What's Wrong With Being Thin And Tired?

My very first loaf of gluten-free bread. Doesn't it look nice? I really didn't expect to get such a nice rise. It only cost like $57 to make. I'm KIDDING. But it did call for 1 egg and then 3/4 cup of egg whites, which equaled 6 more eggs. 7 eggs! Can you imagine? I'm not totally crazy and didn't use my expensive organic cage-free eggs. I used Greg's 99-cent-a-dozen-5-million-chickens-shoved-into-a-hen-house-eggs.

I didn't tell Greg. I made a gluten-free meal of stew, salad, and the bread. I had told my sister earlier that I was going to see if Greg could tell.

"He's got taste buds, doesn't he?"

But he didn't know and he ate two giant slices!

Muhahahahahahahhahahahahahahaha

My sister then threatened to rat me out on my blog for going gluten-free without getting tested. Ewwwwwwwwwwwwwww. I'm so scared. Then she yelled at me because she said SHE doesn't have Celiac's Disease and I'm a hypochondriac and what's wrong with being thin and tired anyway?

"Would you rather be fat and energetic?", she demanded to know.

Actually, yes. Yes, I would.

The gluten-free brownies I made last night did me in though. Greg said they tasted like tar.

"They do not. Those are just regular brownies."

"Your ass.", Greg said and then he actually went and dug in the garbage and found the gluten-free bag the mix came in.

"I feel sorry for you, Michele. Stop reading stuff on the internet. Do I have to get rid of the internet?"

HA! Wait until he has some yummy gluten-free pancakes with Michele's Po Man syrup this morning.

I'm meeting a little resistance with my family as you can see. While I'm getting fat and energetic on my new diet, Greg will be getting thin and tired.

How Many Can We Cram Into A Human Body?

I am sick. The kids are sick. Greg is sick. Our house sounds like a tuberculosis clinic --- a really dirty one.

Greg has been dragging me all over town. He has offers on several properties, none of which we would actually LIVE in. I can't even keep track, except to say that we may soon be Land Barons.

So I must take care of my children and house today. I will quickly say that I think I have Celiac's Disease. I diagnosed myself two days ago. If this pans out, this would explain why I've been sickly since birth. I've always suspected an undiagnosed autoimmune disease, but the fact I've been horribly thin, weak, anemic, fatigued, infertile, etc., sure does point at it. I think my sister has it too. She's not listening to me again.

I'm calling the doctor to make an appointment for next week.

I don't think it would be that hard to go gluten-free, since I only shop at Trader's. Can I still have ice cream and alcohol?

Gregory had two more cavities at the dentist yesterday. His teeth really are rotten. The other children's teeth look fabulous. Poor Gregory. He must have inherited MY teeth, bless his heart.

I should point out that celiacs have bad teeth.

I will end this post by saying that the woman who gave birth to octoplets in California is a single mom, lives with her parents, and already has six children, including a set of twins.

SWEET!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

That will make all of us that used fertility treatments responsibly look even that much more like whack jobs!!!!!!!!!!! According to Good Morning America today, she did IVF and put back EIGHT. What doctor would have done that?

When does it stop? What even comes next? Noctuplets? Do we just keep going and try and cram the most babies we can into the human body?

Who is going to pay for all those babies now? What's wrong with her parents anyway? They are raising six of her kids and then said, "Oh, yes, IVF sounds great."?

Okay, I realize this post is a jumbled mess of my thoughts. The TB clinic just woke up and the hacking is unbelievable.

You guys figure it out!

But It's JUST Corn!

Did anyone catch the Washington Post's article that more than half of all high fructose corn syrup tested contains mercury? Up until now, it's a completely missed source of mercury that the average American child is getting almost continously.

I've long suspected either a food or environmental source for the ever increasing diagnosis of children "on the spectrum". I never thought it was vaccines. Parents all over America are putting off or not vaccinating at all for fear of mercury and autism, yet they have been unknowingly feeding their kids mercury, via high fructose corn syrup, every single day.

What else are we feeding our kids that we don't know about?

Why is mercury in high fructose corn syrup anyway? It's because HFCS doesn't just "fall out" of corn. It requires some serious refining to turn a kernel of corn into syrup. Four refineries in Georgia, Tennessee, West Virginia, and Ohio still use mercury-contaminated caustic soda in their refining process.

The Corn Refiner's Association say this is all LIES though. They've been running ads for the last six months, telling us that high fructose corn syrup is just corn and it's fine for us in moderation. Why, heck, it's all natural.



Here's my favorite spoof of the original ad.



So in addition to making us fat and diabetic, HCFS is also contaminated with mercury. I wonder how Big Corn will spin this one?

Maybe they'll spin it like Big Tobacco.



After all, it's just corn. How bad can it be?

And if you believe that, I've got a beautiful piece of real estate to sell you.

Las Vegas: It's Where The Stupid People Live

Here I am, freaking out and sleepless over what public school my kids go to in Las Vegas, when according to the front page of the Review Journal yesterday, our schools are so bad the kids coming out of them are actually too stupid to get jobs.

Since I know I never click on links (and I'm sure you don't either), here are some of my favorite parts of the article.

"I can only judge from what comes across my desk, but from my personal experience, I would say the communications skills could definitely stand to be better," said Rouff, managing partner of Henderson-based Imagine Marketing of Nevada. "Most of the résumés we get don't even get candidates to the interview point because they're loaded with typographical errors and grammatical problems. And I'll talk to some applicants on the phone, and most of them are not up to the standards we're looking for."

That's because we only teach them in school to ask you if you need quarters or drinks.

Connell said in a follow-up interview that he's especially noticed an "appalling lack of critical-thinking skills" among local graduates. And that skills shortage has broader economic implications. When local schools don't produce qualified workers, Connell said, he and other executives must search outside Las Vegas for talent. Bigger recruiting costs and relocation expenses follow, and companies raise prices as a result. Higher prices, in turn, make businesses less competitive.

We actually only teach kids to count to 21 and then they are qualified to work as a dealer in any hotel. That's as critical as it gets here.

"Whatever you do, don't teach them what comes after 21, or they might fall off the flat Earth."

In the article, one of the suggestions to fix our failing school system is to have vouchers and competition for tax dollars.

Spoor, who said he sometimes has to hire extra workers to make up for skills and service deficits among employees, recommended competition. Encouraging school choice with measures such as vouchers would force administrators who run area schools to better their offerings, he said.

"Nothing makes you better than knowing someone is right up your tailpipe. It keeps you sharp, motivated and hungry," Spoor said. "If you don't have competition, you're not going to innovate, you're not going to step it up, you're not going to push. I just think competition makes people and companies better. The school system has not really ever had any competition."

I couldn't agree more with this. In Arizona where they have the voucher system, my sister can take her tax dollars and send her children to any school she wants. The voucher system is working there. Instead of schools closing or failing, competition has forced them to offer better service and specialities to attract students. You aren't "stuck" in a bad school. The school performs, so it doesn't lose students and money.

This means, God forbid, if you suck at running your school, YOU MIGHT LOSE YOUR JOB. GASP!

My sister liked the school she was zoned for and sent her kids to it. My cousin Alicia has decided to take her tax money and send her daughter to a charter school instead of her local school. They have a choice, unlike me.

But I'm really, really trying to look on the bright side.

If all the people coming out of school here are stupid, this means my kids of average intelligence could actually be geniuses by Vegas standards.

Amanda finally learned how to spell and write her name. She has also learned to count to twenty without skipping 13 and 15. Do you know what this means?

This means I only have to teach her one more number and my work here is done.

The Ultimate Flip This House!

Do not read this post unless you have extraordinary vision.

If you know us or have been reading this blog for awhile, you know that Greg occasionally flips houses. He was doing it in Illinois with his friend Scott when real estate got too crazy expensive in Las Vegas. Fortunately, they got rid of their last one right before the bubble exploded. Whew.

He hasn't had one to flip for awhile now and quite frankly, he's bored. He really NEEDS to be doing something during the day. You can't imagine what it's like to have your husband in your home ALL THE TIME. Just imagine it right now. Every minute of every second of every day, you turn around and there he is, breathing your air, taking up your space, and watching Bill O'Reilly on Fox News. THE HORROR!

My girlfriend Laurie called me yesterday, and told me that she'd picked up three foreclosures in Phoenix for 60 grand each, and was renting them each out for a $1000 a month. She's pocketing three grand a month on 180,000 dollars. So I told Greg, and demanded to know why we aren't doing that? If anyone could be a slum lord, it would be Greg. He's got slum lord written all over him.

Greg decided to see what we could pick up in the 60,000 dollar range in Vegas and you wouldn't believe what came up.

THE ULTIMATE FLIP THIS HOUSE.

Check this beauty out. It's a "gorgeous" 2000 square foot custom on .63 acres in a part of town where a 1/2 acre costs a minimum of 250,000 and it listed 2 days ago for $63,500.



Look at the lovely landscaping! I can almost hear that tree being chomped up in Greg's wood chipper right now.



The whole inside is gutted. He'd have to go in and do a total remodel. New kitchen, bathrooms, drywall.

But he can do that!

Jerry knows a gravel dude. All we have to do is put in a green lawn, desert out the rest, and I seriously think if we put 50,000 into it, we can make a 100,000 easily.



If it isn't already gone, we're buying it today. I looked at the public records on it, and the last owners bought it in 1995 for 119,000. When the real estate market soared, they took home equities on it over and over and over, until they reached a staggering debt of 396,000 dollars. As you can see from the pictures, they never put one penny into the house. This must have been a giant scam! They defaulted in October and the bank will be eating 330,000 dollars. Is it any wonder our banks are FAILING???????!!!!!!

But if we get it, we'll watch Greg transform it. This is going to be so much fun!

Or maybe we'll watch him smash it down with a wrecking ball. It could go either way, which makes it so exciting!!!

But more importantly, Greg will be out of the house and I won't have to listen to Bill O'Reilly all day long. Oh, man, will we get it???????!!!!!!! Do you think it's already gone? I'm psyched!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Do you even understand that it's a whole house on more than a 1/2 acre in a decent part of town for $63,000?????!!!!!! You can barely buy a car for that price.

Did anyone see this blog turning into a real estate blog?

Will This End In Divorce?

I am exhausted. Shopping for homes with Greg is insane. Someone asked me why we don't shop with a real estate agent? Truthfully, I'd never waste somebody's time and if they were with Greg, they might literally implode.

One minute, we were looking at a 100,000 dollar little tiny track home, with no yard, and Greg was saying, "No way. Let's get this. We'll just gut it out for a few years, and pocket a quarter million off of our house. I'll just spend every day working out at the gym. We won't have to go back to work for 10 more years."

Twenty minutes later, we were in a 5000 square foot custom home on an acre for 650,000 and Greg was saying, "This is it! We'll both get full time jobs and buy this and I'll be the KING."

Then we were looking at brand new homes that looked like this.



This would be like living in a totem pole. This a home for really tall, skinny people. Greg would have to stand sideways and hold his breath to fit in there. I think his one ton dually is wider. Do you think it would fit in the driveway? And where would his wood chipper go?

"If the kids were on the third floor, there is no way I'd go get them for dinner. We could live in that though."

I haven't looked at model homes in years. There isn't anyone in them. I can remember looking at model homes in Vegas and having waiting lists for the waiting lists. They used to be packed.

The next stunning idea was to buy a track home and live there during the week to send the kids to school, then come back to our house on the weekends. Oh, I'm really sure.

"I've got a better idea. Maybe I'll live in the new home and come and visit YOU on the weekends."

Then we thought about buying a home in Henderson down the hill from Greg's mom. Her school is one of the top elementary schools in the district. But I can only imagine that Greg would be over at her house constantly. It would be like Raymond.

I told Greg's mom I'd call her and let her know what I wanted for dinner every night if we lived that close, and she could be like her friend, Mary Jo, whose two (or three?) kids and grandkids live on the same street. Mary Jo makes dinner for twelve every day. Barb, if Mary Jo can do it, surely you can make dinner for seven, right?

She's not answering today. Hmmmmmmm......

We are all over the map, in every possible price range.

It's like we're ADHD home shoppers.

When I thought Greg was pouring over the ads in the newspaper, looking for houses, he suddenly yelled, "This is it! Clean. One owner. Non-smoker. No animals. Satellite. Automatic levelers. 4 slides. 40 foot long. 13,000 miles. $32,000. No WAY. That's bigger than that model home. Are you in for fifteen? Let's go on a trip. School's overrated anyway."

Does anyone else see this ending in divorce?

I Want A Mansion

Now that I have Greg on board with moving, we spent all day yesterday driving around and looking at foreclosures. I can tell you this, there has never been a better time in the history of Las Vegas to buy a home. Wow.

The first one we looked at was a 4 bedroom on a half acre.

It sold in 2006 for 663,000 and defaulted this year with the owner owing Citibank more than 400,000. It's listed right now for $268,000, which is a smoking deal.



It had a beautiful pool. It was green and had some sort of fish-type things swimming in it, but it had potential. Their was a real estate agent there, showing another couple, so we asked him if we could look too and he reluctantly agreed. So when he told us he didn't have any time for us, Greg looked at the code he put in the lock box and we waited until they left and went back in and looked some more. The neighbors came over and looked with us.

Super nice neighbors. The one man across the street is a retired juvenile court judge. He said he was going to bring his fishing pole over and see what was living in the pool. When I told him about our school zoning problem and where they were going to bus the kids in from, he said, "NOOOO! That area is full of gangs and gang-related crime. I should know."

Imagine my surprise when the Judge told me the original owners left because they had triplets and needed more room. Which is exactly why we wouldn't buy the house. It just wasn't big enough. They had turned the fourth bedroom into a closet and were trying pass off the dining room as a bedroom. It had less functional space than our own home.

Too bad. It would be a nice home for a family of four. Great neighbors. Great school district. Sigh.

Our next stop was THE HOUSE, a six bedroom, six bath and a 1/2 acre and a gigantic 5700 square feet. It was listed for 389,000.
When we pulled up, yet another realtor was there. Greg asked him if he'd let us in, but he said he didn't have time. So we walked around to the back and Greg slid open the back window and I crawled through and we checked it out. It was BEAUTIFUL. Whoever owned it had two girls and two boys.
Because it had two blue bedrooms with an adjoining bathroom and two pink rooms with an adjoining bathroom. All the kids rooms had built in bookshelves and desks. It had TWO laundry rooms.

It had this God-awful pink carpeting throughout. It would cost 20 grand just to put new flooring in. But WHO CARES. OMG! It's 5700 square feet. Do you even understand???????

I can't even keep my 2400 square foot house clean, but WHO CARES. I want that house. I couldn't even HEAR the kids on the bottom floor when I was upstairs.

But, alas, it was sold. Now we are ruined for all other homes.

I want a mansion!!!

But the quest continues today. Must. find. mansion.

This One Is A Super Star

From the minute Gregory could roll at 5 months old, he moved across the floor of our den and pulled the blinds out of the sliding glass door. From that moment on, he's never stopped.

He's always climbing the highest.


Or hanging from something. He has absolutely no fear, an uncanny sense of balance he did not inherit from me, and he's freakishly coordinated.

I can barely walk without tripping. This child would be on the roof, if I let him. Being Gregory's mother is not for the faint of heart, because I find him dangling from something several times a day. It's like they mixed up Greg's sperm with Spiderman's at the fertility clinic.

So I wasn't entirely surprised to hear what Ms. Donna said after gymnastics class last week.

"This one," she said pointing to Gregory, "Is your Super Star. He's a natural. There's no telling how far he could go. You should pursue it."

Okay. I agree. Pursue it how though? I didn't ask in front of the girls, because I didn't want them to know they are totally uncoordinated dorks like their mother. But I'm sure having him in Beginner Gym at the Community Center for two years isn't exactly taking him as far as he can go! We have a competition gym team there, but it's all girls.

I tried to talk to my sister about it, but when I called her, she wanted to discuss all her own problems instead, so I had to cut her off.

"Oh, you don't want to hear about ME?", she demanded, "Did you only call to tell me how great your kid is?"

Well, uh, yes actually.

So back to my kid, I wonder how one pursues more serious gymnastics? I haven't a clue. I spent almost all of my school years inventing reasons to skip P.E. and trying to lead an almost completely sedentary life. Did you know it's possible for your menstrual cycle to come in last period during your entire Freshman year?

So any more ideas, from you "the people"?

Or feel free to discuss your own problems.

I think I hear my Super Star on the roof.

Project-Based Learning?

While the kids were having a pajama party at school yesterday and celebrating their birthday yet again, I drove like a crazy person across town to the Clark County Zoning Advisory Trustee Board Meeting. I was 15 minutes late and was afraid I might have trouble finding a seat.

Fortunately, the only other two people in the audience let me in. Can you believe it? TWO other people were there besides me. We have 1.5 million people in the city, but everyone else was busy. It was amazing how just a handful of people decide the fate of so many children. I listened as they split one zone in half, dividing people who lived in the same neighborhood, by making kids whose homes faced each other go to opposite schools.

"Howdy neighbor! See ya never!"

It's crazy. What's really crazy is they don't look at anything other than attendance when drawing zoning lines. Their only goal is to utilize each facility with as many kids as it can take. Our school only has 472 students in it. It's an under-utilized school. They are going to bring in 377 students to fill it up.

Period.

Anyway, I plan on being at all of them from now on. They are going to be like, "Who is that woman? Is she a stalker?"

So my question for the day is if anyone has heard of a learning curriculum called project-based learning? I found a charter school I'm interested in, but they don't teach a regular school curriculum. They are a publicly-funded charter school, so they are accountable to the state and the children still have to pass standardized tests, but they don't learn at all the way they do in a rigidly structured classroom.

I looked at their test scores online and they are the only charter school meeting or exceeding on their accountability reports.

I just don't really get project-based learning. When I read about it, it sounds like a bunch of baloney to me. I'm more of a "Sit in your chair and do you worksheet right now" kind of gal.

Then I zoomed back across town, pick the kids up, then spent 2 hours wrapping presents.



This might look like Christmas again, but this is what happens when everyone has their birthday on the same day.



I'm exhausted. It's like Christmas has been going on for a month.




We are just going to hang out today, while I try to figure out what I'm doing with these precious children's lives. Maybe we'll start a project, where they learn to pick up all their toys.

Five Years Ago Today, I Almost Blew Up

Warning: This post will contain partial nudity of a really pregnant lady wearing shockingly high-end maternity undergarments.

Today is the children's actual birthday. They were born at 6:05, 6:06, and 6:08pm. It took an extra minute for my doctor to pry Amanda out of my rib cage, where she had cozied up to what I remember as my pain bone.

I've never blogged before about the enormous amount of weight I gained during my pregnancy, so I thought today, on the 5 year anniversary of their birth, it would be the perfect day to talk about how I almost blew up giving birth to triplets.

First, let's see what I looked like before I got pregnant.

Here's a picture of me weeks before I got pregnant. I weighed 123 pounds and wore a size 2. This was actually heavy for me, because I had already been through two IVF cycles (one fresh, one frozen) in the six months before this picture was taken. Those cycles included tons of hormones and steroids, so I was almost chunky here.

Over the next 8 months from when that picture was taken at the Bellagio with Greg's brother and cousin, I would gain 90 pounds until I looked like this on the day of delivery.

Gasp! (I'm sparing you the sight beneath the heart.)

I went from 123 pounds to 213 pounds in 7 months. I went from my size 2 shorts to Greg's 3XL sweat pants. I gained 13 pounds overnight, the day before I delivered. That was because my kidneys were shutting down.

I was barely capable of getting out of bed and walking to the bathroom at the end. My muscles had deteriorated to the extent that I really believe I needed physical therapy after the kids were born.

I had partial placenta previa with Sarah's placenta, and began bleeding profusely at 11 weeks. Greg was on a whirlwind tour of the Midwest and was driving around Lake Superior at the time. I had driven to Phoenix to hang out with my sister, when I began hemorrhaging. I was certain I was losing the babies. I laid in the back of my car, while my sister drove me back to Vegas. I then bled for nearly 7 more weeks. You can't imagine what it's like to be growing three babies and bleed for 7 weeks. When the bleeding finally stopped, I just stayed in bed for the duration of the pregnancy.

It was when we really understood that our lives were changing. Never again would we do whatever we wanted, whenever we wanted.

Since there was no way I was going to risk losing my babies, Greg bought a dead man's wheelchair he found in the Sun City retirement newspaper, and wheeled me around everywhere so I wouldn't have to put any weight on my cervix. Then he got a dead woman's orthopedic hospital bed from the same paper, and put it in the living room. I was too weak to fight him on sleeping where a woman died.

I slept nearly straight up in bed from about 26-35 weeks, because I had such severe acid reflux. Gregory was laying sideways and across my stomach. Every time he'd move, I'd lean over and vomit into a bucket Greg had next to the bed. I kept missing, so he put newspaper down all around the bed and would bring me food and rinse out my bucket.

More amazing than gaining 90 pounds in 7 months is the fact that I lost 75 pounds in 9 weeks. I like to call this the Being Stressed Out Of Your Mind Diet. Here I was 9 weeks after delivery when my friend Melanie came to visit me.

Note: I'm wearing the same shirt as the first photo. I am a fashion diva.

It was like I was the incredible shrinking woman. The last fifteen pounds took another 5 months to come off and then I kept losing weight. When the babies were 7 months old, I actually weighed less than I did when I got pregnant.


Note: The same shirt again. I still have that shirt, which will tell you how much time I've spent shopping for myself in recent years. This was with my friend Cindy at Mandalay Bay. I forgot which floor I had parked on, in the parking garage and kept getting on and off the elevator with the triplet stroller. I had to put it in diagonally and then hold up the back wheels to fit. I almost collapsed when I finally found the van.

It's hard to believe what I put my body through in such a short period of time. Two days after that picture with Cindy, I got pregnant with Austin.

A couple days ago, Jen @ Amazing Trips asked me if I could believe it's been five years already and would I do it all over again?

No, I cannot believe it's been five years. I often wondered along the way if I'd live this long?

Would I do it over again?

I would. I'd go through all that pain and mental anguish again.

I'd do it for you, my children.

Happy Birthday my precious babies. I love you all so much. You were worth it.

Pick Ourselves Up, Dust Ourselves Off....

Watching the inauguration yesterday was the highlight of my day.



The kids started preschool at 9am PST, and I dropped the girls off and ran back down the hall to watch it with their ballet teacher, who happens to be African-American. It was such a great moment. I couldn't help but getting teared up, and when I looked over at Ms Donna, I could see that she, too, was crying. So I hugged her through my tears.

But other than that moment, the day went pretty much went to hell quickly. I especially loved the part when the principal of my kids' school called me back. I told him that I was concerned about the effect the proposed zoning changes would have on our school, and what did he think about it?

He said, "You SHOULD BE concerned. You should have been at the meetings when the residents West of us said they didn't want their kids coming to your low class neighborhood. They were very contentious and I didn't go to the last one because it was so ugly."

Our neighborhood is low class???? We've only had the District Attorney AND a commissioner live on our street. I'll go over to their neighborhood and take a dump on their 150,000 dollar floor. How DARE THEY call me low class?

Now is when the people I was talking about as low class, leave their slum apartments, and come over and take a dump on MY floor. Little do they know that I have 3000 dollar feces brown carpeting and I won't even be able to see it.

I guess it all depends on where you live as to who is low class.

So to make the day even more fun, I went to a new dentist to get my teeth cleaned, and he took out the handy-dandy magic laser cavity finding equipment, and told me I needed 4200 dollars in dental work. He told me I needed a crown, all the seals taken off my molars and re-done due to decay, two of my front teeth sealed, and three cavities filled. I'm really sure my teeth have completely decayed in the year since I've had them cleaned.

It's really weird that you couldn't actually see any of that on the x-ray.

I told him if he didn't see any teeth rotting and about to fall out of my jaw, then he could just give me a cleaning and some flouride.

So he did. Total cost? $102.

I've got to get out of this funk. I'm depressed, I think. It's so unlike me to be in such a rut.

In the words of our 44th President, Barack Obama, "Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again...."

Besides, I don't think my teeth look that bad. What do you think?


Is this low class? Do you think it was the coffee?

It's Time For Smoking School

Now that the children's education is doomed, I've decided to teach them something to fall back on in Las Vegas --- gambling.

It was game number 2 before I realized that the children do not yet have the attention span for a serious game of bingo, and it's easier to look at their cards and pick numbers that everyone has. I'm going to request they start doing it like that at the casinos.

It has taken how many days? Five? To get Greg on board with moving. We drove around with the kids last night, looking for a home in the district I want them to go to school. We discovered we can afford to buy just the floors in one home we looked at. The floors cost 150,000 dollars. That seems like a really good use of money, spending a 150,000 on floors for people to walk on with their feet. Did the couple say to each other, "Let's make sure we put down how much the floors cost in the flyer."?

We did find one foreclosure that backed up to power lines and barb wire on some luxury apartment homes. I envisioned looking out my kitchen window and daydreaming I was in prison.

Greg said we'd be fools to try to sell our home in this market. So I've decided to Adapt Or Die and teach the kids to smoke, along with gambling. Chain smoking is a gambling requirement.



How do we look? Like locals or tourists?

The State Of The Schemes

I have been so preoccupied between the kids' birthday and researching schooling options, I've been in a tailspin.

I promise to get back to fun stuff!

I currently have so many schemes going on over school, I'm having trouble keeping track of them all. I can tell you this though. Our neighborhood is an island surrounded by shit.

This didn't bother us before we had kids, because we weren't worried about sending our children to school. We weren't going to live here for long. Eleven years later, we are still here and in love with our neighborhood. If you live in Las Vegas, then you know how unique it is to have any property at all. Most people walk out their back door and slam their face into their wall.

We love our yard and our space. We love this way of life.

Add to that the fact our house is paid for, and moving isn't an option I'm willing to undertake easily. Sure, we could probably trade even up for a track home (which would be newer and bigger) in a better school district, but they might get a little testy when Greg parks a front end loader in the driveway.

Our options are limited for moving out of state, because of Austin's pre-existing medical condition. We have individual insurance now that I purchased before I had children. Even if I found someone to cover Austin, it certainly wouldn't be for the rate we have NOW, which was based on us having no medical issues at all. Despite the trouble I've had in the past with my insurance and getting referrals, they've been fantastic about paying the bills.

Then I did some major research through the archives of the school district and discovered that three years ago our school was failing. In three short years, they went from failing to high achieving. Why? Was it a miracle? No. Because our zoning changed. Now our zoning is going back to the almost identical one that we had when our school was failing. Why? Because we have a new principal with no power.

Zoning here is political. The people with the loudest voice get the zoning they want and the people who are politically connected and active live West of us. You should see how the map went in their favor.

So here is my current plan. I am going to send the kids to kindergarten at our school. They'll be in the afternoon class and they don't bus in the afternoon. This way I can see what the zoning changes do to the school next year.

Then I will apply to all the magnet schools and see if any of them get in. I found out if you have multiples and one gets in, they'll take them all.

If that doesn't work, I have several options to "live" with people we know.

Do you think anyone will think it's weird that there is eight children and two wives in one house?

It may require a modest hair and wardrobe makeover for me and the kids to pull it off. Nancy? Can you do this hairstyle?

I will give up makeup and spiritually marry you if I have to.

Thank You God For The Weather

If I had my own phone line to God for requesting weather, I could not have special ordered a day more perfect than yesterday for my children's fifth birthday party.

It was the most beautiful winter day yesterday, in the high 60s. The high pressure air pollution gave everything an other-wordly golden haze. I like to think the golden haze was God winking at us.

My first born, Sarah.

Gregory

Amanda

Why isn't it my birthday again?

We had five sets of triplets at the party. Can I thank God again for the weather? Can you imagine if we had all been shoved in our house?

Scenes from the party. It was so much fun. These kids are growing up together. Watching them at this age was a pure delight.

We sang Happy Birthday to each one separately, which was really fun. I've never done that before and it was nice to give them each their "moment".
Amanda hid her face in her chair when everyone sang to her, because she was so embarrassed. It was so cute. (Why is Lucus flipping me off in this picture? Did you teach him that Don?)

Then it was time for the pinata. This is one of Misti's boys. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say this is Matt. I think I see Mike is in the trampoline in the background.

It was such a great day for the kids and for me and hopefully for everyone else too. I am really looking forward to this next year.

I've got so many emails to answer, but I think I need a day to recuperate from all this fun. Everyone took my crafting idea to heart and bought the kids tons and tons of really cool craft stuff, which they want to do all of them right now. (Thanks for the 10,000 beads and fingerpaint Laura! Is this payback because I got your boys BATS last year for their birthday?)

Thanks everyone for coming. I'm so happy to have you all as friends.

Let Them Eat Cake

Another triplet mom wrote once that she was eating in a restaurant with her trio, when a grown man approached her and announced that he, too, was a triplet.

After making conversation, the triplet mom asked the man what advice he could give her to help her raise her own children?

He thought about if for a minute, and then said, "Let them have their own birthday cake. I always wanted to have my own cake."

While it may appear the children wrote their own names on these cakes, I assure you that that's my handiwork. I can't imagine why I'm worried about their penmanship.

You've never seen such excitement over something so simple as choosing and helping make your very own birthday cake. This must be a luxury if you are a triplet.

"Let them have their own cake."

I can do that!