The Random of Steph

It's amazing how fast a summer can fill with an event here and an event there, despite being a half a year away. We found ourselves needing to accommodate a family wedding, a family reunion, an epic solar eclipse and last but not least, the kids ever extending school year.   Snow days can create havoc in the future too it seems. Then there was conflict over where specifically to go.   I longed to go to Yosemite as it had been over a decade and the kids had never been there. Scott pointed out we had already been there.  Sage wanted to go to Yellowstone to see a geyser.  Scott pointed out we had been to Yellowstone several times and Sage had been once.    Sage called him out on that one.  She doesn't remember that trip.  Which seems accurate, since she was 2. Scott wanted to go to Glacier, where none of us had ever been.   We all would like to go to Glacier but there's a reason we hadn't been there before.  It's by nothing else. 'Lil...

Looking back, I'm not sure where it started.   Was it my husband's sabbatical for which we had no plans?  Was it the "every kid in a park" program?  (www.everykidinapark.gov)   I can't recall where the plan hatched or at which point my husband said yes.   Let's go on a national park camping trip when Sage is in 4th grade.  Let's plan a big trip. It's been in the works for so long I can't even recall where it started.   I know that is part of the reason we bought a minivan a year ago.   Not just a replacement minivan but one with roof racks, lower milage, a tow hitch and DVD player.   This was a roadtrip machine - not just a soccer mom van. It was last year as well, I purchased a book from the library foundation sale, a older edition of National Parks of the American West.   I read it.   I asked my family to look at it.   I begged my family to look at it.    Finally last Sept, Scott picked it up and said we shoul...

Because if finding a strange selfie of your kid on your phone doesn't sum up motherhood, I don't know what does.

Does anyone even blog these days?  Read blogs?   I mean, it was a thing.   A real thing and everybody had a blog.   I had a blog.   I guess I still have a blog.   This thing is a blog.  While we're on the subject, blog is such a weird word.   What does it even mean?  Who came up with it? I get derailed sometimes.  Sorry.   Or not sorry.   I've been thinking about blogs and decided they died with the popularity of Fbook.   Remember when you had to have a college address to get a fb account?   Now our parents are on fb.   My childhood babysitter is on fb.  And when I get fed up with fb as a platform and the way it can feel like "everybody look at me", I check myself and post pictures of the kids because the grandparents live in different states.   I know those pictures are part of the reason they joined fb in the first place.   As much as I would describe my relationship with fb as love/hate, the t...

I've postponed and avoided doing anything like one does in the evening by putting my kids in their room, tucking them in 3 to 4 times, and hoping on the computer to stalk Facebook and surf Pinterest and look at the emails I haven't done anything with and then plumb run out of steam to waste time.   Is that even possible? Today, the smallest one, my baby, my boy turned 3.  It was a lovely birthday from my perspective and the truth is that it doesn't take much to make him happy. It made me think I should celebrate this milestone with words.   It reminded me that I was going to write down his birth story, but I never did.  Three years later.   It reminds me that as he potty trains and grows more independent that it's getting easier.  My life is not as full of tending to really small children as it has been for the last five years or so.    I feel like I could handle another baby.   But there are no plans for another baby.   He is my bab...

Perhaps it's the new year but I've been itching to write. And not just any kind of writing, blog posts. Of course now that I'm here, I hardly know what to say. Perhaps we should make a list of the things going on in my head. And if it's too boring, feel free not the read. In fact feel free to unfollow me. Not that I take up too much space, posting every year or so. :) - I like Dr. Pepper. A lot. All of a sudden. It's like a pregnancy craving that comes on with no rhyme or reason. I'm not pregnant. I just really like Dr. Pepper. - Both the kids went down for a nap with no crying. I think the stars aligned. I'm not sure what happened. All I know is they've both been sleeping for over an hour and I've got time to write a blog post. Because I really don't want to get up and clean. - Perhaps it was the HGTV we watched at my in-laws. But we are reorganizing, redecorating and cleaning out this house. We are motivated in a...