Henry and the Pee Bottle

Poor Henry!  He is the victim of one of my worst parenting fails to date.  But it sure makes for a good story so let me back up a bit.
Ever since Marcus was little, we've had a bottle in the van that the boys can use if they need to go to the bathroom while we're driving.  Typically it only gets used on long road trips.  Yes, I know it's gross that we have a "Pee Bottle" but you try driving 13-hours by yourself with a van full of boys.  It's torture!  I'll do anything to speed up the process, which means we only stop for gas.  While I'm gassing up, the boys know it's their chance to use the bathroom because our motto is "We stop for nothing!"  By the way, I think that's our only family motto.  How pathetic.
Last week I drove over to Barb's to borrow her power washer and took Henry with me.  Naturally, Barb and I got to talking and Henry passed the time playing around in the van.  I heard Henry start to cry and figured he bumped his head climbing over the seats or something.  When I opened the van door my nose was assaulted with a powerful smell.  I looked at Henry and knew instantly why he was crying.  He was holding the pee bottle and spitting and crying.  I was horrified!  Obviously somebody forgot to empty the bottle because Henry definitely didn't get a drink of water!
I can't even imagine how horrible it must have tasted but it was bad enough to make Henry cry.  I felt so bad for him but I had to take a picture before I scrubbed his mouth out with toothpaste.  I didn't know what else to do!  He happily cooperated and kept saying "Pee pee?" with a confused look on his face.  I told the brothers and of course they were so grossed out they couldn't even laugh.  Then they started arguing about who was to blame and none of them fessed up.  And none of them could remember the last time they used the bottle either.  I can't even think about it without cringing.  And laughing really hard.  Henry seems to be doing just fine though he hasn't forgotten about it like I had hoped he would.  Life with boys is never dull and usually gross.

 The Pee Bottle

 

My poor boy with pee all down the front of his shirt.  We are all scarred for life after this episode!

Stake Conference in my Pajamas

My life is forever changed.  Today was stake conference which means every six months we go to church and sit for 2 hours listening to our stake leaders.  It's great as an adult but horrible if you have kids and since I have five kids it's extra horrible.  My boys are usually antsy and asking "how much longer?" after about twenty minutes so the two hour meeting feels eternal.

Randy is in Utah for the weekend and I was dreading the thought of stake conference on my own but my friend/neighbor Barb, rescued me again.  She really is the best!  Her husband {named Randy} takes care of all the tech/video/broadcasting for stake conference so it can be streamed and viewed at 2 locations.  Barb emailed me the link enabling me to watch the live stream of stake conference from my house.  I watched conference in my pajamas, snuggling with my boys and enjoyed every minute of that 2-hour meeting.  It was amazing!  I wondered how something that wonderful could not be bad?  I mean it was just too good to be true.  But it was true!  Now my dilemma is how will I go back to sitting through stake conference at the church ever again?  It's like going back to dial-up internet.  Or black and white television.  Or horses instead of cars.  You get the idea.  But today I'm just thankful and so happy.

Landon wasted no time bringing in all the Legos and Ethan got extra comfy on the inflatable couch

Seeing my boys snuggling makes me happy

 Also, while we are on the subject of Sundays and church, I must share this story of the 2018 Epic Parent Fail.  A few weeks ago when Laura and her family was in town, we come home from church in three different cars.  Typically after church my boys come find me, begging and pulling on my arms to stop talking to my friends, and practically drag me to the parking lot.  This time was no different so I sent Landon to get Parker from his class as I rushed to gather up my things amidst the dragging and pulling.  I got out to the parking lot and all the kids rushed to jump in the cars and make the fastest exit possible.  We arrived home about fifteen minutes later and began our traditional Sunday lunch of grilled cheese sandwiches when Randy got a phone call informing him we had left Parker at church.  I freaked out.  Randy drove to Parker's very kind and hopefully not judgemental Primary teacher and picked up Parker.  When Parker got home, he walked right past me, throwing the picture at me that he made in Primary and burst into tears.  I immediately hugged him and apologized and hugged him some more and promised I'd never leave him again {fingers crossed}.  Once he calmed down I looked at his picture and almost started sobbing myself.  In his cute hand writing that I could barely decipher, it said:

Dear Mom, I love you  Thank you for loving me  Love Parker

Can you believe it?  Reading it was like being stabbed through the heart with a knife.  Seriously, I felt so bad.  I'm the worst.  The worst.  Now I know how the mom on Home Alone felt.  It's time to teach my kids what to do when they get left somewhere, not if.

I mean, who could forget this cute kid?  Me.  That's who. 

Happy Birthday, Henry!

Henry turned one!  Hooray!  Good thing he's too little to know what should happen on birthdays because we didn't do anything to celebrate his birthday on the actual day.  Well, I did tell him happy birthday, but that was it.   We were too busy having fun with Laura and her family who came to town.  We spent the afternoon at Pine Lake so the kids could experience paddle boarding and water trampolines, and then our friends took us boating on Lake Sammamish.  Ironically that night was also the first time since we opened our office that Randy had to see an emergency patient on a weekend which meant I had to assist him.  So we cut our boating experience short, raced home, threw on some scrubs, and ran over to the office while Marcus put Henry to bed. On his birthday.  Without a single present or birthday cake.  So now you know why I'm glad he won't remember his crappy first birthday.  Summer birthdays just plain stink.  And we have 4 of them in our family.  Ugh.
Here are some pictures of cute Henry sporting the one-year-old look.  We love him to pieces around here (even when he's fussy and clingy from having too many strangers around). 

catching some Z's on the boat

 The day after his birthday and I was too lazy to make him a cake so he got a giant Costco muffin with leftover homemade frosting from Randy's birthday cake.  It took him a minute to figure out his favorite muffin was under the frosting.

We quickly wrapped his ball in old Christmas wrapping paper.  I really outdid myself.

Grandma Great sent a gift that plays music so it is now Henry's most favorite toy.  This boy LOVES music!

His look of fear was due to the fact that he kept trying to touch the flame on the candle.

It's hard to be 1

Marcus shoved it in his face and then he cried. 

Eventually he figured out the goodness of cream cheese frosting and made quite the mess