Our river of life

The distance makes it a little less scary...

2012-01-16T14:59:00.000-08:00

And once again January 16th has rolled around as it will every year and I am overcome with the emotions of that day, and the days that followed... because two years ago today Atty had his first seizure... But this time around, although I have shed a few tears rereading my posts and remembering, I also feel so thankful! And relieved. And at peace with were we are. I can hardly believe we are two years in already though. In May of this year he will be on his diet for the full two years and ready to wean off! What a hill is seemed at the time {his diet}, a mountain really. Steep and slippery it appeared and I feared failure, it felt like a heavy burden on my shoulders ready to drag me down as I tried to climb. I was scared to even take the first step. But I did, we did, and we are now headed down the other side with the breeze in our hair, taking in the view!!! Wow what a ride! I am so very proud of my son and how far he has come. Even though this day, every year, will be emotional for me... It's just not so scary any more. :)

These are some of my favorite things...

2012-01-11T07:39:00.000-08:00

So I asked the kids about their favorite things and got some interesting and amusing answers. I would love to try and remember to ask them these questions every year to watch the changes... but knowing me I'll probably forget. :( I will record these ones with the tentative hope that I will remember to do it again...

Bubu, 6yrs-

Color- light blue

Shape- heart

Emotion- happy

Friend- Charleigh M.

Animal- zebra

Comfort food- peanut butter and jelly sandwiches

Vegetable- Broccoli

Fruit- Watermelon {of course!}

Thing to do- play with dinosaurs

Book- Dr. Seuss books

Subject in school- history

Holiday- St. Patty's day

Treat- marshmallows {the big ones}

Season- summer

Exercise- lifting weights

Movie- Cat in the Hat, series not movie...

Day of the week- Tuesday

Month- December

Song- We Wish You a Merry Christmas

Toy- dinosaurs

Stuffed animal- big froggy

Atty, 4 yrs (5 in three weeks!}-

Color- blue

Shape- heart

Emotion- silly {haha!}

Friend- brother Evan {so sweet!!!}

Animal- Birds

Comfort food- Muffins {home made, almond flour}

Vegetable- green peas

Fruit- orange

Thing to do- play with birds

Book- bird books

Subject in school- learning colors

Holiday- 4th of July

Treat- heart treats {home made freezer candies}

Season- Spring

Exercises- Jumping on the trampoline

Movie- Nemo

Day of the week- Sunday

Month- December

Song- Jingle Bells

Toy- A spinning thing

Stuffed animal- parrot

Spike, 4 yrs-

Color- Black

Shape- Star

Emotion- Scared {really?}

Friend- cousin Hunter

Animal- bear

Comfort food- hot dogs {haha!}

Vegetable- carrots

Fruit- blackberries

Thing to do- play hide and seek outside

Book- There's No Place Like Space by Tish Rade {He went and got the book so I would know exactly what he was talking about...}

Subject in school- reading {he started this week!}

Holiday- Easter

Treat- ice cream {of course!}

Season- Summer

Exercise- riding bike

Movie- Rescue Heroes

Day of the week- Sunday

Month- April

Song- 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, once I caught a fish alive, etc... {I don't know the name of that song.}

Toy- little white sports car

Stuffed animal- gray elephant

Lala, 2 yrs {she did surprisingly well answering these, I gave her some options for some of the questions, but for the most part she answered on her own with no help...}-

Color- red

Shape- square

Emotion- sad {she does fake sad a lot, haha!}

Friend- Asher B.

Animal- pig

Comfort food- crackers {so true, this girl loves her graham crackers, haha!}

Vegetable- green peas

Fruit- watermelon

Thing to do- play with kitchen set {I was surprised when she answered this on her own with no ideas from me!}

Book- Ladybug Girl {a new favorite of hers...}

Subject in school- learning colors {She's not really in school exactly, but she learns right along with her brothers.}

Holiday- Valentines day

Treat- marshmallows

Season- Winter

Exercise- dancing

Movie- Nemo

Day of the week- Sunday

Month- March

Song- Jingle Bells, with a yeehaw and the end... :)

Toy- doll house

Stuffed animal- dog

Can we say goodbye to January yet...

2012-01-10T07:49:00.001-08:00

I've just been blah... I always seem to get this way in January. I'm so tired of the cold, gray, short days of winter. Even though I know we are on the other side now and it's steadily getting lighter and lighter, it doesn't seem to help at this point. I want green, warmth, the promise of summer days. I want to garden and hike and picnic. I want day light after my daycare kids head home so that I can actually do stuff outside. I want the chickens to lay more eggs. Actually they are starting to, after taking a couple months off! If I was more of a self reliant homesteader I would have ate those chicken, so annoying to feed them and feed them and clean their stinky cage and not get any eggs... I don't like chickens in the winter time. She how grumpy I am! Then there is the matter of my weight and how out of shape I am. Been feeling really down about that and frustrated with my lack of options for getting back into shape. I wanted to get a Curves membership but I just couldn't justify the monthly cost... then I tried some work out videos but the kids want to join in and get in the way and always seem to need something or get into something right when I'm getting my groove on... then I tried to figure out a way to walk/run outside but by the time my husband gets home {at least right now} it's completely dark out and he leaves to early in the morning to do it before he leave for work. With that plan I was getting out so rarely it just wasn't making a difference. The only place work out equipment can go is in our room, which isn't very large, so my options were limited... But just this week I found an elliptical on Craigslist that was affordable so my hubby went and picked it up for me and it fits perfectly in our room! The nice part is that I can put on a movie in the playroom for the kids so that they are preoccupied and then I can grab my mp3 player and go work out in my room, which I did last night for the first time. And it was awesome. :) Well towards the end Lala did come find me and that was a bit frustrating... but not enough to make me stop or anything, I actually got to go for a mile!!! And you know what I felt great! I am one of those people that really needs to work out for my mood, I need to get out for fresh air as well, which is why I'm such an outdoorsy person... but working out works too. So my goal is to do a mile every day {which means probably every other day or less, haha!} and then go up from there. In April {when it's hopefully light late enough in the day so I can actually get outside after hubby gets home} I want to start the couch to 5K program. Me running 3 miles {by the end of the program} seems rather silly, but I'm going to try. It really does make me feel so good after wards. So anyways this is how I'm going to fight the gray mood that is dragging me down... in fact I had a whole blog post about how blah I was feeling in my head but then I did that mile last night and I feel so much better that I no longer feel the need to vent my bleakness... your welcome. :)

On top of the mood I've been in I'm also going through a rough patch with Lala. She is so testy lately. Throwing fits, just for fun I swear. Just basically testing every limit and rebelling against authority and basically getting too big for her britches. It's so hard to repeat over and over again the rules and expectations we have in this family. It's embarrassing dealing with her attitude in front of others, and it's frustrating when she is the only one acting up in public. I guess I should be thankful she's the only one, but I just want to be past this stage, I feel like I've already put in so much time getting the boys were they are with their behavior that the selfish part of me just wants to be done. But I know I have to put in the time with her as well, and I know that once she figures it out things will get better... it's just hard to keep my eyes on the prize so to speak when she is testing me non-stop. I'm a bit sad that my last little baby is past the "can do no wrong" baby stage and into the testy toddler stage. It's not that she's horrible {even though my complaining makes it sound that way} she's a great kid, I just have high expectations for behavior with my children and I know that she will live up to them... soon I hope. Haha!

Homeschooling has been going well. Although if I'm being honest some days I have to force myself to do it... Keeping to the school schedule has proven to be a bit hard for me. But the nice thing is that we can take days off when we want and make up those days when we want and the schedule is our to do with what we want... it doesn't have to be the same as our local public schools. Plus it just doesn't take as long to get done with my three what it takes to get done with a class room of 30 some. On a whim I picked up some early readers at the library and had Spike try one... and he is reading!!! It will never cease to amaze me how different each of my children are. His preK program isn't any where near the reading stage, but because he knows all his letter sounds and is open to learning how to read, excited really, I think I'm going to skip forward for him... which is another awesome thing about homeschooling. You can really tailor to each child's needs and readiness. Love that. One thing that is a bit frustrating though in a selfish way is that it's obvious that Atty and Spike are not going to be on the same level, not any time soon anyways, so instead of using one program to teach each of them {which I was hoping for because they are only 4 months apart} I will have to use separate programs for the most part... which means separate programs for all three {four separate programs as soon as Lala is old enough}. It would have been a lot easier with them on the same level, but oh well. Such is life and it's not about me after all, it's about the best education for each one of them. Just have to figure out the best way to incorporate three separate lessons into our day and make sure they all get enough one on one with me. Some things we can do together still so that helps. I also want to focus on more art and creative projects being incorporated into our day. I've really been lacking in that lately. And in all this I want to remember the value of play. I don't want to get so focus on school that I forget how much they learn just through play alone... especially at this age! Which reminds me of the next book I want to read The Value of Play by Rae Pica. :)

Well that's all for now, speaking of schooling I have some planning to do... I'm going to try and get my goals for the new year on here at some point, some of them anyways. Keep myself accountable. I've realized though that if I try to share all of them then I'm just not honest enough with myself to make any real change. So I'll share my goals for the house and yard and such but keep the more personal ones to myself. :) I know that's not nearly as interesting, haha, sorry! Also I plan on doing a blog post on a day in the life, just for the fun of it. So that I can look back when they are older and see how things change over the years on the day to day stuff. I'd like to add some more homeschooling posts as well, I never really seem to get into the nitty gritty on that topic... I'm sure as my one and only regular blog reader {you know who you are} you are just dying to hear all about it... haha! Oh and by the way Kat, you're awesome, thanks for all your great comments, I always look forward to reading them. Even though I didn't start this blog looking for lots of readers, but rather a great way to document our lives, still I've loved all your great comments! I love every ones comments {I've had some great commenter's over the years} and feel so lucky to have found such amazing people to share with!!!

Few words, many pictures... Merry Christmas!

2011-12-27T08:18:00.000-08:00

What a wonderful holiday we've had! My husband and I ended up with some time off, and we put it to good use. :) We made Christmas tree pictures and added presents for all our family members. Atty decided to add an extra present under his tree for his brother in Montana... So sweet!
We are thankful that he has been able to stay in contact with is biological brother even though they were adopted in different states! Doesn't often happen.

Bubu sang Christmas songs up front at church. He was so brave and so adorable. Spike said he wanted to but then he got a little too scared and decided to sit and watch instead. But he did stay with his class the whole time... little steps. Atty isn't ready for that yet so he sat with us. Just the fact that he sat with us in the super crowded and loud church and listened to the music is a big step for him! He use to get so overwhelmed by situations like that, he would melt down in to a out of control tantrum.

We went to a get together at my mom's house and the kids fell in love with this cute puppy... especially Spike, he really really wants a dog.

We also went to the Lights of Christmas this year. Our neighbor brought over free tickets for all of us! We had wanted to go but hadn't found enough coupons to make it affordable for us so I had given the coupons I found away to some one else that I knew was going. It was so sweet of our neighbors to think of us. I think this neighbor and I have been trying to be friends for the last three years {she home schools too!} but we are just both to shy to get around to actually hanging out, haha! Anyways they had already gone and then her husband got the tickets so they passed them on to us.

It was a lot of fun, but super crowded as we went the night before Christmas eve... then because it was late and I had some of Atty's food with we stopped at a fast food restaurant {which we never do} and got the kids some dinner. This might have been cooler to them then the light, ha!

Lala in her Christmas eve dress pushing her "baby" around in the stroller. He actually likes it, such a sweet cat.

The kids always get to open one present on Christmas eve that is their special pj's and one present from someone out side of the family. Then I make them sit for pictures in their Christmas jammies... :) We also went to look at the "dancing lights" this year on Christmas eve right before bed. It was a lot of fun, sitting in the van, eating some treats and watching the lights go to the sound of the music. They had the donation box again for Children's hospital, which we love. Feels good to be able to donate. It goes to stuffed animals for the kids that are there, and Atty got a few of those when he was there, it really does make a difference.

Love stuffing the stockings after the kids are in bed. I always put a Big Hunk in my husbands stocking... ;)

Stockings stuffed, presents under the tree, Atty's special cookies ready, bring on the morning! {All by 10:30 too, that's a record for me!}

Here they come... I don't know if Lala was yawning or excited in this picture, haha!

I had to include this picture, even though it's blurry. {As many of my early morning pictures were, so frustrating!} The boys found a stuffed animal dachshund, and because they know that she loves the two {real ones} that she has, they were so very excited to give it to her. It was really cute.

Because Atty can't have any treats in his stockings I made him his special cookies this year as well as his freezer "candies". I gave the other kids a few more treats this year in there stocking and it didn't seem to cause any problems. I try to stay away from the wrapped ones and just put bulk treats in there stockings. The bright flashy holiday candies draw the most attention, so I stay aways from those still.

Lala got some lip gloss in her stocking, oh boy was she excited! She's always trying to use mine.

Bubu taking his turn to hand out presents.

Spike in his monkey hat, over the moon excited over his Nerf gun... something I never though I would get my kids. There will be rules, but I've relaxed a bit with the boys on this.

The kids were so excited for me to open the presents they got for me... even though some of them had already slipped up and told me what they were, haha! They found me another adorable snow globe, and it was Bubu that reminded my husband that they needed to get one, so cute!

This year we decided to go sledding on Christmas day. Mount Baker is closed to skiers on Christmas day, so we thought we would try it out. It was awesome and might have to be our new tradition. Normally we go seeking snow on New Years day... but you can't beat an almost empty mountain for sledding! It was a lot of fun!! And free, bonus!

Made sure to take a picture of me so that in the future my kids would know that I was there as well... haha! Some times I wonder if they will think I just wasn't ever there since I'm always the one taking the pictures and don't end up in many of them.

Getting ready to sled down.

My sister and mom came too! My sister acted as a human sled for Lala a few times, she loved it.

We need more sleds... Didn't stop the boys from having fun though, they just rolled down the hills in between turns. :)

The climb back up wasn't easy... but they managed. Tough little guys.

These two only made it a little while before they headed back to the van.

We found a snow fort and had a snow ball fight, me against them... I won. Haha! It was only because I had endless snow available to me, they ran out pretty fast... once that happened they started losing member fast, first one to join my side... Spike of course.

It was a beautiful day.

A late Merry Christmas wish to you all.

~I~

2011-12-22T09:02:00.001-08:00

I... Love to run fast and then ride my shopping cart to the car {and my children do too}.

I... Always say a prayer in my head when an emergency vehicle goes by, intended for where ever, who ever, it is headed for.

I... Almost always cry about deep thought while on road trips, it's my time to ponder and sometimes grieve.

I... Love traditions.

I... Hate cleaning the kitchen/doing dishes... oh and laundry... hate it.

I... Can hardly sleep if my husband is not in the bed {or at least in the house} with me.

I... Always sleep with the sheet up over my ears. Always. And my feet covered.

I... Am still afraid of the dark.

I... Have a hard time being okay with my body.

I... Tend to be outwardly pragmatic and inwardly an idealist... I confuse myself.

I... LOVE researching, in a super nerdy way. If something peaks my interests I will research the heck out of it.

I... Read more non-fiction then fiction, because I love learning about things. Right now I'm really interested in the history of American women. Before that I was really into homeopathic medicine and herbal healing, and before that into healing foods and diets.

I... Believe whole heartedly in natural health care and eating foods that heal, in preventive care and being responsible for and informed about your own body, and how to stay healthy.

I... Wish I had what it takes to be a midwife, but sadly I don't.

I... Freakishly check every door, and every window, every night before bed... even when I know the door is locked I will still walk over to the door and touch the lock... weird I know. I won't be able to sleep other wise. I've tried.

I... Am eclectic in everything I do, from homeschooling to decorating to clothes... everything. Some times I drive myself crazy because I can never just go with one theme.

I... Wish I was craftier. Or in actuality I wish I had more time to be crafty.

I... Love the out doors, mostly in the summer, although all the seasons have their fun.

I... Wish I was a race car driver... I fantasize often on how fantastic that would be. I hope to some day drive a real race car and race really, really fast around a track some where. I some times like to punch my mini van up to the speed limit {I usually stop there any ways} really fast so that I can pretend. {when I'm alone that is...}

I... Some day want to own a Chevy Nova again like I did when I was a teen... a really nice one. :) And yes I probably will speed a bit. Oops.

I... Sometimes {often} want to be a rebel. It's a hard thing to keep under wraps, haha!

I... Share my husbands dream of some day owning motorcycles {and learning how to ride one, ha!} and then going on long road trip through the country on a nice summer day. :) It sounds exhilarating to me!

I... Desperately want to live in the country on a nice big piece of land, preferably with a creek running though it, back right up next to some foot hills in a house we built together.

I... Would love to start riding horses again, and even own one again some day. I use to dream of racing horses and would fancy myself riding the World Famous Suicide Race in Omak, Washington. I though it was fantastically daring. Still do. But a regular walk in the woods is about all I will be able to do by the time I ever get back on a horse {although I always preferred a full out gallop, I'm thinking it wouldn't go so well now}.

I... Often have a hard time expressing how I truly feel, even though people tend to thing I'm a straight shooter. I tend to be straight forward about situations happening around me, but not about myself personally.

I... Love to sing... but shouldn't ;)

I... Love to dance... but shouldn't ;)

I... Hate being wrong. It drives me crazy. I try really hard to never be wrong. I also hate making mistakes which has honestly really held me back in life.

I... Wish I was brave enough to wear leopard print. I've been brave enough to wear fuzzy leopard print pjs and slippers, but I wish I was brave enough to go out in it.

I... Am really messy if I don't have a reason to be clean. Which is why it's good that I run an in home daycare... other wise my house would be falling apart. Although I might be able to do more fun things if I wasn't always... and I mean always... cleaning.

I... Dream of someday being a naturopathic nutritionist.

I... Love to organize, but my paper clutter is out of control. Go figure.

I... Am a control freak, it's an issue for sure, that I am trying to change little by little.

I... Can't stand it when plans change... back to the control issue, haha! It can drive me to tears!

I... Am obsessed with my husband. Seriously. Good thing I married him. He is the only man I have ever loved and I really do feel that no one holds a candle to him. It sometimes amazes me that I'm still madly in love... {most days, haha!}

I... Feel better in large crowds where I can easily slip away, verses small groups where I feel trapped. I know it doesn't make sense for most people with anxiety. I'm not saying I like large crowd but if I have to pick between the two I'll go for the bigger one any day.

I... Don't like being the focus of attention, my heart speeds up, my face turns red, I want to run away... For example, it does not make me feel special to have a whole restaurant sing happy birthday to me, in fact it makes me want to cry. Don't do it.

I... Don't do well with being woken up at night, especially if I'm really tired... I don't normally swear, but I will in the middle of the night. oh and I'm not a morning person. At all. I need a moment, give it to me if you know what's good for you. After I've had a moment to adjust I'm good to go.

I... Wish I was better at playing with my kids. I like crafting with them, going on walks, exploring, trying new things, going on road trips and outings, camping, watching a movies with them, snuggling up with books... but when it comes to just playing with them I'm not very good at it. Good thing they have plenty of siblings to play with.

I... Wish we had a Jacuzzi Whirlpool tub, I would live in that thing... if I could.

I... Love projects, ask my husband.

I... Can't stand having nothing to do, I like to stay busy. Which is a good thing since I have four kids.

I... Love oriental food... and margaritas... preferably at the same time. I told you I'm eclectic.

I... Am a list maker, and I like adding things to my list that I can easily cross off along with the hard stuff. I will sometime put things on my daily list that I have already done just so I can cross it off, haha!

I... Tend to "swim against the current" in almost everything I do, but I tend to keep it private. No bumper sticker declarations on my van. :)

I... Am a bit of a snoop. Probably because I want to know everything and I hate surprises. Well not all surprises... most. I've learned that some things are better as surprises, like presents. When I was a kid I ruin a many great surprise presents with my snooping.

I... Desperately want our family to stay close. My biggest fear is of my kids growing up and moving far away. It makes me tear up just thinking about it. I want to have the kind of family like the show Parenthood... well not exactly, just the over all closeness of it. That show makes me cry almost every single time, and laugh. It's great. Even my husband watches it with me, but I don't think I'm suppose to tell anyone that, ha!

I... Am a lefty and proud of it, I'll let you dwell on whether I mean left handed, or politically, haha! {or both?}

I... Am sure that I could go on and on with this post. But I now need to go live my life. We are all unique but similar in many ways... being human is so fascinating.

I... Suggest you do an I post, it's fun. :)

~One post that should have been two~

2011-12-10T14:06:00.000-08:00

We got a real tree this year!

{I'm really not quite sure why my hubby thought it was so funny for me to cover up the first letter... but he got a good giggle out of it.}

We've had a fake one for the last 7 years, but it's starting to look sad and I'm not sure if I want to buy another one, so off to the tree farm we went, for this year at least.

It really was a lot of fun to look for the perfect tree together...

Christmas kisses... :)

Running, running, running...

And we found it!

Getting the lights onto this type of tree was not fun... I had to wrap each branch or it looked tacky, if we get another real tree I'm thinking it will have to be the bushy type. Once I got all the lights on a whole section of the lights went out, and would not come back on... and you know what? For the first time ever I said... I don't care, and left it that way. I'm trying to learn to let the little things go and not get myself all wound up. It really does feel good, when I manage it... Plus now that all the ornaments are on you can't {hardly} tell. :)

Hanging ornaments... this was the first year she could actually help, and boy was she cute!

Decorating the tree together, and looking at all the awesome ornaments... :)

Spike has been living in that Spider Man costume, haha!

All the lower branches are decorated with non-breakables, less stressful that way... even if it does look a little silly.

That sign says, Kisses Under The Mistle Toad... I love it!

We made pine cone owls around the end of October, and decided they looked mighty fine on the tree... Atty doesn't know it yet but I found him an owl ornament for his stocking this year and he is going to Love it! He's still all about the birds.

I'm so proud of myself this year, I finally got all the kids first Christmas baby pictures up on the tree... I've had Bubu's {this one} for years now, but never managed to get the rest of the kids up there. Well enough was enough and I forced myself to finish what I started...

I went out and found one for Lala, I didn't paint it, but it's up!
It's also not a first Christmas picture, I might change that in the future but I didn't have one on hand and I just wanted to get her on the tree. :)

Again not painted but Spike is on the tree... I've had this ornament and Atty's {with out pictures in them} sitting in the Christmas tub for a few years now, good grief... talk about procrastination, I must be the queen!!!

...and also not painted, but hey I'm making progress... I was lucky enough to find a first Christmas picture for both boys though!
We also made pine cone decorations for the tree, the kids had a blast with that... I think if we can squeeze it in we might add some popcorn chains as well. :)

This year since the tree was a different size our angel didn't fit on top... but I like that I had to go look for something new, I found a cute little star and the kids love it. We have been watching the Little House On The Prairie series and in one episode the little sister gets a star for Christmas and when she puts it on the tree she says "Happy Birthday baby Jesus". So my kids have been saying that almost every time they look at the star, so sweet.

A decorated tree... I used all white lights for the first time, and I think I like it. I'd like it more if all of them were working... gerrrrr, and let it go... :)

Also got all the Christmas decorations out. A favorite tradition of mine {I think you can call it a tradition, haha!} happened sort of on accident. On Bubu's first Christmas my Husband got me a snow globe as a gift. And every Christmas since he goes with the kids and they find one for me... I really look forward now to seeing what they pick out for me. Every year we unpack them and set them out, we look at the date on the bottom and talk about what was happening on that Christmas, how old the kids were. We wind up the music box ones and listen to the song, I shake them up for the kids to look at and we marvel at the details. I like keeping them super special by packing them away every year and being excited about getting them out again. Keeps it fresh and new. :)
I'm going to have quite the collection by the time the last kiddo leaves the house, haha!

A cute Christmas picture. Our Maxie Moo as named by Lala... She also calls him Bunny and Catkins... which by the way if we every get another cat I will just have to name him Catkins, I love it!

Okay I know, enough already... don't you just want to snuggle him though!?! Snuggle up and read a good book by the fire, drink some chai tea, ahhhh...

Now that I don't drink coffee, I'm horribly addicted to chai tea, crave it all day long!

Okay focus, back to my rambling post...

I got a new rug for the living room that I love... because I needed the old one for the playroom... because we got new carpet!!! Finally. So I'm using the old living room rug under the table in the playroom, that way the kids can still craft and eat out there and I don't have a heart attack.

This is were the post goes off track, feel free to stop reading...

Because we had to clear the whole room out... and wow was that crazy... I reorganized when we put everything back in. I probably should make a whole new post for this, but since I might never get around to it, here goes. So the home school area is tucked back behind the couch now, I wanted it a bit more separated from the playroom and the whole shelf is now used for school instead of half school, half toys. Which means my husband had to make me a new shelf for toys... good thing he's good at that sort of thing. :)

Here's a better picture of what I'm talking about. The home school area is now tucked away in the corner... I love it. See the new carpet? I love that too, never had new carpet before... it makes the whole room so much more inviting, I actually want to spend time on the floor in there now, haha! The old carpet really needed to be replaced when we moved in three years ago, but it just didn't happen.

I really love how the couch is up next to that wall now, opens up the room. We always had shelves on that wall before. That's the nice thing about moving everything out, you really get to rethink the set up when you are moving everything back in again...

On a side note, my kids really love playing with balloons, and don't worry we are super safe with them and they all get put away when it's not "balloon time" any more. :)

So here is a picture of the wall unit that my hubby just built for me... It was built to have a certain size plastic tub in each section, I just don't have the tubs yet. The closet that has all the stuff stacked in it is getting shelves built for it right now and will also have more plastic tubs to keep everything organized. I wanted more stuff packed up and away to have more space in the playroom. Plus rotating toys keeps the kids interested.

A closer look, I can't wait to get the tubs so that it looks less cluttered, but I really love it already. I'm so thankful that I can dream up something and my husband will make it for me!

So there you have it, that was a lot for one post... I have so many other things I'd like to post about but some how it never happens. I think I've been spending too much of my computer time on face book and then I don't have time left to blog... need to switch that around!

Contemplating myself...

2011-12-10T08:40:00.000-08:00

I wonder what it mean that I always feel a need to have an abundance of things. I don't think of myself as a material person. But I always want everything to be full in my life. From book selves, to food shelves, dresser drawers, and closets. If I see an empty self I want to fill it... it feels wrong to me to have say a desk top empty, it feels like wasted space. And that's what it always boils down to, wasted space. I don't like to waste. So maybe that is more of the issue, not a want of things. I'm reading a book right now called The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin, it's a pretty good book. I started thinking about my need to keep things filled up when I read a section of her book where she was talking about how some told her it makes them happy to have an empty self some where in their house where they keep nothing. Just an empty shelf, full of possibilities. And that made them happy. Not me, that would never make me happy. It's funny how so many things in life are not a one size fits all sort of thing. In another section of the book some one else was telling her that you need to always have a junk drawer for many different reasons... now that one rang true for me, hahaha! But in fact I have way too many junk drawers, I have boxes of junk that I can't seem to part with, don't know what to do with it... that doesn't necessarily make me happy, so I guess it's all in moderation. I do know that having an organized house makes me feel happy, but so does being surrounded by happy mementos which is why all surfaces of my house are covered... ha! I like to feel full. I like my shelves being full. I feel better when our food shelves are stuffed to over flowing. I like my house being full of kids, and kid stuff. I like going through my box of saved cards from birthdays and holiday. I could go on and on. I never really noticed this before I read her book though. And so it make me wonder, why does it make me happy? And I find it interesting that when not kept in moderation, which happens often, the same thing that makes me happy starts to drive me crazy. Like when it starts to turn into clutter, or when I run out of room to store things properly, or when I keep thing that serve no purpose anymore... in this I could also go on and on. I have a hard time throwing things away. I do feel better when I thrift or gift, or recycle when possible. I'm trying to get better at this. In the last couple months I've been slowly tackling the clutter factor, the drawers over flowing with stuff {junk drawers, and in reality boxes and bags stuffed in closets...} the shed where every thing gets shoved to when I don't know what else to do with it, the excess in clothes, etc... I'm starting to realize that what makes me happy in smaller amounts, drains me in larger amounts. I'm parting with things I really didn't think I would part with. I'm going to keep a junk drawer {or two} and a few memory boxes, but I'm feeling a desperate need for a little less clutter. I won't ever have an empty shelf though, that is just not me... and that's okay. :)

Insert a little black cloud right above my head...

2011-12-05T06:24:00.000-08:00

I've been a wretched, nasty, mean and super agitated wife and mother lately and I'm ashamed. I really want to change, and every night I go to bed thinking about how desperately I want to change, then the next day comes and it's the same thing all over again. I'm just a grump. The morning usually starts off well, and I make it through the main part of the day okay, although I feel like I distance myself from my kids in order to do it. Stick to the schedule, get done what needs to be done, stay a professional {because of the daycare}. Then the evening {and weekends to be prefectly honest} comes and snappy mean mom comes out. I start feeling behind and burnt out and frustrated and just generally tired. Tired of the non-stop cleaning, tired of the non-stop reminders, tired of breaking up arguments and bickering, tired of correcting behavior, tired of preparing meals, tired of all the noise... really I could go on and on. Why am I in this negative place. I can be an anxious person, I've had to fight that my whole life, but this is maybe more depressed or something. Maybe I need to get my thyroid check. Or just get more sleep instead of staying up late enjoying a little time with less demands. Why can I not stay focused on the positive for more then two seconds? Why am I not enjoying my kids more? Why do I want to run away? {Not for real, just in my head...} Why do I feel so overwhelmed all the time? I want so desperately to be a better mom, and I feel so frustrated with myself because I feel like I know what I need to do but I just don't stick to it. I need to be more loving, I need to spend more time just being with them... I know that sounds funny coming from a stay at home mom but I get so caught up in taking care of the house and all the other day to day stuff, and the daycare that I forget to just stop and really spend time with them. I want to change my attitude so bad, I act stressed out and frustrated way to much. I want to appear {and feel} relaxed and happy more often. How do I get there? I want to be a mom that really enjoys her kids, and hardly ever raises her voice, stays calm and collected... has fun, acts silly and lightens up the mood in the house, and I want to be that mom on a regular basis. With out my house falling apart while I'm playing... I really wish I didn't care about that part so much but I do. So I guess I need to make keeping the house clean fun as well, know how do I do that?

...and one more makes seven...

2011-11-09T06:52:00.000-08:00

Meet our newest family member... Max.He's ten weeks old and super adorable! I saw his picture yesterday morning and just got this feeling that he was the perfect kitty for our family. The kids had been talking about getting a pet for a while now {Although it's mostly been talk about a dog, but I'm just not ready for that... so I guess I'm trying to buy myself some time, haha!} I had started thinking about a cat and looking around for one. Just looking and getting ideas. I didn't think we would be getting one for another month or so. But I just couldn't pass him up! In my mind the perfect cat would be a big fluffy orange long haired male cat. And there he was! He turned out to not be as orange as I thought, but you know what it doesn't matter because he's still gorgeous. A Carmel Vanilla Swirl... yummy. :) So far he's just a doll, really sweet. Hopefully it will stay that way, he's definitely been well loved and very use to people. He's litter box trained {a must} and seems to be doing fine with that as well. Seems really healthy and well balanced. So far we couldn't be happier.

Isn't he just adorable!

A day {or three} late and a dollar short...

2011-11-03T08:08:00.000-07:00

Happy Halloween!Some how I deleted the pictures of us carving pumpkins before downloading them, sadness. But I did get some cute pictures of them in their Halloween costumes.

We had a house full of super heroes and kitties this year. :)

I would say the kitties out numbered the super heroes except that my hubby is a super hero whether he dresses up or not... ;) So it was a well balanced night, apparently kitties and super heroes can live in harmony. Plus kitties always need a super hero to rescue them, haha!

My adorable little kitten. She was a puppy for our Harvest party, but she got too hot in that outfit so she gladly switched over to a cute little kitty, that barks. ;)

Meow... Atty picked out kitty ears and that was all he was willing to wear, he's never been big on the Halloween outfits. I found a black shirt and pants, add some whiskers, and ta da, black cat!

This boys makes the best super man if you ask me! He's my super hero!

Spike went with spider man once again... his favorite. He's also been wearing it ever since, every where we go, even to bed! I just talked him out of it last night, because superheroes need clean clothes you know! He asked me first thing this morning if I'd washed it yet...

Kitties! It's sort of turned into a tradition that I am a cat every Halloween, and even though I'm a bit bored with it and my outfit/face paint gets more and more boring every year I can't seem to stop. Ha!

We had a great Halloween, at home. We played hide and seek for a super long time and the kids loved it, it was a lot of fun. The kids were a bit disappointed with our measly 5 trick-or-treaters though. They were pretty excited about the idea of being involved with Halloween by at least handing out trinkets... and then hardly a soul showed up. Ah well... I can't say that I personally mind all that much, I would hate to live in one of those neighborhoods that get slammed on Halloween but I was sort of wishing for a little bit more excitement for my kids since they were being such great sports about staying home and skipping on the candy. One problem we have is with the porch light, we have motion lights so it looks like our porch light is out until you start up the walk... I think some people skipped over our house because of that. Although we did have our awesome jack-o-lanterns going... and there were little faces peeking out the window all night. Might have to figure out a solution for the porch light next year. Who knows maybe we might be brave enough to take the kids trick-or-treating again next year. Atty might be old enough at that time to be okay with trading his candy for toys or money... if that ends up being the case we won't even be home, problem solved. ;)

Harvest Party!

2011-10-31T07:50:00.000-07:00

Once again we had a Harvest Party to celebrate the fall season and had our own version of Halloween fun... and it was a blast! Because Atty can't have any candy {as well as lots of other foods most people can have} we've had to get pretty creative to make it an over all fun experience for everyone. My dearest friend came over with her girls again and my mom and sister showed up. Always more fun with loved ones there!All dressed up and ready for the festivities to start! First up... Hay rides! Haha, it was a silly little thing but the kids thought it was lots of fun! Get a red wagon, a wheelbarrow, and some straw and you've got yourself a funny Harvest party hay ride parade!

I got the giggles thinking about what the neighbors must have been thinking watching our strange little spectacle...

I wasn't the only one with the giggles though, there were giggles all around, it's fun to get silly!

The kiddos seemed to have the most fun playing in the straw afterwards though... go figure. Kind of like the box is more fun the the present at Christmas time, haha!

Even grown ups got in on the fun... I wasn't about to because I hate being itchy! So I did what I do best, took lots of pictures!

No one else seemed to care much about getting itchy though... :)

After all the hay fun we went inside to do a craft, fall themed stick puppets. It was a lot of fun, but I don't have any pictures of that as it took every adult there to keep down on the chaos and lend a helping hand.

Then after a little bit of free play to get their wiggles out we moved onto... Pumpkin Play dough! I made my first batch of pumpkin play dough, and it was a hit!!! It smells super yummy and it was the perfect texture, the kids had a blast with it using fall cookie cutters to create with.

They played with the play dough for quite a while before moving on to the next thing...

And while they were doing that some of us grown ups were whipping up some yummy treats in the kitchen!

But before we started in our our harvest feast we just had to have a treasure hunt!

The kids loved it just as much this year and they did last year... maybe even more. I added more clues and made them a little harder and they still did amazingly well! They all worked together to find their gift bags full of harvest treasure. This year I did add a couple chocolate/peanut butter balls for the kids and just left one bag without and clearly labeled for Atty... Then I got Atty his chocolate freezer "candies" and it worked out really well. I just made sure to get the chocolate for the other kids out of the bulk section so that it wasn't wrapped, that way it doesn't look too different from his "candy". They all ended up with a treat and everyone was happy. :)

Spiders! The kids loved this... and it was super easy. We also had chili and cornbread, little sausages, an apple tasting tray, Atty's bread, and sausages Atty could have as well as some yummy fresh apple cider.

Festive!

Getting ready to feed some hungry kids.

After dinner we had to read our "spooky" book, in the dark, by flashlight of course! What Was I So Afraid Of? by Dr. Suess, love that glow in the dark book.

Love their faces!

After the book we all ate yummy pumpkin cookies over vanilla ice cream. Atty had his own almond flour cookies over homemade coconut milk ice cream

It was a lot of fun and we even got to follow it up with a movie and sleep over! I was planning on going a little bigger with the party this year, but none of the other people I invited ended up being able to come... you know what I realized though, it's actually a lot nicer keeping it little and I'm thankful it stayed that way. Of course we would have been happy to see any one of our other friends show up, but I'm thinking from now on I will continue to keep it little with just Iva and I getting together with our kiddos. {and Neenee and Auntie are always welcome as well!} It just makes it more relaxed and gives us {meaning Iva and I} more of a chance to enjoy ourselves instead of rushing around trying to keep everything fun and on time and everything else involved in a bigger party... Anyway another successful Harvest party, and I'm so glad my kids could have some fun, they've been such troopers about not trick-or-treating any more {because of Atty's diet}. Tonight we will be handing out candy free treats, little trinkets, to any trick-or-treaters that show up at our door and I think we will get dressed up as well to do that... maybe have some popcorn and a movie and enjoy this Halloween {candy free} at home together. :)

Picking pumpkins over the years...

2011-10-24T21:26:00.000-07:00

When I was posting the pictures of our pumpkin picking adventure this year I started thinking about pumpkin outings of the past. So we are going to go down a memory trail of the last six years... hold onto your hats!

Even though Bubu was born right before pumpkin season in 2005 I don't think we went to a patch with him, and even if we did it would be in a photo album somewhere and not on the computer, and well that's just to much work... so we are starting in...

~2006~

This is the pumpkin field we use to go to before we moved, fun but actually sort of expensive as well, didn't really notice it with only one kid though...

Little baby Bubu, back when it was just the three of us.

~2007~Three rapidly expanded into five and by the time the next pumpkin season rolled around we weren't a little family any more!
We went back to Stocker Farms that year, but realized that soon we wouldn't be able to afford it. We never ended up looking for another one around there though because we moved...

My little baby pumpkin, Spike! He had {has} melt your heart big blue eyes!

This picture cracks me up, looks as if they are both working hard on filling those diapers! Or maybe they were just working on their tough guy stares, haha!

The big brother, he has been a great big brother from the very beginning, and he had a crash course in big brother!

~2008~

Babies getting bigger!

We tried out a new pumpkin field after we moved and it was fun, but expensive...

Actually got J to sit for a picture as well! These were the days when it was five boys in the house... and me. Crazy!

Poor Atty wasn't feeling well on this day... but I still love this first family pumpkin picture, finally one with all of us in it!

~2009~

Baby girl! Yes there is a baby inside that wrap, it was cold and she was newly born and so I wanted to keep her snugly. :)
Once again the family grows!

This was a yet another "pumpkin patch" we tried out after our move... not a hit with us, it was at a nursery and they just had pumpkins sitting around to pick out, we like the pumpkin field experience ourselves, so we never went back. The search for the perfect {and not to expensive} pumpkin patch continues...

~2010~

And we found it! Stoney Ridge Farms is the place to go! Love this family picture of us all again.
Amazing how fast the kids grow!

Baby Lala exploring the pumpkin field, so cute!

~2011~

This year was the first year my hubby couldn't come with us, sadness. I still love this group shot though, really shows how much the kids have grown! Do I really have that many kids!?! How could that be possible I'm still in my early twenties right?

Looking forward to many more pumpkin patch pictures!

Still our favorite pumpkin patch!

2011-10-24T20:35:00.000-07:00

We went to Stoney Ridge Farms again this year and I just love that place! It's clean and crafty and not to expensive. There always lots to do, like looking at the animal, playing on the play equipment, going in the corn maze, picking out apples to eat, and of course finding the perfect pumpkin! Holding his sister's hand, so sweet!

This picture cracks me up, two serious faces and two goofy faces, haha!

Showing me their favorite picture. I love all the art work and crafty ideas here. So much eye candy... ;)

My little pumpkins...

Wow they have grown!

It's amazing how much a kid can grow in a year!!!

The animals are always a favorite with my kids. This pony was so sweet.

Even though we have chickens at home the kids spent a ridiculous amount of time gazing at these cluckers... silly kids.

I have a picture of Lala last year next to this same wagon... and she was sooooo much tinier. Sigh.

Do I really have this many kids? Ryder had to work, so he is sadly missing from our family pumpkin picking photos. :( My hard working man.

Lala got the flower head band for her birthday, I love it on her but the only way she will wear it for any amount of time is if I tell her it's a hat... which doesn't work inside of course. Bummer.

My brother Ben and his family showed up and hung out with us. It worked out perfect because my mom met us there and then when she left they showed up so I didn't end up being on my own with the kids. Which is always less stressful, and a happy mommy makes for a better time for all. :)

The boys had a blast going through the corn maze with their uncle Ben, they love that guy! Lala and her girly cousin had fun too, at a much slower pace.

Spike spotted a perfect pumpkin...

Girls just had to have a wagon ride. These two play so well together, I'm glad Lala has a cousin so close in age and they live near enough that the girls can hang out together often. Lala needs that being the only girl and all.

Bubu was determined to find the biggest and best pumpkin of them all!

Such a funny picture, I love it! Uncle Ben was being quite silly and in doing so managed to get all the kiddos looking his way! Awesome.

Even though I'm super sad that our annual fall pumpkin patch picture is missing a huge part of us I'm still glad we got one. And we had a really great time. Plus we found some great pumpkins, and brought home some of the best apples I have ever tasted!

We will be back next year Stoney Ridge!

Changes...

2011-10-22T07:27:00.000-07:00

Life has been busy. Which is good, but sometimes I want to slow down. I have a feeling that with four kids there won't be any slowing down for a very long time.

Yesterday I spent some time rearranging the kids rooms. We are going to have Spike and Lala share a room for a while instead of having all three boys in one room as before. Then eventually {if we are still in this house, which it looks like we will be now... not the original plan} then we will give the boys our bigger bedroom and move into the smaller one. Lala will be old enough then that she will need her own room. I still haven't found a bunk bed for Spike and Lala in our price range but it had to be done regardless. So he's sleeping on the floor {on a mattress} in his new bedroom with the promise of a bunk bed soon... I moved big heavy dressers by myself yesterday and I'm feeling it today. I get so impatient to get things done that I don't use common sense some times. I know that my back goes out easily now a days, but I just wanted it done. Hopefully it won't get too bad, last time around I was on the floor crying, with my back out, begging my sister on the phone to come help me.
Anyways, one of the main reasons for the switch is because I want Lala to have a regular bedtime with her brothers and go to sleep on her own with out someone laying down with her. The boys have each other and I am pretty sure Lala would not want to sleep alone in her room. We once tried having Spike sleep alone in his own room to see if it would be a better sleeping arrangement and he feel apart, it was horrible... We tried for a week or so and he screamed and cried every night until I switched him back. It wasn't worth it. I don't want to start out that way with Lala. All of my children have been slowly transitioned into sleeping on their own. I've nursed and laid with my children until they feel asleep until around two years old and then slowly taught them how to go to sleep on their own. Slowly... as in the first night I sat by their bed until they feel asleep, then a few nights later the middle of the floor and then once they were okay with that the door and slowly leaving the doorway earlier and earlier before they were asleep. Sometimes going back to sitting in the hallway if they weren't going to sleep {Atty has a really hard time going to sleep sometimes and after his seizures would come out of his room over and over again. It took some serious camping out in the hallway and repeatedly putting him back in bed with out talking before he finally figured out he would be required to stay in his bed... there were moments I didn't think it would ever happen. He is the only one that still gives me night time trouble.} The first night all the boys went to sleep on their own after hugs and kisses and walking out of the room I wanted to throw a party. But that of course had the potential to wake them up again... so we just watched a movie together and marveled and the novelty. :) Now the boys are all really great sleepers, they don't fight bedtime, aren't afraid to go to sleep, and for the most part go right to bed {except again, Atty}. We read, tuck them in, hugs/kisses and prayers and I walk out. Now it's time to make that the norm for Lala. Last night you could have scooped my jaw up off the floor. After nursing her for just a moment I told her she was going to go lay down in the bedroom and that Spike was in there now too. I carried her in there, laid her down, gave her hugs and kisses and she marveled at how Spike was in there, I told her he was sleeping and she started whispering, it was so cute. Because I've already been tucking her in and then laying at the end of her bed for a while now until she feel asleep I decided to say night-night and walked out... I'll admit I was cringing. Expecting tears or footsteps in the hallway. I stood in the kitchen waiting... and waiting... and waiting. Not a noise. For the first time in a long time every kiddos in the house went to bed, just like that. It was unbelievable. I'm not going to even hope that it's going to be that easy with her, but wouldn't that be cool! I think it helped that Spike was already asleep, which I won't be able to count on every time as I'm going to start laying her down at the same time as him soon... but still it was beautiful and there is a light at the end of the tunnel! Even though I am excited about this new transition, it's bitter sweet at the same time because it just means yet again that they are all growing up so fast. For me it truly signals the end of the baby/toddler years. No longer will any of them need me to snuggle them to sleep {well maybe occasionally, a girl can hope right}. Their pudgy little arms wrapped around my neck as they drift off to dream land. I have this tendency to get busy, busy, busy and with nursing or snuggling the kiddos to sleep it's always forced me to slow down and be in that moment with them, be physically close to them and just breath in that bond. It's also always gave me a good excuse to kick up my feet and read a book, haha! Oh well, guess I just need to figure out a good snuggle time and schedule that into our day so that it's never pushed to the side or forgotten. Not that I don't hug and snuggle and express love to my children every day... but I think any mom, especially one with many children can understand how the day can fly by and before you can come to terms with it your kids are in bed and you realize you didn't get enough quality snuggle time in. Projects, house cleaning, school, work, etc... got in the way and you forgot to pause and really snuggle up those kids. Always before I had bed time to make up for that, guaranteed snuggles as they drifted off. Now I'll just have to figure out something else that works for us. Maybe each night I'll lay down and snuggle a different kiddos for a moment, a little special time with mommy. Life with children is a constant readjustment.
Interested to see how it goes tonight, and really anxious to find a bunk bed! I also want to paint the kids bedrooms, maybe this spring, and get some more shelves in there so they can start keeping some of their special toys in their bedrooms instead of the playroom. Especially Bubu because he's starting to like the "bigger boy" toys like Lego's and we can't have those in the daycare playroom with the little kids. I also want to sew some curtains for their rooms for the closets and windows. Haven't don't that in a long time! The kids actually have really boring rooms, we've focused most of the fun in the playroom, so I'd really like to do some room make overs in there in the next year. :)
Well I've ran out of rambling time, so off I go running, busy, busy day ahead!

Where's the oobie fairy?

2011-10-10T13:54:00.000-07:00

I think my little girl is going to be hard to wean...

I've never made it this far with any of the boys, I always got pregnant again and it was uncomfortable to nurse them and made me feel super grumpy so for both of our sakes I always weaned them to a bottle. Then at two the bottle fairy always came and took the bottles, left a treat, and that was the end of that. Not happening that way this time and I am at a loss. Part of me wants to wean her and another part of me doesn't really care just yet. She hardly nurses, just once before nap time and once before bed. I tried cutting out the nap time one today because she just turned two and I figure I should start in that direction. But she started crying and saying "sorry mommy, sorry mommy" and it killed me. Seriously, I'm tearing up just thinking about it. I kept telling her there wasn't anything to be sorry about, that she didn't do anything I just wanted her to take a bottle and we would snuggle, but she was heart broken. I teetered on the edge of being hard hearted about it and firming my resolve, but I just don't care enough yet to do that. So I nursed her and she was so sweet and happy and then fell blissfully to sleep. Which is so much better then what would have happened if I had continued to insist on a bottle. There is a huge part of me that feels guilty nursing Lala longer then I did her brothers. If I wean her now then it's not too much different then it was with them, but if I take a more relaxed approach {Which is what I was planning on doing with all of them before the whole pregnant while breast feeding thing got factored in.} I feel like they didn't get a fair deal and it makes me feel bad. Not that the reasoning really makes any since or should be a consideration for her... but there it is in my mind none the less... What's a girl to do? She's my last baby and I just don't feel as rushed with her as I did with the boys. With them, in retrospect, I was so rushed and strict about what happened when... keeping them all on the same schedule, doing it all the same. But with Lala it's all been different, some in little ways, others in big ways. I don't know if it's because she's a girl, or she's the last, or I'm just tired and more lazy. I'm definitely way more tired... and old. I guess I've just relaxed more on some things and don't feel so uptight about it all any more. Either way, she is not going to be an easy one to wean, because she plays me like a fiddle, and because I just don't really feel this big push to wean her this time around... Not saying I'm going to nurse her until she's five or anything, I guess today is just not the day. And neither is tomorrow...

I'd have to say that the bottle fairy makes things a whole lots easier!

Where's the oobie fairy when you need her?

{Oobie is what all my kiddos have called nursing.}

Birthday party madness!

2011-10-09T20:15:00.000-07:00

I'm thinking these pictures shout it loud and clear...
Cute little birthday girl!

Reading her card from her brother, so sweet...

Lala made this face over all of her presents this year, really adorable!

Make a wish my little strawberry shortcake...

To the moon! {or where ever super cuties go...}

Awesome dress up birthday party with friends!

Love these girls, the girl in pink I started watching her when she was three months old! Wow time flies!!!

Birthday present aftermath.... ahhhhhh!

Such sweet gifts, and such wonderful friends!

Happy birthday and a fruit pizza to you!

The big two year old sporting her new red shoes! She's lucky to have an Auntie that always keeps her stylin' ;)

Lala even got to end all this birthday party madness with a sleep over with her bestest friend... I'm thinking that was the best part.

My little two year old had one amazing birthday!

{Well actually two celebrations...}

I blinked, why do I keep doing that?

2011-10-04T21:21:00.000-07:00

She's two! I can't believe she's two! My baby turns two today!!!I couldn't have dreamed up a more brilliant, beautiful, wonderful you. You brighten our lives with your wild self, your sassy silly attitude. The stuff you say blows me away, the games you come up with, the things you do. All that you have accomplished in two short years. I say short because truly it feels like I blinked.

How do I have a fully potty trained, speaking in sentences, independent thinking little girl... where did my baby go? My last little baby. When did the rolls disappear, you're not even a round little toddler any more. I have a tall, skinny, leggy little girl now and I just don't see how that can be possible. It seems the harder I try to hold on and make things slow down the faster they go... I'm trying not to be sad about it because I love watching you grow... but all I have now of the baby years is pictures. You've all grown up on me. My babies, no longer babies...not even my last little one.

Bye-bye baby years, hello to the big kids. Good thing I have lots and lots of pictures.

"I am a puppy!"

2011-09-29T08:55:00.000-07:00

This girl is convinced she is a puppy! She loves all things puppy, she pretends she is a puppy, she talks about puppies all day long... She found an old pair of pj's that once belonged to a brother and she wants to wear them every single night now, actually she wants to wear them all day long as well.I would say it's adorable, except she takes it a little too far. You see my girl is potty trained {thank goodness!} and wears undies all day long, keeps her diaper dry at night, totally and completely potty trained... except for one little thing. She likes to poop in the back yard... like a puppy. Yes, you read that right. I am at a loss for what to do. It's getting pretty ridiculous. A couple days ago I caught her once again getting ready to poop in the yard and I said the first thing that came to mind. "Leiella you are not a puppy! You don't poop outside, you poop in the toilet!" To which she replied "I am a puppy!" What followed was a never ending argument about whether or not she was a puppy... yeah it wasn't my best moment. But seriously, you are not a puppy. I'm all about kids using their imagination, but there is a line... and pooping in the yard crosses my line. Big time. I do not like doing poop checks in the backyard when I don't even own a dog! Never imagined as a parent hearing my boys shouting "MoM, Lala's pooping in the yard again!" Good Grief. I've given up on convincing her she is not a puppy and instead I'm working on convincing her that even puppies get potty trained... not that I've ever seen a dog use a toilet, but hey I did say I'm all about imagination right!?!

Let it go... but keep the beauty.

2011-09-28T06:55:00.000-07:00

Yesterday a very nice older gentleman came over and measured our playroom for carpet. {So excited!} He ended up being here for over an hour talking my ear off! I was actually already told that he was a talker, and boy was he! Over all he was very nice, but there was one comment he made that hit me hard. It was made when he glanced at our wedding picture above the cabinet. See I was pregnant when I got married. So he saw it and commented on the fact. He was just one of those guys that says what ever he's thinking and it wasn't meant in a mean way, but it hurt all the same. Because I know that others have wondered the same... if Ryder and I got married simply because I was pregnant. And it bothers me. I feel like I need to explain my wedding picture every time some one notices it. I feel like I need to tell people that we met when I was 15. That we were together, and dedicated to each other for years and years and years before we got married. That it was me not him that had hang ups about getting married. That he proposed to me before I was pregnant and we had already picked a date... so we stuck with it even after I got pregnant before the wedding. That there was no shot gun involved.
I hate that I feel this need to justify and explain my wedding day. It was one of the most beautiful days of my life, held second only to the first time I held each of my children in my arms and gazed into their little faces. {So I guess technically it's 5th?}

I've had people assume that we had a little wedding at the river because I was pregnant. Like I was hiding out or something. We had a little wedding because it was perfect for us. That's it. We got married at the same place Ryder proposed to me, and we had the people who were the absolute closest to us at the time at our wedding and that's all we felt we needed. Not that we didn't love everyone else, we just didn't want everything diluted with all the pomp and fuss that goes into a big wedding. It was already planned that way and had nothing to do with being pregnant.

I look at these picture and I remember how I felt and how everything seemed perfect. Flooded with love. Marrying the love of my life, and being pregnant with my first born, I was overflowing with good feelings. I hate that I do often wish I wasn't pregnant in my wedding photos now, that I feel embarrassed about it. Because of the comments and looks. It takes away from those really good feelings, and I hate that. I really do.
It sometimes makes me want to cry. I shouldn't want to cry when I look at my wedding photos. I shouldn't let what other people think bother me so much. But I do, that's just me.

How can I though, looking at these pictures? You can see the love, the excitement. I know the truth, the reasons. I need to let the rest go.

I need to embrace these photos and see them for what they are... photos of a very happy, very pregnant women marrying the only man she has ever loved. Living a dream.
Yes we were together for 11 years before we got married and we are still together 7 years after getting married and we love each other just as much. If not more. And that if you ask me is beautiful.

I need to let it go. Maybe I'll just put a different wedding picture up, one of just our happy shining faces so that I no longer have to deal with comments from people who don't understand. But then I feel like I'm trying to hide the fact that I was pregnant and I don't make apologies for that. I don't regret that, not one tiny little bit.

Feeling my son kicking around in my tummy and being with loved one, everything felt so very complete and perfect and whole.

If I'm being perfectly honest the only thing I truly regret is that I looked as big as a house in my wedding dress... but that's just vanity talking. :)

Another {birth} day has passed

2011-09-19T19:46:00.000-07:00

Sigh.

I'm not even going to pretend I feel good about it, because I don't. Yes I'm thankful to be here on earth and with my family, yes I want to enjoy every minute of that. It's just the getting old part that's getting to me. The little things.

Last night at the grocery store I had Leiella with me at the check out stand. She started to throw a fit about some thing and so I crouched down to talk to her. The check out lady interrupted me and when I looked up she said "oh I just wanted to see your face" and in her hands was a bottle of wine. Apparently one glance at my face told her all because she most certainly didn't ask for my ID.

I've got greys I need to cover and 20 extra pounds I need to lose and I'm not feeling so good about my aging self. There doesn't seem to be a spare moment in the day that I can take for me. This last year and a half with all the craziness of Atty's health issues, his diet and having a baby {who is still not totally weaned by the way} plus the fact that I have four little kids to raise... well lets just say I've let myself go in a lot of ways. And I'm feeling kind of sad about it, but I seriously don't have the energy to do anything about it, I hardly have the energy to take a shower. So I really shouldn't complain, but complain I will because this is my blog and well getting older is hard. For me. I recently glanced at my reflection in the window of our van while pumping gas and I could spot all sorts of new lines, and my face just looks old. Some where along the way it lost it's youthful look and I'm really not quite sure when that happened. I don't feel old enough to look this old, well that's not totally true some days I feel ancient. Okay most days I feel ancient. Bleck. I guess I should look this old.

I went and got some henna for my hair so that's a little step. Haven't had a spare moment to put it in though, that's a whole different thing. But I have it, so that counts right? I also talked to my husband and he told me to go ahead and get the Curves membership I've been dragging my feet about. I hate to spend extra money like that but I really don't like going on walks by myself and work out video were just so not working. The moment I'd put one on every one of the kids would need something different, or they'd start getting into something or whatever. It just wasn't working. We don't have anywhere to put exercise equipment, so I've ran out of options. I don't want a gym membership, had one to many experiences with creepy guys at gyms, course now that I'm old it might not be such a problem any more... hummmmm. In all seriousness I'm going to try and force myself to join Curves {I like the all women thing} I did it after I had Bubu and thought it was wonderful. I do hate signing up for memberships though, guess I need to get over that if I don't want to be 20 lbs over weight any more.

Maybe I'll just end up one of those bitter old ladies that is over weight but doesn't do anything about it and just complains all day. Fun.

One week down... the homeschooling has begun!

2011-09-17T09:27:00.000-07:00

Our school year has started... and I've already had a melt down, ha ha! We took a day off after our road trip and started on a Tuesday instead, even so Tuesday hit me like a ton of bricks and all the sudden I felt totally overwhelmed. This is the first year I've done Kindergarten with anyone, I've always taught preschool in the daycare and last year I did preK with Bubu which is just a little step up from preschool so it didn't really phase me. This year there are a lot more subjects to cover in more detail and something about that threw me off. Also I think it will take a while to get into the groove of things and everything just felt really forced and unnatural. Add in to that two toddlers who weren't use to the change yet and wanted to climb all over me and do what Bubu was doing and two more kids who wanted in on the action and I just really felt the whole thing spelled disaster. Thankfully it's gotten better since then...There is always an adjustment period when you change a schedule with children or throw new things in. Our daycare schedule hasn't changed but with the added home school schedule for Bubu thrown in there it's definitely changed our day. After that first day and a melt down the next morning just thinking about starting the day, I've made some changes and things have gone a lot smoother.
The problem was mostly me, as usual. I'm afraid of failure. Always have been, so much so that it's held me back in life in a lot of ways. It hit me all the sudden that I could fail big time with this and I sort of froze up for a moment. I let it overwhelm me and started doubting myself and my ability to teach my children. I had to take a step back, speak with my husband and some homeschooling friends and supporters, and get my perspective back. I know that homeschooling fits our family best, at least at this moment, and so I am willing to throw myself whole heartedly into it.
I've also made the decision not to take on another daycare kid even if a good opportunity presents it's self. In fact I feel at this present moment that I am done taking on any new families ever. My current family is planning on having one more and I only have one more available opening anyways so I will be open to watching a second child of theirs and that's it. Even so that leaves about seven more years of childcare. That's enough for me. Hopefully at that time I will be able to stop daycare and focus on my children's schooling alone. At that time I will have ran a daycare for about 14 years! It will be hard for me to call an end to my childcare but I have a feeling it will be the best decision. If it wasn't for the love I feel towards my little daycare kid and my desire to watch him {and the fact that the family is a blessing to work with} I would call it quits now, even though that wouldn't be the wises financial decision. But he really does fit into our family dynamic well and so it doesn't add in a lot more stress then say my daughter alone. The only issue is the work it takes running a daycare and following all the daycare protocol as well as keeping my house in running order and cleaned up enough to open each day. That is actually the most stressful part for me right now. Sometimes I just want to be able to relax the schedule a bit, or leave the kitchen a mess in order to work on something with the kids, things like that. But I can't and that is what overwhelms me the most and causes the anxiety I feel. I hate feeling behind or having to rush to catch up, and I feel like my days are consistently like that right now. All those down times I use to spend cleaning and catching up are now spent teaching... where do I fit in the cleaning with out driving myself mad and staying up until midnight?
All that being said I do love teaching my children. It's exciting. And when I let go of the other stuff and focus on that it's a lot of fun!
We have some really great materials this year. I pieced together a kindergarten curriculum for Bubu for this school year but next year we will be using the full Sonlight curriculum. If I was braver and more confident I would love to put my own curriculum together, but for now I will rely on a really great program to do that for me. :) That way I know for a fact that every thing that needs to be covered is in fact being covered. There is a lot of book reading and less work books and text books in this curriculum so I feel that it fits our family well.

I spent some time organizing a corner of our playroom to fit our needs. I've changed it around a few times since then and it still doesn't feel perfect but it's almost there. The kids have easy access to the things they need and their own spaces for their school projects and papers. I have space for everything I need and it flows pretty well.

I organized and rearranged our art shelves in the laundry room, which is right next to the playroom. I made room for each kid to have their own shelf for their school work and such. I was going to move this into the playroom but for now I think it might be best out of the way {and out of the hands of the little ones}. It's easy enough to get to.

I posted Bubu schedule so that it was easy for me to see and know what comes next. I've already changed it a few times to make the day go smoother, it's all a learning process. I have the bulletin boards all prepared, although I might move them closer to the learning corner. I do wish that the school corner was a bit more separated from the play room but there really isn't anything I can do about that right now, and I also need a table and chair set up that is better for little kids, so that their feet can touch the floor. That I just have to figure out here in the next few weeks, maybe find a shorter table/chair set up or just make the current one shorter... not sure yet. Our school day right now is from 8:30 to 3 at the latest, broken up by breaks and snack/lunch. We are doing a 4 day schedule with Fridays used more freely. Sometimes they will be used for bigger projects, or any catching up that needs to be done. Sometimes we might just take a Friday off to enjoy the sunshine, or take a breather. Maybe even use them to go on a field trip. Who knows, but for use the four day a week works best for now. You'd be amazed by how fast you can cover a subject with just a kid {or four}.

So there you have it, our first week. The ups and downs and all. :) I will try to post more about our year, mostly so that I can look back on it all, hopefully with fondness. ;)

Road trip!

2011-09-14T08:08:00.000-07:00

We had an amazingly wonderful trip to eastern Washington. My sister and I went with the kiddos over to a friend's house for the first time ever. We were going to tent camp one night, but at the last minute I found out there were cabins at the campground and I reserved one of those instead... soooooo glad I did. I might be ready to tent camp next year with the kids, but for now it's cabins for us. We went fairly slowly on the way there, making a few stop and having some fun. First major stop {Besides potty breaks, egads going on a road trip with a recently potty trained little girl... yikes. She did a great job though, even if we had to stop Way Too Many Times!} was at the Chelan County Historical Museum in Cashmere. Lala was seriously enthralled with this poor bear. I think she thought it was real at first. She kept wanting to go back and stare at it... There were A Lot of taxidermied animals at this museum... not my favorite thing. But the information and artifacts were very interesting.

Our cabin was adorable, clean and comfortable. Only thing that would have made it better would have been if it had a fridge for our food... but it wasn't that sort of set up. We survived regardless. I brought a camp stove and we made a campfire as well. It was kind of neat to do all the camp stuff on our own... I'll admit I leave all that stuff up to my husband for the most part. :) I had everything well planned out and organized so the whole thing went off with out a hitch. Except for the part where Lala had like 4 accidents in a row after we set up camp... she made the whole drive dry and then just lost it. Lets just put it this way, she pooped at the playground in her underwear while we were way far away from our cabin, I had to bring her back and I got lost and was wandering around with a poopy little girl {I had thrown the nastiness away but she was still a mess} in super hot weather, tired out from all the driving, and at that point I didn't think the trip was very cool any more... thankfully it got better after that.
Such is life with little kids, the unexpected always happens. It's more about building memories for them, and practicing selective memory for myself. ;)

Cute little chaos creator... on her way to the bathroom, thank goodness.

My little trooper.

Crushing nuts with a rock, Bubu thought this was a super cool idea that his Auntie came up with. He thinks his auntie is the smartest person in the world... seriously. I try not to be insulted by that because she is admittedly one super smart lady. When I don't know the answer to something, or I'm just tired of the never ending questions I just say, "ask Auntie Rissa, she'll know". It's kind of fun some of the questions I send her way. :)

Atty finding bird feathers, of course.

This girl was super proud of her big girl swinging... she was even trying to pump, ha ha!

This camp ground had an really big fun play ground for the kids, they loved it!

If you are wondering by now why my daughter was running around in just her undies, it was hot, and she wasn't inclined to wear clothes and I didn't feel like a fight. So there you have it. At least she agreed to the undies, and sun hat...

This tree was a favorite with my little monkeys, right out side our cabin.

The view from our cabin.

The lake at the campground had a really nice swim spot for the kids. I'm thinking next year we are going to try and find a way to bring the hubby and stay for a few days. :)

Love my adorable sister. She took a day off work at the last minute for me just so I wouldn't have to go alone... and she had to work the day we got back, after a 6 hour drive home! I seriously couldn't have dreamed up a better little sister.

Bubu keeping his little brothers safe on the board walk. :) His idea. He's such a caring, loving big brother.

We were at Lincoln Rock State park, can you see Lincoln?

A super sweet lady offered to take a group photo for us, and also told us some really interesting local facts. Then we found out that although she grew up in that area she actually now lives right around where we do, as in minutes away! Small world.

Always have to find rocks to climb!

Love this sweet picture, with her little arm wrapped around her auntie's neck. She knows who to suck up to, considering her auntie will carry her everywhere... Mommy not so much.

The next day we hit the road around noon after a slow relaxed start. We took a few pictures along the way but not very many stops. Even so it seemed to take Forever to get to our destination this time. Dry yellow field and rocky canyons get old after a while...

Finally, reached our friends house, the kids were so excited to see their long lost friend. She use to be a daycare kid before they moved and my kids have missed her badly... We talk about her often, but they had no idea where she had gone to and they were excited to find out. :) Their back yard is of course dry, so there wasn't much grass and lots of awesome dusty dirt... which was super cool in their book. Wow did they get dirty fast! After being cooped up in the van I just let them have at it, and they had a blast!!!

We figured since they were already dirty and in need of a bath, why not make them sticky first too... haha! It was definitely a hot watermelon type day. I'm pretty sure Bubu could eat a whole watermelon on his own if I let him, he has always loved watermelon...

Ummmmmmm, yummy! Then off for some serious bathing. :)

The next day we were treated to a local fair. Lots of fun.

It happened to be my birthday as well and so my sister bought me a really cute tie-dye dress at the fair... I then bought my daughter and my sons some tie-dye as well. So cute.

Aren't they adorable!

We also headed to a local park, and Atty found a rainbow to hug, so funny.

Spike and his friend holding hands on the way home, sweetness.

We stayed two nights there and then woke up at 4 in the morning and hit the road because my sister needed to work and because I wanted the kids to sleep for as long as possible. They did end up sleeping for a few hours and my sister and I had some amazing conversations and got to view a beautiful harvest moon setting. It was really nice, possibly my favorite part of the trip, haha! We took a few pictures on the way back and stopped a couple times for potty breaks and to get breakfast out, but other then that it was straight home. My kids are troopers and really great road trip buddies. The only sad point was not being able to spend my birthday with my honey, but we celebrated when I got back and it just made the birthday fun last that much longer... not that I want to dwell on getting Older for very long.

Now we are full swing into our first week of school... more on that later. :)

Snapshots of summer

2011-09-06T07:34:00.000-07:00

Wow, as summer winds down {and a new school year is soon to begin} I am reflecting on how full and wonderful it truly was. We didn't do anything spectacular but we sure did have a lot of fun. And the kids grew before my very eyes! I've posted about some specific things we did, so this is a fill in the gaps sort of post. :)Sporting a beautiful dress and snow boots, haha! She knows what she wants to wear, and there is no talking her out of it now. It can be... interesting.

We played at a LOT of different park, we went park exploring. We are lucky to have some amazing parks in our area. Picnics at a park are a favorite in this family.

We also went on some amazing walks/hikes. Explored new places and old favorites. Add in a picnic with this as well, and you have a full day of fun!

Visited different spots at local rivers. Lots of great river spots around here too!

More fun at a river, most of the river banks around here are rocky, but our favorite spot which happens to be really close by is a sandy river bank, and we love it! We like the rocky spots too though, fun to throw rocks into the water and grab some for our collections. :)

This girl learned how to climb ALL OVER the play equipment this year, wow is she quick. She also wants to do it on her own and is quite amazing {and a bit scary}! I let her do most of it on her own{still ready to jump in when needed} and she has become very capable this year... and very proud of herself.

Our ladies have GROWN! They are laying 6-8 eggs a day now, and last week I stopped buying eggs at the store... We go through a crazy amount of eggs a week, so I'm really excited about this! Can't beat fresh eggs. Makes me want to figure out ways to be even more self reliant.

We went to a lot of really fun birthday parties. This one was their cousin's second birthday, and it was so much fun... Lala didn't go into the pool when she had her swimsuit on though, she waited until I dressed her and then went in, crazy girl!

Another fun party we went too, I asked Bubu to keep an eye on his sister for a moment {it was safe enough for him to do that} and when I turned back around he was holding her like this... adorable! He takes his job, as big brother, seriously. :)

Awesome rope swing, the boys all took turn, after turn, after turn... Wish we had a tree big enough to have one!

All the kids enjoyed this fun tire swing at the same house, Lala even enjoyed spinning on it with her brothers!

We want one of these, so relaxing...

Found this frog while gardening... there's been a lot of gardening this summer, always fun. The kids love helping me too, I'm lucky if I get a moment to sneak out there for quiet reflection alone because usually they beg to come with me.
{I love both, but sometimes I really do crave those quiet reflection moments in the garden alone.}

Lots of silly moments this summer, mostly from this kid... Don't ask, I have no idea why he is dressed up this way.

We went to a really great park with friends that has a water park and a petting zoo and just happened to have a fire truck to tour there too! The kids were sooooooo excited!!!

Little firefighters. ;)

Summer fun with my dear friend.

We had a few sleep overs with her and her girls and that is always a blast! Our kids play so well together and we have been friends for so long that it's just relaxing, we don't feel like we have to entertain each other, it's like hanging out with my little sister {which is also really fun}.

The kids loved the petting zoo, almost as fun as the real zoo... and not nearly as exhausting, plus this petting zoo is free, bonus! Of course there weren't any tigers and such but for now they seem to get just as excited about bunnies and pigs, so go figure.

More fun at a park... told you we went to a lot of parks, and I didn't even take pictures of all the park outings and hiking adventures. Parks are free and my goal this summer was lots of fun free {or really cheap} out door or educational activities. I really feel like I reached that goal {which doesn't happen often enough} and I'm excited to add on even more stuff next year. As well as some new favorites we discovered this year.

We found really fun water parks, free water play, so exciting! I guess I'm just lucky that my kids are easily entertained...

They were finding it a little cold, but that didn't stop them. They are Washingtonians after all, on the rainy side no less!

And then there were summer time haircuts, right at the end of summer, silly boys. Ryder got his hair cut my the local hair stylist {that would be me} and then all the boys decided they wanted to look like daddy. It was a bit harsh for me, cutting Atty's hair.

No summer time post would be complete with out some pictures of our favorite sandy river spot! Lala was jumping in puddles, so cute... Splashing like a big girl.

Then there was this little drama. I left her in my bedroom for a quick moment to take the sheets to the laundry room and she managed to smear a favorite lipstick of mine all over her face. Uggggggg, at least it wasn't poop painting {I screamed when I first saw her, fearing the worst}. Speaking of thinks potty related this girl is wearing big girl undies all day long now and having hardly any accidents. She's even napping in undies now, and waking up in the morning dry... So pretty soon here she won't be wearing a diaper to bed either! She is just growing up way too fast my girl.

I've been promising myself a new play room carpet as soon as she is fully potty trained {as an incentive to keep going on those really hard days...} so I'm getting pretty excited! :)

Building towers, so proud of herself...

More fun with daddy at our favorite spot, building sand people.

Daddy snuggles, no summer is complete with out that!

Crazy dirty fun in the back yard, and silly tiny pigtails. :)

Bubu spent a morning drawing all of us, so cute! Lots of art projects this summer as well...

Then there was Bubu's sixth birthday this last weekend. I can't believe I'm the proud parent of a six year old! Got to have those birthday pancakes!!!

We went to our favorite house, to visit some of our favorite people on Bubu's birthday. We stayed over and had a camp out style dinner for him. He went on a treasure hunt for his presents in an amazing garden, it was so much fun. We have such an awesome extended family!

He got a bigger bike for his birthday, and was so excited! I wouldn't normally let him ride with out a helmet or shoes, but he just wanted to try it out real quick. :) Now to work on getting those training wheels off { I have a feeling that Spike with be doing that before Bubu though...}

Cheese cake with raspberries, around a camp fire, doesn't get much better then that!

Happy birthday to a wonderful boy.

And the biggest news of the summer... My husband decided to try out fishing and caught himself his first fish! So awesome. We are some big fish eaters in this family, and it is so expensive, so I am looking forward to some more fresh caught fish! He did all the work too, even cooked it on the BBQ, he knows how to make a lady happy... ;) He also knows there is no way on God's green earth I am cleaning a fish. He jumped right in and figured it all out on his own, I love how he isn't afraid to learn new things.

Love this picture and really loved being there to share in his excitement!

We have one last adventure coming up before we start our school year. We are going to eastern Washington for the first time. We have friends that moved over there and we are going to go visit them. It's quite the drive {about 5 hours if you drive non-stop} so I'm a bit nervous about that. We are going to split up the driving on the way there by camping one of the nights so that we aren't driving such a long stretch all at once. Plus we want to take our time and do some sight seeing. :) Then we are staying two nights at our friends house and then leaving really, really early {as in 3 or 4 am} in the morning and driving straight back with no stops. Well except some potty breaks I do believe... The only thing that makes me a bit sad is that my husband can't come now because he finally got called back into work, after being laid off for about three months {the going back to work part is a good thing though}. My birthday falls on a day that I will be gone and I haven't celebrated a birthday with out my husband in about 15 years I believe...

:( Lucky for me my sister took time off work to come with me, she's awesome like that. The idea of going alone with the kids was a bit overwhelming in all honesty.

So wish me luck and keep us in your prayers for a safe trip and I'll tell you all about it when we get back. Oh and soon I can't wait to post all about the beginning of a new and exciting school year, the homeschooling way!

Do I seriously have a six year old?

2011-09-02T07:29:00.000-07:00

My first born beautiful little baby boy has turned six today!You are an amazing little man now Banden, so loving and friendly. One of the best big brothers anyone could ask for. I remember gazing at you in the hospital the night after you were born, I couldn't sleep I was so filled to overflowing with love. A love I had never felt before, the love of a mother for her child. I cried, and laughed and dreamed of what you would become. Of everything that we would do together. You though are more wonderful then I could ever have dreamed up. You make me want to be a better person each and every day. Every year that passes I love you more and more and I don't even know how that is possible.

Happy birthday to one of the sweetest boys I know!

the gift of memories

2011-09-01T07:38:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago we go some family photos taken by Kristin Harris Photography. She was such sweet lady and I love how the photos turned out! We've never had family photos done before and I really didn't want studio photos, they always look so stiff to me. Kristin met us at a local park and she was so relaxed and fun that it was easy and comfortable to do a photo shoot with her. Normally we are a shy family and I was afraid she wouldn't be able to capture the "real" us. I was so excited when I received the disk and realized that indeed she did, and wonderfully. {I have permission to print the pictures, so I'm assuming posting is okay too, I hope.} Seventeen years and counting. And I'm still madly in love, with extra stress on the madly part. :)

I wasn't sure if I liked this one or not, but when my husband saw it he really liked it. He said, "it's my beautiful girls". So now I think of that every time I see this picture and it warms my heart.

This is one of my favorites. Sometimes I can hardly believe we have four beautiful little kids. We were together for so long before kids and then it seems like we blinked and there they all were. We are still amazed and often shake our head in wonder as our eyes met, often over the chaos of our children. If we do nothing else big with our lives, except raise these wonderful children, I will still feel truly blessed. I look forward to the day we are old together and are surrounded by our grown children, and their children. Ryder has told me many times that from the beginning he envisioned us old together sitting on a porch swing holding hands, and that's how he knew I was the one. When I think about our future I see that very thing as well.

Beautiful, this girl of mine.

This is another favorite of mine, just because of the reality of it. Not a single one of us is looking straight at the camera, we are all caught up in each other, love that.

I never feel like we are a big family, but looking at the pictures I realize that we are definitely not a small one either, so I'll go with some where in the middle. :)

I LOVE this one.

So sweet, all of them holding hands. Team Rivers!

Love Atty's smile in this one. Another great shot of the family as well.

A daddy and his boys.

... and a mommy and her girl... :)

A great shot of my littlest boy, isn't he so handsome and couldn't you just fall into those big blue eyes!

That smile just takes over his face and lights up his eyes! And those curls, and red hair... oh my!

The sweetness of this boy just shines though this picture. My oldest, wise little man.

Love the smiles on every ones face {except Lala, she was woken from a nap and didn't warm to picture taking readily} but frankly she's cute smiling or not.

Brothers.

Absolutely love.

Atticus brought his favorite birds as a distraction. He doesn't always do well in these sorts of situations, but he ended up surprising us all. At first I was wishing that he didn't have his birds in all the photos, but when I got the pictures I changed my mind. I love this photo, it shows his love of birds and his personality and it will be a favorite of mine for all time.

So there you go, amazing photos from an amazing photographer. And the whole thing was a gift from a wonderfully sweet daycare mom. An absolutely thoughtful gift, that I will treasure forever.

Four on a log

2011-08-30T13:49:00.000-07:00

Some times I can't believe I have four happy, healthy, and adorable kids.I've been trying to up load these amazing photos we had taken of our family but they won't upload. The photographer sent the disk to me with a release form to print them so I thought I would also be able to put some on here, not sure why it's not working. I'll have to trouble shoot later. For now you get one silly picture of my kids down at the river, one of their favorite places to play. :)

Birthday party melt down, no not my child... me.

2011-08-08T07:44:00.000-07:00

I had a total melt down on Saturday.

Let me rewind.

So Spike didn't get a birthday party in June, around his birthday, because Atty had his Seizure Free celebration and there were a million other things going on. I promised him one this month as it seemed really important to him this year. It seems he often feels skipped over and in reality he often is in some way or another. At least it feels that way to me, my husband thinks I'm a bit over sensitive on the topic. But he has been overshadowed many times by Atty and Atty's health issues, and I think that the fact that they're only four months apart makes it even more complicated. I could got further into the many different reasons I feel the way I do about this but this post isn't really about that. It was part of my melt down though, those feelings. By the day of the party I was feeling pretty frustrated because almost every single one of the friends he had invited couldn't come for one reason or another. I wasn't frustrated with them, but frustrated things were turning out that way. I really wanted the day to be extra special for him. He doesn't really have many friends, as most of the kids gravitate towards Bubu because he's so out going and friendly were Spike is shy and quiet and has a tendency to pester when he feels left out {which is often}. We were having a melon party, and had worked together to make the decorations and clean up before the party. My kids were very excited because we were going to have a watermelon eating contest. I continued to act upbeat even though it started to seem pointless as hardly any kids were going to come. I kept hanging on to the fact that surely my dearest friend would show up with her two girls. Even if it wasn't his choice in friends {just because they are girls and well he's very into boy things right now, plus the oldest is Bubu's dearest friend and the youngest is a baby}, it was better then no kids. Then she called to cancel. And I fell apart. It left a baby cousin and a baby I watch in my daycare, plus adult family members for guests. Which I was excited about, but wasn't much for Spikes birthday party, friend wise. My heart just broke thinking about how it must make him feel that not a single friend would be showing up to his party. He had diligently helped with the decorations and planning, chosen the guest list and talked non stop about this party for the last month. And not a single friend was coming. There wasn't a thing I could do about that and I felt hopelessly frustrated. I sobbed in my husbands arms {in private of course} because I had wanted so desperately for Spike to have his special day. We've made such a fuss about Atty lately with celebrations for this that and the other and I wanted Spike to feel some of that too. While I was in the middle of falling apart my dear friend called back an told me that she rearranged her schedule and was coming after all. She knows my feeling about Spike and she has seen how he sometimes gets skipped over and didn't want to leave us hanging. I love her dearly.
So I dried up my tears, pulled myself back together and continued on. I had a gentle talk with Spike about why most of his friends weren't coming and he took it in his normally reserved manner. I reassured him that he could still get together with those friends at a different time. I told him that there were still people who loved him dearly coming that wouldn't miss it for the world and that was what mattered most. He asked is we could still have the watermelon contest, which made me smile. I hugged my littlest boy close and breathed in his sweetness. In the end love is all that matters and I love him so much it hurts.

We had a fabulous party, which included some awesome snakes as presents {not real thank goodness!} he could not have been happier. Well yes he probably could have if one of them had been real, ha ha! We played games, blew bubbles and colored with chalk. We laughed and enjoyed ourselves entirely and it all worked out. As it usually does when I give up trying to control every little thing and focus on making the best of the situation.

And we most definitely had the watermelon eating contest. :)

My camera ended up dying on me though, of course. Seems to always happen at the worst times. I didn't get any pictures of him and his birthday cupcakes, but he was cute and glowing when we all sang happy birthday to him.

I wish I didn't have a guilt button with him as big as a mountain, but I do. You are probably thinking what in the world is this women's problem? I'll admit it seems as if I'm totally over reacting. But I just can't explain the feelings I have when it comes to Spike. To see one of your children struggle so much more then the others, and to have things never seem to end up even or fair drives me crazy. I feel like he hurts inside and it's not one big thing, it's a million little things that I can't change. I constantly feel like I do everything wrong with him, while I'm trying so hard to do it right. He is a hard one to understand, so bright beyond his years, so complicated. I don't worry so much about my other kids, but I constantly worry about him. Constantly. And I'm so sensitive to everything concerning him. I wish I understood better why I feel this way about him and I really wish I didn't feel like there is a reason why I need to worry so much about him. My husband says maybe it will end up that Bubu is the one we have to worry about, he has a way of changing my perspective like that. If only I could give up worrying in general, but it is what I do best...

And shine she does

2011-07-29T07:03:00.000-07:00

She is hilarious.Seriously... Seriously funny. I can not believe how fast she is growing up! How brilliant she is. The things that she says some times make my jaw drop. My heart aches for the baby she is leaving behind though. I see little glimpses now and again and that's it. It's proving really hard for me to let go and admit that my last little baby is growing up. I can't really call her a baby anymore and hardly a toddler! With her 5-6 word sentences, her independent nature, her drive to keep up with her brothers. She is not one to be coddled that's for sure {not that I coddle, but I do have to fight the urge with her sometimes} she lets me know in no uncertain terms that she is capable and demands that I let her grow up. Sigh. She is a little me, and so I understand and I swallow the urge to keep babying her and I step back and let her shine.

And shine she does, like the brightest star in the sky, or the prettiest fish in the sea. She's one of a kind sparkly, my girl. And I'm not just saying that because she's my daughter. ;)

Snakes and such

2011-07-18T09:05:00.000-07:00

I took the kids to the Reptile Zoo last Saturday. They LOVED it, almost more then the regular zoo I do believe!There were all kind of amazing creatures there. Turtles, snakes, lizards, alligators, even spiders and frogs.
There were actually two sections to the place, it's a good thing we had met up with friends there that knew all about it or we might have left only seeing one side. It would have still been cool, but not nearly as amazing as the whole thing!

Ira was quite the snake charmer! Seriously. And he was super into everything there, especially the snakes. No fear at all just a lot of curiosity. Good thing we don't have poisonous snakes in our area.

We got to met up with these wonderful friends for a fun filled day. {Melody also has an awesome blog, check it out!} After the zoo we went to a park for a picnic and a nature hike as well as playing on the play equipment. {We had so much fun that the day just flew bye and before we were ready we had to say goodbye.}

They even got to hold some snakes, boy were they excited! {Can't say the same for myself...} Atty was a little bit distracted, he gets overwhelmed easily so he couldn't focus very well but I still got a few photos of him and he held the snakes for a moment before moving on. I was just glad he held it together and didn't have a melt down. That use to be a big problem with him, but it actually hasn't happened in a while thank goodness.
He's just really scattered and wanders around randomly from thing to thing, it's hard to keep an eye on him and can be sort of stressful at times, especially because he is very impulsive. I caught him trying to lift a lid of a spider cage when we were there, yikes!

Spike's face just glowed the whole time we were there, he was really into the whole experience. :) {I just hope he doesn't some day ask for a "pet" snake, ack!}

Bubu was also really excited about the whole thing, and so gentle with the snakes, a bit more timid then Spike but just as willing to hold them.

A bowl of snake anyone?

Atty in awe.

There were the most adorable frogs in here! My favorite part. I prefer things with out strong jaws, sharp teeth, venom and the ability to strangle you. But maybe that's just me.

Bubu's super excited face. :)

At the end I decided to spring the extra so that the kids could hold the big snake and get their picture taken. I'm glad I did {not something I would normally do being the frugal lady I am... some would say cheap or stingy, ha ha!} it ended up being the highlight of the whole trip for the boys and Lala was really excited too. She had no fear of this thing what so ever! I had to keep stopping her from trying to pet it's face.

Spike did not want to give it back. At all. I think he could have hung out with it all day! He was very excited to get a chance to be on the head end for a moment.

Such a great experience. I really had to swallow my fears and enjoy the moment with my kids. My husband was not as excited to see the kids so close and personal with the snake, when I showed him the pictures he was less then thrilled, ha ha! At one point when they were holding the snake it started to wrap back around Bubu's neck and he said "Mom it's trying to hug me!" Um yes son that's what it's trying to do... sure. I just smiled and nodded while unwrapping it, quickly. Why take that special moment away with the reality that snakes don't hug. Bubu told everyone, all day long, that the snake liked him so much that it tried to give him a hug and it was because he was so gentle with it. Sweetness.

The only thing that had the potential to ruin our visit was the rude girl that worked there that had no customer service skills what so ever and lacked in class in a big way. She was pretty nasty and I really had to bit my tongue and let it go, some thing I'm trying to get better at.

All in all is was a superb day and we hope to go back again soon, the kids really want to bring their daddy next time... I can't wait to see how that goes. :)

Emotions tied up in a song

2011-07-15T08:54:00.000-07:00

I identify so strongly with this song. Word for word. I can listen to it over and over again. The emotion in her voice takes my breath away. I think of my life, what I've gone through and then I think of my husband and how he saved my life. I'd be lost with out him. This song is so tied into my life it's like I wrote it, but I could never write something so eloquent. Beautiful, absolutely beautiful.

Listen to it as loud as you possibly can, close your eyes and feel it. Does it speak to you as well?

Good Grief...

2011-07-14T18:19:00.000-07:00

Banden spent some time tonight examining my face, he had all kinds of comments and questions. One of his comments was "mom you have a really big nose, but I like that, I like that about you". Ha ha ha... oh my. Great self esteem booster.

Speaking of self esteem I am struggling with my weight right now. One minute I feel really down about it and the next I just don't want to care about it. I'm a healthy person and that's really what matters the most. But. But. But. Sigh. With all the stress and the focus on Atty's health issues and his MAS diet, with Leiella almost done nursing and my cycle coming back {not that you needed to know that, but OMGoodness do I crave sweet food like crazy once a month, it's ridiculous!}, with four children and a daycare to run, with a house that turns messy in the blink of an eye, I just don't have the time or the energy for me. I really don't. I want to but I just don't. I mostly just need to make time to really workout, but making that time ends up on the end of a really long consistent to do list. A lot of the stuff on that list can not be changed or ignored so me myself and I end up on the waiting list. That's just were I am in my life right now. I know that there will be a time when I will have moments where I can do things like work out or really take a break for me, but now is just not the time. I frustrate myself with feeling down about my weight. Because I don't want to fall victim of the "must be the perfect mom, women, daughter, wife" thing. There are so many pressures piled against us that I don't want to be my own worst enemy and I hate seeing other women that are obviously buying into it and stressing themselves out over it. My husband truly doesn't care, and I really shouldn't be so vain. Who am I trying to impress? But as much as I say all these things in my head I find myself dwelling on it on and off all day long, and now I find myself writing about it, so obviously it's bothering me a great deal. I've been trying to change the way I eat, and also my portion sizes because now that Leiella is hardly nursing I don't need as many calories as before. I've been pregnant or breast feeding for the last 6 years so I really have to change my eating habits. Get back to normal portion sizes. And I have to get a handle on this cyclic eating I've been doing, good grief. My first cycle I gained about 15 pounds, I kid you not! That's in one month people, yikes! It's not that bad any more but that was a nasty wake up call. Anyway I don't really need to go on and on about it, I just needed to get this out. It helps me to write things down some times and then I tend to stop dwelling so much.

On a happier note I was also told tonight by my cute little boys that I am beautiful, that they love my hair and freckles and that I have nice eyes. Sigh. They are sweet just like there daddy. Apparently this girl needs a lot of nice comments... and they have no problem handing them out. :)

Projects, good food and fireworks, what a day!

2011-07-07T11:02:00.000-07:00

Happy Fourth!!! {yes, yes I know it's way past by now, but all the same}.We had a wonderful day. Spent working on projects together, then a yummy dinner out on the back deck, followed by a pretty cool fireworks show viewed at a local park.

This girl is such a daddy's girl. If it looks like she is glued to him in every picture it's because she is!

My adorable little flower children.

Can you tell daisies are an all time favorite of mine? I let the wild ones grow in my garden, I figure a plant is only a weed if you don't like them. Since I love the wild daisies that grow around here I openly invite them into my garden. :) I think it's a horrible shame they are considered weeds. They do have a tendency to take over if you let them, but you don't have to.

My littlest boy, such a sweet heart he is. Lately he always wants to hold my hand, hug or kiss me, tell me he loves me, pick flowers for me, tell me I'm beautiful, etc... It's really so adorable.

Snuggling daddy and waiting for the show to start. {which took forever!}

Actually sitting still for a picture, and not making a silly face for once, wow! Rare indeed.

Fire works! Lala was super quiet the whole time, but she didn't freak out so that's good. Atty still said he was scared but this was the first year he wasn't sitting on someones lap clinging on for dear life. Plus I think he actually did enjoy it. Growing up.

See all smiles. We had a blast, and even got out of there with out a problem. Sometimes you get stuck in some serious traffic, yuck.

When we got home our new crazy {and I mean seriously crazy party animals} neighbors down at the end of the block were lighting off some really big fireworks. J said they had been at it since it first got dark. {and they kept at it until midnight!} While the hubby and I were getting the other sleeping kids out of the car Bubu went in and grabbed a blanket and settled down on the sidewalk to watch. It was so cute that I just had to let him stay out there with me for a while longer. Even though it was really, really late at that point. He was wide awake and so excited. It was nice to have a moment with him and then a bonus moment when J decided to join us. He didn't go to the fireworks show, so it was nice to get to watch some fireworks with him after all.

Okay so now I am pretty much caught up and I really need to remember to never let it get that bad again! I am really trying to pack a lot of exploring into this summer and a ton of yard projects as well but I will need to make time to post now and again before I let weeks get away from me!

Yummy, yum, yum!

2011-07-07T10:50:00.000-07:00

Our first egg! {They didn't lay the egg here, I just wanted a picture after the boys brought it to me.}

It was super little and the boys found it out in the yard. Since then they have found two more eggs in the yard, but they were soft shelled. I'm thinking I need to go get them some oyster shells. I've heard they need them for the calcium so that the shells will be hard.
I'm not sure why they are laying them in the yard. They have nesting boxes. I only let them out on the weekend too {to give me time to clean up chicken poop, yuck} so it's not like they are out there all the time. If they were I would understand more why they would be confused and laying in the wrong spot, but this isn't the case. I'm at a loss as to how to get them to lay eggs in their nesting boxes. Will have to brain storm and do some more research I guess. They are actually laying early too, we weren't expecting any for another month or so. Anyways regardless of where they are laying, we are so excited to see some eggs!

{and yes I still have even more catching up to do...}

An inspirational outing

2011-07-07T09:35:00.000-07:00

A weekend ago we went to this really awesome park. Actually it's a few parks in one area. There is a wild life sanctuary with a boardwalk, a fragrance garden and an old homestead park with animals and gardens, plus it's right next to a river. If it was closer to us we would be there all the time! I got some serious inspiration from the gardens, the fragrance garden as well as the vegetable gardens at the other park. It was a beautiful warm day and we spent the whole day there. We also met up with family as well. Neenee {grandma} Aunties and a niece. So fun!I must have this in my garden.

And this.

I am all about organic gardening and adjusting tolerance levels, but this sign cracked me up! There were NO plants there. If you are going to place a sign advocating this sort of gardening at least have a healthy looking plant by the sign!

Because dry empty dirt does not get the right point across I do believe.

Smelling the flowers.

Auntie Rissa! Lala loves her auntie I promise, she is just focusing on those sunglasses. She was waiting for her moment to seize them off her face, and or put her fingers all over them. She's crafty like that.

Board walk fun. The kids loved this walk, I was a little nervous myself and praying the whole time one of them didn't stumble or step off in their excitement. It wasn't all that deep, just nasty.

Can you tell I'm exhausted already? And it was still before noon. We didn't leave the park until close to 6 pm. It was a looooonnnnggggg day.

My little explorers.

Had to get a picture of the boys on this pig bench, they loved it.

I am going to do my new garden beds {where the pond use to be} like this. It's a four by four foot bed split up into one foot squares with string so it looks like a grid. They were amazing. This type of compact planting fits a ton of vegetables into a really small space. Exactly what I need!

The kids loved the animals. I was a little sad and shocked that there wasn't very many animals at this park anymore {and just by the condition of the fragrance garden and park in general}. I use to go to this park as a kid and they had so many more animal, plus the park was obviously taken better care of back then. With all the cuts in budget and stuff this park has really suffered. Still a cool place, but it really has been neglected over the last 20 years. A volunteer at the fragrance garden told me that the garden is pretty much only run by volunteers at this point. If I lived closer I would most definitely want to be one of those volunteers. I couldn't help but think about all the stuff I would love to do to fix up the garden as I was walking through.

Cousins! These two are just the cutest. They were looking a wild birds, since there were no other animals in this pen. Leiella is still calling most birds spooky or spooky eagles {ever since the baby crow incident}. After the fragrance garden, the boardwalk and the park we decided that it was just too hot and headed down to the river.

Lala sat down in this pud puddle before I could even get her swimsuit on. Ahhhhhhh refreshing!

Rivers make me nervous so they were only allow to put there toes in, but it was enough to cool off. They still had tons of fun in the sand and squishing in mud puddles.

These two were just plain adorable as usual. Some how they ended up both wearing green sunhats and pink swimsuit and they were just too much!

Love.

So there you have it, I managed to drowned you once again in pictures. And believe it or not... I am still not caught up with my posts. Good Grief.

Garden beauties...

2011-07-07T08:13:00.000-07:00

Red, White, and Blue

2011-07-07T07:52:00.000-07:00

No I'm not catching up with a 4th of July post yet... I'm talking about my house! I finally went for it and decided to paint my front door red. I love it! First we took the storm door off, something I've wanted to do for a long time {previous owners put them in, but it didn't make much sense on such small front steps. People practically got pushed off the steps just opening up the screen}. Then I took some pictures of the house and went to pick out paint, found a color that looked great with the blue, or at least I hoped it did. I really lucked out because I didn't even try it out first, just bought a gallon and went for it. Don't ask me why I bought a gallon for a front door... I just did. Before

After
I also painted the trim white and I'm going to be painting the trim around the windows white as well. So there you go red, white and blue... what do you think?

Okay three catch up posts down, more to go...

First camping trip with all the kids!

2011-07-06T14:36:00.000-07:00

In keeping with the catching up theme now I will share about our fun little camping trip with J a couple weekends ago. We went camping for two nights up at a lake about an hour away from our house. Our van was packed to overflowing. In fact before we ever going camping again I insist we have a trailer or rack of some sort, we were ridiculously crammed in like sardines. But it was worth it, the kids had a blast. Spike has been insisting that he was going fishing with his uncle J when he came for a visit, so we made sure to bring the fishing poles! My one and only picture of J on this trip. He was trying desperately to get out of the way, but I snap it as fast as I could. I've had to get pretty sneaky these days with the pictures.

This camp site is such a beautiful place. It's next to a lake in the mountains and is surrounded by trees and then open pockets of fields. There is a cool bridge over the water and a little play area for the kids. Lots of fun to be had. We are thinking it's going to be our yearly go to place for camping with the kids. I use the word camping loosely as we ended up getting a cabin {thankfully there just happened to be one available, when we tried to reserve one they had been all booked up} I had packed up for tent camping but was so relieved to get a cabin instead. Especially since it decided to down pour the first night we were there. I don't think in reality we are ready for tent camping just yet with all the kiddos.

The kids loved this tire swing, I could not believe how many times they wanted to spin around on it! I got sick just watching.

Running around on the grassy hills. The only big negative about this place is the horrendous amount of goose poop that was all over the place... That being said in the three days we were there I never once saw a goose. Weird. We did see a really cute raccoon though, and deer, and about a million tadpoles. I kid you not, there were black clouds of tadpoles on the edge of the lake in one spot.

The boys fishing. They didn't catch anything, but they had fun trying. Actually I take that back they did catch something on the very first night, but it was so tiny it got tossed back in. It was cute how excited they got {my husband included}.

Daddy love.

Atty was obsessed with this net. In fact he threw the most embarrassing, have to go back to the cabin, fit over it. He said he needed to go potty so I asked Bubu to hold the net while he went. He did not want to let go of that net for even a minute. From the moment those words left my mouth until about 15 minutes later by the time we made it back to the cabin the boy fell apart. He didn't get that net back for quite some time. Mommy was not a happy camper.

No camping trip is complete with out s'mores {unfortunately, as I would rather skip the whole thing}. Atty roasted his banana chunks again this year and it didn't bother him one bit. I made him sweet crackers and cashew butter "chocolate" and he had s'mores the magic diet way. :)

On our last night there we went out at dusk to go bat spotting. Wow was there a lot of bats! I couldn't get any pictures, because they are super fast. It was really fun though, we sat and fished and got all excited every time a bat swooped by.

It was fun that is until this happened. It was Spikes turn to hold the fishing pole and I looked away for a moment to watch bats with the other kids and when I looked back over he had decided to wrap the fishing wire around his wrist! Just like that. This kid is always getting himself in the weirdest predicaments. He's the same kid that shoved a crayon so far up his nose we had to take him to the ER, and they had to sedate him to get that crayon out! Anyways, it ended up being no biggy, my hubby just clipped the string. I was freaked out there for a second though because it looked so tight! Lesson learned I hope. Lesson being either don't look away when Spike is fishing, or don't wrap fishing line around your arm, either one.

Beautiful time, and an even more beautiful spot.

And I still have more catching up to do... sigh. :)

A day well spent

2011-07-06T14:08:00.000-07:00

Wow do I have some catching up to do, one post is not going to be enough. I have all kinds of excuses for my absence but I won't bother going in to them. You're welcome.{I find it nearly impossible to get good group pictures of these kids lately, drives me crazy!}

So for starters, J is here!!! He's camera shy so I count myself lucky if I happen to get a picture or two of him. To start his visit out right, and to celebrate Fathers day {yes I'm going back that far} we went to an awesome park, it's a favorite of ours. We spent the day enjoying the beach, hiking and having a picnic.

Daddy picked his girl a rose. So sweet, she hung onto that thing for a long time... before she ripped it into little pieces.
And yes my hubby is carrying her in a sling, he's awesome like that. :)

Got my yearly rock picture. I will have to find the other ones that I have taken over the years to compare. These kids of mine are growing up way too fast! The more I try to slow things down the faster they seem to go.

Had to get a picture of us together on my man's day. He is such a wonderful daddy! Makes me so happy to know that my kids have such a great example in their father. Some one they can look up to and admire.

Beautiful and full of spunk.

And wait what is this... a picture with J in it!?! Well count my lucky stars. :) I had an unfair advantage, he was trapped after all between two little kids. Isn't he getting so tall and handsome! We are excited to get to spend some time with him, more adventures to come!

A baby crow, Spike, and getting away...

2011-06-07T18:46:00.000-07:00

So in random news... this "little" baby crow tried to move in. He or she was really confused. I'm not fond of these birds, but this one was so sad and hungry that I couldn't help feeling a little sorry for it. The kids thought it was awesome. Boy was it noisy... I think it cawed at us for at least a couple hours before it finally went away. I saw what I think was the mommy hanging around towards the end, and I'm hoping she got him to go home. Little run away thought he was old enough to leave the nest...I know it doesn't really look like a baby but it is, still had the fluff on the underside and was opening it's beak over and over again hoping that we would feed it.
Even tried to come inside at one point. I almost caught it and called the wildlife rescue people, but then I saw the mommy bird and decided to see if it would just go back with her {plus my husband wouldn't help me and I'm scared of crows... ha ha}. Seriously it kept trying to land on me! Wasn't fond of that idea. Anyways it made for an exciting night for the kiddos.

Love these silly little critters.

It is so hard to get a good picture of this girl anymore, she absolutely refuses most days.

This picture cracks me up... look at her face, I might be able to capture her for a picture but she will NOT smile for it... ha ha!

I put on a skirt, I think the first time this year, and the boys all declared me beautiful. I love how easy it is. I mean I hardly have to do anything to hear them tell me how pretty I am. Which is the upside of hardly ever getting "fancy" as I call it. :) Honestly I'm mostly a sweats and ponytail kind of a girl. Last night I was showing Ryder what I found for swim wear, I'm a seriously modest sort of girl and so I actually bought work out wear, a shorts and tank top sort of thing. It looked like a super modest tankini. I am totally unable to find anything that covers enough for me in the regular swimsuit section and have completely given up on that. Anyways I was complaining about how I looked in it because I'm really out of shape right now and not feeling so hot about it. Bubu pips up and tells me I look super pretty. Which was really sweet. Then when I was walking away I heard my hubby tell him "good call". So funny, my boys.

The kiddos sporting their new tank tops I got them on Spikes birthday. It takes so, so many shots before I get one half decent photo now days. Believe it or not this was the best one. Sigh.

Spike and his birthday pancakes. the BIG 4 year old!

I made my first real cake from scratch. I always thought for some reason it would be hard, but it totally wasn't. Not that I did anything fancy, but Spike loved it. He had been showing me different pictures of cakes that he wanted for months before his birthday. Funny kid. He has a real need for things to be made super special for him, must be a littlest boy thing. I think he sometimes feels a little skipped over. He was disappointed that no one was coming over for his birthday but we already had a get together the weekend before. He won't stop talking about the friends he wanted at his birthday party, it seems really important to him this year, so I'm going to do some sort of get together for him later this month.

The day after Spikes birthday is our anniversary. I was 15 when we met 17 years ago, I fell madly in love, and I still am. Through all the ups and down, and there have been plenty. Saying it was our 6th wedding anniversary seemed like such an understatement. My husband and I got to go over night to a hotel, which rarely ever happens. Left the kids with my mom and sister. It was hard to do, I haven't left Atty with anyone over night since his seizures started. Even though he hasn't had any in over a year now, it still was hard to do. There is so much involved in his diet and such. Anyways in was fine, he survived, I survived and even the baby girl survived {hadn't ever left her with anyone, including my husband, overnight before}. She is still nursing to sleep, so I was a bit worried, but she made it through. We had a wonderful time, dinner and then a movie in the hotel room and then some swimming in the pool later at night {because I only had a horribly ugly and old swimsuit I waited until the pool was empty, which was nice having it all to ourselves}. Slept through the whole night with out having to get up and take care of something/someone. That was a bit weird, but beautiful. Then I tried to sleep in, but couldn't...gerrrrr.... just to use to getting up early I guess. We waited until the very last minute to check out and then we tried going down to the beach for a picnic. But when we got there we couldn't help thinking about how we wished the kids were with us. We kept talking about them and how much they would like it there, then about 15 minutes in my husband said, maybe it's time to go home, and I agreed. So instead of walking the beach and taking our time like we had planned we hurried home to see the littles. It was a nice break though, and we are going to try to get away overnight every year now around our anniversary. We have only been away together over night one other time since the kiddos. We are getting better at realizing that we need to take time together {with out the kids} as time goes by. A moment to reconnect. Usually the conversations we do have are interrupted by little voices over and over again, so to have just a simple conversation were we could concentrate on what the other was say was so nice. I think my favorite part was the comfortable silence though, not something that often happens in a house full of little kids.

It's been a busy last few week, and already the weekends this summer seem to be filling up. At some point I want to have an open house with the kids to show some family and friends what we have done in school this year. As the school year comes to an end I've been reflecting on this last year and what I did and didn't do the way I wanted to. I've loved seeing them learn and improve as the year goes by. I'm already getting excited for next year! Next year will be even better. I'm planning on posting a little more about our experience this year soon. :)

Oh, and J is coming for a visit as soon as school is out for him... we are so excited!!!

The many {baby} faces of Spike

2011-06-03T07:19:00.000-07:00

Today is my baby boys fourth birthday! How the time flies. I decided to go through some Cd's of photos trying to look for a baby picture of him and I stumbled upon these. They show perfectly all the side of my brilliant, mischievous, funny, and very serious little man.

*Giggles*

*Toothless grins*

*Big sparkly blue eyes*

*mischievous looks*

*Contemplation*

*Serious gazes*

You are my complicated, mysterious little boy Spike, and I love every little bit of it. You keep me on my toes and always striving to understand you better. You make me question, and guess, and learn. You are always teaching me something new, and yes testing my patience as a mother {or maybe you are simply trying to teach me patience as well}. You always seem to be ten steps ahead of the rest of us, and sometimes I secretly think you are already way smarter then me. A wise soul you are. As I watch you grow I am so proud of who you are becoming. I know I can count on you to always keep life interesting!

Happy Birthday my love. My shy little boy with the beautiful big blue eyes.

Wow... busy weekend!

2011-05-31T14:13:00.000-07:00

This weekend we packed in Atty's party {seizure free for one year on his magic diet!} on Saturday, the Seattle Aquarium on Sunday, and a really great walk in a local bird sanctuary on Monday. A fun filled, beautiful, memory building weekend, just my kind of thing. :) I took over three hundred pictures in one long weekend, so in comparison these pictures here are just the tip of the iceberg so to speak. Didn't think you all would want to wade through that many pictures, ha ha! Atty's Seizure Free party was amazing. Wonderful friends, great Atty friendly food, lots of laughs, a few tears {mostly me...} it was food for my soul.

Atty's face was lit up with happiness the whole time. Being able to share his food, and have other people enjoying it meant the world to him.

I got trophies for all the kids and had them engrave a special message on each one, they loved them. I had to have my dearest friend stand with me and talk for me at first as I was so choked up with emotion that it just overwhelmed me, but by the time Atty's turn came around I was able to talk and give him his trophy. It was a really special moment. I also took a moment to thank all the people there who have been there for me and supported me and I made a super ugly cry face as I tried to get out the words I needed to express myself. I didn't quite say what I wanted to say, but they understood, tears were shed all around and we all hugged. It was beautiful.

Then my mom surprised Ryder and I with trophies of our own. So sweet and totally unexpected. Go Team Rivers.

We finished with almond flour cupcakes, they ended up being super yummy and not a single one was wasted. Yay!

This little red head {he would say orange head if you asked him} is my Champion! He has now been seizure free for one whole year, and as of Saturday is off his medicine. All of it! Wowsers.

The next day we were off to the Seattle Aquarium. Everyone was super excited!

The under water dome ended up being one of the favorite for everyone. The boys visited it twice, and spend quite a lot of time looking around at all the amazing fish. On our second trip in {yes we went around the whole aquarium twice!} we saw a scuba diver cleaning the windows and the boys thought that was really cool.

One of my favorite pictures of the day. :)

Looking in the tide pools, a touch and feel area. Another favorite.

A lady asked me how I kept track of my kids as she was having a hard time keeping track of her two {her words, not mine} I told her bright shirts. That's the ticket. Well that and teaching your kids to mind you and stick by you in crowds, but I didn't go there with her. I do always dress my kids in really bright clothes when we go to crowded places and find that it really, really helps. In fact I was just thinking while we were there that I want to have a tie dye party this summer and make some more brightly colored shirts, they are the best for spotting in a crowd. :)

Are they truly all mine!?! I am a lucky girl. :)

On Monday we went to a bird sanctuary for an amazing walk. I was looking through our Atlas and happened to see that there was a bird sanctuary on a close by island that we never knew of before. It took us all of about 15 minutes to get there. That's my kind of outing.

It was truly beautiful and the calls of all the birds was music to the ears. We saw so many, and the kids were all really excited. The walk was a super easy maybe two miles round trip. A big bonus was an eagle nest with two clearly visible bald eagles. We were told that there were babies in the nest and the kids thought that was really neat. We all spied on them with our binoculars.

There were also lots of cranes. The kids got a good giggle over one that wouldn't stop squawking. They are really loud!

We tried to get a family photo, but it didn't work out so well. :)

My hubby and I took turns for a group shot instead. This was the end of the trail. It emptied out into reedy marsh lands right next to the river and close to the bay. Beautiful.

We were all super proud to make it to the end of the trail. And everyone was a trooper on the way back. I love that my kids like to hike, because I am a big explorer! I can't wait to go on more explorations with this team. Slowly we will go farther and farther, pretty soon maybe I can talk the hubby into a hiking/camping trip... he's not as into the exploring as I am. But he lets himself be dragged along {and I think he secretly likes it}.

One whole year!

2011-05-26T21:24:00.001-07:00

Check out my post on Atty's blog. Today = 1 whole year of being seizure free on the MAS diet!!!

So proud of my kids! Every one of them helped to make this year successful for Atty and his magic diet. We are having a party this Saturday with close friends and family. I got the kids real trophies with a special message on them for each kid. I am so excited to give each one their trophy and see their proud little faces. I might have to have someone else read what the trophy's say, because I'll probably be to teary eyed. I also made a video to show at the party and I am hoping to be able to figure out how to post it on Atty's blog to share his beautiful story. I will also post some pictures of the party on his blog as well. One whole year down, one more to go. Actually he will always have some sort of difference in his diet, but hopefully just not as strict as it is now.

Tonight after dinner we ate almond flour muffins to celebrate and then spent some time shouting "No More Seizures!" at the top of our lungs. :)

In retrospect...

2011-05-18T14:31:00.000-07:00

This was our pond. Yes I said was. This winter the pond pump went out, and along with the fact that I was already falling out of love with this pond, was the fact that I didn't want to spend a penny more keeping it running. Lets face it the pond was not a selling factor for me when we bought this house. Yes it was pretty and sounded beautiful. But I run a daycare, and I have four kids, one of my children has gone through a serious health scare as many of you know. Four months of non-stop seizures, and a very intense diet has been followed since then to stop them. Which takes a lot of extra cooking, prep and planning. I don't have time for extras, and fishing algae out of this pond every other day was just getting to be a little too much {we are talking copious amounts, no matter what we tried}. I'm a gardener, I'd rather spend any extra time I can scrounge up daydreaming in the garden. Plus I've been dreaming of the extra yard space. Our backyard is fun, but it's not very big. So anyways I finally talked my husband into ripping it out. And what a mess it's been.

It was really pretty at first, so I was a little sad to see it go. To bad it was so much work to keep it looking good. We really couldn't enjoy it much as it had to be behind an 5 foot {ugly} fence to keep the kids safe. Some day I'd like to live on property with a little creek running though it... that's my sort of water feature. :)

My husband rented a little tractor thingy and we got serious. Sort of scary to jump into a big project like this, because if you change your mind... well there just isn't any going back. Not that I was going to change my mind, but I know my husband hasn't been as keen on the idea as me. Probably because he has to do most of the work. Around here I churn out the ideas and he gets them done. ;)

So thankful for this hardworking man who trusts in me so much that he will make my ideas happen, even if he doesn't "see it" like I do. Makes me want to work extra hard to make it super cool so that he will feel like it was all worthwhile.

One little snag in our plans is the fact that this soil, if you can call it that, is practically pure clay. And doesn't drain. Which is probably why the previous owners turned it into a gorgeous pond, because it was pooling up regardless. Soooooooo, um, yeah. In retrospect, maybe the pond was a great idea. Shesh.

Scrambling for a better plan.

...and I think I've got one. I will make this work. I will. And when it's done I will show you the results, they will be stunning. {Not really, you can't really top a beautiful pond, it will be more kid friendly and fun... but that's what we are all about around here!}

New best friend.

2011-05-16T06:00:00.000-07:00

Don't worry, she is not eating it... just giving it a kiss. No big deal. {Ack!}

My Mother's Day adventure!

2011-05-09T07:34:00.000-07:00

What a wonderful day! We went on an amazing hike on Mother's Day. We walked along a bluff over looking the bay and then down to the beach. Then we followed the beach back. Not a drop of rain, which was a real treat considering we went hiking even though there was a threat of rain coming. Instead of rain we got some perfect hiking weather. My sister and mom came with us which was perfect because there was one adult for every kid, and considering the drop offs along the side of the bluff section of the trail I think I would have had a panic attack if there wasn't a hand for every child. The trail was to skinny for more then a pair of people to walk on, even pairing up was hard. But it didn't take the fun out of it. We saw so many cool birds, the air was fresh and sweet and the combination of sun and breeze felt so good.The walk started off on a steep up hill climb. The boys just trekked right up. Little troopers!
Love these wonderful boys of mine. Atty did really well on this hike, I was impressed. Last year he had to take quite a few breaks in the stroller on a hike that we went on... this year he hiked right along side his brothers, which was super impressive considering the hike was almost 4 miles {my husband swears it was more like 6, but my book listed it as closer to 4...} and the elevation high point was 250 feet! That's no small feat for a boy who was seizing non-stop a little over a year ago!!!

Love these tough old trees.

Looking way, way, way down... and back to see how far we had come.

Yikes, hold on tight to your children! The boys thought it was super cool. The views were amazing! My camera just couldn't do them justice.

We saw so many cool birds, we are definitely a bird watching family now. {Thank you Atticus!} We brought along a laminated field guide on local birds and we spotted quite a few different types. My sister taught us a bird call for the red winged black bird that sounds like "pumpkin eater, pumpkin eater", the boys loved this, especially when they heard that very bird and it did sound remarkable similar! This giant of a bird pictured above made the bald eagle flying near by look miniature. We were in awe! This bird wasn't on our list, but my husband guessed it as a golden eagle? I have no idea...

Everyone has a buddy... This is about the spot on the trail where my husband started doubting that it was a loop trail and though perhaps I was taking us on a wild goose chase and started suggesting we might want to turn around. But it was Mother's Day so he let me have my fun, and sure enough eventually the trail wound back down to the water {I myself was starting to doubt, but didn't say a word of course...}

Stopping for a break and to take in the view. My strong sister carried baby girl on her back for the whole bluff walk! I would not have survived that I do believe, definitely not a strong as I use to be...

Once we got to the beach we had a picnic packed by my husband. Best sandwich I have ever had! Then we went beach combing. I love finding unique rocks for my outdoor rock collection. My favorite is hard shaped rocks, I have quite a few. On this walk I found some really nice green and bright round white rocks. Lala loved the sand, and this was the first time she was at the ocean, she was in awe.

Bubu was so excited to find this heart shape for me, he was bubbling over with his excitement when he gave it to me, so sweet!

My little beach explorers.

I love this picture of my husband and Lala. Sharing in her joy of the powerful sea. She held her daddy's hand as she watched the waves rolling up the beach towards her. Her brothers had fun chasing waves. {Until Ira fell and got all wet... then he had to wear mismatched clothes for the rest of the trip, at least I had some or he would have been one cold sad little boy.}

Hearts in the sand just for me... Love.

{Bubu's little hearts are so adorable!}

One happy Mommy, one great team. One wonderful day of many! I'm a lucky lady.

{Don't laugh to hard at my sporty head band... my ears get so cold with any sort of wind and then I get an ear ache. I don't mess around with that, style goes right out the window when it comes to pain.}

Chasing Chickens

2011-05-03T06:05:00.000-07:00

So I've been trying not to swam this blog with chicken pictures... but we sure do love our chickens! :) Especially this girl. She loves them so much she just has to squeeze one! She is determined to get her hands on one. And since they are bigger and faster now I have let her loose on them. They don't like it very much, but it sure is funny to watch...

We let them out in the yard occasionally on the weekend before we mow and she follows them around the whole time. She says "Here Chicks, here chicks" over and over again, it's super cute. They don't listen though, they may be dumb, but there not that dumb. When I say it on the other hand they come running... because that means food and these girls love to eat!

Lala will even try to trick them into coming to her by grabbing handfuls of grass for them. The few times that one of them has come close enough to nibble a piece she will say "Bite" with a big smile on her face. But then she tries to grab it and the chase is on. Our girls {the chickens} have a tendency to nibble fingers, because we are always feeding them by hand. The only problem being that they can peck kinda hard now and when they actually get your fingers, well it hurts a bit... doesn't stop the boys from feeding them worms, slugs and bug though! The boys think that is the coolest part. :)

Chasing chickens could keep this girl entertained for hours I do believe.

The chicken seem to think it's worth it for a moment of relative freedom and a chance to scratch in some grass for yummy treats.

Not that they don't have an awesome chicken coop... cause this thing is super cool. My hubby did a great job as usually and our girls are happy! It's been fun working on it with him. Chickens for us is a bit of a hobby and we are treating them more as pets, so they are a tad spoiled and we have spent more money on them then we probably should have. But the kids have no other pets right now and we have all been enjoying them so much {Atty and Lala in particular}. We sanded the inside this weekend to make it easier to clean and keep the stink down. I also planted hops on the outside to grow up and over the chicken coop. I will be hanging some good smelling herbs from containers off the top of the coop {on the sidewalk side where the boards hang over}, hopefully. That's the plan anyways. I've also talked my husband into more of a reddish color for the chicken house {as I'm not very keen on the dark brown almost black that he painted it}. We are also going to be adding a window soon. I never thought I'd like having chickens so much. Now wait tell summer {when the pen gets a bit more stinky} and I might change my mind!

~spring~

2011-04-29T06:33:00.000-07:00

Looking at these pictures makes me realize how much my children have grown in this past year.

This little guy is just a mischievous as he looks...

This little redhead has been quite the silly little man lately.

I told him something super funny, can you tell?

Don't be fooled by this sweet face... the only way I could get her to smile was to ask her if she wanted to eat. Ha!

Other wise the whole time she was doing this... blowing spit bubbles. Yuck!

She's a sassy one my girl.

Happy Spring!

{Right after I took all these pictures... it hailed! Sigh.}

Easter, mostly in pictures...

2011-04-26T21:28:00.000-07:00

I never seem to have the time for blogging anymore, but I wanted to get this Easter on here some how, so it's mostly in pictures. Some day when there is less cleaning to do {I swear it's non-stop right now!} I'll get back to blogging with words, maybe. :)

In case you are wondering why I posted a picture of us sitting in a field... we went to an Easter sunrise service {very} early in the morning.

Sunrise service, check. Easter baskets, check. Breakfast... almost.

It's hard to get this boy to take a picture these days, sigh. Of course I was trying to get him to stop for a picture in the middle of an egg hunt... not the best time for that I guess.

Sassy face, she's been perfecting it and it's almost perfect. :) {Seriously she practices in the mirror!}

Pretty girls in Easter dresses. My girl is slightly less fancy, what can I say... I'm always going for practical. Oh well.

My sister and my {hopefully} soon to be sister-in-law {either way she's family now!} and my adorable niece.

Happy Easter! Hope you had a wonderful one as well.

A baby loving book worm...

2011-04-12T21:26:00.000-07:00

{ Pay no mind to her stained up shirt, I wasn't planning on taking her picture...but she was just too cute!}

I don't know how you've grown so fast! You are sitting on the floor next to me right now {yes you should be in bed sleeping, but of course you are staying up late with mommy again, what can I say...} looking at the new library books and talking up a storm. I love your cute little voice. You flip quickly through a book then toss it aside for the next. Speed reader. ;) Some times you "read"quietly, some times you shout at the pages. You recognize cows, and babies, birds and dogs among other things and you say the words a loud. You laugh at some of the pictures. You look at the books upside down and right side up. You look at the same ones over and over again. You clear the shelf of library book and make a mommy proud. Your favorite book tonight has a baby in it. Babies are your favorite. You are such a little mommy in love with every baby you see. Trying to baby your brothers {not always well received} and the littlest daycare boy {also not always well received}. Wandering the house with baby dolls in arms. For some reason tonight with you sitting there looking at all those books by yourself it hit home how much you have grown. I marvel at your adorable little self, but I can't help but feel a tad bit sad that my last little baby has disappeared, and in her place is a little book worm. {Well actually that very last part doesn't make me sad.} I love you my {not so baby} girl!

Every day normal

2011-03-29T11:45:00.000-07:00

The boys decided to clean up the playroom on their own and when they were done Bubu came up to me and said, see mom I told you we were experts. ~While they were cleaning they did the team cheer where we all put our hands together and say Go Team R*****! I over heard Bubu telling Spike to put both his hands in and Spike said I have a booger on my hand, Bubu just said so do it anyways, and they did. That's some brotherly love right there... ha ha! ~Bubu keeps randomly saying, they poisoned the water hole, with a country twang and it's kinda creepy. (It's from one of the toy story movies.) ~I was making lunch and the boys were cleaning up the playroom{we clean up the playroom a lot around here} and over the hum of conversation I hear Maybe she will beat us. If anyone had been over they would have thought horrible things happen around here, but they just meant that I might get lunch done before they were done. Spike then said, she's not the fastest, to which Bubu replied, don't say that it might hurt her feelings. ~Bubu is obsessed with PB&J sandwiches or more like PB&H{honey} sandwiches. He asks if we are having them morning, noon, and night. They've had more lately then I'd like to admit. Finally I told Bubu that he can't have them all the time no matter how many fruits and veggies he has on the side. He came back later and said in a very serious tone, Mom some people have peanut butter sandwiches all the time. Every day! They do. I told him some people might but we don't. Not the response he was looking for. ~Lately Bubu's been telling me things starting with the phrase, some people do... or some boys do... and sometimes it's not very pleasant. Like the other day he told me, some boys hit their brothers. He was frustrated with his brothers and I guess he wanted to let me know that some boys hit. I usually follow this sort of conversation up with, yes but not in our family. So now he says, but not in our family. Usually before I can now. ~Atty was walking around the house today singing, wash, wash, wash your hands, wash the germs away, over and over again. Then he switched to, Twinkle bell, twinkle bell, twinkle all the way... It was cute. He loves singing and often makes up his own words. One of his favorites right now is The B.I.B.L.E. song. He was singing it so much that he got his sister singing it, which I have to say is super adorable. Her version sounds more like bub-bub-ba-lee and she just says that over and over again without the rest of the song. She loves to sing too and the both of them together when they get going is the cutest. ~Mom I have to find my spotted leopard, I love that guy, he's just so hugable! Banden is so funny. He's the hugger that boy. ~Atty loves the chicks, talks about them all the time. He told me today, we don't squeeze the chicks, only gentle and talking. Great advice mister! It's hard not to squeeze them because they do look so squeezable! ~When ever Bubu gets dressed up nice he always asks me, do I look like a genius? To which I reply, Absolutely! With no correction. It's just too adorable. ~The boys were discussing their muscles today at lunch, a hot topic around here lately. They will sit at the table eating their food talking about how it's making big muscles. Bubu flexed his muscle and asked me, do I look like daddy? I said, well yes of course. To which I heard a chorus of questions about who looked the most like daddy while they all flexed their muscles at the table. *This post is not posting the way I want it too... no matter how many times I switch it and repost it, so I must log off now before I scream!*

Adopted chicks~

2011-03-26T09:12:00.000-07:00

I really had no idea that when we got the chicks it would bring up discussions about adoption from Atty, but it has, and it's been pretty consistent.

About a week or so before we got the chicks Bubu had asked me a question about Atty and his bio-brother that lives in another state {also adopted}. We were talking about Atty's brother as we often do, and reminiscing about their really fun visit to our state this last summer. All of a sudden Bubu asks me why Atty and his brother don't live together, because brothers live together. Then he said it was very sad. It was to the point and it scared me. It scared me because no matter how many times I rehearse what I will say when these questions come up it just doesn't seem to come out of my mouth as smoothly in the moment. I want our discussions to be honest and age appropriate and full of love. It's a hard topic to talk about. But questions need to be answered. We talked about it, Bubu and I, and I could tell Atty was listening but he didn't say anything.

Then we got the chicks and the questions started.

Where are the mommy chickens? Are they dead? Why aren't the babies with their mommy? Are they going back?

And on and on and on. I really felt like there was more to his questions then just concern over the chicks. It felt like it was a safe way for him to ask me his questions, although I don't know if he really thought that through or not. So when I answered I made it about adoption in a way. He asked the same questions over and over again and I continued to answer them, until he finally seemed to be satisfied. He never made a connection with himself by saying anything about him being adopted, but he seemed to be making a connection of some sort. This is the first time he has asked questions about adoption, always before it was someone else bringing it up, or myself mentioning something about adoption or his birth mom/dad. Even though we weren't talking about him, it felt great the he was finally opening that door a little and talking about it in a sense. It's only been recently that he has even started asking questions of any sort. I have a feeling it's going to get pretty intense with the questions around here pretty soon, he's got a bunch stored up in there somewhere.

How funny that little fluffy chicks opened the door for discussions about adoption with him.

I love you Dansen

2011-03-15T07:56:00.000-07:00

I'm really worried about my brother. He's in Japan {he lives in Tokyo} and we have heard from him since the big earthquake and tsunami but only twice. I just read his blog and the last entry helped me feel a little better... but only a little. I wish he would come back to the States for a while, but knowing him as I do, unless he was forced, he won't be coming. He's lived there so long it's home to him. I keep watching this live news channel and it seems like everything is just getting worse and worse over there. Between after shocks, more earthquakes and threat of nuclear meltdowns. Being an older sister I just want to scoop him up and hid him away. I want to protect him and there is nothing I can do from here.

I love you Dansen. We are thinking about you, people are calling asking about you all the time, we miss you so much and we wish you were here. You are in big trouble if I find out you were able to email me and didn't. I am assuming that you can't for what ever reason.

These pictures are from the last time I saw my brother when he was visiting from Japan after years of not seeing him. He was meeting his nephews for the first time.

Chicks!

2011-03-13T12:53:00.000-07:00

We have decided to do the farm thing, even though we live in town. In our town you can have as many chickens as you want {as long as there are no neighbor complains} but NO roosters. Not that I would want a rooster.... no thank you. We have been talking about getting chickens for a long time, we go through about 3 dozen eggs a week and we like to buy organic, so that gets expensive {for eggs anyways}. I have been trying to get us more and more self sustainable, with gardening, and learning how to preserve our own food. So we decided to take the next step. There is only so much we can do being as we still live in town and don't have a whole lot of property. I've already pushed the envelope on this one, turning our whole front yard into a garden, and I will be planting seeds up there this spring, so we will see how that goes. My husband is building the chicken coop behind our house, outside of the play yard. So they will be hidden away. My only concern is that they do get a little stinky, and their coop is going to be right by the walkway into the play yard, so that might not be very pleasant in the summer. But we will have fresh eggs... so I will focus on that.

{I told the kids they could name them... so their names are Eeny, Meeny, Miny, Mo, Catch-A (Catcha), Tiger, By-The (Bytha), and Toe. Ha, ha! That's what I get for telling the kids they could choose the names. I feel sorry for Toe...}

They are soooooooo cute! We are enjoying every minute of their cuteness, as they grow fast and it won't last long. We were going to get four, then six, and some how ended up with eight. Four Araucanas and four Black Sex-Links. {Yes that is there real name... but I've also seen them referred to as Black Stars and I will be calling them that from here on out.} I have to tell you when I googled the Black Sex-Links for more information I was a little nervous. They are suppose to be really great egg layers, so that's awesome. The Araucanas lay "Easter eggs" all different colors, which is why I ended up getting four of those as well. We were going to just get the Black stars, but after talking to the lady about the Araucanas I just had to have some.

The kids were so excited! Especially Atty as he has been really into birds of all kinds for a while now. They just can't get enough of these little fluff balls.

Baby sister reminding everyone to be quiet... ha ha!

Getting a chance to hold the little ladies. The boys were so gentle.

Atty was so extremely gentle and sweet that his fell asleep in his hands.

Lala wants to hold one so bad, but she's just too little to fully understand how gentle she needs to be. It's hard because she can see her brothers holding them and it drives her to tears that she can't. It's a little scary getting the chicks out around her because she tries to grab them and she pokes at them in here excitement. She calls them her babies, and just wants to squeeze 'em. I can't hardly blame her, the fluffy little chicks really do look squeezable. :)

Chicks in a basket, how adorable is that!

See Lala's hand sneaking in there? I'm telling you she is determined to get her hands on one!

It's just to much for my little lady, she wants to snuggle them up. How could mommy tell her no, no?

We are in love with these little babies. We want to get them use to us, with out scaring them, so that they will be friendlier when they are all grown up. We can't have them out for long right now though because they have to stay warm in their box so that they don't get sick. It's a little nerve racking taking care of these little ones, I don't want to lose one and I want to make sure I'm doing everything right. So far it's gone well, except I can't seem to get the box to stay the perfect temperature, it's either a tiny bit to warm or a tiny bit on the cool side. But they are staying active and seem healthy. It's actually fun to watch them running around and interacting. I'm afraid you all might be in for some more chicken post, as we are super excited about them!

Rambling is the only thing I'm good at...

2011-03-09T14:27:00.000-08:00

It seems that pictures speak louder then words in my life right now. Though I don't often have time to sit and journal what we are doing I do pick up my camera and snap away as much as possible. I love looking back on pictures, seeing the children as they grow. Looking at all the different things we have done together, firsts caught on film, special moments frozen forever. When memory fades, I will still have my pictures. I have grand ideas of getting them all printed {for I am devastatingly behind in that} and doing all sorts of amazing crafts with them, putting them in photo albums and scrapbooks to treasure for ever. Someday I hope to get around to that... Some day. Atty was so proud of himself for going down this slide all by himself, he went down it before Spike would, which was pretty impressive I must say! He is doing so well it's hard to believe he has a serious seizure disorder. You would never know. He is almost completely caught up developmentally, it's amazing!! I didn't think about him having a seizure, or freak out even once about him climbing around, the whole time we were at the park. When he was having his seizures just the idea of him at the park would send me into panic mode.

This isn't the best quality of picture, but Bubu's smile is so sincere I just had to post it. Lately it is so hard to get a good picture of him, he is either seemingly glaring or has a cheesy smile on his face... or running from the camera. This picture I had to take with my camcorder because my camera died and I was with out one for weeks! My camcorder doesn't have a flash so every picture I took had to be outside in order to really be able to see anything. Being with out my camera made me realize how often I am pulling it out. I'd be lost with out it. ;)

This little boy is a ham, he is always trying to get a laugh. He also has the most amazing eyes! I just recently cut his hair really short because more then once he was mistaken for a girl. I really have no idea why, he seems like such a boy to me, but I think maybe it was because of his absolutely beautiful eyes. Now that his head is shaved, I've not had a single person get confused about his boyness. He looks remarkable like his father, a little mini me.

I got to see my J-bird on his 16th birthday! I can hardly believe he's sixteen, I was sixteen when he was born! I was taking care of him when his mom wasn't around {which was a lot} at that age, it seems so young now. Time gone in the blink of an eye. It's so hard to get a good picture of him, this is the only one he was sort of smiling in. Sigh. I made him home made tortillas, and home made re fried beans and brought him all the toppings for super yummy soft tacos. He was thrilled. It was worth the very long drive and crazy cook-a-thon to hear how excited and thankful he was. He's such a sweetheart {when he's not being an evil teenager that is}. He lives with his sister {my SIL} and she just had a baby so I made her a bunch of food too, for the freezer and a monkey themed diaper cake that turned out super cute. It was a great trip. J just called me and thanked me again for the food and asked me to come down once a month and make tortillas and beans for him, silly kid. He knows the way to my heart... compliment my cooking. ;)

I take way too many pictures of this girl, I can't help myself. She is so full of sass and big personality. And her clothes are always so cute.

This hat belonged to one of the little girls in my daycare and when she out grew it she {as in her mom} passed it on to Lala. I see my little daycare girl when Lala wears it. They recently moved away and I'm really going to miss her. The adorable hat hides Lala's bald head quite nicely.

Atty and his ducka-ducka... he still loves that duck. It even went to the hospital with him, and continues to sleep in his bed. I wonder for how much longer? I'll admit when he no longer needs his ducka-ducka I'll feel a little sad.

My girl fell in love with these Bob the Builder boots. Much to the dismay of a good friend of mine who is afraid I will infect Lala with my horrible sense of style when it comes to shoes. {I wear "guy" shoes a good majority of the time.} Lala really loves shoes and her favorite are still her red shoes so I'm sure that there is nothing to worry about. {Not that I'm worried, I'm rooting for the boots personally.} I took this picture to show said friend just to annoy her... because that's the kind of friend I am, ha ha!

I love this picture of my oldest at the top and my youngest clinging to the bottom. She so wants to be big like her brother{s}.

My husband found this awesome park with walking trails that has great views over where we live. It was beautiful. In the background of this picture it the town we live in. It was really cool looking at our town from this perspective and trying to spot landmarks and figure out where our street was. We were so high up over the trees that it was like flying.

They are getting so grown. I know I am going to look back at this picture when they are teenagers and think that they look so tiny... but right now in this moment, sigh. No more babies.

Yes that is marker all over my girl. She thought it was fantastic. Me, well I was just glad they were washable markers.

Lala is really into her baby dolls right now, it's so cute.

Twins! These guys are exactly four months apart. And they love wearing matching pjs, I just had to get a picture of that. I wonder if Atty will always be bigger then Spike... I can hardly imagine three teenage boys in my house, but when I try to I always picture Atty as the tallest.

Well I ended up blogging after all, a rambling mess at that. and it took me all day, and made me really behind in household chores at one point. Which is why I hardly ever blog these days. For some reason lately I feel {and am} constantly behind with everything, no matter how hard I try to catch up. Frustrating for someone who likes to have every thing under control. Now I am trying to find a good way to end this post... but I have a screaming, squirming baby girl on my lap, that wants "oobie" and can't have it and I need to make dinner.

So that's that. {And I'm sorry to the ones who stuck around to read it...}

Longing for April...

2011-02-23T07:04:00.000-08:00

I was planning my garden last night, doing some more research on companion planting. Getting all excited. Then I woke up to... Snow! I am so done with the snow. It's beautiful out right now and normally I would be so excited but I can't take this winter any more. I need nice weather. I almost want to cry. Of course lately my hormones have been all over the place and just about anything with bring tears to my eyes. So crying over snow wouldn't be that hard for me to do. It's been along time since I've had to deal with the monthly hormonal ups and downs and I'm not dealing with it very well. Plus Lala is slowly nursing less and less and I always seem to go through a major hormonal upheavel during this time. If only spring would hurry up and show it's lovely self, I just know I'll feel better then. *sigh*

Getting it on paper, sort of...

2011-02-21T06:28:00.000-08:00

There has been so much going on, and lots swirling around in my head. But I never seem to have the time to blog about it. I want to, I think up great posts... but they stay their unpublished in my head, and soon forgotten. Sad.

My girl is growing up so fast. I'm not doing a very good job with journaling that this time around. So it's not just the blogging, I can't seem to write in her journal either. Or get any scrap booking done... I haven't even started on her baby quilt! Shesh. I've written a little in her baby book, but I bet it's time to update that as well.
She is my fearless one. Climbing to the top of the boys bunk bed in the blink of an eye. Always trying to keep up with her brothers. She is talking up a storm, new words every day it seems. Singing. Love the singing. She will bust out with Ol' McDonald had a farm, and Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star or the ABC's song and it's really super clear and absolutely adorable. She loves to beat box {her daddy taught her how} and dance. She hears music and she starts bopping. She can be nursing or half asleep but if music comes on she shoots up and starts moving and grooving. It's really funny. She's got some good moves too, dances better then her mommy already. {that's not really all that hard, ha ha!} She's only nursing a few times a day now... but she would still nurse all day if I let her. I have a feeling she is not going to be easy to wean. If I sit down to do any thing she assumes that it must be nursing time. I often read while nursing her, so now when she want to talk me into nursing her she will go grab a book and follow me around the house saying "Oobie, oobie, oobie". {All my kids have called nursing oobie, Lala did say Aboo instead for a short bit, not sure why.} She's sleeping on her own now for the most part, although she still wakes up way too much. I don't lay down with her anymore, but I often fall asleep at the foot of her bed, cause I'm so stinkin' tired! She can really pitch a fit. Really. And she's starting to do it a lot. She has also been hitting her brothers quite a bit. Some times the house will echo with "Baby sister hit me!" I've given her a few time outs, and she will sit there f0r her 1 minute and then go tell which ever brother it was {or all of them as was the case yesterday} that she is sorry. It's cute. The sorry part. Usually said with a kiss and then all is forgiven. I don't think her brothers can stay mad at her. She's taken up screaming when she has something one of her brothers want, that she most likely just grabbed away from them. She will run away on her chubby little legs as fast as she can, screaming like her life depends on it. It sounds as if she is a little terror {which she sort of it, but a cute one...ha ha!} but actually she has lots of shinning star moments where she just melts me. She's so sweet, and funny. So smart. She loves to cuddle her mommy, and follow me everywhere. She love to help me with everything. She loves shoes. Really loves shoes. Especially her red shoes, and now her new pink cowboy boots. She has one set of molars in, and that was a nightmare. Glad those are all the way in now. She puts them to good use too, as she loves to eat.

I've been working on putting together some gifts for my sister in law who just had a baby boy. I made her a really cute monkey themed diaper cake, don't have a picture yet as my camera is dead right now {so sad}. They didn't have much in the way of baby boy clothes as the last kid was a girl, and they weren't really planning on another. So I asked a bunch of my wonderful friends to find gently used clothes for me to gather up for her. They of course came through with some really cute stuff and so I have a ton of adorable little baby boy outfits for her now. All washed already so that she won't have to. I'm also making her a few dishes of food for the freezer so that she can skip on making a few meals. We are going to visit them next weekend {it's about a two hour drive} to see the baby for the first time and I am so excited! I also bought way to many outfits {all a deal of course, because I love sales} for her, and one of the cutest baby blankets I've ever seen! I love buying kids clothes, there just so cute. Way better then shopping for myself, which I hate to do.

My boys are growing so fast. I look at them and can't hardly believe it. How are they not babies any more? The things they say now, the games they play together, they all have such a good imagination. Love it. Atty has a harder time with imaginative play, but he goes along with the games his brothers come up with. His vocabulary is expanding rapidly, and he is starting to use more expressive words now which is great to hear. Spike is such a little brother. He loves to pester. It can get really frustrating. I mean he really loves it and has perfected it. He's the brother that does the whole, "I'm not touching you, I'm not touching you" with his hand hovering right there and the other child screaming, thing. With a smile on his face. He's so smart too and knows every ones weaknesses. He really seems to need constant attention, which is part of the reason why he pesters so much. He asks me for hugs all day long. I've been making a real effort to sit and snuggle him more. I have also been trying to remember to use more praise for him too, as he needs it. Well they all do of course, but he often gets in trouble a lot, which gets defeating for him, so I have to try and focus on what I can praise him for. Some days, I'll be honest, are a lot harder then others for that. He can be so sweet though, and really takes good care of his baby sister. They all do. You can see how much she adores them because of that. Bubu has been on a helping me roll. He loves feeling like a big kid, doing chores with me that the other kids can't do yet, like hand washing dishes. He's pretty good at it too. Because he's an oldest, he sometimes gets frustrated with his younger siblings, gets over whelmed by them when he's trying to do something and they keep getting in the way. So he's been asking for more alone time in his room, me time as we call it around here. He has always been one for playing on his own and being perfectly happy that way, so he will some times go into his room and build with blocks or what ever. He just needs that break. So far he's the only one who asks for it. I think because I am an oldest of four siblings I understand Bubu's need for alone time, and I sympathize and related to him more. I have a harder time understanding Spike, and probably Lala here pretty soon. I guess I will need to ask my little sister to interpret for them, ha ha!

Well I took a moment to ramble on about the kids, but that just scratches the surface of what I've been mulling over in this brain of mine. As always though, all the kids are up, daycare kids will be here any moment and breakfast needs to be made. Then the cleaning, the schooling, and everything else that takes up every spare moment of my day needs to be done. So I guess once again all those thoughts will stay in my head, and who knows maybe that's were they belong. Just thoughts in my head.

Birthday Photos...

2011-02-04T08:05:00.000-08:00

Look at those curls!

Got to have those special birthday pancakes. Made these with almond flour and he loved them.

These are meat loaf cupcakes with ketchup and mustard. I used almond flour to make them and Atty loves these as well. He had the mustard topped one. Sounds gross, but the kids thought it was awesome.

I some times can hardly believe they are all mine, how did I end up with four kids! They are growing too fast...

Our superman! Opening his birthday presents. His daddy made him that bird house and he loved it. He's really into birds and all things bird related right now. The boys all got binoculars for his birthday so that they could spy on the birds in our yard.

Atty got a bike, now the boys all have their own bikes... I'm thinking there are going to be a lot of outings with the bikes this summer! {Although it's going to take a lot of work to get Atty at the point where he can ride his bike.}

Birthday cake!

Made of course out of almond flour, with whipped cream for frosting {he can tolerate a little} and blueberries to make it fancy. It ended up being pretty yummy, surprising for a first time try! He loved the blueberries, he could only have a little bit so I had to count fast as he stuffed them in his mouth before I could even cut the cake!

And now you are four... Happy birthday!

To the moon and back birthday boy...

2011-02-03T06:23:00.000-08:00

Because it is your birthday my heart child, my fiery redhead, my love, I had to put a baby picture up. Look at those cheeks! Be still my heart, *sigh*...

One year ago to day things looked a lot more like this...
You were having a hard time talking, walking, feeding yourself, or bathing. You could no longer use the toilet. You were drooling and falling over all the time. You were sad, understandably. You were frustrated, overwhelmed and scared. You slept all the time, and could only watch your brothers play. It all happened so fast. You went from our normally happy Atty, active and playing... to seizing all day long. The day before your third birthday I was begging and praying for you to be released from the hospital so that we could celebrate your birthday at home {after a nine day hospital stay}. We did get home in time, but as many of you know the storm continued for many more months. The up and down roller coaster ride. So much has happened in one year. I am thankful beyond words that we are now where we are today. You my son are amazing.

To see you walking and talking. Witnessing how far you have come. Hearing from your doctors at Children's how amazed they are by you. You are a miracle. Your doctor told me there has never been another case she knows of at Children's where a child recovered so well when they didn't even know why the seizures started in the first place. We might never know, but I am so thankful we found out how to stop them. I'm so glad we were able to put you on the Modified Atkins for seizures diet and that it worked for you when six different medicines wouldn't. It's not easy, but I hope you know that I would move mountains for you. I love seeing how excited you get when I figure out another recipe that you like. Thanks to almond flour I've been able to figure out recipes for muffins, bread, cookies, cake, and things like meatloaf and breaded chicken. Every time I figure out something new I feel like the diet gets even more successful and it warms me. Makes me feel good inside, because it's something I can do for you to make things better. I know this diet can be hard on you, some times you talk about candy with a gleam in your eye like any other little kid, but you can't have any. You can't join in for ice cream or have the same cake as everyone else at a birthday party. You can't have anything made from grain. You can't eat unlimited fruit or vegetables with every one else. Every time you eat you have something different then the other kids. We try to keep the stuff you can't have out of your life, but there are times when it's unavoidable. And you cope. Because of you this diet works. With your help Atty we have made you seizure free! So now today on your 4th birthday we celebrate not only your birth and your life, but also how far you have come!

I love you more then life it's self Atticus. To the moon and back, quack, quack...

12 blurry months...

2011-01-16T20:53:00.001-08:00

It was a year ago today that I wrote this. I can't believe it's been a year already. I was actually washing the dishes today when it dawned on me and I became so over whelmed I started to cry. The feelings of that day washed over me, the panic and fear felt like it was going to swallow me up once again. I had to take deep breathes and call a close friend to share my feelings with her. We talked about that day, and the days and months that followed, then we moved on to how far we have come. How well he is doing on his special diet. How amazing he is. How inspiring the whole situation has been for so many people around us. After that I really calmed down and spent the rest of the day reminding myself that it is not a sad day or a scary day any more, it is a day to give thanks and remember how far we have come. We had some family over and shared a nice meal and I made him his favorite magic diet foods and it was wonderful. So perfect. I love that today we took a day that 12 months ago threatened to rip us apart and leave us blowing in the wind, and we turned it around into a beautiful day of remembrance and thanks. I am so thankful. So today I will end this day on my knees, but I won't be pleading, I will be giving thanks. With tears of joy.

Snow day

2011-01-10T20:43:00.000-08:00

Funny story...we drove 2 1/2 hours up the mountain to take the kids sledding in the snow, just to have it turn around and dump on us this week. Silly us. The kids got a story this Christmas called Stranger in the Woods. Now I know it sounds scary but it's actually just about a snowman in the woods that all the creatures of the forest are wondering about. They finally get close to it and realize it's a yummy edible snowman. It's a cute book. We decided to make an edible snowman for the birds in our neighborhood and we got ideas from the book. After rolling up the snow we used a carrot for the nose {Don't think any birds around will be eating that, but you never know what might come take a nibble.} nuts for the eyes and mouth and then we sprinkled two types of bird seed on his hat and around the ground. It was a lot of fun.
This is the first snowman that the boys all helped with. Maybe next year the little girl will lend a hand too...

Had to get the muscle behind the project in the picture too, ha ha! It was so much fun to spend time in the snow with the hubby and kids. After we were done with the snowman we didn't want to be done with the snow so we grabbed our sleds and decided to go across the street to the field and see if we could sled down the hill in the back. My hubby was skeptical but I told him that the boys didn't need a super big hill this year and it would be easier to go up and down that way anyways.

I ended up being right {as usual...just kidding...sort of, ha ha!} We had a blast! At one point I just had to bring up how funny it was that we were having more fun across the street from our house on a little hill then we did when we drove 2 1/2 hours to go sledding. I think we went down that hill a total of four times and then called it a day. Of course there were a lot of little factors in that day that made it over all tiring and a tad bit frustrating, like driving that long and then finding out when you get there with 3 young boys that there is NO WHERE to go to the bathroom...ummm yeah. I won't tell you what we did, but desperate times call for desperate measures. But back to this snow day. If anyone needs to pee it's a hop, skip and jump away from home. Nice.

And away goes Bubu, all on his own.

Atty waiting for his turn. He did a lot better too, he got way too cold the last time. This day was bright, even I dare say a bit warm. Makes for a better time. He went down a few times, but he wanted to be pulled back up, little stinker.

Away goes Spike, push me faster daddy!

Snuggling the baby.

Even Lala and I took turns.

I just had to take a picture of my oldest son dragging the sleds home. How did he grow so fast? What a wonderful day. I've heard there is more snow headed our way. I'll get sick of it eventually, just not yet. If it's going to be cold...it might as well snow.

{Looking back in these pictures I realize it really does look like there is no hill at all, but there is, I swear. It's just big enough to be fun for the little ones and not scary. Even my hubby went down on his own a few times just for the fun of it, head first of course...}