At least it's something

I was singing at lunch today and Tennyson and Sanders were both opposed to the idea and kept saying, "Please stop, Mom. Pleeeeeeease stooooooop."

Since they were asking so nicely I stopped, but not before I jokingly said, "Every party has a pooper and that's why invited you."

Tennyson got very serious and said, " I'm not. I went poop in the toilet---not at the party."

I hope it stays that way!

Soccer

Soccer season started for us tonight.  Karaia headed off with a friend to start another season, while the rest of us watched Tennyson's first ever soccer game.  He was so excited.

 He jumped right in like he was a pro.  I guess years of watching Karaia and Beckham play soccer has its benefits.

 He finished with a goal and an assist.  Not bad for your first ever game.

A new size

Tobi asked me to make a scripture tote, like the one I made for Karaia, for Kate's birthday. JUST before I made my first cut into the fabric I had the thought to check and make sure Kate's scriptures are the same size as Karaia's.  Good thing I checked! They are not. They are actually bigger which means I had to increase the size of my original pattern. That took a bit longer than I had planned. Then I sewed, sewed, and did some more sewing all day today.

9 hours later ( not exactly sure why it took me so long) here's the final result along side Karaia's tote to see the difference in size.

Every girl needs a little sparkle.

 The gray fabric on the side was a happy accident. I placed the pattern pieces on the polka dot fabric incorrectly and ended up not having the right amount of fabric to achieve the look I wanted. SO I took the two little boys to the quilt shop and discovered they no longer had any of that fabric left. The gray fabric spoke to me and thus came and lived with me for an afternoon. I love the added sophistication it brings to the tote.

Karaia's is BULGING with all of the stuff she "needs" to get through church.

I was so glad Tobi asked for this special gift! It was fun to sew something again.

Hour long 10 minute chores

It baffles my mind that my children can make a job, that really should only take 10 minutes, last, at the minimum, an hour or longer. And that's assuming they even complete it.

They're like magicians that way. Crazy, frustrating magicians.

Redesigning

I'm making another scripture bag for my best friend's daughter.

Just before I cut the fabric I had the thought to make sure Kate's scriptures were the same size. They weren't! That was a close one.

So now I am redesigning the original pattern. Good news is I will be ready for any size scriptures after this! Hooray!

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Good friends

I helped Sabina, along with many other amazing women, clean her house tonight.

It was sad to see my friend's house without all of her personality in it.

I know they are going where they need to, but as i've said before, change, even the good kind, is hard. I miss my friend.

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dreaming

As you know, I'm a dreamer. Lately, I've been dreaming a lot. As in lay down to sleep, close my eyes, and imagines begin jumping and dancing all over my brain. Mostly patterns of the clothing variety. Which is extremely intimidating because I am not a seamstress. However, I'm shooting for the moon with this whole fabric design thing, so why not me, you know? I'll never know if I don't try.

The result of this renewed vigor of dreams is that I am very tired. And anxious. And terrified. And hopeful. And more of the terrified.

11 years

Today is my 11 year anniversary to my best friend.

Forgive me if the post isn't longer. We had a busy day and haven't sign each other much.

Perhaps tomorrow I will compose a more fitting post to celebrate the joy of being married 11 years to someone you still get excited when he comes home.

But not tonight.

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Change

My friend, Sabina, is moving. Tomorrow. She was the first friend I made in this ward and always made me feel that my opinion was of value. Thats one of her talents.

We would babysit swap every year, and Sanders and Rhyse learned each others names shortly after they learned to say Mama.

I am going to miss her in my everyday life.

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First Day

Today was big day for our little family. Not only did Karaia and Beckham start school, as I mentioned yesterday, they are in the same class.  Beckham in 1st grade ( I swear it feels like he MUST be older than just a first grader)

His shirt of choice? Diary of a Wimpy Kid. We love those movies.

And Karaia as a bid 3rd grader. Where in the world does the time go?

And a couple of the two classmate together.

Both their smiles make me laugh in this picture!

My favorite quotes of the day are:

I asked Karaia how it was having Beckham in the same class with her today. Her reply was, "Well, it was weirder than I thought it was going to be. I thought he was going to sit far enough away from me that I could just forget about it for awhile. But his seat was right behind mine....right next to Cole's."

"Oh, so you saw Beckham every time you snuck a peak at Cole?"

Turning bright red, " yeah."

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Beckham finished telling me all about his first day of first grade. He was especially detailed about lunch as he had been very nervous about finding a seat (Thank you, Diary of a Wimpy Kid). At the end of the tale of his adventures he added, "I think I'm going to handle 1st grade pretty well."

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Sanders came and gave me a quick hug. Stepped back a bit, put his arms around my waist and started patting my waist with his hands saying, "You tiny. You no big. You tiny!" And then continued informing me of my stature for the next 5 minutes.

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After I tucked Beckham into bed he began bouncy his body in his newly tucked in blankets squealing with delight, "I can't wait for school tomorrow!!!!! Mrs. Pickett ROCKS!!!!"

It was a marvelous day.

Quick

I don't really want to post tonight, so this will be quick.

School starts tomorrow which is always a happy and sad day for me. Sad because I like having my kids at home and happy because they still LOVE going to school...and as I've mentioned, Mrs. Pickett is awesome and helps my kids become better people. This year Karaia and Beckham will be in the same class with the same teacher. Mrs. Pickett teaches a MAC (Multi Age Classroom) class and has 1st, 2nd, and 3rd graders in one class. We'll see how they do.

The Fundraiser Yard sale was incredible. You would never have guessed all of that stuff was donated and the proceeds going to one deserving family. I had many, many people ask me if it was a stake wide yard sale. Their eyes would get very large, and an extra donation usually came from their wallet when I told them it was for one family.

And finally, my calling scares me. It really does. I am a ward missionary. It is so beyond my comfort zone to be a missionary. Which is very ironic for a number of reasons. One being that I remember turning eight and counting out how many years until I could be a missionary. And then counting down with every birthday. It was something I wanted SO much. The second reason, is because I love meeting new people and it is never a nerve wracking thing for me to just start talking to people. And Third because I believe in my faith with all my heart. I truly do.

Still, it's hard for me to share that with someone unless they have asked me to. If they ask, I have no problems at all. What I don't want is for someone to think that if they tell me no that that would end a relationship. It wouldn't. Or that I started a relationship because I had an agenda in mind. I wouldn't.

Even typing this out, my mind is buzzing with all of the names of friends and family that read this blog who are of other Faiths or are in-active, and just feeling awkward that they are reading this. I don't want to offend anyone. Ever. But I believe what I believe. I'm not ashamed of that in any way.

I know this is why I am in this calling, to help me grow and be who the Lord needs me to be. I can feel myself still digging in my heals a little. Growth is always a bit hard. Especially when it's for your own good.

Guest Post and Yard Sale

Emilie is off to bed early tonight after a long couple days helping out with this fund raising yard sale.  It was very successful and Emilie was happy to be a part of it.

In the meantime, the kids and I hung out, delivered a few campaign signs, cleaned the house a bit and hung out some more.  That about sums it up.

I'm sure Emilie will give a more complete account of the yard sale in the near future.  Until then, here's an idea for the next garage sale:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LL5kDG7YMVA

New rule

I have been helping my cousin get ready for her HUGE fundraiser tomorrow. It's a massive project and we've been at work on it for hours today.

Because of that I missed my blog deadline. But Sarah made a new blog rule for me , if you haven't gone to sleep it's still the same day.

So there you go. It may look like I missed a day, but I haven't gone to sleep yet so I didn't.

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Lookin' out for her friends

We got to hang with our beloved Mrs. Pickett tonight for a MAC class back to school bbq.

During the evening Casey (Mrs. Pickett) shared a story with me about Karaia from last year.

Casey drinks coffee, which confuses some of the LDS kids who have been raised that coffee is not a beverage that they should drink, but their Mrs. Pickett is awesome. So they are learning it's ok if someone else has a different life style/belief then them that they are still good people.

That being said, they are still kids and their fillters are in the process of forming.

Karaia had talked to Mrs. Pickett about drinking coffee before. More of a why? And why don't you just stop? kind of a conversation. During one field trip Casey realized she had forgotten water or other drink, but she did at least have her coffee. As she was loudly lamenting her situation to her kids, Karaia turned to her with all the attitude, hand on hipping, and love of a pier rather than a student and informed, "We have GOT to get you off of that stuff! "

Thankfully, Casey thought it was hilarious and encouraged me to write it down.

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Lagoon

Today we went to Lagoon. We got there at 11:00 am and left at 10:00 pm. With all four kids. And do you know what? They were amazing. Not a single, whine, complaint, melt down, or grumpy attitude among the bunch!

Earlier in the day we met up with Meghan and Evan, rode a few rides, and enjoyed Lagoona Beach. Thanks for enjoying the day with us Megs! The kids loved having Evan with them for some of the rides.

The best part of the day is that the kids tried so many things outside of their normal comfort zones.

Sanders went on anything he wasn't, "too tiny" , as he said, for. He was also a major clown and would get SO excited if his vehicle, or bug, or whatever, was any shade of green. He would he these HUGE eyes and open his mouth wide as if he had just gotten the best Christmas present ever. And he waited in line better than any two year old I've ever had. He was just so good all day. That's without a nap even.

Tennyson's favorite rides where Bombora and the sky ride. He was so sad that he wasn't quite tall enough to ride the bigger roller coasters with dad. After every ride he would shout at the top of his lungs, "THAT. WAS. AWESOME!!!" He also was a super star when it came to waiting in lines.

Karaia is in LOVE with Wicked and anything else High and fast. (Which, as a side note, is hilarious to me because she was in tears over skiing at Lake Powell and would only try it once....ironic right?) She was game for anything we threw at her and was SUPER helpful with her younger brothers. In fact, Karaia has been extra helpful with the whole family this last week. I've been so proud of her.

And Beckham? Well, Beckham stretched himself the most!  He is my most cautious child by far and has always had a keen sense of his mortality when it comes to amusement parks. But Beckham, willing, went on almost all the rides Kevin asked him to join him on. That list includes the White roller coaster, the log flume, Spider, Wild Mouse, and Bombora. Of course there where others, but those where the biggest ones. Most importantly, he had a great time on them.

You have to understand that for Beckham, this was a HUGE accomplishment! Way to go Beckham!!

He also had the funniest quotes today:

After riding Puff, "Mom, the front is thrilling, I tell you, thrilling!"

At the end of the day, "Dad, I wanted to go on Colossus.....that is until I saw the back flips."

Today makes me SOOOOO excited for the next time we go to Disneyland!!!!

Thank you kids for making today so much fun!!!

Family of Dreamers and a Public announcement

I'm not the only one with big dreams in this family. Lately, we've been working hard making someone else's dream come true around here.

 

I designed the sign. It's nice to see a tangible form of it. But most importantly, Kevin likes it.

If anyone wants a sign we are happy to help!

Also, go check out Kevin's blog centervillematters.blogspot.com

And now, as a Public Service announcement:

When your four year old starts soccer and you buy them their very first, very own soccer ball, DO NOT pump up that beloved ball too much.....

 

I felt SO bad! Not too mention it scared the heck out of me! It didn't pop right away. It lulled us into a false sense of security for about 2 minutes after I stopped pumping before it burst so close to me that my ears are still ringing. 

Poor Tennyson, he was so sad.

Sorry, Buddy!!!!

You don't say

Tennyson turned to me excitedly during dinner and exclaimed," Mom! I ate all my pineapple...and it tasted JUST like PINEAPPLE! "

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Just got home

We just returned from a very fun family reunion in Heber. So you know the drill for the blog.

Goodnight.

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Beautiful

Sometimes I get caught up in life. Going about my everyday living. And thensomething catches my eye, or my heart, I stop and look around.
A beautiful scenery.

My wonderful family.

And I remember that life is more than just getting by, it's about living in joy. It doesn't take much to find it. But it does require a slower pace to fully soak it in.

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Wordless

As in I have no clever, whitty, or entertaining words for you. Sometimes it's rough to be a reader of someone's blog who made a goal to blog everyday for a year.

Thanks for coming back anyway.

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Customer satisfaction

I like to do a customer satisfaction check with my kids every now and again. Fortunately, or unfortunately depending on the day, my children are fairly forth coming with their opinion on my behavior so I am able to get accurate data.

Tonight I asked Karaia and Beckham if they thought I was mean.

Karaia knotted her eyebrows disbelievingly and declared, "Never mean! Maybe a little grumpy sometimes....but not mean."

Beckham quickly said, "A few times."

"What have I done that you felt was mean."

"When Karaia encourages you to believe that I did something and then you believe her."

I turned to Karaia who looked at me with the I'm-just-an-innocent-little-angel-who-has-never-pushed-anyone's-buttons-just-to-watch-them-get-mad face.....hmmmm yeah right.

"Wouldn't that me more of a complaint with Karaia than with me?"

"Well....you believe her...and that's mean."

"OK Bud, I will try and figure out what is really going on, but if you are the one that did something wrong, you are still going to get in trouble."

"That's kind of mean."

Sigh.

There's no pleasing some customers.

Amazing he's still alive

After the movie on Tuesday, I turned to tell Tennyson to keep up only to find that he was LICKING the back of the theater seats as he made his way to the isle. You know, just like when you run your hand across a fence as you walk? Like that, but with his tongue and on nasty, germ filled theater seats.

GROSS!!!!!!!

It's amazing he's not hospitalized.

Seriously.

I guess I can

I've expressed my love of all things organized before. As well as my complete lack of talent in this area.

I couldn't sleep last night because I had told  Beckham that today we were going to clean his room and his room was an explosion of Legos and other little boy paraphernalia. It totally overwhelmed me.

Now usually, when faced with such a task, I call in reinforcement, usually in the form of my mom, and hide behind her amazing talent. I still do the work, but I take ques from her vision.

I decided that today was the day that I was going to put my big girl panties on and see if any organizing talents had rubbed off on me.

I am happy to announce that they did! I clean and organized every last nook and cranny of that room. All by myself! I also rearranged furniture, because what's the fun in organizing if you don't make things look different, and vacuumed everywhere!

I made Beckham help for most of it. I would put things in piles and then tell him where they go. But the final moving of furniture and such was going to be a lot easier with one less body in the room. When I was done, I sent him to see the final results. I asked him what he thought.

He informed me, "I was frozen."

"Why?"

"Because I loved it so much I couldn't move."

AND I still had dinner ready by the time Kevin came home!

(well, if I am going to be totally forth coming, dinner was ready because I asked Karaia to open 4 cans of chili and dump them into a pot. But I turned on the stove and grated the cheese. That counts for something right?)

I'm almost done with all the rooms in my house. It's a nice feeling.

Summer benefits

One of the perks of summer is that my playroom stays clean because everyone stays outside.

It's heaven to walk into a clean room that I haven't already had to clean fifty times that day.

Just heaven.

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just over there

Lately I've been thinking a lot about my dream. It feels like it's juuuuust around the corner sometimes and at others it seems as though the ship has sailed and it may just remain a dream. It could literally all happen or end with one phone call, email, or letter. Any day.

I know this time will help me appreciate whatever Heavenly Father has in store for me. I know I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing. But, the waiting portion of this story is a bit challenging for me.

Someday soon.....I hope.

Colorado

This is the last Colorado post.

With 10 children, eight years old and younger, you can imagine that there was little sleeping, lots of laughter, it felt like it was meal time every 10 secs, and tons of reasons to smile.

Especially when playing in a bounce house inside the living room!

The boys discovered plastic army/police/firemen guys and played outside for hours.

Annie, Mom, Brianna, and I all discovered the lure of polygamy...when it comes to cleaning and child care anyway. The house stayed clean, but we all felt like we were doing less then we normally do at our own homes. And it's not like the kids were clean freaks either. And for me, that's saying a lot :) Not only that but the meals times were very efficient. And even though the children had to decorate the floor and the table with their food, within 15 minutes of them leaving the kitchen you would never be able to tell they had been there because the moms all took a spot and shined it up.

That, and most of the time, we hardly saw the kids at all because they were so busy being entertained by their cousins.

The nights were ours, however. Well, after we convinced the children it was time to sleep. We played games, ate junk food, and just laughed and laughed. 

I had a wonderful time. Even with the drive it takes to get out there, I can't wait to make this a yearly thing.

Thank you, Lawsons!!

How to cool off

Share a shady spot with a fun cousin. I'm not sure what Sanders and Jordyn were talking about under that willow tree, but they were quite animated about it and seemed to enjoy themselves.

Popsicles + Kid = summer!

Frienemies

 These two little cuties had the best of times and the worst of times while we were in Colorado.

 I have seriously never met two more dramatic boys in my life. Their happy was contagious. Their giggles, and there were a LOT of them, were to die for. Their imagination was never ending.

 But the frustrations? Wow. Look out. Zero to I'm-never-going-to-play-with-you-again in a split second.

Thankfully, the happy showed more often.

 I think it will only get better with time...and a bit of maturity.

Funny Boys.