I Only Changed 2 Diapers Yesterday

There are things I enjoy about parenting. Namely being able to order off the kids menu and pretend like its for my kid.

Good thing they like to share.

But there are things that I hate, hate, seriously hate. Namely diaper duty. This pleasure has been mine for four years and for a wonderful 3 month overlapping period, I did it for two kids. And I mananged to keep going somehow. I don't know how.

And since I started staying at home, I am going crazy with diapers. It is a never ending nightmare that I am up against.

And yet, yesterday, I only did it one time. And no, Chase is not home. My day went a little something like this. I got up and changed a diaper. Yes, it was an awesome way to kick things off. We went to church until 12 and then went straight to Ryan and Nikki's house to drop Izzy off. On the way home, Cam Cam fell asleep and naturally I didn't want to wake her up. Let sleeping babies sleep peeps, trust me! So I put her straight to bed. This was about 1:30. And she didn't wake up until 6:30.

It was a little piece of heaven dropped straight into my lap.

When she woke up, I changed diaper #2. And when she went to bed at 8:00, it was still completely dry. So I just put her to bed. I didn't know what else to do.

And that peeps, was an awesome diaper day. Wow, my life is boring.

We Create Kids That Only Their Parents Can Love

I took this picture of Cam Cam because Chase and I thought she looked so cute. Upon further review, I realized this is not a good angle. It makes her look like she has a crooked neck. Sad! But in the moment, Chase and I were amazed at her cuteness. Obviously we think she's cute, we are her parents for hells sake. I was concerned about our judgement after I saw this picture blown up.  

But then I realized that Cambri is pretty freaking cute. She is a crack up. She really loves her shoes. First thing in the morning, she get up and goes and gets me a pair of shoes to put on her with her pj's. Right now, her boots are the cat's meow. I love this kid.  

Cam Cam got her first haircut, courtesy of my dad. He didn't actually do the cutting just the transporting and the paying.

Which panicked my sister to the millionth degree. I was sitting in class and I kept getting text messages from her.

Heidi: I cannot believe u let dad take camcam for a haircut.

Katie: Why?

Heidi: I guess I was more protective of M's baby hair. I am surprised u trusted dad. Wasn't he behind your infamous Elvis cut?

The haircut she is referencing is this one where Chuck took my hair from this:

to this:

And this peeps is the much grown out version. It was horrible.

Being that I got busy in class, you know learning, I never responded to her last text message. And after class, I had four text messages built up from her.

Heidi: Is the elvis haircut a touchy subject.

Heidi: R u mad at me?

Heidi: KK quit ignoring me!!

Heidi: I'm sorry I deeply offended you!! I will never bring up past haircuts again.

I was laughing to myself regarding what a freak show this girl is. She really is too much.

But I also had a message from my dad. It contained this photo.

I now call Cam Cam "The Helmet Head."

Her haircut is like a boy bowl cut. But at least it's out of her eyes. And I'm just grateful that someone cared enough about me and my kids to pitch in and help out. Eternally grateful. I still am.

But when I got to my Dad's house to pick the girls up later that night, he did say something that concerned me.

Chuck: All three of us had haircuts tonight.

Katie: Oh?

Chuck: I told them to cut Izzy's hair off because she never brushes it.

Katie: What?

Chuck: Like yours used to be.

Katie: OMG

Chuck: But she told them she was growing it out.

Katie: OMG

Chuck: So she promised the girl that she would brush it and I decided I would give her one more chance. But next time she doesn't let us brush it, I'm taking her back and having it cut off.

Needless to say peeps, I'm revoking his babysitting privileges.

Thanksgiving 2010

We were supposed to go to Denver for Thanksgiving this year but of course it was blizzard conditions for the four days leading up to our departure.

I am not suprised, it pretty much matches my year.

But being that we weren't in the mood to happily celebrate Thanksgiving, we decided that it would be ok to just go to a restaurant.

And that is what we did. No cooking, no cleaning, just eating with a waiter on hand to refill drinks. I guess there are worse ways to spend the day.

Randomly, they gave us our own banquet room. Six people sitting in a banquet room alone kind of draws attention to the obvious fact that someone is missing. It was kind of sad but we all knew the day would be. My mom was the best cook and we always had awesome Thanksgiving dinners. And I felt really bad about taking my kids to a restaurant because my mom never would have done that.

Not that my kids really noticed. They still had a good time.

I'm grateful that it's over though.

I'm Raising A Nerd

When I was little, I loved Roald Dahl's book Matilda. Chase thought that Izzy would love it because she's a spunky girl and the story is about a spunky girl on steroids (theoretically of course).

Now obviously Izzy can't read yet but luckily for her there is a movie and we found it for $5 at Target. Unlucky for us though. We have watched it 10 times this week alone. She can watch it once and then immediately press play again. Super annoying for the rest of the family that is snow sequestered. Darn Chase for teaching her how the DVD player works. Remind me to kick him next time I see him.



Those of you out there in blog world that have read the book (or seen the movie) know that Matilda has special powers with her eyes. And there is a particular scene in the movie where she is dancing around during breakfast, pointing at things that begin moving. And to a ditty little tune.

So last night, I rounded the corner and came into the kitchen. And walked into this scene.

Isabelle was dancing around the kitchen counters, humming the tune and pointing to different objects. After she saw me, she begged me to take a picture.



I am almost embarrassed to push publish on this post.

Leaf Us Alone!

The snow has finally stopped thank goodness! I couldn't take one more day but alas while it is not currently snowing, it did leave behind a good 12 inches of new snow. And on Thanksgiving! I couldn't believe it.

Luckily before it started, we were able to get one entire raking of the leaves done. The whole family got together (all whopping four of us) and raked, bagged and dumped a ton of leaves. The sad part is that we have maybe two trees in our entire yard. But the trees for our surrounding are attracted to our force field of a lawn.

But our family project was super fun. Cam Cam insisted on wearing boots that were at least three sizes to big for her. And her idea of helping was grabbing one leaf at a time to walk over to the trash bag. She was so sweet while doing it though that we couldn't complain. 

Naturally you could barely even tell that we did anything the next day. And then the snow came. So those leaves have met a suffocating death. That's ok with me :)

I Hate Idaho

I don't know if you can tell by this picture but it is snowing baseball size snowflakes. I can't take it for one more day. I have to leave!

But being that we can't leave on a permenant basis right now, we are stuck inside. So we are playing paper dolls. Isn't my life too exciting for words?

But it's going to be a good opportunity for me to finish up this little project.

Izzy's new room!

The before:

And the after! The paint is dried, so now I just need help getting the big stuff out because I just painted by sliding everything that Cody left.

 I will have to post more pictures once I get everything finalized. This project has been a little secret because Chase is kind of against painting rooms for a specific gender or age group as it makes it harder to sell the house. So not a secret, but a HAPPY SURPRISE!

So twenty years from now when we get ready to move, I will repaint. Until then it stays. But as an FYI, if I ever mention color blocking again, please remind that a slow torturous death would be easier.

And It Was Rockin'

The best part about staying home with my kids is that I don't have to miss things anymore. I might be late :) but I at least the opportunity to be there. So last Thursday I got to go to Stone Soup at Izzy's school.

Which basically means I ate hodge podge soup sitting in a chair that was maybe one foot off the ground, drinking room temperature water out of a Dixie cup. And it was awesome!

I know this is a crappy photo but it was the best I could do. As I was 10 minutes late WITHOUT turning around to go get my camera.

Everyone had to bring something to put in (Izzy brought potatoes that I stole out of my dad's fridge at 10 pm the night before) and they spent all Wednesday cutting and washing. And they cooked it overnight.

A concerned parent even made a gluten free version. This is the point in the story that I am trying to bite back a comment about some people having too much time on their hands.

But then Cambri and I got to eat with Izzy at school. It was really sweet time seeing all the excited kids with their parents. Izzy said it best when halfway through the meal she loudly announced, "This party is rockin!" It was sweet.

Her little friend, Luke, had her to redo so he could record it with his iPhone. I wanted to ask him to email it to me but then I remembered I was dealing with a five year old.

Preschool has changed these days, hasn't it peeps?

Happy Thanksgiving!

Bad, Bad, Bad Blogger

Wow, it's been a while. Don't worry peeps, I'm not gone for good. Just handing over my 10 year old career to somebody else.

It's emotionally draining.

The Chicken Most Def Came Second...

Happy Halloween from the Burke house!

Izzy decided early on this year that she would be Sleeping Beauty and Cambri would be a bunny rabbit. But I already had this amazingly cute chicken costume. I make such cute chickens.

 Not the actual costume, I'm not that crafty. I leave the hard part up to Old Navy. I just help mold the people inside.

Aren't they cute?

This year, the Golicova girls invited us to their church Halloween carnival.

Where we had our hair dyed...

 And our faces painted!

There is more to this story though. We won a goldfish. When I say "we" I mean Izzy. And she blatantly cheated but the church officials deemed it appropriate enough to still let her "win." In her defense, she really didn't understand that she cheated. She was told the objective of said carnival game was to get the ping pong ball in the bowl. And it wasn't clear to the 4 year old who was hopping around on a high fructose corn syrup high that she couldn't just walk over and drop the ball in from a few inches away.

Now I have a fish to take care. And a four year old who is in love with the fish that she lovingly named "Ryan" after her uncle. If I hadn't just quit my job, this fish would put me over the edge. I feel such an obligation to this thing, I mean it is a living creature of God, right?

This is more commitment than I can stand.

Alive & Aware THANKFULLY

The Burke house was put under a little stress this last weekend. Due to some faulty work performed on our furnace/air conditioner, carbon monoxide was being pumped into our home. It started out like a normal weekend. If you consider normal running around like mini demons with lots of estrogen. Normal for us anyway. Saturday evening I turned on our heater for the first time this season. I noticed an odor but thought that maybe it was just the unit burning off dust. I went to bed with a bad headache but managed to fall asleep. The next morning, I could barely open my eyes. Izzy was complaining of a headache as well. Then the nausea started in and she and I were sharing the throw up bowl. When Cam Cam finally got up, she started throwing up as well. It was odd that all of us were sick at the same time but I had had dinner with Paula the night before, so I texted her to see if her kids were sick because I thought food poisoning might be the culprit. She was fine except for a headache left over from my house the night before. Odd? Yes! I finally got to the point where I just wanted to lay down and go to sleep. But the girls were sick too, so I couldn't. We were all in so much pain that none of us could move. Cam Cam would fall asleep mid crawl and not move until I would wake her up. She would then resume crawling and again fall asleep mid crawl. Being that I really am an orphan, I called my Grandma out of church. And she made it to Idaho Falls from Ashton in 45 minutes. When she arrived, she had to knock on the door because it was still locked. I have a 5lbs chihuahua with a bladder the size of a peanut. I couldn't figure out why I hadn't let him out for the morning. Then everything started to click. Gordy wasn't even moving. The girls and I threw up together, every time the furnace kicked on. I grabbed my kids and Bev drove us to the doctor. Even being out in the fresh air for 10 minutes made Izzy and Cam perk up. My headache started going away. The doctor examined us and determined that we were being poisoned by carbon monoxide. When the gas company came to check out the house, they found 25,000 ppm of carbon monoxide in our house and that was after the doors and window had been opened for over an hour and the furnace was off. The gas man kept saying over and over again. "Thank goodness you called. Thank goodness you got out of the house. This is so dangerous." It turned out that the return air vent had been removed and not replaced. So when the furnace kicked on, it was venting carbon monoxide right into our house. Cam Cam had to go on supplemental oxyagen for a little bit but other than that, we are back to normal.

First Call Jewel, you were worth the $483 to fix our furnance properly. Thank you.

Slap With Me The Bad Mom Stick

Someone hit me. It just occurred to me that in this forum, the place where I love to talk about my kids most, I never mentioned that Cam Cam learned to walk.

And it happened two months ago.

I know that all of you in blogworld would get a kick out of her little tottle. I do! It's so cute. Sometimes she gets really excited and tries to run.

It doesn't go well. And she usually falls down.

And Izzy and I laugh and laugh.

It may sound cruel but it's not. I am not a coordinated person so I know that she gets it from me. She looks like a crippled monkey trying to move quickly. I should get it on tape and bore all of you by posting it here. It's really that cute.

So next time you see little Cam Cam, grab a treat and encourage her to run to you. I am giving you permission to laugh when she falls down.

 She's used to it.

My Road to Orphanhoodness

Well peeps, October is historically a good blogging month for me. Not this year. I'm a tad overwhelmed with wrapping up my entire holiday plan for both malls in time to turn it over to the new person. I can't wait. I CAN'T WAIT. It's going to be this huge weight off my shoulders and hopefully my personal situation.

My person situation. I have decided that I have become completely alone in this world. But it wasn't always this way. Here is my ophanhoodness timeline.

May 2008- My sister and brother-in-law move to South Dakota. Yes, this is pretty much the middle of nowhere. And I was very sad.

August 2008- Chasey switches companies. New company keeps him on the road three weeks out of the month and me without my bestie three weeks out of the month. Very sad!

October 2008- My grandpa died. Sad is not enough of a word. Devastating.

December 2009- My aunt Carol died. She used to bring me lunch and have me over for dinner. Overall the world is just not as bright without her.

March 4, 2010- Nope still can't even type the words without crying. It's safe to say the best part of me went to live in heaven that night.

October 2010- My dad leaves for AZ (albeit for two weeks but still!) and my grandma goes to New York to take a tour exploring fall colors. Graciously my best friend Paula commits to helping me watch my girls for extra hours just so I can keep up with a the bare minimum of expectations in my life.

And this is why when I tripped and slammed by head into the corner of a table during Biology that I had no one to call. Yes, Paula would have come but she would have had to pack 4 kids with her. I would have rather walked home than put her through that.

It only bled for a few minutes. I recovered. Honestly I was more sad that I had no one to call because that is just a depressing thought.

Wow, I need a vacation. I just depressed myself again.

I probably should look at the positive things in my life. Cam Cam was born in 2009. She's awesome. My babysitting situation is so nice. Paula loves my girls the second most after Chasey and I. My friends Kelly and Sherri each take a night watching them for FREE so I can go to school. Chuck & Bev do a lot for me, for which I will be eternally grateful. There is a silver lining, right?

Fish Hook 2010

Hey peeps! In case you didn't notice, I gave myself a little blogging break. Mainly because I was the victim of a senseless tragedy. Trust me when I say, if you want to get a drama queen all worked up, put a fishhook through her finger.

When I reached my hand into the back of the car and came out with a fishhook attached to my finger, I went into shock. I was hopping around, threatening to throw up and pass out and screaming like a baby. Chase was extremely pale. And guess what? No medial establishment in Island Park is open over the weekend. So I had to go to Rexburg. Where I BEGGED for an epidural. They didn't give me one. But I did get a nice numbing shot and was sent home with a finger that was mainly in tact, wrapped in a Scooby Doo band aid.

Now you know.

Loving Pancake Covered Life

Ok peeps. I love being a parent. I really do.

But aren't there some days when you just want to hang up the towel?

Give up the ghost?

Give parenthood the old heave-ho?

Wow, I bet you're impressed with my cliche usage. I'll stop, I promise.

But I really had one of those days yesterday. It started super early in the morning with me shoving NutriGrain bars down my kids throats while trying to put their seat belts on. Breakfast at the Burke house. The dog (darn you Gordy!) wouldn't get out of the car. And Cam Cam kept feeding him little bites of her bar. Then screaming like a mad man when she realized it wasn't coming back to her. Then she would calm down. Feed Gordy. Scream over losing a bite. And this went on for probably four bites. Gordy was loving life. I was hating it.

Then I dropped Izzy off at school where I got a hearty "Congratulations" from a teacher. I honestly thought this was a sarcastic way of saying "Wow, you are on time." But I have been so good about being on time, I thought this behavior would be a little premature. Let's give it another month so I can really show them what being late means.

Come to find out, Izzy announced duirng circle sharing time that her mom was FINALLY marrying her boyfriend. Well doesn't that just make us sound like a happy family. I mean, we are FINALLY getting married.

Never mind the actual wedding that happened six years ago.

Things just went down hill from there. I will spare you the boring details. But later that night I was standing next to the kitchen table talking to my dad, who had just made pancakes. I swear that when you have kids, you lose all personal awareness. Izzy is always hanging all over me, so why would it ever be different?

Oh wait, she was lifting my shirt, sticking her fork on me and dragging a piece of syrup covered pancake down my back. Sweet. Syrup comes off easily you know. Especially in an easily reached location, such as your lower back.

I give up.

Merry Christmas Mom!

I did something really scary at work. REALLY SCARY!

I gave my notice.

AAAAHHHHHH!

Words cannot even express how difficult walking away from great people and 9 1/2 YEARS is going to be for me. But I'm excited to see where this new road takes us. My mom always said that being a stay at home mom benefited her and her kids and she wanted me to try it. I always felt like I was doing the right thing for my family but Chasey and I have decided to try something new and have me stay at home.

Starting November 5th, I will officially be a stay at home trophy wife who goes to school full time. CRAZY!!

I'm UnIdahoan

I was told by a coworker that I was unIdahoan.

I rectified the problem.

So now it's official, I AM an Idahoan. Forget the fact that I was born and raised here.

The peeps and I went to Bear World, a place I had never been to. Which I guess makes you unIdahoan. But now I have been. And let me tell you peeps, I found the whole experience to be exciting. The not-so-exciting part? It cost us $55. Wowza.

We saw an Albino Elk.

And we saw super cute bear cubs.

The most random part of the day was when this huge A grizzly bear parked himself in the middle of the road and wouldn't move. Yet the employee opened the gate out and motioned us to continue driving with no regard to the beast that less than five feet away from him.

Chase used the car to nudge the 1000+ bear out the way. And the bear didn't even care. Isn't there something wrong with a wild animal that doesn't react to a car pushing it away? What are we doing to the animals?

Not that I'm some kind of weird bear lover. I actually think the wild would be more enjoyable for me if all bears went away. But being that they are here, are we allowed to make freak shows out of them?

Hmmmm....

Cambri thought sitting next to this deer was awesome. I couldn't pull her away. I did object when she moved in for kisses. I had no idea what kind of diseases to fear but I know there are some.

Chase had fun because he talked Paula and I into stopping to fish. Seriously, he likes to fish more than he likes me. I'm probably not even lying.

The House Fairy Makes Me Beat You

My friend Paula invented the house fairy in order to motivate her children. It's a fairly basic concept. If you make your bed and keep your room clean, then the house fairy comes and leaves you presents. Isabelle has completely and utterly latched onto this concept. Every morning, she jumps out of bed and make it before even leaving to use the restroom. Once the house fairy actually made an appearance at the Golicova household, she was especially excited. Here is an actual conversation that went down last week. When she realized she forgot to make her bed. Not because I reminded her but because she remembered.

Katie: Let's go. I'm going to be late again.

Isabelle: Oh my gosh. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. I forgot to make my bed. I'm so sorry.

Katie: Uuuh o.k.

Isabelle: Are you mad? Are you mad? I'm soooo sorry. I'm soo sorry. I'm going to do it right now.

Katie: Uuuuh o.k.

Isabelle: I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. I'll be right back.

Katie: Uuuuh o.k.

I was actually completely stunned. Happy but stunned. I have never made that kid make her bed ever. I'm sure it's a good habit but not one that seriously ever occurred to me. But this conversation left me feeling bad because it seemed like she was an abused child, scared to death of me. Which if you have ever read this blog, then you know this kid is not scared of anything, ESPECIALLY me. But it made me realize that this is important to her (yay!) and maybe the house fairy should make an appearance.

So when the princesses went down to bed, I left out their loot.

But little Izzy didn't want to wake up. Good thing Cam Cam got her excited.

The first thing out of her mouth was, "I need to call Tashy & Jhanny. The house fairy only left them rubberbands."

Paula's kids had gotten bend a roos the previous week. Not quite rubberbands.

The second thing out of her mouth was said with much outrage. "How come Cambri got something? She only messes things up."

Doesn't it seem like I'm always a step behind around here?