Man, it's really hard to blog when you haven't done it in ages. Life speeds by so fast and the thought of getting it all documented is a little overwhelming. I'll just try and be brief (yeah, right) and get some pics of some of the things I've missed lately.

Reagen and Michaela started and finished fun soccer seasons.

Reagen is no longer the only five year old in town still sporting training wheels on her bike. It's funny how with the last kid your in less of a hurry for them to grow up.

Two school programs. Dancing through Kindergarten.

I love America 5th Grade Program. Yes, this was months ago, but it never got documented.

Reagen had her first ever trip to Build-A-Bear. This may not be a big deal to most of you, but she counted down the days with so much excitement. When I first told her that she got to go, she told me the next day when she woke up that she smiled all night because she gets to go to Build-A-Bear.

This girl got her braces on May 6th. Her teeth have already moved quite a bit. Making room for those two snaggle teeth that are hiding above.

She also had a birthday and turned eleven and we of course had to make her earn those presents. She acts a lot older than she is and is so easy to be around. I'm trying to enjoy these moments before she hits those teen years. I love this girlie.

I had a birthday too and look at us dorky dorks with our 3-D glasses on waiting for Aliens vs. Monsters. I think I deserve some type of award for letting the kids pick the movie on my b-day.

That's just a small percentage of what's been going on in our lives and I don't have time right now to get everything down, but since I've had a few emails wondering if I had dropped off the face of the earth (thanks Keysha and Chelsea), I thought I'd better get something posted out here. I'm failing miserably at documenting our lives and I'll try to do better.

The Nerve Center

Two tennis schedules, two soccer schedules, one taekwondo schedule, one reading calendar, several unredeemed reading awards for pizza, two old grade school program schedules, 30 kindergarten reading words, one key to funky mouth contraption, one orthodontist appointment reminder, three haircut coupons, one walk/run schedule, one calendar to jot down everything else down, two picture orders, one grocery list, a picture of Jesus and a partridge in a pear tree.

If I got my fridge in order, maybe my life would follow.  Maybe.

Some Craftiness

A couple of weeks ago, I got an email from Scrapbooks Etc. (i think) and it had cute gift ideas and I saw this and really liked it and thought it would go good in the girl's room. I bought a 16x20 canvas at Walmart and then just used scrapbook stuff to put it together so it was really pretty cheap to make. Since I don't have a craft room and this was all over my kitchen table for a weekend, I was motivated to finish it quickly. Normally, it would be one of those projects that gets stuck in the closet half done for years to come.  

My thoughts on walk running.

I've never been a runner, more of just a walker, but I really haven't been doing anything lately and I had been feeling lazy and a little out of control with my love of food/dislike of exercise.  When I saw this in the March Family Circle, I ripped it out and stuck it to my fridge because it seemed like something I could do and it says "lose 15 pounds".  Who doesn't want to lose 15 pounds and how hard can it be to run one minute walk two?  (yeah, that was a lot harder than I thought)  I started it and believe it or not, I completed week three tonight. Tomorrow I will run 2.5 minutes and walk 2 minutes 4 times.  Wish me luck.

We don't have one spare corner in our house for our treadmill so it's in nana's extra bedroom. It's a little pink room with a twin bed and matching dressers and night stand from the 70's and pinkish red shag carpet. The treadmill faces a large window with a clear view of our house right across the street. It's been too cold to run/walk outside so I've become a frequent visitor of the pink bedroom. 

I try not to think about how slow time passes for those minutes running and how fast the walking minutes pass. I try and think of other things to distract myself. 

I look out the window at my house and make a mental list of things that need to be done.  Baseboards in my bedroom, closet and bathroom doors painted. New siding around the front door, pictures hung in my room, the list goes on and on, but I get bored with that.  

I think I see someone in my kitchen window. I wave, but nobody waves back.  It's actually just a little tree in front of the window.

I see my reflection in the big window in front of me and I think how if I ran naked on the treadmill and saw my reflection in the big window, I'd probably run faster and longer.  That would really scare all the passerbys so I won't do that.

I think about how I used to hardly sweat when I was younger and how I really sweat a lot now. How I hate showering at night and going to bed with wet hair and how it makes me cold all night, but I don't want to go to bed all stinky so I shower.

I think about how I better not burp while running because that grape crush that I drank an hour ago may come bubbling up.  And how if I wouldn't have drank that grape crush, I wouldn't have to spend so much time on the treadmill.

I think about how I desperately need new music on the ipod because if I hear Single Ladies one more time, I'm going to scream. I wish I could read on the treadmill without falling off.

I think about how I should have lost five pounds by now and I haven't, but I tell myself I'll keep doing it for 12 weeks and then if I haven't lost, I'll drink more grape crush and relax.

Happiness

Just sharing a few things that made me very happy this week.


1. If you know me, you know nothing makes me happier than a bargain. I got this sweet deal from Kohl's. Perfect Comfort Memory Foam king size pad for $37 delivered to my door. Regular price $179.99. It was such perfect comfort that we slept right through the start of Stake Conference. I did feel bad about missing church and being a bad example to the kids so I listened to Soft Sunday Sounds on FM100 to try and ease my guilt. :)

2. This just made me smile. My dad sent some cash in the mail for the kids, strategically hidden in a folded note. He must think I'm still a blond! Look at the very detailed instructions as you open the paper. (I know it looks like it's from "Frank", but it really says "Gramp".

3. Have you tried this stuff? It's hair happiness in a bottle. It helps your hair dry faster, makes it super soft and gives it a shine, but doesn't weigh it down or make it greasy. We've gotta have the big hair.

4. More bargains. More happiness. Two shirts at Old Navy for $2.80 each. And SCORE at Robert's! $150 worth of scrap booking stuff for $15. Rub-ons, stickers, and chipboard, oh my!

5. No explanation needed here. These cookies are simple to make and so yummy. I'll share the recipe below. (oops, picture is gone...refer to cookie in the banner.)

1 8oz. cream cheese, room temp. 1 stick butter, room temp.

1 egg 1 tsp. vanilla extract

1 box moist chocolate cake mix Powdered sugar, for dusting

Preheat oven to 350. In a large bowl w/an electric mixer, cream the cream cheese and butter until smooth. Beat in the egg. Beat in the vanilla. Beat in the cake mix. Cover and refrigerate for 2 hours (or you can stick it in the freezer for 15 minutes) to firm up so that you can roll the batter into balls. Roll in powdered sugar. Place on ungreased cookie sheet, 2 inches apart. Bake 12 minutes. The cookies will remain soft and gooey. Cool and sprinkle more powdered sugar on top if you'd like.

It's easy to eat 12 and not even realize it so make sure you share...or not.

Especially for Ash

Ashley (we'll keep your last name a secret to protect your privacy) - here is the answer to your prayers. If you only would have had this thing 9 years ago. Think of all you could have accomplished while pumping away. All those lost hours sitting in a bedroom or hiding behind a chalkboard in a scrapbook store. What a shame.

Straighten Up!

I'm not just posting these pictures because they totally crack me up. I actually want to document Michaela's teeth getting straightened out. I didn't have braces and my brother and sisters didn't have braces (although we all could have used them). Amy, my little sis, did have some weird contraptions in her mouth, but I don't think she ever had braces.  Mike helped pull her mouth to try and expose some of the teeth hiding in there in the first two pics.  

Monday she had this cool little bridge put in. Every other day, we take a little key and turn in so that it slowly widens her mouth. After eight weeks, she will get the regular braces. She is responsible for making sure we don't forget to do this. She marks a little smiley face on the calendar on the fridge every time we do it. It does make her have a little bit of a lisp and she got part of a hotdog caught in it today from lunch, but she hasn't complained about it at all.  

Are you kidding me?

Did anyone watch The Bachelor?  All three hours of it? I got totally sucked in and watched the whole season really hoping Jason wouldn't be "hurt" again, but after last night, I was just thinking, poor Ty.  Melissa's going to be your new mommy...no wait, Molly might be your new mommy. As much as I hate to admit it, I'm going to have to watch again tonight to see what possibly could happen next. 

Also, is anyone watching Biggest Loser?  I love this season! Oh, and Amazing Race is great so far. Am I pathetic or what?

Don't let your kids learn to bake.

I'm just giving you some advise from personal experience. It's not because of the mess, although that alone should be enough. The eggshells in the wrong side of the sink, the flour blown all over the stove top, the sticky spoons stuck to the counter top, 12 dirty mixing bowls...well maybe that is reason enough.  

But the reason I was thinking of was that when I'm craving something sweet, 90% of the time, I am too lazy to get in the car and drive down to the store and 50% of the time I can't sweet talk Mike into driving down to the store.  99% of the time, I am too lazy to actually get up and make something.  There's a pretty good chance that if it's up to me to come up with a treat, I won't be getting one.

However, now Dal and Kayla have decided they like to experiment in the kitchen and when they want a treat, they aren't so lazy. They make chocolate chip cookies ALL THE TIME!  If that wasn't bad enough, Dallon figured out that he can make cheesecake. Dang his CSE class (what us old timers knew as Home Economics) for helping him get in touch with his feminine side and for teaching him to cook.)  I am totally screwed here. I can no longer rely on my laziness as a weight loss program.

He made this yummy brownie cheesecake for Mike's birthday last week.  I am in big trouble.

UNO

The game of choice when me and her are home alone.  She's surprisingly good. When she wins she chants, "Winner, winner, I want cheese for dinner."  When she loses she glares at me.  She's a little intimidating with the whole dilated pupils and the pursed lips look.

This beats the alternative of her other favorite passtime when we are alone. It's called mom tossing a stuffed animal high in the air over the couch with perfect timing as she runs across the front room and dives through the air to catch it and then slams head first into the couch, over and over a bazillion times.  I'll take 20 games of UNO over that any day.

Recap

A little recap since I've had a hard time remembering how to type lately. 

1. January is usually a month that I get the blues from lack of sunshine, cold weather, and too much eating of food that has absolutely no nutritional value. This year, it just flew by and I didn't even realize I hadn't had the blues until it was February and then I thought what's the use of having the blues now, it's February.

2. The kids competed in the US Open in Vegas for TKD. Fifty-nine countries were represented. Kayla had 6 in her division, fought three times, and won gold. woo-hoo for her. Dal had 53 in his division, fought pretty darn good, but didn't bring a medal home. boo-hoo for him. 

3. I remembered that I don't like to stay in hotels in Vegas. I hate trying to figure out who's long black hair is in my sheets. The women in thongs (or massive wedgies as the kids see it) plastered all over the streets makes me blush. The stay in St. George in a clean hotel was a lot better.  no mystery hairs in the bed. 

4. Reagen informed me that she'd like to be a garbage man when she grows up. She's been collecting cardboard boxes lately preparing so diligently. I wonder if she thinks the garbage men live in boxes. I'm so relieved she has high aspirations.

5. Dal has had a growth spurt and almost looks me in the eyes. Mike is worried that he'll grow bigger than him and torture him to pay him back for all of the teasing Mike does to him. I'm counting on it and looking forward to it. 

6. Work is crazy and leads to migraines on a lot of occasions. It's not a good time to give up Mtn. Dew...again.  Seriously, I'm very happy to have a job right now with things the way they are. I had my 12 year anniversary at Bard this month. Who would have known I could last this long?

7. Michaela gets braces on in March. I didn't think her teeth were all that bad and then she pulled her top lip up the other day and revealed some teeth I didn't even know she had. Whoa!

8. Last, but not least, Mike went postal on us. He got a job with the post office. He starts part-time next month. We are exicted about this and I know he's relieved to be done with the tests, training, and driving courses. (I drive with him quite often and I didn't think he'd pass the driving part.)

 

Some pictures to make this post a little more interesting.

This is Dallon in the red helmet fighting Mexico.

Three of our team members and one little sister.

I took these just to show some of the countries represented. Australia had a huge team and we met a nice Australian boy and I loved hearing him talk.

A couple team members from China.

The hung flags from all of the countries represented.

Kayla, Dal and Josh on the way back from making a snack run to the van.

If you look past the unhappy looking dude in front, you'll see a very happy coach throwing Kayla up in the air after she won her final match.

Random pic of Reagen with the cat that's not allowed in the house, let alone in her bed.

Taken

My girls will not be leaving the country on their own, or with girlfriends, or even parental chauffeurs. 

Not when they are in high school, not when they are in college, maybe not even when they are forty. 

Not to Europe, not to Paris, and probably not even Mexico.

Well, maybe if Mike becomes a super secret agent with sweet killing skills like Liam Neason, but probably not.  Mike and I saw the movie "Taken" and it totally freaked me out. I don't even want to leave the country and who would steal me? It was a very good, action packed, nail biting movie, but it makes you think twice about sending your young American daughters out of the country. I might not even let Dallon leave the country because I think he's kinda pretty in a manly way. Have you seen his eyelashes?

The Flour Game

I had forgotten about this game for many years, but Sunday night we were playing Uno with the kids for the 78th time and it came to me. My aunt Retha taught us how to play when we were young and then in high school I remember playing it with some of my friends and having lots of laughs.

What you do is fill a small cup half way full with baking flour.  Pack it down and then put a clean penny in it. You have to wash it with soap and maybe rub a little sanitizer on it if you are anal like me about germs. Then fill the rest of the cup with flour so that the penny is hidden in the middle. Place a plate over the cup and carefully turn it over so that the flour comes out on the plate in the shape of the cup. 

Now to start the game, everyone slaps ther hands on thier legs twice and then claps once like what you do when you listen to the song, "We will, we will rock you."  Slap, slap, clap.  Got it.  The first person says a subject like books, or colors or spongebob characters, or whatever you like.  The next person has to name a book or color or whatever on the next clap and you keep going around the table until someone messes up.  If they mess up, they have to take a knife and slice off part of the flour.  You don't want to make the flour collapse though.  Whoever makes it fall has to find the penney with only their face and pick it up.  It is hilarious.  Once they find the penney, you carefully pick out the slober they may have blown in there when they were laughing and pack it back in the cup again.  Good times!

What a week

Or at least half a week since all the fun started on Wednesday and ended on Sunday.

Wednesday was a good day. Dallon was nominated by one of his teachers to be Falcon of the Month (doo doo doo...hear the trumpets sounding). They give this award out not just for academics, but for kids that have shown kindness to others, leadership skills, or have improved somehow. Mike and I got to go down to the junior high library and they had a little program for the kids who were nominated. They read the letters out loud that the teachers had wrote. 

I'll have to admit that I had one of those proud mom moments where you almost cry, but I didn't want to embarrass myself in front of a bunch of jr. high kids so I kept myself under control. I'm getting better at that. The cookies and chocolate milk afterwards topped off a great afternoon.

And then there was Friday.  Glorious 5th Grade Maturation Program at the elementary school. Michaela kept telling me that I really didn't have to go. She said the only reason they invite parents is so that they keep the kids from laughing. Now, my kids live pretty sheltered little lives you have to remember. So do I, so I wanted to see if I could learn something along with Michaela.

They started the video and it was pretty cool and hip and everything until they cut to the drawings of our body parts. I seriously almost bit my tongue off trying not to laugh. You know, one of those nervous laughs that happen at church when you aren't suppose to laugh. 

I would look at Michaela and she would shoot daggers at me. I knew she had no idea before this video about what her little tom-boy body was going to do to her in a year or two. I wasn't going to be the one to tell her and ruin her carefree love of life. 

Finally, it was over and I had to force her to take the little prize bag that they give the girls as they leave. She wanted nothing to do with what was in that bag. As we walked to the car, I asked her if she knew any of this lovely information before today. "No!  They are lying.  That is NOT going to happen to me." (I'm glad she's not showing any signs of denial at this point.) I had to be the bearer of bad news and let her know that yes, it actually is going to happen. When we got in the car, she ripped the beloved prize bag open and threw the winged friends at me and told me that I could have them and she'd keep the deodorant and the granola bar.  These are those bonding moments you look forward to as a mom.  

Now fast forward to Sunday morning, 9:00am.  My little family that tries to be real inconspicuous is sitting up front and center at the pulpit in church. Yes, that's right, we had to speak in church. 

Everyone of us.  

Even Mike.

Yes, I said Mike.

Don't fall off your chair for those of you that know Mike.

It actually went well. Mike did awesome and didn't seem nervous at all up there. Especially since he informed us after, that half way through the talk he got this monster cramp in his left butt cheek.  He had all of his weight on one leg and was just a little tense. He said under normal circumstances, it would have dropped him to the ground. I'm so proud of him!

Reagen wanted to talk about Noah's Ark. Dal and Kayla both wrote their talks on their own. You couldn't hear my knees knocking...I think, so we'll consider it a success.  My friend Kathryn, who besides looking like Miss America, is sooo musically talented, sang a beautiful musical number for us.

It was sure a half a week to remember.

It's good to have friends

And even better to have friends with connections! My buddy Chelsea is friends with some developers in her neighborhood and therefore has access to 4 model homes that are really cute. I bribed Reagen into being our little model as we both worked on our "indoor skills". We've found that taking pictures indoors isn't that easy because of the whole lighting situation. It was really fun to have time to make adjustments without a family sitting posed and ready. Reagen had a lot of patience and I paid her well with a humongo frozen yogurt afterwards. Here are some of my favorite pics.

Reagen's version of Rockband

I may be raising a nerd...

...but I'm ok with that. He's already way smarter than me. I come home and find stuff like this on a regular basis. Little test tubes filled with who knows what. I don't even like to ask what may be in them. I'm constantly out of cornstarch because he makes experiments with it. He blew a fuse in his room last year because he wanted to try and make his own lightbulb and plug it into an outlet. I always sanitize my tweezers before using because I don't know what insects he's been inspecting with them. The internet history on our computer has interesting searches for things like inertia, surface tension, and nuclear fission. What the heck is this kid going to brew up? I don't know what most of that stuff even is, but I don't want to ask him because he might figure out he's smarter than his old mom. When he talks about sciencey type stuff, I just nod my head like I know what he' s talking about. I'm not sure where this kid got his brains, but I know at 13 I wasn't trying to make my own lava lamp, I was prank calling boys with my friend Mindy.

Resolutions?

I usually don't make new year's resolutions because I hate to deal with failure so early in the year. I love the idea of having a "word" for the year, though. My good friend Ade explains it here. Last year my word was focus. I'm going in a little different direction this year. My word for 2009 is "enjoy". It sounds a little corny, maybe a little too easy, but I thought about it a lot and I want to enjoy 2009. I want to apply it in all aspects of my life. I want to enjoy my kids more and relax and have fun around them and worry less about what they are doing wrong or that they are annoying the crap out of me some times. I want to enjoy more time with Mike. The kids keep us running pretty steady and we don't make too much of an effort to make time to spend together. We're actually together a lot, but there's always three extra little people hanging out with us. I want to even slow down and enjoy my food. I guess I'm used to always being rushed so I notice that I don't even chew my food half the time. In I throw it and down it goes. Maybe that's why I eat twice as much so I can get to taste it a little longer. I want to enjoy my surroundings. I love nature and I don't make enough time for that either. I feel so much peace when I get out on a nice day and I usually give that up to plop down and watch Survivor or some other mindless show. So there you have it.  Now I'm going to go and try to enjoy the Primary meeting I have at 6:00.  Ha!