A few days ago we received notice that they were going to be tearing up the road in front of our house and repaving it. The notice said there would be some inconvenience from Wednesday to Saturday of this week, but that we'd still be able to get into our driveway. The notice was right.

They started at 7 am this morning with their huge dump trucks and road-tearer-upper. I'd never seen anything like it, and neither had Seamus. He thought it was the greatest thing ever. Even before breakfast we bundled up in a blanket (still chilly in the mornings) and sat on the porch watching the trucks. Since then we've gone out every half hour or so to watch these huge beasts in action.

Here are some fun pictures of all of the excitement.



We have camp chairs on our front porch, one for me and one for Seamus. We ran over to BYU for a quick Jamba juice with Uncle Tommy and then came back for more big trucks before Shay's nap. He keeps saying "Oh man, what is that big truck doing" or something like it. We've never had more fun on the porch than this.

I spend way too much time reading blogs and not enough time writing my own. By the time I run the gambit of blogs I read I'm out of time to write on mine. Seamus has become more demanding of my time: "Mommy sit here" "Mommy come play Shay-shay" "Mommy, nooooooooo!!!" I'm trying to teach him patience, waiting for his turn, etc, but it's a long and tough road we trod.

Awesome new book I'm reading "Parenting with love and logic". It's amazing. Just what I needed to read at this point in our lives, since Shay's just at the age where I can start using it. I'll post more about it when I have time. In about a week my sister and her kids and husband are coming to visit, so don't expect a lot of posts at that time. We're going to be busy, busy, busy. Hooray! I'm so excited to have a playmate!

My mom got two new keys made for her car, but didn't realize that her original key had a transponder chip in it. Unfortunately, apparently that chip is necessary to start the car and even though the new keys unlock the car just fine they won't start it. We didn't figure this out until late last night when my brother returned from his trip to the East Coast with only the new keys. Mom had the originals in Virginia with her. Dylan, great guy that he is, volunteered to drive up to the airport and get my brother and bring him home. Now we've got to figure out how to get the car home since if you try the wrong key several times it'll lock up the engine and the dealership has to unlock it at their Service Center.

Lots going on...

Also, great gifts for Mother's day: the last book in a series I've been reading, yay! And a super nice digital picture frame. It takes memory cards or USB keys and it'll play music while scrolling through your pictures. Also, apparently it will play movies if they're on a USB key or memory card so Dylan wants to take it on trips to watch movies in the car or wherever. Very cool. We've already put a bunch of pictures on it and it looks really neat on my corner table.

I know Mother's Day is tomorrow, but we got a jump on it early this week. My mom went to VA/NC to see her other "favorite" children for Mother's Day so we celebrated by taking her to the Tepanyaki Japanese Steakhouse on Wednesday of this week. We had such a great time! It was Shay's first time at one of these places and he did ok. He was mesmerized by the flames and cooking food, but he didn't want to eat any of it. Just too weird, I guess, to have someone cook at your table.

I'm just so happy to be a mom. It's by far the most rewarding thing I've ever done, and that includes my BS. I can't imagine life without my little guy and I'm totally excited for our new Baby Abby to come. Dylan is doing a great job of making me feel pampered this weekend...he has several surprises planned. I also got myself a few things for Mother's Day. A book called "Love and Logic in Child Rearing" or something like that, and a cute brown peasant skirt. Hooray for a day celebrating moms!!

Some random things I've been thinking about lately:

We've started watching the Fox show "Drive" starring Captain Malcom Reynolds from Firefly. That's really the reason why we turned it on in the first place. We have enjoyed the first four episodes so far, but we heard a rumor today that they may be canceling the show. Fox just doesn't give shows a chance. When has four episodes of anything been enough to get you hooked? It's too bad. Drive seemed to be the kid sister of "Lost": puzzles to figure out, competent acting, following back storylines, but unlike Lost the writers actually give the viewers bigger slices of the plot. Oh well, it's been fun while it lasted.

Shay's sentences have started getting longer. Dylan's birthday is this weekend and typically what I hear from Shay now is "Daddy happy birthday get daddy balloons eat cake daddy birthday!" He usually manages to get his point across, but sometimes we have to resort to pantomime to understand each other. He picks up words here and there that I had no idea he knew. Like his cute little voice saying "Oh, shoot!" when he drops his toy or spills his snack.

I did our taxes wrong (stupid Turbotax) and we ended up overpaying by about $350. In my mind right now I'm trying to rationalize whether I should file an amendment and get the money, but risk red-flagging our file and having a possible audit. I really don't want to do that, so I think I'm just going to let the money go and chalk it up to a learning experience. Sometimes I'm such a wuss.

The Summer of Sequels is upon us and there are many that I want to go see. The problem is that I'm spoiled and I don't want to go to a theater to see them. I hate the price, the lines, the wait, the chairs, the other people, the time away from home, the babysitter scheduling, the noisiness of the sound system... It might just be hormones, but I'm disenchanted with the whole movie-going experience. What was once a fun outing has become a tiresome chore. Plus, no matter whether I visit the restroom before the show or not I always seem to have to go at the most inopportune times. Dang tiny bladder and giant baby. So Harry Potter is definitely on my list, and probably Pirates of the Caribbean, but I'm not so sure about the others. I'm happy seeing Spiderman, Shrek, and Oceans 13 at home. And probably some of the other ones I can't remember right now.

Hey, I never said I was thinking about interesting things, just that I was thinking about things.

Blogger has been giving me problems. Even Dinomight doesn't know how to fix them. I'll keep trying to post, though. I've got several saved...