Crazy, Beautiful

So... April, huh?

Well, the biggest occurance of that lovely month (in my opinion) was Truman's first birthday. His cousin Bryar was born just 9 days after Truman, so my brother and I decided to combine the two birthdays into one large party. It was a really sweet day, weather was gorgeous, babies were cute as all hell, a lot of family and friends turned out. My mom made an extremely girled-out butterfly cake for Bryar, which was wicked cute, and I made a rad little turtle cake for Truman. Two turtle cakes actually, a large one for the family on behalf of the boy, and a little one rollin' along in a tiny Radio Flyer wagon for the man-of-the-hour himself. They loved it of course. Truman dug right in two-fisting that sucker and stuffing his face. Bryar went about it with two delicate little fingers, trying to keep her finger nails and clothing as clean as possible. Like I said, wicked cute.

Then of course, April brought the final of 3 temporary custody hearings in my attempt to acquire full residential and legal custody of my two little boys. (I have had full custody of them from the moment they were each born, I've been just been trying to get things in legal documentation!) So, the hearing sucked. The judge we were assigned to refused to hear the case whatsoever. She read her case notes from the previous Judge and decided to force my boys and I to move back to Oregon within ten days of the hearing, so that the boys would be closer to a father who refused to see them, call them, contact them or support them in any way for the previous 12 months. We were literally in and out of that court room within 7 minutes. Not a word was allowed to be spoken on behalf of either party. Just a complete stranger's snap decision that heftily altered the futures of two innocent little boys. Righteous, gotta love this legal system.

Elliot flew down from Oregon a few days later to stay one night with us and help me drive back to Portland. We loaded up a Uhaul trailer with the necessities of our possessions, kept the boys awake all day to ensure a solid ten hours of sleep that night in the car, and had the family over for one last dinner and goodbye hoorah. We were loaded up and waving to our family around 7 p.m., and arrived in Portland around 9 a.m. the next day. Elliot did every mile of driving himself. At one point in Idaho, early in the wee hours of the morning, Truman woke up with a mild fever and we were stumped in our search for infants tylenol by closed grocers statewide. We found a safeway with inner lights still ablaze and pulled in to the parking lot. We were intercepted halfway to the doors by a sweet old gentleman who informed us that the store was in fact closed but being remodeled, which explained the lights. When we asked him for a recommendation on where to find the tylenol, he asked us to please wait for a moment, and returned minutes later with a bottle of infant's tylenol which he had purchased from inside the closed grocery store, and happily refused any sort of compensation. I wish I could remember his name but I will never forget his face, or his sweet smile of genuine care for an ailing baby. It was such an awesome gesture. Truman had a comfortable, fever-free sleep for the remainder of the trip, thanks to that sweet man.

As I said before, crazy move... beautiful drive!

Say what?!

Hmmm... How long has it been? I'm not going to jump in to everything all at once because, frankly, that would be damn exhausting. So instead, I'll just list off the major key points that have impacted my world in the last few months, and touch on each one individually at a later time... Here we go:

April:

Truman turned one!

Went to Oregon for the last of my temporary custody hearings

Moved to Oregon (crazy move, fun damn drive)

May:

Got engaged! (and shortly there after, unengaged!)

Started new Job in Oregon

Went to my first Kills show

Reconnected with a lot of old friends (which has really been beautiful!)

June:

Dang, what the crap happened in June?

July:

Happy Fourth, Holmes!

Rylan's first birthday

Final Permanent Custody Hearing! (We won, d-bag can suck it!)

Mom came to visit

August:

David's 23rd birthday

Reconnected with some more old friends (so much fun)

Corey and Andrea got married!

Found a live-in nanny (she's rad)

Mom's new company opened it's doors (Itsadogthingshop.com, Check it Magooch!)

September:

FISHER'S 3rd BIRTHDAY (boo. and Hooray!)

Happy Labor day to you

*Most definitely there are things missing from this sad little list, but, I shall recall them and bore you to tears with their insignificant details! Oh! I just remembered... a GREAT many wonderful books! Now there is a list worth getting excited over!!

Caterpillar Sandwiches

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TRUMAN!!!

For his birthday, we thought eating bugs would be fun!!

Turns out, eating bugs really IS fun!

We made us some caterpillar sandwiches, with ham to make 'em look fleshy!

They were pretty tasty, and fun to look at. The grown ups had a harder time eating the poor little buggers than the children did... it was weird for Paps to bite off the head of a cute little dude just minding his own business on Paps' plate!

Fisher thought plucking off the eyes and saying "HA! Sucker! I've got your eyes, haha!" was the highlight of his evening. We had a blast! Normally I would use spinach tortillas, not wheat, so that the buggy fellas are green, which is just much cooler, but I couldn't find them and didn't want to store-hop in search of them. Oh well though, these guys were cool!

Octopus Pasta

Fisher wanted to help me make lunch today, so we decided to do something fun. We made "crazy pasta" (4 types of pasta together) with alfredo sauce, and cut up a hot dog, gave him mustard eyes and sat him up on the noodles. I was thinking next time I'll put a few goldfish crackers on the side here and there so that the octopus has a few ocean buddies to hang out with. Fisher loved it, he thought it was awesome to have a creature on his lunch, and cracked up when he bit off the octopus' head!  Fun meals rule, baby!

Practice Turtle, the Cake

Truman, my little boog, is having a birth anniverary soon!! He loves turtles, was a turtle for halloween last year, and makes a face pretty regularly that resembles a turtle, so I thought, What the heck, lets do a turtle cake!!  This is Practice Turtle, he's cool. His face and limbs are weird, and his shell is the same color as the grass, and his shell pattern is extremely not symmetrical, but he's alright! I made him out of red velvet cake and the grass he's standing in is green banana cake with a green coconut flake coating to look more like grass. He's hanging with some bugs, they're cool too, but they don't have names.  I'll post photos of Birthday Turtle after the big day, he's not even a real guy yet and he's already cooler than Practice Turtle, he's even got a pretty sweet ride! Anyhow, this dude was fun to make and I'm going to take him to work with me today so that the ladies there can have fun eating him. Thanks Practice Turtle, you've been lovely!

"we're going backwards"

Fisher and I ran to the grocery store together today. As I pulled into the the parking lot, this is the conversation that I had with Fisher:

Fisher:  "no mama, not this way!"

me: "We have to go this way, this is the way to the store"

Fisher:  "no mama, we can't go backwards"

me: "we're not going backwards baby, we're going forward"

Fisher:  "mama! I can't go forehead!"

And then I laughed so hard that I nearly peed in my pants.

Tag... you're it!

STEP 1: Respond and rework. Answer the following questions on my blog, replacing one question that I dislike with a question of my own invention.

STEP 2: Add one more question of my own.

STEP 3: Tag eight other bloggers.



1) What is your favorite day of the week?

The one that ends with a Y

2) What is your biggest fear?

Being unable to protect my children

3) What was your worst subject in school?

Math

4) Who did you hug last?

Fisher and Truman - pre-nap group hugs rock

5) What websites do you visit when you go online?

Facebook, Zephyr Style, California Baby

6) What was the last item that you bought?

Devastator

7) If you could go anywhere in the world, where would you go?

New Zealand

8) What is your favorite book?

A walk in the woods (right now)

9) What was the longest car ride you ever took?

8 people crammed in a station wagon from bountiful Utah to L.A. California

10) What was the last movie you watched?

Australia (One of the baddest ass movies ever made!)

11) If you had a whole day to yourself with no work, commitments, or interruptions, what would you do?

Play in the mud with the boys and not care about the mess until tomorrow

12) If you were to win the Powerball, what would you do with the money (besides invest it)?

College funds, move to New Zealand!! Buy a house for nana.

13)If you could pick the single most pivotal moment in your life, what would it be, and why?

The day I found the courage to leave a bad situation and protect my children no matter what bumps in the road i came accross, because life since has been the sweetest ride imaginable

14) Who is the person that has had the most influence in your life?

My boys. Without a doubt My boys!

15) If you had a choice of places to live, where would it be?

New Zealand! Have I not made that clear?

16)What's an item on your property you can't live without?

Water

17) If you were stranded on a deserted island, and got one luxury item to take with you, and one person to take with you, what and who would it be? 

My little family (that counts right)!! And a water purification system

18) What is one thing you would change about your life?

I would have finished college and gotten my degree before I was 21

19)If you could only hear one musical artist for the rest of your life, who would it be?

Fats Domino or Frank Sinatra

OK, I now tag:

1. Sarah
2. Katherine
3. Momica
4. Amanda

5. J and J

6. Zephyr

7. the other Sarah (yes that's you)

8. Hillary

castaways

Just a moment ago Fisher was playing in the family room and Truman and I were watching him. He was pretending to be on an island, all by himself, building a hut. Fisher walked over to Truman, put his little hand on his brothers face and said "Truman, do you wanna be a castaway wif me? Wanna be a castaway Chip? Okay."  It was awesome.

missing pieces

It has been a few weeks since my last update and a few important things have happened.  

First, Truman experienced, and loved, his very first Christmas! We got to have my little sisters here with us for the first time on Christmas eve overnight. It was so much fun to have them, and to see the boys on Christmas together. Santa brought Fisher and Truman each a new Radio Flyer bike and an Art Easel with supplies to share for their playroom.  Yaya and Paps spoiled us all and we had a wonderful holiday. Fisher even learned to share with others and to be responsible with his money. He bought all of his own Christmas presents for his cousins and Grandparents with his own money that he has been saving over the last year. He decided, after having the concept explained to him, to buy a book from Barnes and Noble to be donated to a child with less fortunes than himself. It was very sweet watching him pick out just the right book! He also decided to adopt an angel tree baby and, again with his own money, bought a new package of diapers and gave some of his own clothes that he has grown out of.  He loved to share and was very proud of himself, as was I!  

Second, thanks to my families' generous Christmas and birthday contributions, I got to start work on my family tree tattoo, which I am very excited about! I can't wait to immortalize my family in this beautiful piece of art, the design of which I owe a lot to my big sister, Sarah.

Next, my children's safety and future has again been threatened by their biological father, a matter which we are trying to rectify as best we can. Sarah, Matt, David, mom and Paps have been very supportive and helpful through all of this.  Mom, paps and David, who we live with and closest to, take the boys' safety very seriously and monitor every aspect of vulnerability with extreme caution.  No children have ever been better protected or more loved than these two perfect little boys!  Sarah has spent a lot of time researching information and resources that are helpful to our situation. Also, when we lived with her, she and Matt protected them every bit as vigilantly as our family here at home in Utah do. Again, these boys are very blessed with caring family who want the best for them. I just wanted to take this opportunity to thank everyone for looking out for my children! 2008 was a VERY scary year, and the terror is far from over. But through it all, my children have known an endless love from so many, an endless supply of support and care. They haven't had to experience our continuing fear or stress because these people have protected them from it all while loving them unconditionally. Thank you for taking care of us! We are hoping for a safe end to this nightmare before another year has passed us by, and we owe that hope to Sarah, Matt, David, Mom and Papoo. Thank you, we love you!