The Bushes

We finally got brave and took out the bushes that covered our house and most of the sidewalk.  Kevin and Shane conversed for a while about how to get a truck into our yard.  The solution was to take out another tree that was mostly dead anyway.  I think they thought that pulling out trees was man work and that trimming other bushes in the yard was woman work.

Shane is directing Kevin how to attach a chain around the bush.  Kevin is behind the bush.  Meanwhile, my Mom is pondering what the boys are doing and working hard.  I stole a line from Ben Hur, "Row well and live."  I told her told her to trim well and live.  She worked really hard, so maybe she believed me.  

This is the bush graveyard that grew to twice this size by the end of the evening.  When all the bushes were gone we enjoyed a lovely dinner together.  

Nathan and Joseph

Nathan was born at 9:19 am on February 26, 2010.

7 pounds 3 oz

20 inches

Shane and I got up early that morning and headed to the hospital to have labor induced. We were off to a fine start around 6 am. We did the usual turn up the pitocin and wait. About 8:45 my water broke and what seemed like one minute later I felt the urge to push. My doctor hadn't arrived, so the nurse instructed me to not push. I was really distraught at this point because the urge to push was overwhelming. After what seemed like an eternity, my doctor arrived and we began the push process. Push #1 was only successful with me letting out a crazy person scream, but no baby. My doctor looked me in the eye and said, "You're going to have a baby on this push, so when I tell you grab the handles, push, and don't make noise this time." I listened and Nathan arrived on push #2.

Joseph is warming up to the idea of having a baby brother. When he decides that he wants the baby he runs up to him and says, "Mine!" Luckily he has not tried to carry him around the house. He was tender with a baby doll at nursery on Sunday and carried it around the whole time. He seems to think that he can carry Nathan around the same way and is rather annoyed that Mommy and Daddy won't let him.

This is Joseph pointing out his little brother's features. Who would have thought that everyone has a nose, ears, and eyes?

This is Nathan about three hours after he was born and what he looks like for most of the day. If only I could convince him that he should take up this sleep routine when its dark outside and open his eyes when its light.

After some coaxing he decided that he likes the heat lamps.

Nathan was not the biggest fan of the heat lamp. The little wire attached to his tummy was a heat sensor that told the lamp when to turn off, indicating that he was 'done'.

Disneyland

We spent three days in Disneyland last week. Joseph was a travel trooper and is cut out for marathon driving. I think he liked watching movies in the back with his daddy. No one in my car volunteered to drive so I drove all 1800 miles of the trip.

Disneyland is a fun place for people of all ages. I even got my grandma to ride Space Mountain. Getting her on that roller coaster with me and my mom was the highlight of my day. Rachel told Grandma to close her eyes if she got scared, but when she got off she said that closing her eyes did not help. The funny part of the ride was that when the automatic cameras flashed my mom and I had big goofy grins and my grandma had her eyes scrunched up and her lips pursed. I'll have to post the picture.

Joseph liked all the water in the park and got annoyed that we couldn't get in the fountains. He didn't care about any of the characters except Sully from Monster's Inc. who he insisted was a kitty.

Kevin and Shane were not interested in having their picture taken with any characters. After much prodding, they finally relented and said they would have their picture taken with someone. I can't see why they were embarrased to have their picure taken with Chip and Dale.

Toward the end of the visit we rode several little kid rides. Joseph thought they were fabulous. The adults did their best to act like they were having a great time on the kid rides.

My dad flying in an applesauce box.

Grandma and Grandma Great buckling in Joseph for his flight.

Kevin and Rachel on the little lady bugs.

Joseph and Grandma in the ladybugs.

My Grandma is Born Today

David Copperfield begins with the simple sentence, "I am born."  This is an obvious start to anyones existence because its the only way to make our way into this life.  In modern times we have come to registering our births so that not only do our mother's remember the day we were born but also every government, civil, and health agency in the land.  This mainly proves that the registered person is in fact a citizen of the United States and not a citizen of Gondowanland trying to pose as a citizen of the United States.  

The importance of this entry is that my grandma is officially born today.  She began trying to register her birth in 1964.  She was not born in 1964, but began the process of registering her birth at that time.  When she was born mother's were not required to register the births of their children.  The family moved shortly after her birth from Arizona to New Mexico, so registering her birth in Arizona never happened.  Despite extensive documentation she was told that she did not have the right kind of proof of where and when she was born.  One would think that a testimonial of someone present at her birth would be enough proof.  Alas, it was not for the birth offices of 1964.  She periodically tried to register her birth after that time and was continuously denied.  Two years ago, prior to going on a cruise, she began the process again thinking that she would need a birth certificate to get a passport.  Come to find out that a birth certificate is not requisite to getting a passport. Apparently other countries don't care so much where the tourists were born as where they call home.   

After 45 years of trying and several denial letters she received her birth certificate in the mail.  On paper she is officially born today.

End of Another School Year

School ends on Friday.  The kids have been ready for school to be over since our state tests ended.  That was in March.  We've continued to wait around and muddle through extensive topics like surface area and the quadratic equation.  I've continued to hope that they'd learn something along the way.  The last portion of my Pre Algebra final was an essay question that stated, "Now that the year is over, tell me what you learend in math."  Some of the responses were fabulous, but had nothing to do with math.  

Student A

I learned that if you can't say anything nice then don't say anything at all.  I learned that I will never use math in my life or for my job, so I'd better do a good job in school so that I'll never have to deal with math.  

Student B

I can't remember anything I learned, but I know it was a lot.

Student C

You should come teach math at the high school.  

Student D

We learned about numbers.  

Seems to me that last one is a little vague.  

We have nothing to do with our last few days of school because the final exam is over and I am not assigning work to the students.  To mix things up I'm offering extra credit for each geometric construction that is neatly completed and colored.  I see very little practical application for geometric construction but they are fun and I've gained further appreciation for applications like prinshop that make my life easier by making me not draw perfect pentagons.  

I Snapped at My Neighbor

I've been annoyed several times through the year at my neighbor in school.  He likes to follow the rules and I do too.  Sometimes I get a little lax over the whole no gum in school policy.  I figure that if my worse problem is that my kids chew gum then I'm doing pretty well.  My neighbor likes to come peek in on my class occasionally.  I normally take his catching kids with gum in stride and laught it off.  I couldn't take it anymore on Tuesday and I finally snapped at him when he came into my class and announced that a student was chewing gum.  I whipped around and loudly stated, "I don't care!"  He sulked back to his room.  I felt elated that I'd finally stood up to him for one minute at most.  After a miserable fifth hour thinking of how awful I'd been I went up to him and apologized for my actions. His parting words were that all of use were getting tired and that he would have done the same thing if I'd come into his room like he had into mine.   

The funny thing is that the students are thrilled that someone stood up to their strict English teacher.  Someday they'll appreciate his strictness.  Until then I'll keep getting caught with kids who have gum.  

Joseph had a great time hunting Easter eggs.  He picked up each egg and then daintily dropped them into his basket.  As you can inmagine his version of dainty is rough compared to most versions of dainty.  
It was a cold day but we had lots of fun.  Joseph woke up from his nap so he was clingy.  Shane took all the pictures so I don't have any of him to post.   

I wonder what Joseph thought about coloring eggs.  Shane tried to get Joseph to color an egg.  he thought holding an eggs was really strange and ended up chucking it on the floor.  This is why Joseph is far away from the eggs in this picture.  

Someday I'll make an album of Grandma hiding behind various objects.  This one is so choice.  

The highlight of the weekend was finding out that Kevin and Debra are engaged.  I secretly hoped that they would get married and even discussed with Mother that I thought they were a great match and well suited for each other.  It turns out that they mutually decided that they should get married.  There was no mushy getting down on one knee or big engagement surprise.  In true Kevin fashion I found out that they were engaged from a text message that simply stated, "He Mevin I'm engaged."  I was thrilled down to my toes when I read the message.  Their wedding plans are still in the air.  From what I've heard the big day will be sometime in August.  Joseph is thrilled to have a new aunt.