I just didn't have it in me to blog last week. I don't think anything spectacular happened so I didn't stress too much. Hope my adoring readership was able to get through the lapse.

This past week we had lots of company. Kathleen and her boys came up to spend Tuesday and Wednesday with us. We had a lot of fun with them, and Kathleen showed me how to make the yummiest whole wheat bread. I really want a Kitchenaid. Anyone feeling particularly generous? Anyone?

Kim and Jasmine came up Thursday afternoon to help celebrate Sydney's 5th birthday. Syd got her crown at preschool that day as well as a goodie bag from her awesome teacher. We had a cake with family that night.






On Friday, Sydney had her friend birthday party. I decided to be a bit more adventurous than usual this year and make a dinosaur cake for the party. Sydney is really into dinosaurs. When I saw this cake in the March Family Fun magazine, I knew I had to make it for her. The "dirt" on top is supposed to be made out of chocolate graham crakers, but I couldn't find any. I checked several stores with no luck. Sydney was impressed anyway and asks to see this picture. Guess I did all right.


Tansy told me she wanted to go potty yesterday. I told her that she wears a diaper. She said, "Di-pah off," and started pulling her pants down. She got the stool herself, and insisted that I put her on the potty. She is actually pretending to wipe herself here. Of course nothing happened, but she was so serious about it. Hope this girl doesn't think we are doing this any time soon. Hang in there, baby!

I've been trying to get a shot of Zack's teeth, but he isn't cooperating. I could show you some lovely shots of his tongue though.

And let's not forget the most important news of all. Ben's last day of class was Friday. He will be done with finals tomorrow! It's almost here. In six short days, he will graduate and commission with the Air Force. Oh, the places we'll go!

Happy Easter! It has been a fun day for us. The girls colored their eggs last night, then woke up this morning to find that the Easter Bunny had hidden them in the living room for a fun egg hunt. They also looked very cute in their new dresses, but I didn't get a shot of that.

Yesterday we took the girls to have their portraits taken. So glad that is over. Don't get me wrong. We actually got smiles this year. The problem was keeping the girls portrait ready. Especially Sydney. On Friday, she really wanted me to help her put on some nail polish. I agreed, but then she picked out five bright colors and wanted all five colors on each hand. I finally talked her into clear nail polish like Junie B. Jones.

Crisis averted, right? I thought so until about five minutes before we were supposed to go. That's when I noticed that she still had a large temporary tattoo on the back of her right hand. I quickly located the baby oil and took care of that.

Tansy looked way too much like a boy for me, so I had her wear a head band and repeatedly told her how pretty it looked so she would leave it in. She decided that the position needed constant adjustment and got looking pretty weird while we waited. I adjusted it right before we went back and decided to have her go first before she could mess with it again. No dice. She wouldn't let go of me. Sydney is not usually very cooperative either, but when Ben asked her to show Tansy how to do it, she went into some kind of "model mode." She was doing all of the poses the photographer asked her to. If we could get her to smile naturally, that would also help. Tansy watched and mimicked her from the side. Sydney even came up with her own pose that she wanted a picture of. So funny. Tansy was good for about three shots after that, which was good enough for us.

Last night, Sydney had a nightmare and fell out of bed. She cut herself right above her right eye, and it's a bit swollen. So glad she didn't do that before pictures!

In Zack's efforts to gain forward mobility, he has finally learned to roll over. Poor little guy. It makes him so mad because it is not even close to what is trying to do.

And I can't forget the funniest thing. We got The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything from Netflix this week. If you are not aware, this is a VeggieTales movie. Sydney has watched it a few times, and yesterday she said to me, "Mom, do you know who is my favorite in The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything?"

"Who?" I asked.

"Alexander," she said with a shy smile.

"Is that because he's handsome?"

"Yeah, and I really like his hair."

What? Her first crush is on an animated vegetable. At least he's one of the good guys.

These are just random pictures I took of the kids one day. Sydney couldn't stop talking long enough to get a decent one. I wonder how she ended up like that?

No news yet on our orders. The paperwork has gone to Hill AFB, but we are still waiting for approvals, and Ben has to do at least one more interview. They are trying to push everything along as quickly as possible, and I am trying not to revert back to my awful nail-biting habit.

My birthday was last week, and I am officially 30. I got to go shopping all by myself. So quick and efficient. I got a license plate cover that says "Air Force Wife," Peter Breinholt's "All the Color Green" CD, and Writing Magic by Gail Carson Levine. It was a lot of fun, and the kids were so good that day. Of course, there was a ridiculously chocolatey cake involved as well.

Zack broke his first tooth on my birthday. Very exciting! I guess Sydney really was an abnormal case. Sydney almost made it to her first birthday toothless. Tansy and Zack both came in at eight months.

On Monday, Tansy got to have a birthday party with the Abshire side of the family. She actually stayed really clean while eating her chocolate cake. Shocking. I let her choose her own cake at Walmart. She was pretty impressed with that. Sydney kept trying to get her to choose a white cake, but Tansy would not be swayed.

I had to snap a picture for St. Patrick's Day. Yes, we all wore green, but we skipped the green pancakes this year since Ben had an early class. The girls got green milk with breakfast instead. Tansy was really not sure about that. However, you will notice her trying so hard to copy what Sydney is doing with her hands. She is Sydney's little parrot. I'm so glad for two little girls who play so well together. Zack just tries to stay out of the way because the girls play a little rough with him.

On Wednesday, Ben left for Wyoming for an ROTC base visit. Just me and the kids until Saturday afternoon. It went surprisingly well, except for Sydney's cold. Ben even took some pictures of base housing they visited so I could get an idea. It was so nice. I'm so excited to move into a house!

The "big girl bed" is working out great for Tansy. She loves that she can get in and out of it by herself, and I love it too. She always seems to wake up when I'm in the middle of something, usually feeding Zack. I often find books or toys in with her at naptime. I'm glad I skipped the talk about not getting out of bed. It never occurred to her to just get back out until yesterday.

This is Sydney being "bookalicious." Her word. She wanted a picture, and she is modeling her preschool shirt that she had worn that day for a field trip. They went to the Willow Park Zoo Education Center. They learned about a lot of animals and got to touch a snake and a lizard. This is how we discovered that Sydney is allergic to reptiles. Twenty minutes after getting home, she was covered in hives. Poor girl. Good thing we always have Benadryl on hand here.

Ben had Spring Break this past week. Such a nice break. However, the weather didn't get the message about the "spring" part. On Monday we got a foot of snow. That's Cache Valley for you. Ben got to sleep in and recuperate from the crazy semester he is in right now. Only six more weeks to go.

In preparation for our move, we decided to return my sister's crib. We borrowed it since Tansy wasn't big enough for a toddler bed when Zack was born. She was just too short to climb up, which really defeats the whole purpose. Tansy had a great time helping Daddy take it apart.

We had a bit of crisis, though, when we got one crib disassembled, moved the other into Zack's room, and then realized we had no idea where the hardware for the toddler bed was. Ben discovered it under a box on a shelf in the closet of Zack's room. That was totally me, since Ben would never do something like that. We got the bed put together right before we left for Orem for some family fun.

We stopped by Hill AFB on the way to my parents' house to get a couple more things for Ben's uniforms. Sydney was so excited to see so many people in uniform.

On Thursday, Ben and I took Sydney to lunch and to the Draper Temple Open House. She was so excited to go inside a temple. She kept asking when we were going to get to the room where you get married. That's the last stop. She really loved the Celestial Room.

On Friday, we went to the dinosaur museum at Thanksgiving Point. Sydney is really into dinosaurs right now, and she loved it. The kids were so exhausted by the time we were done. The pictures are of Tansy in the
Erosion Room and Sydney digging out a dinosaur skeleton in the sand box at the end of things.

Friday night, we had a birthday party for Tansy and me. Tansy turned two on Saturday, and I will be (gulp!) thirty on the 28th. Ben has promised adventure and excitement for the big day. He actually picked up a gift for me at the Shopette at Hill AFB when we were there on Wednesday. It's a license plate cover for my van that says that I am an Air Force Wife! I love it.

No orders yet, so the moving plans are kind of on hold, but I'll keep everyone posted when I know anything.

To clear up the situation from my last email, here's the update. I left some treats on my neighbor's doorstep with a note hoping to clear things up. She stopped by our apartment and told me that she didn't even really know what happened and wouldn't have if the police hadn't come to her apartment. She apologized for her friend's behavior and said she was glad that it wasn't going to cause a problem with us. She also said he isn't coming back.

Moving on to real news, we got our dates from the Air Force this week! We are to report to Whiteman AFB in Missouri by May 21. However, dates only mean that the detachment can begin processing orders. We need orders to get on the housing list and set up lodging at bases along our way. They won't be done for a couple more weeks. Sigh.

My sister Kari and kindly agreed to come with us to help with the kids on the move. We have two cars that we have to drive out there, so having an extra pair of hands is vital.


I buzzed Zack's hair again this week. I took off an inch and a half! I didn't get the gasps at church that I expected. When I buzzed it when he was 2 months old, you wouldn't believe the horror. It's not like I use a razor, people.

His hair was so puffy and would get so messed up. I could put barrettes in it, for goodness sake. He looks much more manly now. If only we could get Tansy to grow an insane amount of hair. Sigh, wishful thinking.

So, I didn't post last week since we were at my parents' house for my mom's birthday. I also don't think I have any pictures. I'll try to do better this week.

The most exciting thing that has happened to us lately is that Ben and I had the opportunity to file our first police report. This is a crazy story. We have had a consistent problem with parking in front of our building all winter. The main problem finally moved last week and we thought we were done with it. However, another vehicle that we didn't recognize started taking up a spot. After two days of this, we still hadn't seen who the driver was to talk to them. Thinking that it was a visitor since it had out of town plates, we decided to leave a note on the windshield, which read, "This parking is for residents of building E. Only one spot per unit. Please move your vehicle to the uncovered visitor parking." Ben put the note on the car at 7:15 a.m. When he left for class at 8:45, it was on our door step and the car hadn't moved.

Later that morning, the office manager called and I asked her about the car. She said she would knock on doors and find out who it belonged to. She called later and said that she didn't have any luck, but that she left a note on the windshield. I looked out the window and told her there was no note, but that I had heard someone coming in and out of the apartment next door although the tenant was at work. While we were on the phone, a guy came out of the apartment, got something out of the car and went back upstairs.

A little later, I came out with the kids to take Sydney to preschool. I saw the manager's note torn up and thrown on the ground in front of this car. I quickly loaded the kids in the van and locked the doors while I buckled them in. I felt that if this guy was getting so bent out of shape about moving his vehicle that I didn't want to be anywhere near him. After dropping off Sydney at preschool, I sat in front of the office for half an hour waiting for Ben to come home so I wouldn't be stuck on the stairs with my two sleeping babies if he came out to confront me. The office manager came back from lunch, and I explained the situation to her. The tenant had come home, so she went in to call her. However, they were watching from the window and the tenant called as soon as the manager walked in. The tenant drove to the office as Ben was coming home, so I followed him and parked the van.

Sure enough, as soon as we got out of the cars, this guy comes outside and starts getting into it with Ben. We took the kids inside just before he got in Ben's face and started threatening to hurt him and our family. When I saw this guy come within a couple of inches of Ben, I frantically called the office manager and told her what was going on. It didn't get physical and the guy drove away, but I was really rattled.

We spent the afternoon looking for different housing options, but with the short time we would be here and the fact that Ben doesn't have a job until next month, we are stuck. I called the office manager to see if the guy was gone, and she asked us to file a police report about this. We headed to the police station and ended up talking to an officer who was in our ward a couple of years ago. This was good because I was afraid that any officer would think we were leaving stuff out since it was such an unreasonable reaction to our note. Having someone who knew what kind of people we are was nice.

The office manager was assured us that he has left for good, but she said that we should let her and the police know if he comes back. The officer said the same thing.

Basically, despite their assurances, I have spent all of my time locked in my apartment, watching out the window for him. It isn't fair and it isn't fun, but it is temporary. We will have our orders next month, which will mean an end in sight. At least we got a new experience out of it, right?