School Starts!

Hello again!

I know its been a while now but I'm going to say it is because I'm a selfish Mom. I had so much fun spending time with my kids and hubby during their summer break I just didn't even bother blogging about it. I think I'm such a bad blogger because I tell myself "Karen, I don't want type a huge big long blog today." But I decided when I sat down that I would just talk about our exciting morning so that I would actually do it. BUT I'm long winded and now that I'm typing I know and you know I won't shut up. So sit back a spell and read my rants!

Today was Cort and Tatumn's first day of school. We took them to register a few weeks ago because as you all know we moved...again. I'm going to take this time now to tell you all how AWESOME it is to live here. I LOVE my new apartment! Its so beautiful, and big and new. Its great having normal neighbors and its wonderful having a pool at our disposal and the staff here are so very very nice and helpful. Looking for a great apartment to live in? Email me. :) Now back to my original thought...So we registered them and they were so nervous about a new school again that I was just praying that got some nice teachers who understood them and how scared they were about starting all over again. I mean I know my kids are pretty much the most awesome kids in the universe but THEY don't know that so I needed to make sure the teachers knew so they could spread the awesomeness that IS Cort and Tatumn. So when we walked in to register them the lady at the counter was so nice and helpful and sweet. I sat down and filled out all the paper work and then this guy walks in who looks just like a regular kinda guy. Polo shirt and khaki shorts and sneakers and he walks right up to Cort and asks him what his name is and just strikes up a conversation with him. Well my mommy radar starts beeping going "Hey Karen, there is some strange guy talking to your kids" so I listen in as he just basically sat down and talked to them both and in one conversation had them both so excited to start school and so excited to meet their teachers I just sat back a little dumbfounded going "what just happened?" So then the lady behind the counter jumps into their conversation telling the kids that they just met their principal. I was so pleased by his way with kids I just smiled to myself and finished the paperwork and joined them in conversation. Cort tells the principal he wasn't too happy with the date they choose to start school because it was on his birthday. The principal just grinned and said "Oh! You are so lucky! tell you what, were gonna roll out the red carpet and have the paparazzi there and take some pictures of you and put out some balloons and its gonna be amazing!" So when we leave the office Cort is just busting at the seems to start tomorrow. He keeps talking about how great it will be and even Tatumn is excited hoping she gets to be in one of the Portable classrooms. Why? I dunno...because its different?


As we can see here...Cort is a bit more excited than Tatumn. She got the nervous bug as soon as we got out of the car. But wow...that principal didn't lie. We got there and there was a huge red carpet, balloons, reporters, camera's, the whole enchilada. As soon as we walked in a guy with a camera snaps a picture of Tatumn giving the principal a high five then he asks me for her name and how to spell it. I'm going "wow...is she gonna be in the paper? I mean...she is undoubtedly one of the most beautiful kids in the planet...cant say I blame him." Then a reporter for the Salt Lake Tribune comes up and asks Cort about how he was feeling and if he was happy or excited or nervous and what he thought of the school slogan "a ticket to success" and all that good stuff. She asked me questions but in all honestly I was so nervous and jittery that I don't know how i answered or if I even answered the question she asked me. Sad huh? But then we walked in and got all the first day questions answered. Who their teacher was, where their class room was, how school lunch was gonna work payment wise. Then they have all the 2nd graders go to the front so they can be escorted to their portables. Tatumn gets so scared she wont let go of my hand. I felt so bad for her but I tried to get her to go then we finally falls in with the other kids. Somehow she got separated from them and ended up with 2 ladies who were trying to get kids in their class's. Meanwhile I'm hanging back with Cort waiting for our turn to look up his classroom. We end up walking right past her to get him to his room and I look at her and her she is staring at the floor. Then I notice her nose is getting red. Mommy radar starts blaring at me "OH! NO! She's gonna cry!" So I reach out and take her hand and she literally jumps up into my arms and starts to cry on my shoulder. I felt so bad she was so scared. I took 5 steps in before she felt a bit embarrassed about her tears and she got down and tried to laugh the tears away. My brave little girl. Turns out their classes were both in portables and they were almost right next to each other! So I show Tatumn where Cort's room is and tell her that if anything happens and she needs her brother to go straight there and he will take care of her. He puts on her big brother face and says "Yeah Tatumn, If somethings wrong and you need me you come right here and I'll take care of you" I almost cried...I'm such a baby. So Cort goes off to his room and I take Tatumn to hers and make sure she can point to Cort's room from there and then I ask her "are you ready?" she says "yeah...but mommy can you come in with me?" I just smiled and said "They don't let the parents in class with you but I'm not leaving until you feel better OK?" She gives me her best big girl brave smile and says "OK". I open the door and her teacher is sitting at the front and the class is on the floor around her. The teacher says "Hi sweetie! Whats your name?" I was right next to her and could barely hear her mumbled "Tatumn" The teacher looks at me and says "i'm sorry I didn't hear ya" So I tell her loudly "Her name is Tatumn" and the teacher stands up and walks over and takes her hand and says "Oh Tatumn! When I was writing your name out for your desk I was so impressed by your beautiful name. I love it, its so pretty" Tatumn just unleashed her best doey eyes on her and gave her a big smile and walked with her to her new desk. I said "bye Tatumn" and she just glanced back at me and smiled then walked in. I shut the door and almost cried.

My babies are in school! Next thought in my head..."I must blog about it!" So another school year starts and we try and get back into the hang of things. For now I'm walking the kids home from school today but tomorrow I'm going to work at Sarah's house so I'll have the car and will just have to run back and forth a bit to make the school/work schedules work. But it will all work out just fine. It always does.

~Ciao

Spring Break

So my kids have been on spring break now for a whole week and have another week to go. Its so much fun having them home with me. The Easter bunny came and left them some candy and a kite so were hoping for some good kite flying weather soon.

I know its past Easter now but were going to paint some eggs today and the kids want me to hide them for them to find so that's our big plan for today. This means KC will have hard boiled eggs for lunch for a while hehehe.

So I know that I don't post often but the most recent exciting thing that has been going on is we moved to a new apartment in Midvale and its so nice here! They are all brand new so were the first tenants in this particular apartment and its so great having 3 bedrooms. The most exciting feature to me? THE KITCHEN!!! I mean wow! we have really high ceilings so it "feels" like a house not an apartment and the kitchen has all new appliances and hardwood floors! Looking back on my last carpet post was funny because in our new apartment I don't let any food or beverage leave the kitchen so our carpet is SPOTLESS!! and its everything I thought it would be!

I've been really trying to be a good Mom/housewife and I have a routine set up in my day so my place is always nice and tidy and KC has a nice homemade lunch and a nice warm meal when he comes home to his nice clean house and it makes me so happy to see him happy. I love it here. I'm so happy! Have I mentioned that I'm happy? Because I'm happy!

In an effort to not upset the kids we are letting them finish out the school year at their old school in Salt Lake but I'm going to be so happy to get them to school out here. Were gonna save a small fortune in gasoline. They are sad to leave friends behind but I know Cort is such a friendly kid he will have absolutely no problems getting new friends here and Tatumn will too. I know it will be for the best but after how hard it was from them to adjust leaving their school in Tooele I just didn't have it in me to do it to them again if we could avoid it.

So I got to visit my parents for Easter and see my brother David and his wife Julie and their son Kyle and Levi was there with his wife Heather and their new baby Ryder and it was just so wonderful to see them all. Little Ryder is getting so big already. I still get frequent visits from Levi at my new place and I look forward to those visits so much. I love when people come see me. SO COME SEE ME!!! NOW! haha!

Besides the thought of unexpected visitors keeps me up to date on housecleaning and I love it. OK so my random movie quote of the day is from "office space" and its probably my very favorite movie to quote to people but deal with it. Our main character stayed home from work and didn't do anything all day but sleep in and do nothing and his friend calls him up to tell him his boss is gonna be so pissed and then says "What did you do all day?!?" and he responds "Absolutely nothing. And it was everything I dreamed it could be" lol I love that. Its like my weekend mantra.

Love you all!

~Ciao

Carpet

So today I was picking up the apartment and doing some dishes and and getting dinner ready for when KC got home from work and just as I was patting myself on the back and telling myself what a good job I did I really took a look around. What the HELL happened to my carpet!?!? I'll tell you what...2 kids. I have punch stains that will never come out. I am so excited that the dining area in our new apartments is on hardwood and not on carpet because I don't know what it is with these juice companies. I can picture a group of men (yes men...it has to be men) in a board room going "What can we do with our juice that people will think of us every single day?" and some idiot in the back of the room who was hired for the sole reason that he is the boss's nephew that the boss took pity on because his wife made him and hired him and said "Here sit in a tie and look smart...just don't open your trap and you get paid weekly" saying out loud to the group "HEY!!! What if we made our juice absolutely IMPOSSIBLE to clean out of carpet?!? Then these people will see our stain and go HEY! I need more juice!" and since nobody wants to upset Mr. Boss Man they agree and put freaking permanent marker liquid inside of our juice.

Wow...that was even random for me. haha! I love blogs...I will write whatever I feel like and you will all read it! BECAUSE I SAID SO! MUAH HA HA HA!

OK so enough with the juice stains in my carpet. I am very excited about moving again to a nice new apartment. Anybody available to help just let me know *wink wink* its going to be on the 27th I believe. I have decided to start in the kid's room and start boxing things up and I swear I'm going to throw out half the stuff we own. Why do we hold on to the things we do anyway? I mean do we really thing to ourselves "Wow...My daughter can't wear these pants anymore because they used to be pants but now look like Capri's...but I think I'll wash them anyways and fold em and put them right back in her closet" Yes...I have done that several time hehe

So lately to save on gas money KC has been dropping me and the kids off at their school in the morning and he goes on to work and I walk home then I walk to pick them up and walk them home. I have to admit at first it just made me tired thinking about it. But I must say that now that its routine it is really a lot of fun! Me and the kids have the funniest conversations these days. I love to hear from them about the "hot topics" at school and the highest things that they worry about or think about. If I have some spare change I'll bring my big cup with us and we stop at the 7-11 for a 90 cent refill that we all share on the walk home and talk about school. So for now Tatumn likes to tell me how she wants to do her hair the next day and how she wants me to give her "princess hair" (is she really mine?) and Cort likes to talk to me about books he is reading. He is really into this book series "Diary of a wimpy kid" that is coming out as a movie soon too. Its exciting to see him so into books and not just video games and television. Every day I harass Cort about letting me cut his hair but he refuses. Its so long and shaggy!!! He will have a mullet soon if I don't put a stop to it...maybe he just doesn't want ME to cut it. I think I'll bring this up at our next walking opportunity and see if great clips can cut it for him.

Well I have run out of things to talk about and I'm still laughing about the Boss's idiotic nephew bit from the beginning of my post and I think I need to just let that image soak in a bit.

~Ciao

Whats in a name?

It has come to my attention that I have not been updating my blog nearly often enough. So I decided to take a thought that just popped into my little head and write about it. Whats in a name? Have you ever learned the secret behind your name? Everybody has a very specific reason for a name that I know of. Most people were named after family members long past. Some people were named for friends of the parents. I know that when I was born I had so much in common with my Mother that she named me the name she was supposed to be named. My understanding is that when my Mom was born her Mother wanted to name her Karen. My mothers aunt wanted that name for her daughter and forbade my Grandmother to name her daughter Karen so my Mother was named Sue. So when I was born I was born in the same month of my Mother, we were both the 2nd daughter and the 4th child. Our mothers were the same age when we were born. We weighed the same, we were the same length. Just a lot of bizarre similarities. So as I was brought into this world my Mother said THIS is Karen. Karen means "Pure" and its Greek. I certainly don't think of myself as "pure" but am still honored by this name. I used to hate my name but I guess it was just a phase...I think everybody goes through a time when they hate their name and their parents reasons for it. I remember my brother Levi telling me to call him something different when we were in public because he disliked his name. I think he got over it too. In hindsight I'm very proud of my name and hope to do it justice. Living up to the name that was some body's like my Mothers is a big responsibility and an honor.

My husband was named for his Grandfather Kenneth. Unfortunately I was not blessed to have met the man in this lifetime but will look forward to meeting him in the next lifetime. For those of you who know me and KC well enough you know I do not and never will call my husband Kenneth. (for reasons I will not make public knowledge...for those of you who know you can join me here with my "lol") Ironically my Grandfather was also named Kenneth. My Grandfather passed away when I was 1 year old and doubt me if you want but I have a singular memory of him playing catch with my older cousins in my Grandparents backyard. Its odd...to have such a memory when your only 1 year old stick with you for your whole life. I remember such tiny details about that memory. I'm getting away from my topic forgive me. So KC was named for his grandfather and to hear KC talk about him and his memories with him Kenneth Nickerson was a great man whom I would truly love to meet someday. So what does Kenneth mean? According to most baby name websites it means "Born of fire" and its Gaelic. So now I wonder if there is a reason for the first Kenneth being named Kenneth and was it so important to be passed on so many generations? Interesting thoughts...

Now when KC and I knew we were to be blessed with our first child we decided then and there that we would have picked out in advance a girl name and a boy name. We are both particularly proud of the names we chose for our children. We were still in the decision making process and nothing really stuck out for us as far as names went. Then we went and rented a movie called "The quick and the dead" starring Russell Crowe and Sharon Stone. We both really enjoyed the movie. Russell Crowe's character is a ex-killer reformed and now a Preacher having forsaken his evil ways. His name was Cort. Now its important that you all understand that we did NOT name our son after this character. Meaning that this movie did not alter our lives due to this character or his performance. It was just a good flick. But as soon as we heard the name out of the movie we both looked at each other and said "Cort...That is a really nice name!" So we decided on Cort. Cort is French and means "short" and as you all know, Cort is NOT short...haha! Even as a baby he has always been in the 95th percentile...so the meaning of Cort is almost silly if you know him but the name in my mind is and always shall be my son's. When I hear "Cort" I think of a handsome little boy who takes care of his sister at all costs. (even when she doesn't deserve it) I think of this kind hearted soul who wouldn't wish anything ill on anybody no matter what they do to him. Most of all I think of dimples hehe.

Now Tatumn-Marie. I absolutely LOVE this name. One thing KC and I wanted from the very beginning with names is something different...but not TOO different. Something you don't hear a lot anymore but not something you hear and go "Wha?? That's a persons name??" So you can see how perfect Cort was. Now on my side of the family we don't give girls middle names. Because when we are married we usually take our maiden name as our middle name. So my Mother was born Susan Sundburg and was married to Mark C. Allen and is now Susan Sundburg Allen. So I was born Karen Allen I was married to Kenneth Allen Coon (yes the middle name being my maiden name is actually a huge coincidence) so my married name is Karen Allen Coon. yup were both KAC's. So when we were thinking of names we thought it would be fun to stick with the movie theme. Well when Tatumn was in my tummy we went and rented the movie "Scream" yes...the one with Nev Campbell...don't judge me. Anyways if you remember Nev's best friend the blond girl who was totally sarcastic. The sister of Deputy Dewy. Her name was Tatum. Again we both looked at each other and said "wow! That is a cute name!" Of course we started thinking of Tatum O'Neil and the like but its not an often heard of name. So since my side didn't do middle names for girls and KC's side did we compromised. Yes her name IS hyphenated. Of course we call her Tatumn (the silent N was KC's idea and I love it) but her full name is Tatumn-Marie Coon. Thats how it is on her birth certificate and that's what she's called when she's in trouble. We didn't think of the middle name until she was born and they put her tiny body on the table and bundled her up and we saw all that mass of dark dark brown hair and she opened her eyes and looked right at me with her beautiful dark doe-like eyes. "Marie" sounds so perfect for her. Tatumn means "Tate's Homestead" and obviously once again..it means nothing to me but the "Technical" meaning. To me when I hear "Tatumn" I think of an absolutely beautiful long haired girl with a gorgeous smile who has her daddy wrapped around her little finger and she knows it! She is such a Daddy's girl. I think of angelic laughter and a little Princess. We even call her "Princess Tay"

So whats in a name? In my own humble opinion the baby name websites can all take a hike. I don't care what the technical meaning to anybodies name is. A name is what you make of it and how you chose to live your life is how that name will be remembered in time.

~Ciao