Playing in Cars

I was thinking the other day about how glad I was that I let my kids play in the car.

Sure, it's annoying that every time I get in, I have to turn off the blinker, the windshield wipers and the hot air that is on full blast.

Sure, they say it's not the safest thing to let kids play in cars. But the windows are down, my car doesn't have a trunk, so the suffocation thing isn't so much a risk.

Yeah, Avril does know where to put the keys, but as long as I'm cognizant of them in the car, how much harm can be done? Plus, our driveway slopes away from the road.

I was just thinking how nice it was that they would be in one place for a period of time and not running all around the house making me panic every 10 minutes thinking, "Oh, crap, where are they now? What are they into? Have they wandered off and drowned somewhere?" and other thoughts along those lines, when I glanced out the window fondly listening to their sweet laughter...

and saw Xandri- my two year old- perched on the roof of the car.

Maybe I'll listen to the experts after all.

Thailand: FAQ

So I've had a number of questions posed me about various aspects of our trip, so I thought I would elucidate you all.

Q. Who watched your kids?

A. My magnanimous and ever-generous mother-in-law, Zan. I swear, this lady just gives and gives. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Q. So, wait, your hair is like three different colors throughout your pictures.... what the crap?

A. Yes, that's right. I refer you to this post in the which I describe the fiasco

that led to the bleachiness.

About 4 days-ish into our trip, we found an amazing hair stylist, Lily, in Chiang Mai at like 9:30pm who did two foils and OCD'ed on my cut until she was happy with it. So I LOVED what she did, she put in some darker colors.

However, by the time we got to the island (still haven't posted about that), the sun had bleached most of that color out and we were left with multi-colored blonde (tiger pictures). Which I also love.

And here we are today, with my hair looking something like this:

Q. Weren't you afraid the tigers were going to, you know, eat your face off? (thanking Elsie for that phrase...)

A. Actually, no, I wasn't afraid at all. Here are my reasons:
1. The first tiger we saw was so fat it could barely waddle all the way down the road to the shade trees with her friends. Probably she'd already eaten her German tourist for the day and was digesting.

2. It was early afternoon. Everyone knows that that's the best time to catch a...

wait for it....

CAT NAP

3. There were so many people there telling you what you could do, where you could walk/sit/stand/touch the tiger that it was honestly beyond controlled. Trust me, I pushed my boundaries to get cooler pictures and they were all over me, shaking their heads at me and moving my hands/pushing me back.

4. Honestly, any wild animal raised in captivity and constantly surrounded by humans -- maybe I'm too trusting of the creatures -- but if you ask me, in that situation, they're going to be able to handle those kinds of stresses much more easily than one that was captured.


Feel free to continue to ask your questions. I'll edit this post to include new ones should they arise. I'll do my best to continue to post installments on our Thailand trip, hopefully I can drag it out until this time next year... Yeah, hopefully NOT.

Cattle Branding

So a couple weeks ago I experienced my first ever cattle branding. It was an eye-opener, I'll tell you that much. Derek's grandparents own a ranch and they were doing their branding and so of course Derek offered to come up and help for a weekend. The girls were all over the place loving it, checking out the horses, climbing all over old tractors and anything else that was taller than they were. Derek got right to branding (he didn't even change his clothes, so while he looks super hot in all the pics, he also got cow blood and crud all over his pants).

Babies checking out babies...

Monkeys trying to find something to climb.

Derek wrassling a calf.

Derek: 1
Calves: 0

Searing through hair and flesh has a terrible smell. And no matter where you're standing,
you're bound to get a healthy whiff. In fact, if you move so that the smoke won't blow into your face, the wind will oblige you by changing directions. There's no escaping it.

Crazy calf on the loose...



watch for blackie there....



wait for it....



wait for it....

He's coming through!

Just milling around after the process. Calmly, of course. No one here is freaking out or trying desperately to escape the corral or scream-mooing.

Derek: 2
Calves: 0

That's right, this man is a calf-wrassling machine. She put up a bit of a fight, this one.

Hey there, Tex. T'ain't room in this town for the both of us.

Me jus' chillin against some old building on the ranch.