FREEDOM!!!! as said by william wallace

i can leave my house whenever i want now!! hooray for a second car!

baby abba star - the dancing queen

easter festivities

My sisters and their families came down on Saturday to celebrate Easter. Due to the rainy weather, we ended up doing the egg hunt inside and later dyed eggs.

As you can see, Livia had a blast:


On the other hand, Sam was quite bored:









We also celebrated April birthdays. Addison turned 9 yesterday on the 13th. Emmalynn will be 5 next Monday. And I will be 28 next week. At the last minute I realized I only had 2 candles... hence the lame excuse for the kids getting to blow out the candle, and myself only getting a lighter to blow out.

This is Sunday morning. In my family we have the tradition to hide the little chocolate eggs and then find them. Maybe next year, Sam will do a little more of the finding himself.




The search for the basket. In case you don't understand Sammish yet, "showie" is shovel.




Displaying the goods:



Livia in her first Easter Dress. (Sorry Jason, but this WILL be a yearly thing.)



I got a haircut a couple of months ago... I hated it.
So I got another haircut. And so far... I love it!

Our little biker babe:

Sammy enjoying Livia's Easter gift for her:

pure exhaustion

So the last post was recorded last night. We had been playing with friends all afternoon, so Sam didn't take a nap at all. He ate dinner ok, but it was obvious he was tired. And then he fell asleep sitting up at the table (as the video shows.)

We decided to let him take a cat nap on my lap, but when I realized just how exhausted he was, we just put him in his bed. (He started dozing off at the table before 6:30.) I was worried about him waking up really early, since he usually goes to bed at 8:00. But he didn't wake up until almost 6:30 this morning, so I thought he caught up on his sleep.

Today, I gave him some lunch, and then I went upstairs to change Livi's diaper. When I came back down about 5 minutes later, this is what I found:






Is it the chair?

must...have....sleep....zzzzz

guess who didn't get a nap.

fly away home

This poor little bird flew into our garage and kept trying to go through the closed window to get out. It was unsuccessful. So Jason had to help the little guy fly free.

feels like spring... well it did.

To enjoy the nice spring weather, we took a little walk to the park to eat our lunch.




Sam found a girlfriend. Then she found one too. So he just followed both of them wherever they went.


This would be Sam feeling a little dejected due to his recent break-up:

But Maggie had a blast!





Sam finally got over his heartache and had fun on the slide.




Later, daddy made it all better by starting to make a race car for our Cook family party next month.





Daddy: Sam, what are we doing? What's this? Huh?
Sammy: a car, daddy.
D: a car?
S: yeah.
D: yeah.
S: it's gonna be a race car.
D: is it gonna be fast?
S: yeah.
D: are we gonna win?
S: yeah.

a meal to die for

Mexican Chicken and Rice

4 frozen chicken breasts
2 cans cream of chicken soup
2 cups salsa
3 cups minute rice

Combine first 3 ingredients in crock pot. Cook on low for 8 hours. Shred chicken with two forks. Stir in rice and replace cover. Let sit for 5 minutes.
Eat with tortillas, sour cream, cheese, guacamole, etc.



Sounds yummy. Well, it is. And it's so easy. (You do need to start it in the morning though.)

That's what I planned for dinner tonight. Really easy, no need to stress about dinner at about 5:00 like I usually do. But...

Then my crock pot committed what I can only assume was suicide.

Poor Sam, how crazy that must have been for him, since he was standing on a stool right next to it. He probably could've touched it had he decided to test his mommy's patience. (Not my Sam!)

Nope, it just did it. It threw itself off the counter, leaping to its death by tile. Quite traumatic for all involved really. I had my back turned doing the dishes, I didn't have a chance to talk some sense into it, or to coax it into staying alive for at least another 6 1/2 hours.

Now it's just gone. Little bits of the pot were just helplessly scattered about the kitchen. I'm sure Thomas and Friends were just as startled and surprised as Sam and me.



No Mexican Chicken and Rice for the Cooks tonight.



I considered seeing if I would just be able to replace the pot. So I tenderly and sympathetically picked up the heating part, and as I was cleaning off some cream of chicken and salsa on it's edge....

It jumped again!!



This jump seemed to do the remainder of it in as its frame was partly crushed in.

As I picked it up again, I whispered, "Rest in peace little friend. You have served me well. Now go... go and rest in peace."

Then, it died in my arms. And I slowly brushed away the tear that was rolling down my cheek.

mail call

why is it that a dog gets better stuff in the mail than me?

Happiness is... being a Sammy

Sometimes we ask Sammy, "Are you a boy?" His response:




(No, I a Sammy.)

Isn't it funny that anything can be a road, or tracks, or both?


or a horse, for that matter!

This is a typical Sammy prayer:



(the 'ding bell' was a voice mail alert on Jason's phone)




(as quoted in an earlier post)

Shark Grooving

All my life, I have heard songs on the radio or some other random place and I think to myself, if I ever make a mixed CD for myself... I want this song on it.

Well, now I have it! And the beautiful thing is... when I find another song I want to add to it... I just do it! The only catch... it's on the computer. But since I pretty much never leave my house... I'm set!



Jason introduced this great site to me. It's called Grooveshark. (listen.grooveshark.com)
You can create different playlists for your different moods. (So far my playlists are church, fun stuff for Sam, and my faves.)

Any ways, it's super great since it has a massive selection of songs. Just this morning I remembered a tape my family used to listen to in the car by Raffi. And they had most of his songs. (I couldn't find Biscuits in the Oven though, so that made me sad.) But type in any song name, or singer, or album/soundtrack, and you have lots of options to choose from.

So, basically I love it! I can listen to exactly the songs I want to!!
Check it out and create your very own huge-as-you-want-it-to-be mixed 'CD' for your very own... and for very FREE!

So come... and groove some sharks with me.

the fooling continues

Apparently Nature thinks its April Fool's Joke is pretty funny... and I thought it was almost spring. Guess I'm the fool!

Hopefully this is the last snowman of the season.


It's a pretty hefty snowman too! And this snow was all just from this morning.


It wouldn't be daddy-son time if there wasn't a sword involved...




Livi was content to stay inside with mommy and just watch from the window.