are just the coolest kids around.

Taylor and Alexis called last night to tell me that they ran a 5k on July 4th! A 5K!!! At 13 and 10, my girls have run farther than I ever even considered at that age. They've been running twice a week since they got to Georgia. Taylor has been running with me since the end of Lacrosse season, to keep up with everything and not feel like she's dying when she goes to camp this summer. Alexis took it up down in Georgia cause she was bored. And the fruits of their labor were culminated in a 5K run on July 4th, in which they had awesome times--not that I'm bias or anything! ;-)

Taylor: 31min that's a 10min pace for those of you mathmatically challenged
Alexis: 34min that's about an 11min pace

Which in whole means that my kids can run as fast as I can!

For those of you that need motivation...there ya go...my teenagers are running....and YOU aren't!!

It's raining, it's pouring....

...inside the house!



Alexis comes running up from the basement the other night to tell me in her most concerned voice that a pipe is leaking and water is going EVERYWHERE!!! So, I grab a pot to catch the water and down to the basement I head. She's right, water is spewing from the ceiling of the basement, and at this point it's hard to tell if it's from a pipe, or something else. I head back upstairs to grab another pot and some towels, and as I get to the top of the stairs, I am met by a river of water--traceable to the bathroom. At this point, I've had both the girls come upstairs to contain Connor and Keira in the playroom while I figure out what in the world is going on!



In the bathroom, I find a totally flooded floor, and a toilet overflowing. Stupid me, what do I do? I try flushing the toilet again to see if it will make the water go down...uh...NOOOO...more water is now on the floor. I never realized HOW MUCH water can come out of a toilet! It sure doesn't seem like that much when it's just sitting there behaving itself. The thought to turn the water off to the toilet finally occurs to me, and now I'm standing in a pool of water, with 4 kids in the playroom, one crying in his chair on the counter, dinner under the broiler, and Sean at a dentist appointment! As I wonder if I should call him home, it occurs to me that the water is now off...all I have to do is clean up the mess and I can figure everything else out later. No, I won't call him, and have him rush home to this disaster...I can handle this...



Water is emptied from the toilet bowl into the sink, every towel we own is thrown on the floor in the attempt to mop up the mess, and it's back down to the basement to deal with the water coming thru the ceiling. By this time, it has finally stopped coming thru the ceiling so there is just the mess that is left to cleanup. A drenched ping pong table and carpet. Not so bad. More towels sops up the mess, and the now full pot that was catching the water is taken upstairs to empty. A quick check on dinner...not burnt yet, so we are OK. At this point I decided to confront the child that has caused this mess (can you guess???). I ask Connor if he put something in the potty. He says "No". Did you put a toy in the potty?--No. "I just went potty, Mommy". Hmm...so for whatever reason, Connor went potty, flushed, left the bathroom, and five minutes later I had Alexis running up the stairs telling me about a leaking pipe that ended up being a bathroom so filled with water it went thru the floor to the basement.



It took me 15 minutes to plunge the toilet enough to actually get the water to flow thru again. I still don't know what was put down the toilet, but everything seems to be in working order. As I recounted my evening at work the next day, all of my coworkers with boys gave me the following advice--Get used to it...that was just the beginning!



GREEEEEEAAAAAATTTTTT!!!!!

Here's to you Daddy...

Keira is the center of quite a few of our funny moments. Today's episode features a little girl, curious as she can be...

I get a call from Sean today just as I'm getting ready to leave work for today to tell me all about Keira waking up from her nap. Apparently, while she was sleeping, she pooped in her diaper. Keira is making is very well known to us that a dirty diaper is unacceptable. Which I suppose is a good thing, as that *should* make potty training go far easier than it did for Connor. Anyway, Keira woke up with a poopy diaper. She called for Sean, and when he got to her room to bring her downstairs, the sight awaiting him was CLASSIC. Keira was standing at her doorway gate (we gate her in so that she doesn't come around the corner and fall down the stairs) with poop on her hands, on her legs, on her face and clothes...and then he looked around the room. Poop everywhere...and when i say everywhere I do quite literally mean that. It was on the bed, on the sheets, on her books, on her stuffed animals, on her carpet, and finally...since that's where he found her...on her gate. Yes, it was EVERYWHERE. We were in fact still cleaning poop up this evening before putting her down for bed. I'm not sure how so much fecal matter could be smeared out of one diaper, but she managed to finger paint in poo across her entire room...ah such a lovely shade of brown...
I'd love to have a picture to go with this story, I can just imagine the cute little look on her face as she stood in her doorway calling for Daddy. Unfortunately, instead of the camera Sean grabbed the child and took her directly to the tub. Darn him for being a good parent!!!

4am is NOT morning!

We've had a bit of trouble as of late with the youngest daughter of our group...she has taken to our bed with a certain satisfaction that we can not seem to undo. She has never been a great sleeper, and is prone to waking up multiple times in a night. Usually, she wakes up and goes back to sleep shortly afterward--no intervention needed. Lately, however, she has decided that when she's up, so should we be (or at least one of us, she's not too picky!)

Last night, or early this morning, she decided that 4am was as good a time as any to start her day. So, as usual, I went in and settled her back down...gave her her baby, covered her up, and attempted to head back to my slumber. This was not in her plans apparently, and she protested. So, not wanting to wake up 4 other children at that time of day, I decided to lay in her tiny little toddler bed for a bit. This seemed to be an acceptable answer to her, and she proceeded to pull the cord on the music playing bear she stole from Connor's room and settle herself in. So there we laid, side by side...in this tiny little bed for a good 20 min. At which point, I had decided that she was ok and could drift off on her own while I went to a much more comfortable "grownup" bed. I made it into my bed, and got covered up before the screaming started! So, off to her room I went again...this time to give up and bring her to her happy place (in this case, between me and Sean in our bed).

I have come to the conclusion, that children revel in the thought of keeping their parents awake in the middle of the night. So much so in fact, that they have the innate ability to stay awake until JUST before your alarm clock goes off for the day. This is the point that they fall gracefully back asleep to finish of their much needed rest, while you are left with a day full of things that need to be done, and no time left for sleep. It always tears at my conscience too...do I let them sleep--looking so peaceful there in my bed? OOORRR...do I wake them up, and make them as miserable as I now am?? I obviously know that they latter is the wrong answer, but tell me you've never looked at a sleeping child and had that thought???

In this case, I gently pulled myself out of bed and let sleeping babes lie. I'm sure she'll have a wonderful day and somehow I'll pull my lazy butt thru and make it to the end...

Aren't kids grand??

My oldest children, Taylor and Alexis, found my blog last night. They felt like they hit the jackpot! It was like opening the forbidden diary of their own mother...

I found this to be absolutely hilarious, and revelled in their glee at reading what I'm sure they felt was off limits. They laughed and giggled at the descriptions of themselves and their siblings. They thought the pics, albeit few, were pretty cool. AND they thought that it was just the coolest that they were able to google my name and find the blog. All this of course then led to the question of them having their own blog, or their own facebook page, or their own webpage, or their own cyber-something. It did start me thinking...where will we be in 5 years, when my youngest starts school, if we are already at the place that some homework MUST be completed via the internet???

Questions to ponder...

Happy Anniversary to us!!

Yes, I'll take this opportunity to NOT focus on my kids for a second, and make mention that Sean and I have been married for 4 years...today! It sure doesn't seem like that long, and then in the same breath, feels like forever. Weird how that works!

For all those who are well past my mere 4 years, congrats to you! And for those that are still new to this whole thing, yay for you for taking on the work and joy that is a Happy Marriage...

This will be my kids in 6 years...

I received a funny little anecdote this morning at work, and it reminded me so much of what I envision Connor, Keira, and Jacob to do when they are a bit older that I HAD to share...

Subject: Where is God?

Two little boys, ages 8 and 10, are extremely mischievous. They are always getting into trouble and their parents know all about it. If any mischief occurs in their town, the two boys are probably involved.The boys' mother heard that a preacher in town had been successful in disciplining children, so she asked if he would speak with her boys. The preacher agreed, but he asked to see them individually.So the mother sent the 8 year old first, in the morning, with the older boy to see the preacher in the afternoon.The preacher, a huge man with a booming voice, sat the younger boy down and asked him sternly,'Do you know where God is, son?'The boy's mouth dropped open, but he made no response, sitting there wide-eyed with his mouth hanging open.So the preacher repeated the question in an even sterner tone, 'Where is God?!'Again, the boy made no attempt to answer. The preacher raised his voice even more and shook his finger in the boy's face and bellowed,'Where is God?!'The boy screamed and bolted from the room, ran directly home and dove into his closet, slamming the door behind him.When his older brother found him in the closet, he asked, 'what happened?' The younger brother, gasping for breath, replied, 'We are in BIG trouble this time........................................................................... GOD is missing, and they think we did it!!!

My new favorite tool--Picasa

I just downloaded Picasa...and can I just say, that it is one of the coolest photo editor tools I've used to date! I'm sure that I'm probably the last person on the planet to use it, and by now there might be WAY better tools out there, but until I find them...I'm hooked! I can take a whole folder full of pics, and hit one little button, and voila! I have an awesome collage to share with anyone who cares to see. I'm thinking of the many ways I can put this to good use already!

Alexis' Field Trip

Alexis went to the Chester County historical society yesterday. Boy, was she excited when she got home!! A typical dinner for us involves Sean and I asking what happened at school that day. This is usually replied to in a couple of different ways--"nothing"; OR a detailed minute by minute replay of the day (I'm sure you can all guess who gives the play by play).

Last night, Alexis was so excited to tell us about what happened on her field trip she could barely contain herself until dinner. We kept telling her to wait until dinner to give the whole story so she'd have something to talk about...she liked that idea, but didn't like the wait!

So, the synopsis of Alexis' field trip....

• She learned how to make butter (you like, um, put milk in a jar thingy and then you like shake it and there's this um, little ball thingy in it to like agitate it, and yeah), and also heard the story about how the guide that showed them how to make butter hates buttermilk and thought that her grandfather, who first let her try it, was trying to poisen her because it tasted so bad.
• She learned what type of clothing used to be worn by men and women and even got to try some on. She thought this was very cool, but couldn't understand why none of it fit her!
• She had to memorize a portion of the Declaration of Independence...and she DID!!! She recited it to us word for word, no mistakes!!!! I was so proud! By the way, she still remembered it this morning, and let me know how impressed with herself she was that she could still remember it--and recited it again.
• She learned how to put together chairs, and they were able to actually assemble one while they were there.

Since Alexis rarely gets excited about anything at school...this was a much welcomed change of pace. Hope everyone enjoyed my rendition as much as we enjoyed hers!

My gang!

Can you imagine?? I was able to get everyone together, clean, and sitting still long enough to ACTUALLY take a good picture. As I'm sure you can see, all attitudes are clearly defined here. Taylor, looking all teenager-"are we done yet, and aren't I pretty"; Connor-"I AM the coolest kid around!"; Alexis-"I just can't sit here this long without itching, or moving, or SOMETHING!!!"; Keira-"You better be quick, cause I'm OUTTA HERE!"; and Jacob-"What the heck is going on!!?!?"

Ok, so the blog is started! Guess I better hold up my end of the bargain and actually make some updates...

Our family is in full "get ready for summer" mode. School's out in just a couple of weeks and I'd say that Taylor and Alexis can hardly keep themselves together. I'm told by Taylor that she no longer has "class"--she has projects and simulations. Right up her alley...especially since for one of them she gets to be in charge! Alexis on the other hand continues to get homework nightly and isn't too happy about it. She's trudging through though and they are both counting down the days till the last day of school. Connor and Keira, not realizing what school is, are just happy it's getting warmer cause that means they can go outside to play! Sidewalk chalk is the newest treat at our house--apparently it's not only fun to play with but tasty too! Jacob continues to grow at an ever-amazingly fast pace. We've decided he'll have Keira outgrown within the year.

Short post today..work is busy! More to come...

Hi Everyone! I thought I'd start this blog to keep everyone up to date on the happenings at the McCullin household. So many kids to keep up with...and not always enough time to send separate emails out! Hopefully this will take off and be an easy way for everyone to keep up with us!!