I'll be back.

Christine is hosting Z sisters this week, in case you were wondering.  You're welcome to catch a glimpse over there.  I promise I'll be back here soonish with a more comprehensive update.  I honestly feel like I need to move back to Korea, or keep my kids home from school more often.  There isn't much to tell.  I know you don't just want to hear about where Darin and I went out to eat TWICE last week.  Surely there is more to life than that.  

Maybe.  

I don't know.  

Over and out.

Checking in...

Hi.  Do you "pin" on Pinterest?  If you don't, I'll bet some of your friends do.  I don't "pin" very often.  I only have the little pin tool on one of my three computers.  But I have the iphone app, so often when I'm stopped at a boring red light, or in the carpool lane at school, I check in with my app and see what people are pinning.  The best service Pinterest has offered to me lately, is recipes for dinner time!  My sister Rachel is almost a pro at pinning.  But she's totally a pro at internet searching in general, so I'm not really surprised that her pins are so high quality.  Last week, or the week before, she pinned a picture of a canning jar in which someone had baked chili topped with cornbread.  Something about that totally caught my interest, and I knew I wouldn't sleep well until I just tried it.

Here was the original photo:

Haha!  Here is mine:

Mine did not turn out half as cute.  But when it's dinner time, "cute" is hardly the point!!  They were tasty.  I could have eaten them for dinner every night for a week.  The ground turkey was so much better than your standard ground beef in a regular chili recipe.  My kids don't love chili.  But they LOVED that cornbread topping (I reduced the sugar from 3/4 cups to 1/2 cups).  I don't care if everyone loves what I make, I only care that they all learn how to try new things.  Want the recipe?  Here's the link.

I feel like having a new motto: "If you pin it, I will make it."  The worst part about cooking dinner at home every single night is having to come up with what should be for dinner.  Now with all of my friends pinning fun new recipes onto their "boards" that question could easily be answered for me almost nightly!  Awesome.  Also thanks to Pinterest, I have found a great new white bread recipe.  We've made it twice already.  Here you go, CLICK.

P.S. If you are pinning recipes on Pinterest, please make sure I know about it.  Thanks.

Two more things,  Z Sister Update is over at Ie Li's this week.  Watch out, Christine looks like she's wearing a raccoon on her head.  It's not for the faint of heart.

Second thing, I love my latest creation for my ladies.  Details are posted over at MOM.  It was a labor of love, but so are they.  There is a beautiful metaphor in there somewhere.  Mostly I just like to make stuff.  Chili in a jar, or dresses for little girls.  It's all the same.  It keeps life beautiful!

1st Day

First, a tiny bit of recap.  We went to the beach one last time before school started.  The beach quilt made it out on the sand for one final time of the season.

I will miss our long and lazy summer days.  I'm glad we lived it up as best we could.  I will miss staying up late and sleeping in just as late.  I will miss taking road trips and visiting with friends.  I will not miss the heat or the humidity.  I will miss their summer bronzed skin.

Long Live Summer!

The day after we went to the beach, my sister Rachel was pinning smoothie recipes over on Pinterest.  One pin in particular required me to call her immediately and make sure she was feeling okay.  It had spinach in it.  

Me: "Hey, that monster smoothie is full of spinach.  Are you sure you want to make that?"

Rachel: "Yeah, I think we need to eat more spinach probably"

Me: "Okay, I'll try it for you and give you a full review.  But it sounds gross".  

Rachel: "Okay, let me know".  

The next day, I made the monster smoothie.  It was not gross.  I have made it again since.  I think eating more spinach is probably super important.  Maybe.  I have to say, when I made it the second time, all my berries were frozen berries.  It tasted a lot better.  I just think it's the kind of drink that should be cold, not room temperature.  Just trust me on that one:

I couldn't let summer end, and the kids go back to school without one final celebration.  I sampled my crowd to figure out what most would be excited about.  It came down to our cookie dough cupcakes.  Though I bought vanilla frosting to top them with, to simply avoid the whole "I hate cream cheese frosting" debate, when it came time to frost them, I just thought to myself that I could do better than store bought vanilla.  I did a quick google search on the infamous cookie dough cupcakes and found one clever girl who invented a cookie dough frosting to go on top of them!  Friends, it is frosting that tastes just like cookie dough batter.  It is the most clever frosting I have ever tasted.  Please try some soon.

    You need the recipe?  Okay, here you GO!  You're welcome. 

(Just so you know, I used a plain old box mix for my cupcakes, and toll house cookie dough in a tube for the filling.  The only part of the above recipe I used was for the frosting.  Someday I'll go all out.  But I'm not sure if it's necessary.) 

The day after the cookie dough cupcakes was the first day of school.  Can you believe I sent my oldest off to middle school?  He seems completely unfazed by the experience.  I guess that means it's a success so far.  

Here's my cute crowd all full of summer memories and cupcakes:

Middle Schooler:

4th Grader:

1st Grader:

Other 1st Grader:

I am slightly biased, but I think these are the greatest kids on the planet.  I love spending my life with them, and I love watching them grow up and blossom into who they were meant to be.  

Long Live School Year 2011-12!

Z sister update.

Annee:

(Do you have the pocketbooth app?  Maybe you should.) 

Last Week:

• Missed the Rebecca Skloot speech at NC State.  We had just returned from Hotlanta the night before.  The house and our lives were somewhat in chaos.  Stepping out of the house at 4:30pm to not return before 9 or 10 seemed like a risky move.  But Darin and I both agreed we needed a little date.  We opted to leave the house around 7.  Eat a simple dinner out, and then head over to the theater to see if we could still catch a showing of "The Help".  Darin didn't know a thing about it.  Except he thought it was going to be a girly movie.  I think he actually really liked it.  
• Hosted my Cooking Club.  I haven't laughed that long or that hard in a long time!  Were we laughing about lemonade?!  Let me just say, everything is hilarious at cooking club.  And the food is always delicious.  I made Mango Lassis as our cocktail.  And I brought THIS as my dish.  The day after cooking club, I had to try this Brazilian Lemonade recipe which was such a delightful summer nightcap.  
• Finished my quilt!!!!  Oh man did that feel great!
• Had a tri-ward primary meeting to clean out the nursery toys!  It lasted a few hours.  At the end, I decided I needed to go watch a movie.  I wanted to catch "Snow Flower and the Secret Fan" before it left the foreign film theater.  But somehow my request got confused as I was buying my ticket.  When the movie started I realized I was in the theater for "Queen of Play".  In the end, I decided to just stay.  I do love an evening spent listening to French. As a side note, I was once again reminded of a fashion principle that most real French women have.  They have only a few key pieces to their wardrobes.  They are usually high quality and really well fitting.  They wear them often and repeatedly, changing out accessories, shoes, or whatever.  I think it's not about quantity to the French, it's about quality, and how well it fits.  I think this was a good reminder for me.  (PS-I'm kind of sad that I missed Snow Flower.  It was one of the best books I read this year.)
• Took the kids and some friends to the beach on Friday.  I'm so glad we've figured out how to do the beach as a day-trip.  All that vitamin D does something for my soul.  
• Ran 13 miles on Saturday which brought my weekly total up to around 34.  I really need the tempts to start cooling off.  The miles just keep climbing from here on out!  
• We took a trip to Atlanta.  It remains completely undocumented.  It was a fabulous trip.  We all had such a great time.  I should document it.  

This week:

• Back to school night for Henry is on Monday night.  Good thing too, we don't have a clue about what to expect out of the 6th grade.  Not a clue!  Good thing he is so easy going.  He doesn't seem to even mind that he doesn't know a thing about what to expect at his new middle school!!
• Tuesday Darin goes back to school.  I think he's going to miss his epic summer break.
• Tuesday the elementary school will post their teacher lists and host a back-to-school/meet-your-teacher event that night.  Big day around here!  
• Wednesday we will do something to commemorate the end of a tremendous summer!  A special dinner?  A special outing?  Maybe a special dessert?  
• Thursday-EVERYONE GOES TO SCHOOL.  Oh how I hope it all goes well.  This is going to be a huge transition for all of us.  We sure love staying up late and sleeping in late.  
• Host a baby shower on Saturday.  I really want it to be cute.  I better start working on that!

Sarah:

Last Week:

• Hired a couple guys to come over and finally move postal box cabinet into the house. I've cleaned about half of it - my fingers are sore from opening the little latches so much
• Was recognized by a woman in a store from being on Courtney's blog
• Went to Velour one night to see a band who wants to play at the Rooftop Concert Series next year - hung out with Tyler Glenn (lead singer from Neon Trees)
• Felt pretty cool for having such famous friends, and then spent the bulk of my day on Saturday in front of a computer writing code which reinforced my innate nerdiness
• Back-to-school shopping for the boys was done online this year - new shoes and new tshirts for the first day. We'll build up a fall/winter wardrobe when the weather calls for it.
• Didn't get to bed earlier than 2am any nights this week, which meant I didn't get to get up to exercise at all. Someday.
• Finally forced June to try out the "big slide" at 7-peaks holding her tight on my lap in spite of her kicking and screaming. She said she hated it at the time, but when Scott got home she was so proud to report to him that she'd done it. The next day she wanted to do it again. Had to pay Brenden to babysit Huck in the baby pool.
• Huck figured out how to go under water and loves to show off his "new trick". He comes up every time with such a surprised face - doesn't ever close his mouth or eyes
• All 4 kids got haircuts! I let them go all summer long but it was finally time. Wow they look so much better.

This Week:

• BACK TO SCHOOL!!!! That's it. I can't think beyond that. I'm so excited to get back to a routine. I'm sure once things pick up again and get crazy with homework and projects and making lunches I'll look back longingly at our lazy summer schedule, but I don't care. For now I'm just excited.
• Cub Scouts committee meeting
• Wasatch Elementary fall festival silent auction planning meeting
• Rooftop Concert Series volunteer meeting
• RACHEL COMES TO TOWN!!! Paper chain has been made
• Lower Lights fireside in SLC
• Lower Lights recording this weekend
• Need to take a trip to SLC to go to Anthropology during Friends & Family week - will this be our last one?! Consider buying this from Urban Outfitters. Shoot - looks like the table I was going to get is already gone. WILL I EVER LEARN?!?!
• Finish cleaning the postal cabinet and put the room back together
• Buy mirror - I've been shopping antique stores for a round gilded mirror for the living room, and of course have regretted not getting the first one I saw on my hunt. Hopefully it will still be there. 
• Hire a yard crew. I give up. I need to take something off my plate and it should probably be the yard work. 
• Cook at least one crock pot meal - gotta get back to cooking dinner!

Ana:

Last Few Weeks:

• Real Life exploded.  I discovered a development problem at work which had me having to work 8+ hours a day while taking care of Jack.  Most days I am grateful for my job...but not this month.  Our internet broke during month end and I had to go to work at Kinkos until the wee hours of the morning,  we had 4 ant appointments to try to deal with our ongoing ant problem, plumbing appointments for leaking sinks, DMV appointments, doctors appointments, unpacked boxes taunting me, a fridge that broke down for a week, a broken dish disposal, a call from the school district informing us that Jack is the only Kindergartener in our area that they don't have space for causing me to fly into mad panic and spend my free time checking out the other options in the district, stomach pain causing me to spend the day at the hospital as they worried I was having an appendicitis, and Jack sick with a high fever.  All of this pushed me beyond my pregnancy hormonal breaking point and I called my mom in tears and flew her out to help me in early August.  She leaves on the 31st and I am way more prepared to handle life then I was a month ago.  Moms are the best.

This next week:

• Finish fixing the work problems before this baby decides to show up and add another element of chaos to my life!-Take Jack to Kindergarten orientation on Friday to meet his teacher and other kids in his class (school starts Monday the 29th).  They have a "Boo Hoo Breakfast" for the Kindergarten parents after we drop off our kids on Monday.  Jack thinks this idea is hilarious.  That me and the other moms are going to go eat breakfast and cry.  Someday little boy your wife will understand.
• My final ultrasound at 34 weeks.  This will be the deciding factor on whether we prepare for a scheduled c-section most likely between 37-38 weeks if my placenta previa hasn't completely resolved itself.  Also, we found out the baby was breech at an appointment last week when the silly nurse couldn't find the heartbeat for five minutes causing me to go back into full panic attack.  It took the doctor 10 seconds to find it and pronounce the baby breech giving me a second condition that would require a c-section more then likely at 39 weeks.  Monday is the ultrasound so fingers crossed!
• Celebrate our 9th wedding anniversary!  I couldn't have asked for a kinder, more loving man then Zack.  Seriously his patience, love and understanding continually make me the luckiest.
• Research car crash safety ratings and purchase an infant seat so if this baby comes in the next 3 weeks we will be able to take it home with us.-Decide on a name for this dear baby.  It took me 3 weeks to actually call Jack by his name.  I now love that he is Jack, so I might just have to accept that I might not be in love with any boy name from the get go. 

Ie Li:

Last Week:

• Last swim lessons of the summer.  Sad.
• Visiting teaching
• Temple with Steve.
• Babysat for a friend.
• Painted the interior of my front door black.  It was all very impulsive, but I like the results.
• Started sanding down a side table in preparation for painting.
• Steve completed his first drywall repair job.  He did a great job.
• Got the okay from my doctor to start running.  I do need to buy new running shoes.  It turns out that I pronate, even though all these years of going to specialty running stores, told me otherwise.
• Made my first truly delicious loaves of 100% whole wheat bread.
• Received letters in the mail revealing the teachers of my children this school year.  

Next Week:

• Visit friends
• Start running
• Live up the last week of summer.  School starts on the 29th!

Rachel:

Last Week:

• We saw The Help and it was amazing.  Seriously one of the best movies I've seen in so long.  
• Visited Uncle John's house on Lake Wynona!  It's a pretty small lake.  It was really fun to go tubing.  Too bad the boat ran out of gas!  I'd really like to go water skiing again.  Ken and Steve were pro.  
• Sadly did not go see Rebecca Skloot's speech at UNC.  I hope Annee will give us a report.
• Chatted with Summer for 2 hours!  So good to catch up.  We're figuring out how we can live nearby each other again within the next 5 years.  CO maybe?  
• Saw lovely pictures of Tracy's wedding from mom.  So happy for her.
• Got a haircut.  The girl didn't do as good this time.  Darn it!!  
• A major rain storm knocked out our power on Friday night so we up and went to the movies to see One Day with Anne Hathaway.  Overall it wasn't that great of a movie.  But it did make Ken really sad.    
• Pre-shopped with CZ for Anthro Days.
• Looked into Ceramic wheel throwing classes in the area.  I plan to start one up right after October 15.  So excited!!

This Week:

• I'm going to Utah!  I'll be there Thursday through Sunday morning.  I chose to fly out of Provo because I'm curious to test it out.  Can't wait!  I wish Ken could come.  He is teaching 50 hours for Kaplan this week.  Yikes.
• I have a running list of Utah to-dos (aside from obvious family time!).  There's a fabric store I want to visit, check for treasures at Downeast and any antique stores, hike the Y, pick up my scrapbook supplies from the storage unit, run in Provo canyon (or bike ride with dad?), bring back bottles of our favorite salsa and some fry sauce.
• Did you know they discontinued my favorite kind of garments?  I bought out all the warehouse's remaining stock.  There's one more store I can check in UT.  Sad.
• Continue to plan our Christmas Card!  I can't stop thinking about it!  I'm so excited.  We have our photos booked with BlueLily.  Now I just need to plan our outfits, design the card, send it off to  Rowley Press, etc.
• Finish our wedding album.  The pictures expire online on Labor Day.  
• Figure out if Ken's sister will visit us over Labor Day.  Sounds fun!

Christine:

Last couple weeks: 

- Looked at more houses and apartments.  I think I've pretty much narrowed it down, though I'm terrible at actually pulling the trigger and making a decision.  

- Went to the zoo.  I'd like to take more advantage of all of the free activities in DC, so Jon and I ventures out to the zoo one day.  It was pretty fun and luckily not too hot.

- Enjoyed 24 hours up at Uncle John's lake house.  I thought it was a perfect little introduction to the area and I loved the time on the boat! (and I'm glad we didn't break it!)  

- Worked a few shifts at Anthropologie.  It's been pretty slow at the store and I don't have a ton of hours, but I've been enjoying getting to know the people at this store and seeing the differences.  Remember Anthro days starts today!! 

- Saw Crazy, Stupid, Love and The Help.  I loved The Help and definitely shed a few tears, I thought it was a pretty great representation of the book.  I ended up going to see it by myself after accidentally falling asleep in my car after work one day when I was supposed to meet Rachel and Ken to go see it.  By the time I woke up and walked into the theater pretty close behind the Fitzgeralds, the movie was sold out.  Pretty big fail right there.  

- Did a day trip to the beach!!  Tuesday I went with some friends to Rehoboth Beach and I loved it!!  We left super early at 5:30 and got there in two hours, had breakfast, then sat on the beach until we left at 2.  I was glad to see that a day trip to the beach is possible and hopefully will do a few more before the weather turns too cold.  I always love seeing the differences between west coast and east coast beaches.  

- Drove to Morgantown on Saturday to visit for a few days and participate in all of the festivities that are taking place as school starts back up.  It's interesting being in a college town at the start of a school year and not be going back to school myself.  I'll be honest I don't envy any of them at all as I see them all getting ready for classes.  I'm definitely happy to be done with school.  (Though I'm not sure that actually means I'm ready to start working a real job, eep!) 

Next week:

- Hopefully make a final decision on an apartment.  I know this has been on my to-do list for awhile now and it's getting down to the wire.  My future roommate, Jaklyn, is driving out labor day weekend, hopefully I have a place for her to land!  

- Work Wednesday and Saturday and possibly try to pick up some other shifts.  

- Possibly try to go to the beach on Friday.  I don't have work or anything else and now that I know it's possible the lure is hard to resist.

- Buy a plane ticket to Utah.  I'm hoping to go visit at the beginning of September.  It's possible I'm missing the Utah based part of the family and feel like I still have some lose ends to tie up at my old house and whatnot.

- Run a few times.  I've actually been doing pretty good about running at least a couple times a week which is pretty big for me.    

- Try to figure out some way to go riding.  With all this free time I really would like to find a barn that I could start riding at now and then continue once I start working.  

- There's not a whole lot on this list, my days are pretty spontaneous lately, not really planned out too much.  

Mom:

This just in...Mom said it's a sneak peak of more to come.  I'm excited for her update.  Where is this picture taken?!

Hey Sibs, remember this day?

Remember how we met at the new D.C.  Shake Shack for lunch on a Saturday?  Then how we carpooled over to the National Mall to visit the Jefferson and the FDR monuments?   

Remember how Ruby wanted us to paused along the banks of the Potomac to take a quick picture that would include the Washington Monument?

Remember how I thought it was a National scandal that we don't have a monument to John Adams our second US president?  And how that prompted a bit of googling and explaining and analysis?  

Remember how hot it was?  Will the children ever remember the monuments or just the heat?

Remember how CZ wanted to take the picture below, and how we waited in line to have our turn to take it?

Oh yeah, did you remember how hot it was?  Did I already mention that?  Shade was like manna from heaven.  

Anyway, I love living close to you all.  I'm so glad we can gather impromptu like for lunch and sightseeing.  I love that it's D.C. that we're learning and exploring together.  I feel like the luckiest girl alive that we have landed so close to so many.  It's a gift.

The funny thing is, the olden-day mom, right before her family was leaving on a trip was probably making sandwiches to eat in the car, or making all of her important phone calls, since she was about to be away from her phone for a few days.  Or generally cleaning the house or ironing something maybe?  But the now-a-day mom is hurrying to update the blog about the last trip, because she's about to go on another trip, and who wants to come home to an out-of-date blog?

Funny how olden-days compare to now-a-days.  Know what I mean?!  See you in a few!  But unlike my olden-day counter part, you can still reach me by phone should there be a communication emergency that a text wouldn't suffice for (wink!).

We went to Niagara Falls. Two weeks and five days ago, to be precise.

After a two and a half-week blog break I'm ready to wrap up our Trip North.  Since getting back, the girls and I have packed up and left and come back again from another trip!  This time we set out for Indiana to visit my cousin Lisa.  It was an adventure.  I love the freedom of summer that allows for a spontaneous decision like, "I'm going to drive to Indiana today".  I'm also glad that Darin did  most of the driving to and from New York, so that I wasn't burnt out of that task!  And after our five days in Indiana, we came home for a few days, and then Darin and I went off on a little two day trip to Charlotte, sans kids!

Anyway, back to the pictorial evidence of our trip to Niagara:

This is the view from the top of the falls.  But from my memory of being there 24 years ago, I knew that there was a much more exotic view to be had, if we'd sign up for the Cave of the Winds tour.

We kind of had to walk a long way to get to the Cave of the Winds tour, and it was another hot summer day.  Spirits were getting low, and people were skeptical that it would really be worth it.

We found a little spot along the trail where I said, "look children, you can say you got into Niagara Falls!".  And so they all took their shoes off to cool off.  But I did get slightly nervous picturing one of my little ladies slipping on the rocks, and being swept off and over the falls.  So everyone was forced out of the cool water!  

People started reviving a bit when ponchos were handed out, and special issue sandals became mandatory footwear!  Suddenly they believe me that maybe something was about to happen at Niagara Falls!

We descended in a huge elevator, and suddenly we walked out at the bottom of The Falls.  Suddenly smiles started to appear again.  Also because maybe the temperature dropped about fifteen degrees down there at water level.

Henry gets sprayed by Niagara Falls with Canada in the background!

Look at how close they are!!  

We kept climbing up to the next higher level which was called "The Hurricane Deck".  It was so loud you had to scream to be heard.  And I didn't dare take the camera out because it would have been drenched.  The boys took off their poncho hoods and simply stood on the hurricane deck getting soaked to the bone.   It was wild and crazy.

Soaked to the bone.

Here I am telling George he can kiss me for taking him so close to Niagara Falls.  I had to show him what a kiss was.  

We forgot our passports, so we couldn't venture over to the Canadian side.  The New York side feels a little bit like a strange mixture of shanty town and some International airport.  Weird.  We ate at the Hard Rock cafe.  But after that, there wasn't really anything left to do.  We looked at our watches and it was 5pm.  A quick google map search revealed that we could be back at Steve's house in 8 hours.  Darin felt the urge to get us back home.  To be done hotel hopping.  A quick text to Steve said,  "See you around 2am!  Don't wait up, but if you don't mind leaving the door unlocked, we'd be ever so grateful!"  I think we actually made it around 12:30am, and they were still up.  They had even arranged all the bed, pillows and blankets, so that we could literally fall into bed.  It was possibly the best night of sleep we had had all week long!

And just like that, our trip North became our return trip to the South.  Every great vacation has to come to an eventual close.  We had a grand time.  It was all that I had hoped it would be, and even a few surprise bonuses along the way.  I think the kids loved it.  Now to start dreaming of where to drive to next summer...

P.S.  "The Sisters" are over at Christine's this week, in case you are looking for a more current account of our happenings.  Hurry, click!

Thursday was for PLAYing

We woke up Thursday morning at 10am.  The entire family, in one hotel room, slept until 10am!  We must have been tired.  When we finally rolled out of our beds, we settled on powdered sugar donuts and hot chocolate made using the hotel room coffee maker!  Did you know you could do that?  We didn't either.  Once everyone was full, we let the kids go for one last swim, and I did my second of two vacation, hotel-treadmill-runs.  That was the goal, and it was accomplished.  We let Darin stay back in the room and figure out what the plan for Thursday should be.

When we got back, he had everything packed up so we checked-out.  We vaguely thought we were going to head north already towards Niagara Falls, since that was the last place on our vacation to-do list.  But when we unexpectedly decided to drive around the block of our downtown Rochester, NY hotel (so we could say we "saw" Rochester), we happened upon the National Museum of Play.  Darin and I looked at each other, did a quick google search to see what it was all about, and when we saw that it was featuring an exhibit called "The history of video games", we were sure that the NMoP would have something for everyone.  And just like that, our plan for the day changed.  Oh how I love vacation!

In beautiful Downtown Rochester, NY 

The kids were thrilled with our last minute change of plans.

The highlight ended up being this wacky room that is designed on a tilt, and has so many patterns on the walls and the floors that instantly your equilibrium is out-of-whack, and you go crashing into the walls.  The kids couldn't get enough of it.

Sometimes playing is super serious business.  See below. 

Do you recognize where Ruby is standing?

She's on Sesame Street!

And we all got a kick out of sitting in front of the green screen and making it appear as if we were sitting and talking to muppets.  

And a huge part of our time was spent in the best mini-grocery store we have ever seen.  This one was seriously at the top of it's class.  Complete with the final receipt printing out and everything.  The girls were in heaven.

It's was a charming and relaxing day.  We shut the museum down.  When it closed, we left.  We were just a couple hours away from Niagara Falls, so we started driving north so that we could wake up Friday morning at The Falls.

Come back for Friday's update when I finally get to take my family to Niagara Falls.  Something I've been dreaming of, ever since I had a family ;)