My day started with waking up at 5:00 to meet at a nearby park to run hills with my boot camp class. My tired worn out body is still recovering from Monday's substitute instructor, who I think may have tried to kill me. It was pretty chilly this morning so I was less than thrilled to be outside. My darling fit as a fiddle husband is still in stellar shape so I would pass him running down the hill as he was going back up. He would wink or smile every time he would pass.By about the 10th time we passed his little signs of affection were getting old. All I could think was, "listen you SOB, I am running this stupid blankety blank hill because you got me pregnant 400 times and ruined my body and you are chugging along acting like Rocky!!"I finally lost it when he gave me a little love tap the last time we passed. I blurted out a few words that were not very nice and I think he may have learned his lesson to not give his wife any more love taps while he was lapping her.

Tuesday's are always our busiest day of the week. Dave and I both have school, Shannon, Kelsey and Maggie all have practice and Erin and Ryan both had games. Grandma dropped Maggie, Kelsey and Shannon off at the park where they all practice. I met them there after school. Kelsey had hot pink finger nail polish stains all over her yellow practice jersey. That is pretty typical of Kelsey, I noticed she had white out all over the palm of her hand. I asked her why and she said "I looked on our team website to see what color practice jersey we were wearing today, I wrote it on my hand so I wouldn't forget." I then asked her why she would write white jersey on her hand and wear the yellow one." Maybe next time she should actually look at her human post it note BEFORE she gets dressed.

Maggie had a little bike accident on Saturday. I was sitting in the kitchen and I heard a loud crash followed by laughter followed by screaming. Maggie and Ryan were racing their bikes up the driveway when Maggie crashed in the garage. She thought it was pretty funny until she noticed the gushing blood on her big toe. The Murphy family has a lovely trait of sacrificing their safety all in the name of winning, my youngest Murphy is no exception. I asked her what she ran into and she said "everything." If you could see the state of our garage you would understand that when she said everything that she was not exaggerating. Of course we are out of band aids so I had to go next door to borrow one from the neighbor. When Maggie calmed down I asked her why she didn't stop. She said that her bike doesn't have any brakes. Kelsey said "great mom, you give her a bike without brakes." I told her that she was riding the bike the kid down the street gave her. Kelsey asked, "didn't you check it out before you let her ride it?" Thanks Kels, like I don't feel bad enough. The bike does have brakes but they are hand brakes and they are hard to operate. I am thinking of returning the "death trap" back to the kid down the street and telling her thanks but no thanks. Maybe if everything in my house wasn't turned into a competition we would be OK.

Erin came home from school today and told me that she wanted to go on a mission trip. They had a missionary come to school today and speak at an assembly. Erin was very inspired. She said that she brought pictures and showed a slide show. She was a little concerned that the lady didn't wear make up on her trip. Erin said that if she goes that she would bring her make-up. I have visions of Erin walking around Honduras wearing a string bikini with spiked heels and a full face of make-up. Maybe she could spread the gift of vanity in a third world country!!! She would be the first missionary asked to never return.

Kelsey woke up this morning and could barely open her eyes. She fell asleep in her contacts two nights in a row. I told her to try and go to school, her eyes should feel better soon since she took her contacts out. I got a call from the school nurse around 9:30. She said "I have Kelsey in my office, she has pink eye." I explained to her that she slept in her contacts, she said "OH she didn't tell me that." She probably thought, what is wrong with this mother. This kids eyes are swollen shut, did she even look at her kid this morning. I hope she didn't notice Ryan at recess today without a coat when it was only 40 degrees or Maggie with a half carton of chocolate milk down the front of her shirt. On the bright side, Shannon looked fine today. Speaking of Shannon, she had a cheerleading end of year party after school. I picked her up at 4:15. She was really excited and said "mom, look what I got." She unzipped her pencil case and pulled out a wilted green thing that looked like a leaf. I said, "what is that?" She said, "we dissected frogs today in science and I cut off my frogs foot and put it in my pencil case to bring it home. Isn't it cool!!!" OK I think that this is proof that every one of our children are a little off. I used to think that she was one of the last remaining normal ones but the stolen body part from the science lab has me a bit nervous!!!

Cheer leading try outs went really well. We had to rush back to school for the talent show after tryouts on Thursday. Shannon got to go first for final evaluations so she could leave early to get to the talent show. She was pretty nervous but thought that she did OK. She was standing against the wall at the talent show and her boyfriend (did I say boyfriend?) was standing next to her. He wasn't even that close to her, probably at least a foot a way but I couldn't help but think to myself that I wanted to scream "get away from her, who do you think you are standing next to my baby?" Instead I just stood there and accepted the fact that she is growing up and said a quick prayer of thanks that this kid didn't have any tattoos or piercings. We got an email on Friday that Shannon made the Varsity cheerleading squad. Woo Hoo, that was pretty exciting!!! She had three days to accept the spot on the squad and I think something like five days to turn in the big fat check. I thought about trying out for cheerleading when I was her age but was afraid because I couldn't do the splits. Turns out, you don't have to do the splits, who knew??? I sure wish I could do high school over, I might even study this time.

I took Shannon shopping today to get her eighth grade graduation dress. We found a couple that we liked. We ended up buying a bright aqua blue dress. It looks really pretty on her with her red hair. When we got home from shopping Dave looked like he had just woken up. Today is his 39th birthday. He spent most of his day napping. I was a tad aggravated when I came home to a messy house and starving children. I don't have a problem with a messy house when we have a zillion soccer games on the weekend, but a day of laying around, tends to make me a little crazy. Ryan came in the kitchen and asked "do you think you and dad have a good relationship?" I was a little concerned, I thought he may have picked up on the tension in the house as a result of his father's Rip Van Winkle day. I explained to him how much his parents loved each other and what a great relationship we had. He said "Oh, OK I was just asking because he is in the other room watching girls in bikini's play volleyball."

Today was one of those days that I knew would be a mess no matter how hard I juggled all of our activities. One of those days where I am envious of all the people with 2.2 kids. I had school at 4:00, Kelsey had a student council meeting until 4:15, Shannon had cheer leading tryouts at 4:30, Erin had a game at 5:00, Ryan had a baseball game at 6:00 and Kelsey and Maggie had soccer practice at 6:00. Dave also has school on Tuesday nights. I called this morning and arranged for Ryan to go home with his friend so he could go to the game with him. I told him to pack his uniform in his backpack. Of course he had everything in a ball so I went to re pack it. That's when I noticed that the baseball pants that I told him to bring downstairs to be washed were still filthy. I decided not to stress over the situation and just hope that everyone would think that the dirty baseball player belonged to the family that brought him to the game. Grandma was going to drop Shannon off at cheer leading try outs (40 minutes away) and then drop off Kelsey and Maggie at practice. I was going to pick Shannon up after my class let out then swing back by to get Kelsey. Everything would have worked out but Kelsey had student council until 4:15. She said "don't worry mom I can miss my meeting." She came up to me a half hour later wearing her little student council T-shirt and said "can you write me a note excusing me from the meeting." I said "never mind, I will skip my class, (just like my high school days) some things are just more important." I wanted to bring Shannon to her try outs anyway. On the way to try outs I remembered that I forgot the physical form that Shannon needed. I figured it would be better to be on time with out the form. I called home to see if grandma could fax it to Dave's office and he could bring it to me. She couldn't find the form, she picked this time to tell me that I had lots of papers laying around the house. Dave ended up calling the place that did her physical and they faxed him a copy. The cheer leading coach told us to just bring it tomorrow. Everything is always high drama with us. Shannon did really well, she knew all the steps and executed them with confidence. It is nice to have such a confident kid, moments like that make a mom proud. I wanted to say, see that darling little red head, you know the one, the one that is better than the other 40 kids in the room, yeah that one, yeah she's mine!! I would bet that 39 other parents felt the same way about their perfect kids too. I dropped Shannon off at the house and headed to pick up Kelsey. I grabbed MC Donald's on the way home. Another fancy family meal. I checked the kids grades online today so I had some nice dinner conversation. I said, "one of you just flunked two religion quizzes, I cant remember which one." I pointed back and forth in between Ryan and Shannon, Shannon was trying to remember if it was her and then Ryan finally said, Oh I think that was me. Shannon said, "I think I am flunking gym, I keep wearing the wrong shorts." I have one kid flunking religion and another one flunking gym. Dave an I should really stop reproducing NOW!!! Ryan is student of the week this week. He said "it's April, they were running out of people so it is my turn." He got to bring in pictures of himself and his family for the bulletin board. Apparently the third grade boys all think Erin is "hot" now. I guess Sam and Lauren are losing their touch, they are getting too old.

Friday morning we had a bit of excitement. Dave was still out of town so I still had my big comfy king size bed all to myself. Maggie woke me up around 1:30 because she threw up. Of course she didn't make it to the toilet, that is one of the wonderful family traits that ALL of my children have inherited. I had her crawl in bed with me. A few hours later I woke up to my bed shaking. I was half asleep, it sounded like a hail storm outside and my deck sounded like it was falling off the back of the house. I was half asleep but it was pretty obvious that it was an earthquake. When the shaking stopped I thought about turning on the TV do see what it registered on the Richter scale. I decided between the vomit and the natural disaster that I was missing enough sleep, I rolled over and fell back asleep. Twenty minutes later the phone rang. I should have figured that Lauren would be calling. She has always been my kid that was afraid of tornadoes, thunder storms, fires and floods, it looks like we can put earthquakes on the list as well. She woke up in her dorm and her bed was shaking. She thought it was a tornado because it was so loud. She started screaming and ran out of her dorm and screamed for everyone to get out. It took her a while to realize she was running down the stairwell of her co-ed dorm in a tight t shirt and skimpy string bikini underwear. I am sure the boys are praying for more earthquakes. Her room mate's boyfriend is from California, he told her "way to go Lauren, lead the whole floor down to the lobby on the bottom floor during an earthquake." She was on tornado mode. She is still scared to death. I thought the earthquake was pretty cool, I'm weird.

We left the house pretty early this morning for Maggie's soccer game. Kelsey is out of town for a soccer tournament and Ryan was playing at a buddy's house after his baseball practice. Grandma took Erin to her soccer tournament and we left sleeping Shannon at home. Dave and I both left our cell phones at home. We met up with grandma at Erin's game. She said, "Shannon called looking for you." I used grandma's phone to call Shannon. She was mad because we left without her. I'm sorry, please forgive me for not assuming that my always crabby, less than pleasant 14 year old would want to get up at 8:00 on a Saturday and sit out in the rain on a cold cloudy day and watch soccer all day. I told her we would be home after the game. Later we decided to not go home in between Erin's games. I called Shannon to tell her we would be home around 5:00. That went over like a lead balloon. Apparently she had spent the majority of her day trying to figure out how the food in our refrigerator and pantry would jump out, cook itself, end up on a plate with a fork and show up in her lap on the couch with out anyone's help. She never did figure it out, I sure hope she survived her home alone day with out too many emotional scars. Once we returned home she asked to spend the night at her friends house. She crabbed and crabbed because we weren't home and then left as soon as we got there. When will I ever understand teenagers!!!!

Kelsey got picked to be in a soccer juggling video that will later be on a soccer website. She is pretty excited but a little nervous. Most of the other kids in the video are a lot older than her. There is only one other girl and 9 boys. Last I heard they are in the process of selecting a few other girls. The video is being shot a week from Sunday. She has been out in the front yard practicing for two days. It is a good thing her lawn obsessed father is out of town. I don't think he would handle the constant stomping on his precious grass too well. What he doesn't know won't hurt him.

I took Shannon to Urgent Care tonight for her sports physical that she needs for cheer leading tryouts for high school . Her doctor couldn't get her an appointment until June so I figured I would just pay the $35 (like the Sunday fiasco with Erin before soccer try outs) and get her physical at urgent care. Her try out starts on Tuesday so I was running out of time. We started with the eye test. I soon realized that Shannon is blind. She started stumbling with the letters. The nurse said "Shannon are you reading line seven ?" Apparently she got every letter wrong. Finally we gave up and she was able to read line five. She had a huge red line in between her eyebrows from pressing her head so hard against the machine. I guess she thought the harder she pressed, the better she can see. They brought us in a room and gave her a gown and told her to strip down to her bra and underwear. When she took off her shorts I immediately noticed her lovely bright aqua bikini underwear with a white elastic waistband with black letters that said *hot bottom *hot bottom*hot bottom*hot bottom*hot bottom* all the way around the waistband. She could tell right away by the look on my face that I was less than pleased with the underwear. Something about my fourteen year old daughter having a "hot bottom" was less than pleasing to me. She giggled and said "grandma bought them for me." She folded the elastic over and all was good. Maybe she should give the hot bottom underwear to her sister with the sunburn striped butt.

I got an email from Ryan's teacher that said, "Ryan has had such a great week, he has kept his talking to a bare minimum and his class work as well as his behavior has been excellent." I replied back Wow, There is a God! I hope she has a sense of humor.

Dave called me this morning from Jeff City. He said he slept terrible, I felt really bad for him. I didn't mention to him that I can't remember the last time that I slept better. That stupid dog of his slept on his side of the bed instead of tangled up in my feet. I survived my crazy night of driving from sporting event to sporting event yesterday. I got home from Kelsey's soccer game around 9:30. My cute little baseball player was still awake. I asked him how his game went. He said "good, I was the clean up hitter." I was envisioning my son walking around the dug out with a trash bag picking up trash. He rolled his eyes and explained to his brilliant mother that a clean up hitter is the fourth batter. "Who Knew." Erin went tanning last night, she had on underwear with sheer narrow stripes on them. When she got out of the shower, she noticed that she had sunburn stripes on her butt. She showed me and said "I can't wait to show everyone at school." I am very thankful that she goes to an all girls school." Not nearly as thankful as her father is.

I had a dream last night that my dog was up all night peeing all over the house. I am starting to feel like Bill Murray on Caddy Shack with the gopher. I met Dave after work to look at a used car lot for a car for Erin. Lauren knew I was going there after work. She called me around 4:00 and asked where we were. We were just sitting down at a restaurant, she said "that's why I was calling I'm hungry and I new you guys would go out to eat." She must have been plotting this all day, unlucky for her, she thought I got off work at 3:30 instead of 2:30. She missed today's gravy train, I'm sure she will connive a little better next time. Dave leaves to go out of town tomorrow. Our sport schedule is a little crazy since or spring soccer games have all been rained out and we are now into baseball season. Tomorrow Erin has a game at 4:00 a half hour away, Shannon has tumbling at 4:00, I have school at 4:00, Maggie has soccer at 5:00 twenty minutes away, Ryan has a baseball game at 6:00, thirty minutes the other way away,(provided I get his baseball pants exchanged to the right size on my lunch hour) Shannon has soccer practice at 6:00 at the same place that is twenty minutes away that I have to drive back to get Maggie before I pick Shannon up from tumbling, and Kelsey has a soccer game at 8:00. I also have to throw in homework, spelling words and baths. Dave you picked a fabulous time to go out of town.

Erin got pulled up to the Varsity team for a soccer tournament this weekend. I went to her game on Saturday. It was cold and windy,I felt like a human Popsicle sitting on the sidelines watching her game. After the game I decided that I would prefer to hear about the next game via a cell phone report after the game. My kids each play at least 60 games a year with tournaments and all the different leagues that they play in. I try to make at least 90% of their games. I simply choose to get my 90% in while the sun is out and the temperature is above 60 degrees. Truth be told I actually felt a bit guilty about skipping Erin's second game and not going to any of Kelsey's games so I decided to do something constructive with my day. I decide to steam clean my carpet. I was tired of walking around on my hands and knees looking for the source of the dog pee smell. I started with my bedroom and bathroom (who puts carpet in a bathroom?) and finished with Kelsey and Maggie's room and then Ryan's room. While I was helping Maggie clean her room the dog peed in Ryan's room. I guess he wanted to make sure I had a fresh spot to work with. I tried to let him out a few minutes earlier but he wouldn't go, it was a little to cold and windy for him . My phone was ringing off the wall while I was cleaning the rugs. Lauren was back from her Dallas trip and needed the car that her and Sam share. Sam left for a trip to Indiana to visit her cousin and locked the car key in her dorm. Lauren had a ten page paper that she had to work on and her back pack was in the trunk of the car. Sam wasn't answering her phone. I suggested that Lauren call Bobby (her cousin) since Sam wasn't answering. Apparently Sam dropped her phone in the toilet and it was no longer working. That sounds like a college story that a mom doesn't need to know. Every time Lauren talked to Sam she would call me with an update at how mad at Sam she was. Erin called and needed me to pick her up. I woke Shannon up and yelled at her for not helping. I told her that it was house cleaning day. She vacuumed one room while I was working on my bedroom rugs and crawled into her bed for a two hour nap. I told her to clean her bathroom while I was gone picking up Erin. I finally finished all the rugs and my back felt like an 80 year old woman. Dave and Kelsey got back from her tournament shortly after I had finished. It was nice having a clean house. I can't remember the last time that I had a free Saturday. I cooked dinner and went to bed early because my back hurt. I woke up this morning and hobbled to the bathroom. On my way back to bed I noticed that Dave and Maggie's beloved dog had thrown up all over the carpet in the 2 minutes that I was in the bathroom. I woke up Dave and suggested to him that he may want to clean that up or he may find his beloved dog's head on his pillow like a scene from the movie The Godfather. I have toyed with buying this stupid dog a belly band, it is something they make for dog's that are not house broken. It is basically a dog diaper. I haven't bought one yet because I am assuming he would eat it off of his body considering he eats his way out of his crate.

Lauren called today, she was finally able to get the car. Sam's suite mate was able to let her in to get the key. I am so glad that they share their little squabbles with me over the phone since I am no longer able to witness it first hand like the old days. God I miss that!! Oh never mind, I still have Erin and Shannon.

Bootcamp started again this week. I have not been good at eating my fruits and veggies and journaling my food. Somehow I keep choosing birthday cake over watermelon. We were supposed to go to Nashville this weekend for Shannon's soccer tournament. Last night we had a parent meeting for Kelsey's trip to Sweden next July with her soccer team. The trip sounds like a once in a lifetime opportunity for her. Over 70 countries participate in this tournament. The trip includes, flight, hotel, all transfers, and breakfast every day. We were told that a Big Mac sells for around $10 and a beer is $6. I have decided to sew pockets in all of Kelsey's clothes so she can stock up for the rest of the day at breakfast. Dave gets to go with her, the trip is too expensive for us both to go, besides I couldn't leave the rest of my babies for two weeks. Erin would turn our house into party central. I asked Dave, "how are we going to afford this trip?" He said, "I would eat nails if I had to, to give Kelsey this opportunity." I guess that means she's going. Of course now the rest of my kids are using this as leverage to get what they want. Shannon wanted to go to Florida with her friend and her family. They are flying so it will be pretty expensive. Of course I got, "Kelsey gets to go to Sweden and I can't go to Florida?" Now I am paying for a trip to Sweden AND Florida. We got home from the parent meeting last night and were too tired to pack for Nashville. Our original plan was to have the van packed and ready to go. We were going to take Shannon out of class at 1:00 and hit the road. Plan B was to rush home from work, go to the bank, pack, get the oil changed, buy new wiper blades and try to get out of town sometime before rush hour. I got the oil changed and was heading home to pack when I got the message that the tournament was cancelled due to the weather. Sometimes being a procrastinator actually pays off. I had Dave pick up the kids today from school since he was home. I had a splitting headache. Sitting inside Jiffy Lube waiting to get my oil changed didn't help. The smell of oil and grease makes me feel sick. I was going to try and lay down for a half hour while he was gone. I said "why don't you bring the dog with you to surprise Maggie." (Besides, he would just sit on the end of my bed gnawing on his leg if he stayed home.) When Dave got back he said "brilliant idea, to bring the dog, he was so nervous he pooped all over the van. I had to smell poop the whole time I was waiting for the kids and he got poop all over Maggie's coat." That made my nap just a tad bit sweeter.

Kelsey stayed home from school sick today. Now that the weather is finally warming up her allergies are terrible. Maggie woke up with a runny nose this morning and I am thinking of nominating her for an academy award for best actress in a drama. You would think that she was absolutely dying. When she got in the car after school, I asked her how she felt. She got a really puzzled look on her face and said "fine,why?" I am getting the impression that keeping her focused at school for the next eleven years may be a bit of a challenge. Ryan had his little magic show for his after school program that he took. He has always really liked doing magic tricks. Grandma and Maggie went with me to the show. Shannon decided to pass. I told her not to bother asking her brother to help her move furniture when she gets an apartment someday when she can't even bother going to his magic show. She said "OK, I won't,bye!!" I think I really got to her. NOT!!! Grandma said, "the tricks were much better at this years show compared to last years." (They were the same tricks that they had last year) Maybe she just payed attention this year.

I sent Erin to the grocery store for me one day last week. I asked her to pick up some lunch meat, bread cereal and yogurt. I normally shop at Dierbergs and she went to Schnucks. She called me from her cell phone and said "Schnucks doesn't have lunch meat, I have looked everywhere, there is a big sign that says meat on the wall and all they have under it is the kind of meat that you cook." I said, "Oh that's right, all grocery stores don't have lunch meat, can you swing by Home Depot or Lowes on the way home to get the ham and turkey?

My garage sale went well on Saturday. Erin was supposed to help me because she needs service hours. Her service card is due in less than two weeks. She wanted to make up most of her hours. She claims that she is much to busy to actually serve the community. Maybe they should put, see asterisk in the school handbook. *all sophomores except for sweet little Erin Murphy (because she is much to busy) are required to do a minimum of thirty hours of service. I woke her up bright and early Saturday so she could serve the community. She sat in a lawn chair wrapped in a blanket for about 10 minutes. Once she saw that I was making a little cash she decided she just had to have a bagel from Bread Co. We were having a bit of a car issue. Lauren came home this weekend and was planning on taking grandma's car to her exercise class and Dave was taking his car to Ryan's practice. Erin ignored Lauren's announcement that she was taking the car and beat her to it. Once Lauren discovered that Erin didn't show the proper respect to her older sister and took the car anyway, it posed a bit of a problem. I thought about tying them both to a tree with a free to good home sign around their necks. Once Erin finished fighting with Lauren she moved on to Shannon. They were fighting over Shannon's warm, fuzzy pink blanket. They both sat in the same lawn chair sharing the blanket instead of Erin going inside to get her own. Erin still needs 29 hours and 55 minutes of service hours. Maybe she can look for a garage sale next weekend and volunteer to sit in a chair wrapped in a blanket. Lauren has vowed to call the teacher at Erin's school to let her know that Erin really didn't perform service to the community. The Murphy's were really feeling the love this weekend!!!!

I was sitting in class today when my phone rang. Of course my teacher was standing right next to me when it rang. I forgot to turn it off before class. I looked at it and saw that it was Shannon calling. I tried to quickly shut it off so it would stop ringing. I was unsuccessful, instead I took two pictures of myself with the camera button. Luckily my teacher decided not to scold the student pushing forty, for having her phone on. When we got a break, I went out in the hall to call Shannon back to see which kid was on fire or bleeding. She knows the rule about calling me at work or school. She didn't answer her cell phone, I was getting a little worried. I called the house phone. Ryan answered, I asked to talk to Shannon. I asked her what she needed, she said "Oh. I was wondering if I could make brownies?" I said, "are you serious?" She said, "I went ahead and made them, Oh, are you at school? I forgot." I guess I should be happy that she didn't send me a text message.

I am having a garage sale on Saturday, I went through the kids summer clothes. Maggie is a little attached to some of her outfits. She insists that they all still fit. Tomorrow is dress out day at school. She wants to wear her short shorts and a tank top, the only thing missing is some leopard print stilettos. Maybe I can have Lauren swing by the house and give her a quick makeover before school.

Today was our last dance class. I would hardly call us Fred and Ginger but we are definitely a little better than we were on week one. We spent the majority of the six weeks arguing about which one of us did the steps wrong. (it was usually Dave) We are actually considering signing up for the next session so we can brush up on our moves. We came home tonight and showed the kids what we learned, we got mixed reviews, Erin was impressed, Kelsey was disappointed that Dave didn't dip me, grandma didn't care for the song, Ryan wanted dad to put mom in a "death spin" (whatever that means) and Shannon just looked at us like we were stupid. Thank God I don't have self esteem issues!! We start our next session of boot camp on Monday. It has been a nice two weeks off. I have continued to run on the treadmill these last two weeks but I have fallen off the wagon as far as journaling all of my food and eating six small meals like I am supposed to. I don't think the White Castles we got on the way home from our dance class would fit well in our boot camp plan. I wonder if six small sandwiches could substitute for six small meals?