Afternoon At the Mall

Just from the title you may be wondering just exactly what I have to tell you. Truth of the matter is I just returned from taking my five perfect children to the mall where we went to JCPenney Portrait Studio. We have a membership there where if purchased you don't have to pay sitting fees for two years. The price of the membership is about $30.00, so for how often I go I get my $30.00 back in one sitting with three kids getting their photos taken.

Things were going great at home, all the kids had been freshly showered or bathed. So we didn't have any dirty feet or faces, all the hair was nicely combed and they were all dressed and we left in time to get their right before the appointment time. Although when we parked the car and four of my children had jumped out and ready to go in, I was starting to unbuckle the baby to place him in the stroller ---- " Where's the diaper bag?" I asked. This was an important object for me to not be without, because it had the coupons to get portrait sheets at $3.99 a piece and I had done an online survey with a $3.00 off coupon and my membership card to waive the sitting fee was in it also. Not to mention all the necessities to keep the baby happy and fed. I do nurse my baby but occasionally like today when I'll be away from home in a store by myself with five kids I like to have a bottle on hand too!! And so I knew the little guy was about to get quite fussy if I didn't feed him soon. So I told all the kids to get back in the car upon which I hear lots of mumblings and I don't wannas. They eventually sat down buckled back up and we left the parking lot to head for our home which is less than a mile away. I call the studio on my cell phone and let them know I had to head right back home to get all these things I had left.

I get home and start panicking when I can't find my diaper bag where I thought I'd laid it down, which would have been in the kitchen on one of the chairs. I glance toward my living room and didn't see it there I walk to my bedroom and whew, I see it. Pick it up and go out the door back to the van. (Because I drive one, 2003 Chevy Venture that is White) We drive back to the mall after waiting to get on the main 'drag' that goes over to the mall for about 7 minutes. I was facing west trying to make a left at an intersection with only two stop signs, which happened to be the direction I was stopped at.

Why is it when I'm in a hurry and normally it would take 5 minutes to get to the mall this time it took like 15 minutes. AAGGH .

So we park the car again all the kids jump out I get the stroller out and set it up and then proceed to unbuckle the little guy and notice that he was asleep. So I pick up the stroller and collapse it down and just shove it in the front of the van so I don't have to open the rear hatch again. So I take out the carseat and carry him in like that. We get to the studio which at the moment was so crowded with people that were either waiting to pick up a picture or waiting to pay for their session.

I fill out their form that asks for name, address, membership number and who under 18 will be photographed. My kids are behaving somewhat okay, the baby is still asleep, and I'm thinking this isn't so bad. WHAM!! wake up--- Thomas my two year old just wants to run to the drinking fountain located at the front doors, so I had to chase him down a few times. Like literally -- I was running in the store to catch him, while he was laughing as hard as a kid while running away from mommy. I catch him and finally after waiting for about 5 - 10 minutes we were able to go in a get our portraits taken. I have 5 kids but only photographing 3 this go around, plus I was ready to pose with them individually so we could have some mommy and me pictures. By now I've completely lost track of the time -- don't know how long the actual session lasted it was probably only 30 - 45 minutes but seemed like an hour or two.

Since the studio has gone digital they like to "enhance" a bunch of the pictures and then they download them to the viewing screen where I can then take a look at them. So after the session is over we have to wait for at least another 10 -15 minutes for this to take place. So we're waiting the kids are getting anxious to leave no longer sitting still -- the two year old says " I want to go on the alligator" aka escalator. Finally I let my four children go to the escalator holding hands so they can "ride it". They were to go down from here walk around at the bottom and come back up. Well they did exactly what they were told and then some. They did this at least 2 times but maybe as many times as 5. So while they were doing this I was in the studio still and waiting for the download to happen, noticed the children hadn't come back yet and went to check on them. As I was walking to where they should have been but couldn't exactly see it yet, I heard my two year old down on the first floor, saw my son and youngest daughter running from the one side to the other to come back up. I heard my 8 year old running in her "shoes" ( The college students that lived next door moved out and were going to donate them to either the trash or DI and of course my girls had to grab them because they were cool, not their size and tons of colors on them. They come back up and I met them on the far side as they got to the top. My two year old starts running back to the other side while screaming "do it again, do it again!" I had my baby in my left arm facing forward and started running after my two year old. I grabbed his arm and he wasn't very happy, but by this time I wasn't either. We get back inside the studio and waited for a total of about 30 - 45 minutes at least just to see the pictures.

Well the time arrived that I coudl view our portraits on the computer screen, kids running around being loud -- and I just seemed to tune them out -- what could I possibly do ? Okay so yeah I should have had a helper with me to help corral them but I didn't. The baby is now back in his infant seat and strapped in while one of my daughters is feeding him a bottle he ate a total of 8 ounces really quickly it seemed. ( I guess it was quick compared to the time we had to wait.) I had a hard enough time trying to decide which portraits I wanted and what sizes. I finally figured things out but not too soon though. Paid for my purchase and picked up some of the baby that had come in, and then we were off!!

By now the kids are whining as loud as possible about how hungry they were and still driving me crazy!! We get to the car -- whew, I made it without killing anyone. Next time I go to do a group picture "daddy" will be present to help contain the kiddos. By the time I got to the car and saw what time it was we had been in the portrait studio for a little over two hours, but it seemed like I was there for at least a week!! And that was my afternoon at the mall.

Some educational websites for kids ...

I just happened to find a newsletter that I think all moms will like. Here's a link to the newsletter. You have to subscribe to get it, so take a look at it and see if it's something you'll like. More tomorrow. http://www.atozkidsstuff.com/aug207.html . My kids as you might already know have not started school yet, and were asking for some math worksheets, after doing a google search for a website where I could print off free math worksheets that were at their level I came across this website http://www.mathplayground.com/Math_Worksheets.html -- I printed off a few worksheets for my girls and they just ate them up, and enjoyed having some "homework" to do --- Now I can print of a few more for them to do tomorrow as a refresher before school starts, I wish that I had found this at the begining of the summer and would have had my kids doing these worksheets all summer long. I'll continue to use this site from now on. Just thought that I'd make you aware of this so that you and your kids might benefit from it also.

Caught without a burpcloth

Okay so why haven't I learned yet to carry like five (5) burp cloths around with me??

I was standing in line tonight at the picnic mentioned in the last entry and my husband was with my older kids letting them play on the playground. So he had the four older kids and I was by myself with my 4 month old. I left my diaper bag by our blanket which wasn't close by at all. I tend to hold my son in my left arm his tummy facing away from me. My arm started to feel wet and slimy. I looked over his shoulder and he had spit up down the front of his clothes and then all over my left hand and then onto my right arm. YUCK!!! I didn't have a burp cloth or a rag no blanket, no tissues, napkins or anything on me to wipe up this mess. Not wanting to lose my place in line, and not having any of my other family members close by, I'll be somewhat resourceful -- I reached down and wiped the spit off my hand and arm using the grass I was standing on. Even being a brand new mother of a fifth child and having what I would call some experience with babies you would think that by now I might be a pro at this and never forget to bring anything for the baby, that he might need.

When does school start ??

So tonight we went to a park here in Provo and did a potluck picnic with all the other families that also go to Freedom Academy in Provo, Utah. Along with the picnic was also the chance to meet the teachers of our children. Luckily we were able to meet all the teachers that will be teaching my three girls. This school is in the process of building a new building and is currently under construction. So many things have happened lately that I'm not sure if I should be irritated or just say "that's OK".

Here's the shortened condensed version:

PLANNED : First day of school scheduled for Tuesday Sept. 4th, 2007 at the new location.
ACTUAL : First day of school for my kids will now be Sept. 5th, 2007 at the old location.
WHY #1 The school has run into problems with getting the easement for power, from the city, to the school. So for now it has set back the move for at least two weeks.

WHY #2 The old location has been subleased to another charter school but now all of Freemdom Academy's students can not be at school at the same time. The other school will use all the classrooms upstairs and then Freedom will use the classrooms downstairs.

PLANNED: Start school on Sept. 4th and attend every day!!
ACTUAL : In order to accomodate all involved students in K-3 will go to school M, W, F and students in 4 - 8th grades will go T, TH, Saturday (8th) so by the end of the first two weeks every student will have put in 5 full days of school.

PLANNED: The last day of school is the Friday before Memorial Day.
ACTUAL : In order to get the right amount of time in we will extend the school year by one week at the end of the year.

-- So after the picnic in the park we drove by the construction site and have seen the progress, and it still looks like it is a long way from being done.

PLANNED: The big move from the old location to the new is scheduled for Sept. 15th or at least that weekend.
ACTUAL: TBA
This summer has been long and my children are now begging to go to school and I'm more than ready for them to go back. I believe that they have become bored, and are running out of ideas to keep them entertained and active.

One step at a time

Okay so I am taking this blogging thing one step at a time, and the more I play around with this blogging site and my myspace blog -- I'm starting to get the hang of it. It's amazing how when I was in my teen years -- I was up on the "lingo"
for the Internet, but now that I'm nearing 30 I have a really hard time
catching on to it. So I have to "Google" the words in order to find out
their definition. I'm sure that my kids will know more about the darn computer and Internet language than I will in just the near future. They already spend Internet time on www.barbie.com and absolutely love it. They are always checking out the backs of movies or food boxes just to see if there is a web address to type in and check out!! My girls are 8 and 7 and just soaking up what little time I'll give them on the Internet. My 7 year old has an educational binder that she started and gets on the Internet and looks up terms that relate to gaining more knowledge like learning things about the history of our country, the history of the state we live in (Utah) -- star constellations, pictures of planets, and outerspace. She's also looked up different countries and their flags.
So I'm glad she can use the internet to gain the knowledge that I used to have to look up in an Encyclopedia. A huge thank you to those that make this possible.

New to the blogging scene

I'm so trying to do this blogging thing, but it is going to be a slow learning process. But I think along the way I'll actually learn to do things I'm trying to figure out right now. So please give me time to learn this and then I'll get going like crazy.


I changed my font at pYzam.com