The Third Child...

We have three beautiful children together:

Mine: The Social Guy [The Oldest] - He can talk to anyone, anytime, anywhere (and I am NOT kidding). He remembers faces and names, unlike his mother. He will make friends no matter where he goes. He loves, loves, loves people.

His: The Artist [The Middle Child]- She has the most amazing stories in her head. She can take you on the adventure of a life time without you ever leaving the living room or backyard. She can write them or help you act them out, even at the grocery store.

Ours: The Brainiac [The Baby] - He can figure out how anything works and will tell you how he could make it better. He is happiest in the garage or working with Legos thinking up his next greatest invention. Oh, and he has a really weird East Coast accent.

The three of them are a great mix and most of the time they make a beautiful blend of oil, herbs, and vinegar (in no particular order). But sometimes they separate and it makes parenting their different styles difficult. So one of my favorite things to do is to take them camping. It's a few days when the "Olson Family of Five" is nothing but a perfect blend.

Some of our frequent places to visit are the MN State Parks. The State Parks are usually very clean and quiet, enough privacy and enough running water. We like to hike and "rough it" (rough it = double decker air-mattress for me and hubby, nice sheets, three room tent, mini tents for the teens, organizers, flat top gas griddle, gas grill, gas burner , adapter for the car battery to run plugged in appliances (yes I 'could' bring and run my microwave), reclining chairs, mp3 player and little baby speakers....I think you get the picture.) for as many weekends as we can each summer. Unfortunately we were only able to go family camping once this summer. But, there are so many blog-able events that happened over the weekend you can expect a few blogs this week :)

Seeing that the kids are older (15, 14, 8), they got a lot more freedom this year. The teens went to the showers by themselves. All three kids took the dogs for short, but adventurous walks throughout the park. Our requirements were simple: stay together and bring a walkie talkie.

Then there is the Third Child...
Considering his age, he was probably allowed the most freedom of them all...

Eight Year Old, "Hey dad, I wanna make a fire."

Dad, "ah...no? I paid $4 per tiny bundle of wood and you are not making a fire at 3:00 in the afternoon."

Eight Year Old, "but dad, I really, really want to make a fire. You always make log cabin fires and I wanna build a tee-pee fire."

Dad, "You can make a fire closer to dinner time."

Eight Year Old, "but-sep-for [except for] I wanna make one now."

Dad, "Fine. Go get your own wood and you can make a fire."

Eight Year Old, "All the wood is too big for me to carry."

Dad :::hands Eight Year Old a saw::: "Okay, go saw it into smaller pieces."

Fifteen Year Old tunes into what is going on, "WHAT!?!?! Did you just give the Eight Year Old a saw? AND tell him to go cut his own wood?"

Dad, "Yeah...so?"

Fifteen Year Old :::silently thinking::: "what the FUCK are you thinking?"

Fifteen Year Old, "You never gave me a saw at eight!"

Mom, "oh, you don't even remember being eight."

Fifteen Year Old, "wow"

***Hours later Eight Year Old starts fire with Dad's $4 per "small" bundle of wood***

And of course we didn't give The Oldest Child, aka The Social Butterfly a saw at eight! He would have sawed his finger off while talking to the people at the next camp site...

Tiaras and Tutus~
The MFP

An Ode to Facebook

ah Facebook....I love you Facebook. You have given me such a great tool to communicate with friends and even make a few new ones. Every day feels like the best party ever. You never know what is going to happen, or who will say what, but I am guaranteed a lol, a giggle, a *snort*, and usually a few lmao, rofl, and some pixie dust! But sometimes life is not a party and sometimes one of us needs a hug or a virtual cookie...and even when I can't be there to comfort a friend face to face, hug to hug, I know that I can always send a little love <3, or a Mafia Wars Energy pack.

:::Captian Obvious arrives on the scene::: Well, MFP, it's all about participation. If your friends didn't post and comment on every one's statuses then Facebook would be a boring place in cyberspace and you would spend even more time playing Bejeweled Blitz then mentally or physically healthy. :::Captain Obvious leaves:::

Thanks Captain Obvious....and thanks to Facebook and my all Facebook friends...Party On!

(special thanks to the Lil' Sissy for letting me borrow Captain Obvious...)

No Apologies!

WARNING! Some of you will read this and say, "must be rough..." I know this because someone already said that to me this week. So I am starting out this blog by refusing to apologize for my life. I refuse to apologize for the fact that I am a stay-at-home mom, instead of a career mom. I refuse to apologize for homeschooling my kids, instead of sending them to school. I refuse to apologize for having a husband who works from home, instead of spending fifty plus hours a week at work. I refuse to apologize for being over-weight, instead of thin. I refuse to apologize....period.

This has been a typical week for us:

Monday at the beach, with friends.
Tuesday at the river, with friends.
Wednesday, at a friends house for science co-op. (Yes, we are still doing school. At our house we finish the course before moving on and I refuse to apologize.)
Thursday at the park with friends, plus grilling dinner at the park with husbands when they are done with work.

Considering the fact that the kids and I have been using the house as "base camp" this week, it is no wonder that I have had a hard time keeping up with the household chores. Sure I've done some dishes and tossed some laundry in the washer and dryer, but tonight it hit me. Mount St. Laundry is about as big as it gets. I am pretty sure the only clean dishes we have left are the big serving spoons and a few large Tupperware containers. The bathrooms have sand on the floor and my plants are drooping and begging for water. So what do I do? I look at my husband and I say....

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry the laundry is out of control. I'm sorry the kitchen is a disaster. I'm sorry the entryway is piled high with towels and shoes. I'm sorry you've had to take care of the dogs. I'm even sorry I haven't shaved my legs all week. I'm sorry." and he says to me.....

"I'd rather have a girlfriend then a mom."

You see, apparently he's okay with a messy kitchen and having to find his own matching pair of socks sometimes, but he doesn't want us to stop having fun together. And after what we have been through lately that is the best thing I have heard in a long, long time. (Oh, by the way I did shave my legs, but the dishes are still piled to the ceiling!)