What's on Don's Mind

It is a quiet morning so far. It is my last day of work for 24 days. One of the few perks of doing shift work is having 7 consecutive days off every month. When I combine vacation days to my days off, I get 24 consecutive days off ... oh how sweet!

The big thing on my mind right now is our big trip this year to Gatlinburg Tennessee nearby the famous Dollywood. At around 13 hours driving time, this year's drive will be a little less grueling than 2007's excursion. We plan on breaking it up in two days. We'll stop off in Nashville for a rest before driving into the Great Smoky Mountains.

We'll be with the Hobsons the whole time. There's usually never a dull moment at these reunions. I've been informed we'll be having a talent show. Jill's been prodding me for ideas on this one. I'm just not a performer and so I'm having a really hard time committing to this. It's giving me ulcers just thinking about it. Maybe we'll sing a song and Jill can dress up like Dolly and I can dress up like Kenny ... I dunno.

The other pressing issue on my mind is fixing the toilet in our bathroom. It's been in a running state since we bought the place. It has gotten really bad the last two days. I had to shut both bathroom doors last night so I wouldn't hear the constant running. I'll be buying some new parts I think. I just fixed the handel a few weeks ago. But when I shut off the water, I noticed the water didn't shut off completely. I think some of the threading there is stripped. I may be opening a can of worms when I start this little project.

The rest is just small stuff ... I'm gonna mow the lawn, water it, do some other yardwork, play with the kiddos, help Emma keep up with the Book of Mormon, play chess with Emma and Ben, play trains with Erick, tickle the snot out of Cami, go to the gym, swim (97 degrees the next 4 days) and ask Jill (every hour) what I can help her with.

At night, I plan on getting in some chess (FICS and ChessTempo) and playing my latest addiction ... Sim City 4.

That's about all for now. I'm sure Jill has lots of other things on her mind that she thinks should be on my mind also! :-)

Stay tuned for lots of pictures and even video! I was looking at the videos I've uploaded at YouTube and noticed that I've not uploaded any since last year!

Have a great weekend everyone and congradulations to all the kids who've graduated and completed another school year!

The Doorstep Puppy

A Little History

Back in June 2004, we were holding a garage sale one Saturday morning. While we were sitting outside, we found this little puppy come wandering in our yard. He was so cute. We kept him and fed him for a few hours. We put up a sign and eventually the owner came and claimed him. But the damage was done.

Emma really wanted a puppy and Jill and I grew very attached to the puppy in the short time we had him. The owner said that our neighbors still had two puppies left to sell. We met our neighbors and they let us take the two puppies to decide which one we wanted. We liked the "runt" of the mix. He was very mild and laid back. His sister was very hyper and so cute. Jill really liked the boy, but I preferred the hyper one.

We decided on the little boy and named him Fritz.

Fritz Freaks Out

I was trying to sleep one morning when I heard Fritz going nuts. I got up to see what was going on. Jill said there was a puppy on the doorstep. He was a little furball wandering our neighborhood and heard Fritz barking at him. So the pup decided to come to our house.

We brought him in, gave him some food and water and he and Fritz played like old pals. We were a little guarded knowing full well what happened the last time we brought in a pup. Since I was going to work the night shift that night, Jill didn't want to deal with him at all. We immediately put up a sign hoping someone would come by in the morning. No one came. So we called the city animal control unit at lunchtime.

He came by, retrieved the pup and drove off. He was yelping in the kennel truck while I signed the papers. Poor little guy.

At first we thought he was a pug until we googled it and decided he was no pug. He looked kind of like my cousin Shon's dog, but I couldn't remember what kind of dog she was. I emailed Shon and then googled "fluffy dog" Eventually I found a picture of a chow. To me he looked chow. The animal control guy didn't think he was chow though. He said he looked like a lab. Whatever he was, he was sure cut and cuddly.

Later that evening, some kids came looking for him and our neighbor's told the kids that their pup was in the city kennel and they had 5 days to retrieve him. So at least the little pup got back home.

All in a good week's work!

See this cute little guy?



Gotta love him right? You also gotta watch him every second or else this is what happens....

As I was finishing up yoga in the living room, Erick had gone somewhere and gotten real quiet. I thought to myself that I should go check on him, but no, I am in the middle of the tree pose and must finish. So, when I finished, I went to check in the kitchen to find frosting smeared all over the wood floor, on the counters and in Erick's hair and all over his hands. There were frosting footprints! It was really fun to spend the next 30 minutes cleaning that up before the kids got home from school. Thanks buddy!

This week Don worked the night shift and so it was me all alone coming home from our soccer party and getting all four fed and bathed and scriptures read and teeth brush (oh, am I complaining?) sorry! Anyways, Cami was so tired after her bath and Erick was taking a shower and so I thought I'd quickly go and lay Cami down while Erick finished up. When I came back it sure smelled nice in the room, kind of like my brand new bottle of coconut lime verbena that I had gotten for my birthday! Sure enough, the entire bottle (which was full) was gone forever down the drain. Just minutes after that we were in the bathroom brushing teeth. Can you guess what happens next?

Emma needed something so I left Erick for just a minute to finish his teeth up and when I returned, half the bottle of toothpaste was all over the floor and counter. It was just a little much for one day!

Erick has also been known to roll the entire roll of toilet paper onto the floor rendering it useless, I am sure none of your kids has ever done that?

We love this guy but he is a handful.

Erick also loves to watch "Wow Wow Wubzy", from 1:00 to 2:00 pm. This is a blissful hour in our home because Erick sits the entire time and is totally enthralled, a very much needed daily break that goes by WAY too fast.

Emma has been amazing me lately with her art abilities! I will have to take some pics of her work. I need to get her in an art class and let her continue to develop this talent that she feels so successful at. She is a sweet girl. Her goal is to read the Book of Mormon before her baptism date on August 23rd. We are on page 107 and so we have a ways to go, but she just started about 3 weeks ago so we are doing pretty good. This goal was Don's suggestion, I thought he was crazy, we are busy enough and can barely get in a couple verses a day let alone 5 pages! But, it really has made a difference in our home and I hope it will make a difference in Emma's little life.

Benjamin of course has lost 2 teeth and he tells everyone (strangers) about it. He is pretty proud of it. He continues to look more like Don everyday! Everyone comments about this fact! Ben comes in my bed every morning and hugs and cuddles with me (I have learned to like this, I normally don't like being touched or bothered in the morning). He sleeps without a shirt or somehow his shirt always comes off in the night, so in the morning I get to rub his nice and smooth bare back. I told him he better enjoy having a smooth back now because if he takes after his dad which apparently he does since he is pretty much his clone, it won't be smooth for long. (sorry Don!)

Now for Miss Camille. She pretty much rules the roost around here. Whatever she says or screams goes. Everyone just loves her and she is spoiled to death, altho Erick doesn't give her her way, he fights for his rightful spot in the family. Cami worships the ground the kids walk on and wants to be just like them. She is so cute. She has a full blown mullet going on right now and it is getting longer, but only the back! I can't do a thing about it. Ah well, her cute personality makes up for the lack of hair. She is a doll and we love her.

I don't have many new pics to post, but I will soon, so stay tuned!

Fathers and Sons Campout

This was Erick's first Father and Sons Campout. It was a lot of fun. After we ate dinner and shortly after sundown, both boys said they wanted to go to bed! Poor Erick really was tired, but Ben endured and stayed up to play capture the flag with the other boys. Erick hung out with me and we played some chess by the campfire while the big boys ran around in the dark.

We camped right by the lake (click on the picture to go to google maps to see the context). Pilot Knoll is a nice park. It was completely full that night. I'm used to camping and not having a single other camper within a dozen miles, so this was a little weird, but that's city camping for you.

The boys had a lot of fun throwing rocks in the lake. We found tiny baby frogs the size of my fingernail. Erick liked how they jumped around. We found a turtle and a water snake too.

We eventually went to sleep at 10:30 that night. The older boys were still playing capture the flag. They used our tent as the hiding place for one of the flags, so we kept getting some seekers by our tent. Erick and Ben fell alseep pretty quickly.

The next morning was beautiful. We hiked around some more, ate breakfast and then packed up and went home before Ben's soccer game.