Who Invited Them?

Thursday was the annual Hadlock Family Reunion. This is the "Be Seen At" event of the year. Mountains are moved and miracles are created to be at this party. One person showed up five (5!) days after giving birth a few years ago. Short of death or a freak summer BYU football game, there are no other excuses as to why you can't be there. Trust me. I know. Because we drove all the way home from our honeymoon without stopping so we could catch the end of the reunion eight (8!) years ago. Unfortunately, we couldn't find where it was, so we didn't make it afterall. And another year, a concert I desperately wanted to attended was scheduled for the same night. We didn't have Josh yet, it is Wade's family, I thought I'd be okay with just a one hour appearance at the reunion, but I was nearly shunned for the entire year for picking the concert over the reunion. I have come to accept the family reunion as a yearly must-do event.

The actual planning stage begins in January when a family member treks, barefoot, in the snow, uphill both ways to the Parks and Recreation Department to schedule the exact pavillion we need for our familial needs. Then, beginning in March, Wade's dad reminds us nearly every time he sees us of the date for the reunion. Sometimes, I like to play dumb:

"June 25? What's going on then?" or:

"Hey, did you hear we're going on vacation from June 24 to June 26?"

It's great to see his eyes widen in disbelief that we would schedule something over an event so spectacular and amazing as the family reunion.

On Memorial Day, we have a precursor reunion at Wade's parents house. A sort of trial run after visiting grandpa at the cemetary. This sets the stage for our actual family reunion a month later. Warms us all up for the upcoming festivities. It's not advised to come into this reunion cold.

So comes June 25 (though the date changes, it's always in the later part of June and on a Thursday). We make our way to the park pavillion that is rightfully ours, thanks to our fearless family member that risked life and limb on their hike to the Parks and Recreation Department six months prior.

There's not a lot that's organized about the event--we sit around and talk quite a bit, have a few pick up games--but over the years we've added a few staples. Every family is responsible for their own lunch. Then we have a snow cone station set up.

It should be noted that I LOVE snow cones and sometimes wonder if this is the whole reason I show up year after year. Well, that and good company, of course, because I could just buy my own snow cone machine for $20 at Wal-mart. I try to keep myself to four or five snowcones, but I have, in years past, been known to top out at eight or nine. I wasn't feeling so hot this year, so I stopped at two.

Other stations include the game station and the sleeping station.

Over the years we've added activities to our reunion. There's a horseshoe pit where the guys (and a few girls) take turns throwing crescent shaped metal objects at big sticks stuck in the ground. It looks to me to be a very difficult game given how far the stick is and the accuracy in which you have to throw the object, but there is a core group of relatives that really enjoy this game and are surprisingly good at it.

There's water balloon volleyball that has taken on a whole new level of competitiveness over the years. What was once a nice, friendly game has turned into a death match. I opted to stay out this year. This event is usually followed by a water fight instigated by Wade or his brothers--all of whom are 30 or older (well, almost 30, but still...). I don't think it happened this year. If it did, Wade made it out pretty unscathed.

Wade's sister rents a cotton candy machine and we all pig out on even more sugar. (I try to make half of my snow cones using the sugar free syrup to lessen the sugar poisioning that always befalls me after the reunion). Then someone cooks "Tuffies", which is a homage to Grandma's meager upbringing where they ate fried bread a lot.

Every year, we have a few unsuspecting souls try to barge in on our gathering. They figure since it's such a big lawn and there's so many people, four more won't make a difference. But we Hadlocks, we know our kind and we can sniff out imposters. So, our designated bouncer will amble over to the offenders and scoot them off our land.

This year was no different. I saw four people casually walk over to our area. At first glance, they were an odd collection of souls. They could've been a family out for a nice picnic on a Thursday afternoon, but they didn't really look like that's what they were doing. For starters, they were all wearing badges. Is it necessary to have name tags when there's only four of you? So I thought maybe they were co-workers out for a nice lunch hour. But why the pavillion at the park that's tucked away? I watched our "bouncer" talk to them and they turned around and walked back the way they came. I returned to my conversation and then noticed the group reappearing with a small folding table and an ice chest. I was very interested in this turn of events because in years prior we've never allowed anyone to infringe on our reunion space.

Out in the open land, they set up shop. Such a bizarre collection of items they brought. I was intrigued. It was after Wade's uncle called over everyone who was blood related that I realized two things: (a) in the 15 minutes since I'd shown up, I already had a blog entry, which allowed me to relax and enjoy the event without having to fabricate a story and (b) we now have a new activity to add to our annual repertoire.

Genetic Testing.

That's right. Just when I thought the family couldn't get any weirder someone invites phlebotomists to the reunion. Wade's uncle, who has pulmonary fibrosis, invited a group from the U of U who was researching the condition and if it was hereditary to come to our family reunion to test the relations. Grandpa and Grandpa's brother both had it as well.

I have been to many a family reunion in my time. I have been to some very strange family reunions. But never have I been to a reunion where people were giving blood. There are few things more awesome than having phlebotomists show up at your family reunion to draw blood. It was like our own little tribute to Twilight. I can't wait until next year to see what testing we (by "we" I mean, those blood related. Since I married in, I'm exempt, but it's fun to watch everyone else) will endure. I'm all for seeing who REALLY is a Hadlock.

Camper Confessions

You are doing something wrong if your camping trip doesn't end with a visit to InstaCare.

Cue why I don't particularly like to camp. Camping does not bring fond memories of my childhood back to me. We went three times growing up. Once, when I was about 18 months old, and I touched all the dead fish that had washed up onto the shore and then subsequently spent the next two days puking my brains out. The experience scarred my mom so bad (since my twin brother was doing the same thing on the other side of the van on our way to the closest motel) that we didn't go again until I was nearly a teenager. Then we went twice in consequtive years. I don't recall anything bad happening. It was a lot of fun. But my dad isn't much of an outdoors kind of guy and my mom hated the organization of it all and the rest of us just didn't care that much and so we didn't go after that. We went to Europe and Mount Rushmore and Nauvoo instead. Much more my type of vacationing.

When I married Wade, we spent a lot of time backpacking, though we did do some car camping on occassion. And, since starting to have kids, we've fallen into a routine where we get out once a year with friends. It's plenty for me.

Four things that I hate are being cold, not feeling well, lack of sleep, and all of the above happening at the same time.

Thursday, we headed up camping with Wade's brother, his brother's family and some mutual friends of which we all have an intertwining friendship with. Despite my misgivings with camping, I realize that it was an important part of pretty much everyone else's life growing up and so I try to go along with it. I like what Wade's co-workers from India say: You spend all this time and money to get a good job so you can get a good home and then for fun you want to go spend the weekends living in primative conditions and sleeping in tents?

Thursday, during the day, I felt the beginnings of a bladder infection coming on. I get them fairly frequently and I know of a few tricks to keep the symptoms at bay. Unfortunately, it had already progressed past that point. However, we've been planning this trip for a while and I had spent a lot of money at Wal-mart (camping isn't cheap, no matter what anyone says) and I didn't want to disappoint, so I kept my mouth (mostly) shut. I thought maybe I could flush it out with a lot of water.

Um...no.

At the risk of sounding a little like grandma's monthly newsletter that goes into a lot of detail about these kind of things (hey, it's a small town, she's 89, there's not a lot going on. A bladder infection could really be the highlight of the month. Don't judge) I'll spare you the details except to say that the symptoms only got worse when I was sitting, standing, or laying down. In short, I was pretty miserable.

I awoke yesterday morning after not having slept all that much (note to self: don't wear watch to bed when camping) and stumbled my way through the day. The rain (lots and lots of rain) didn't help my mood any and I was only feeling worse by the hour. Come nightfall, coupled with being cold and wet and already tired, I was not a happy camper. At 3:15 in the morning, I sat up in our tent and annouced to Wade that I hated camping and I was miserable. Wade, to his credit, sweetly replied, "what's wrong, honey?" I, taken back by such a sweet-natured response to his obviously crazy wife, calmly replied back that I was done with the rain (hello? Three weeks of rain?), I didn't feel good, and I wanted to go home. I stopped short of crying for my mommy, but don't think the thought didn't cross my mind. I believe Wade even muttered something about my hormones, which deserved a smack at the least, but I was too cold and miserable to venture over to his side of the tent.

Come to find out, Wade doesn't even remember the conversation. He was apparently sleep talking, which would explain his sweet reply to my crazy rant. But not his "hormone induced" comment.

After another sleepless night, I emerged from the tent and made my way for the upteenth time to the bathroom. My body finally screamed "you nimwit, get some help before I really make this miserable" (details aren't necessary, but it was blatantly obvious things were in fact going to get a lot worse) and Wade and I scrambled to get our gear packed and home. We would've stopped at InstaCare on the way, but remember how bad you smell once you leave the campsite? You love the smell of the campfire when you're sitting in it's wake, but as soon as you're packed away in the car, you realize that it's a very revolting smell. So, after showering, I made a trip back into Salt Lake and InstaCare and now get the added benefit of orange sweat, and pee--a side effect of the medication.

A note of apology to my fellow campers, of which I was especially cranky with this morning. Wade knew I was having a bit of a problem, but I don't think he realized how bad it really was. Other than that, I'm not sure anyone else picked up on it, and just thought that I was having a terrible time with camping in general. Which I wasn't. I was actually having a lot of fun except for this minor wrench in the plans. And so an apology for being the wet blanket on everyone's morning.

It's Official!

It's official! I have hereby been certified as a Mathematician from the University of Utah.

And trust me, if they gave ME a degree in mathematics, they'll apparently give ANYONE a degree in mathematics.

I got my diploma in the mail just this very day. I ripped it open and spread out my piece of paper and reveled in the knowledge that I do not ever have to step foot on the campus of the University of Utah ever again.

Until my son, the Doogie Howser M.D. of Tooele County, graduates from medical school in 12 years. Of course, he'll go to John Hopkins...

So, no, I never have to set foot on campus ever again.

Wait, I run an annual 5k on campus in September every year...so other than that little jaunt down memory lane...

I'M DONE!!!!!

Night Owl, Early Bird

It's been established that I am not a morning person. Wade can attest to this when the job falls to him to awaken me for 9:00 church. I have been blessed with children who are not early birds as well, and in the perfect world this is an ideal situation.

However, in my perfect world, I have a ripped and toned body that can cross a 5k in under 25 minutes and can qualify for Boston. I'm far from this dream, but I'm trying to get my body on board. And so I've found a few friends with the same goals and we're trying to get there together. But that means that exercising has to come when we can all do it.

After factoring in husband work schedules, kids and babysitters, husbands in school and in scouts and everything else, our exercising schedule looks a little like this:

Monday: Swim at 5:45 am. Track intervals at 9:30 am (because we can bring our kids and let them run around).
Tuesday: Tempo (faster than normal) run of between 3 and 8 miles starting at 6-6:30 and lasting a half hour to an hour and a half, depending on the mileage.
Wednesday: Swimming at 5:45 am.
Thursday: Road Biking at 6:30 am. 1 hour
Friday: Long run of between 6 and 12 miles. Starting at 6 am or earlier, depending on the mileage.
Saturday: Mountain Biking at 7 am.

This means that I don't sleep in...ever. I really miss sleeping in. Waking up when I hear the first rustle from Aunika. Or Josh comes in. Today, Aunika didn't even wake up until 8:45 and Josh, I had to wake up at 9:20 to go to the track. That would've been perfect sleep time, except for that I'd been up since 5:30.

And it'd all be fine except for that my body does not want to go to sleep before midnight. And the biggest problem I have is that I hate my alarm clock and so I wake up at least once an hour to see how much time I have left before it's suppose to go off. The last two hours practically every night, I'm awake almost every 15 minutes. It's this weird anxiety that I'm going to oversleep, or that my alarm will go off and scare me.

So it doesn't really matter that both kids are incredible sleepers, because I'm not. And so in addition to this crazy training schedule I have going on, I'm also trying to do it on minimal amounts of sleep.

Which means, it's 9:30...is it too early for a nap?

My Father, the Car Enthusiast

Thursday at Toastmasters, I got to evaluate my dad's speech. He gave an interesting speech on the different cars he's driven over the years.

I had no idea he was so fascinated with cars.

He commented on his Fiat he had before my brother wrecked it. Even said that after he paid $1600 f0r a new paint job and his son crashed it that "oh well. Life goes on." I, of course, set the record straight by commenting during my evaluation that while "life went on, I had only seen my father cry twice the entire time I was growing up and that was ocassion number one."

He also mentioned the blue minivan we drove around in forever, saying that it "fit his family of seven very comfortably." I'm not sure which family he was referring to because there were only five of us. I think that my parents got it to separate the three of us before one of us was killed at the hands of another. It was also nice so that we could bring a friend along on occassion too witness our sibling love.

He spent some time describing his first car, a 1957 Pontiac that his uncle had given him. In all of my 28 years, I don't recall him talking about a 1957 Pontiac given to him by his uncle. However, upon furthering questioning with my mom, I realize the 1957 Pontiace was in fact "Fat Mertle" that is referenced on occassion. I had no idea that he received it from his Uncle when he was 16. I thought that was pretty cool.

Another new tidbit mentioned in his speech was that he went to work one summer for a guy specifically because he had a (some famous year) corvette. To this day, he still seems in awe of it.

The best part of the speech came when he mentioned the car he now drives. I had no idea my dad was such a car enthusiast because he readily admits that he bought his last car based solely on color. And, Thursday night, he told everyone just so. He said that he marched onto a lot and told them that he was looking for a new car based on it's shape and color. He left with a bright yellow Mazda 6, which I can see from the freeway when I drive by his work. It's assurance that he's where he says he is. I always just figured that he didn't know anything about cars. But, turns out he knows quite a bit. Just in his old age, he doesn't care much above shape and color.

I stood up and gave a great evalution that, of course, led to evaluator of the night. Oh yeah! Five for five, baby.

Happy Father's Day

Father's Day falls at the end of a very hectic eight week period during the year. It all begins with Josh's birthday on April 25, followed shortly by my birthday on May 1, Mother's Day the second Sunday of May, Wade's birthday on May 20, and our Anniversary on June 15. Clearly, we didn't plan this all out very well, did we?

And so Father's Day sorta gets the short end of the stick every year. I have a hard enough time trying to find a good present for Wade's birthday and so usually by Father's Day, it's a card. But this year, I decided to combine our anniversary gift and Father's Day gift by splurging on a gas grill.

I have spent the last seven years looking out the window at neighbors who have been barbequing on nice grills. A few years ago, I got a small charcoal grill that was more a hassle than it was worth. It took forever for the coals to heat up and even longer to cook on. So we rarely brought it out. It was only $8 at Wal-mart so it wasn't a huge financial investment. But every year, my cooking magazines (yes, I have a subscription to a few. I'll give you a moment to pick your jaws up off the floor....okay, are you back?) spend all their summer issues talking about the benefits of grilling. And I was jealous.

So this year, I got the quintessential Father's Day gift, coupled with a great anniversary gift, for Wade. I had to pack the kids up and drive into Salt Lake to pick it up on Monday. Then I had to load it up in the back of the car and drive it home, but I had to take the legs off to fit the kids back in (though the thought to leave them behind did momentarily cross my mind. Kidding. Maybe.)

And it's been great. I've used it twice already this week.

But all kidding aside, Wade's a great father. Especially on Sundays. Because my standard day consists of grumbling out of bed, getting ready, stumbling to church, wriggling through three hours of meetings, stumbling back home, grabbing the first thing I can find to eat and climbing back into bed. Even on Father's Day. And Wade doesn't ever complain. He entertains the kids while I get my (very necessary for my function for the rest of the week) nap. He feeds Aunika every morning while I exercise. He doesn't complain about my twice monthly 5ks. And he does this all while working 40+ hours a week, going to school two nights a week, finishing the basement and being scoutmaster.

He's much more patient than I am with Josh and can get the baby to laugh more than I can. Which is hardly fair. He always dispenses great advice and is still one of the smartest people I know. It's what attracted me to him in the first place. Sometimes, I wonder if Wade realizes how much I love him and appreciate all that he does. We kid around a lot, but he's my whole life and I'm not sure where I'd be without him.

A note about my own father: He and Wade are very similar. Which could be a good thing or a bad thing, but in this case is a great thing. I feel very fortunate that I've gotten to know my father a lot better in the last few months by participating in Toastmasters with him. It's been a great experience. He was (and still is) a great father. When Aunika was two weeks old, I had to take Josh into InstaCare for an ear infection. I didn't want to take Aunika with me because it was right during RSV season and I was afraid of what she'd be exposed to at the InstaCare. I was suppose to meet my mom at her house later on and so I drove in, thinking she'd be there. When I couldn't get a hold of her or my mother-in-law, I called my dad to see if he knew where my mom was. He dropped everything at work and came home so he could watch Aunika while I took Josh in. What a dad!

Happy Father's Day!

Milestones

Every parent compares their child to others around them that are the same age. Deep inside, they want the kid that's rolling over the soonest, or crawling early, or walking or talking or counting to ten or doing algebra. Rarely, do you actually have that child, because no matter how early your kid is doing integrals in his head, someone else's kid's been doing it for a while now.

But, for every parent that has the uber child that blows the milestone timeline out of the water, there is a parent out there who's child is behind. Not so behind as to be worried, but enough behind that people start to wonder.

Meet Aunika. Aunika is the sweetest, best natured baby in the world. She started sleeping through the night at 9 weeks. And not just from 11 pm to 6 am, but from 8 pm to 8 am. She doesn't really ever cry unless she's hungry or her diaper's full or Josh is being particularly annoying--er, loving--towards her. You can wake her up in the middle of her nap and she'll just give you a big smile. She eats every three hours during the day, so it's easy to plan your schedule. In two words, she's adorably content.

Content is nice. But, as we've come to find out, does not lend itself to much motivation to do things other nearly-seven month olds are doing. Like sitting up or rolling over. She's just so...content to lay there. Why do anything else?

"Toy, what toy? I'll just sit here and watch the grass grow. Or the paint dry. Whatever."

So this week, she's finally starting to roll from her back to her belly. Which is a big milestone. When you're like four months old. And she's actually kind of liking it. A few months back, she tried it a couple of times, but found she didn't like it so much and rolled back., content to just stare at the ceiling. But now, we'll find her on her belly just looking around. Until she gets tired. And then she looks like this:

Because, see, she's forgotten how to roll on to her back and so she'll just plaster her nose to the carpet (see section on content) and stay like that until you check on her and rush to her aid because you fear she's suffocating herself to death. After that, you put her in her highchair, and this is what happens:

Don't even get me started on her little round bum and her inability to sit up by herself, though according to the internet isn't that big of a deal at seven months. But still, it'd help, since she has grown out of her carseat-meaning her head sticks out one end and her feet the other and I can't take her anywhere because she's not sitting up on her own. People are starting to comment, like "maybe it's time to give up the carseat." Meaning, isn't your 1 year old a little old to still be carted around like that?

Funny story. I'm at Wal-mart the other day and this sweet looking couple, probably in their 80's, gets in line behind us at the (very slow) checkout lane. They start talking to Aunika:

"Oh, look how sweet he is. Isn't he the cutest baby? Oh, he's so cute. Look at all those cute smiles he's giving us."

The guy turns to me and asks:

"How old is he?"

I thought for a few seconds and replied: "He's six months." I even had a name picked out should they ask. Curtis. Never mind that "Curtis" was wearing a green shirt with flowers on it and poofy sleeves or that a purple blanket was tucked under "his" legs. The blue carseat and bald head seem to confuse a lot of people. And when you're 80...it doesn't matter if you get mixed up on a few genders here and there.

Silly girl. But isn't she a cutie?