hinckley house

a little something

2009-11-08T17:26:00.002-05:00

hoping to re-enter blogland soon. (susan, i've a read a few of your posts - will comment as soon as i catch up on more of your musings.)

for now, this picture at sarahjane explains how i feel lately. when did time start to go by so fast? i've started to continually beg my kids to "stop growing" for which they just laugh in my face or flat out ignore me. it was also pointed out to me about a month ago (by a dear, but honest friend) that i am now old enough to be the mother of a missionary. where has the time gone? while i can't say that i want to go back and relive much (except maybe when i wrote evan's name on his birth certificate), i feel a growing desire to slow down and savor moments more. now i just need to put that in action and stop let's say arguing with my 10 year old over the timing of a song which just might have happened yesterday when we were practicing for our an upcoming talent show!

the color of the week

2009-10-18T17:42:00.002-04:00

ok, boys and girls, here at the hinckleyhouse the color of this past week wasss..........

orange

as evidenced when i dyed lily's socks orange for her halloween costume....

or when i dyed this girl's hair orange for her halloween costume....

...and for when i completed my second half-marathon on oct. 10, 2009. ING sponsors the hartford marathon and their signature color is orange. among other things, we all got orange sunglasses which pat and i are sporting in this post-race pic. i have to say if you are feeling depressed, put on some orange sunglasses. they really brighten your view. it's fun seeing the world through orange.

p.s. just for the record, jake's wheelchair is also orange.

race day

2009-10-18T17:37:00.002-04:00

here are some race day pics that do NOT include me.

pat and the kids arrived early in the morning with me so that they could get parking (and wouldn't have to park in the next town over like last year).

fritzy ready to cheer

i guess the kids got to say "hi" to a fridge at the park. lily didn't want to meet the fridge.

at bushnell park again ...my dad graciously came down to help pat with the kids.

my dad, the kids and pat cheered me on from 3 different places on the race course. it's a great feeling having people cheer you on - even complete strangers.

the kids ready to cheer at the starting line which somehow ended up as the last pic for this post. (as always, no finish line pics of me.)

birthday present

2009-09-27T21:18:00.002-04:00

pat's birthday was this past saturday. for his birthday, my good friend, analia, and i negotiated and then bought him his dream car - a mini-cooper S. i got to sing "big guy in a little car" (think chris farley in "tommy boy") to him and feel like i've assured his happiness for at least the next 10 years or so. here are some pics from when we picked the car up. my parents and my niece were with us (hence the extra child in the pics). later, my parents watched all the kids so we could take a drive and go out to eat.

diddle, diddle

2009-07-08T17:43:00.003-04:00

diddle, diddle, dumpling, my son, jake

was dressed for school after he did wake

with one shoe off and one shoe on,

he was sent to school like dumpling john

and while this rhyme is a tad bit lame,

it's there to show that mom's to blame,

and sometimes she just does not think,

and dad must give her a knowing wink...

(...after he comes home for lunch and sees jake's shoe on the floor. have i mentioned that a week ago sunday, we had to drive 2 hours round trip to retrieve my purse at a restaurant in rhode island? fun times at the hinckley household!!!)

lessons learned

2009-06-30T13:58:00.007-04:00

we returned home from our vacation to wisconsin on father's day a week ago sunday. since then i've downloaded 300+ pictures on my computer, met up with my sister-in-law & her family in new york city and went to an air show at a military base in rhode island where we saw the blue angels, canadian snowbirds and the F-22 raptor perform.

i still need to go through my pics of our vacation, but am all set to blog about our day in new york. my wonderful sister and her two kids agreed to take the train with me to NYC so i could meet up with pat's sister's family. it was an adventureous day, but a good one nonetheless. i used to have a poster that said: "all i ever need to know i learned in new york." while i can't say i learned many life lessons on our little adventure, i did gain many other tidbits of wisdom such as:

new york city is much more wheelchair friendly than paris. however, the man at the information booth at grand central station is not aware of this. new york locals are much more aware of which subway stations have elevators. this doesn't help when you have already gotten off the subway and are trying to exit.

if in a pinch, i can take jake's wheelchair (with jake in it) up an escalator.

it might, just might, be easier to drive into NYC and find parking for a vehicle that needs 9 ft. clearance than navigate the subways.

you can fit a wheelchair, folded up double stroller, two adults, and five additional children in a very, tiny elevator.

don't get off the elevator unless you are sure that you are on the correct floor (especially when you have all the aforementioned things in tow.)

do follow that prompting to grab those rain poncho things that they gave you in niagara falls even though the weather forecast said no rain. (this was learned the hard way.)

don't take your kids to a playground with a water park when you are expecting your amazingly talented sister-in-law to take pictures of them. (it really wasn't that big of a deal).

most new yorkers are willing to show their big hearts when they see someone needs help. (i.e. making room for a wheelchair in the subway, giving up their seats for the kids in the subway, helping you find the elevator to exit when you look lost, offering to help you find a subway station w/an elevator, just opening the door themselves and setting off an alarm when they see you waiting for someone to come open the gate so you can exit, suggesting an inexpensive chinese restaurant to eat at when you are trying to get out of the rain, etc....) we'll just ignore the two ladies who immediately pressed the close doors button after entering a (rather large) elevator; they didn't look like they were from new york.

unfortunately i forgot my camera in the car at the train station, but my sister-in-law was all set to take pics. i had her do some of grace since i didn't have her do school pics this year. despite some craziness, we had a great time with annie and brian and especially enjoyed seeing their kids. (although i have no pics of jane.)

i put this pic in just so you could see what annie had to deal with. fritzy worked hard to keep a frown on his face (even when i pretended to be shot in the bum) and lily was picking a scab in most of the others!

i like this one a lot!!! it truly is amazing that annie got such a great shot in the very brief period of no rain.

evan likes to do lots of martial art like poses.

i mentioned there was a water park, right?

annie's boy with my sister's girl

family day & the wonders of facebook

2009-05-30T22:44:00.014-04:00

before we headed off to family day for pat's work today, i remorsed on facebook about how i would be missing our friends who usually join us for family day, but currently live in japan. anyhoo, scott (the dad) read that statement a mere 6 minutes later and called to say he was in town on business. he was able to come with us. we had a blast even though we missed his family dearly. -APRIL, COLLEEN, BRIDGET & ASHLYNN - wish you could have been there too!!

here's a pic of scott with jake. scott was one of jake's first teachers at church when we moved to ct seven years ago.

lily was first on the bungee jump swing. here she is ready to take off.

the rest of us waiting for our turn. (note the scowl on gracie's face. she thinks it the greatest injustice that i tend to make the older child wait and the younger ones go first).

lily in mid-air.

fritz, all geared up.

fritz in the air. if you look up from him and a little over to the left, you can see grace doing a flip.

i have absolutely no idea how much cotton candy my kids consumed this year. it's all they asked for; their wish was often granted. other times, a certain 5 year old would just sneak to the cotton candy booth while we thought she was playing in the playground.

ready for the rock wall.

lily did really well on the wall and actually climbed up a good distance for her age.

first swim of the season.

so, exactly how much cotton candy was consumed? ...enough to totally hide gracie's face, multiple times...

...enough to make a beard...

...and enough to make your kids go like this the minute you get in the car.

truth be told, there are lots of actions shots of me today; i played volleyball, did the bungee swing, climbed the rock wall and flipped off the diving board. another little or rather large truth would be that i've gained 40 lbs since i went to family day last may. it's still kind of schock when i see current pictures of myself with all the extra padding. so when we got home and downloaded pics, the plethora of pics of overweight me in so many mid-air shots had me in stitches from laughter - just imagine a beached whale trying to do a back flip in the water. (now i know fat jokes are not appropriate and i steer away from them - but it's ok, when you're talking about yourself, right?) while i got a good laugh out of those pics, i'm not humble enought to post them. this one pic of me almost reaching the top of the rock wall was actually decent (or rather hid my weight) enough to post.

oh, and come next spring, if i haven't lost the weight, will someone please remind me to try and restrain myself on the diving board? thanks.

science fair

2009-05-28T10:46:00.002-04:00

grace and her partner, darien, won the science fair for their grade at school and placed 2nd in the whole district. her project was testing the different forces that affect flight. after reading their results, pat was a little worried how reliable the testing was, but the girls came up with a good question and evaluated their experiments well. they also did the project on their own. pat got them started, but the rest was all them.

the girls with their teacher when they presented their project to the district for judging.

lily "patiently" waiting to hear what gracie's award will be.

getting their trophies - 2nd place - beat out by the tooth enamel experiment.

the girls with their trophies, awards and younger siblings.

grace also won her first math bowl and is now off to compete against another school next week. pat and i do find it interesting that she is a top math and science student at a performing arts school. that might help, but the girl is genuinely smart and has always had a burning curiousity and love of learning that i hope remains with her throughout her life.

memorial day weekend

2009-05-28T09:16:00.012-04:00

we had a great memorial day weekend filled with outdoor walks, exploration, quiet time, puzzles, mud, canoeing, s'mores & visits with family & friends. could you ask for anything more?

we took the scenic route on the drive up where we crossed three covered bridges, lily "saw china" and i saw a sign with the words: "3 kids for sale" on it (drove by too fast to actually read the descriptions of the kids). a third generation "harry belafonte fan" was solidified as that was all gracie listened to on the drive up and back; (i believe harry belafonte was pretty much required listening when pat was growing up.)

we spent the weekend at my good friend from high school (darlene)'s house near montpelier, vermont. darlene and her husband were gone the first couple of days, but caught up with us on monday. sunday was spent visiting with our niece, chelsea, and her husband. chelsea just graduated from vermont law school. saturday was spent on the stowe recreational path (after both pat and i took turns having late morning naps). the pictures pretty much tell the rest -

who knew a little foot bridge could be so much fun? i think we spent a good 20 minutes here while we walking the recreational path in stowe.

jake with a swollen bug bite at the top of his nose. we weren't in vermont for more than a few hours before he had a bite. the bugs have always loved him, poor guy. (when mosquitoes get in our car, i go after them with a passion that verges on maniacal because i worry they will just bite jake).

we also found a museum (??fine art store) off the path. it had a sculpture garden and fun stuff inside like this couch made of nickles.

one of dar's cats, harry, totally clinged to us when she was gone. we were fully prepared to be completely ignored when dar returned on monday.

chelsea and jake came over to eat dinner and roast marshmallows on sunday. they are cute couple and we've enjoyed getting to jake better through these visits. he's a good guy which chelsea more than deserves.

we were able to complete 3 of the 4 american girl mystery puzzles. i was a little disappointed that the clues to solve the mystery were just written on the puzzle in glow-in-the-dark paint. i would have preferred a more challenging and subtle approach, but the puzzles were enjoyable to do nonetheless. during the first puzzle, grace did abandon me for other things (in fairness to her it was after a good amount of helping). it just reminded me of all the times, i had abandoned my dad on puzzles while growing up and came back after he had made progress to help finish things off. sorry, dad! but no worries, i'm getting my just desserts now.

on monday, we went to the beachfront near dar and gerry's house. they have a canoe and we had fun going out on it. lily was scared to be on the canoe at first, but soon changed her mind and enjoyed it.

the men with the kiddos.

fact of life #241: kids always gravitate to mud, n'est pa?

dar and i holding our own in the canoe. we had done canoe trips together when we were teenagers (CUE "Memories" music - not "Memory from "Cats" - but the other one - doesn't barbara streisand sing it?).

jake fell asleep on the blanket and got a sunburn on the part of his arm that we left exposed.

grace and i went out together after this pic was taken. we did well until some high winds kicked in and struggled getting back to shore. but we made it once the wind died down - only to find out that dar was the only one who had faith in us returning. THANKS for the vote of confidence, DAR!!!!

THANK YOU!!

2009-05-22T16:08:00.003-04:00

my brother, jim, and his wife, amy, sent the whole lot of us birthday cards - (well, the whole lot of us who had birthdays). he gave each of the kids a dollar bill for how old they were (cute) and drew pics on the envelope. for my birthday card, he called me a dork and misspelled birthday, but it's ok - i still love him!

THANKS FOR MAKING OUR DAY, JIM & AMY!!!!

daily laugh

2009-05-12T15:05:00.004-04:00

my brother and sister-in-law sent this to me this morning. the text at the end of this commercial translates as: "your teeth also want to be white." enjoy!!!

still don't get it? maybe this next one will help.

for tice

2009-05-11T19:16:00.002-04:00

i just had the following conversation with your son:

tycen (handing me a wrapper): "here's garbage."

me: "thank you, buddy!"

tycen: "my name is tycen."

hope that made you smile since i certainly did.

for stacey

2009-05-10T09:26:00.011-04:00

...and megan, you would like this too, and probably any of my "wicked" (as in the musical, folks) loving friends - Chess in concert is coming to PBS in june!!!

i've been watching horrible copies of this on youtube for months. sooooo glad it's finally ready to be released. i have to admit josh groban is not my favorite voice, but i think kerry ellis' voice is as beautiful as idina menzel. i will definitley be watching.

FOUND!!

2009-05-03T18:58:00.002-04:00

...in the nursery, under the table, crammed well by the arms of one little boy and found by the loving care of a special nursery teacher. hallelujah!!!

easter in cali

2009-04-30T14:10:00.004-04:00

what are you looking at in the pic below? that would be 5,000 easter eggs scattered around the lawn. (yes, that is the correct amount of zeros.) my aunt and uncle took fritzy and i to the most amazing easter egg hunt while we were in california.

everyone was split into teams and given a huge garbage bag. the eggs had colored coins in them, not candy; some eggs were special prize eggs. here's everone gathered getting the low down. the woman in pink is one of the planners who does these hunts annually. they're goal for next year: 6,000 eggs!

everyone lined up ready to go. it was a very fun sight.

on your mark, get set, GO!!!

a special area was designated for fritzy so he didn't get trampled. i think the next oldest kid was 7 years old.

cleaning up the yard.

he sure enjoyed himself!

all the eggs your team collected were thrown in one big bag and weighed as teams. the team with the biggest weight, won. (previous years, they had everyone open and sort coins worth various points according to color.) everyone who came to the party was asked to bring a gift basket. the winning team got first choice, and so on until everyone had a basket. i believe fritzy's team came in third. he was very happy with the basket my aunt and uncle got him.

good witch again

2009-04-29T08:02:00.008-04:00

after smoldering temperatures and feeling like i was the wicked witch of the west (read "i'm melting!") for the past few days, the temperatures have finally cooled down here and there is even a freeze advisory in effect for tonight!! hallelujah!

in other news, this past sunday was one of those "horrible, terrible, no good, very bad days." my hubby was out of town so i brought all the kids to church on my own.

to recap, it was the first day of the heat wave and i hate heat waves especially when they are disrupting my spring, i had to change jake's pants and diaper and clean up a huge puddle right as i told everyone head to the car, my soon to be three year old colored with a black crayon on the pew and wall while i was listening to a talk during sacrament meeting, 20 bazillion wipes couldn't take the crayon off and realized i would have to go home after church and get goo-gone, i had to separate an actual group wrestle among my younger three kids during sacrament meeting, my five year old didn't show london and france but definitely showed a bunch of people in manchester her underpants during said wrestle, i let my 2 year old go to nursery with his special blanket because i was just relieved he was actually going to go without a fight and i had to teach mother's day songs in primary, i was crabby while teaching those songs, ran home after church to get goo gone and other cleaning supplies, cleaned off the walls and pew in the chapel while trying to discourage my two year old from using microphone on the stand, gathered all the kids in the car and realized we do not know where aforementioned special blanket is, search the church twice looking for said blanket, finally leave church somewhat surprised how calm two year old is, actually start to leave church parking lot without blanket and two year old starts screaming, i think how wise i am that i have gotten him attached to two blankets and that he will be fine when i get him home to his other blanket, two year old wants nothing to do with other blanket and screams for the next hour while i call every mom of a baby at church and ask if they accidentally took home his blankie, was very crabby with husband on the phone when he calls that evening, forgot to watch my favorite show and i never forget to watch my show, finally give in and turn on the air conditioners on april 26th!!!

the good news is that i was in bed reading by 9 pm that night, felt quite justified in turning on air conditioners considering what a bad day it had been, watched my show on monday (thank you cbs for finally putting amazing race episodes online), fritzy has been using his other blankie without complaint ever since his hour long "grieving" period, the kids and i were all seated while the prelude music for sacrament meeting was still playing and i was actually complemented by a dad at church at how quietly my children wrestled (that's a good thing, right?)!

the bad news is that fritzy's blanket is still MIA (sorry tice, it wasn't outside). hopefully, it will be in the lost and found when we return to church.

for tice and natalie..

2009-04-29T07:51:00.003-04:00

or any other mom of a 8-10 year old daughter or son who has had the pleasure of seeing high school musical, i got a good laugh out of this clip.

twilight necklaces

2009-04-09T09:49:00.003-04:00

for my twilight loving friends (hello, nat - i'm talking to you), go check out my friend stacey's blog. she's selling some mighty cute (and inexpensive) necklaces right now.

here comes the sun

2009-04-09T09:37:00.003-04:00

i'm in sunny california with fritzy to visit family. although it's not sunny, it's raining! not quite sure how i managed to hit california when it was raining, but i certainly haven't packed right for it. hopefully, it warms up soon. (when i asked my aunt last week, she said it was sunny and in the 70s.) anyhoo, i return next tuesday. have a happy easter everyone!

MI-5

2009-04-06T16:15:00.004-04:00

pat and i watched the season finale for season 3 of MI-5 last night. MI-5 (or spooks at the brits call it) loves explosive season finales, but this was the biggest ride so far. boy, it took me a while to settle down after watching it.

might i say one of the best things about MI-5 is that it first starred mr. darcy from the keira knightley pride and prejudice, then when he left the show, they replaced him with frederick from materpiece theatre's persuasion. really, does life get better than that?

post edit: ok, and when i went to look up the website for MI-5, it appears that now mr. thornton from north and south is also a regular. i sooo want to meet the casting director for this series!

p.s. you can watch "north and south" and "MI-5" instantly on netflix.

february break

2009-04-03T09:13:00.005-04:00

in all my catching up on five months worth of blogging, i forget to mention my girls trip in february. my parents took the girls with them on their annual skiing trip to utah. they stayed with pat's mom and were able to build great memories with the hinckley side of the family (and mine too).

my parents took the girls skiing for a few days. this was gracie's third year, and lily's first. lily was fearless (as usual) and ate it all up (as shown by pic on the collage below - i just love that smile.)

from what i hear, grace is doing quite well on skies; although, she is a more cautious child than lily - or should i say more reasonable child?

waiting to get on the lift with papa.

skiing down the mountain with nanna.

all geared up; ready to go.

my brother and his wife came down from idaho and the girls had a wonderful time goofing off with them. this might be a good time to mention that gracie's nickname "gigi" comes from abbreviating the phrase "gracie goofball."

one of the biggest highlights of the whole trip was to go babysit cousin mallory twice a week. seriously, the girls loved doing this and was always one of the top two things out of their mouths when asked what their favorite part of the trip was. looking at the picture below explains it. mallory has the sweetest disposition to match that face.

other highlights include decorating pottery with aunt carolyn, then being joined by cousin kait for a movie. of course, playing with nanna jean's (hinckley) amazing collection of dress-ups.

the girls took an overnight flight home. so we just went and got them at my parents' house the next morning. i was so giddy to see them that i felt like a kid on christmas morning. we even ended up waking them up because we couldn't wait any longer.

i always send the girls with money that i never see again. i don't think they ever need to use it with so many grandparents around to spoil them, but they do always come home with a sweet little token for us.

fritzy enjoyed the attention of being home with just mom and jake more than i thought he would. he was glad to see his sisters though when they returned.

april fool's

2009-04-03T08:37:00.003-04:00

we had a fun april fool's day. i made this mock sushi to celebrate, but opted for no pranks. (much to my dad's dismay, i'm sure. my father attended a college known for its grand scale pranks, and was seriously proud when i almost inadvertently incurred a $200 fine for one of my college pranks at byu. his parents actually paid $200 worth of damages for one of his pranks while he was in college, but that's a story for another day.)

the sushi was actually rice krispies treats with gummy worms in side and a fruit roll-up wrapped around it.

something only the kids would enjoy. (i ate just the rice krispy part.)

when grace came home from school, she declared how happy she was that i hadn't said what i always say on april fool's day yet. i went totally blank on what she could be talking about and after pestering her for a while she finally told me. yes, she was so right. i almost always walk around on april fool's day saying "it is my day to fool everyone else. no one can try to fool me." it's a good thing that i didn't say that this year as amanda totally fooled me. i'm actually embarassingly gullible as was evident when i tried to make this thai soup recipe last night. i couldn't find the thai seasoning that the recipe called for. after doing some research, i found that fish sauce was a common ingredient in thai food; so i bought it and tried to make my own variety of the soup. i was extremely gullible to think that i would tolerate fish sauce in a meal when i dislike fish. i used half the amount the recipe called for and still felt like i needed to drink a whole bottle of pepto bismal 2 hours later. luckily, i hadn't put the chicken and veggies in yet, so i just dumped the soup down the drain and started over with a tried and true mexican recipe i like. so anyone (who lives near me) want some fish sauce?

oh, and to conclude, i thought i would put a pic of my april's fool. (zucchini courtesy of my sister's garden).

a must see

2009-03-31T15:48:00.007-04:00

let me preface what i am about to write by stating that i never cry in movies. (it usually takes "shirley maclaine in terms of endearment type of acting" to get me to shed tears unless of course, i'm pregnant- but i digress.) this past weekend, pat and i thoroughly enjoyed lars and the real girl. i had wanted to see this movie when it came out, but abstained because i was worried of the nature of the jokes based on the premise; it's about a shut-in man who orders a "special" doll over the internet. i decided to put the movie on my netflix queue after i read a great review from a blog i love to read. first off, this movie is totally clean!!! except for the real nature of the doll, it is a PG movie. (the real nature is hardly referenced and certainly not how the doll is treated in the movie.) but that is not why i loved this movie. it is ultimately a movie about the goodness of people. you get the feeling that lars lives in a frozen tundra, but yet you want to move to this place immediately because of the sense of community and goodness in the people's hearts. it is all done so beautifully - the movie truly is surreal at times. after first laughing hysterically when he introduces his "friend" to his brother and sister-in-law, i found myself with silent tears running down my face through the remainder of the movie. you can find mr. ebert's review here. let me know if you've seen it or watch it and what you think!!!

beginning of mr. ebert's review: How do you make a film about a life-sized love doll, ordered through the Internet, into a life-affirming statement of hope? In "Lars and the Real Girl," you do it with faith in human nature, and with a performance by Ryan Gosling that says things that cannot be said. And you surround him with actors who express the instinctive kindness we show to those we love.

post edit: and to state the obvious in case you don't know me, i'm not pregnant; those tears were genuine.

spring break

2009-03-29T17:49:00.003-04:00

grace has been off of school this past week. we've had a relaxing week of not getting up too early (still had to get jake to school, but his bus is later), watching movies together, reading, playgroup, playing outside when it was warm enough and a special lunch date with dad on friday. on thursday night, i took lily and her to the ballet. the russian national ballet performed "cinderella" at nearby UConn. it has been a long time since i saw a professional ballet (usually see local productions). i had forgotten how a ballet company has such fluidity and at times the whole motion on stage flows with the music. it had also been a while since i've seen a ballet that seem to have male dancers to spare - and everyone of those male dancers could have been greek statues their muscles were that pronounced (except for the one played the stepmother -that is- we never saw his legs!)

here is a picture from the website. i have to say the prince holding cinderella's hand in this is NOT the prince she falls in love with.

spring hike

2009-03-29T17:23:00.006-04:00

yesterday was so beautiful, we went on a little family hike. shoes were muddied before pat and i could get the jogging strollers together. the kids also spotted this snake by the creek and called us to look. we came across a much more aggressive snake later on a walk that gave us some good arches before slithering away.

who knew my kids were such posers? we had quite the photo shoot on the way up.

reaching the summit (if you can call it that; i do live in the northeast, people!)

i experimented with the light while i took pics of grace. gracie would have definitely been one of those pioneer children "who sang as they walked and walked and walked" - which is what she did. (i would've been too for that matter, as would my mother. i have fun memories of singing "the band played on" with my mother while we walked places when i was a kid.)

Quote of the hike:

lily after just slipping on a log: "mommy, you know why i fell?"

grace: "lily, you fell because there was not enough friction."

ok, then.