The joys of mommy life....

Today was a very hard day and I sat on the couch all day long. Then I had to go to YW's and miraculously I felt better then I have felt in weeks. It was so great to have an evening where I didn't feel terrible! Yeah, there is hope!

While I have a little energy left I will write about my adorable children.

Saturday when we had our do-nothing-but-lay-around-the-house-day I made cookie dough brownies. We ate some but there was a ton left. A couple days later Ryan notices that some are missing. When he went up stairs he saw some in the bathroom. Then started to investigate and found more in Joseph's room. SO this is the dialog that followed
Ryan, "Joseph did you eat the brownies?"
Joseph,"no"
Ryan,"Well then how did they get up here?"
Joseph,"They walked."
Ryan,"Then where are their legs?"
Joseph,"They don't have legs, the scoot like a boat."
He then proceeded to show Ryan with his hand how a brownie would make it's way upstairs by sliding.

When Ryan told me this I cracked up! Funny kid.

He asks me daily what size the baby is. Today I showed him pictures of a baby at this stage and he loved that. Then he looked at my stomach and said, "Well if the baby is that small then why is your stomach so big?" Yeah I have been wondering the same thing. Really though I just told him the baby need to be surrounded by fat, muscles, and fluid to stay asfe and grow healthy and strong. He is so excited about this baby.

Cute things about Joshua.
He loves stories and will bring me books all day and say "read you?"

Everything is in 2's right now, He started to say 2 babies the other day then stopped and said, "umm 1 baby" Funny kid

He loves his "amials" He will line them up and then with his cars crash into them and make them fly across the room. For some reason this makes me laugh which encourages him to do it again and again.

He loves to make me laugh. He gets a look of pure delight. I think we have a clown on our hands. He is always trying to get strangers to look at him so he can make them smile.

I had to put Joshua into the girls room for a little while. The boys room has no air condtioning. The first night I went in there to find Sarah in his crib reading to him and Emma standing right next to the crib. I made her get out. About 10 minutes later Emma came to me crying saying,"Joshua won't let me sleep, he wants me to lay in his bed, but I am so tired." I tried to explain to her that she didn't have to but she was afraid he would never go to sleep if she didn't do just what he wanted. This has been going on for several nights now. She loves him and wants to make him happy but then she gets so tired. She is such a love girl and I love her little smiles!

Sarah is going through an on year. The kids seem to take turns being on or off. Meaning they have times that are harder for them or easier and they seem to take turns. It is almost like they see someone else going through a hard time so they ease up. Sarah has been so happy and helpful and asks me several times throughout the day what she can do to help. It has been so nice with my feeling so sick, especially in the kitchen. Her and Emma love to make lunch together.

Jared on the other hand, Hmmm? I would not say an off year per say but he is getting older and testing his ability to question authority. He is still so good even when he is frustrated with our parenting. He simply sighs a heavy sigh and if we allow him he will give us a story of why he should not have to do what we asked him to but e is never rude or unkind to us.
On a good note, He is so concerned with me. He has come up to me so many times over the last few weeks and just give me a hug. SO sweet.

Basically what I am trying to say, I love these kids. I just can't imagine my life with out them.

More funness for me.

Here are more pictures of my cute children.

Pictures always make me happy!

This pregnancy is kicking my butt. Last night I think I hit bottom. My wonderful husband help to walk me through it. He asked me what is it I love to do. The only thing I could think of was taking pictures. I have felt so sick I have been out of commission. So after the kids went to bed I took Joseph out into our yard for about ten minutes, that's all I could do. And I am so happy with the pictures I got. I love my camera and I love photoshop!

My SIL Sarah sent me to this website www.shedoeshair.blogspot.com.

I have been so lazy when it comes to doing hair lately. I thought others might enjoy this also.

Here are two hair do's from her site.

How cute and simply this was.

Sarah's is just curls but I have learned how to do it so that there are not fly aways. Also with Sarah's hair it is so thick it usually takes me forever to curl. I learned that if I curl under the bottom half and do ringlets on the top I save a ton of time.

Happy Fathers day

This week has been a rough one for me so the thought of getting up early to make the Ryan breakfast in bed was a little scary sounding. So I took the kids to the night before and let them decide what they wanted to bring him for breakfast. It was so great. Jared got it all together, helped the kids sign the card and fill out papers all about dad. He rounded them all together and they came in singing happy fathers day. They did all this before I even woke up. Ryan and I hung out in bed with the kids for the morning and it was nice. He got his Itouch a couple of days before so presents weren't real exciting. We did get him a book and he enjoyed reading it with the kids. We went to his dad's after church and enjoyed visiting.

At his parents we had the best time reading the comments about this article. My FIL was spot lighted in the paper. It was a tribute to being the father of 13 children. I guess some people in the community feel we are robbing them of their resources by having so many children. If you have time you should read the comments. They are good for a laugh. My favorite one was this comment from a guy who came form a big family...
"Religion didn't play a part in how many children we had, though we did go to church. Mom just liked kids and Dad just liked Mom, but he thought the kids were alright too."

I don't have a picture of Ryan but I do have this artistic picture he took of his fork. I love this man.

Ryan works so hard to support us. It good to feel loved by this man!

I can't even believe...

My baby is two.

We had such a nice mellow day. In the past I have had a birthday party for 2 year olds and I have decided that they don't really enjoy it. So for Joshua I decded to do what i thought he would like, read books, as many as he wanted. I had bought him a few books for his birthday and after we read those several times he picked out more and we snuggled and read. Then we went to my MIL's where Josh took me to the library and we layed on the ground and read a ton of books. My MIL and I then went to target and let him pick out his gifts. Cars, a ball, little einsteins rocket (a favorite with even the big kids), dollar spot animals. He also wanted lunchables for lunch, thats easy. My kids think they like lunchables but when I buy it for them they never eat. it.

We then went home, took naps, wrapped presents, and waited for him to wake up. He was so fun to watch when he opened his presents. He was in no hurry to move on to the next. He wanted to play with the one he had and I think he would have been happy with one toy.

After this we got pizza and went to the park. Joshua loves the swings and he was so funny when Sarah would push him. He would put his head backwards and hang upside down.

He just loved being free to run and play. On the way home I bought a birthday cake, Yes I bought my first store bought cake ever. That just tells you how great I was feeling. My kids are really not big cake fans unless it is lemon or cheesecake, mom and dad have played a big part in this;) SO when I saw this cake with cookies all over it I thought for sure it would be a hit. The kids ate the cookies and left the cake behind. A week later and I have a huge cake in my fridge.
He was so great though when we sand happy birthday. Joshua got really into it and sung right along with us. I love this kid!

I never thought they looked much a like until I saw this picture. Look at their eyes.

He reminds me of how smart Jared was at this age, he repeats everything we say and can communicate really well with us. He loves to sing and be heard just like Sarah. He always dances and sings when he hears music, no matter where we are. He loves to snuggle and make you laugh like Emma. We were eating noddles yesterday and I was laughing at how he was taking fistfuls and putting them in his mouth. I called Ryan over to come see and then Joshua became such a ham and started make animal noises as he quickly shoved food into his mouth. As we laughed he smiled and kept doing it. He loves his mommy tremendously and sometimes doesn't want to share me just look Joseph. He loves his food and sweets just like daddy, and has a smile that melts mommy just like daddy.

Joshua's names for the kids
Jared= aired
Sarah=airah
Emma= emmy
Joseph= Jouh

I know big families are not for everyone but I just can't imagine if we had stopped having kids before we had this little gem. He makes us all smile and is the best little buddy to his brother. He wants to be just like Joseph and follows him around doing whatever he does.

Joshua, I hope you always know how much you are loved by every member of your family.

Crafting

I made this for the kids school teacher. She really is the best. I wanted to make this adorable summer kit my friend Shannon did but I ran out of time. This I did in about 30 min.
I have felt like crafting again. I am hoping once I feel better to make some wall decor for the girls room, finish Jared's quilt, paint the frame I have been meaning to paint for a few months, and I would just like to enjoy crafting with the kids again.

A day of accidents and booboo's

Sunday afternoon I was curling Sarah's hair for church (it turned out so stinkin cute) When she wanted to show me something and reached across the curling iron and got a horrible second degree burn. I felt so bad. It looked horrible at first, it was all white and got bubbley. Ouch.

This is a couple of days later. This is was the beginning of our accidents.

Monday we had our monthly birthday party. We had a blast swimming. It was time to get out and Emma was having so much fun she decided not to stay in for "just a little longer." She had watched the bigger kids dive off the diving board backwards and decided to try. She didn't clear it and wacked her nose pretty good.It got pretty black and blue and swelled instantly. I kept asking my MIL,"Are you sure it is not broken?" Once she had finally calmed down and rested for awhile she wanted to go play. Then a nephew hit her in the nose with a ball and I just felt so bad for the girls. It was a rough day.

While I was sitting with Emma I hear Jared scream this horrible scream and I go running. He is holding his arm and I expected to see it dislocated hanging there with the bone sticking out. Flash backs from when my brother broke his arm. The first thing he said to me in between screaming is "I's not broken, It's not broken." It actually looked fine but I could tell he was in a lot of pain. I had no idea if it was broken or just sprained. Again I asked my MIL what she thought. I consider her an expert in things like this. She thought it looked sprained. It is still hurting him but we have decided it was just a bad sprain.

At some point in the middle of all this I notice that Joshua's foot is bleeding and he has other blisters. I saw these blisters on Joseph earlier and wondered what they were. But once they both had them I worried it was hand, foot, mouth disease so I take Josh to my MIL and it turns out it is just from the bottom of the kiddie pool. Not really a big deal at all.

One good thing came out of all this, we went home early and I got to bed before to late. Usually we love to sit around and visit and stay way to late, so fun though. I love living near family.

Actually I felt very fortunate. With all these accidents none of them ended in the hospital, a few were close, but that is it. What a blessing!

I normally make the choice to not complain on this blog. I like to reserve this space for the positive things in my life. But today I feel like I just need to be grumpy and I am hoping getting it out of my head will help me feel less negative.
I always have great anticipation when going to my first OBGYN appointment when I am pregnant. I am anxious to see that the baby is fine and hopeful that I will like the doctor I am going to, moving makes it hard to keep a dr you know and love. Plus the added wondering if I am farther along then I though or am I having twins, I recognize twins is probably a passing idea put into my ever day dreaming head and not so but either way I would love to know.The past few nights I have not slept well with anticipation of my appointment. I guess you would say I can be a worrier sometimes.
I woke up feeling really sick and with a pounding headache. One of those mornings you just want to stay in bed. But since I had to leave the house at 9 with the kids fed and ready as well as myself I had no choice. I was running a little late, another down fall of mine is anxiety over being late.
So when I walk into the office, tell the lady my name, and she says, "Oh I think they are rescheduling you." I start to cry. I held it together so no one new but me but it had just been such a long night and such a rough morning I felt like this was the last straw. I have felt sick for 4 weeks now. I feel like my functioning ability has been decreased to nothing. I normally don't even get sick till 8 weeks and here I am 8 weeks along and already sick for a month. I guess my hope for a good day os decreasing. Why do some days feel so very hard. When time passes I recognize how silly it is to be so upset but in the moment it feels so real and frustrating.
Yesterday was the last non black out day for the Disney passes in awhile so I had told the kids we would go. The night before Emma had hurt her nose diving off the diving board backwards and Jared sprained his wrist really bad. So when I woke up feeling really sick my desire to go had diminished to nothing. But since I had told Joseph and he was so excited I decided to go. Jared no longer wanted to go because his wrist hurt so bad. We finally get off and get there before 11. It was almost 90 when we got there and it was so crowded we had to park way far away and walk a ridicules ways. I kept a good outward appearance for the kids but let me tell yeah, never go to Disneyland in the summer, Never go the day a new ride opens, never go when you feel like you shouldn't but go against your better judgment, and never go when the high temp is over 85. If you were thinking of going in the summer, don't! Pull your kids out of school
shortly after they have started, near the end of Sept. You will coast on every ride, enjoy wonderful weather, children and parents will all be happier. I didn't last long and the kids were so drained the hardly said anything all day.
I will probably delete this post tomorrow but I do feel better now that I have complained.

You Are An INFJ

The Protector You live your life with integrity, originality, vision, and creativity. Independent and stubborn, you rarely stray from your vision - no matter what it is. You are an excellent listener, with almost infinite patience. You have complex, deep feelings, and you take great care to express them. In love, you truly see relationships as an opportunity to connect and grow. You enjoy relationships as long as they are improving and changing. You can't stand stagnation. At work, you stay motivated and happy... as long as you are working toward a dream you support. You would make a great photographer, alternative medicine guru, or teacher. How you see yourself: Hardworking, ethical, and helpful When other people don't get you, they see you as: Manipulative, weak, and unstable

What's Your Personality Type?

I don't like to be a bragging mom but....

...sometimes it just has to be said. This last few months have seemed crazy and home school has seemed even crazier. Today was our last official day. We met with the kids teacher and it felt so good to hand everything over to her. We are going to have a bonfire with the rest of the papers! I also got there testing scores for the end of the year. This test is the nation wide test they do at the beginning and end of each school year.
Emma is to young to test but Marina let me know she is above level and reading really well.

Sarah, ending 2nd grade, scored 216 in math which puts her 25 points above average and at the middle of 5th grade level. For reading she scored 216 which is 28 points above average and at the end of 6th grade beginning of 7th grade level with a level of reading comprehension between middle of 7th and middle of 9th grade. For language usage she scored a 223, that's 32 points above average and at a beginning 9th grade level.

Jared, ending 4th grade, scored 229 in math, which puts him 19 points above average, and end of 7th grade level. For reading he scored 227 and that puts him 22 points above average with a level of reading comprehension between end of 9th and middle of 11th. For language usage he scored 222 and that is 15 points above average and at an end of 8th grade beginning of 9th grade level.

Would I love to take credit for their smartness, yes. But I really can't. These kids are so much smarter then I ever was. I believe they came from heaven that way. We have encouraged them. I read a book when Jared was little that explained if you focus your efforts on teaching your children to read and read well then schooling will be easy. I have tried to do that and it seems like it has really helped to encourage what they already had within them. Jared and Sarah love to read and Emma loves to look at books. She is starting to ask me how to spell everything and any time she sees a sign she spells it out and asks me what it says. Lots of times she can sound it out. It is so fun to watch them learn. With that said, I think they might go to public school next year. Just because I am not sure I will be a good mommy trying to home school with a newborn. Besides, I think it will be nice to have more time with the little ones.

And just when you thought my bragging was all done.... Jared one his champion baseball game tonight. They did awesome. Not bad for his first season. They won against their division last week and then played against the north division tonight. We were ranked 4th before the playoffs so I am shocked we won against the 1st place time of the other division which had never been beaten.

Yeah, today was a good day. I welcome the summer with open arms, bring it on!

Random things that make me happy

Everything I grow usually dies so I am so excited to see our radishes growing so well.
See this cute boy? When I looked at this picture I realized how much he looks like Jared did at this age.
I actually created something and I remember how much I love to make things. This was for my SIL's baby shower.

And look how cute these baby sock buds turned out, not bad for a first try. I tied them on to the outside of the present.

And here is my cute family above the Hoover dam.

We decided last minute to head of to Vegas with Ryan for their first boot camp weekend. I had such a terrible couple of days I decided I wasn't going to go. I knew Ryan would be busy the whole time and I wasn't sure how I felt about spending 4 days in vegas with the kids. We ended up having so much fun. I felt pretty good most of the time, had a few bad moments though. Mostly we just relaxed and I needed that so much. Our hotel was luxury. We got a free upgrade to a super nice suite at the Palazzo which was such a nice hotel. The shower had a jetted tub and 5 shower heads. I could get used to that!
I got to visit with my sister and that was fun. We just don't see each other enough. Also my SIL's Sarah, Allie, and Orchids were all there with their hubbies. We spent a lot of time at the pool and it was awesome. It was like bath water and that is my kind of swimming. Plus the pool was perfect for kids. There were 7 different pools to choose from.

On Thursday night we went out to eat at Denny's. "Yeah" sarcasm you might think but it was actually a lot of fun. Because it was only Denny's I didn't worry about the kids being loud. Emma even sung us her concert song in full voice and nobody cared. One old lady even told me how well mannered the kids were. With that said we decided at the beginning of the trip to make a game out of how many people made comments about having so many kids. I think we ended at 15. Most were normal comments were normal but a few were worthy of noting.
1st- a middle aged uppity looking women made a face before she asked if they were all mine. When I said yes I awaited her reply. when she shocked me with a big, "wow, you look amazing." It totally took me by surprised and I am sure my smile took her off guard as well.
2nd- a lady about 20 asked me if they were all mine and then proceeded to tell me how beautiful they all were and how she hopes when she has children the are that beautiful.
3rd- and not s nice. Ryan left somethingin the conference room after it was all over one night and we, as a family, went to go get it. Some of the members were still asking question and one man just kept staring. Then with a big grin on his face he said "You should join a circus" He thought he was so funny and I had to give him props for at least using some creativity and not giving the normal "You must be busy" response.

We went to the Hoover Dam on Friday and this was jareds favorite part of the whole trip. Who knew? He was so impressed that they could build that awesome building.

Inside the observatory they had interactive games for the kids. That was a hit as well. We then drove by their grandma's old house she lived in when she was little. They thought that was cool as well. Then we came back and met up with my sister and swam some more. I love swimming. After that we went over to the venetian, it is connected to the palazzo, and ate Gellato and watched a show they have in the middle shops. Sarah got picked to help with the magic show and that was fun for her. Then we went to dinner and we all felt so tired it was simply time to go to bed. We really had a great time bonding as a family and I am so glad we got this break.

One other random thing to note is how funny Joshua was with the strangers in the elevator. He would reach out and touch their hand our their leg. One man called him buddy so for the rest of the trip he kept saying "Hi buddy" to people. What a cutie.

We had to leave without Ryan since his little sister was getting baptized Saturday night and he wasn't going to be done till late. The drive was fairly painless and I was relived we made it with 5 minutes to spare.

The baptism was very nice even if the little boys were so tired. I belong to such a cute family After the family party I crashed and I am still recovering from the trip but it really was worth it.