For a very long time, I have wanted to sign up for cooking classes. I finally signed up for a couple at the Laguna Culinary Arts Academy, and am hooked. I went for the first time last night and spent over three hours in total bliss. I know everyone always says that they love food…but I really LOVE food. I love to see what ingredients work well together, what methods are used, and what a professional vs. the home cook uses. Last night I learned all about meats and sauces, and I am signed up for pasta sauces in a few weeks. Very fun!
Scout Kei Denison has grown almost a complete pound in a week and a half. I took him in for his 4 month check up and he weighed 14ibs 9oz. Yesterday I took him in because he had a rash and weird bumps on him and he has been acting really funny lately. First off, he has been fussy and does these low gurgle/screams like he is furious which he never has done before. Second, he has been constipated instead of his totally regular self. Lastly, he has been so ridiculously hungry that I feel faint throughout the day if I don’t eat pretty often.
The doctor explained that it was nothing serious, and to keep an eye on certain things to see if they get worse. He also explained that the binging was due to him growing so much in the past weeks. This morning, Micah and I were playing Scrabble -or should I say I was creaming him in Scrabble- and Scout was with us making these low toned screams again. Micah was holding him (in his usual way - like a football), and walked over to the TV. On his way I saw out of the corner of my eye something that resembled a waterfall. Let’s just say that four days of food ended up on the slate floor. Micah yelled…GET SOMETHING! So I did…I ran for the video camera! Needless to say, we have one happy and unconstipated little boy on our hands again!
I am SO bummed that Calin and Skylar are starting up school again. We have literally had the funnest summer together. On top of the fact that my “nannies” are gone, I will also miss my little sidekicks. Bummer!
If you recall, I had a “mystery woman” who stole all of my Iwako Erasers recently. Well, by careful retraction of events and stealth private investigation, I discovered it was Calin - my stinkpot niece. She would never admit to it, until about two weeks ago, she casually mentioned, “Lindsey, you are SO boring now that you have a kid. You haven’t even done anything about our war.” So it is her! My simple response was, “I am just waiting untilo you least expect it.” She said, “yeah right” and had no faith in what I am capable of.
I had the plan long ago, but it wasn’t until today I got to put my plan into action! So on Calin’s first day of seventh grade, with her new Marc Jacobs bag on her shoulder….people are going to start whispering. They are going to wonder if she forgot to shower or something….but then they are going to think something even worse may have happened, like she was REALLY nervous for her first day! She might even wonder herself, what is going on. But when she goes to grab her first pencil of the day….she is going to see that she shouldn’t mess with me….and that War Stinks! Thanks for providing the diaper Scout!
We had a fun day of family and swimming. Scout loved the water, but was totally wiped out by the end of the day.
I guess when you have a little sister that always tries to be like you, it gets to you sometimes! But this time, she has really gotten to me!
Tristen’s new thing is that whenever she comes over to our house when the baby is not awake, she just “checks” on him, and then he is magically awake! Funny thing is that after four months, Micah finally set up our baby monitors, so I know exactly what is going on in the baby’s room.
This morning, Tristen came over about 45 minutes after putting Scout down for his long morning nap. Against my wishes, she “checked” on him. I curiously and anxiously listened by the monitor to hear the door slowly creak open. Then what she thought were delicate footsteps over to the crib. A few little taps on the bare back…and then a surprised HUH! She spotted the monitor and knew she was caught red handed. She tried to play it off, like she knew I was listening all along and whispered “MAMA” in the monitor so I could hear. Then I hear Scout’s mobile playing “By The Sea”, as I irritatingly head over to the room. When I get there, she quickly says, “he was already awake”. I think NOT, as I see the sweetest little swollen eyes opened about half way. He looks up at me and then puts his head down again. Then Tristen says…”Whoops!”
I told her she is his caretaker for the next two hours, and then this is what I found………………..
(Notice he doesn’t like it!!!)
The final looks….
His dad is going to kill her! And my mom just says that we will make beautiful girls!
(P.S. - Megan just called and asked what was going on. We told her the above story, to which she replied, “Funny you mention that. Last night we were looking through the baby videos, and Lindsey…your kids are dead. You were the meanest aunt. You were always making our kids eat gross stuff and when Chloe just started walking, you were yelling…trip her, trip her!” –Well times have changed Megan, and I am much nicer now!)
(P.S.S. - I told Tristen to clean it all off, and she hesitantly reported that it will all come off in the pool….except maybe the lipstick. Apparently she couldn’t find a dark enough color in the regular type of listick….so she moved onto the permanent stuff.) -Don’t worry crowd - I have the remover!
Every fall brings many things…..beautiful leaves, cooler weather, and unfortunately many Saturdays filled with endless football! Here is father and son watching the UCLA game. I secretly think that Micah hopes Scout plays for UCLA like he did! Notice the UCLA colors on Scout.
I got up at 4:45 am. We headed to Los Angeles around 6:15 and didn’t have very much traffic. We stopped for breakfast and got to the studio early — a whopping 5 minutes early which is amazing for my family. When we got there, all of the other families looked nice — already dressed and ready to go. On the other hand, our family was still in sweats and grubbies (except the always ready-to-go Trilby). To my mom’s disgust, we dressed out on the street with Scout’s baby blanket covering us.
When we got in, my mom and the kids were sent to a “green room”, and we had a “rehearsal” to give the producers an idea of our energy level that morning. They also went over all of the rules and a little strategy. One thing they said that hit home was that when we picked the two people for the fast round, don’t just pick people because they want to be picked…pick the best people. (This was an interesting piece of strategy that any lame rod would know, but for our family’s benefit, we were all glad that Tristen heard it.) After that comment, and while Brook, Megan, Trilby and I were giving secret thumbs up signals, Tristen said, “I don’t care what they say, I am going up.”
I am proud to say that our family was the first to be picked for the show! Our first show went pretty well. John O’Hurley loved our family and so did the producers. They said we make great TV, and that was evident when Tristen introduced us all. She said, “Hi, I am Tristen, blah,blah,blah….this is my ‘bossy’ sister Lindsey, my ’single’ sister Trilby, my ‘nicest’ sister Megan, and my ‘littlest’ brother Brook.” Then she told the host how good looking he is and he kissed her hand. Not wanting to be the “not kissed” sister, I crossed my hand over Tristen and had him kiss my hand too. I guess my family is what I know, so it isn’t unusual, but apparently our family is a bunch of “hams”. In fact, the casting director came by and told us we were making her look good. Our game was pretty competitive, and it literally came down to the last question…and thank goodness for Brook - we stole the round and ended up getting to the fast round.
Of course Tristen went first. She did OK, but got really flustered on one answer so she passed. Her excuse — “I kept thinking of Mormon answers!” The question was ”Name something a family should do together.” Her answer was going to be family home evening, but she knew it wasn’t going to be up there and got flustered. At the end, John O’Hurley announced that she ended up with 83 points. She then told him, “my bossy sister is going to KILL me when she gets out here!” I did — going first, she should have at least gotten us half of the points. In fact, because she has all of the opportunities to get the #1 answers, she should have well into the 125 point range. Luckily when I went out, I was really focused and calm. When they were turning over my answers, there was one left to turn over. I needed 29 points to win, and Tristen had already given the number one answer that had 48 points attached to it. So if you do the math, I really needed to give the #2 answer that had a lot of the rest of the points. It was tight, and when my answer flipped over, by the skin of our teeth, 33 points gave us the W-I-N!
We had a great day, topped off by shopping in L.A. and a great dinner. Too bad the second show didn’t go as smoothly, but the producer said to stay tuned because they want to have us back for the “tournament of champions!” Sounds great if Brook and I do the fast round!
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