Things I Love About AZ

See, there ARE beautiful things in the desert:


The photography is not the greatest.

These are all in my yard. The first one: an Hibiscus. I LOVE orange Hibiscus. The second one, I have no idea what it is called, but we just planted this tree, and it has these wonderful yellow bell flowers on it (it's not the yellow bells bush, it will be a full sized tree one day...) and the third, again, I don't know the name, but I love looking out my kitchen window and seeing these beauties.

What are the pretty things in your yard?

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My mom used to sing a song that said:

"Oh how I hate to get up in the morning! Oh, how I'd love to remain in bed! Someday I'm going to murder that bugler. Someday they're going to find him dead."

She would wake up so cranky that on Sunday's if she said she was going to take a nap, we would beg her not to do it, for our own sakes.

This gene has been passed on to me.

Sleep is sacred, I take it very seriously, and I simply can not to relate to others who don't.

M is 13 1/2 months old and has been sleeping quite nicely in our closet. It is pitch black, and the clothing on the racks muffles the outside noise.

After our big trip I decided it was as good a time as any to move him in to E's room, as they will have to share growing up [we do have another bedroom, but I enjoy having a guest room (read: I'm a glutten for punishment)]. So we moved the crib.

I knew it would an adjustment, so E slept in the extra bedroom until the transition time is done. Monday morning I hear the sounds of playing and see this:

{Note: the little light indicating PM is not lit up}

Apparently, with all the toys being in E's room 5:53 AM is a perfectly reasonble time to greet the day. I did not embrace this fact with even a measure of glee.

Somehow, E ended up back in his room in the middle of the night, and they must have pow-wowed to ensure that I knew the joy that is pre-dawn rising.

So 6:30 AM saw me hanging black trashbags over the glass on their window (along with the blinds and curtains, it is pretty dark in there now).

Tuesday morning fared a wee bit better: 6:15 AM

Today: 7:05 AM

I know that for some of you these hours are par for the course, and from you I will probably receive little sympathy. But in my family 5:53 AM is only for activities such as the AUTOMATIC sprinklers going off so that the grass gets watered before it's too hot. Those digits were just not meant for human viewing.

Query: Would it be totally unreasonable for a 13-year old to be sleeping in his parents closet?

Update

Just to catch up:
On June 6th we headed out to California, to my in-laws house to spend a few days with them. There was a big gun show that A, my brother-in-law, my father-in-law, and E went to. They got to spend some time drooling over armaments that we will never be able to afford. They had a catch and release fishing pond there and E caught a cat fish, but was too freaked out by it to get picture.
My mother-in-law and I went down to Huntington Beach Pier and walked around, M loves being outside.
A flew home on Sunday night. He lost his wallet at the airport (luckily he'd taken his Driver's License out of it so he was able to get on the plane). So I called around and cancelled all of his credit cards. While I was on the phone with the last company, the airport police called to say they'd found it. When my father-in-law went to pick it up, it had everything in it safe and sound, even the cash that was in there.
On Monday morning the boys and I drove up to my dad's in Carson City, NV: no small feat to drive 10 hours with two little boys and one adult, I did stop three times to let them run around a little bit each time. I hadn't been there since November of 2006, the weather was perfect and it was so fun to visit with my sister and brother, it was the first time my brother met M. There is a part of me that would love to like living in Carson City, I just can't bring myself to do it.
I also got to visit with one of my favorite people in the world, Becky. She is the friend that no matter how long it's been since you've seen each other you just pick right back up where you left off. She is a delight, and her daughter is a gem.
On Thursday I packed the boys back up in the car (thank goodness for a portable DVD player and a bag of Dum-Dum suckers) and drove back down to my in-laws to spend a few days before coming home. I was planning to come home on Saturday to make it home for Father's Day, but I got the 24-hour bug and was up all night, so I took advantage of being with grandparents and let them take my kids for the morning while I laid around and relaxed.
We came home on Sunday and have been trying to catch back up with real life.
It was really nice to get out of the heat, to see the people I love. And I was totally shocked by how good the boys were in the car, E helped take care of M, and the amount of screaming was minimal, I dare say it was a pleasant experience.

M

He is pretty quick, this guy. I gave the boys each a bowl of Lucky Charms as a snack (I don't normally have sugar cereals, but it was so cheap!) I went in to take a shower, came back out, M had eaten all of the marshmallows and conveniently avoided the nominally healthy cereal part. If he accidently got one of the offenders in his mouth, he promptly spit it back out, and searched for a tastier morsel.