A Place for Everything

Running with...ruler?

2012-01-23T18:33:00.000-08:00

It was a tough weekend at the Duggar house. Hyrum was doing a "trick" with a ruler in his mouth and fell. You guessed it, he tore a big gash in the back of his mouth, just above his bottom molars. After being assured that we had a guardian angel who made sure he didn't die, the pediatrician sent us to a Ear, Nose, and Throat doctor. The end result is that Hyrum had his second round of general anesthisia. Here he is before the procedure.

The doctor said he did a great job, and only needed five stitches. Lucky for us, they will dissolve, so we don't have to do another round. Which is good, because Hyrum didn't like waking up after the stitches. But, as you can see from below, he is fine now. In fact, I haven't heard him complain about pain yet!

Dare Devil

2012-01-14T22:29:00.000-08:00

Don't ask me how or why, but at some point today, a clothes pin appeared with an insane desire to be attached to someone's nose. Or, Joy is just a torturer in disguise and it came out a bit today. This all started with Joy questioning my ability to pin a clothespin to my nose for 10 seconds. It eventually led to Brigham, in a show of bravado, keeping it there for more than 30. You want to see this for yourself.

(Go to the main blog to view video if you are reading this in your email!)

Friday the 13th

2012-01-13T23:32:00.000-08:00

It was our night to have the kids over for our babysitting co-op, and we had some fun. I stuck vinyl mustaches on their clear cups and we all LOVED them!

Okay, I loved them the most. I LOVE mustaches! At least, ones that aren't actually adhered to someone's face...

All from one set of sheets...

2012-01-09T19:20:00.000-08:00

I had some great flannel sheets that somehow found their way to a pair of scissors and a small child, thereby making them fairly unusable as sheets. So, for Christmas this year, I made them in to pajama bottoms for my kids. I even put a little snowman applique on the t-shirts I bought to go with them. When I got to Nevada, my sisters decided to use the remaining sheet pieces to make jammie bottoms and appliqued tops for their kids. And, I got a pair, too! That means 11 child sized and one adult sized jammie bottoms out of one set of sheets. And, I even had enough left to make hand-warmers for my kids!

If you can't tell by looking at this picture, it was a WILD Christmas!

I'm awsome

2011-12-05T21:33:00.000-08:00

I love that Hyrum has huge amounts of self confidence. That really is important for kids, right?

Yeah, pretty much.

(If your are viewing this post via email, go to the blog www.tarasplaceforeverything.blogspot.com to view the video. The post will make a lot more sense.)

Christmas advent

2011-12-01T09:23:00.001-08:00

I have held off posting for months now because I felt like I needed to catch up on everything that has happened since I posted last. I keep getting further behind, so I am just going to jump in mid-stream and not look back.

We love Christmas, and anticipating Christmas is almost as fun as the actual day. I love advents, and we always have one or two hanging around. Well, this year, I decided I wanted one for each child. Here is what I came up with:

This one is paper cylinders sewed in opposite directions at each edge.

I made this one last year. It is muslin bags with iron-on vinyl numbers.

This is the paper cylinders again, just different colors.

Last is this cool one I did with my Silhouette this year. You have the option of boxes or drawers for each space, and maybe next year when I have more time I will do the boxes. As it is, I think it turned out pretty well.

In each of the containers is a small piece of candy, and in one of the four each day is a scripture relating to Christmas. I told the kids they had to get their morning work done before they get to open the box for the day, and at 7:30 this morning every one was done, with no prompting on my part! Yeah! I love Christmas!

The Best Mother's Day gift EVER!!!

2011-05-11T05:14:00.000-07:00

I have finally grown up a bit and realized that Mother's Day is not about being pampered and petted. It is about being grateful for the gift of BEING a mother. So, my expectations of the day do not involve getting great gifts. But, this year, Brigham gave me the most thoughtful, unselfish gift I have ever received. He gave me...wait for it...a "big-huge-Mother's-Day-kid-spanking-stick". He even wanted me to try it out to make sure it worked and volunteered to be the test-y. And, this massive branch you see Hyrum holding is the actual stick. I should have gotten the picture with Brigham, but he is already on the bus, and the stick needs to be removed from the property before someone uses it for a big-huge-house-smashing-stick!

Okay, last thing. The night before Mother's Day, Brigham was saying his prayers, and I wanted to share an excerpt:
"Please help Dad, Joy, Paul and Hyrum to love me as much as I love Mom. I love her so much I don't even throw up on her." That, my friends, is true love!

Making fun of my kids

2011-03-13T20:10:00.000-07:00

What is the point of being a mother if you can't occasionally make fun of your silly kids? Today was a great opportunity for that. First thing after breakfast the kids decided they wanted to paint. (We are still down with colds, so we didn't go to church right after breakfast as we usually do.) As I wanted to get a little crafting done too, I readily agreed. Joy taught the boys how to make splatters on their pages, and Brigham took it to the next level.

You almost don't notice the healing burn or the hula hoop to the head scabs with all the paint.

Brigham and Joy really get along quite well, and after a bit of clean-up, they went upstairs to come up with a parade. I don't think that really caught on, because after a long while, they came downstairs bedecked it Silly Bands. They were rock stars, and Joy did her best to get her rock star attitude on.

Personally, I think the unbrushed hair was much more effective than the silly-banded pajama pants!

Then, this evening, Joy and Hyrum did this amazing stunt. I have been noticing lately that Joy is an exceptionally scrawny child! I mean, look at her arms! I think Hyrum's arms are bigger around than hers! It is a wonder he doesn't just fall flat and smash her like a pancake! Okay, he did a few times.

And speaking of scrawny, I couldn't resist this shot. Have you ever seen such a pointy bum in your life? It looks like an elbow joint, not a bum!

Well, that was cathartic. Maybe I will let them live another day...

Super Hooper

2011-03-11T21:49:00.000-08:00

It is amazing what a few days of practice will do for a person. You remember a few days ago, when I posted a video of Hyrum's cute hooping? He was pretty cute, but not very adept. Well, that has changed. He can now keep a hoop up as long as he likes. And, if I don't distract him, he can do just about whatever he pleases.

What you don't get from this video is how little he is. It is even more adorable when you see the action and realize it is being accomplished by someone who is only 41" tall! And, he is not even remotely modest. He will tell you he is a great hooper.

Hula Hooper!

2011-03-07T20:29:00.000-08:00

Joy and I have been doing a lot of hula hooping lately, and Hyrum has been fascinated by it. Unfortunately, his powers of hooping are not great. He stands still and spins the hoop around him. Well, in the last couple of days, he has figured out that, if you move your body, the hoop goes longer. So, I got a bit of video of his exertions.

Brigham and Hyrum wouldn't believe that I was recording, which is why they keep telling me to "take it". (For those of you who are getting this via email, go to the blog here and watch the clip).

To-do list

2011-03-01T21:41:00.000-08:00

This is Brigham's to-do list for today, of his own creation and origination.

In case you can't tell, it says:

- Laugh

- Run

- Play

- Scream

- Yell

It was quite a list, but I think he accomplished it.

Snow Day!

2011-02-23T22:00:00.000-08:00

Talk about a snow day! After we finally got out, we had a lot of fun. The kids didn't really want their pictures taken, so just pretend the look happy.

School is cancelled for tomorrow, and I hear we are supposed to get another 6-10 inches tonight! Maybe we will be able to make that igloo Paul wanted to make.

A New System

2011-02-22T21:13:00.000-08:00

I am always looking for better ways to do things. Or, just ways to start doing them. On this occasion, I was looking for a way to get the kids doing their morning work without so much monitoring from me. As I ruminated, I eventually came up with a plan. Sure, it took me almost two months to get it from idea to implementation, but the important thing is that it got there eventually! And here it is.

In the boys room, I have a peg bar on the wall to hang stuff from. Each boy has a bucket, and each night I put their clothes for the next day in the bucket. So, after consulting with my dad on how to do it, I added 18 clothes pins to the bar. Now, each boy has six clothes pins that I fill up with chore cards. Each boy has five cards (color-coded per child) that say, "PJs Away", "Get Dressed", "Make Bed", "Clean Room", and "Brush Teeth". I left one extra spot for the time when I start giving them more work.
The idea is, when they get up in the morning, they need to do all their cards before they come out of their rooms. When a card has been completed, they take it out of the clothes pin and put it in their pocket. Then, when they have gone to school, I take the cards out of the pockets, check the work, and if it has been done correctly, they get rewarded. They earn one penny per card completed, and if they complete them ALL, they get an extra nickel. This money goes into their special banks (empty peanut butter jars with their initial on the front that I made especially for this purpose) that hang from the living room mantel.

Theoretically, it will only take the boys 10 days to earn a dollar, and Joy even less, since she has more than five cards a morning. Today was the first day we tested the system and it went okay, but I hope to report back that it has been a screaming success!

It's working!

2011-02-20T22:04:00.000-08:00

As a parent, there are many times when I wonder if anything I am doing makes any difference at all. I mean, I am trying, but I fail a lot too. So it is always nice to have a moment that seems to say, "Yes, you are on the right track, it is worth it." Tonight I had one of those.

I went upstairs to remind the kids for the ump-teenth time that they were supposed to be getting their pajamas on, and this is what I found. No, Paul doesn't usually sit around studying the scriptures, but he was sure trying to tonight. He was following his fingers along the words and making up his own story, but he was in the scriptures! A few nights ago, I changed the way we do scripture study. Instead of me reading to the kids, we sit together, each child with their own Book of Mormon, and each person "reads" a verse. If you are a reader, you read. If you are not, I say it and you repeat. And, if you are somewhere in the middle, you read what you can and I help you with the rest. The scriptures live in the boys' clothes buckets, so they are always in the room with the boys. And, now I am glad they are, because they are getting it!

March Craft Group is ON!

2011-02-18T10:28:00.000-08:00

Yeah! March craft group is posted and ready to be viewed! This is what we are making:

Craft group is open to anyone in the area who wants to attend. Go to the craft group blog for all the details!

(Thanks, Brown Paper Packages for picture and instructions!)

2011-02-10T11:12:00.000-08:00

While I was busy with other things, my boys were busy being creative. The created a pencil-spatula apple launcher. The process of getting the clip was a bit interesting, but in the end, we got it. Take One:

Take Two:

Take Fifteen:

Valentine's Mailboxes

2011-02-10T10:01:00.000-08:00

I saw some super cute Valentine's mailboxes on a blog the other day and wanted to try them out, but I didn't want to drive 45 minutes to buy real mailboxes. So, I looked around the Silhouette store online and downloaded a pattern to make my own for $0.99. The kids picked out their paper, and here is what we ended up with.

The only disadvantage is that they are a little on the small side. So, I made coordinating envelopes for the bigger Valentine's to go in.

I think it would be an understatement to say that the kids are excited to open them on Valentine's Day.

We were Heart-Attacked!

2011-02-09T22:23:00.000-08:00

Sometime tonight, a devious crime was committed. When I pulled up in the driveway after picking Joy up from church, we found our yard covered in hearts. (It may have been there when we left to pick Joy up, but I was so focued on herding the boys I didn't even glance at the front yard!) I don't know who did it, but we sure appreciated it. The kids almost wet themselves in their excitement! And, I felt pretty special too.

Thanks, whoever you are!

The kids' Valentines

2011-02-09T22:19:00.000-08:00

This year I am a little ahead in my planning, so I let the kids make their Valentines. I found an idea on Family Fun and it turned out like this:

While Joy was at Achievement Girls tonight, the boys worked on their Valentines. Okay, I have to put in a little plug here. I wanted to do these, but I didn't want to spend hours cutting out 64 leaves and 64 hearts. So, I figured out how to make my Silhouette do the work. I took some existing graphics and modified them to create the hearts and the double leaves. The hearts were easy, but I impressed myself with the leaves. Then, just hit the button and let the machine do all the work. It was lovely.

Anyway, tonight, the boys wrote their names on the leaves, glued the leaves, and selected their suckers. I put a dollop of hot glue on the back of the sucker and attached the heart. My favorite part is that materials to do Valentines for all three kids' class ran me about $3.50 total! The 50 pack of card stock was $2.50 and I only used 10 pages, and I got the suckers after Halloween at a bag of 100 for $1. Can't beat that!

I was amazed at how patient Brigham was writing his name. Seven letters 27 times really adds up!

I let Hyrum make the leftovers. He was so excited to print his "H" and then have me finish his name for him.

Valentine's prep FHE

2011-02-07T19:37:00.000-08:00

I have always tired to come up with traditions for our family and sometimes I am more successful than others. One of the ideas I have had for years but never put into action came to pass tonight. It goes like this:

On the Monday before Valentine's Day everyone writes love letters to each member of the family that are then delivered on Valentine's Day. So, tonight for FHE, that is what we did. We had a short lesson in which we talked about the Family Proclamation and what it has to say about love (husband and wife are to love each other, love their children, and to teach their children to love and serve one anther) and then the kids made Valentine's cards. As Joy is the only one who writes well enough to write a letter, I settled for having them make cards for each other. Super fun. And, with my fancy new Silhouette, I cut out mailboxes that I am going to put together later tonight. Valentines will be distributed to the boxes and the kids will have the opportunity to add to them throughout the week. I am really excited to get them finished tonight!

Here are some shots of the kids at work:

We had to leave the cards to dry, the kids still haven't learned that you don't need a quarter-sized drop of glue for each item!

Another successful FHE

2011-01-31T20:06:00.000-08:00

Well, it appears that the ball is now rolling. For the second week in a row, we had a successful Family Home Evening. Funny thing is, we almost didn't have it. We didn't get things ready yesterday, and I almost decided to cancel for tonight. However, I didn't want to get in that habit, so we moved forward. It was Brigham's night to teach, and when I asked him what he thought our family needed to learn about, he said "healthy foods". Well, I told him I thought it would be a bit of a stretch to learn about healthy foods if we were having ice cream sandwiches for dessert. He was quick with a new idea that would go with dessert - cold foods! Lucky for me, inspiration hit. We decided we would teach a lesson on how to properly set the table.

First, Brigham helped me get out and stack on the counter five of everything we needed - plates, cups, napkins, forks, spoons and knives. That was almost a disaster since he thought I meant stack them all in the SAME pile! After that catastrophe was averted, we moved on to the lesson. Each child came over and Brigham gave them one of each item and instructed them to sit at the table. Once we were all seated, we had a lesson on left and right. Since the three youngest are still a bit fuzzy on that concept, we kind of slid through that. Then, I showed and had the kids all put each item in the correct spot. Easy. And, each night this week, we are going to set the table with all the silverware to help it set in. Paul led the kids in "When We're Helping, We're Happy" (one of my personal favorite propaganda songs from Primary) and Hyrum said the prayers. Woo Hoo! We are on a roll!

Oh yes, and we also did reverence practice. We have been having some problems being reverent in sacrament meeting and primary, so at FHE (and we may start doing it every night) we sit for 10 minutes and listen to church music. The kids have to sit on the couch or love seat and fold their arms reverently for the whole 10 minutes. If anyone gets irreverent, we start the clock over. It is amazing to me how well this calms them, and hopefully will even help with our reverence at church.

And, I just couldn't resist adding this shot of Brigham from this evening. Doesn't he look innocent?

For the freezer

2011-01-30T22:18:00.000-08:00

I don't know why, but lately I have been driven to make meals for the freezer. And, since it seems such a useful thing to do, I am chronicling my adventures over at my food blog. Just wanted to let you know in case you feel the world is coming to an end, or your are going to have a baby, and want to be prepared. So far I have 13 meals in the freezer, and there is no end in sight...

Now I Understand

2011-01-25T22:39:00.000-08:00

I remember as a teenager listening to my mom say that she always felt depressed on Mother's day. She felt like it was a reminder of all the things she wasn't doing. I didn't get that. If you knew my mother, you would understand why. She was the mom all the kids only wished they had. Of course, she wasn't perfect, but neither were her kids (I mean, her other kids.) Anyway, I remember her making similar remarks on other occasions. Like after going to a visiting teaching conference. And now, as an overwhelmed adult, I finally get it.

I went to our ward's visiting teaching conference tonight. The speaker was good, and the music was excellent (just kidding, I sang.) But, as the speaker talked, I found myself feeling like I was laying in my coffin, and with every topic she covered, I was having shovelfuls of dirt dumped on me. She did a great job, but there are so many things that I wish I could be doing. You should meet the ladies I visit, they are wonderful! But, I just don't have the time to do all the things for each of them that really could be justifiably done. I guess I should rely on the Spirit to prompt me to the most important things. But, when one of the examples of how to do visiting teaching was to do for our sisters what their mothers would do if they were here, I almost cried! Oh well. Does anyone else feel this way? Maybe I am just crazy.

Great FHE and activity!

2011-01-24T20:54:00.000-08:00

For some reason, I have never really gotten a good grip on Family Home Evening. It always ends up with me, 10 minutes before start time on Monday evening, trying to come up with some meaningful lesson/activity/snack. You can guess how often I succeeded. Well, this year we have moved to the 9am meeting time for church, so we decided to make good use of the time on Sunday. I created an FHE assignment spinner and after quiet time on Sunday, I am working with each of the kids to prepare their part of FHE.

This week, Hyrum had the lesson, Paul the activity, and Brigham the treat. When I asked Hyrum what he wanted to teach about, he said, "Making Jesus happy." So, in a bu

rst of inspriation, we came up with a simple way to teach. I made simple happy/sad faces out of paperplates and craft sticks for each child. At FHE, we talked about what kind of things made Jesus happy. Then, we played happy/sad. I named something the kids might do, and they turned out the happy or sad side to show how it would make Jesus feel. Simple, but it kept their attention, and they seemed to enjoy it. We sang "I'm Trying to Be Like Jesus" for our opening song and "If You Chance to Meet a Frown" for our closing song.

Then, the activity. We made hula hoops. Yes, made them. It was really easy, and MUCH cheaper and better quality than buying them at Walmart. Now, if I could only find cheap colored electrical tape, we could get them decorated in something besides black. Anyway, here are the kids in action.

One of the cool things about making them ourselves was that we could make them the right size for everyone. Not that I think Hyrum will really get good at age 3, but stranger things have happened. If you are interested in making your own hula hoop, I used this tutorial.

I even got my own hoop, but the look of concentration on my face was a little much for the camera!

The Music Man!

2011-01-19T21:42:00.000-08:00

Lately Hyrum has become especially interested in violins. What, you don't see a violin in this picture? Well, I certainly see one. That rolled up piece of paper in his mouth? Yeah, that's what he calls his "violin." He has been doing this for a couple of days now. He rolls up a piece of paper, sticks a piece of tape on it (I don't know that it really matters where, apparently the tape makes it sound better), sticks it in his mouth, and walks around the house making tooting sounds with it. Yeah, I know, he's weird.

I just couldn't resist these two. It really isn't hot here, but the boys go out in their hats, coats, and mittens and run around and jump and then come back in the house where the temperature is simply unbearable to their overheated little bodies. So, since they are so dang cute, I let them run around topless until I get too cold looking at them.

And, doesn't this just look like a man who is proud of himself and his physique? I love it! I wish I were that confident!

On a side note, we had some friends over to play today, and Hyrum just HAD to hold the baby! It was adorable!

After a while, Hryum started asking about his baby doll, Scrabble. Since Scrabble was carelessly left on the floor and Daisy chewed his hands off, I took the opportunity to drop Scrabble in the trash. It has been at least two months since Hyrum even asked about him, so I figured it was safe. Did I tell Hyrum that? No way! Are you crazy? I just asked Hyrum where he put Scrabble last, and he got a dazed look in his eyes and moved on to another topic of conversation. Safe for now!

According to Brigham...

2011-01-17T18:20:00.001-08:00

Brigham opened the freezer and saw a cold pack with the words "Cryofreeze" on it. "That means, it was melted and then frozen, so it cries." Yes, that boy does have an imagination!

Motivation for dinners

2011-01-11T10:44:00.000-08:00

In all the stress and mess around here, I really struggle to get a decent dinner on the table every night. Like all things, this goes through stages. Sometimes I am super vigilant and other times I am a huge slacker. Right now, I am a super slacker. However, I found a dose of great motivation last night. I read this great post from fairlyhappy last night and have decided that dinner is too important to waste. Here is the post:

10 Dinner Time Tips

I am a mother of four boys, a wife to one (boy also) and owner of a brand new puppy (finally... a girl!). As the nurturer in my home, I have the solemn responsibility of feeding my family. This is not an easy task. I have spent the last few years making family meals my top priority. Dinner time can be stressful, exhausting and frustrating... but it doesn't have to be. When I wake up with a plan, dinnertime is fun, entertaining, enjoyable and sometimes even delicious. This list is for anyone who wants to make FAMILY DINNER a priority in 2011.

*There are no pictures because everyone's table will look different. Please remember:It's not about how it looks-- it's ALL about how it feels.

1. Use a menu. You have to know what's for dinner in order to prepare for it! (duh!) I make a rotating menu once a month and shop once a week, mainly for produce. We will talk about recipes in another post (be thinking of your own favorites to share!) Having a menu will calm you down and keep the kids from asking "What's for dinner???" Make sure your menu is full of recipes that you all like :)

2. Let the children help! Even the youngest kids can help find ingredients, mix a salad, open a can, measure a cup of water, etc. My three older kids rotate each day with the following jobs: help mom prepare the food, set the table & take care of the baby. Sometimes they rotate between all three jobs in preparation for ONE meal! Keeping all of the kids occupied before dinner will add a feeling of cooperation in the kitchen... and it will help build confidence in your children.

3. Put a tablecloth on the table. This sounds simple, but it means you are preparing for something special. The tablecloth doesn't have to be fancy. In fact, it will be less stressful if it's not... then the kids can spill without worrying about being scolded. Rotate your tablecloths-- buy one for Halloween, Valentine's Day, birthdays, etc. Make sure it's machine washable!

4. Set a TIME for dinner. Set it and keep it. This will give help you know when to start preparing. Make sure each family member knows it's time to eat! Be consistent. If it's important to you, it will eventually become important to the entire family. (If dad can't make it home on time, start without him!)

5. Turn off the television. I can't stress this enough.... turn the damn TV off! Dinner time is for family bonding. Do not let the TV take over this sacred time. Music is only allowed if it's quiet and it contributes to the positive atmosphere. Be careful on which activities your family has going... Don't allow soccer, dance, whatever-it-may-be to get in the way of dinner. It's too important!

6. It's ALL about the conversation. Ask questions, tell stories, make up jokes, center your conversation around FUN topics. Avoid anything stressful or controversial (money, grades, behavioral problems, etc.) Ask questions that elicit conversation (with no wrong answers!) Start your own conversation jar with questions to draw from. If we can get our kids used to talking to us while they're young, it won't be so awkward when they become teenagers.

7. Keep a dictionary next to the table. It sounds silly, but you wouldn't believe how much you can learn from a dictionary! A dictionary can settle "arguments" as well as enlighten your already stimulating conversation. And if all else fails, learn a new word each night and make everyone use it in a sentence.

8. Start your own dinner time traditions. We have tacos for dinner E.V.E.R.Y. Tuesday. A simple tradition we started that we just can't (and don't want to) break. Make pizza on Fridays. Pick a theme night once a month. Dance around the table before everyone sits down to eat. Hold hands while saying the prayer. Eat by candlelight. Have a picnic on the floor. Make everyone eat with a large serving spoon. Eat food only one color... the possibilities are endless! Start your own traditions that the kids will look forward to and will continue with their children.

9. Teach your kids to clean up their own spills. Don't cry over spilled milk. Have plenty of napkins available and let them do the work. I also allow my children to make their own food if they don't agree with the food on the table. Many a peanut butter and jelly sandwiches have been made over the years. I don't care as much as long as I don't have to do the dirty work.

10. Invite friends over! Once you've got a routine going, invite someone to join you! Of course, this cannot and should not be every day. But inviting friends (either yours, your kids or both!) can really break up a dull routine and it will force you to prepare in advance. Be sure to use a recipe that's been tested and tried... and make sure to invite the right family! jk. sort of.

I am going to post my favorite recipes ASAP.... and would love you to link your favorites so we can all build our menus for 2011. Before I finish this post, I wanted to share a few fascinating statistics on family dinner. If these don't convince you the importance of eating together as a family, I don't know what will:

Family dinners are more important than play, story time and other family events in the development of vocabulary of younger children. (Harvard Research, 1996)

Frequent family meals are associated with a lower risk of smoking, drinking and using drugs; with a lower incidence of depressive symptoms and suicidal thoughts; and with better grades in 11 to 18 year olds. (Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, 2004)

Adolescent girls who have frequent family meals, and a positive atmosphere during those meals, are less likely to have eating disorders. (University of Minnesota, 2004)

The average parent spends 38.5 minutes per week in meaningful conversation with their children. (A.C. Nielsen Co.)

For more on the information and statistics of family dinner read HERE and HERE andHERE and HERE.

Wow! I am impressed. After browsing the site a bit, I also stumbled across a great post to help with menu creation, and I am going to do it tonight. If you want to see it go here. Happy dinner-ing!

Hey You!

2011-01-10T23:39:00.000-08:00

You don't have to be perfect! You are good enough the way you are! You don't have to have 145 followers to be super cool! Take it down a peg! You are an amazing person! Quit comparing yourself to all those women who seem to be able to do it ALL! You are a daughter of God who is doing what she can, and that is plenty good! I mean it, really.

- This post has been brought to you by someone who has been there and knows.

A quiet Saturday with the sock puppets

2011-01-08T23:50:00.000-08:00

Today we decided to spend the day at home creating. Paul and Hyrum made houses for their glitter balls, Joy made a helmet, and we all made sock puppets. The kids picked out socks, hair and eyes and I ran the glue gun. Here are a few:

Brigham c

alls these two Mr and Mrs Crazy Hair. Don't ask me which is which.

It was really fun to spend the day creating and then listening to Brigham. He has the BEST imagination. Oh yes, since we made puppets, I did a little tutorial on how to make the mouths really work. You can find it on my craft blog.

Okay, I had to put in a picture of Joy's helmet. We went to see Narnia tonight, and so she decided that she needed to make a helmet in honor of the occasion. She used paper and masking tape and must have worked on it for two hours. I only got into the action at the very end to help with the visor that, I must add, really goes up and down. It was great, she wore it to the movie, and you could tell when she was getting nervous, because the visor came down!

January Craft Group

2011-01-07T22:04:00.001-08:00

Yeah! We have a winner! For those interested in participating in the first monthly craft group, it will be held at my house on Thursday, January 20th. We will do a day session at 10am and an evening session at 8pm. (Joy has a musical program at school that night, sorry). However, the craft we will be doing should be fairly easy, so it won't take long. We are going to be making these:

Since we are moving into February, we are going to do Valentine's colors. Cost is $1.50 per headband. If you are interested, please get money to me by Monday, Jan 10th so I can get supplies ordered and here prior to the 20th. For all details, please see the OH Craft Group Blog. We will use this blog in future to do all of the coordination of the group. Please leave details of how many you want in the comment section of that blog if you have not already done so! I am so excited!

Happy 9th Birthday, Joy!

2011-01-02T20:22:00.000-08:00

Wow, I can't believe that she is actually nine years old! I never thought we would really get to this point! For some reason, I have never pictured her (in my mind) as any older than a kindergartener. It seems unbelievable that she has actually been a part of our family for nine years. I can't put into words how much my life has been blessed by having this sweet little spirit influence my life. She isn't perfect, but she is much closer to it than I am. Hopefully she will stick around for a while longer so I can grow up to be like her!

Joy was determined to make her own cake this year, all by herself. So, she followed the directions on the box, and baked her own cake. She was nervous about the frosting part, so I did that for her. For some reason, she thought triangles were an essential element (this was even before the banner) so we put them on. Weird, I know. However, she will get a super cool cake for her birthday party later this week.

Yes, we got her an MP3 player. Since I control entirely what gets put on it, I figured it wouldn't do any harm. She loves to listen to books, so that is what she is getting. On John's wisdom, she gets a speaker, not earplugs!

Since Joy fasted this morning, she really wanted to have crepes and hot chocolate for dinner. Not to nourishing, but you only get a birthday once a year, right?

Cool birthday banner, huh? Just get a Silhouette (like I did for Christmas) and you can whip one out in no time! And, Joy LOVED it!

I am not exactly sure why Joy opened her presents in her pjs, it wasn't really that late. But, she got a house coat, slippers, and monkey pants for her birthday, so here she is, modeling.

Who's the cuter monkey?

Guess what I am making -

2011-01-02T20:19:00.000-08:00

I will just say that there will be one for Joy and one for me. I will post on my craft blog when I am done, and you will get to squeal with delight! If I am feeling generous, I might even post a picture here...

New Year's Musings

2011-01-01T20:58:00.001-08:00

There is something very hopeful about the start of a new year. Even though it is just another day in a long succession of days, it is a good place to start. And so, I am starting.

I have been trying to be better about daily scripture study, prayer, exercise, journaling, and budgeting but without consistent success. Last night, as I read President Monson's "The Three R's of Choice" from October's General Conference, I figured out why. President Monson talks about an experience of Clayton M. Christensen playing college basketball. The summary of the experience was "it is easier to keep the commandments 100% of the time than it is 98% of the time." When I make exceptions to doing things I know I should but aren't convenient at the moment (like exercising when I have put it off until 9pm), the exceptions become the rule. I miss more than I hit. So, I am done with exceptions. I am structuring my time so the important things come first, and the goofing around comes after. That means, for me, as soon as I put the kids to bed, I read, pray, journal and budget. Then, when those are done, I can clean the house, craft, coupon, or spend time looking for my newest passion. I have even printed up a daily checklist so I can keep visual track of my progress!

It is interesting how these things work. Tomorrow is Joy's birthday. She spent a bit of time today planning what meals she wanted: crepes and hot chocolate for breakfast, homemade chicken and noodles and milk for lunch, and fried chicken and milk for dinner. I was so busy with all the things I was trying to accomplish, I didn't remember that tomorrow is Fast Sunday, and Joy has made the decision to fast. (She has worked her way into it gradually - first she fasted breakfast and stopped at snack. Next Sunday she fasted through breakfast and snack and ate lunch. This week she is scheduled to fast through lunch and eat at afternoon snack. This was all her own plan and she has stuck to it.) When I remembered it was Fast Sunday, I talked to Joy about it. I let her know, and then told her the decision was hers to make, but told her that if she decided to fast, I would make her special meals for her on Monday. Well, she was not happy. She wanted to fast, but she really wanted her special meals. I just let her mull over it. After a while, she came to me, slouching and upset. She said she just didn't know what to do about fasting tomorrow. So, I shared what I had learned from President Monson. I told her that, in my experience, was that it was much easier to make a decision and always stick to it, then there was no decision to make and fret over. If she had decided to fast, I recommended that she fast and not think any more about it. The amazing thing of it is, she did it! She agreed, and I haven't heard another thing about it! I wish I was that mature. It is also nice to see the almost automatic blessing I received from having read that talk. I wonder if there are any other parenting tips hidden in last General Conference...

A trip to the Seattle Temple

2010-12-31T20:15:00.000-08:00

In September (or was it October?) our stake president challenged each family in the stake to take a trip to the Seattle Temple before the end of the year. We were encouraged to get dressed in our church clothes and walk around the grounds. Since today was the last day of the year, we figured it was about time. And, it was a good trip.

Joy really wanted her picture taken with this statue. Doesn't she look innocent? It reminds me of how sweet she really is and my responsibility to treat her as such.

I think the kids really fit with this one. Mine are the ones in color. Those bronze ones just agreed to hold still for the picture. You know, the bronze ones, the ones that are actually behaving!

I didn't realize what a cold day it was! I am awfully glad we grabbed the coats, because it was much colder in Seattle than it was at home!

All in all, I am glad for the counsel of our stake president. It was a long drive, but we had some good discussion, and I feel that we have already been blessed. What a blessing it is to have a temple close enough to drive to!

Holy Deals, Batman!

2010-12-27T20:21:00.000-08:00

Okay, I couldn't resist going out and getting a few after Christmas deals today. And, am I ever grateful I did. This is what I got at Rite Aid today - $125 worth of stuff for... (drum roll please)

$9.35 out of pocket! And, I got back $35 in +Up Rewards! So, they paid me $25 to take $125 off their hands! I LOVE Rite Aid!

The other amazing deal was at Walmart. There was a $4 off Gillette razors coupon in the November and December PG insert. And, since Walmart has their gift sets marked half off, this normally $8.88 set (which includes a razor, full size deoderant, body wash, and something else in a tube) only cost me $0.44! Yes, that is 44 cents (plus tax)!

I got seven sets, all that I had coupons for! Can you blame me?

Christmas 2010

2010-12-26T17:37:00.000-08:00

There are just too may to put all the pictures on, so you get a smattering of my favorites.

I know this one isn't very flattering, but he looks so much like his mother, I couldn't resist! - I bet you didn't know that photographic double chins were hereditary!

Meme got all the kids pillow pets, and they LOVED them!

Hyrum, following in his father's footsteps. Yes, he did ask Santa for a football with only a little prompting.

And, everyone got electric toothbrushes. Yeah!

Paul and Brigham got these twin ball tracks from Santa, and I can tell they are going to bring HOURS of entertainment! yeah!

What did Joy ask Santa for? A harmonica. And, after it was all over, this is what she was doing. She is really quiet talented, I must say.

Gingerbread (Graham Cracker) Houses

2010-12-22T22:08:00.000-08:00

One of the things that we usually get around to every year is gingerbread houses. Only, I cheat and just use graham crackers. It makes the process much faster, and at this point, that is what the kids prefer. So, here they are with their finished products. I assembled the houses and spread frosting on top and the kids do the rest.

The process:

I think Hyrum thinks I don't get in enough pictures, so he "took" one of my while I was taking his.

The product:

I am sure you noticed that they got increasingly creative as they went along? Joy has a better idea of what houses should look like and then it goes down from there.

My little artists

2010-12-07T19:44:00.000-08:00

While my back was turned, Hyrum and Brigham decided to paint themselves instead of their papers.
Yes, they get their artistic talents from their mom. Enthusiastic, but not always well directed!

Joy the fashion designer

2010-12-05T20:27:00.000-08:00

For years, Joy has wanted a sister. She has pretty much given up on that crazy dream now, but every now and then something happens to spark her girlish fancies again. This time it was the birth of a baby girl cousin who lives pretty close. So, Joy has decided to be a designer. She got out the scraps from her quilt and has been working on a variety of projects. Today, she decided to design a bracelet. It was four or five layers of fabric, cut to an oval shape, with an oval hole in the middle. Then, she hand-basted (although I am sure she meant it to be a real seam) around the inside hole. When I explained that what she had created would be a bit of a choking hazard for poor Grace, her plan shifted. She pulled the sewing tight, which caused the whole thing to ruffle, and turned it into a flower. Then, she cut out a "lily pad" from green fabric, glued a pin on the back and, viola! She made a pretty cute little pin. I was quite impressed. She did it all except the hot gluing, which I insisted on doing myself.Since this worked out, she has decided she wants to make a dress, using Paul as her model. When I informed her in no uncertain terms that Paul could not serve as model, she was pretty upset. It took me convincing her the she didn't have near enough fabric to make a Paul-sized dress to get her to use Scrabble (Hyrum's baby doll) for her model instead.

The beach and beauty shots

2010-12-04T20:46:00.000-08:00

Gorgeous, I know. This is about 5 minutes from our house.

Hyrum and I built this little sculpture, and boy, was he ever proud!

I was trying to get pictures to send in Christmas letters, and this is what I ended up with.

Public Enemy Number One

2010-12-01T20:29:00.001-08:00

To start, let me tell you something about Brigham. He does not meet a stranger. I almost don't want to take him out with me anymore, because he is sure to inform whomever we meet everything that we are about to do. They may find that we are going to go to the drive-in, or that he is going to get a swat on the bum if he doesn't behave. Or, he may go up to some random woman in the post office and get a little friendly.

Such was the case today. I was in the post office mailing a Christmas box, when I noticed a very stiff looking elderly woman behind me. Perhaps she her hearing aid wasn't on loud enough to hear Brigham's conversation, or perhaps she is not in the habit of talking to kids who she doesn't know. Whatever the reason, she was not even acknowledging that Brigham was in the same room, let alone trying to converse with her. So, I brought Brigham back to me, and asked him not to continue to try and talk with her. Of course, at this point, I noticed that Hyrum was now hiding underneath his favorite post office counter. As we were done paying for our box, I went back to get Hyrum and take the boys out the car. While I was convincing Hyrum that he really needed to come out, Brigham decided to try and renew is previous conversation. You can only imagine my internal convulsions when I looked up and saw Brigham standing next to the same woman, not only talking to her, but rubbing her bottom! No, I don't think he realized he had his had on this woman's rear. He was just petting her like he would have a lost puppy he was trying to calm. Unfortunately, the resting place for his hand was not one that was having the calming effect he was hoping for. Personally, I think I would have reacted a bit to someone with their hand RUBBING my bum, but this woman stoically ignored the small boy by her side.

Poor kid, he was only trying to be kind. I when I regained my composure enough to grab him and notice what he was saying it was "I love you" as sweetly as any child every told his grandma the same. But, I don't think she will be signing up for the adopt-a-grandparent program anytime soon!

Thank heaven's for Daisy's kennel!

2010-12-01T00:57:00.000-08:00

We had friends over today while we worked on several advent calendars. I was surprised at how much fun the kids had playing in Daisy's kennel! Zack and Hyrum particularly enjoyed their stay.

Christmas Advent

2010-12-01T00:54:00.000-08:00

I wish I could say that genius struck, but at least an idea struck. I was looking at advent calendars the other day, and decided to come up with my own. Today, I put the idea into effect. I sewed up some muslin bags, used heat-transfer paper to make numbers, and then modge-podged Christmas paper on clothes pins. These bags were filled with treats, and a scripture per day.
When they were hung up, I think they looked pretty nice. I can't wait for the kids to see them in the morning!

First snowman of the year!

2010-11-26T23:37:00.000-08:00

Well, we got some snow this year. Thanksgiving was the best snowman snow of the week. So, while the adults worked on dinner, the kids made their very own snowman. Good job, huh?

The end of $20 at Rite Aid

2010-11-23T21:20:00.000-08:00

Well, I am done with my $20 at Rite Aid experiment. I have so far accumulated $225 worth of products, and I now have $21.50 left to spend. However, it is starting to get difficult to track the exact $20 I started with, so I am ending my experiment. I think I have more than proved the merit of Rite Aid's coupons/+Up Rewards/Single Check Rebates.

However, I am now a confirmed deal shopper. So, in the spirit of my "place for everything" blog, I have created a new blog. You can visit www.tarasplacefordeals.blogspot.com and there find my continued saga of deals and steals ('cause sometimes the deals are so good, it feels like stealing. Like this week, I got a $85 item, and after the sale, coupons, mail-in-rebates, and single check rebates it only cost me the tax!)

I hope you have enjoyed this as much as me! See you later!

Homemade laundry detergent

2010-11-23T21:15:00.000-08:00

Although it seems that I am just obsessed with coupons/deals these days, that is not actually the case. I am simply learning to be more frugal. The art of finding a good deal is just more exciting than some of the other things I have been doing. However, I came up with a pretty intriguing one a few weeks ago that I got to try out today.

Have you ever heard of homemade laundry detergent? I hadn't. But, in talking to my sister, she mentioned it. Since the price was right, I got the ingredients and waited to run out of the detergent I was using. Today was my lucky day!

How do you make your own laundry detergent? Easy. Really.

Get a big can (I used a #10 can left over from Costco peaches) and add 6 cups of water. Put that in a big pot of water and bring to a boil. (This "double broiler method may not be necessary, but I didn't want to cook in the same pan I was making laundry detergent.) Then, grate 1/3 of an Ivory soap bar and add to the heated water in your can. The goal is to melt your bar soap in the water. When the soap has melted, add 1/2 cup Borax (found in the laundry soap section) and 1/2 cup washing soda (this is made by Arm and Hammer, and I found mine in the laundry detergent section at Ace Hardware. Walmart failed me on this one.) Mix until the powder dissolves. Then, pour 1 quart of hot water into a 2.5 gallon bucket. Add soap mixture and then 22 cups (11 pints) cool water. Stir and let sit until cool. When the mixture cools, it turns to a gel. When you are ready to use, just mix detergent (so that the gel breaks up a bit) and add 1/2 cup to your washing. Done! Mine looked like this:

One batch makes 2 gallons, which means 128 loads of laundry. The super amazing thing about this stuff is the price. Let me do the math here:

Borax - $4.29 for 76 oz - 19 batches in a box - $0.23 per batch
Washing Soda - $3.79 for 55 oz - 13 batches in a box - $0.29 per batch
Ivory bar soap - $1.50 per bar - 3 batches per bar - $0.50 per bar (of course, if you get a good sale, this is MUCH less)
price per 2 gallons of detergent - $1.02
price per load - NOT EVEN A PENNY!

So, as you can see, it is fairly economical. To be mild.

How does it work? Well, I will have to post more about that later. I just washed the sheets that got wet on last night, as well as some assorted kids clothes, and they came out smelling and looking clean. So far, so good. However, I will use it for a bit and post some more opinions. And, since I want to give credit where credit is due, I found the recipe here! Thanks, Tipnut!

$20 at Rite Aid continued

2010-11-19T14:47:00.000-08:00

Well, this week's trip was a little late in the week, sorry! However, I am including the link to Hip2Save where I found all the deal info for the items purchased today here.

Today I got all this, a $52.03 value, and I only spent $3.43 out of pocket. You can't pay for tax with +Up Rewards, so that has to be paid cash. Fortunately, many of the items I purchase have Single Check Rebates, so I am able to continue my original $20 cash flow that way. I actually spent $0.50 of my original $20 today, so my total stands at $225 worth of products, and I still have $19.50 to spend! Previous posts on this strain here.

On a fun side note, a month or two ago I got a free subscription to Martha Stewart Living. My December issue had a card for $5 off your total purchase at Hallmark. So, today I swung by and picked up two rolls of 45 ft Christmas paper for $1.87, and then they threw these two cute little coin purses in for free! Score!

I heart vinyl!

2010-11-19T00:05:00.000-08:00

I LOVE vinyl! There are so many options! Yesterday I flipped my halloween word blocks over and made some for autumn/thanksgiving. Thanks, Erin, for cutting these out for me!

One day I will be the happy owner of a Silhouette and not have to beg cutting favors from my lucky sisters...

Yummy and Chocolate

2010-11-17T23:01:00.000-08:00

Mmm, don't they look good?

I taught Activity Girls tonight. We were doing manners, and I decided that hot chocolate served in china and petite fours (sp?) might persuade the girls to behave a little more mannerly. It worked!

Giving Thanks Tree update

2010-11-15T20:40:00.000-08:00

Why is it that pictures NEVER turn out looking like you want them to? Ah well. We have been working on the Giving Thanks tree for two weeks now, and it is looking really cool, so I wanted to share. My biggest problem has been getting the leaves hung, it takes a lot of time to put the string through the holes, tie them and hang them with the colored side out, on the tree. Thanks Celeste for the great idea to just put them on paper clips! It takes a fraction of the time!

Veteran's Day hike

2010-11-12T00:07:00.000-08:00

Why is it that kids get to a stage where they can't help but make funny faces when a camera comes out? And, why do they get stuck in that stage for at least a decade?

We sure love living in such a beautiful place!

Joy the guitar strummer

2010-11-10T21:46:00.000-08:00

I had completely forgotten about this video until I was flipping through stuff last night. We were listening to some fun music, and Joy wanted to be part of the action. She ran up to her room and returned with this little travel-sized guitar my dad gave me. She had fun strumming along, but it just amazed me to see how grown-up she is getting.

This is mainly for those of you who just don't get to see the kids everyday. Enjoy! (And no, I don't think she has a good shot at a career in the industry!)

Rite Aid part 4

2010-11-10T10:31:00.000-08:00

The deals on essentials are so good this week that I had to go back for a second round. Here is the haul:

$31.03 worth of toothpaste, vitamis and supplements. And, I still have $20 left to spend. Just in case you were wondering, I am paying for sales tax out of the original $20. The amazing thing about Rite Aid is that, when you go over the value of the product in coupons, you get that amount taken off other items on your bill. And, lots of these purchases qualify for single check rebates, so I actually get a check in the mail. That's how I am paying the sales tax. So, for my original $20 I have gotten $173 worth of products, and I still have $20 left to spend. Have you started shopping at Rite Aid yet? See here for the last purchases.

$20 at Rite Aid part 3

2010-11-09T21:58:00.000-08:00

Next trip to Rite Aid this evening. I scored ALL of this stuff - $52.16 worth of stuff - for FREE!

Total left to spend (out of the original $20) - $21! Whoohoo Rite Aid! See here for last week's haul.

If this confuses you, I am on a mission to see how much I can get by putting in $20 at Rite Aid. So far I have gotten $142 worth of stuff!

Simple, but oh so effective

2010-11-08T19:49:00.000-08:00

Which, of course, is my favorite.

This came about because I felt like I was disciplining kids all the time. ALL the time. I wanted to find a way to focus on and reward their good behavior, instead of always punishing for bad. So, after combining some good ideas of various family members, I came up with the "Good Behavior Chart". It is a simple idea. Each child has a clothes pin with their name on it. Any time they do something "good", they move up one spot on the chart. For the littler ones, anything good counts - saying "thank you", putting dishes in the sink, eating their dinner without fussing, anything! For the big ones, they have to do those things without being asked. It is a 1:1 ratio - one good behavior - one spot up. When they are bad, they move down a spot. Since this is a good behavior chart, I try not to move them down much.

When they get to the top of the chart, they get a Good Behavior Buck. These bucks can be redeemed at the Good Behavior store.

The Good Behavior store consists of a bin full of dollar store items, each priced for various Good Behavior Buck amounts. The most prized items have the highest prices (even though they only cost me a buck!)

Although this is a remarkably simple system, it works wonders. We have been using it for almost two months now, and it still works! The kids are excited to see their progress up the chart, we are focusing much more on their positive behavior, and they are learning the value of saving. I don't know that Hyrum has ever gotten anything more than a sucker (the $1 item), but Brigham and Paul are remarkably good little savers!

As well as being very useful, it was incredibly easy to construct. I cut 14 5.5x1.25" strips of construction paper, lined them up on a piece of poster board, and cut the board out around the size the strips made. I covered the thing in contact paper, wrote the kids' names on some clothes pins, and hung it on the wall. Viola! The Good Behavior Bucks (which I made in Word) are just kept pinned on the top of the chart behind the back. When they earn bucks they want to save, those get thumb-tacked to their spots on our cork board. I love it, it it really seems to be making a difference in their behavior!

What do you do with 15 kids for 4 hours?

2010-11-06T08:18:00.000-07:00

I am lucky enough to be a part of a weekly date night babysitting group. We have four families who, each Friday night, combine kids at one persons home. Three couples leave, one remains with the kids. It works out GREAT! You get three Fridays a month where you don't even have to feed your kids, and you get four hours out with no enormous babysitting bill. However, when it is your Friday to sit, you get all 15 kids! We have all found that it is best to have some riveting activity for the kids to be involved in. This week, I went to the dollar store, got six packages of twisty balloons with pumps, and distributed them among the five oldest kids and myself. I was amazed at how creative the kids were. The hats that came out of this bunch were quite impressive.

Some of them got more impressive as time went by - And, of course, we did have a few traditional dogs in the mix, just to make things interesting!

Now, I have a month to plan the next night...

Sweet deals at Albertsons!

2010-11-05T11:31:00.000-07:00

We stopped by for a quick trip to Albertsons after dropping the kids off at school today. We got LUCKY! I brought a few coupons of my own, but the Eggos (which were on sale, a mix and match so they ended up $0.99 each when you bought 10 participating items) also had a peelie on them that brought the regular price of $3.59 down to $0.45 per box! Needless to say, we stocked up. Also on the same sale is Green Giant vegetables, regularly $1.69 per can down to $0.39 per can! (has to be part of the 10 mix and match) So, we ended up getting $130.09 worth of groceries for $26.12! Excepting the brownies that cost me $2, these are things we use all the time!

Who says coupons aren't worth the time?

$20 at Rite Aid part 2

2010-11-03T20:19:00.000-07:00

For those of you who are just tuning in, I am doing a little experiment. I am trying to see how much I can get by spending $20 at Rite Aid. On 10/27/10, I started by making a $20 purchase which resulted in $20 of in-store credit (+Up Rewards, in Rite Aid language). To see what I got then, go here. Having made that initial $20 purchase, I am now just using those +Up Rewards to see how much more I can get for my $20. Here is today's haul, regularly priced at Rite Aid for $50.82. (I know that sounds like a lot for this stuff, there is also a $20 item that is not pictured.)

To make this purchase, I used $13 of my $20 +Up Rewards - that's it! I went to Hip2Save, found out the sales for the week, used those sales and $25 in coupons, and my total for the purchase was only $16. Unfortunately, you can't use +Up Rewards to pay tax, so I did pay $3 out-of-pocket. However, all is not lost! I got an additional $9 in +Up Rewards from this purchase, and will also get a check for $6 in the mail the end of November when my single check rebates are sent to me. So, I have $16 in +Up Rewards and $3 in cash from the rebate. $1 down, $19 to go!

Giving Thanks Tree

2010-11-01T20:40:00.000-07:00

I am so impressed with myself - I actually had all the parts in place in time to implement an idea. This is our giving thanks tree. Yes, it looks bare, that is the point! After dinner each night leading up to Thanksgiving, we are going to write one thing we are grateful for on the back of a leaf and then hang in from our tree. Each leaf has to be a new gratitude, no repeats! By the end, we should have 125 leaves on the tree.

These are the first five. It was a great FHE, and I think the tree has some real potential.
Now, if I can just find a way to decorate the rest of the mantle, all will be right again in the world.

Yes, that is just what it appears to be!

2010-11-01T20:27:00.000-07:00

I swear, I was just down the hall in my room, with the door open, even! It was only five minutes! Suddenly, I heard the sound of water being splashed around a little too vigorously to be the tooth-brushing sounds I expected. So I went to check it out.
Let's just say that they didn't get wet from running their toothbrushes under the sink.
When I walked in I was really tempted to scream, but instead, I walked away, picked up my camera, and documented.

While I was gone, they decided that it wasn't enough to dunk their heads, they wanted to try baptism by immersion. Fortunately, they are too big to get all the way in. But, Brigham was really pulling his foot out of the pot when I snapped this shot.

After documentation was taken care of, I had them strip down and hop in the tub for a little one-on-one with some soap and hot water. While they were scrubbed, we had a little chat that went something like this:

Me - "So guys, what kinds of things go in the potty seat?"
Boys - "Potty"
Me - "What else?"
Boys - "Toilet paper"
Me - "What else?"
Boys - (turning greenish and getting quiet) "poop"
Me - "And, where did you just stick your heads?"

I don't think we will have this particular problem again.

Happy Halloween!

2010-10-30T21:55:00.000-07:00

Hope all your haunting is delightful! Ah, Joy has moved from the innocent state and now wants to be something scary. Glad to know the idea of drinking blood is not appealing.

I got really lucky this year. Paul was dying to be a train, but when I told him I was going to be a ghost, he dropped the train cold and went with the ghost. Whoo Hoo!

Brigham wanted to be the FULL alphabet this year, it was adorable!
Arr, mateys!

(The I didn't realize until after the kids had all requested their pumpkins and we had them done, that each of the kids matched their pumpkins!)

How far will $20 go at Rite Aid?

2010-10-27T10:48:00.000-07:00

I love a good deal. Really, I LOVE a good deal. And, recently, I have discovered the value of coupons and knowing good store policies. I have been super excited lately to find that we have a Rite Aid and Walgreens in town, and they have some amazing programs that really allow me to stretch my dollar much farther than this inflationary economy would suggest. So, I have decided to do an experiment. I am going to see how far $20 will go at Rite Aid. There is a condition to this experiment - I am not just going to get stuff because I can get it cheap/free; it has to be stuff that I will use/gift.

Having said that, here is my starter. I went yesterday, and got 3 lip glosses, 7 lip sticks, and 10 nail polishes for a whopping total of $20, retail price $40. (I had a coupon, so that took care of the tax.)

The lip stuff was buy one, get a nail polish free, and each lip item/nail polish awarded me a +Up reward of $1, so since I purchased 20 items, I got $20 worth of +Up rewards. These rewards can be used the same as cash (mostly) for Rite Aid purchases. So, essentially, I got all of the above for free!

I have noticed that I tend to say, "for free" and apply that to this purchase, and then the next purchase where I actually use my +Up rewards. So, I guess another purpose of this experiment is to see how much I really get out of my $20. Want to know where I find out about all of these good deals? Go to Hip2Save, my newest favorite deal site! I will try to stretch these $20 as far as they go and keep you posted on the progress. The idea is to keep a running tally of total value and then at the end picture all I purchased for my $20. We will see how it goes!

Jaws

2010-10-26T21:51:00.000-07:00

What's that you say? It looks like Hyrum has something in his mouth?

You are right!

Just be glad this one doesn't bite!

(or wipe his nose!)

Cute Pumpkins

2010-10-24T22:12:00.000-07:00

So, I admit it. Lately, I have been like an ADD kid on a craft high. I have been doing way too much craft, and not enough house work. I think I am finally getting things reigned in, but I just had to show you one more thing before I do.
I know, super cute, right? I was getting ready for a mommy/daughter night with Joy on Saturday, and I had this great inspiration hit for some cute, easy pumpkins. For instructions, drop by and visit my craft blog!

Commitment

2010-10-20T17:26:00.000-07:00

I don't always have much of it. However, I want to force some on myself. I have decided that I want to grow my hair, without cutting it, for the next year. This is the longest my hair has ever been, and I want to see what it would be like to have another 6" on it. So, My commitment is that I will not cut my hair (except for trims for health) until November 2011. This is now, I will post another picture then.

My newest toy - Thanks Harry!

2010-10-18T22:57:00.000-07:00

I finally decided that, even though I really wanted one, I couldn't justify the expense of a new power tool, let alone the two I wanted. Yes, I wanted a mitre saw and a table saw. However, good sense finally kicked in. I figured I could just settle for a hand tool. So, I went to Walmart and was checking out the muscle driven variety. While I was pondering the pros and cons of the selections, and trying to keep Brigham and Hyrum from cutting off their fingers, who should walk down the aisle than my good friend Harry. I admit, he did seem a bit surprised to see me down the tool aisle, but the surprise could have been at my lunacy in bringing the BOYS down the tool aisle. Well, after chatting after a minute and finding that I was planning on buying a mitre saw, Harry offered to give me the one he had and wasn't using. What a great guy! He even dropped it by that afternoon!

Thanks, Harry! And, no, it wasn't this dusty when he dropped it off. This baby has seen some action!

Brigham the A-M-A-Z-I-N-G!

2010-10-18T16:24:00.000-07:00

Have you read this book? Well, Brigham did today. At least, he read 95% of it, BY HIMSELF! I know, hold your applause. He is a genius!

Joy's new room

2010-10-17T14:31:00.000-07:00

Recently, I visited my sister Brya, and she had the coolest colors on her kids' bedroom walls. I was inspired, and wanted to try some color myself. I will say, my colors are MUCH brighter than hers, so don't be afraid to go in her house.

This is Joy's room. I am not sure which of these pictures best reflects the actual color of her room, so pick your favorite and go with that.

I never realized how hard it is to take pictures of a room, until I tried it. (Nor did I realize how much dust there was on top of the ceiling fan until I posted this picture!)

To get the flow of the room, imagine that you have walked in and turned back to face the door. This would be what you see. (Wall 1) Now, turn to your left. No, your other left.

Continue to turn. (Wall 2)

Turn again. I know, the light through the window really throws things off. (Wall 3)

And this is the last turn before you are back to the door. (Wall 4)

My favorite part about this room was how CHEAP it was. It only took one gallon of paint, $14 at Walmart! The words on the wall were a lucky dollar store find, $1 for an alphabet, and we got 5. The diamonds were also a dollar store find, 2 for $1. The dragonflies and flowers were vinyl cut by my sister, but only cost $4 for the vinyl. The shelves and frame came from the thrift store and just got a coat of paint. And, the curtains and sheets (which match the curtains but you can't see) were on sale at Walmart and came to $19 total! I am telling you, not only was this room fun to conceptualize and create, but it was great on the checkbook! The boys room is next on the list, and although I have actually already painted, I think it will have to wait to decorate until after Christmas when things quiet down a bit.

Brigham's word board

2010-10-17T13:57:00.000-07:00

You may know this already, but Brigham is OBSESSED with letters. I am not exaggerating. That boy owns at least 20 alphabets if he owns one. Lately, we have been having a problem with sticky alphabets. He has gotten several of them that are stickers, and they are sticking to EVERYTHING! Walls, tables, refrigerators, his brothers, Daisy, everything. So, we came up with a solution. We went to the dollar store and picked up a piece of black foam core. Now, any letters that have a sticky back have a place to stick. It works well, and he is pleased to show off his words.

Halloween Decor

2010-10-13T15:33:00.000-07:00

I finally finished it! This is our Halloween mantle,

Yes, those are the kids' silhouettes. And this is the bathroom.

If you want to try this, my craft blog has more detailed info on how to do it.

Recipe Holder

2010-10-12T23:35:00.000-07:00

I don't know about you, but I have a hard time finding a good spot to put recipes when I am cooking. Some place that doesn't get in the way, but that I can still see the darn thing. A while ago, I came up with a great idea. Today, I improved it. My microwave is just over my stove top, so in the upper left corner of the microwave, I stuck a 3M strip. On top of that, I stuck a plain old clothes pin. So, recipes just get clamped in there, and I can see them without getting them covered in flour/sauce/etc. Today, I painted the clothes pin black and glued on a magnet. Now, it looks a little more sleek and can hold these adorable magnets I have been making lately. When there is no holiday in season, I can use the generic "D", and when in season, a magnet to match.

Quick note. If you try this, make sure that you leave a bit of the clothes pin sticking up above the level of the magnet. You need that room to be able to push the clothes pin open!

Giving Thanks idea

2010-10-12T20:20:00.000-07:00

I am in the midst of decorating for Halloween. I have gotten so many new ideas this year, that the project is taking longer than I originally anticipated. And, I wish I would have gotten it done earlier so that I could have posted pictures sooner...(sigh). Well, as I was reading "Little Women" to the kids tonight, a Thanksgiving idea hit me.

I don't know about you, but Thanksgiving is always a bit of a let down for me. I LOVE Halloween, and Christmas is FABULOUS, but Thanksgiving just gets mushed in there without all of the planning that goes into other holidays. I mean, what do you do for Thanksgiving? Well, this year, we are going to make a Giving Thanks Tree. I am going to see if I can find a good branch-y branch from our obliging forest to serve as the "tree" in our tree. I will make sure there are no leaves, because these will be what we add. Prior to the first of November, I am going to cut a bunch of leaves out of some cute fall scrapbook paper. Then, each night before going to bed, each child will get to name one thing they were thankful for in the day. These will be written on the leaves and the leaves will be hung from the branches of the "tree". By Thanksgiving, we should have, instead of a bare branch, a tree full of thanks to serve as centerpiece of our Thanksgiving table. I guess I will have to find some way to preserve the leaves. If it works, it will become a yearly tradition. I'll tell you how it goes.

The Pumpkin Patch

2010-10-11T21:41:00.000-07:00

We are lucky enough to live close to a large pumpkin patch, and even luckier to have had a sunny afternoon today so we could go. We went and looked at BUNCHES of pumpkins.

Can you tell how many pumpkins are in here? We added about that many again before we were satisfied!

Interesting to note is the fact that we did not buy any of the pumpkins pictured here. We had an interesting lesson on value. After trudging out the the patch (it wasn't really that far, but I was pushing Hyrum in the wheelbarrow), selecting our 12 pumpkins, hauling them all the way back, and waiting in line to make our purchase, we noticed something we hadn't seen before. We thought we had the $0.22/lb pumpkins in our wheelbarrow. But, then we saw a price we hadn't seen before - $0.35/lb for sugar pumpkins. Sure enough, all of ours were sugar pumpkins. So, without hesitation or embarrassment, we hauled them all back out to the patch, put them back, and selected two, big, obviously NOT sugar pumpkins, and hauled them back to the stand. All the while, we talked about how, even though they were smaller, the sugar pumpkins would cost more. So, we left with two big pumpkins and a promise to check the sales flyer for our local food market for when their pumpkins go on sale, so we can buy even MORE pumpkins, and get more for our money. I'll tell you what, my kids are going to grow up understanding value! And, I can get away without exercising tonight. My arms got plenty of workout with that wheelbarrow!

Boo!

2010-10-10T21:39:00.000-07:00

I had inspiration hit me a week or two ago in Walmart. This is the culmination of that inspiration. We made these Halloween hats today, and then had bunches of fun taking pictures of them. I didn't get the professional quality poses I was hoping for, but those darn kids managed to turn out cute anyway!

See this A Place for Crafts post for more info on how to make the hats.

A day for crafting

2010-10-09T22:16:00.000-07:00

We had big plans today. We were going over to visit the Olympic Peninsula, and we were excited. Then, Brigham had the nerve to come down with this nasty croupy garbage, and the road trip got put on the back burner. So, we decided to declare it a day of crafting. We seriously spent a good chunk of the day just puttering around making "stuff". You can look at my craft blog for more instructions and links to tutorials if you are interested.

This is take two on the cute flower pins we found at Wise Craft. 75% smaller than the pattern, and I am LOVING the cream canvas! A friend gave me a bunch of vintage buttons, and I can't wait to do some more of these babies! Joy even joined in the fun and made a Halloween one!

I have been working on getting Joy's room decorated, and I told her that we couldn't put anything on the walls until we had everything assembled. I lied. We finished her hair clip frame today and I couldn't resist putting it on the walls. Now you know what color Joy's walls are!

And last, a few thrift store tins re-purposed to Halloween decorations. They will get to serve double duty as decoration holders when they are done as decorations.

Hyrum, who woke himself up coughing and is now perched on my lap, has declared me "the coolest". I think my day is complete.

Gel Paint

2010-10-03T21:36:00.000-07:00

While perusing various blogs (I never knew there were so many out there) I found a recipe I just had to try - gel paints. This is what we ended up with. Oh yes, although the recipe is actually for scented gel paints, I did not add the scent - the thought of my kids eating cornstarch water was not appealing. Trust me, if it smelled good, they would have eaten them. (As a review of the recipe, I am not sure I will make them again. They thickened FAST, and were not really satisfying to paint with. Definitely cook them on medium, not high.)

Anyway, I figured that if I gave the kids something to do, I was more likely to be able to listen to General Conference. Who am I kidding? But, it was really cute to watch them paint. I don't know if you can see it, but Brigham's jaw is set in his I'm-really-focusing-here set. Some people stick out their tongues, Brigham sets his jaw and goes to work.

Maybe you can see it a little better here. And no, I don't usually have the boys hang around shirtless in October, but these paints stain.

Joy did not have any desire for the sensory experience of gel paint finger painting. Nice, clean, un-squishy watercolors for her, thank you very much!

Yes, I did get to listen to Conference for 10 minutes before I had to come up with another diversion.

Two delectable dishes to welcome fall!

2010-09-28T08:27:00.000-07:00

Okay, maybe I am exaggerating with "delectable". How about super tasty, out of the ordinary, and pretty delicious? That is probably more accurate. The first is what you see here: Apple Pie Oatmeal. No, this is not an original. I found it in one of the cooking magazines my fabulous Mema signed me up for. It is apples cooked in with your oatmeal, and then brown sugar, cinnamon and vanilla with nuts sprinkled on top. Wow! It is like a healthy bowl of apple pie. Recipe here.

Next delicious dish is a Tara original. Grilled Peanut Butter and Chocolate Chip Sandwiches. The name pretty much says it all. Slather your pan/griddle in butter, add a piece of bread with extra nutty peanut butter, sprinkle on some chocolate chips, add another slice of bread and grill. As much as I am loathe to admit there could be such a thing as too many chocolate chips, you could even back off from what is pictured here and still be fine. The result is a nutty, chocolately, melty, fall-y sandwich that your kids will beg for over and over again. Not to mention you getting up for a quick midnight sandwich!

Count Down to Candy!

2010-09-27T08:15:00.000-07:00

While I was in Nevada visiting my sisters, they introduced me to all sorts of new things. One of them was a great blog How Does She? She had a really cute 4x4 project that I decided to try. We LOVE Halloween, so this Count Down to Candy was perfect!

Being as I have never learned a proper fear of power tools, I remembered that I had some kind of saw in my garage, so I went to Home Depot, bought a 4"x4"x8' and brought it home. I then discovered that the saw sitting in my garage was a Miter Saw. I looked up an online manual, read the instructions, measured and cut. After a little bit of sanding, some Modge Podge, and vinyl lettering that I cut at my sister Brya's, this is what I ended up with.

As soon as I get down my fall boxes, I will have to put that cute crow on top!

Hyrum is THREE!

2010-09-17T22:50:00.000-07:00

I know, it seems like he is older, but no - he is only three. And, he wanted a pirate cake for his birthday. That was a ton of fun. See post below. And, now, the picture roll. Not much commentary, sorry. Hyrum got a bunch of new Signing Time DVDs. Did you know there is a second volume with 13 more DVDs? Hyrum loves Signing Time, and was still excited when he came to the fourth package.

Uncle Charlie and Aunt Janet came down, and we sure enjoyed having them.

John is such a great dad. He got key chain flashlights for each of the kids, and Hyrum got to open them and distribute them to all his siblings. They LOVED them.

However, the favorite gift of the night was Joy's. She got Hyrum a new baby brother. Yes, it is a doll. Hyrum is my biggest helper, and definitely a nurturing little soul. None of our other kids have ever had any interest in dolls, including Joy. However, Hyrum loves the dolls in nursery at church and begs for one every time we pass by the isle at Walmart. So, he now has a baby who he is referring to interchangeably as his "friend" or his "baby brother". And yes, he has named him. Scrabble. Hyrum original.

Don't worry, John is appropriately dubious.

Arr..It's a cake!

2010-09-17T22:43:00.000-07:00

Yes folks, my best birthday cake ever! Hyrum wanted a pirate cake, so this is what he got. I found a great recipe for Marshmallow Fondant at allrecipes.com and it worked great! Much better than any of the other fondant recipes I have found. Woo Hoo! It was a lot of work, but oh so worth it!

Beesting and subliminal messages

2010-09-17T22:11:00.000-07:00

After school the other day, I thought there was something funny looking about Brigham. I looked and looked, but I just couldn't figure out what it was. There were no obvious bang marks, no gashes, and no puncture wounds. I looked some more, and finally realized that his eyes just didn't look right. Yes, there was definite disfigurement between the eyes. He was swollen!

I asked him if anything had happened at school, but he was non-committal. When I showed it John, he thought we should take him to urgent care. When John asked him what happened, he said, "Oh, I got stung by a bee at school." You would think he would have remembered it when I asked him!

The same day, we got a big set of cookie cutters at Walmart - 101 including numbers and letters. Let's just say that Brigham's obsession with letters has found a new outlet. His newest fascination is making play dough letters and smashing them together to build words. After the kids were all gone to school and Hyrum down for his nap, I started cleaning up and this is what I found -

Do you think he is trying to tell me something?

Introducing...

2010-09-16T13:33:00.000-07:00

My newest blog - A Place for Organization! I know, I know. You have all been waiting for the day when I would start a blog with all of my fabulous organization ideas and tips. Well, wait no longer, your prayers have been answered.

Okay, really, my home is in major need of re-organization, so I am doing one of the things I love. Yes, I admit it, I love to organize. And, to help keep me motivated, I am blogging my efforts. I am posting before and after pictures, as well as ideas and tips I find along the way. Just do me one favor. When you see the 'before' pictures, just pretend I took them at someone else's messy house. It doesn't really matter whose, just not mine!

Purooneemoochi

2010-09-14T20:58:00.000-07:00

Brigham is reading now, and putting together a wide assortment of his own wods. This was today's creation. Another common one is "Banoochi". Don't ask me what it is, but he wants to be it for Halloween.

Vacation

2010-09-10T13:26:00.000-07:00

Yes folks, for the first time in 3 years, the Duggar family took a vacation. It was FABULOUS! And hot, and full of kids. I don't remember the last time I have seen so many kids. (See bottom for proof.)

I am going to do pictures in reverse chronological order, because I always forget and load them that way. Here you go -

While visiting with my brother Matt and his family, Joy got daring on the monkey bars. She was hanging upside down, and tried to flip her legs off. Needless to say, she didn't stick the landing. Okay, her face stuck the landing, in the woodchips. She also accomplished a bloody nose. I was really impressed with the amount of not-crying I heard. But, this was the look she got to sport on the first day of school. Everyone loves a kid with scabs, right?

And, that is my entire picture history of Matt's. I think I was exhausted by the end of the trip.

On the way to Matt's, we stopped by the Reno temple. Hard to get a close up on faces and get the angel. Trust me, the faces are pretty tired.At Erin's, we met up with my Aunt Cherie, Uncle Don, and cousins Celia, Olivia, and their kids. We went by Lattin Farms, where Uncle Don works. Yum! Delicious cantaloupe, fresh watermelon, and u-pick veggies. Yes, I did pick. Yes, we had brushette later in the evening.They have this great little cow train they hook up to the back of a golf cart thing and haul the kids around. Uncle Don was our "in" and the kids rode free.

What you can't tell from the clip is the rapid rate at which the cow train goes when Uncle Don is driving. This was taken after a stop (Madison thought the dirt bouncing in the bottom of her car was a bug). Hyrum had to be removed because it was too "bumpy". This video shows the start up, and just at then end, you see how fast those cows can go!I know, knife safety. The kids had their back turned.And then there was the lake. Even though it was down about a million feet, give or take a few, we made the most of it. On a scorcher day, anything is good.We also found that the sand had clay in it, so we all clayed up and got muddy. Moms too. A few of us were more brazen than others. Of course, a few of us look cuter with paunches than others!There was also a great park at Erin's, and we took full advantage of that.Hyrum has become obsessed with making faces.For those of you who don't know all my family (especially the extended) in this picture you see (from left to right) my sister in law Janet, sister Erin, cousin Celia, and aunt Cherie. I am not sure who those strange kids in the background are.At Brya's, it just seemed like the house reverberated with kids. Since she had the biggest house, we spent most of our time there. There were usually 10 kids, and 3 to 4 adults. Wild!

Madison and Joy (with Dayton by an ear)Okay, I admit it, most of these pictures are just so you can see how many kids there were.The girls - Joy, Madison, Jenna and Emma

The boys - Dayton, Wyatt, Brigham, Hyrum, Austin, and PaulThis is not a great video, but it does demonstrate a bit how much movement we saw.

Yes, this is how we all felt when we were done. Thank you Wyatt and Brigham!

8/16/10 Pictures

2010-08-17T09:47:00.000-07:00

Poor Paul had an abdominal migraine, and when he gets those, he tends to just lay around. He is always a little out of it after throwing up his guts. I was a little surpised at HOW tired he was, he didn't even take time to get centered on the couch before knocking out!

Brigham is attached to his new "writing board". Not a drawing board, mind you, a writing board. We figured out the other day that he can read. Just simple words were the vowels say the short sound, but up to five letter words. I didn't know he could read at all! He even takes his board to bed. He woke up at 5:30 yesterday morning and came crying to my room because he couldn't find his writing board. It fell off in the night and he was devistated!

Of course, Hyrum wanted his picture taken too. A few moments before this picture, Daisy was laying under the chair, so Hyrum had to lay in the same spot in the same pose.

Did I mention that John put up a swing in the playroom? The kids love it!

Did you know...

2010-08-15T21:35:00.000-07:00

That you can make a great, easy batch of cookies from a cake mix, two eggs, and 1/2 cup of oil? Mix and bake for 8 to 10 minutes. And, since Albertson's has their Betty Crocker cake mixes on sale, buy 10 get them for 50 cents each, it is FAR cheaper to make than buy! I already bought 10, but I think another 10 are well in order. My favorite are chocolate with chocolate chip, but the lemon run a close second!

More birthday

2010-08-04T11:08:00.001-07:00

Unfortunately, it has been a while since I blogged, and I just can't quite figure out how to get it to do what I want. So, there has to be a second post for Brigham's birthday to get the pictures in.

Brigham LOVES letters, so I thought it fitting that he should get a letter cake for this birthday. If you look closely (the marbling is a bit distracting) you will see that Brigham's name is spelled out in cake. It really worked well, one letter per person and the cake was gone!

Brigham also got a family gift presented on his birthday. Her name is Daisy Mae, and she is a 12 week-old dauchshund hound/english bull mix. We love her to death! Okay, John, Joy, Paul and myself love her to death. Brigham and Hyrum are still a little unsure. But she is a great dog - sweet temprement, mostly housetrained, almost never barks, and is as sweet as you could ask for. Thanks Betsy!

More picture of Daisy when I get some more free time. Okay, more pictures of the kids too!

Brigham is 5!

2010-08-04T09:57:00.001-07:00

Yesterday, Brigham turned 5! I am just amazed at how quick that boy grown. He netted all the school clothes he needs for the year, and a backpack. It is great when they are so excited about school that they don't mind getting school clothes for their birthday.

Brigham is 5!

2010-08-04T09:57:00.000-07:00

Pictures...we really do take them!

2010-04-18T08:59:00.001-07:00

S0, we haven't really fallen off the edge of the world, although my blogging has. In between work, kids, and house work there doesn't seem to be time to breath. However, over the past few weeks we have taken some fun outings, and taken the camera with us. Here are the results.

We went hunting driftwood yesterday, and there were some great photo ops. Okay, I admit it. Someday I want to really study photography, but it the meantime, you get what you pay for!

I can't believe how hard it is to get them all with their eyes open at once, let alone looking in the same direction!

Then, a week ago, we had a picnic at a nearby park with my family.

(Joy wasn't having fun at the moment.)

And don't tell Mom I posted this, she'd kill me. She only allowed the picture since Joy was the photographer. That's how we got her out from under the slide.

Paul is somewhat fascinated with sticking out his tongue lately. I think most of the pictures I got of him feature his tongue.

There is a yearly tulip festival here. It is quite gorgeous. Too bad the kids don't hold still!

What did I say?

So, that's us. I know, there are twice as many of me as you have ever seen. I have decided that I don't want my kids to forget what I look like!

Joy's Baptism

2010-01-25T20:48:00.001-08:00

Joy is getting baptized, and she really couldn't be more excited about it. The other day, she told my sister that she was "overwhelmed with excitment" and she told me she was so excited that she felt like she was going to explode. She can't wait, and neither can I. She will be baptized on Thursday, January 28th at 6pm. We will meet in the Relief Society room, and all are welcome to join us.

I have to say, it has been a humbling experience preparing for this event. She really does know what she is doing. She takes it very seriously and I am so proud of her. What a joy she is in our life. Maybe someday I will be worthy to be her mom.

A GREAT Day

2010-01-22T21:23:00.000-08:00

I just want to have it set on record that this was a fabulous day! Hyrum, the super-amazing, seems to be potty-trained, in ONE DAY!

I got to take the day off work and be home with the kids so that John could go down south, so I decided to potty-train Hyrum. He has been showing some clear indicators that it is time. He wants to wear underwear and will stay dry for several hours. Then, he will ask to wear a diaper, fill it, and ask for the underwear back.

We started the morning running errands, and when we got home, the underwear went on with the promise that every time he went in the potty-seat, he would get a Popsicle. I took him several times with no result. I was getting worried. Then, out of the blue, he says, "Got to go potty" runs in, climbs on the seat, and goes! He wore underwear to nap and stayed dry. His only accident of the day was when waiting for his brother to finish, and it was a small one. WOW! I am so excited. I hope tomorrow is as good!

And, more importantly, Mom came successfully through her surgery. The doctor says that if all continues as it is, she could come home on Sunday!

And, my friend is well! What we thought was a major hematology disorder is a very rare, but not too worrisome, hematology disorder.

And, we got a final yes on Joy's baptism date. Thursday, January 28th at 6pm!

Secret Santa

2009-12-02T19:54:00.000-08:00

THANK YOU Secret Santa!!! When we got home last night, there on our porch, was a glowing gift from a secret Santa. Hyrum said "wow" more times than I can count, and Brigham and Joy were both convinced that the gift was put there by Heavenly Father, because he loves us. And, he does. He loves us enough to send us amazing, thoughtful, and kind friends. Whoever you are, THANK YOU!

You must be kidding!

2009-11-14T12:56:00.000-08:00

I came home from work yesterday to hear a harrowing tale. Apparently, while John was doing some work on the computer, the destruction duo (otherwise known as Brigham and Hyrum) got a carton of eggs out of the fridge. They must have been pretty quiet, because John didn't hear anything until after they had gone to the top of the stairs and thrown every egg in the carton to the bottom! John thinks that Hyrum must have been the initiator because there was only one egg that made it half way down - Brigham has a much better arm. Thank heavens the floor at the bottom of the stairs isn't carpeted!

Bats in the Belfrey

2009-11-08T22:29:00.001-08:00

At least, that's what it looked like on Halloween, and that is my long-lapse excuse.

So, I had to show off the cool costume Mom and I finally got done for Charlie. Yes, I know. Amazing.

And, Hyrum rubbed peach juice in his hair and the result was hair-raising!

Okay, for real, I am just way busy. Between work and the commute, my spare time just doesn't justify blogging. Don't tell that I wasted this!

We had an earthquake!

2009-07-01T07:23:00.000-07:00

Hyrum woke us up this morning crying at 4:48am. Okay, he woke me up. It would take a chainsaw to wake John. Or, appearantly, an earthquake. I guess maybe I shouldn't mind Hyrum's 1.5 hour crying jag, because it meant I was awake to feel the 3.7 richter earthquake that hit at 5:09am. Cool. The following link gives all the details from the USGS. (Don't ask me what it stands for, but it is official.)

Memorial Day

2009-05-25T21:50:00.000-07:00

And what a memorable day it was! We went to the cove this morning to see low tide off the pier. The pier is one of John's favorite places, and so we go there all the time, but I have never been during low tide, and it was quite a different experience. We had a ton of fun looking at all the crabs, starfish and fish in the water, just a few feet away from us.

While we were walking down the pier, Hyrum happened to look down through the cracks, and was all the sudden afraid to walk anymore.

If you want to take time to watch the video, it is hilarious! After we went down on the floating dock and looked closely at the sea creatures, we went back up again and looked out at the pier. Of course, the kids had to climb up the railing, and in the process, Brigham donated one of his shoes to the sea. We waited around for about 20 minutes hoping that it's course would intersect with the floating dock and we might be able to retrieve it, but it was no use, and we now need to get a new pair of "crocs" for Brigham.

You can't tell it from the picture, but this shoe makes a great sea vessel, it was about 50 feet out from us at this point.

In the afternoon, we went to some friends for a barbecue and had a lot of fun. However, we had several exposures I could have done without. Twice, my attention was pulled away from a discussion by the sound of several kids yelling, "Sister D, Brother D!" Not only was my attention grabbed by that, but so was the entire backyard's. And, both times, there was Brigham with his pants going down and the boy parts coming out. Let's just say that our friends don't need to water their lawn in several spots now. I swear, that child is going to be thrown into a cell for indecent exposure. Of course, I may not be too far behind him. I am trying to wear more skirts (that is a whole separate post I will have to do sometime) and so I wore one all day today. And all day, it wasn't a problem. So, I didn't think anything of it at the barbecue. Until I was standing chatting with some friends when I realized that something was fluttering behind my shoulders. Yes, it was my SKIRT! Fortunately, I was wearing a slip. Even more fortunately, the backyard behind me was clear. But, that was one gathering that had to be left early for the sake of all. The breeze picked up, and even with walking around with the skirt gathered in my hands, there was danger of exposure. So, the kids had to forgo root beer floats and I can still look my friends in the eye. Ah, life.

Holy Calories, Batman!

2009-05-20T11:58:00.000-07:00

Did you know that in one serving of Kraft Macaroni and Cheese there are 410 calories? Wow! I don't eat them anymore (except for one or two bites because I just can't resist) but I figure they are great for fattening the kids! I know, better to stuff them with highly nutritious calories, but I am not always that on top of it. So, for lunch today, the kids eat Mac and Cheese and I eat a plate of zucchini. Unfortunately, I am not sure that the zucchini is that much more nutritious after I slather it with margarine!

Sixth folder

2009-05-19T08:46:00.001-07:00

Sixth folder, fourth (last) picture. I didn't actually have six pictures in that one! I am obviously not the world's best photographer. Poor kids, they were more than a little scared of the sprinkler. Perhaps that is because it only came out three times the whole summer. I now understand why they don't sell many outdoor water toys here. I tag Brya, Erin, KellyAnne, Linda, and Angela!

Conversation with Joy

2009-05-13T15:59:00.001-07:00

Me - Aren't these grapes nice and crispy?
Joy - No, they taste like soap.
Me - Soap? Maybe your mouth tastes like soap.
Joy - No, my lunch didn't taste like soap. Maybe I am allergic to grapes.
Me - Hmm.
Joy - Did I used to be such a great reader before I had grapes?
Me - Um, no. You had grapes long before you were such a great reader.
Joy - That must be it. I must be allergic. Grapes make you change. That must be why I am such a great reader.

What?