Because it was empty

Noah has a hard time remembering to keep the light off, stay in bed, and not scream that he is Indiana Jones when we put him to bed. Jaden and Noah share a room so this is a real drag for Jaden who has school in the morning. Anyway, recently we have been putting Noah in our bed, just to get him our of the room where Jaden is sleeping. Noah doesn't like this plan AT ALL. He cries and cries and cries until finally he falls asleep. Being the mean mom that I am I just let him cry... it's good for him, and he needs to learn the consequence of being such a little butt head!

As mentioned before, he doesn't like this idea very well. Last night was NO EXCEPTION! We were watching SVU and suddenly Noah is screaming his head off. I just rolled my eyes and sent Mike up. About 5 minutes later Noah is still screaming and Mike walks downstairs, sits on the couch and says, "I can't deal with him." Sigh... I guess it's my turn... I truge up the stairs to see what the problem is and he comes walking (still screaming) out of my bedroom completely and totally naked. This is become an unfortunate habit of his at bedtime... taking off all his clothes. I ask him why he is crying and he says it's because "Because... um... because... I um.... I peed in the shoebox." (this is the queue for my blood pressure to start rising.)

"Noah! Why did you pee in the shoebox? There is a bathroom right there?!?! Why did you pee in the shoe box."

"Because the wannapona see wha tee boo!"

"Noah, take a deep breath and stop crying. I can't understand you."

Noah takes a deep breath and turns off the waterworks. (Note: this is the number on indication that he was FAKING!!!) Once he was calmed down I said "Okay, now tell me why you peed in the box."

(On the verge of falling apart again.) "Because it was empty!" Queue waterworks...

I turned around and looked down the stairs to Mike who was shaking quietly and covering his mouth...

I couldn't look at Noah for a couple of minutes because I was laughing so hard.

Brown Roses

I thought this was really neat. I am totally going to get some of these for my yard. Have you ever heard of a Brown rose? I think they are cool:

I also found these. They are called "Black Roses" but I thought they were really pretty:

Anyway, I thought they were nice.

Stuff...

Well... we did the heart attack on Monday and it was great fun. The Nosy Nellie that is my brother in law Greg (Best... not James) opened the door and then my sister in law came home at exactly the wrong time. She wasn't very discreet or sympathtic for the kids that were hoping for a surprise. She just stopped to chat then pushed her way through and into the house. It was a little strange. Anyway, after my in laws we went to my parents house and did it to them. It was really fun because they weren't nosy and didn't open the door. The boys had so much fun sneaking around and whispering, they got a little cold at the end but it was really fun for them.

I got to hold Jennie and Greg's babies yesterday (Mike's sister had twins late last year). That was lots of fun. Because we've been so sick we haven't seen anybody in Mike's family for weeks and weeks but I got to hold both of them at the same time. I should have taken a picture. It was super cute.

Mike has started receiving his gifts for Valentine's Week. He was a little confused the first night. I don't normally give him presents for no reason at all but yesterday he started to catch on. I did the whole thing with the candy bars and he said " That was great, I've never had one of those posters and I've always wanted one." I don't think anybody would understand the magnitude of that comment... just me. It's one of those things that only your spouse could know and I know how big of a deal that was for him and how flattered he was. (BTW Greg... my husband likes the cheesy stuff!) Anyway, it's really helping our currently strained relationship. (Only strained because of the day to day things of regular life... no worries, nothing to dramatic!) Anyway, I thought I'd give you a quick update of how things are going. Nothing too exciting... man! I'm exhausted!

Valentine's Day

I said that I was going to dedicate this blog to being prepared for the second coming... well, this entry does that, in a round about way... We have been really having a hard time the last few weeks.. just life, kids sick, jobs are stressful, and a constant need to do the laundry and dishes!!! Nothing too much to worry about (it would be nice to be included in prayers... if you think about it. Man! I had an awesome experience the other day with prayer... another time though) just the difficulties of life getting to us. \Well, because of the discouragement that seems to be sweeping through my house like poison lately I have felt inspired to express to my husband how much I love him. You can tell somebody something a hundred times and it's still the same thing over and over, just words. I have been trying to serve him by doing little things... not whining as much when he has to go to a Jazz game for his work... ahem... and when he has church stuff to do.

On top of doing that stuff I have decided that I am going to do an extra special thing for Valentine's day next week! Every day he's going to get a little treat from a "Secret Admirer!" I wonder if he will tell me about it if I say it's from a secret admirer... hmm... that is going to be an interesting experiment (I'm NOT setting him up... it will just be interesting...) I bet he'll tell me about it. We don't normally celebrate Valentine's Day because it's just such a cheesy holiday and we usually just end up in an argument! Once we even celebrated in August (6 months later) so we could avoid the crowds... we just aren't big on Valentine's day... that's changing this year! Anyway, here are my brillant ideas...

Day 1: Use the following website to send him a braille message via email from a secret admirer.

Day 2: Money for my Honey... Check out this website.

Day 3: New Shirt and Tie with a note that says "We are a perfect fit!"

Day 4: Poster Board telling him how much I love him with candy bars. (You know, "Don't 'Snicker' but I think you are a 'Mr. Goodbar.'" Kind of thing)

Day 5: A small Scrapbook that is just pictures of us and has reasons that I love him in it. Check out this website.

Day 6 or 7: I'm just not sure what order I'm going to do these things in yet but I am going to make him a hanging paper heart and fill it with candy for him to wake up to. (I'm going to do this for my whole family)

Then the other one I'm going to do will be making heart shaped cinnamon rolls and taking them to his work.

FUN huh?!?!

Boredom Busters

Okay, I know that the title of this entry is totally creative and cute... not my idea. (I am hanging my head in shame.) Anyway (Okay, no more hanging) I found this FABULOUS website that I may have mentioned before but I don't remember... anyway, it's called Sugardoodle. It's got great ideas for everything from FHE to.... hmm... can't think of a "to." Well, it's a great website and my primary kids can credit most of my lessons to it. I strongly suggest you check it out.

On this amazing website I found a fantastic list of things for kids to do. I have printed this out and I'm going to hang it on my fridge so when my kids want to turn on the TV we can find something else a little more creative for them to do... some of the things on here need parental guidance (especially with kids as young as mine) but some of the stuff they can do without me which gives me a minute to load the dishwasher or do a load of laundry. Go check it out.... right... here.

A Different Direction

Well, I have been thinking about something. I don't think anybody would argue with me that this world is getting scary! The economy in the crapper and all the scary things happening out there. Then you read the scriptures and that gets me even more scared for my little family! My cute kids are SUCH good kids (most of the time) and I can see Jaden's little testimony blossoming and (thank heavens) Noah follows his example... at least so far. I do know that I am responsible for teaching them the things that they need to know to make it and "be all they can be." That is not a responsibility I take lightly. I think about how I can help them and teach them things every day. Sometimes I feel so overwhelmed that all my kids need and I frequently feel like I'm totally failing them. But then I stand up and say all I can do is the best I can do and sometimes my best sucks! Luckily my best is usually pretty good. They are good boys.

Anyway, now I will get back to the subject at hand. The second coming is... coming my friends. I am done with the goals I had set for myself, I am going to erase them and am going to spend my time and energy preparing for the second coming. I figure that's kind of all inclusive. You have to be ready financially, spiritually, and all other ways. Also, I want to help others be ready so ocassionally I will post ideas on how to get ourselves prepared for the second coming of the Savior.

Okay... here goes. I once had a dream about food storage (I know, I have the strangest dreams... last night it was like my brain was throwing up! I dreamed that my best friend from High School was sitting INSIDE a vending machine! I seriously dream in technicolor... it's all very vivid... and EXHAUSTING!) and since then I have been totally obsessed with food storage but because of my POOR planning skills (poor doesn't even begin describe the extend of my planning skills) I have never really had much more than just a few weeks of food storage. I get so proud of myself when buy something to put in my food storage. (Funny story - Once Mike and I were in Provo for a BYU football game and on the way home we were going to stop at a park to meet his family and have a picnic. Before we could do that we needed to stop at the grocery store to pick some stuff for a PICNIC... so stuff like paper plates, plastic forks etc. When we got there we were talking about trying to beef up our food storage and decided to start watching sales and buying things for our food storage that way... well, we got so excited that when we walked into the grocery store... in Provo - We DON'T live in Provo, we live on the other side of the mountain actually- to buy paper plates we ended up walking out with 6 boxes of cake mix because they were on sale! Can we say ADHD??? I get so distracted so easily. We still have a couple of the boxes and that was not last football season but the season before!!! I still have them because I always forget that we bought those so I buy another whenever I need it. I really need more structure to my life.) But I don't have anything documented so I really have no idea what I have... I could tell another story but I won't... I'm such a space cadet! Well, in order to build my food storage I am going to use this plan. Once this plan is completed it there will be enough food for one person to survive for a year. I figure that will keep my family kicking for a few months so I think that's a good place to start! Anyway, I'll keep you all informed on how things are going.

Isaiah... the great brick wall in the Book of Mormon

At least for me...

I am not the brightest star in the sky (not stupid, by any means but sometimes a little dense) and I NEVER get anything out of Isaiah. Truth be told I have not been doing very well at the scripture goal (everything kind of stopped when Jack got sick.. now that he's better I'm trying hard again) but I have reached the Isaiah the chapters in 1st Nephi. Oh man! They are rough... I find myself just reading them to just get through them and call it good... sometimes I skip them. I don't know what to do, this is ALWAYS the point that I lose my gumption and the scriptures just start collecting dust. I REALLY LOVE the stuff after it but the actual Isaiah chapters...

Anyway, I wanted to share this AMAZINGingly brillant idea I read about today... My pantry is a death trap. Always so messy. Then that mess always tends to vomit out all over the kitchen. Can I just say that I LOVE chalkboard chalk? I think it's brillant! A FANTASTIC IDEA! (Sidebar - My sister had the idea of making a list of all her spices and keeping it tapes up to the inside of her spice cabinet because... like the rest of the world... she will keep buying the same spice over and over again because she doesn't think she has it. Then that retched cabinet is just overflowing with duplicates of the SAME STUPID SPICE!!! Well, Jill... this one is for you. instead of using a peice of paper, which will undoubtably get all wrinkly from old age and will get all messy when you write a spice up there then it's gone and you have to scribble it out, cover the inside of your cupboard with chalkboard paint and keep a single piece of chalk handy. That way, when you use a spice, you simply erase it. when you buy a new spice just add it to the bottom. I know I know... I'm brillant... now back to the pantry) Using an old Ruler paint it with chalkboard paint and hang it in your closet. I don't think I'm doing this brillant idea justice. Here is a picture...

Now do you understand the brillance. For the story behind this glorious creation go to this website... http://thriftydecorchick.blogspot.com/

Heart Attack!!!

Okay, I am going to start my "Direction" today. I am fairly confident that the people this entry will effect don't read this blog so I'm safe that I'm not spoiling anything.

I am the mother of 3 little boys and I am BOUND AND DETERMINED that my boys will be sensitive and loving. I try SO HARD to impress on them the importance of thinking of other people. Well, starting next week we are going to make another effort in this on going battle. We are going to "Heart Attack" their grandparents. (For those that don't know what a heart attack is - it is a group of people that take decorations to somebody's house and secretly decorate their front door in hearts and valentine's related items.) I found some really great ideas too... We are going to make "stain glass hearts." (Let's try this picture thing again.






We are also going to do Heart door mat...
And, we are going to make some hearts with things we love about them and tape them to the door. I think our parents will really like it.
We will be doing each of these activities for the next few weeks for family night then on the family night before Valentine's day (which is also Mom's B-Day) we will take all the stuff over there and secretly decorate their door.

I'll take pictures of the final product.

By the way... all the projects above can be found at the following link: http://www.skiptomylou.org

Direction

Yikes it has been a week! I realize that it's only Wednesday but I'm trying not to think about it. Normally I'm not like this. I figure that I should be happy no matter what day it is. In my never ending quest to be happy and content with the little life I have I try to keep myself happy with wherever I am at the moment. Well, today is Wednesday and I'm not very happy about it. Oy... I could use a nice weekend at the Anniversary Inn. We are all sick (except Mike but I'm sure it's coming) with an "Upper Respiratory Infection." Really we all have a CRAZY bad cold. AND we all have PINK EYE!!! YuckO!

Anyway, being happy in the moment... being happy in the moment... being happy in the moment... I have been trying to think of a specific direction I can take this Blog. I don't really want to just blog about my every day life... I'm not exciting enough for people to read that! People would get bored. Heaven knows I'm bored with my life sometimes, I can't imagine why anybody would want to read about it!

I read some really fun blogs, crafts, FHE, decorating etc... I have been trying to think of something inventive that I could do but I'm not the kind of person that is great at one or two things. I'm OK at several things and would like to just blog about those several things. FHE, crafts (I would have steal ideas for this one!), cooking, decorating (again with the theft!), scrap booking, organizing (I'm not very organized but I have a lot of good ideas and maybe if I were to write about them I would start using them!), money tips (stop laughing!), and tips on parenting among other things. I don't mean to brag but I think I'm a pretty good mom. I lose my temper sometimes and sometimes my kids socks don't match but I think they are turning out to be great kids and even though I know I can't take all the credit I do feel that I have a few good ideas for my VERY SMALL audience. I believe there are two people that read this blog. (HOORAY FOR ME!!! At least I don't have to be nervous about offending a large group, sorry to the two of you!)

I'm not starting today... I'm too stinkin' tired and I'm at work so I really ought to... well... work. I will start soon and I'm going to start thinking of things I can do. I would like to give you a fair warning. While I am kind of creative I don't think that I am going have any ideas that blow your mind and my craft stuff probably won't be all that sensational but they are mine, I am proud of them and if you don't like them then you can just go home!

Phew!!!

Man what a week! We had to take Jack to the hospital this last week because he had a really high fever and couldn't stop coughing and his blood oxygen level wasn't high enough. It was really scary. He has been SOO sick. He has viral Pnemonia (sp?) and a virus just like RSV but it's not RSV. It's been rough and several nights of very bad sleep. He's doing much better now and is at the sitter so I could come back to work. Poor little guy.

Anyway, I have some pictures that are a little old but they are super cute! This was before Jack's time so he's not in these pictures but DANG! They are so stinkin' cute!! Now, how do I do this? Hmmmm....

Yeah! I did it. This is Mike and Noah. What a hottie! (Mike that is... not Noah, but he is going to be a heartbreaker!)

I did it again! I think I can handle this. This is Jaden and I. It's funny, it's like looking the same face twice. We look so much alike!!! Talk about a heartbreaker :)

Here are all four of us. I'll bring some of Jack soon.

Book of Mormon FHE

I love FHE I can't even tell you how much I love FHE. It's so exciting to teach my kids something and then they mention something from the lesson about a week later. It is so much more satisfying than teaching primary (which I also love, just not quite as much as FHE) . A few months ago I felt very strongly that we needed to have FHE on the Book of Mormon stories. Things didn't work out so that we were able to start doing it right away because it was Thanksgiving then Christmas so we had special FHE's for those but now that it's boring old January we are trying again! OH MY GOSH!!!! My kids are so stinkin cute!!!! I really don't know how I lived without them, it's like they have always been there... even before they were here and part of my life. (I have some pictures I meant to post today but I can't today. I'll try really hard to remember tomorrow!) Anyway, we did some role play. Noah was Nephi (he was a little grump and didn't want to be the guys that complain... aka Laman and/or Lemuel) Jaden and Jack (Jack just played with the Christmas ornaments we haven't put away yet) were Laman and Lemuel respectively and Mike was Lehi and Laban while I was the narrator, Zoram, and the angel. Noah has this turkey baster that he runs around with all the time and he calls it his sword so that was Laban's sword. It was so fun to see my kiddos with towels on their heads pretending to be these people. I love love love my kids!!!

Next week we are going to talk about Nephi building a boat and color pictures then glue them on construction paper. We have a special place where we hang our FHE art so these will be displayed there and after a week or two they will move to the family scrapbook. I'll try to remember to take pictures! (Here is where I found the pages for the boat coloring activity... it's a pretty long link... http://www.lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?vgnextoid=21bc9fbee98db010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD&locale=0&sourceId=6da79f82a6bab010VgnVCM1000004d82620a____&hideNav=1)

New Year's

Okay, I'm fairly confident that nobody reads this blog (it has been since August since my last post!!!) so I thought now would be a good time to start back up. Last year I read a blog (http://crockpot365.blogspot.com) that was about a woman who made a new years resolution to use her crockpot every day for a year. She did, and it was AMAZING! She did such an amazing job and now she is going to write a cookbook that is going to be in stores this fall. (I HIGHLY recommend it.) Anyway, I would like to follow in her footsteps... sorta. I am not ambitous enough to crockpot every day for a year, or even cook every day for a year. But... I am SICK AND TIRED of flaking out on so many things sooo.... i thought this might be a way for me to be accountable. I just have to keep my self pumped up... (I'm going to do it... I'm going to do it... I'm going to do it!!!) Sooo... these are the items that I have determined that I am going to do this year.

1. I SERIOUSLY need to lose about 30 pounds. I know I know... those that know me think I'm crazy but I am bigger than I have ever been (I can't even blame it on having three kiddos because I have slimmed right back down to my former size after all three!!! I just REALLY have a weakness for candy! However, I do think I can blame a desk job.) I am not one for dieting and I don't think it's to the point where I need to go crazy to lose weight so right now I'm starting simply by working out for a total of a total of 3 hours a week (that's about all I can fit in, I'm a busy girl) and so far my muscles are completely SPAZING OUT but I am on target!

2. Pray 2x's a day. Obviously this is going to be quite personal since it's called "Personal" prayer but I have let this drop and I can see the difference in my life.

3. And this is the biggie! I am going to have 100% visiting teaching for the whole year! I know this may not be that big of a deal for most people but for me it's terrifying! I am scared of some people (specifically the people I visit teach! - not that they are terrible people, they are AMAZING but I am not so much... so it's scary for a not so amazing person to go visit people that are so incredible!) and I've been such a flaky Visiting Teacher (that doesn't even describe how horrible of a VT I am.... One girl I was I was visiting pretty consistently while she was pregnant then I - as usual - flaked out and I have not seen her since.... SHE IS NOW PREGNANT AGAIN!!!! AND HAS A 2 YEAR OLD BABY AND HAD A MISCARRIAGE IN THE MEAN TIME!!!! I am that bad of a VT!) it's very embarassing to go now. I am going to repent and then just try again.

4. Read the scriptures 4.5 hours a week... again the best I can fit in right now. I have not been doing a good job with this either and I feel the change since I've stopped.

Okay... there you go. I'm sure nobody even checks this anymore but I think if I can pretend that somebody is out there listening then maybe I'll be a little more accountable. I tend to make grand plans then not follow through (I know... me?!?!?!? Not follow through?!?!?! NEVER!!!!!) but I am really going to do it this time. I really really am going to do it! I just need to get over the hump of the visiting teaching!