The Kirkmans: busy, busy, busy, messy, messy, messy

Caleb wanted to be in Daddy's uniform too

Tuesday, Chick-fil-A with Caleb, and shopping. He had to take his bucket of cars everywhere we went and in the whole foods store, he had to put his bucket into a basket and push it all over the store. I made the mistake of going to Costco hungry, and ended up buying way too much, included their freshly baked cookies. Caleb was very happy about it, and the kids loved it when they had cookies and milk for an after school snack. Samuel had soccer practice, and the field was really wet, so ten minutes after we arrived Caleb had found several puddles, and was completely soaked and ready to go home. Samuel had a good time playing soccer, and just needs to work on not touching and pushing his teammates while waiting in line for his turn to kick the ball.
Wednesday, Samuel's IEP, playgroup, and lunch at our friend Leslie's house, Caleb absolutely loved playing with his friends Liam and Luke. I made Salmon, and squash croquettes for dinner, they were good, but my kids wouldn't eat them, so I sent them to give some to Leslie's family, and she texted me saying they were eating Macaroni and Cheese at her house. Crazy kids, at least someone appreciates my cooking, I just wish it were my kids. Although Austin did eat the salmon really well, she loves salmon.
Thursday, walk for the first time. At dinner time, Samuel wanted me to make him a smoothie, but I was feeding the baby, so I told him to start getting the things out, and I would help him when I was done with the baby. This morning I had put a pound of butter in the blender to soften, so I could make better butter. When I went downstairs, There was butter all over the floor, sink, counter, and garbage can. Samuel had gotten it out of the blender, so I could make his smoothie and thrown it away, but since it was so slippery he kept dropping it, and wiping his hands on everything. Well there went a pound of butter, I'm definitely not digging it out of the trash. As I was starting to wipe up the butter, Caleb ran through the kitchen stepping in the butter and tracking it even further across the floor. So, while I'm cleaning, the other kids are getting frozen mini pizzas (purchased when I went to Costco hungry) and heating them up, and eating them. I make Samuel his smoothie, and go to the freezer to get out my veggie burgers, since everyone else has found something to eat. My veggie burgers are not there, I ask the kids if they know what happened to them. Samuel says when he got out the frozen blueberries for his smoothie, the box fell out, and he couldn't fit it back in, so he put it in the outside freezer. I went into the garage to get the veggie burgers but they weren't in their either, so I ask Samuel to show me where they are. He goes out to the garage and picks the box up off the floor. He didn't put it in the freezer at all, he had just thrown them on the floor. It's a good thing I was going to make one, otherwise those would have been ruined too. So I make my veggie patty, and Just as it's done, Samuel says "i want that", so I give him my veggie patty, and make myself another one, I put cheese on it, and toasted two pieces of bread and made a nice sandwich, Joseph comes up and says he wants it, so I give it to him, and make one more for me. As I'm sitting down to eat, Caleb is hungry again, so I feed him, then go back and eat my cold veggie burger. As I'm cleaning up, and throw my paper plate in the garbage, I see the other two veggie burgers I made that the boys wanted in the garbage. I ask them why they threw them away, and Samuel said he didn't want it without cheese and bread, like I made mine, so he threw it away, and Joseph said he thought it was a cheeseburger, and didn't want it, and threw it away too. Samuel had soccer practice, and still struggled with waiting his turn appropriately, but is pretty good at kicking the ball around.
Friday, I came down the stairs, and saw a huge puddle of orange smoothie on the carpet, and on the floor downstairs, and there were a bunch of crumpled of papers next to it that were also covered in smoothie, I asked what happened, and Caleb says he spilled his smoothie and tried to clean it up with the papers. These papers, I discovered were Samuel's completed homework that he has to take back to school on Monday. He was not happy. Poor Caleb, he tried to clean up his mess, and I tried to tell Samuel that if he hadn't left his hw on the floor, Caleb wouldn't have used them to clean up his mess. I finally calmed Samuel down, and told him I would write his teacher a note, explaining what happened. Then I got to work cleaning the smoothie mess off the carpet. I went into the kitchen to make breakfast, and Joseph was eating a cheeseburger, I looked at him and asked him if he made another one (He had one for dinner last night), and he said "no" it was the same one. I asked him if it was in the refrigerator, and he said "no" it was just on the counter all night, but that it still tasted good. I groaned and explained to Joseph about how meat goes bad, and can make you really sick. I thought he knew this, but apparently the other times I've told him, he wasn't listening. Caleb woke up saying he wanted to play with "HIS Liam" (his friend), and started washing his cars, and drying them, and setting them up in the backyard ready to play with his friend. He wouldn't let me shut the back door, because he insisted that his friend Liam was on his way to play cars with him. It was wet and cool outside so Caleb even took a towel outside and was drying this off everything, including the grass, in preparation for Liam to come over. I finally convinced Caleb that Liam would play with him later and we ate breakfast, and then went on our morning walk. (the kids' didn't have school) By the time we left, Joseph said his stomach was hurting so he stayed behind and soaked in the bath. It was pretty cool outside this morning, so I had Malachi wearing his hat his Grandma Hardy made him. (see picture below) After our walk, I changed Caleb's diaper, and noticed a really bad rash on his bottom, hands, and feet, some were blood red, some were blistered, and some were pink. He was scratching them and complaining about them hurting, so I gave him a bath. And then since I was feeding Malachi when he finished his bath, he fell asleep on the floor waiting for me to be done (picture below). After Caleb woke up, we went to a kids health fair for a couple of hours, they had a good time, making jump ropes, eating healthy snacks, playing with hula hoops, and spending forever inside the bouncy house castle. They ran through the bouncy house over and over again, for over an hour. They were hot and sweaty, and Samuel would lie down on the tarp (pictured below) to rest in between running like crazy through the bouncy house. We got home, and then went to the park with the Kelley's(our friends). As soon as we got home from the park, we went to the Deployed Spouses potluck dinner, Joseph was feeling better, so he came with us. (he layed on the couch for over 8 hours groaning, and playing video games.) The kids had a good time, but there wasn't anything Samuel could eat there, so he ate whatever he wanted. Caleb loved playing with his friend Liam there (they got to play with cars), he didn't even eat, he was too busy playing. We went home, and I put everyone to bed, it was a busy and exhausting day, but fun.
Saturday, started out with Joseph leaving at 6:30 to go to the stake center to get ready for the pancake breakfast. The kids and I got ready and met him there at 8 am. Joseph was in charge of cooking the pancakes, and he did a good job. Caleb's friend Liam was there, and Leighton (Samuel's friend). They had fun playing together. The stake preparedness fair started after the breakfast, and the kid's played in the nursery, while Austin came with me and went to the first session, about 72 hour kits. After the session, we left and went to our FRG (family readiness group) at the park. The kids played for a while, although Caleb just wanted to swing, and the girls would get him in the swing and then push him for a minute, and then run off, leaving him there in the swing, poor Caleb. We left the park and went over to the old commissary where they were having a big garage sale, and looked around for a little bit, until Samuel through a big fit because he wanted a $200 jeep, and I said "no". So we left and went home to eat lunch. After that our friends the Kelley's wanted us to go to the park with them, so we drove to a park downtown and had fun playing for a while, then went to a yogurt shop for a treat of frozen yogurt. Then I dropped the kids off at the Primary practice and pizza party, and went home and had Liam and his mom over for our own little pizza party. I went back and picked up the kids from the activity. Man that was a busy day, the kitchen has been a mess, since Joseph was supposed to do the dishes, and hasn't, and I told him I wouldn't do them for him. He also didn't do his chores this weekend, and neither did Samuel. But we have had a very busy weekend. Caleb's rash has been a little better, I talked to the Nurse about it, and she said it was probably just a virus, and would be gone within 48 hours. Last night, Caleb woke up screaming and crying, and kicking and punching about 5 different times. I don't know what his problem was, he would just scream, and cry for me for about 10-15 minutes, until he would fall back asleep exhausted. I would try to hold him and calm him down, but nothing worked. But he woke up happy this morning, so I don't know what was going on with him. The kids had their primary program today at church. They did great, and Malachi, Caleb, Joseph and I had a good time watching them. Everyone had a great time at church. Although Samuel has been complaining about his neck and head hurting since yesterday, and been much subdued because of it. If it isn't feeling better tomorrow, I will take him to either the dr. or chiropractor.