The Peeing Bandito Strikes Again

The names have been changed to protect the oh, so guilty. This is also a warning to you that you might want to avoid this location until you can be sure it has been thoroughly sanitized.

By now you all know my son, The Peeing Bandito, from this previous post. He gets older everyday, so of course everyday I get more comfortable in the fact that he won't do this horrible, socially unacceptable thing again. Apparently, I can keep dreaming. The picture is of Skippy John Jones. He's a character in a book that my kids love. How I wish that my little Bandito had taken the time to throw on a mask before he did his business in yet another public place.

Here's the story. We were at the Lehi McDonald's with friends yesterday when Oreo came up to say that one of the other children had peed in his pants and kept playing so it was on the slide and everything. We decided it was time to go. Well, the peed in pants child informed me that Bandito has peed as well. I looked at Banditos pants and they were not wet, so I was confused. I said to Peed in Pants that Bandito's pants weren't wet. He then informed me that Bandito had pulled down his pants and peed. ?!?!?!?!?!?!!!!!!!! What?!!!!! I look at my small, cute, innocent Bandito and very calmly asked, "Did you pee in the play area?" "No," he innocently answered. I asked again, still very calm, "Did you?" He lowered his eyes and whispers, "Yes." "Where?" He points to the top of the play area. So what is the course of action to be taken here? Run away as fast as possible? Tell the appropiate authorities so that the proper course of action can be taken? Walk away slowly talking nonchalantly acting as if nothing is amiss? After having ascertained that my child had indeed relieved himself on the play equipment I felt I needed to let the workers there at McDonald's know what had happened. There was a woman mopping the floor in the playroom so I told her that the children had an accident in the slide area. She looked slightly confused at that. I then clarified by saying that the boys had peed in the top of the play area and on the slides. She looked at me and said, "OK." Now, I will not tell you that the "OK" in any way meant that she was going to clean it up, but I did my bit in letting her know. I then informed Bandito that he is never allowed back in McDonald's. He, of course, cried at that, because he does love to play there. I guess we'll just have to go to Carl's Jr. the next time he wants to use a public bathroom. If you know what I mean, and I think you do.

Ian's Birthday

Ian turned 13 on Dec. 24th. I did post about how that made me feel, but this is about the actual day.
In the morning the birthday child receives their gift from their amazing parents. Wow, that box is huge. Either this kid's parents love him a lot or he won't stop growing so they had to buy him a whole new wardrobe. It's both, you sillies. Later in the day we went and saw Bolt as a family. Super cute movie and fun.

Then home for Costco pizzas and his new favorite dessert, pecan pie. Attending were Pelo grandparents and Kenneth's two sisters, one bro-in-law, one nephew and one niece. After eating he opened sibling gifts, which were books and grandparent gifts, which were clothes and money. I think he had a great day and I know he loves being 13.

Sophia's 80's Hair

Before Christmas I did Sophia's hair in spiral curls. When we combed it out I thought it looked like 80's hair, so I gave her a baby claw and this is the result.

This is the closest thing that I could find of me with similar hair. I wish you could see the teddy bear earrings, the charm bracelet, and the high waisted white shorts I'm wearing along with the teen magazine with Debbie Gibson on it that I'm holding.

Pelo Family Christmas Party 2008

My parents were able to get Classic Skating in Orem for our family Christmas party this year. It was so fun for the kids. I was really proud of them for trying because most of my kids don't skate.

Ian was doing great trying. Orion was crying and falling down a lot.

Theron does skate, so he did the best.

Dylan was on the scooter, so he was fine. Sophia was sick that day so she didn't get to go. I don't skate and really wanted to try, but I showed up really late so I didn't get a chance. Maybe next year. The highlights for me were seeing everyone and my sisters toffee, thanks Amy.

Foreground: Dale, Miriam, Amy and Brad. Background: Randy, Josh and Mike.

Wendy, Brenda, Mom and Dad.

Jon, Jeremy, Chelsea.

Cinnamon Rolls

For some reason this year I got it into my head that I wanted to give cinnamon rolls to people for a Christmas treat. Have I ever been able to make cinnamon rolls in the past? No. So what, pray tell, made me think that it was something I would be able to do? Because I'm clueless like that, that's why. My first try I made it with the same roll recipe I had tried at Thanksgiving with pretty much the same results. FLAT.
They tasted great, but I only let my closest friends try those as they were not very pretty. The next day my sister sent me a recipe that her friend, who is famous for her cinnamon rolls, uses. I had much better results with that recipe. I did some research online as well and tried different things, like using white sugar only, brown sugar only, white and brown sugar (brown won), amount of cinnamon, melted butter verses soft butter (soft butter won after a tidal wave of melted butter came off all over my counter and floor), knife cutting verses floss cutting (definitely floss, plain though). If that sounds like a lot, it was. I spent about 3 days making and taste testing cinnamon rolls. Needless to say, I was so sick of cinnamon rolls when I was done. By the end they were tasty enough to give to our VT and HT families and kids teachers. Which is what I was going for. So mission accomplished. I think I will need to practice some more to get really good at it though. The cream cheese frosting was good every time. Now I want a cinnamon roll.D

Teacher Gift Idea

I was going to be ambitious and get this up before Christmas so if anyone wanted to try it they could. I obviously mean Christmas 2009. So here you go.

Supplies: Small styrofoam ball 3-4", Sequins (these ones are 8mm, but I would get bigger ones if you can find them for time purposes), straight pins, greenery leaves (these are from a pear plant from Walmart), ribbon and a school picture.

You start by putting a pin through the center of the sequin.

I did have a few larger sequins from a mixed bag of sequins, so I used those around the picture. Push the pins into the picture and into the ball along the middle edges of the picture. Cut the corners of the picture.

Fold the corner over each other and pin.

Continue to secure and pin.

Picture fully secured. Now pass it on to the child.

Orion started pushing in pins. It may not have been as neatly done as I would have done, but it was passable. You are going to cover the whole ball with the sequins.

He did put them on a little thickly. I would just barely overlap them instead of putting them right on top of each other.

Finished front.

Finished back. This is a great activity to do while watching your favorite Christmas movie.

Take ribbon and cut approx. a 4 inch piece.

Secure with a pin and sequin just by pulling one out of the top and sticking the ribbon under it and pushing it back in.

Do the same thing with the other side of the ribbon.

Take the greenery and cut off two leaves.

Hot glue greenery to the top of the ball on top of the ribbon.

An apple for the teacher.

On the tree it is a little heavy, but really cute.

It was a lot of work, so for Sophia's teacher we did this one with hot glue and gumballs. Talk about heavy. Also, there's one with gumdrops.

Special acknowledgments to Sarahanne Lawson for the sequin ornament idea and Sarah Harman for the candy ornaments idea.

Christmas Choir Concert

Theron and Sophia were both in choir this year. As you can see they were super excited about it. Just kidding, this is their super serious choir faces. I'm so impressed with the teachers and others who help out with the choir after school and then doing the concert. It was great and so dang cute.