Again with the driving...

So, yesterday Rachel and I argued about how "good" of a driver she was. Turns out she put a nail in her own coffin this morning. We all know how moths are attracted by light and women are attracted to shiny objects. Well, this morning Rachel was driving me to school (yes, she does a lot of the driving; I still have my manhood) and saw shiny lights on the side of a busy road: flashing police lights. This isn't bad unless she should have been looking at the non-flashing brake lights of the commercial truck in front of us. Four screeching tires and an unplanned lane change later convinced me that she is both moth and female. Luckily, she is good at avoiding collisions, and we went on our tense way. To top it all off, she's supposed to keep it easy because of high blood pressure; kind of killed that idea. Fortunately, Lauren was strapped in. Lauren tends to scream a lot when she falls out of car seats, which in turn speeds up Rachel's heartbeat. I'm not blaming you for looking, babe. And I know you don't like my backseat driving. But aren't you glad I had presence of mind to check for other rubberneckers? Oh, and nice recovery. May it never have to be executed so precisely again.

Where have I been?

I saw this on Jill's blog and thought it would be fun. I think this is accurate at least to my knowledge, I know Jamie is going to correct me, I'm usually wrong.


visited 26 states (52%)


Jamie - - - Honestly, sweet nectar that I call my own, you have no idea how often you are wrong. First, you've been to West Virginia. Remember the toll road we had to drive, and Charleston, that sinkhole in the "mountains"? And if you add that I've been to North and South Dakota as well as Maryland, that gives me thirty states (60%). We should bust out the last three mid-West states for our summer vacation.


visited 30 states (60%)

This is something Rachel probably won't blog about. So I'm getting this one out before she deletes it. I received a voice mail from my mother a few days ago. My mom doesn't call unless to talk to Rachel or tell me about mail that she received. The message said something about Tucson police department and pictures of Rachel. So I called her up. Apparently our van had been photographed turning left on a red light. They gave this violation website where you can look at traffic pics of the violation in progress and a short video of it. The video shows our van making an obvious red light turn. Pic one and two were a median's eye view of the van turning with the red light visible. Pic three was a closeup of the van's rear license plate. And Pic 4???

That's right, Rachel is as giddy as a monkey on narcotics. Look at that beautiful half-smile, as if she didn't know she had been caught trying to beat the light. Ah, technology. Thank you for the candid shots.

From Rachel------ For the record, Jamie was with me and that dumb little mistake cost us like $250. That was my crap, I just got caught red faced. Everyone consider the fact I drove from Moscow to IF (10 hours) with 3 kids by myself and not one violation. I also drove ALL the way to Tucson without a problem. I would not have gotten caught were it not for this "Technology" Jamie speaks so highly of. So thank you Honey for letting everyone know how great of a driver I am!!

Rebuttal from Jamie - - - - My sweet darling of infinite love, most accidents happen within 25 miles of home. Most accidents occur because somebody was not obeying traffic laws. Running a red light is not obeying the law, and most interstates (especially in the West) don't have traffic lights. Hence, any traffic violation was more likely to happen close to home than on a cross-country dash. Besides that, you've been able to talk your way out of several speeding tickets, especially in Moscow, which you should have made known. Let's be totally honest, my bundle of cuddly baby-boy-making love. You can't sweet talk a camera, but I bet you'd try if given the chance.

And the award for best parents goes too....

US. Jamie & Rachel Allen. Here is why, Saturday was Hadley's 6th birthday, we told her it was ALL HER DAY. She could call the shots all day. She said she really wanted to go to Chuck E. Chesse's. So we took her, not thinking it was a Saturday afternoon. There had to have been at least 200 kids there not including adults. About 5 or 6 parties were going on at the same time. Luckly we don't know anyone here yet so it was just the 5 and a half of us. It cost over $40 to get 1 large pizza, 5 drinks, and tokens. The pizza sucked and it was loud, but we perserviered. After all how could we tell her we didn't want to be there. We were there for a good 3 hours. The girls had a blast. Hadley kept telling me I was the best mom ever and this was her best day ever. Maybe she could sense my frustration with all the other kids there. Can you see why we deserve the award? Afterward we went to get some movies and groceries.
I can't believe my baby is 6. I suppose it is good seeing as how we are having #4 soon. How would that look to have 4 kids under 5? If I had it my way, they would all stay under the age of 5 forever. Hadley has told me it is hard being the oldest and having to set the example. I really think she was sent to us first because I can't think of any other little girl to be my first born, biggest sister, best friend to me, best friend to her sisters, best friend to everyone. She is so tender hearted and caring. She takes great care of her little sisters. What a great example she is to not just her sisters but to her parents as well. There is nothing more humbling than when you curse, your 6 years old reminds you that is a swear word. Talk about putting you in your place. I hope we can be friends forever and she can tell me everything when she is older just like she does now. We love you Hadley.

Look at me I'm 6!!!

Needless to say they did sleep pretty well that night!!

Sorry

The last 2 posts were a little messed up. Maybe this will work... If not I apologize. Please bear with me.

The Verdict Is......

So, I thought the scanner/printer was compatible with my computer, apparently it's not. I was going to scan this really cute picture to post. Well, I'll just describe it, it's black, white and gray, a little fuzzy with a couple arms and 3 legs. YES I SAID 3 LEGS. That means there are 2 legs and a PENIS!!!! WE ARE HAVING A BOY!!!!!!!! I can't tell you how excited we are. Now we just need to work on a name. Any suggestions???

5 Months???

Here they are, tell me what you think. 5 months along???? Be honest, you can't hurt my feelings as you can tell I'm pretty thick (skinned)!!!

my ever growing belly

Funny story, I thought my belly was really growing until I went to buy a new bra today and the girls asked how far along, I am and I told her I will be officially 5 months tomorrow, her eyes got huge and she told me she would have guessed 6 and a half or even 7 months along, I'm telling you, I'M HUGE!! I should have been offended but, it's the truth.

This is my view sitting down and the one below this is my view standing up. Do you think I look only 5 months? When Jamie gets home I'll have him take a picture of a side view and post that too, and you can tell me what you think. Remember it is really hard to offend me. I know I look huge!

How was your Labor Day Weekend?

Our weekend started out with a trip up to Phoenix to look for a couple things at Ikea and go swimming at my Uncle's. The day went pretty fast. We ended up only swimming for a short time, my uncle came out drunk and was playing with Avery and dunked her a couple times, it freaked her out and pissed me off, so we left. He is a real nice guy especially when he is wasted. That was great, and to top it off we left the girls float toys there and didn't find exactally what I wanted at Ikea.


The next day we went to church, our lucky ward got to hear us speak. That went pretty well. Of course Jamie said some off the wall things but his talk was really good. We spoke on the Restoration. I really don't think anybody really listened to my talk after the run down on our family, because a bunch of people told me I gave a great talk. HA!


On Monday nobody had anywhere to be so we got Subway and went up to Mt. Lemon. It was so nice and cool, the girls were asking for jackets. It was hard to leave. It's nice to know we have a place to go when we feel like we are going to melt. They also have great fudge up there!! We have had a lot of storms lately and that has kept it in the 80's but the storms are diminishing and the temp is rising. Today was 97 and it is supposed to get warmer and warmer everyday. They say the lower triples by Friday. I wanted to go back up this weekend but we just found out we are going back up to Mesa to the Temple for a primary activity. It is usually about 10-15 degrees hotter there. Hey! We can pick up the girl's float toys on our way out of town. Then we have to rush back down to go to a party for Jamie's department. It's going to be a long, HOT day. Maybe we can go up to the mountain next weekend before we go to Chuck E. Cheese's for Hadley's birthday.

The girls at the top!

By one of the many waterfalls on the way back down the mountain.

One of the MANY advantages to the storms down here. We get great flooding, not too dangerous but fun to drive through, awesome thunder and lightning, cooler weather, and beautiful rainbows.

Bragging about nothing

Okay, I, Jamie, know this has nothing to do with making babies or anything else that might be important. But when have you known me to care about the important stuff? This is just to notify you of what my cheap $45 metal detector discovered on its first real outing.

It found nearly a dollar in coins during our disaster trip to Bear Lake. That's a freaking candy bar, people. Now, let the comments about how insensitive I am toward my wife and family begin.