Blog? What blog? Oh yea, I have a blog.

Guess it’s about time to update my blog. Unfortunately I hardly took any pictures this last month so you’ll just have to read all about everything. I know, shame on me.  Blog readers are often like little kids... they don't want to read a lot unless there are pictures that go along with it.  I promise to be more diligent about my picture taking this month.  Anyways, here’s what’s been going on since our last post (at least what I can remember- these are in no particular order).

* Kole and I found out we get to go on the Trek! It’s really a youth trek, not a whole stake trek, so I had to bug a few people (namely the Bishop and stake young women's president) to get to go but as you all probably know “the squeaky wheel gets the oil.” I’ve never been on the Trek before so I am way excited- though I am not sure it is completely sane to be excited about hiking miles through the Wyoming desert in the hot July sun, dressed in pioneer attire and pulling a hand cart, not to mention no hope of a shower or real bathroom for four days, - but I’m still beaming with anticipation. Plus I get to help the youth of our stake get spiritually prepared to go. I love that I have this assignment. I have no idea what I am doing but I am sure it will be a lot of fun mixed with a lot of hard work. Somehow Kole gets to go but he doesn’t have to do any work beforehand. Hmmmm. How convenient. Anyways, I am happy that this trek is mostly for the young men and young women. I love the youth of the Church. They are so fun and funny and insightful and it will make the Trek extra fun to go through this experience with them. Now I just have to get in shape so I don’t end up with an unhappy fate like many of the original pioneers.

* Kole and I finally graduated from institute! http://institute.lds.org/ We still intend to be perpetual students (I’ll just say, the more I learn, the more I realize how little I know.) but it was nice to make everything official and get a diploma along with the 2 additional certificates for extra classes taken. Guess it was about time since we've been going for over 8 years! It’s a solemn feeling to add up years and think about what else was going on in your life that many years ago and what has happened all during those years. It is practically a miracle we didn’t get sidetracked with all the craziness of life- marriage, kids, work, school, callings, etc. We went all year round and even with babies in tow at times. I love Institute and all the time and “sacrifice” has been totally worth it. I hope we always live close enough to an Institute so we never have to give up this incredible learning experience.

*We all got the stomach flu. Ugh! Even if you don't live around here you should be afraid... I know so many people who have already passed it along to their family and friends in other cities and states. Kole, Eve and Jack seemed to get the mild version... it only lasted about 24-48 hours with a little lingering nausea. Jack complained that it felt like something biting his tummy from the inside. Cute the way he describes feeling sick. Mostly the kids would just throw up and then go back to playing and then throw up again a little later and then play some more. But from what I've experienced and what my friends have said, it tends to be a little worse for adults. I am positive I have never been so sick in my entire life!!! My mom concurs. The first day I couldn't eat anything or keep any food in me so my blood sugar level got too low and I kept passing out. I thought I was going to have to go to the hospital and get hooked up to IVs. It was so terrible. Even after the worst of it, I lived off crackers and Gatorade and didn't get out of my pajamas or leave the house for 4 days. I will spare you all the gory details but let's just say that I now know more than ever that Kole really really loves me.

* My church calling kept me super busy during the month of April. It's like having a part time job on top of my full time job as a wife and mom. Whew! Good thing I love it.  Firstly, we decided it was time to do primary teacher reviews. Since one of the counselors in the presidency just had a baby, our president asked me to go along to all the interviews. We wanted to really get to know our teachers and how they were doing with their callings so we put together a rigorous questionnaire and then had a sit down “interview” at each of the teachers in their homes to go over the questions. It was a good thing- we have amazing teachers and we learned so much- but obviously it meant a lot of time away from home and family pretty much every Fri, Sat and Sun. 18 interviews at 45 minutes each = You do the math. I’d rather not find out just how many hours it took. Fortunately, we have a year break until we need to do these again.

But on top of that busyness I taught Sharing Time all month long. That basically means I lived in a state of continual stress thinking about what to do for my lessons all month long and then every Saturday night my sweet husband and children had to live with me ignoring them so I could prepare my lesson. Thankfully the Spirit is the real teacher and the Lord is good to ensure everything turns out fine despite my potential to completely mess things up… probably shouldn’t agonize so much over everything. Oh, also and I was in charge of putting together the Stake baptism program. Ahhh, this month is much more relaxing. 

* Kole started a workout program... P90X to be exact. Have you seen the infomercials? I get tired just watching them. I think I’m not even in good enough shape to get in shape with P90X. But Kole is motivated… He has a “Biggest Loser” contest going on between him and some friends. I guess they are doing the contest for something like 100 days. I’m actually really impressed with the results so far. He lost about 15 lbs last month! So not fair. The only time I could lose that much in a month is if I have a baby pop out of me. Anyways, I promised Kill Joy that I wouldn’t post any embarrassing pictures- even though they are just sitting on my computer practically begging to be released to the public. Guess you’ll just have to be surprised when you see him next.

* Misty, the dog from the underworld, was sent off to obedience school for 3 months. I’m hoping they work on her digging instincts.

* We buzzed Jack’s head a little too short a couple weeks ago. Now he looks even more like his daddy. When he saw himself in the mirror he cried. But it’s growing and he seems to be less traumatized from the whole experience. We were supposed to have family pictures a few days ago but they got pushed back until the weather gets better. Good thing.

* Mother’s Day was really quite peaceful and uneventful. We went to church and then I came home and took and nap and watched the Blindside and basically vegged. Normally we would have done some big family thing with both of our moms but that didn’t happen this year… Both of our moms ended up going out of town- Kole’s mom took a vacation to Oregon with her mom and sister. My grandma ended up getting really sick over the weekend and had to go to the hospital so my mom flew out to California to be with her. Not exactly the circumstances that make for a great Mother’s Day but I guess we will have to celebrate when they get home. Maybe I’ll even take some pictures.

* Easter was in there somewhere… still hardly any pics.  I told Kole to go take pictures of the kids hunting eggs.  This was the best one.  Need I say more. 

* General Conference (I really loved Julie Beck's talk… she's always amazing.  Look it up for yourself: http://lds.org/conference/talk/display/0,5232,23-1-1207-3,00.html)
* We had a few freak snowstorms.  Ahhh, spring in Utah... I'm going to be really bitter if it snows in summer this year.
* I guess I did get some more pictures of Jack falling asleep in random places.  Cute kid.  I probably should just start an album of him sleeping.   

* And I'm sure there is a bunch more stuff that I can't remember right now.

No Foolin'

We woke up this April Fools morning to quite a surprise... Mother Nature is a cruel prankster!

It took us at least 20 minutes to round up all the snowgear and then put it all on but only about 10 minutes out in the snow before they started complaining about the cold and wanted to go back inside. Hmmm.  That seems like a rather bad investment of my time.

Anyways, it sure does seem like winter sucker-punched spring today (and we all got to feel the effects) but I have a feeling that spring will win out in the end...

Ok, now a funny story:

On Sunday we had a Primary Presidency meeting at my house while Kole went to his Elder's Quorum meeting over at the church. Of course since evidently men aren’t able to multi-task with the childcare duties he left the kids home with me.  So anyways I put a movie on in my room and told Eve and Jack to be good while I'm in the middle of my meeting. You would think I should know better than to think they would be the sweet obedient children I was envisioning but like they say, hindsight is 20/20. In the middle of our meeting Jack comes in looking somewhat confused and panicked, rubbing his face vigorously with his beloved blanket. I call him over to inspect his problem and I see "something" all over his face. At first I was just as confused as him but almost instantly I had the notorious "aha moment"- it was SUPERGLUE! All over his face! OK, I know this makes me look like a negligent parent but in my defense, I had hid the superglue up high, behind stuff and yet he still found it. I think he thought it was makeup because it has a little brush and he brushed it all over his face. Luckily, he didn't glue his eyes or mouth shut.  You may be tempted to think "poor kid, that was just bad luck" but don't be fooled.  Only minutes later I come upstairs to check on them and I find that Jack has colored with highlighter all over my computer screen and desk. How do I know it is him?  The proof is smudged all over his chubby little hands.  As for Eve, the verdict is guilt by association.  How convenient she didn't tell me anything as it was happening.  Grrrr.  At least highlighter washes off and with time superglue eventually comes off skin. Is it wrong to be happy he didn't decide to color his face and paint the computer with superglue instead?  Gotta keep my priorities in order, right?

Invasion of the giant termites

Termites- you know those dirty creatures that destroy wooden things and then leave "piles" around? Yep, we got 'em and we 'em bad. But let me tell you, these are not your garden variety termites. They are HUGE. I've never seen termites quite like these but based on their behavior there is no denying that is exactly what they are. About three days ago they invaded (I believe they caught a ride from my parent's house). Their destruction began almost immediately upon their arrival. They dug three holes in our deck, they've eaten the corners off what's left of our deck and planter boxes and yep, they've even left nasty piles of "stuff" all over. Oh the piles. Don’t even ask Kole or you will certainly hear an earful. Even worse, I agreed to let them invade. Crazy, I know. The other strange thing is they have names; names that would almost make you think they would be cute and sweet- names like Misty and Cutter. I will try to contain the giant pests as long as I can but beware; I hear there are others out there like them. I took a picture of them just so if you ever see any like these you will know to protect your stuff!

Exhibit A and Exhibit B

The kids in the middle are actually the "good" ones in this picture.

(Did I mention THEY DUG THREE HOLES IN MY DECK!)

Mom and Dad, your bill is in the mail.  I am sure it will we waiting for you when you get home.  XOXO

On a much happier note, it's park weather again.  Happy warm (and not just "Utah warm") and sunny, almost like a real spring day!  Boy am I glad to get the kids out of the house and into the sun.  They need to run off their energy on something besides my treadmill.  Here are some pictures from our day at the long-lost park right across the street from our house.  It has been so long, I practically forgot it was there. 

Eve is getting so big.  Last fall I would have to stand right under her everytime she wanted to climb something on the playground (She is a little clumsy sometimes.  Hey, I'm not being mean.  She has the scars to prove it) but now she is a master climber.  Sigh of happiness/reminiscing.

Is this fear or fun?  Hard to tell but he refused to go down the slide the whole rest of the time.  Big baby.

Just ignore all the weird bean pods that look like dead snakes all over the ground.  Can you say Creeeeepeeeee?

I was highly tempted to just leave them hanging there... but I'm not that bad of a mom... despite what everyone may think as they read this blog.

Ok, also here are a few other pics from over the last little while...

More sleeping in random places

Mommy's little helper- all decked out.  It's beyond me why they don't make manly aprons for boys this age.  What?  Boys have to clean house too, ya know.

Lunch and a real train.  Kids thought that was so cool.

Ok, now that you read my blog, get off the computer and go enjoy the nice weather!

It's my day. It's all mine.

Can you tell from my new bright and beautiful blog background that I'm a little antsy for some spring flowers? It is now officially March and the sunshine and warmth seemed to arrive on queue. No flowers yet but the left-over snow is brown and ugly and my lawn has mud-puddles.  It's a good sign.  But am I going to sit here and talk about the weather like you and I are in the middle of some awkward conversation forced by a random run-in in the grocery store? Of course not. Let's get back to life.
So, anyways, here are some pictures. I'll tell what's up as we go along...

To start out with we have some pics from my little birthday party yesterday.  I love the close family parties but I told Kole that next year I want an all out party with all our friends and family.  Mark your calendar now because you are invited.  Even though my birthday is not until March 2, I have been soaking up the attention for days now and I intend to continue to do so as long as I can.  Kole has been a super-duper hubby to allow me to use the "but it's my birthday" excuse all weekend to avoid doing things I'd rather not.  So sweet.  I wonder just how long this can last. 

I love the intense look on Jack's face in this picture.  It's like he's had some long battle with the cupcake and now he's going in for the kill. 

I think it was a very good thing that her dress is purple because after last night it would have ended up that way anyhow.

What?  This isn't how you wash your hands?

Thanks Deb for taking the time to look at and "read" every book they brought to you.  You have patience like Job. 

Me, talking on the phone to my Grandma Louise who lives far away in warm and sunny Southern California.  Sooooo jealous. 

Grandma Wendy and my little monkey man Jack.   No more monkeys jumping on the bed!  Just after this picture was taken Eve decided she wanted to join Jack jumping on the bed.  Bad idea.  Her bed is definitely not made for so much fun.

This ubber-cute guy is my bro-in-law Grayson. (I love ya, Grayson. Don't hate me for blogging about you)  It appears he has become a black-hole of cool almost overnight. It's like all the cool just gravitates to him.  Obviously, this hat is super cool but also obviously, I am too old to truly comprehend its amazingness. I know all you ladies are swooning but he is much too young for any of you and besides it appears he is currently taken or "in a relationship" as his facebook status states. Believe me, this is huge news! If this all works out he may just be the first of Kole's brothers to completely disprove he's gay. ;) (Sorry if you are feeling out of the loop here. It is a long running family joke that it seems will never die.   Our family suffers from "homobrophobia" aka the fear that your brother is or will turn out to be gay.  I am sure I am going to end up offending way too many people here.  But what else is there to say when I have so many single brothers-in-law?)


Like just noted, my bros-in-law are single.  Please see the post titled "Party Time" and look for picture of all the boys on the stairs for a preview of the available merchandise. 

End of Birthday Party.  Next event. 

Also this weekend, our ward had our first Primary party of the year.  From my point of view (having never thrown nor been to a primary party before) I think it was a great success!  It was a PJs Bishopric Breakfast.  Everyone showed up in their favorite pajamas and we had breakfast and then we did activities with the acronym "PJs" while members of the bishopric taught us about each subject.  It was really fun. 

I hope no one is too picky about having their kid's faces on the web but I just had to include a couple group pictures because everyone looked so darn cute... I hardly ever see everyone in anything besides church clothes.  (Eve is on the bottom left)

For "P" we learned about how prayer helps us know Jesus Christ and then the kids colored prayer rocks.  My mom was joking with me that whoever originally thought of prayer rocks must have been crazy.  You are supposed to put them on your pillow to remind you to pray but then you end up forgetting to take it off your pillow and when you turn out the lights and crawl into bed you hit your head on the rock.  Then you throw the rock on the floor and when you wake up in the morning and stumble out of bed you stub your toe on the rock.  I suppose it ultimately does serve its purpose because how can you forget to pray after that? 

For "J" we learned about the joy we experience as we come unto Christ and the kids played games involving stuffed animals and sleeping bags. 

For "S" we learned about how the scriptures help us to know Christ and the kids made scripture ribbons to bookmark their scriptures. 

Overall, good times.  It was a really cheap and easy idea if anyone needs to put together a primary party in the future.

Not so pretty in pink

So, yesterday I dyed my hair. My natural color is mostly strawberry blond so I decided I would try to get as close as possible to it since I am tired of all the upkeep. Didn't turn out quite as expected. I don't really like my PINK highlights! Ok, it's not exactly like "Holy crap, she totally dyed her hair pink!", it's more like "There is something peculiar about her hair. Hmmm, I know, it's pink!" I suppose it could have been worse. I am sure this is what I get for trying to do it myself but I've never had any problems before. I didn't have time to fix it yesterday (had to go to my mother-in-law's birthday party). I love public humiliation. No one seemed to gasp in horror so either the lighting was very flattering or more likely, I think most of the people there are too nice to tell me the truth. However, my oh so sweet and comforting husband agrees that it looks PINK. I would let all of you decide for yourselves but I think I will avoid the paparazzi. Now if only I could avoid Wal-mart. Re-dye today.

Do something. Do anything.

What have I done lately?  I know I've been crazy busy and yet what is there to say?  I usually try to post on this blog at least once a week because I intend to one day print all these pictures and stories and memories and put them together into a book for my kids. (I figure the public nature of a blog should motivate me to keep better track of our lives since I have mommy brain and I otherwise would probably just forget everything.)  However, the last two weeks have been full of nothing but winter blah and despite the busyness of day to day life, nothing has been exciting enough to put into print.  So I won't waste time trying to up the entertainment factor here.  However, I did take a few random pics and thought I should do something with them besides just let them sit on my camera until they get erased.

Jack has been "hiding" in our extra closet all the time lately.  But he doesn't just hide in there, he reorganizes it.  He is a cleaning machine!  He's barely two years old and I think he already has OCD. 

Funny thing, about two seconds after I took this picture, the boxes he was sitting off were tipped off balance and he totally biffed it.  Am I a bad mother to think that's funny?  Probably.  But it's not like he was badly injured.

More hiding (this time in the laundry basket).  Problem is, he can't get in by himself.  So I always have to put him in it and then pretend I have no idea where he is hiding and then I have to sing our hide and seek song over and over and over...  at least one of us is having fun. 

After all that playing who wouldn't be exhausted. I love when he falls asleep in random places.

   

Our cats, Stimpy and Scout, are total gluttons for punishment. The kids really love the kitties and sometimes they love the kitties a little too much. Evidently, if you love a cat a little too hard they pee all over. Eve and her bed learned that the hard way.



I sure am thankful for indoor plumbing, arn't you?

Facebook Friends

Well, much to Kole's disappointment and despite his ridicule, I finally joined Facebook.  I am aware I am behind the times.  Kole and I both used to make fun of Facebook because everyone wants to be your "friend" even though you've probably never said more than 2 words to each other before. It always seemed strange to me. But curiosity finally got the best of me and I just had to jump on the bandwagon.  I suppose it was a necessary action in order to prevent myself from becoming a social outcast.  Maybe we can apply a little peer pressure to Kole and see if we can suck him into the Facebook abyss too.   Surprisingly, it has been fun to look up people I haven't seen- or really thought about in a long time.  No offense to any old friends out there.  It will be good to keep in touch with people who otherwise would have probably just faded out of my life.  Anyways, if you are one of my friends in real life- and if you are reading this blog, we can assume you are- feel free to look me up (and I will try to do the same) and we can be Facebook buddies too. 

Go Aggies!

This last Friday we took the kids to their first USU gymnastics meet (USU v Boise St.  We lost but it was still fun).  I love living so close to a university. There is always something going on.  Seeing all those girls flipping and twisting made me miss my glory days when I did gymnastics and I was actually in shape.  But now just thinking about doing that stuff again makes me hurt. 

Nevertheless, the kids enjoyed watching the show.  Well, Jack really just kept looking around for Big Blue, the USU mascot.  Jack thinks he's so cool.  I think Eve would disagree.  She ran into him by the food booth and when he offered her a hug she just clung to my legs and buried her head.   But at least she really liked the gymnastics.  She told me she wants to be like "those ballerinas."  Hmmm.  I loved doing gymnastics but I can only imagine how nervous it must have made my parents.  I don't know if I could handle the stress.  Gymnasts do a lot of dangerous stuff.  And I did get hurt a lot... 

I finally broke my wrist when I was 15 (a week before we moved from California to Utah) and so it was a good time to take a break from the sport, only I never went back.  But I did do tumbling for a while and then I joined the school diving team my junior year.  Just happens to be where I met Kole.  Who would have thought a broken wrist to could lead to so many good things.

On a side note, I survived my first month of doing Sharing Time at church.  In our ward each member of the primary presidency teaches for a whole month and then gets two months off.  Primary has definitely been a new and interesting experience, especially since up until about 2 months ago I knew absolutely nothing about primary.  Trial by fire, as they say.  It has been challenging but it is going better than I thought it would.  When they called me to be the first counselor in the primary I cried for a week and I was highly tempted to raise my hand when the bishop asked if there was anyone opposed to my being sustained.  But I am doing better now.  Over the last little while I have really gained a testimony that this is where the Lord wants me to be at this time (even if the reasons are not completely clear to me just now).  It's not a place I would have chosen for myself since I would not necessarily consider myself a natural "kid person" but I have faith that the Lord knows what He is doing.  I suppose when you get put in a situation where you have no idea what to do or what's going on, you really learn to rely on the Lord and you find that He enables you to accomplish things that you didn't think were possible. I just hope that the kids are gaining blessings through this experience and they don't have to just suffer through while I learn and grow.  Pray for us all.

Party Time

This last Saturday we had a little family shin-dig to both celebrate Kole's birthday and enjoy a little time with Keaton before his Army deployment.  (He left Tuesday for Kuwait where he'll be for a month to get culturally acclimated and then off to Iraq for about 9 months.  He'll be fine, I am sure.  But pray for him nonetheless).  I suppose both are a little something to be sad about.  Nevertheless, we still had fun.  We ditched the kids and had to get a babysitter other than our parents for only the second time since Eve was born.  Yet another advantage of having the only grandkids on both sides of the family and only living 10 minutes away from both. 

Among the games we played was "The Name Game."  It's easy to play and and lots of fun- if not a little embarrassing.  Basically everyone playing takes three little pieces of paper and on each of their papers writes the name of someone that they think everyone will know.  They can be names of real people, characters, living or dead, famous or just infamous to the people playing.  Then all the papers are folded and gathered into a bucket or basket or bowl or whatever.  Everyone sits in a circle (boy, girl or however you wants to divide the group into two teams with the players of each team sitting every other person). Each person gets a set time (one minute or so) to get their team members to guess as many names as possible before the time runs out.  When their time runs out, you go to the next person in the circle (who is on the other team) and just keep going until you're out of names.  Of course there is a little bit of a catch:  The first round is kind of like "Taboo." Just don't say the name but anything else is fine.  Second round you can only say one word.  The third round is no speaking or sound effects, only charades.  The third round is especially fun- but I'll be the first to admit, I'm no actress.  I took some pictures of everyone else playing.  All pictures of me have been completely erased. 

See if you can guess who they are acting out.  Some of the names were: Sandra Bullock, the Flash, Jack Nicholson, Austin Powers, Kermit the Frog, Edward Cullen, Loraina Bobbit, George Carlin, Lady Gadiva, Elvis, Captain Kirk, Steven Segal, Bruce Lee, James Bond, Richard Simmons, Brant the bicycle guy, Spongebob Squarepants, Tinkerbell, Moses, Ronald Regan, Cher and that's all I can remember.