Life changes

My grandparents were up visiting from Florida for the last week, and today they left, and I miss them already. :(  I wish it were cheaper to fly so we could go visit them more often, but good grief, flying is outrageous!

So i'm going to try to make some changes around here. First of all, i've gained way too much weight in the last 2 years. I did so well after I had Avery, I lost 45 pounds (not including baby weight... you can add an additional 20 or so to the total.) I was in the right frame of mind for weight loss at that time though. Now i've gained 30 of it back, yes you read that right. The first step is admittance, right? And its really really hard to admit, especially to people other than myself.
So the question is why? Why did I gain it all back? And I do not know the EXACT reason, but I do feel like its a combination of things.
#1 We moved. When we moved to the rental, it had no counter space, so I went back to using boxed goods and no menu. Quick, easy meals that required little counter space for prepping.
#2 Also during that time, I was a little depressed from moving, and especially during that time of the year (fall/winter) when i'm always hit hardest. I don't like the short days, I don't do well in the cold, and we are always sick during that time. So winters are hard on me. Add to it being sad from moving into such a depressing place.... perfect storm.
#3 Jadon. I love that boy more than life, but he can make things stressful sometimes. I feel terrible saying that, he is my son, and God made him the way he is and he is perfect in His image, but it can take its toll on our family when he's so anxious. I eat when i'm stressed. And it tastes GREAT going down, but then the guilt hits me afterwards and it just adds to it.
#4 Migraines- One of my migraine triggers is missing meals. Anytime I let myself get too hungry, or eat a meal late, I get a migraine. So i've learned over the years that I need to always have a snack readily available for me so I can eat if i'm hungry.
#5 Laziness. Part of my laziness I can blame on my back, but the other times i'm just lazy. I'm tired from not sleeping well on nights when Jadon's worried, and so I just don't move nearly as much as I should.
So changes HAVE to be made before I end up back where I started. And i've tried over the last year, but never succeed, and I realize its because i've been in the wrong frame of mind. I feel that a lot of weight loss success is due to how you're thinking. If you're not fully committed, it ain't going to happen, at least that's the case for me.  And right now I don't feel like i'm in the right mind frame, so I need to figure out how to change that and GET back into the frame of mind I was at when I lost those 45 pounds!
So i've got a billion new recipes to try, and i'm going to try to make a new one at least once a week, maybe twice.
Going to try to go with more fresh "real" ingredients as opposed to processed garbage.
And i'm going to try to keep up with my menu. I'm at about half the menu right now, where i'll make half the month then forget, or i'll forget an ingredient in a meal so we have to have something else that night instead.
Also, if we ever get a dog, that will be a GREAT excuse for me to go on daily walks with the dog! Because I hate walking by myself, even in the neighborhood, at least having a dog with me would make me feel not so alone!

Now that the kids are in school, i'm going to try to do a new pinterest project every other week or so. I've got so many ideas, and then I never do anything with them! What a waste.

Also i'm going to try to help out in Jadon's classroom. Which is stepping out of my comfort zone a little. I know, it sounds weird that helping in my child's class is stepping out of my comfort zone, but remember i'm introverted, i'd prefer to just sit as a fly on the wall, or work behind the scenes.

Other things going on here: We are gearing up for Avery's birthday party in a couple weeks! It is, of course, a Frozen theme. ;) My baby is going to be 5!!!!!!!!!! :*(

Also, per my acupuncturist recommendation, I've started taking a magnesium supplement for these migraines. And I don't know if its just coincidence or what, but I have hardly had any migraines in the last month and a half that i've been taking it! I know its not the acupuncture, because i'd stopped going before I started taking it, and I had still been getting migraines. So, we will see if this trend continues! I hope it does, but sadly getting a migraine is still always in the back of my mind all the time.

So that's where we are right now in life! Or I guess I should say, where I am. Derek's at work most of the time, Jadons at school most of the time, and Avery is in between home and school.

This is the first day in awhile that we've had nothing going on, so today Derek and I are going to pull everything out of our garage and clean it out. We've got lots of spider action going on in the garage that i'm really not fond of!

Crippled

I'm crippled right now, and it really sucks.

So y'all know my history with my back pain. Last year I had really bad back pain, went to physical therapy and that helped. (I won't mention the part where I stopped doing my back exercises like I was supposed to after my physical therapy sessions ended........) Also tried acupuncture but that didn't really seem to help much either. My back is already "sensitive" to too much stress on it, so this previous Friday, I was hunched over cleaning bathrooms, hunched over mopping the floor, hunched over working in the yard. My back doesn't like hunching. So that night, when I was hunched over embracing my dear daughter in a hug, my back screamed at me. The muscles in my lower back tightened and cramped up and now i'm back to a year ago where my back hurt so bad I could barely move. (this is where I cry and kick myself for not doing my exercises like I'm supposed to.)

So Friday night I slept terrible. My back was throbbing with pain in the middle of the night and I laid in bed and did a few small stretches which calmed its screaming enough to let me get back to sleep.
Saturday though, we had obligations. It was Jadon's last day with his psychologist, who is leaving the state to pursue a new job as a dean. I didn't get to go since I was gimping along and couldn't get ready in time. So us girls stayed home and I sat on the heating pad.
Then after that, Jadon and I had to go to the Humane Society for orientation on volunteering. Started off sitting in cold, hard, metal chairs for 15 minutes there, then we were on our feet for an hour and a half while they showed us the ropes around the new facility. Needless to say, i'm extremely grateful to have heated seats in the minivan, because although it was over 90 degrees out, I had my seat heater on high to sooth my aching back after the orientation was over. The rest of Saturday, I literally spent the entire rest of the day in this same chair i'm in right now with the heating pad on my back.

Today it feels very slightly better. At least, its not throbbing anymore. But i'll still need to take it easy. And i'll start my exercises again, and hopefully I won't stop again.

My exercises are a pain because I have to spend 30-45 minutes laying on the floor doing stretches and muscle building exercises. When my back is killing me, its easy to do it because it helps my back get better. But when my back feels fine, its hard to do it because I have a million other things I could be doing than laying on the floor stretching a back that doesn't hurt. Not to mention, laying on the floor several times a day to do exercises always makes me sleepy.
So really this whole thing is my own fault for quitting the exercises after my back got better.
But thankfully it happened on the weekend and I have an amazing husband to take care of me and the kids. :)  He won't let me lift a finger.

Yesterday evening, the kids were out back playing, I was sitting here of course, and Derek was getting ready to make some dinner. Suddenly the kids were gone. Sometimes they get out of view from the windows but they are over on the sides of the house. Or, I've found Avery all the way up the hill at her friend Avery's house knocking on their door to see if Avery is home to play with Avery. Or across the culdesac at the other neighbors house saying hi to them and their dogs, or next door at the neighbors house playing with a visiting baby. One day I even found them all the way up at the mailboxes! They told me they saw a man that they thought was a neighbor up the road that we hadn't met before and they wanted to go say hi and see if he was nice!!!!! (WHAT THE HECK???? didn't anyone ever teach these kids about stranger danger????? The short answer is YES!!!! They've been taught many many many times about strangers!!!!!! The funny thing is, when we are in town at say the checkout, and the cashier talks to them, they hide their faces and don't say anything.) So they've been informed they are not allowed to go in the front yard by themselves (we can't see them out front), and they are not to leave the backyard.
So yesterday when I was sitting on the heating pad and Derek was getting ready to make dinner, and the kids went missing, he was running around the house frantically looking around all over outside for them with no sight of them. It was about that time that the neighbor next door texts and says she has the kids.
So what did they do? They went to her backyard and went up on her deck and to her back door.

Sigh.
Sometimes I feel these children have no sense in their noggins!  They are just so social, and always want to hang out with people and animals. Thankfully we have amazing neighbors who LOVE our kids (or so they say), and gladly let them come over and pester them. I'm thankful they are social, they certainly didn't get that from me! ;)

Another funny story, the kids were going to the neighbors house up the hill to play while Derek and I went to the school for curriculum night. Now, I had told them not to ask them for food because they do that a lot- eat people out of house and home. (you'd think I never feed them.) So I told them they didn't need to eat there because we just ate dinner. So Avery asks me some scenarios- what if I need a drink. My answer, you can ask for a drink of water. What if they give me something to eat? My answer, that's fine if they offer you something then you can accept it, but you don't need to ask them for anything other than water.
Now Jadon usually doesn't ask for things, but Avery has no shame in it. So when the neighbor mom was making cookies, Avery informed her that she wasn't allowed to eat one.... unless she offered her one, then she was allowed to eat it. Subtle hint Avery! ;)
She got the cookie.

Never a dull moment with those two!

So yes, Jadon and I are now official volunteers for the humane society! He's excited, and I am as well. To start we are going to go once a week for an hour to play with the kitties. Then I think we'll add some morning time to that, which is when they do the cleaning of cages, and perhaps we'll clean some kitties cages (it'll be good for Jadon.) Then eventually we may work our way up to the dogs.

Well that's it for now!

Anxiety is no picnic

I would have thought the first day of school would have been Jadon's highest anxiety of the week. But he actually did really well on day 1. Didn't sleep well at all the night before, but he did well at school nonetheless.
Next couple days went fine and dandy without any issues.
Then today came. And he woke up and was immediately anxious. He had pain in his stomach and tried to tell us he wasn't feeling well. We know better now. He gets pains and twinges in his stomach all the time, as most of us do I imagine, (btw, we had his pediatrician check his stomach to make sure nothing was wrong with him) however he's so hyper-focused on them that he freaks out with every ache, pain, twinge with his body, especially when its in his stomach.
So today did not start off well. And then he refused to do anything and refused to go to school. We were not going to reinforce his fears and eventually got him to get dressed and ready, however he missed the bus, and was a half hour late to school.
And in case anyone thinks we are cruel for making him go, he's pulled the "i don't feel well" many times, and is always fine.  His psychologist said we can't give in to those things because it just reinforces his fears and he will never learn how to cope.  As hard as it is, we must stick to it.

Sigh.

On a different note, we had curriculm night at the school last night, where we met Jadon's teacher and heard all about what they would be doing this year in 2nd grade. LOOOOOVE his teacher so far! She's energetic and positive and upbeat. She's been teaching for 20 years. So i'm excited for his year this year, I think it will be a fun one for him! (if he can relax)
Last year he had a good teacher, but she was old (had been teaching for 43 years!), oldschool, quiet, and quite frankly a little dull. So they are completely opposite.
We heard all about the new common core learning that they are doing now. And while I hated it before, and wondered why in the world they would change the old way that wasn't broken. But, she said they were finding that kids that graduated highschool were not college ready, and so the common core seems to have higher standards and gives kids an alternate method of learning. You won't find any multiple choice questions! And while I still have my doubts, it sounds much less retarded now after she explained it to us.  We will see how well it works when the kids that start on it graduate... that'll be awhile though!
So there's 70 some 2nd graders at the school, so they now have three 2nd grade teachers to accomodate them all. Last year Jadon had 31 kids in his class, this year he has 24, so that's a better number! Unfortunately he got separated from his good buddies. But fortunately he isn't in the same class as the neighbor boy that hangs out at our house all. the. time! (That's a whole other story.... a quite annoying story!)

Avery, well, she's Avery. Goofy, silly, lovey, etc. She started second year of preschool and of course loves it! I'm so thankful that she's a good kid, and I think when she sees us struggling at any given time with Jadon, she realizes she needs to be on her best behavior because we are completely exasperated! (Thank you Jesus!!!!)  She has her moments, but its rarely at the same time Jadon's having a "moment." Next year she will start all day kindergarten and I will miss my little stinker. :*(

First day of school was weird without all the noise in the house, and I felt a little lonely and missed my kiddos. I'm already getting back into the groove though and its actually rather nice having quiet! ;)

And just like that, its over

Sunriver. Its the highlight of our summers. And we look forward to it all summer. I see it on my calendar and get excited to start planning and packing. Then the day finally comes with much anticipation!  And then I blink.... and its over.

The same holds true of summer in general. I look forward to it immensely, longing for warm, lazy days of summer. Freedom of not getting up as early in the mornings. Freedom to go do things at any time without having to worry about schedules. Then its here, and then I blink and its done.

School starts in a couple days. I'm dreading it.

Now the season is changing again. The kids will be in school again which means to bed early and up early. It means busy evenings from after school activities.
Bleck! Yes i'm complaining a little, but winter is coming and the weather affects me and I literally dread that season. The rain. The cold. Those short days. A muddy yard. Being stuck inside. The constant illnesses.

Needless to say, I'm very grateful for the time we spend each summer in Sunriver to conclude that season of life. Such a perfect ending!

So what do we do while we are in Sunriver? Well, most of it is spent riding bikes. Riding bikes to the village. At the village, we eat food and ice cream, play mini golf, bumper cars, ride the kiddy train, listen to live music. We ride our bikes out to the airport and watch the planes take off. We go to the park and play. We eat, eat, eat. We play games. We stay up late and enjoy everyone's company. Then we wake up and do it all over again!
This year on our way up, we stopped at the High Desert Museum. That was pretty interesting. The kids enjoyed the short presentation about reptiles where they brought out a lizard, a snake and a turtle and we got to see them up close and touch them.
Then we went and listened to a half hour presentation about birds of prey. The lady who did the presentation did a very good job and was very knowledgeable and held a falcon the whole time while doing the presentation, feeding it and spraying it with water to cool it down. It was really interesting.

Now that change is coming, we are making changes at home too. We are going to start eating healthier. Avery has gotten better about trying new things..... she doesn't necessarily like them, but at least she's trying them with less protest. My menu for the first 2 weeks of school is in place. Including new items like veggie omelets and stuffed green peppers.
So a few areas we are making changes is- eating more fruits and veggies. Eating healthier cereal- which means no more sugary cereals.  Eating less carbs- which is mostly just less crackers.
One thing I noticed after a 4 day binge on less healthy food and lots of soda- last night my entire abdomen was protesting to me from my neck down to my butt, and my body felt horrid. I had quit my soda addiction a long long time ago, and only drink it when we go out or are at someones house who has it. And even when we go out I have been ordering strawberry lemonade. But this week I think I had more soda than I've had in a year!

Fun times, and i'm already looking forward to next year! Thanks mom and dad!

Summers ending already???!!

This is what I hate about summer.... it goes too fast! I'm not ready for school to start again, for being sick constantly, for the short days and the rain and cold. The only positive is that I get to do my errands by myself.
Avery's going to do tap dance. She's super excited!
Jadon's not doing any sports at this point, but he and I will be volunteering at the humane society, hopefully weekly. He's excited for that. He's also signed up for a club at the humane society and will meet monthly for some fun and crafts and of course his favorite- animal socialization!

We are thinking about getting a dog. The kids just love dogs, and we think it could be good for Jadon to have a dog in the house. However with allergy sufferers in the house we need a dog that is good for allergies. It may sound odd, but i'm looking forward to having a dog to walk every day. Why? Well, i need the exercise, and I don't like walking by myself when the kids are in school and Derek's at work.

Derek and I finally watched God's Not Dead! It was a great movie! Some of the story lines were a little lame and the acting not always the best, but the message was amazing and that was far more important than the acting.

Date night

I had the honor and privilege of going on a date with my favorite little girl last night.
 She is such a good fit for our family. She's our comic relief, and our little love bug. I'm so thankful and blessed to be mommy to this little sweetie!

She's been looking forward to a date with mommy for a long time. During the school year we have more time together when Jadon's in school, but its usually spent running errands or doing daily tasks. Last night was just for us. I asked her what she wanted to do, and she said she "wanted to go get some drinks." She was talking about going for smoothies, so the initial plan was to go to Jamba Juice. But then when we got in the car I asked her again and she said again "well I thought we'd get some drinks and then food." We had just eaten dinner, so I suggested we not go out to eat, so she decided on Yogurt Extreme.
She got raspberry yogurt, and loaded it with 3 different kinds of sprinkles, sour gummy worms, circus animal cookies, those jelly ball things, and pretty much any candy. Basically she had as much candy as she did yogurt. It looked...... well to me it looked gross. Like a belly ache waiting to happen. Even the guy working there mentioned how "yummy" it looked as he had watched her pile on the candy.
Let me tell you, that girl can really put away her sugar! She ate her entire bowl of yogurt and candy!
And after that she wanted to go to the park, so I took her to the park where she met a 7 year old girl and played hide and seek with her, as well as spun on the tire swing together.
After the park she said she wanted to go to two more places, but didn't know where and wanted to drive around looking. Well, it was getting late and I wasn't going to drive around looking for something to do, so we decided to go to Home Depot and I let her pick out a few plants for another flower bed in the works. She loved the idea of being able to pick out whatever plants she wanted. I steered her towards perennials so that they would come back every year and I told her everytime we'd look at the plants we'd remember our date together. We have a couple super hot days in the forecast, so she and I will be planting them after it cools a bit. I think she picked well. She picked a hydrangea (my favorite, cant go wrong with hydrangeas!) and a couple others that I don't remember the names off the top of my head.
Starting her love of gardening early on :)

I enjoyed my time with my precious little girl. I'm so blessed to have her.

Weather

Since we've been in our house, we've had some pretty intense weather. We've had some SIGNIFICANT snowfall a couple times, we've had some torrential downpours that left us with a huge pond in our backyard, and last night we had quite a lightning and thunder storm! It rolled right over the house and left the walls shaking. The lightening continued for probably around 2 hours, and it was a spectacular sight! Power flickered on and off and left my oldest in a crying panic yet the littlest slept through the entire display!

It. Was. Amazing! :) It was like a good Florida storm and it was beautiful!

My pictures are not spectacular with my phone, but at least its something. I also got a few videos, but there's a nervous little boy talking constantly through them.

On a different note, have you seen Kid Snippets on youtube? The kids love them and us adults are pretty fond of them also. Really amusing :)
Here's a few of my favorites. Avery likes hair salon because the girl has long pretty straight hair.... and Avery likes long straight hair. ;)

Co-pilots
Hair Salon
Slushies
Wedding Jitters
Drivers Ed

I made a mistake

Ok, I made a mistake. I admit it:

I put the dumb pinterest app on my phone!!!!

And now, whenever I have a free moment.... for example when i'm waiting for my coffee in the morning, or laying in bed at night.... I open up that little pinterest app and away I start pinning!
And now I have over 1,000 things pinned. Mostly house stuff, yard stuff, organization stuff, kid stuff, recipes, etc.
And I really dont understand how life existed before there was pinterest!!!
But the funny thing is, i've only actually tried a handful of the things I've pinned.
I've tried many recipes, and some have came out good, and some not so good.
I've made a few house things. And all those came out fine.

Bottom line is, pinterest is an addiction! But a good one ;)

Life...

Its been a month since I last posted already. I've tried a couple times to write another one since then, but I'm not sure what to write about and I haven't had a lot of time.
We've been busily working on our yard, and our firepit is almost done! We won't be able to do a whole lot more this year, will have to save up for next summer. Our hope is to get the rest of the flowerbeds around our deck outlined with brick (plants will probably have to wait until next year at this point), finish the firepit, and if money allows, add a little more sod. Our neighbor redid her front yard and had some leftover sod that she gave us so we have a small patch of grass right now, but not enough to play on. Its hard to wait! We LOVE our backyard and we just want it done already! Its huge, its quiet, and I can envision its completion in my head!

My poor little guy is having anxiety again..... well, I guess it never left him, but its "flaring up" again. Since before school was even out his anxiety has been growing worse and worse. He's worrying about things that we can't even begin to dream up. He's worrying about things that would never happen. He's worrying about things that happened a year ago. This has caused many sleepless nights for all of us in the house but the little one! After discussing with Luis, Jadon's therapist, we are going to see also a child psychiatrist and consider medication for him. We aren't fond of the idea of medicating a 7 year old child, but he is not enjoying life when he's a constant bundle of nervousness. He's not eating as well, he wants to lay on the couch a lot because his stomach hurts from worrying, he doesn't sleep well. He worries about worrying. :(  Its heartbreaking. And it has to be hard for him seeing everyone else living life normally, having a sister that has no fear. In fact, he's said before several times how he wishes he were like Avery and daddy and mommy.
We ARE going to take him to see his normal doctor to look at his stomach, just to verify that there's nothing wrong with his stomach. He complains about it hurting all the time, but its always when he's worrying and all the professionals we talked to think its just anxiety, but just to be on the safe side we're going to have him looked at.

On a different note, the kids are doing very well in swimming lessons, and we will have our same teacher for at least the next year. She's a college student and this coming year will be her last year of school.

I signed Jadon up for a day camp at the humane society, and he was SUPER excited about that since the day I signed him up. He got to do that a week ago. He LOVED it! I think I mentioned it already, but I was contemplating signing him (and I since he has to have an adult with him) up for volunteering at the humane society. He really enjoys being with the animals, and I imagine it could be therapeutic for him?

Both kids are doing soccer. They both enjoy it, and we already knew this but Avery is quite good at athletic stuff. Poor Jadon got my athletic abilities.... or handicaps I guess is a better way to put it! :(

I started doing acupuncture a few weeks ago for my back pain and migraines. I haven't had any help yet, but since my headaches have been around for a very long time, it can take many many treatments to help them, and even after helping I might have to continue going every once in awhile.
Acupuncture is weird. I really hope it will help though. I like the idea of not putting more medication into my body!

First and last days

First day of school - sept. 2013

 Last day of school- june 2014

First day of school- sept. 2013

 






Last day of school- june 2014

Its amazing to me how they still change SOOO much! Yes, this is expected the first few years of life, but Jadon is 7 and he still looks like he changed so much this school year!

And Avery's first picture cracks me up now, her backpack was practically swallowing her! She grew 3 inches during the school year, and I think its pretty obvious!

I love those two!

Summer Plans

Summer doesn't officially start for us until the 18th. Thanks to the snow days we had!
On one hand i'm totally ready for summer, ready for not making lunches anymore, ready for not getting up so dang early. On the other hand, Jadon behaves better at home when he's in school because he's kept busy all day, and while I always try to plan some summer activities for the kids, its never enough.
I also try to not over schedule us during the summer because i think that down time, free time, is good for all of us!

So our plans aren't incredibly exciting. Getting the yard put in, we always go to Enchanted Forest. I'm sure we'll go swimming at the pool (although we cant go to toddler time anymore, Jadon's too old.) Derek and I have been looking into more local places to go to. And our big event is our annual Sunriver trip at the end of summer. We all look forward to that all summer!
Derek and I will have our 11th anniversary as well! :) And something crazy- we've been together for 15 years this september!!!  :)

I've got both kids enrolled in soccer for the summer, we also have swimming lessons. And the humane society has a couple day camps so I signed Jadon up for one of those, and he's really excited about it! I'd also like to get Jadon involved in some volunteer work at the humane society. I think it would be good for him. Avery would LOVE it as well, but with her pet allergies, I don't know if it would be a good idea. She'll be heartbroken if she doesn't get to do it though.
And VBS of course for Jadon, (Avery gets to go next year.) One of the perks of being a bigger kid... you get to do more fun things than the little kids. I do feel bad for Avery though, she wants to do the things Jadon's doing but she's not "of age" yet.

On a different note, with as much watermelon as the kids and I have been eating.... i'm afraid we are going to turn into watermelons! Yummy!!!! :) Pretty soon the blueberries will be ready for picking, and I can't wait!!!

What??????!!!!!

I hate cleaning the bathrooms. I do it once a week (or try to....the kids bathroom sometimes more) but it seems like once a week is every day. Once a week happens so fast. And I hate cleaning them! Why? Because it takes too long. Because of getting everything set up. Because I have to wear gloves. Because I'm down on my hands and knees on the floor. The only good part about cleaning the bathrooms is the end when they are clean and I can breath a sigh of relief because I have a week of not having to deal with them anymore. But then it seems I blink and its time to clean them again. Ugh.

So last night I was trying to think of ways I could cut corners or shorten the time it takes me to clean them. I'm pretty anal about how they are done, because its the bathroom! Bathrooms are gross. We poop, we pee, we bath our dirty bodies, we brush our dirty teeth, we wash our dirty hands in them. So i'm a little anal about how things get cleaned in the bathroom. Don't want to risk any cross contamination, and want to make sure all the germs are wiped up properly.

So to clean both bathrooms from top to bottom, showers included, takes me well over an hour.
What. A. Pain.
Now you can understand why I want to figure out how to cut some corners. So I googled how to clean a bathroom quickly. And I found some pretty useless information. I also found a video on youtube.
It is wrong on so many levels! Its a 3 minute video, so please take the time to watch and be amazingly grossed out! HERE!

One persons comment to the video was that you can't clean a bathroom in less time it takes you to take a dump.
Not only does she use plain water to "clean" some things, she uses her bare hands in the (dirty) toilet to squeeze the toilet brush, then goes and without washing her hands she starts wiping the counter area. And what about all the crap she put in the shower??? And she didn't even clean the shower! So gross. Not to mention, that bathroom was already clean, there was nothing on the counter and nothing in shower to move first. No towels or bath mats. And what in the heck is a johnny mop?!? Whats wrong with a normal toilet scrub brush? After a week, my bathrooms, especially the kids, are much dirtier than that. Is that how motels clean their bathrooms???? That scares me, from now on when I'm at a motel i'm taking my own container of disinfecting wipes and i'll be using every single one to wipe the entire room.

Totally disgusting! Were you as grossed out as me?

In case you hadn't caught on, this video bothers me to no end, i'm disgusted and appalled by it and I hope you all do a better job of cleaning your bathrooms.... at least before I visit you! ;)

Medical bills, and yard work, and babies.... oh my!!

Yard work is slowly under way! Yesterday dad and mom came over with the tractor and chopped all the tall tall grass down for us. What a difference that alone made! The grass was so tall and now we can actually see the yard again and it feels big once again. We aren't sure exactly what our next step is going to be. We've had a lot of expenses this month with lots of medical bills between Derek and Jadon. (Did I mention that Jadon sprained his wrist a couple days before we went to Florida? We didn't want to have any problems in Florida if he had fractured it at all, so Derek took him to see the doctor and was x-rayed and everything. Just a little spraining was all thank goodness and by the time we went to Florida he didn't even need the ace bandage wrapped around it anymore.) So the medical bills are flowing in now from the boys. So it will be slow going for the yard, but that's ok, it will make it just that much more sweet with each step we get accomplished. :)

My little nephew is a week old already! Jenny emailed pictures out, and he is just so dang cute!  Annnnnnd i've got baby fever now..... ok i've had it for awhile but something about cuddling a little baby makes it much stronger. ;) The kids have also been talking about wanting another sibling.
We'll see.... convincing Derek is the first hurdle. ;)

Oops

Its been 2 months since I last blogged. In my defense, we've been busy. Come on, did you really think a family with a 4 and 7 year old would NOT be busy???
March ended with track and swimming lessons, school. And recovering from illness.
April was a busy month. We finally had Jadon's birthday party that we had to cancel for 3 weeks due to his pneumonia. Derek had another trip to Wisconsin for work, where he tried to die on us. (long story that I think most of you know already and i'm not going to explain again.)  As well as school, field trips, track and swimming, and preparing for our vacation to Florida!!
April 30th, we left for Florida for the kids first "real" vacation, first time on a plane for both of them as well. To say they were excited would be an understatement.
We spent until May 8th in Florida, enjoying the sunshine and warmth, the beach, LEGOLAND, sunset cruise, etc etc etc. But mostly we enjoyed the time we got to spend with my grandparents. Two of my favorite people in the world!
We returned from Florida, expecting to come home to a new baby boy relative (Derek's sister.) However, baby Harris decided to make his grand entrance into the world 10 days late. Today we got to meet the little guy, and he's totally adorable!

Other than all that, we've been working on designing our backyard and are getting excited to finally get some of it taken care of. We already decided its just too much money to get it all done this year, so we will be doing it in phases over the next few years.

Schools getting close to the end for the year, and I have mixed feelings about it. Jadon does much better when he's kept busy at school all day in that structure with all his friends. And Avery does better when Jadon's at school as well. As soon as Jadon is home, they both start acting out and getting into trouble.
Jadons school year is ending with several field trips, a trip to the pool with his class, field day, etc. We went to his school's carnival yesterday.
The kids have to go to school for an extra week at the end of the year thanks to the week off from snow we had in February.  I'm not looking forward to an extra week of making school lunches.... i'm about burned out on making lunches. There's only so many things you can pack that dont require heating: PBJ, PBH, meat and cheese sandwiches, and cheese and crackers. Thats about it.

So that is all I have time to update right now.

Pneumonia

Poor Jadon. He ended up having pneumonia! By Monday his fever was not down, he was just getting worse, and Monday he was complaining that his side was hurting really badly. We placed a call in to the pediatrician, but they took too long to call back so we just took him to the ER. 

We all know how Jadon is when it comes to doctors and hospitals. But he was SO brave! I'm so proud of him! He had to have an IV to help hydrate him and to get a strong dose of antibiotics. They had talked about keeping him in the hospital for a few days, but didn't think he was bad enough to need to stay. I think that was a good idea, I think he would have mentally healed faster at home than he would have at the hospital. Because at home he feels comfortable. He has his video games to distract him, and his own bed to sleep in. 

Its amazing the difference a full day of antibiotics made!!! By the end of yesterday, he was up and around some. Went to his room to play legos with Avery for a short time, and they played something mild in the living room also. He ate a good dinner, requested 2nds, but then couldn't finish the seconds. After not eating for 3 days, he visibly lost weight. At home he has been weighing about 51 lbs (before illness). At the hospital he was only 49. Now I know 2 pounds doesn't seem like much, but when you only weigh 51 lbs and youre tall and skinny, 2 pounds is quite obvious. His pants are just hanging on his little butt. 

His fever finally broke last night! And this morning it is still down, so as long as he keeps the fever away and continues to progress, I think he'll be able to go back to school friday. One day back and then another week off for spring break. Lots of time for recovery. 

And Avery, i'm so proud of her too. She has been such a good girl over the last 5 days, despite getting much less attention, and not getting to play with Jadon, and being cooped up in the house. She has not given us any grief. Even at the ER, she was an angel. Despite the fact that we didn't get any lunch that day. You'd think she'd be bored at the ER and cranky from not getting lunch, but she was so good. 

I'm very proud of both of my kids.  And i'm very thankful for the wonderful doctors and nurses at the ER who were so nice and helpful, and all our family and friends who were praying for him. Its really hard to see your child be so ill. 

Sad day

Well we should've been having a birthday party right now. Should've been playing games and eating cake right about now.
Jadon came home early from school yesterday because his right mouth was hurting and he just couldn't take it any longer. Poor guy, I know it was hurting because he was crying. He rarely cries when he hurts. I called the dentist and they were stumped because he didn't have any abscess, no teeth coming in, was not hit in the face, no canker sore, no fever, etc. So I made an appointment for monday in case his mouth was still hurting after the weekend and if its better I can cancel it.
By bedtime his ear was hurting him, and middle of the night he was having trouble sleeping because his ear was hurting. By morning the fever set in and he was no better and Derek took him to urgent care with what we thought for sure was an ear infection.
But, turns out it is some virus thats going around that involves the whole body. So he's got a cough, an ear ache, a fever, and has thrown up a few times (but has no stomach ache). Derek said the doctor had already seen several cases of the same thing today.  So he was sent home with a couple prescriptions to help with the ear pain and in case he has any nausea and told to stay home for a couple days and eat a clear liquid diet.

So, instead of eating the yummy minion cupcakes that I made for the occasion, he's sipping water and 7 up and eating popsicles. Instead of playing silly games, he's laying on the couch having a movie marathon. And that just stinks. Why? because it seems like he always gets the short end of  the stick. He's been sick at Christmas-time twice, sick when Aunt Jenny was in the hospital, and now sick for his birthday party that he's been looking forward to for weeks. And that makes his mom and dad very sad. :*(

So as far as rescheduling the party, the next two weekends are during spring break, so its likely that people wont be home. We could wait until the first weekend in April, but by then his birthday is almost a month gone. And today is beautiful! Its mid to upper 60's!

Can these illnesses just please stop already? I'm tried of it. This has been a horrible winter for sicknesses.

Sad, sad day. :(

Seven!

Tomorrow my baby boy will be 7 years old. I'm going to have a 7 year old. Wow!! He is now closer to being a teenager than a baby. That is both scary and bittersweet! Love that kid!

We are having a big birthday bash on Saturday. We've never had a "big" birthday party for him because our old house was too small. Last year he really wanted a big party but we'd just moved into our house. So this is the year! We finally have a house big enough to have more people over comfortably!
So the party theme is Despicable Me. I made all the kids minion goggles, and their favor bags will be decorated like minions. The cake will be cupcakes with twinky minions on them. As far as games, I couldn't find any games that were new and exciting, everything is the same old games, for example: pin the tail on the donkey, toss the little bean bags through the holes, scavenger hunts, etc. I spent hours researching games online. I finally came across Minute To Win It games. Doesn't fit the despicable me theme, but the games should be fun for 7 year old boys. Plus we only have 2 hours with them, so the games will have to be quick anyways!
Jadon's excited, and so am I! I'm excited to do this for him.

Busy busy busy

We've been a busy clan here. Every day of the week is filled with something!
Jadon has been doing basketball, and while he likes it, he has already lost interest (thanks a lot ADD.)  So he is trying out track and field next. Not sure if he'll like that either, but he needs to burn off energy, and i'd rather he tried lots of new things now so he can decide for himself later on what he likes and doesn't like.

Avery does tumbling and she loves it! I asked her if she wanted to do something else and she said no, just tumbling. So tumbling it is!

Almost 2 weeks ago we traded in my car and got a minivan! Yeah, laugh it up, I know the rep minivans have, but I LOVE it! Not only does it smell wonderful, like a new car, but it has heated seats, a backup camera, a moon roof and many many many more things. It drives like my old civic did, and its soooooo convenient. The deciding factor between a minivan and an SUV was the fact that the kids can get into the minivan by themselves easily, and it has a ton more space than an SUV. We were quite surprised at the amount of space. And, now I like driving again.... for now. ;)

We have a birthday coming up! My baby boy is going to turn SEVEN in a couple weeks!!! SEVEN!!! When and how did this happen so quickly!?!? What a big guy he is becoming! While he can be a handful sometimes, he makes me smile every day and I love him to pieces!
So since last year was a very mellow year for celebrating birthdays, we are having big parties this year! We are inviting all the boys in his class to come over.... which means I may be just a little out of my mind. If all the boys come, then there will be 18 seven year old boys in my house at one time!!! Lord help us!!!!!!!

Snow pix!

As I promised, here are some snow pictures. These were taken this morning. When we woke up this morning this is what we had. It snowed all day long and we now have well over a foot! Looking at these pictures makes me chuckle now because it seemed like a ton of snow at the time, but now we have SOOOOOOOO much. An additional 3-5 inches is forecast for tonight as well. I'm excited to wake up and see what we have!

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Avery LOVES eating the snow for whatever reason.

The little hill in our backyard makes a good hill for the kids to tube down.  Its short and easy for them to climb up. (However for the more exciting time we use the street hills!)

Backyard. Now the snow covers most of the bottom of the deck.

During the last snow storm in December, I made the cats some beds out of old pillowcases. Here's Gina staying warm.

 I've always loved the way the trees look when covered in snow.

Derek has been working from home the last 2 days but took alot of breaks today to do some tubing.

I'm not sure why these next 2 photos are not centered. I have them set to be centered but they are not following the rules....
Anywho, Earlier today I took a picture of the cars covered in snow, And again tonight I took a picture. Shows you how much snow we got today!

Absolutely crazy!!!! NEVER seen this much snow here in the Valley, and i've lived here my whole life! We've had a couple of years where theres been significant snowfall, but i've never seen anything like THIS!
Tomorrows forecast is for snow/rain mix and/or sleet/freezing rain, followed by all rain in the afternoon, followed by snow/rain mix during tomorrow night. So, today was potentially the last of the straight white stuff. I have thoroughly enjoyed it, as I know many others have too. Its so beautiful to watch and see. Thank you Lord for this rare occurrence!

More Snow Days!

This has been the best winter ever! I had wanted a good winter this year in our new house, and i'm sure gettin' it! No school yesterday or today because of it, and there's probably close to a foot of snow out there! Its BEAUTIFUL!!! It snowed pretty much non stop yesterday.
Yes, school was cancelled again, for thursday and friday. The kids are already having to go an extra 2 days at the end of the year from the last snow storm we had, and they had to make up a day in January as well, so i'm curious what the will do to make up these days.
During the last snow we had back in December, our cheap plastic sled broke, so luckily when I saw that snow was becoming a strong possibility in the forecast, I checked Target for their snow stuff. They had it all 50% off so I got a boogie board thing (that doesn't work, at least in this kind of snow its not), a kids inner tube, and a grownups inner tube.

I'll post some pictures once I get some good ones. :) Time to go get ready to play in the snow!

Not too bad~!

So I had 8 posts last month! Not too bad, considering I had 28 for the entire year last year!

Not much to report.... We had a 6 day weekend this week. Jadon only went to school on monday and then I kept him home on tues/wed due to a bad cough. Then thursday and friday there was no school.  We still had a busy week though.

We've been playing Wii Fit lately. Its old, but we stopped playing it for a long time and recently got it back out again. It surprises me that we actually work up a sweat doing it. Things like hula hooping, boxing, running and biking really get you warmed up. I wouldn't recommend Wii Fit as an exercise regime or for weight loss, but its kinda fun and gets you off the couch at least. Being winter, we are beginning to get restless and irritable being stuck indoors. Whenever its sunny, we try to bundle up and head outside. It always feels good getting fresh air at least.

Well i'm out of things to talk about.

Oh, as some of you already know, several years ago the contractor who built our house was wrongfully accused of racketeering. He pleaded not guilty, and the last 2 weeks he's been on trial. He started a blog to write about the trial: Randy Gray Trial  Please keep him and his family in your prayers as they find out the verdict this week. He is the father of 6 kids with a 7th on the way, a good christian family, and he is a good person.

How???

So many times when I click on a Pinterest link, it takes me to someones blog. OK, that's fine, nothing wrong with blogging. ;) However, you read the "About me" piece, and these women have full time jobs AND their own business, 20 kids, a blog they write in (with lots of pictures of their projects), volunteer positions, are the room mom for their children's classes, the coach of their kids sports team, AND have miraculously spotless houses, and seemingly endless amounts of time for everything else like entertain, going to the gym, baking and cooking amazing things, making their hair and makeup perfect everyday, making their kids hair perfect every day, day trips, weekend trips, weekly trips, etc, etc, etc. Oh, and they still have time to sit at the end of the day to catch up on their favorite reality shows, and then do their yoga before they go to bed, where they then get a full 8 hours of UNINTERRUPTED sleep, and then they wake up happy and peaceful at 5am, go for a run, and are ready to start the day all over again.  I'd like to know: HOW DO THEY DO THAT? Are they being honest in that they really do all of those things... daily? Do they really have 40 hour days, or so it seems? Or perhaps they keep their kids chained up all day while they do everything, then let the kids out for the last hour or so of the day. I just don't understand how people can do that? I barely have time to blog, although i've been trying REALLY hard this month in case you hadn't noticed. 

My house will not stay clean no matter how hard I try, its messed up within 5 minutes. My kids do not behave all the time. We have extracurricular activities that take up every single evening.

So i'd like to know if these women are for real? Most of the moms I know do not have time for all those things. Their kids are not perfect angels. They have to take time out daily (multiple times daily) to discipline their kids and deal with unruliness. Their houses never stay clean. They don't have time or money to do all the things these "supermoms" do. Do the Supermom's kids never get sick??? Do THEY never get sick? (I say that now since i'm sitting here unable to breath with a pile of used kleenex next to me and a box of unused kleenex just waiting for me.) ;)

So in conclusion, I am no supermom, and I think the women who claim to be supermom's are all fakes. 

There. I'm done. 

practices

Jadon began basketball this week. He had 2 practices, and so far he really likes it. We also so a good improvement between the two practices!  Its his first time playing any "real" basketball, aside from our Little Tykes basketball hoop and ball at home. At his age, at his games, they will not be doing any stealing, fouls, or even keeping score. I'm looking forward to watching!

In this video, his coach was "blocking" him and he was supposed to move forward with the ball. Most of the other kids struggled with that a little, I was really shocked when Jadon did it so well.

Avery started a tumbling class through the parks and rec this week, and she had a lot of fun as well! 

this video is Avery doing a backwards sommersault... she is in the green polka dot shirt.

We've all had this darn cough thing that's going around. Pretty much its only a cough. Then yesterday Derek and I both came down with a head cold on top of the cough. I spent all night coughing so I feel pretty horrible today. I took a "nap" (an on and off doze) for an hour and a half and I am looking forward to going to bed tonight!

Thank you Grandmas!

Thank you to Grandmother, Grandma Debbie and Grandma Karla for all your Boxtops and Labels for Education! With the Boxtops that were turned in by all the students between Sept and early Dec, the school earned almost $600, and with the Labels for Education points earned will go towards playground equipment. Yay!
So thank you for your help and keep 'em coming! :)

Yard

Looking out at our backyard right now.... its a big huge mud pit. At least the french drain is working well! With all the rain we had over the last few days, we discovered 5 little.... springs.... or something, coming out of the side of the hill... not down the top of it, but literally out the side of it. That will have to be dealt with at some point. But the good thing is, its all draining into the french drain. My hubby did such a great job on that!
I feel overwhelmed by all the things that need to be done. If we get nothing else done this summer with the backyard, we at least need to get grass put in. Top priority.

I was just telling Derek that I laugh now at how we were overwhelmed with having to do our yard at our old house. That seems like a PIECE OF CAKE now compared to what we have now!

One things for sure.... I can't wait for spring to come, and summer, to dry out the yard so we can move forward and have a nice backyard to play in! Hurry up warmer weather! Hurry up sunshine!

Hey did you all know that the sun is setting later now? Its getting close to half an hour later than it was. Yes, i'm a weirdo and I keep track of that because I NEED to see that the days are getting longer and there's hope in the dead of this "favorite" season of mine! I'm dreaming of that sun!!

Life

Its my favorite time of year!! No its not. I hate this time of year. In fact, I'm without a doubt certain that January and February are my least favorite months of the year. I hate the weather, I hate the long days, I hate the additional pounds gained from December, I hate the illnesses, I hate that the kids are stuck inside most of the time and can't burn off extra energy.
November and December are at least filled with holiday gatherings and holiday events that help with the above. And March daylight savings starts so we get more daylight time, and Jadon's birthday is in March, as well as half of our extended family.
But i'm not here to complain and whine. Although its pretty easy to this time of year! ;)

The kids started swimming again tonight after a month off. We always take December off from all extracurricular activities because December is already a busy month without all the extras. We started on private lessons today though. Previously we'd just done normal group lessons, which we felt were not as productive. Why? Well, the classes are 30 minutes long, and with 6 kids in the class, they just weren't getting enough time with actual swimming. A good portion was always spent waiting for the teacher to work with other kids. However, the last 2 sessions we had the same teacher and we really like her, Jadon has actually showed some improvement with her, and she is really good with both the kids, and knowing when to push them. Which is exactly what Jadon needs, since he's very tentative in the water. If you push him too much, he freaks out and ends up back at square one again. So, she noticed that and slowly builds him up to do things. We lucked out and were able to get her for private lessons, so we are thrilled with that. And the kids had a LOT more actual swimming time with just the 2 of them. Not to mention, the pool was basically empty so they weren't distracted by all the other children in the pool around them. They both said they had more fun than in the normal class.

Jadon starts basketball next week. It will be his first time playing basketball. As always, he's a little tentative. For some reason, he got it in his head that he's going to be playing in a college-like coliseum with tons of people there. I explained to him that its not that way, I found YouTube videos of 1st graders playing basketball-practice and games and showed him those. But until he actually goes, his mind is set on how it will be, and there's usually no convincing him otherwise.
I'm excited for him to try this new adventure!

Avery starts a tumbling class next week also. I went to sign her up for gymnastics at the college like we do every winter, but the class was full. So we're doing a tumbling class through the parks and rec instead. Hopefully she'll participate this time!

I dont know if i mentioned that I was going to be going through ALL of our stuff this month and purging and organizing it all. Its been pretty fun.... you know me, I love organizing! I love decluttering too! So it feels good to go through all our stuff and get rid of whats collecting dust, and then organize whats left. Its also hard to get rid of things sometimes for sentimental reasons. However, I read an article that reminded me that its all just STUFF. And the more STUFF you save, the less value it actually has to you. So I try to keep that in mind when I'm going through things. The hardest things for me to get rid of are things that pertain to the kids when they were little. Their clothes, their toys, their artwork, etc. Its all so precious to me.
But regardless, our office is growing a large pile of  "Stuff" in it to give to Goodwill.
Another problem I have is thinking that I might some day use or have a need for things. Like clothes.... I have kept this little cropped cardigan thing for years. Have I worn it even one time? Nope. But I always thought that I might someday have something to wear it with, or have a use for it. Needless to say, those things are hard to get rid of too, just because i'm afraid i'm going to get rid of it, and then a week later find something I could have used it for.
Or keeping clothes that are too small for you, but you'll be able to wear again when you lose all that weight you gained. I'm not so bad at that anymore, but I used to be. Turns out when i'd finally lost all the weight and could fit into the clothes, I didn't like them anymore.  Also, if there's anything I learned from What Not To Wear, its that you dress the body you have NOW....not the body you hope to have someday.
So, i'm having a lot of fun getting organized and decluttered :)

I did pretty good controlling my portion sizes this week, most of the time. So changes are slowly happening there.... in my mind that is. I'm trying to retrain myself to that mindset that I don't need to eat so much, that food is not my best friend, and that I actually feel better when I don't stuff myself and eat slower. Eventually i'd like to start walking (outside) when both the kids are at school, but its going to have to stop raining and warm up a little for that.

Its already been almost a year since we moved into our new house! Its so hard to believe! I truly truly feel blessed here. Very rarely do I feel irritated with something about our house. Our old house I was always bent about something....... mostly not having enough storage space for anything. Here it feels like everything has a place, and we dont have 20 different storage shelves inside to hold things, or a pantry in our garage. Everyday I love my laundry room, and i'm so thankful to have it be inside now instead of in the garage, especially in the winter months! I'm so grateful to have a 4th bedroom that we can use as an office/sewing/craft room. I'm so grateful for our large living room where we can all sit and play games together, or where we can have company without everyone being crammed into the room. I'm grateful to only have 2 toilets instead of 3 to clean, even though once in awhile a 3rd toilet is sometimes needed (amazing how all 4 of us can have a need to use the bathroom at the same time!) ;)  I'm super super grateful for our huge backyard and i'm sooooooo looking forward to getting it to a usable state this spring and summer! And i'm very grateful for our neighbors. What are the odds that we'd end up with such amazing neighbors who are very tolerant of our kids and even seem to be quite fond of them.
As hard as it was to leave our old house and memories behind, God provided a new home for us in a big way. And what about the fact that Jadon's bff moved in just a few streets away? or that there's a little girl 2 houses away who is the same age as Avery, and also named Avery? Or that a house behind us lives a boy who is also a first grader where Jadon goes to school (different class though.) Or that the "older" kids in the neighborhood are super good with kids and are really good role models for Jadon and Avery. I could go on and on, but it was definitely not luck that brought us here. God had all this planned before we even knew it.

See, I told you my blog post wasn't going to be all whining and complaining ;)

Goals

What a year we just finished! The big highlights of our year were: moving into our new house, Derek and I celebrating our 10th wedding anniversary, Avery starting preschool and Jadon starting 1st grade (full day school.)
I hope you all enjoyed our picture year in review. I make those mostly for the kids because they love to look back at the pictures of themselves and what they did during the year. We go back and watch the past years occasionally, and its a great reminder of how blessed we are.

I hate new years resolutions. I think they are dumb, and no one ever keeps them. I quit setting new years resolutions a long time ago. However, I think its always good to have goals, and a fresh start. So I have plenty of goals for this year, including: lose 15 lbs before our big trip, get active again (because i've gotten lazy... thank you migraines), complete our backyard (or at least get the grass put in!), put down my ipod and instead spend that time with my kids, get back to my menu board and get back to my cleaning schedule, work on the kids manners, get rid of these migraines! etc. All of these are very doable, and if I get rid of the migraines it will make it 100% easier to do and stick with these goals. Before I get a migraine I usually get reeaaalllly tired. Its like my warning sign. And after the migraine is over, I feel very drained as well. And since I get several migraines a week, I feel tired and drained A LOT. Its hard to get anything accomplished feeling that way, not to mention having a pounding head.

We got the kids a cheap little microphone for Christmas. I knew Avery would enjoy that, and she actually said that was her favorite gift! Anyways, she gets bashful about singing in it, so I was going about my business one day and she was in the living room singing and I happened to get a video of her really getting into it. She's singing a song from her favorite cartoon show Strawberry Shortcake's Berry Bitty Adventures....There's a character on the show named Cherry Jam who is a famous singer and so sometimes she sings on the show, so she's probably imitating Cherry Jam. Its amusing ;) Excuse the mess, it was the day after Christmas and anyone with kids will understand how much of a mess Christmas makes when you have kids!

This is the start of my 7th year blogging. I noticed that my blogging has been on a steady decline since the year I started. Every year i've blogged less and less. I can tell you exactly why! First year I had just one child..... correction, I had just one child who still NAPPED! Second year was mainly the same thing until October when Avery was born. The next year, I had a busy toddler and a demanding infant. The next year, busy preschooler and busy toddler. The same the next year. Then last year we were moving and good golly its hard to blog when the kids are trying to talk into one of my ears and i'm trying to think at the same time. Takes me over an hour to post anything at all with all the of the interruptions! And Jadon sits over my shoulder reading it out loud as i'm typing..... I finally just stopped trying to do it when the kids were up, and at night when they are sleeping i am not motivated to do it. I tried doing it on saturday mornings but like I said, distractions abound all over the place so it was taking me hours just to do 1 blog entry. On top of that, I have run out of things to talk about that might be of any interest to anyone, (other than griping about annoying irritating people in this world.)  So for those of you faithful who still read it, and are not bored to death with my ramblings about nothing, i'll try to be better this year, but I really can't make any guarantees! ;)

So Jadon is signed up for basketball, and starts that in a couple weeks, and Avery is signed up for a tumbling class and starts in a couple weeks as well. We had been trying to get them signed up for semi-private swim lessons, but our favorite instructor is not available when we are, so now i'm not sure what we will do. Because of other things going on during the week, we have limited options of when to do lessons, and the pool doesn't offer normal lessons during those times. 

So that's where we are!

Merry Christmas

Hope you all had a very merry Christmas! As always, we have so much to be thankful for!

Today is the aftermath of the chaos that having 3 Christmas' in less than 24 hours brings.... so the kids are busy with their new toys and mom and dad are overwhelmed by the giant mess that comes with opening new boxes of things, as well as the boxes and the wrapping paper, etc. Not to mention all the tiny toy pieces all over.
The day after Christmas for us is always spent at home, cleaning up, putting together new toys, and recovering! What a whirlwind of craziness it is!

Christmas and chores

Christmas is in a week and a half! Wow! And what a difference a year makes. Last year at this time we were in the rental and I had no Christmas spirit at all. None. This year I couldn't wait to get our tree, to decorate our house with lights, and I even got out some (not many, but some) decorations for inside the house.
Our tree is the biggest we have had ever, since our ceilings are 9' and vaulted, we are able to get a taller tree. So its a modest 8.5 feet, and narrow. Just because we have a large living room doesn't mean I wanted to have a fat tree take up half of the room.

Like much of the rest of the U.S., we were under snow for a week last week. It all began the Friday before last.... the snow began falling in the early morning, they cancelled school that Friday. We had a great time playing in the snow and sledding down our hills, but it was really really cold (one morning it was 4 degrees.) Since it didn't get above freezing for a week, we had snow for that long, and the only day of school the kids ended up with was this last Friday.  Unfortunately, the snow was too powdery to build snowmen or igloos or have snow ball fights.  It didn't even work well for sledding for the first day or two.  And unfortunately our sled broke halfway through the week.

Because of the snow, we were stuck home for many days. We lost precious time Christmas shopping. The kids also both missed their field trips to Storybook Land.

We've been really trying to emphasize being grateful this year with the kids. We have so much to be thankful for, and Jadon seems to miss that point. I know its nothing we've done, I know a lot of why he is the way he is is because of his mechanics. He can't control his outbursts, his fits of frustration. Its still embarrasing though when he does it because everyone always looks to the parents for their kid behaving that way.

During the summer, we had daily chores for the kids to do. Since school started, and the weeks are busy and we are home less, all the summer chores have been forgotten. They still do their chores that they've been doing for years now, but the bigger ones, like cleaning the bathroom, mopping the floors, vacuuming, etc. have been tossed out. Since there's less time during the school year, I recently revamped the daily chores list. And, in addition to the chores, they have character qualities they will need to follow too (respecting parents, being kind to siblings/friends, etc.) During the school year, their chores are minimal since we have extracurricular activities and homework in the evenings.

I saw my neurologist again a couple weeks ago. Since the meds I was on were not working, I have started a new one. I've only been on it at half dose for a couple days. I really hope this one works. I'm really tired of all this! :(

Snow!!

When we moved into our house, I had hoped that we would have a good snow this winter so we could play in our big yard and slide down the hill.
Well it happened!!  Snow!!! School was cancelled on friday, and we've had snow on the ground for 3 days now with no meltage. Its been super super cold, (this morning when I got up it was 4 degrees) so the snow cant melt. The roads are covered and i'm not even sure we will have school tomorrow.
Today we spent a couple hours outside playing on the hill with some of the neighbors. The kids had lots of fun, and the parents enjoyed it too. Avery slid face first into the front bumper of a parked truck on the side of the road, and she was pretty unhappy about that.
Friday when it was snowing and the kids were outside in the back playing in it, they discovered that a first grade boy from Jadon's school lives out our backyard. I thought that was great at first that Jadon had a next door neighbor friend. However, this boy is over here ALL the time now. We've had to send him home several times already. Makes me wonder, where are the parents that they would let their kid constantly come over?  Or are they okay with it because they want to get rid of him? Anyways, I predict we will be seeing a lot of this boy in the coming months.
Saturday Jadon had a birthday party to go to. We were stuck home since the roads are icy, so we walked to the party. It was a good 20 minute walk both ways. By the time we got home it was about time to leave again to go get him. Derek decided he was going to try driving the car up the hill so we wouldn't have to walk to get him again in the freezing temperature. He managed to get up both the hills, but coming back he couldn't make it back up one of the hills. On his second attempt he managed to make it up.
Then of course as soon as he got home he went outside to play with the "backyard boy" again.
And as I said, today we played on the hill. It was how I always imagined it.... all the neighbor kids sliding and playing in the snow. :)

The poor cats have been freezing. I made them 2 pillow beds out of some soft furry fabric and batting then put the pillows in cardboard boxes. Two of them have pretty much not left the boxes in the last 3 days. The 3rd cat, Bear, has been missing for several days... since before the snow even started. Not sure where he could be. Jadon said he saw Bear once when he was outside but Bear ran away. How true this is, I doubt it. Jadon likes to fabricate stories.

Hard to believe that Christmas is just a couple weeks away! And then after that we begin a new year, and the hardest part of the year for me (January-March) because at that point the winter seems to be never ending and I'm not distracted by holidays, and I feel like I will never see sunshine again! I love the snow, but I love and need my sunshine.... working in the yard..... smelling the freshly mowed lawns....etc.

Well there's my post for the month of December! ;) Hopefully i'm only kidding.

Old

The other day I got my 2014 calendar, and as I was going through it, writing in birthdays, I had the realization that everyone is getting so old! Every last one of us!  It made me sad. Writing "Avery's 5th birthday" on October 8th just about made me cry. How can she be turning 5 next year????????? She's still my little baby, there's no way she will be 5! :(

Its hard to believe its November already! I feel like the weeks are just flying by!
Lets see, last month we got our deck installed, and we love it! We also spent many sweat hours in the backyard installing a french drain before the rain sets in. We were so busy with the deck and yard that I never had a birthday gathering for Avery. Luckily she didn't seem to notice or care much. I'm a terrible mother! I did end up making birthday cupcakes for her so she could at least blow out a candle. She was wanting a #4 candle for months so I couldn't deny her of that.

Yesterday was a busy day! We spent the whole morning at Avery's preschool helping out for her Harvest Party. Then in the afternoon we went to Jadon's classroom to help out at his halloween party. We enjoyed both of course! Then before dinner we went to the village so the kids could trick-or-treat. We then grabbed dinner, went home and ate it, then went for some more trick-or-treating. Avery thoroughly enjoyed herself! Jadon liked it too, but Avery kept informing us that she was having so much fun. Avery was a kitty cat, and Jadon was an Army guy.

We've had a series of water issues around here last month also. First the water heater started leaking. That was fixed, then about 2 weeks later, I was cleaning the kids toilet, and noticed that it was rocking back and forth. So the guy came back out and fixed that. The same day that he fixed the toilet, later that day I discovered that the kitchen sink was leaking. So he will be coming back out next week to fix that. This is not surprising to us to have all these problems. We don't have the best luck. OH, and our washing machine.... yes, our brand new front loader..... had leaked now twice for no reason that we can find. Derek called customer service and they told us to do all these things. The leaks were so random though, that we just decided to get a tray to put under the washer to be safe rather than sorry.

I've gotten a lot done in my recipe binder, and I decided i'm going to have to do a separate one for desserts. Already several times the binder has come in handy, and I love it! Its so easy and convenient!

Well next time you hear from me will probably be in a month at the rate i'm going ;) Sorry, I run out of things to talk about and I don't have a lot of time to sit and type.

Howdy

Despite having the extra time on my hands on tuesday/thursday mornings, I still haven't found enough time to do the things I imagined i'd have time to do. First of all, up until last week, my physical therapy appts. were all on tues/thurs mornings when Avery's in school.
This was the first week of not having any appts.  And one of my 2 "free" days I went to Costco.

I've been trying to streamline ALL my recipes into one organized binder and have all my recipes be in plastic sleeves so if I spill on them, I can easily wipe them up. The reason i'm trying to do this is because since I meal plan for the month in advance, I am searching for many recipes to use. Sounds simple, but when you have recipes all over the place- pinterest, printouts, recipes cards, recipe books, on the computer, etc. its hard to find things quickly and easily. And then I forget where a particular recipe was located. This has made meal planning terribly difficult and irritating and not at all fun. I didn't even make a menu this month. SO, something HAS to be done about it! So i'm doing it similar to this one that I found on Pinterest. But this means i'm typing out a bunch of recipes. Yeah, its going to take awhile, but I know i'll be so much happier once i'm finished!

So back to PT. It helped my back a lot! I was worried because for most of the sessions it didn't seem to be getting much better, but once I started the strengthening exercises, it really started helping! I also have a book that my physical therapist recommended, and it is fantastic! It totally explains WHY my back hurts, and exactly how I can fix it. The only problem is it doesnt contain strengthening exercises, but for me that wasnt a problem since I went to physical therapy and learned them. BUT, it explains so much of why/how bad posture affects your back and even other parts of the body. If anyone wants to borrow the book you're more than welcome to.
I'm supposed to keep up with my therapy for another 2 months, then narrow it down to just a few exercises and stretches after that. I'll never be "cured" but now I know what the causes are and how to fix it if I start getting a backache.

So our deck is half done!!  Its big, and its great! I wish we could have enjoyed it this summer, but we will get to next summer for sure!!! Because our house faces west, we will have the morning sun on the deck, and the shade of the house on it in the evening.  I'm really excited!! The deck is possibly going to be done on monday.

This morning i'm getting my hair cut. I haven't had a cut since January! Hair has been a low priority, and I just throw it back in a holder most of the time.

Avery turned 4 on Tuesday!  I can't believe my baby girl is 4!! (Avery says "i'm a 4 year-older") How did this happen?? It crept up on me too fast, so I didn't get any party planned, but she still wants to have a party, so probably later in the month i'll get something together.
She is enjoying school, and she's always excited to show me her art projects after school. And I look forward to picking her up and spending the afternoons with her. But, after having a live in playmate (Jadon) for the last 4 years, she's a little lost on how to play by herself without him. So as soon as we eat she's begging me to play with her, and she mopes around until I do. I finally had to start telling her that if she didn't go and find something to play with on her own for a bit so I can get the kitchen cleaned up, then i'm not going to play with her. At which point she goes to her room and finds something to play with, but then still asks me every couple minutes if I'm ready to play yet.

Jadon is loving school still. You can tell he thinks he's a cool dude for getting to ride the bus. And i'm happy for him to get to ride. He had his jog-a-thon at school a couple weeks ago, and he ran 9 laps. And, his class ran the most laps out of all the school, so they get to have ice cream soon!
He's taking a lego class after school one day a week right now, and he's enjoying that.

Both kids are in swimming right now, both in level 3 together. Yes, Avery caught up pretty quickly. I've said it a billion times, but she's a fish. Poor Jadon is struggling after having a "traumatic" experience in swimming class a while back. So now he's afraid he's going to drown and starts panicking when they let go of him. Of course, when he panics he starts sinking. He did better at class this week though. He needs to get his confidence back up.

Well I cant think of what else is happening, so I better get ready for my hair appointment!

School days

Busy busy busy. I don't know why I always think that when school starts things will get less crazy?  But then again, I always think that summer will bring less chaos as well. Not so. I just need to accept that life will be crazy until the kids move out.

So about a month ago I hurt my back. I strained it so bad I could hardly walk. Luckily I had my annual physical with my doctor and I mentioned that my back was killing me and that I seem to get backaches A LOT. My doctor referred me to physical therapy. So twice a week i've been doing physical therapy. My back is very slowly getting better. And now I know how to deal with it better. However, my poor posture seems to be a major contribution to my back aches. I slouch when I stand, I slouch when I sit, and I don't always lift things properly. I'm ruining my back by doing all of those.

So school is going well for both kids. Jadon loves it still, and loves riding the bus. Sadly, last week they practiced their "drills"- fire drill, earthquake drill, and lockdown drill. It saddens me that they have to even HAVE a lockdown drill. Things have sure changed since we were in school.

Avery enjoys preschool, and during snack time, parents are selected each day to bring in snacks for the kids. It has to be healthy snacks, except on birthday days, people can bring in cupcakes or cookies or something like that. Well, Avery is not into "healthy" really. So twice now parents have brought in carrot sticks. The first day Avery refused to eat it. But the teacher told her she had to take a "polite bite" meaning she had to at least try it. Apparently she screamed about this, i'm not surprised, and it took her 20 minutes to take a teeny tiny bite. She also had to try a piece of turkey on another day. Avery does not eat meat, so again there was issues, but she did end up trying it. If only we could get her to try things around here, but we think its because she is in the room with a bunch of classmates and also because she's not quite comfortable enough with her teachers yet to blatantly tell them NO! like she does to us.
And in case anyone thinks we baby her when it comes to eating. I can assure you, we do not. She has missed many many many dinners and desserts because she refuses to eat or even try dinner. She skips probably on average 4-5 dinners a week. Our pediatrician told us last year at her appointment that after a few missed dinners, she'll get the hint. HA! Fat chance. She gets the point and she does not care. She's stubborn as can be. Little stinker!
She has another appointment coming up in a couple months so we'll see what her pediatrician says this time!

I painted Avery's bedroom this week, so now both kids' bedrooms are painted in colors they picked out. I love the color of Jadon's room, its a blue color. Avery wanted purple. Dark purple. So her room got painted a darker purple color. She loves it. Its not terrible, but its not my favorite. I had tried and tried to convince her to pick a lighter shade, but she desperately wanted the dark purple. So be it.

And so it begins again

Today was the first day of school for both the kids. Jadon's school was a frenzied crazy mess, as first days usually are. Poor kid though, we couldn't find his classroom. When we came last week to visit, the secretary showed us one of the wrong classrooms. So we found it right before the bell rang and we felt terrible leaving him like that. Queue me crying.
Then we dropped Avery off at preschool, and that was much less chaotic since there are only 14 kids, and we've been there before. I don't think she even knew or cared that we left, she was too busy playing with a Little People princess castle. But queue more crying for me anyways.

So now here I sit, its silent in the house, I can actually hear the fridge quietly humming. Its very strange, something I haven't experienced much of in 6.5 years. I feel oddly lost. Kindof like how I feel when I go shopping by myself, I feel more scattered and like i'm forgetting something.

Lunches will be totally strange and quiet for me and Avery, without Jadon here to jabber continuously.

I'm so excited to see him get off the bus this afternoon! He's been looking forward to riding the bus. I'm excited to hear all about his day.

Summer, swimming, house, & articles

I don't understand how this summer is going by so fast. Its depressing really. :(

Anyways, I've got a couple articles posted by friends on Facebook that I thought were good reads:

An article about accepting your post-baby body as something beautiful that grew a life in it! It will never be the same again, but it did a miraculous thing!
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/joy-gabriel/kate-middleton-and-the-mom-in-the-mirror_b_3672553.html?utm_hp_ref=fb&src=sp&comm_ref=false

This is an article that follows a lady who takes pictures for Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep... an organization that sends photographers to hospitals following the loss of a baby, to take pictures of the baby. My friend who had the stillbirth last year did this, and the article has pictures of the family and baby, as well as thoughts and comments from them. Very touching.
http://www.pamplinmedia.com/lor/48-news/156045-a-gift-few-can-give

I think in my last post to the blog, I mentioned we were going to build a bookshelf and bed for Jadon.  "We" just finished and are in the process of getting it all painted. I say "we" because Derek decided that it was his project. ;) Being our/his first building project, it has its ups and downs. First off, the wood we bought was probably not the best wood for furniture, and most of the pieces were bowed. And there were issues when we tried to make the shelves movable. So we ended up doing staggered placed shelves instead. It ended up looking very nice though, regardless of the setbacks. And I think Derek had fun with his new tools- Kreg jig, circular saw, nail gun...
It was a good learning experience and I can't wait to see how the bed turns out! :)

Swimming lessons are going really well for the kids! Jadon finally passed level 2, and he has really taken to the water this year!  He's not a worrisome little guy who's tense and stiff in the water anymore. In level 3 he is learning how to do the freestyle swim on his own, both front and back. He has really taken off with lessons this summer, i'm so glad and proud of him! And he REALLY loves swimming now.
Avery is also doing really well in level 2. She is very young, so I expect her to be in level 2 for several sessions. She was pretty disappointed though when Jadon passed level 2 and she didn't.

Well around our neighborhood there's lots going on! We have a new neighbor moving in this month, the man to the right of us is building his own house and while its going to take him a long time, but he finally is getting the frame up.  And friday they started digging for the last house in the culdesac. Hopefully the new people moving into the houses will be a good fit for the neighborhood. Right now we have such great neighbors.... totally unlike what we had at our last house! We hardly knew any of our neighbors at our old house. We had a water fight with the neighbors to our left one night. And the kids love playing with the neighbor girl up the street, who ironically is also a 3 year old named Avery. Yes, we are still very happy here! :)
Unfortunately, the backyard project is much more work than I think we were anticipating. So the backyard will not be completed this year. Hopefully next year. We ARE hoping to have the deck done this year though.

Summer summer summertime

Busy summer already round these parts!
Already i've sewed 2 grocery bags from this tutorial- http://www.sew4home.com/projects/storage-solutions/make-your-own-grocery-bags - love them by the way! So much better than those cheap ones the stores sell! Much more durable!
I also converted 2 pairs of Avery's old jeans that she outgrew in length but not waist into skirts following this tutorial- http://www.allaboutyou.com/craft/make-clothes/sew-girls-denim-skirt - They turned out so cute, and since she has such a small waist, I made them a bit longer than the tutorial suggested, that way we will have plenty of growing room, both in length and waist!
I also went through ALL of the kids schoolwork and artwork for the last 3 years.... said goodbye to alot.... kept some.... and the best part is I organized them into neat, tidy bins to use for all their schoolwork through 12th grade! I found this idea from this blog: http://iheartorganizing.blogspot.com/2010/11/school-paperwork-storage.html- I heart that blog! :)
I also just finished painting Jadon's bedroom!
I've got several more projects in the works, as well as tulle all over the loveseat waiting to be made into tutu's for Sunnypatch. Everytime I turn around I find something new I want to do!
We've only taken 1 trip to the pool to swim so far, which is less than I was hoping to do. This is the last year we can take advantage of "toddler time" at the pool because its for kids 6 and under.
We took a day trip to Wildlife Safari and we all rode the camel. They have an elephant car wash too that we really wanted to do, but sadly it was closed that day. I guess they wanted to give the elephants a break.
Today we got 7 lbs of fresh blueberries, and i'm pretty sure Jadon already at a lb. That kid LOVES blueberries! He couldnt wait to get home to eat them.
I have been off of that horrible Topamax for almost a week now! My fuzzy brain feels sooooo much better, and i'm not super tired constantly like I was when on the Topamax. Aside from headaches and migraines, I feel terrific being off of it!!!! I had no idea it was making me feel so crappy.
I have only been on my new medication, a calcium channel breaker for less than a week. I haven't had any side effects from it, but I'm still waiting to see if it helps my migraines. Just feeling better physically has my spirits lifted though!
Jadon's bed broke unfortunately, so we are planning on making him a new bed... not sure WHEN we will find the time to, but i'm super excited! I love a good project ;) We will follow this tutorial: http://ana-white.com/2011/04/plans/hailey-storage-bed-twin and since his bookshelf is garbage, I was planning to make him this: http://ana-white.com/2012/03/plans/4-cubby-bookshelf-or-nightstand (another website that I heart!)
It seems that the convertible crips are not as fantastic as we thought they would be. Avery's bed works great as a crib and toddler bed, but once we converted to a full size bed, it doesnt work so well. The headboard and footboard do not work. Its as if they added it as a full just as an afterthought without thinking it through. I love her bed though, so Derek found a way to hook the headboard up to the frame. Maybe if Jadon's bed is successful, we will make her a new one that will include her headboard and footboard.

Medical

So its been a year and a half on my preventive migraine meds, and although they give me a ton of relief from the migraines in that they reduce the intensity of my migraines, I still get about as many as I did before. So, my doctor referred me to the neurologist, who I saw earlier this week. 

The neurologist said everything with my migraines sounded totally normal and didn't feel a need to order any scans. She said only 1% of the time do things actually show up on MRI's anyhow, so unless there's a concern, its a waste of my money. She basically said I could do it for peace of mind if I wanted to though. But i'll pass. 

She said sometimes migraines just cycle themselves out eventually. They are often hereditary, but just because I have them does not necessarily mean my kids will. I hope that's the case! 

So since the preventive i'm on isn't working well, the plan is to wean off of that over the next 2 weeks (or more if needed.) At the same time, I am also starting on a new medication, a beta blocker. Hopefully that will work better. 

I'm most excited to get off of the other med since it made my brain so foggy. Topamax is known for making people feel mentally slow.  Its nicknamed "dope-amax." Of course, not everyone has this side effect, but unfortunately I did. I forget things all the time, can't remember conversations, can't remember calendar events, have a hard time finding words when talking.... its extremely irritating. I feel like an idiot.

Unfortunately, when some people start beta blockers they can feel tired and run down for a few weeks.  Greeaaaat! But I guess that's nothing new since migraines all the time make me feel a little tired and run down too. 

Annnnd, I apparently displaced my tailbone. Last summer it started hurting, I just thought it must be bruised or something, and never sought medical attention for it. But it never got better, and so last month when I saw my PCP, she ordered an X-ray, and according to the findings on the X-ray, my tailbone is displaced. Not sure when or how this happened, I do not recall falling on my butt or injuring it somehow around that time, so who knows. Anyways, i've been putting off going back to my PCP for further treatment because well for one, its time for my annual (yuck), and 2, at that time she wants to do an internal exam of the tailbone also......... if you know what I mean.  So i've been putting it off.  And I'm worried about how they fix a displaced tailbone! I hope they'd give me an epidural or something! Put me under so I can't feel anything! 

And where the heck did our sunshine go?????????????????????