It's already almost five o'clock in the evening and I have barely accomplished anything today. Ron is in Elko, again, so I had to take the kids to school myself this morning. After dropping them off, I zipped over to Wal-Mart and picked up "Harry Potter & The Goblet of Fire", which I still haven't watched yet. I had just enough time to help my friend workout before I had to fly out of here to get Eric to his appointment with the doctor. We were fifteen minutes late. I hate being late. Anyway, he got a shot and I was prescribed antibiotics for my raging case of mastitis. That's right, folks; I have mastitis again.

Jack has been the world's biggest sweetheart for me today. He's been dragged all over creation and rushed around all morning, but he's been so good natured. We colored in an Elmo coloring book together (he loves Elmo), and ate fresh strawberries. He's been full of smiles and very talkative.

Eric, on the other hand, is miserable and is sharing his misery with the rest of us. He weighed in at 18 pounds this morning and officially has four teeth poking out of his gums. The little stinker is crawling everywhere these days. He crawls from one room to another now, but he often gets lost in the hallway and cries until someone rescues him. He's not letting me get much sleep because he's teething. It's a good thing he's cute.

Heidi got to play with her friend today while I had Eric at the doctor. I'm so glad that she finally has female friends. She and Clyde lifted light weights with me last night. Heidi used 2 to 3 pound dumbbells to do presses and curls, while Clyde had 5 pound ones. Most of the workout consisted of jumping jacks, push-ups and walking lunges. It was really fun. They're fighting over a Magic 8 Ball right now. Clyde asked "Will I get married someday?" and it said "Yes, Eventually". Heidi asked "Am I pretty?" but I didn't hear what the answer was. I don't care what the ball said, though. I already know the answer to that one.

Life is busy, but life is good. The kids were so wonderful yesterday and are doing pretty well today too. I have a few things I don't want to forget and that are worth sharing with loved ones. First off, Clyde was walking out to the van after school last week with a paper plate jellyfish that he'd made by gluing long flowing pieces of crepe paper streamers and curling ribbon. As he walked, the colorful 'tentacles' were blowing gracefully in the wind and he watched them with this completely elated look on his face. He was blissfully unaware of all the other kids milling around in front of the school. It was just him and his jellyfish walking in the breeze. As I watched him, I started feeling really sad. It occured to me that I was surprised to see him look like a little kid. He's grown up so much that I hadn't thought of him as a little boy in a long time. I'm glad we've been able to have so many fun adventures together, and I hope he remembers how much fun we've had even when he's in those horrible teenage years. Heidi did almost exactly the same thing to me last week as well. We were walking home from school on a glorious day and she was keeping step with some pre-teen girls walking about ten feet to her right. She was wearing her trendy hip hugger flare jeans (six slim because she's just a beanpole), a grey velour hoodie sweater with baby blue stripes down the arms, and her white & violet running shoes. Her gorgeous hair was flipped up at the bottom and bounced when she walked. I was quite a few steps behind her pushing the stroller (the girls she was staring at were walking pretty fast), and trying not to be disappointed that my little princess wants to be a teenager so badly. What is it about little girls? Boys are content to run around, get dirty and play hard while little girls want to play house, be pretend 'moms' and meet prince charming. They want to grow up so fast. This is such an amazing thing-- parenting. I wish I could slow time so that I could enjoy it longer.

Speaking of parenting, Jack just woke up from his nap, it's time to start dinner and Eric is starting to cry. Hey, type "Debbie bliss blanket" into the search thingie on Ebay and you can see my finished baby blanket that is up for auction right now. It's the only one that'll come up, I promise.