Game Nights

i love when the family gets together to play games. sometimes it gets so crazy! tonight we played hearts. it was me, ej, mom, and dad. we all stayed pretty close in score and then the last round we played the scores were 96, 97, 98, and 99. we were only playing to 100, so it was crazy! i won because i was the only one to not go over 100. we were having a great time.

S-A-N-T-A C-L-A-U-S! Hurray for Santy Claus!

all my christmas decorations are down. i took them down last night and now i just have to hide them in the closet until next year. i got so many good gifts. the kids and derek got good stuff, too. derek's mom made us a new quilt for our bed. the back was so pretty i thought it was the top. then she told me to open it up and the top was even prettier! so, today, mom is coming over and she's gonna help me rearrange my living room so i can fit my new elliptical machine in! hurray! i've been wanting one for so long and derek completely surprised me with it! it was waiting at someone else's house and i got a picture of it inside of a box, inside of a box, inside of a bag. derek's mom wrapped it. i almost started to tear up. it was the most thoughtful gift.

Traditions at Christmas

who'll stand under the mistletoe with me?

who, who will come hither?

who, who will it be?

with a hey diddley-hi

and a hey diddley-hoo

i'll stand under the mistletoe with you!

everytime we hang mistletoe i sing this song. i haven't hung mistletoe in years, but greenolive reminded me about this song and i realized i'd been forgetting the mistletoe. unfortunately, i don't know where to buy it. growing up we had fake so we never had to buy it. in college people sold it door to door. now, i'm gonna have to do some research to find a local place to buy mistletoe. i wonder if there are any other traditions i've been forgetting.

on another note, i've moved our stockings. they were hanging from the key holder, since i had no where else to hang them.

so my dad built a stocking holder for us using some wood and stuff he had just hanging around. now the stockings are with the tree.

now, here are some cute pictures of the kids.

Emmy's Receipt

the other night we were at walmart. we got everything that we needed and checked out. emmy was given the receipt because she likes to hold them. whenever we go to costco the person at the door checks our receipt and sometimes at walmart our receipt is checked, so like to have it handy 'til i get out the door. well, emmy wanted the door greeter to check the receipt, but when we got to the woman emmy acted shy and wouldn't do it. we left the store and emmy started freaking out because she didn't get her receipt checked. we tried to explain to her that she didn't need it done, but she wasn't listening. i took emmy back inside and had the greeter "check" the receipt. the lady was very nice and looked it over, tore the top a little, and gave it back to emmy. she then kissed emmy on the hand and talked to her a little. emmy was happy and we went home. derek says that emmy get her OCD from my side of the family. whaaaaat? that doesn't sound even remotely like us at all.

Happy Holidays!

well, i guess it's time for another update. not much has been going on. i've gotten some more gifts done. when i'm all done making things i will divvy them up as i see fit. i was telling a sister about the things i'm doing and she commented on how i was not giving everybody the same thing. she seemed surprised, but okay with it. i'm not giving her anything, though. she lives too far away and i don't want to mail anything. luckily, i was assigned to give a gift to the sister who lives near me.

i tried to get my family to stop drawing names this year, but i was overruled. not out voted, overruled. not that i think we shouldn't give gifts, i think we should just stop assigning it. that's how we're doing it in derek's family. i don't have to give a present to everybody, and i'm not expecting a present from everybody. i know that i will get something. a few people have already told me what they are doing, so i'm expecting something.

this year christmas will be very busy. we will wake up and open presents here at home, then go to my parents' house and open gifts, and then go to derek's parents' house and open gifts. usually we don't go to my parents' house, but this year my brother is coming and my mom wants us to be there. we were going to open presents with them on boxing day, but derek has to work.

anyway, i've got all the presents that we're giving the kids wrapped and under the tree. they are leaving them alone, which is good. they'll both get something that they really wanted. emmy is getting a tea set and doll, and andrew is getting a talking thomas and star wars blaster. they will also get a video and they can open their jammies on christmas eve.

christmas eve we are going to a birthday party. i've been assigned to bring the relish tray. that's easy enough. that's something i enjoy because i don't have to cook and keep something warm to take. cold things are much easier to transport.

well, that's all for now. i'll try to post more often.

I'm in My Kitchen

i got some stuff at Michaels to start making gifts. so far it's going well. turns out i need more supplies. good thing i have a couple of weeks still.

Gift Giving

i love homemade gifts. i like to give them and i like to receive them. of course i love store bought gifts, too. this year i want to make gifts for the family, but i'm gonna see if i can get some help. i can't blog about it though, because the people getting the gifts read this. i just wanted to dangle a carrot in front of your noses.

O Tannenbaum

yay! i got my tree all put up. i got the ribbon and the balls and the lights all put up, but it just seemed like something was missing. it needed more. 35 candy canes later, it looks great!

i couldn't get any pictures in the dark. actually, we were in the dark, but i had the flash on. i turned off the flash, but then everything was blurry.

It's Beginning to Look a lot like Christmas!

i am soooooo ready for christmas. it's my favorite holiday. i just love everything about it. i love the snow, assuming we'll get some. i love the music. i love the decorations. i love the food and drinks. i love the get togethers. i love the movies. i just love everything about christmas. i'll be putting my tree up soon. probably tomorrow morning, but we'll see. i bought of bunch of candy canes tonight to hang on the tree, but i also got some peppermints to put in a dish so hopefully the kids will go after those first. i really need to find my tree skirt so i can use it this year. i have one that i need to cut out, but i don't remember where i put it. maybe i just need to get another one. i wish that i had a place to hang the stockings. i don't have a fireplace or a stairway to hang them. growing up, we always hung our stockings from right under the banister. i always liked the way it looked with the stockings getting higher and higher. last year i just laid the stockings out on chairs on christmas eve so that we had them the next morning. one year in college we bought little stockings any my roommate drew a fireplace on some cardboard and we hung our stockings on that. it was a lot of fun.

Nighty-Night

just a couple of minutes ago i knew just what i was gonna blog about. sadly, the idea has left me. it's 1:17 in the morning, which is probably why i can't think of it. i went to the goodwill store today. i was just tagging along with my mom and i was looking around and i found some things that i could maybe do something with for christmas or something. i also found some nancy drew books. there were several, but i only bought two. she's so smart. i don't know how she knows all that stuff. of course being a fictional character helps a lot , i'm sure. i'm so glad that i took typing class in high school. im sitting here with my eyes closed because i'm so tired, but i can still get my thoughts out. of course i check my writing every so often. i just wish that i was faster at typing. i think i'm as fast at typing as i am at writing by hand. i think i need to end this post. i'm pretty sure that i'm rambling incoherently. nighty-night.

Words

i learned some new words recently. i have a tendency to read the dictionary when i'm bored at somebody else's house. a fillip is a type of flick made by the thumb holding finger and then quickly releasing. i learned that last night. today i learned the word graffito. it's the singular of graffiti. i didn't even know graffiti had a singular form. i like to learn new words. especially if they are fun to say. one i relearned was jalousie. it's a type of window shade. it's made of wooden slats that can be adjusted. sometimes i learn a word, but i have no practical application for it so i forget about it. that's the case with jalousie. when i saw it in the dictionary i remembered seeing it before, but couldn't remember what it meant. anyway, don't be surprised if every once in a while i put a word post up.

Random

well, i guess it's time for an update. not a whole lot has been going on. just waiting for thanksgiving to come along and then christmas. so, here's some random pictures!

So Yummy!

every year after halloween i start looking for my favorite cookies from the store. usually, i have to wait forever for them, but this year i've found them early!


we had to open a second tin because the first one is already empty.

Halloween Festivities

well, i'm finally gonna put some pictures up. hopefully no weirdos look at my blog.

these are from our ward trunk or treat.

here's andrew and emmy. andrew is a turtle and emmy is a fairy named silvermist.


here is one of their friends. she's a bat-fairy.
here's one of my friends. she's minnie mouse, but she's not wearing her ears.

here's some weird lady. she's dressed as an indian.

and here's what i want to be next year. isn't this awesome! they won a prize. it had nothing to do with the fact that i was one of the judges. they looked really good.

no pictures of me since i was the one holding the camera.

Sunday

hip hip hooray! maura has saved the day! we were at church on sunday and she brought george with her! andrew hasn't let george out of his sight since.

i would have updated earlier, but i wasn't home on sunday or yesterday and last night we had about three blackouts.

okay, now for another sunday story. we were sitting in the chapel before church began and andrew said he needed to go potty. of course emmy also wanted to go so we went around to the bathroom. andrew likes to go into the men's bathroom by himself. once again he ran away from me and went in. there just happened to be a chair in the hallway, so i sat down with emmy on my lap. a few men went in and out. then i thought i heard andrew crying. i went to the door and hear better and sure enough, andrew was calling for me. a man came along to use the bathroom and i asked him if he would send my little boy out to me. he went in, but then came back and said that andrew needed me. all the men left the bathroom and i went in for andrew. he was having a hard time wiping. he even got a little mess on the floor. i cleaned him up and we left. i thanked the men who stood guard so no other men came in and we went to the women's bathroom. then emmy got to go potty. as a side note, when we got back to the chapel we found that derek had moved us. nice.

Lost Dog

andrew has lost his favorite toy. it's a light brown stuffed dog. he calls it george. we can't find it anywhere here in our apartment. it's not in the car. it's not at grampa's house. it's not at aunt emily's house. i couldn't think of anywhere else we've been these last couple of days. then derek reminded me that andrew and i went to a babyshower. hopefully, it got left at that house. otherwise, we have no where else to look. of course when i called nobody was there. they're probably either at work or visiting the new baby. i guess i can't blame them for that. this dog is like andrew's security thing. he likes to sleep with it at night. derek and andrew were at the carnival this summer and derek won it and gave it to andrew. i think he loves it because it's something he got when it was just him and daddy. i hope we find it.

Funny Story

my sister came over today and she drove my mom's car to get here. so i was like "oh, you have mom's car".

i seriously told that story to another sister today on the phone. i was trying to tell an interesting story, but it just came out all wrong. i mean, that's pretty much the worst story ever told. i do that a lot. sometimes i start talking and i forget what i've already said. sometimes i get totally lost and completely forget what i was trying to say. anyway, maybe that's why people think i'm boring.

Blog Renovation?

last night someone told me that i needed a new blog template. i would do this. i tried to find one. i like having the three columns, and not everysite can accomodate that. i found a site that has three column templates. there was one that was really cute. i copied the code and erased my html, after saving somewhere else, and pasted the new code. it wanted to delete a bunch of my widgets. if i were starting from scratch then i guess i could do this, but i don't want to have to redo all my widgets. you all will just have to suffer with a colorful, but plain, blog from me.

Cool Weather

well, the weather is changing. we had some hail and snow recently, but i hear this week is supposed to warm up again. i love the fall weather. i like layering clothes. emmy likes to wear tights, but we've been having a hard time so far finding them in the stores. i told her that she can't wear dresses outside until we get her some tights. she's really upset because she just loves to wear dresses. she has some really cute pants, but i guess she is just too particular in her style to want to wear them. i have no idea where she gets that from. maybe from her daddy. wink! anyway, i do love the autumntime. i like halloween and i love thanksgiving. i think that we might go to two thanksgiving meals. my family has one around lunchtime and derek's family has one around dinnertime. oh yeah! double shot! we'll see if it works out. maybe we'll just choose one or the other. let's see, which family do we like better? ha ha!

this year for halloween i think that i will be a bumblebee. all i need is a big yellow sweatshirt. i could make a tunic out of fleece if i wanted, but it would just be easier to find a sweatshirt and cut the sleeves off. the dollar store has wings, so that part is easy. i better buy them now before they all get sold out. emmy wants to be tinkerbell. she needs wings, too. i think we'll make andrew a turtle. that shouldn't be too hard. i've recruited my sister rachel's help. she's good at drawing stuff. she can make the turtle pattern on the fabric. anyway, i may post pictures on here of the costumes. we'll see.

The Shopping List

i need to go grocery shopping. i have a list on my computer that i made and it's in sections. the problem is it's based on a store i used to go to, but don't anymore. now i think i may have to rework the list. see, this new store that i go to has the sections in a different order. the list doesn't flow like it used to. of course i could just leave the list alone and just find the section on the list when i get to it in the store. the worst part of this whole thing is that it bugs me. i don't want it to bug me. i think it's ridiculous that it bugs me. i just know that after tonight i'm gonna redo this list.

Personality Flaws

have you ever known somebody that only thinks about themselves? i have a friend on facebook, a girl, who always talks about herself. we have some mutual friends, and if somebody says anything and she answers it's always about herself. always. i started noticing this one day and i got to thinking, "do i do this?" i know sometimes i do, but i hope it's not always. now, of course people are going to make personal comments, but this girl kinda does it to the extreme, i think. no, i'm not gonna tell you who she is or what was said. i'm just saying, it got me thinking. of course, on a blog it is all about me, but i hope when i leave comments on other people's blogs i'm not self absorbed. i do think that we all have the potential to be ridiculously self centered, but at the same time we have the potential to be completely selfless. i hope i'm leaning more towards selfless.

Morning Conversation

scene: me in the bathroom, andrew comes in followed by emmy

action!

andrew: is this my carebear?

me: yes, if emmy says it is

andrew: what's his name?

me: funshine

emmy: is this my carebear?

me: yes, her name is sharebear

emmy: she has a butt

me: yup

andrew: mine has a butt

emmy: carebears have butts

me: ha ha ha ha

Musically Inclined.

wanna hear a bad idea? letting your kids each buy a flute at the dollar store.

we went to the dollar store and the kids each had a dollar. we looked at all sorts of things but then we found plastic recorders. i thought that the kids could learn a little bit about music. they couldn't be that annoying, right? afterall, the harmonica that they play with isn't too bothersome...

yeah, these are high pitched whistles. and now one is broken. i'm so devastated.

September 11th

for some this is a day that will live in infamy. yes, i remember where i was on this day back in 2001. i know that my husband remembers where he was, too. one year ago today i buried my little daughter mary. this day has different meaning for me now.

Grammatically Incorrect

i'm not a fan of using words wrong, but i do it all the time. for instance if i use the word have in a sentence then i will add -en to the verb. like "i haven't boughten that yet" or "i've caughten lots of balls" or "i have satten in that chair before." see, those aren't words. other things like "i'd've" or "here're" may not be acceptable contractions. i also use bad sentence structure. "will you get me out a plate?" i said that once and my dad just laughed at me and said i was "so amish". ha!apparently. also, some things i add an -s to: anyways, towards. they don't need an -s at the end. i dangle my participles like it's going out of style. "where are you from?" "where are you at?" "who should i give this to?" those kinds of things made my college english teacher cringe. actually, that last sentence had a lot wrong with it. you want more? i got more. "me and andrew went to the store." at least i don't misuse "I". i would never say something like "emmy surprised derek and i." i know that's wrong. so, what are some incorrect things you say?

Church Bags!

a couple of weeks ago i left the kids' church bags in the car with crayons in them. the crayons melted all over the bags and ruined them. i was very sad. however, it meant that i got to be creative again! here're the new bags!

Emmy's Bag:

Andrew's Bag:

i thought they turned out pretty good. i finally figured out how to get the extra stitches on my machine! i was so excited!

Setbacks

it seems like there are always setbacks no matter how good things seem to be going. andrew is potty trained. he can go to the bathroom by himself. he knows when to go and he flushes the toilet when he's done, turns off the light and shuts the door. it's great. then today he plays with the toilet paper. he put almost the whole roll into the toilet. yeah, it clogged. the water overflowed and was all over the floor in the bathroom and started to come into the hall. i called the maintenance people and then called my dad. he told me how to turn off the water. then i started to clean and the guy came and snaked it. he said that by how easy it was then it was probably just toilet paper and no toys. i told him i think andrew learned his lesson the last time about toys in the potty. anyway, i just find it so weird that andrew would be so good for so long and then go and do this. i hope he realizes what he did was wrong.

Scrapbooking or Book Scrapping?

i'm almost done with my wedding album scrapbook. i went to michelle's house on wednesday and got a lot done. i've been married for almost 6 years and i'm still working on this. actually, i had all the pictures in an album that i made, but i like the idea of a scrapbook where i can write in it. i enjoy "book scrapping" but i don't get to do it as often as i would like. i think that i'm gonna do some more this coming week. i hope so.

Yummy, with a Side of Hooray!

my mom's plum tree produced plentiful plums this year. she's been giving them away like crazy. i tried to find a recipe for plum pudding, but all i could find were recipes using raisins. um, hello! raisins aren't plums. anyway, i found a plum jam recipe. it seemed simple enough, four ingredients, so i printed it off. a couple days later i was at my mom's house. she was telling me to take some pectin home so that i could make the jam finally. we couldn't remember how much was needed so i asked my sister rachel to find the recipe online. she found a different one that was even simpler. plums, water, and sugar. no pectin needed. i was very excited. so i did that recipe instead. well, i just tasted the jam for the first time today. it was good! i think if i make it again i might add just a little more sugar. if you want the recipe go to cooks.com and look up plum jam. it's the one with only three ingredients.

Andrew is Growing Up!

i think it's safe to say that andrew is potty trained. most mornings he wakes up dry and he goes potty on his own during the day. he hasn't made a mess in his pants in over a week. hooray for andrew!

Family Game Night

my kids love to play games. yesterday we kinda had a family game night. first we played with dominoes. i set them up and they got to knock them down. then we just matched them and made designs. it wasn't a real game, but they like it. after that we played candy land four times. emmy won the first three times. i won the fourth time. andrew was really upset that he didn't get to win. then we played chutes and ladders once and andrew won. finally! then they just played with the dominoes again. it was fun, but sitting on the floor for too long really hurts my hips. i think four games is gonna have to be my limit from now on.

The Reunion

we had a fun time. we played games, went sightseeing like tourists, and nobody broke any bones.

actually, one of my nephews showed up in a cast. according to my sister his leg wasn't broken. with all the running around he did his cast was starting to deteriorate. nursemom talked to the doctor's office on the phone and then my sister, sarah, talked to them. they said that we could take the cast off and see how he does. mrbusdr has lots of power tools in his garage. sarah held the boy while the cast came off. i couldn't watch. now i know that this is his grandchild so mrbusdr is gonna be super careful, but i still couldn't watch. i saw about the first ten seconds and left.

we played a couple rounds of bob. i wish i'd kept a page to post it here. they were pretty funny, except one player seemed to have a facination with potty humor. i tried to make it adults only, but that was shot down. we also played dutch blitz, scattergories, and boggle. i wish we'd played taboo. that's one of my favorite games.

we went to virginia city and walked around there. i can't understand why anybody would live there. the roads are too steep. i'd freak out in the wintertime. it is a cute town with an old timey charm, but that wouldn't be enough to get me there when it snows. we also went to lake tahoe. nobody swam, but we waded in the water. afterwards i had to change andrews clothes 'cause he was so wet. my sister yelled to me that is wasn't a nude beach. ha ha, very funny.

so now i'm sick. i got sick yesterday. we'll see how long it lasts. i can't afford to go to the doctor since i have no medical insurance, so i'll just have to wait it out. apparently one of my sisters got sick, too.

Girls! Girls! Girls!

they're coming! the sisters are coming! this weekend is our bi-annual family reunion! once again, only the girls can make it, but hey at least they can! i'm way excited to see them and all their kids! my kids know that their cousins are coming, but they keep getting confused as to which cousins they are. oh, well, maybe they will remember them better now.

Who Wants a Clean House?!

have you seen this show on the style network called "clean house"? niecy nash hosts and she helps people get rid of their foolishness so they can enjoy their homes better. not that my house is anywhere near as cluttered as the houses on the show, but my bedroom was getting pretty close. i've been watching the show a lot lately and it's really helped me get into the mood to clear out so much stuff. mostly clothes, but i also got rid of some of the kids' toys and books. we had a yard sale and whatever didn't sell went to a local thrift store. my closet was filled with clothes that needed to be washed and i had boxes of baby girl clothes that i was gonna use for mary, but of course didn't get used. a lot of those went to my new niece taygan. anyway, i went through all the clothes and anything that didn't fit anymore or that we didn't wear anymore, even if they still fit, went to the thrift store. i'm still putting away all the stuff that we kept, but it's really not that bad. it'll be so nice to have more organization. now, if only i could just keep it this way...

Really? I Never Knew That!

last night derek wanted to have a game night. we had people over for dinner and then some of us played trivial pursuit. that was fun. then more people left and the truly diehard gamers played taboo. oh, yes. it was great. my sister and my sister in law and one niece were on a team and they were called "the winners". i was on a team with a niece and nephew and we were called "the chocolate frogs". the winners won with 54 points while we had only 46. the best part of the game was my 11 yr old niece who taught us that a stagger is a weapon used in the board game clue, that owls are furry, and that jukeboxes have been around since the 1700's. oh, yes, it was a good time for all.

Awesome!

last night i was at my mom's house. me and her and my sister and her daughter were playing boggle. let's rephrase that: mom, my sister, her daughter, and i were playing boggle. we had the dictionary out for challenges. emmy was sitting on my lap and she was flipping through the pages and looking at the pictures. she would ask me what the pictures were of and get excited if she recognized them without asking. she's already reading the dictionary! i'm so proud!

The Children

so i was reading another woman's blog and she talked about how she changed into THAT mom. you know the one. she hovers over her children at the playground and yells at all the kids. anyway, it got me thinking. how have i changed? when i'm at home with my children and it's just the three of us i'm a lot different than when i'm with people. my children get yelled at and spanked at my house. no, i'm not abusing them, but i do lose my temper with them more if no one is around. yelling happens a lot, but i try to not spank them. at least i only do it maybe once a day and only use my open hand. my kids know when i've hit my limit. andrew will smile at me and tell me that he still loves me. that almost always melts my heart. emmy, who is not quite as articulate in these situations, just gives me a hug. that also gets me. i never thought that i would be an angry mom. why? because i knew absolutely everything about raising children. i was going to be the perfect mom whose children were darling little angels because i was prepared. i couldn't understand why some parents couldn't control their kids. well, for being so cocky i was awared my son andrew. he's so full of energy and he can be very naughty. at my house he has limits in what he can get into. i have locks on door and things like that. when we are in public i really just have to let him loose. otherwise i will lose it. now i don't wonder why people don't controll their children. they can't. at least to a certain point. children have their own personalities. they aren't just what we make them. i wonder what my kids will be like when they are older. can you believe that i'm actually looking forward to when they are older? i just know that someday i'll look back and laugh at how delusional i once was.

I Was Tagged Again

This is kind of like the 25 things - except there are pre-decided questions and it's about you and your spouse, not just you. Come on, play along - inquiring minds want to know! ;-)
♥ What are your middle names? michael and elizabeth
♥ How long have you been together? we started dating a little over six years ago, but have been married for almost six years
♥ How long did you know each other before you started dating? just a couple of days
♥Who asked who out? he asked me out
♥ How old were each of of you when you started dating? 23 and 22
♥ Whose siblings do/did you see the most? i don't know. i think it's about even
♥ Do you have any children together? yes
♥What about pets? not anymore. we used to have a fish
♥ Which situation is the hardest on you as a couple? my laziness
♥ Did you go to the same school? nope
♥ Are you from the same home town? nope
♥ Who is the smartest? we're about equal
♥ Who is the most sensitive? me
♥ Where do you eat out most as a couple? either gengix asian fusion or the fandango casino
♥ Who has the worst temper? me
♥ Who does the cooking? me
♥ Who is more social? me
♥ Who is the neat-freak? neither
♥ Who is the more stubborn? him
♥ Who hogs the bed? andrew (i know it's supposed to be about me and derek, but neither of us hog the bed
♥ Who wakes up earlier? sometimes him and sometimes me
♥ Where was your first date? he says it was at the carson nugget casino, but i say it was saturday night stake conference and bowling afterwards
♥ Who has the bigger family? hmm, as far as sibling go, he does, but throw in the nieces and nephews and i do
♥ Do you get flowers often? sure
♥ How do you spend Christmas? we have xmas morning at our house and then go to his parents house by brunchtime and spend all day there. my family usually does xmas before xmas day
♥ Who is more jealous? i think i am
♥ How long did it take to get serious? ha! that first date.
♥ Who eats more? me
♥ Who does/did the laundry? i do
♥ Who’s better with the computer? um, i know how to do a few things. he does all the maintenance, so him
♥Who drives when you are together? he does, usually. he thinks i'm a bad driver. i say he's a tailgaiter
ok! I get to tag people!! How exciting!! actually, i'm not gonna tag anyone. if you want to do this then consider yourself tagged.

Last Night and Today

well, i went to a progressive dinner last night. i got complimented on my outfit and my glasses. the food was good, but i guess i messed up when i told the people with salads to bring them to the first house instead of the second house. other than that, everything went really smoothly. this is only the second progressive dinner that i've been to and the first one was in a branch and it seemed really haphazzard. i don't know, maybe i was just overwhelmed. i was still pretty new at the time. anyway, i got to talk to some friends and hang out with the ladies outside of church. that is always fun. one house that we went to had a shelf with some games on it. i was impressed. settlers, upwords, risk, killer bunnies, scrabble, othello. lots of thinking games. personally, i don't enjoy killer bunnies, but whatever. anyway, the theme of the dinner was home and garden. the first house had a few garden boxes and a lady talked to us about gardening and fertilizing. she seemed miffed when someone contradicted her about manure, but it went no further than the first comment, so we all just looked past it. the next house had some neat wall designs. the lady had done venetian plaster, i think. it looked neat and had some leaf impressions in it. she talked about how she did it and how much her supplies cost her. she would tell us how something cost so much and then she said what she used, which was a lot cheaper. i like it when people tell you how to be frugal. the last house was so beautiful. i think someone called it a "show house." i didn't play volleyball or croquet or even sit in the gazebo. i just sat on the lawn furniture and talked to my friends. we decided that we are gonna see harry potter and the half blood prince together when it comes out. i probably won't go to the midnight showing, so my friend will have to watch it twice. not that she would mind in the least. so that's what i've been up to this week, so far. today i'm gonna make my sister a lily apron. i'm gonna try gathering it, which i've never done before, so we'll see how it turns out.

Whew!

well, castastrophe waiting to happen is avoided. i rescanned my tv and just didn't scan for the digital channels. i wasn't fast enough to not get at least one digital channel scanned, but it's cbs, so we're safe. so now i can just avoid all those unneeded and def unwanted channels. yay for me for figuring something out!

Time for the Jeopardy!

well, we finally got cable. the guy came today and hooked us up. since being married we've never paid for tv service. we've always had an antenna or done without. it's pretty exciting. actually, cable was my third choice. i wanted dish network or directv, but i have a tree in the way. the guy from dish network came to install earlier this week, but told me he couldn't and said that directv would have the same problem. that's when i called the cable company. they were here in just a few days and total hook up time was about ten minutes. it was really neat to have it be so fast, but i have one problem. i don't know how to delete unwanted free digital channels. i have a digital tv, so apparently i can pick up some free channels. mostly they are music channels, but there's one that really needs to go away. it's a naughty channel. the cable guys warned me that i might get some channels like that. they said they can't control it. my bedroom tv is too old to be digital, so i don't get those channels in there. unfortunately, that's the tv i know how to work and delete channels. derek says that he'll check it out and see if he can fix the problem when he gets home. i sure hope he can. personally, i can just skip those channels, but what if i have a babysitter at my house. i wouldn't want my favorite 12 yr old babysitter to accidently stumble onto that channel. i'm sure she and her parents would never forgive me. i also wouldn't want my kids to find that channel. sometimes they fiddle with the tv when i'm not in the room. anyway, i'm still glad i got cable. now i can have all the local channels. i can finally watch jeopardy at my house! yay!

The Little Girl

i know, i know. i'm late getting this out, but here i go.

emmy is three years old. her birthday was june 4th. emmy is in the nursery at church and she has a few little friends there. she loves to visit her cousins from both sides of her family. she loves visiting her grandparents. she's really social as long as she knows you. if she doesn't know you she is terribly shy, which i'm glad for. i know she won't just go off with a stranger.

emmy loves girly things. she loves hearts and flowers, butterflies and fairies. stars and snowflakes. pink and purple, but also green. i think pink and green are her favorites. she loves to wear dresses and skirts. she loves tinkerbell.

emmy loves to watch videos. can you guess which ones? tinkerbell, of course. sleeping beauty, cinderella, the wiggles, elmo. she loves the story of alice in wonderland. we have four different versions of it. she watches them all. she loves willy wonka and the chocolate factory as well as charlie and the chocolate factory. it amazes me that she doesn't find it confusing that there are different movies about the same story.

she's very smart. she knows most of her colors and can recognize many letters. she loves to draw. nothing really clear yet, but she tells me what she draws, so it works.

emmy loves to talk on the phone. she just needs to know who it is first and she'll talk to anybody. she's not shy on the phone like she is in person.

emmy is like a little shadow. she loves to follow people around. sometimes she's too clingy, but i find that on days when she goes somewhere without me i miss the clingyness. she likes to sew with her nana. sometimes this scares me because i think her little fingers get too close to the needle. i don't let her sew with me and i can't be in the room when she is sewing with nana.

emmy loves to sing songs. sometimes she makes up songs and sometimes she sings songs she's heard. she loves abba. one of her favorite songs in mamma mia. she also loves some songs from church. when i go into the nursery during song time she's usually the only kid sitting there singing. the other kids are off playing with other stuff. i just find it so funny. i don't always go in there at that time. i go in to get the RS roll to the leaders, so there is no set time for me.

anyway, that's a little bit of info about emmy.

Funny Ha Ha

sometimes kids say the funniest stuff. we live near a city called sparks. derek needed to go there one night to pick up some stuff for his brother. we told the kids we were going to sparks. they never got out of the car and derek got whatever and then we started to go back home. emmy realized that we were near our house and she started crying and saying that she wanted to go to sparkles. i didn't quite know what she was talking about, but then i finally caught on. i told her we'd already been there, but she just kept crying and saying we needed to go to sparkles. derek tried to get me to stop laughing, but that was about impossible.

Justice

pretty sure the neighbor kids are hoodlums.

so i went to the playground with my kids and we were gone about an hour, maybe a little less. when we came back i saw a lot more people than normal in the grassy quod by my apartment. well, it was the neighbor lady with her four or so kids and a police officer. oh, yeah. so the lady is holding several spray paint cans and their porch was covered in drawings. i'm just glad it was theirs and not mine. so i walked by and smiled at the lady and said "a little excitement?" she almost smiled and then glared at her kids. priceless! the policeman seemed to be giving the kids a lecture about vandalism, so i just went into my apartment. at least i have a couple years before i need to worry about trouble like that.

Do You Play Croquet?

we had a fun memorial day. our ward had a picnic at a really nice park. andrew and emmy played at the playground and played with balls. andrew and i played ladderball for a while. then me and andrew and some of his cousins played croquet. my mom had gotten a set just recently and we opened it for the first time. i hadn't played in so long i had to read the rules. i remember i used to play all the time when i was a kid. andrew thought it was like golf at first, but then he got the hang of it, sort of, and didn't hit the ball so hard or swing his stick so wildly. of course he did keep picking up his ball and putting it in front of the wickets so he could hit it through. we just let him and didn't count his wins. he really enjoyed himself. i love it when he likes things that i liked as a kid.

Hide and Seek

my niece is spending the night tonight. the kids are playing with her. they were playing hide and seek. i was sitting on the couch and stayja was counting while andrew and emmy ran to go hide. everytime she would count the kids would hide under the kitchen table. so, andrew and emmy start going in opposite directions and andrew yells "emmy, let's hide under here". i couldn't help but laugh. they're too young to understand the need for stealth yet, i guess. we had a nice chuckle, stayja and me.

Sick and Twisted

my husband and i like to joke around a lot with eachother. we also like to watch crime dramas together. tonight we watched criminal minds. this guy killed a bunch of people and then fed them to the pigs on his farm. after the show derek made himself a milkshake, but he made too much. he asked me if i wanted any. i told him no, but then he asked again in a sort of fake menacing way. then he told me that he didn't want to have to twist my arm. i took the milkshake and asked him if he would really ever twist my arm. he said that he would twist it right off and then beat me with it. so i asked if he would then feed me to the pigs. we both laughed about that. i guess you could say we have a dark sense of humor. anyway, i was just getting onto facebook when all this went down so i put in a plea for help as my status. that cracked me up, but derek didn't laugh. he said now people will be thinking things about him. i can't imagine being afraid of him. he's too much of a pushover for that. not that he's a doormat, but you know what i mean. anyway, one friend said that my posts would freak anybody out. she knows me well enough to know that it's a joke. at least i think she does. well, if the police show up at my door i guess i'll know who called them.

Warning!: Adult Content

we went to the playground today. we live in an apartment complex that has two playgrounds, but we always go to the big one with the fence around it. it has one of those big things with slides and ladders and a rope bridge and lots of little rooftops. i always like to see what sort of things are written all over every spare inch. today i saw what seemed to be a gang symbol. actually, i saw it twice. i also saw a swastika. of course there were the usual "for a good time call" messages. the funny thing that struck me, though, was that there were quite a few things written about a boy named shelby. it seemed no matter where i was on the big toy there was some new tidbit, or piece of the puzzle into shelby's explicit life. whoever this poor kid is, he needs to find new outlets for his creativity and lifestyle choices. at least find better friends or less angry enemies. i won't go into too much detail, but i'm sure you can guess. mostly, it seems that shelby prefers male company, whether family relations or not, and even monkeys. was that too much? i also learned that another boy prefers asian girls to white girls and that true love does exist. as in "girl" +"boy"= love. that one cracked me up. nothing like math to say i love you. i'm really glad my kids can't read yet. i can't even count how many times i saw swear words. my kids looked at them and just said that there were letters. i'm sad that eventually they will learn to read. i hope that they will never be the ones to be writing things like this. i know that i never wrote anything like that, when i was a kid.

What the Heck?

so, andrew is telling me he doesn't want to play candyland. i have no idea where this is coming from. i haven't even offered to him to play candyland, so i don't know why he is whining. he's "crying" and saying "mommy, i don't want to play candyland. i don't want to play candyland". i told him that was fine. usually he is begging to play so i don't know what this is all about. unless he is trying reverse psychology. if that's the case then he is a genius. i mean, he has some reasoning skills, but to come up with something like that is pretty cool.

Hail the Conquering Hero!

he did it! derek finally got that dang bug outta my house! i'm so happy to be rid of it. i can finally relax. ahhh. i'm gonna go take a nice relaxing bug free bath.

O Husband, Where Art Thou?

have you ever heard me scream? if you were at my apartment five minutes ago, then the answer would be yes. i was in the bathroom, sitting there, minding my own business and i see this bug near my feet. i screamed bloody murder. i thought it was a daddy long leg spider. nope. just a skeeter eater. that's what derek calls them. it came into my apartment the other day and it's been going here and there. we can't seem to catch it. i'm about to go all nasty and put up a flystrip. those things totally gross me out. anyway, where was derek while i was having my melt down? in bed. he's so tired. personally, i don't think that he should wiggle out of his responsibility as bug killer just because he's tired, so i called him a chump. actually, i had andrew deliver the message for me. andrew thought the whole situation was hilarious. he wanted to see the bug, but it had already gone back into hiding. he also doesn't hear me scream too often. not like that anyway.

Time-Waster

i've been spending a lot of time on facebook, lately. it just never seems to stop interesting me. i can see all kinds of updates on people and their are little games to play. i like to play sudoku on there and then i have a little farm that i enjoy taking care of, not to mention my green patch and blue cove. i think that i just have an addictive personality. not to pills or anything though, just to stuff. i guess i'm lucky that i'm a time-waster instead of a substance abuser. sometimes i wonder what i would be like if i had grown up in a different environment. if i'd grown up with parents who smoked, for instance, would i not find it completely repulsive? would i actually be inclined to take up smoking? these are just some things that i wonder sometimes. i guess you could argue nature versus nurture. brought up to be disgusted by something, rather than those feelings just being inherent in me. i don't know. i'm just rambling at this point. again, wasting time. i better go get my behind in gear and clean my house before derek gets home.

Tales of the Blubbering Idiot

once again, my mother laughs at my pain.

so i was assigned to teach today at church. i really hate teaching. i don't like talking to a group of people. i don't raise my hand in class, or offer any sort of comment. ever. i don't know why i was asked, but i'm sure no one had any idea what they were getting. before i could even start talking, i started crying. that's right. just standing there was hard. so then, our relief society president gets up and tells them that it's just really hard for me to speak in front of a group, and if people could say prayers for me, it would be good. that set me off. luckily, one of the counselors had given me some tissues. i think i used about 9 of them. so basically, it was twenty minutes of me trembling, crying, trying to calm down, hoping to just faint, and a little bit of talking. after church my mom took me to her house. on the way i was telling her all that had happened and she's cracking up. she was subbing in the primary as the music person. she said that if she'd known i was teaching she would have poked her head in. i pointed out that this would have made the crowd bigger, so it was probably a good thing that she didn't. she just laughed again.
this is not the first time that she's laughed at me when i've had to speak. years ago, before i was married i was asked to give a talk in sacrament meeting. i was going to the singles branch, and was still fairly new to nevada. anyway, i told a story of something that had happened years earlier. apparently it made people think that i currently had no friends and i swear they wanted to assign one to me. yeah, mom cracked up at that, too.
i don't know why i get chosen to speak. i can't do it. you want me to sing a song? sure, no problem. oh, dance on stage? that's fine. recite a poem? okay. talk? with my own words? absolutely not. i don't know if technically i have panic attacks. i need to see the symptom list, or talk to a psychologist. my own personal opinion, heck yeah it was a panic attack.

A Little Excitement

so, a little girl in reno got swine flu. now everybody around here is freaking out. andrew didn't feel good last night so i took him to the hospital. i'd rather have it be nothing at the hospital than swine flu at home. anyway, he just had a stomach virus. the doctor gave him an anti-nausea suppository, which andrew didn't seem to mind. andrew just needs fluids and i shouldn't focus on foods right now. actually, this morning andrew seems fine. you wouldn't even know that he was sick last night. we got to the hospital at about 1ish and left around 3:30ish. i forgot my glasses, so i couldn't see the clocks to well. the kids were nice enough to let me sleep until 10 this morning. they didn't get into any trouble. they're pretty good kids.

My Foot Hurts, Can I Go to the School Nurse?

i think there is something wrong with my foot. just my left one. whenever i'm up on my feet for a long time it really starts to hurt. last night i was dancing at the church and when i was at home i put my feet up. in about five minutes my left one was really hurting. it makes me limp. it still hurts this morning. by afternoon, though it shouldn't be hurting so much. this happens almost every morning, but last night i was more strenuous than usual, which is probably why it happened last night. i don't know what to do to stop the pain so i just deal with it. i mean, as long as i don't walk on it and keep it elevated it doesn't hurt. it's just when i get up to do something.

Uh Oh

i'm in the living room and i can hear my children laughing hysterically in another room. i'm afraid to go in there to see what they are laughing at. i don't want to yell at them if they turn out to be doing something that they shouldn't be doing. it almost sounds like they are trying to play baseball. andrew has a hockey stick that he's been playing with all day. he got it back today. yesterday i bagged up all of andrew's toys that were in the living room and dining room and put them in a closet so that he couldn't get to them. today he was being nice so he got them all back. certain toys were apparently very important to him. like his mario toy. it's a plush mario that he got for his birthday. he was really upset when that went into the bag. he was just refusing to clean up his toys so that's why he lost them all.
hmm, the kids are being quieter now. they must have destroyed whatever it was that they were playing with before. i really don't want to go in there and see what a mess andrew's room probably is.
the kids have good imaginations. they can take a toy and make it into something totally different. like a hockey stick becomes a bat, or legos become a gun. i know that i shouldn't let my kids play with guns, but they see their daddy doing it. you know those arcade games where you hunt animals. derek likes to play those. he also watches duck hunting videos. of course i watch crime dramas. they do see guns. i'd rather have them know what they are and what they are for than to be really curious about them. they also see things on kids' movies. remember the old willy wonka and the chocolate factory? little mike teavee shoots a toy gun at the tv. the new charlie and the chocolate factory has mike teavee playing a video game yelling "die die die!" sometimes andrew will say that. i wonder what people think. back in the day i would have been very disapproving of that sort of behavior. now, i try to just deal with it. i do have limits to what they can watch and do. there was one thing that i liked to watch that they also like, but when andrew started to repeat a certain word i didn't let them watch it anymore. they really like to repeat what they say. my sister thought she heard andrew say swear word the other day, but she knew she must be wrong so she asked him to repeat what he said. "mommy got her 'chine back" is what he really said, but she didn't understand 'chine as in machine the first time. she knew that we don't ever use certain words so she made him repeat himself and then she understood. see, my mil borrowed my sewing machine for a couple weeks and when i got it back i made some church bags for the kids. a little girl in andrew's class asked why he had one and she didn't so my sister told her i made it and that's when andrew said what he said. last night one of my sil's said a word that, while not technically a swear word, isn't something i want my kids saying. andrew was asleep, but emmy was awake. i gave her a look and reminded her that children repeat what they hear. she was sorry.
anyway, this wasn't supposed to turn into a lecture, or fillibuster. i guess i should go see what happened in the other room.

Some Bad and Some Good

when the weather changes people get sick. this just seems to be a fact. i think it's because people go without jackets or appropriate dress because they are so excited about warm weather. i don't think this applies to me though. i never wear a jacket. usually i don't get sick when the weather changes, but this time i did. i don't know why, but i musta just gotten what everyone else got.

anyway, on a lighter note. emmy has been more interested in going potty. she sees andrew getting all these stars and she wants them too. she's still wanting her prize. it's a tinkerbell teapot house. i don't remember tinkerbell ever living in a teapot, but i guess it's possible. emmy really likes tinkerbell. she loves watching the movie. i don't mind because i think it's really cute. she got some tinkerbell wings for easter. they're a little big on her 'cause she's so tiny. so, she's been going potty sporadically. andrew is much better, but then i have to remind myself that he's older and would be better at it. andrew is going for a remote controlled thomas the tank engine. he's been asking for it for months. now it's in the bathroom waiting for him to win it. it will be his third prize. the teapot is emmy's first prize. i think this may be the last prize for andrew. he's getting the hang of going potty pretty good. his pullups are even dry a lot of times when he goes. when he's always dry then he gets the thomas underpants. i don't know what we'll get for emmy. i hope they make panties her size. they must. right? maybe.

Woo Hoo

Andrew went stinky in the potty! Yay! he got two stickers on his chart for doing it.

Explanation

so, at three in the morning i will think almost anything is funny.

i'm gonna explain that last post. when i was a kid i used to watch the Great Muppet Caper a lot. a lot. anyway, as a kid i didn't notice a lot of the jokes that were meant for adults. now, watching it with my kids, i get them. at least most of them. i'm sure there're some that i'm still to short for. at one point in the movie gonzo is telling the gang how he found out about the jewel heist that's gonna happen. first we see the bad guys making the plans and then the camera spans to gonzo looking dumbstruck. next scene is the muppet gang with gonzo saying "so there i was, under a table. i was doing a little photographic essay on knee caps" and everyone just kinda nods like this is normal. to me this is just hilarious. the fact that they find it so commonplace is what cracks me up. well, that movie is pretty funny. lots of good lines outta that one. especially janice. anyway, back to the original story. the other night my kids wanted to watch "the frog movie" as they call it. it was too late at night so i didn't let them. i got them to sleep and me too. since i went to bed when they did i was up in the middle of the night. i tried to go back to bed and i thought about that line, then i thought that would make a funny blog post. it was like 3am so this idea just cracked me up. i had to cover my mouth so i didn't wake anyone up with my laughing. that's when i decided i was going to do that. two of the pictures are my kids and the other three i got off google. andrew's picture kinda makes it look like he's missing a leg, but it's just under him. he's whole. emmy decided her hand should be in her picture. anyway, i thought it was funny.

A Little Photographic Essay on Knee Caps

Outside

we went to the playground today. we just got back. andrew found a rock to make his pet. he says it's a girl rock. it already took a nap, but now it's awake, so he's playing with it. i told him not to throw it, or he would be in big trouble. i can just see him throwing it at the china cabinet and smashing all the stuff. emmy doesn't seem to care that he's got a rock. she's coloring pictures that are hanging on the wall.

so, i was at the park and derek called. i told him where we were and he almost didn't believe me. apparently, he thinks i hate the sun. it's true that i don't like to stay in the sun for too long. i tend to burn. my skin is very fair. i've gotten sunburns on cloudy days in autumn. so far the kids have never gotten bad burns. they've gotten just a little pink, but not what you could call bad. i've heard that one really bad burn as a child can lead to skin cancer later in life. if that's true then i'm in trouble. i've gotten many bad burns. when we go swimming at my mom's we always make sure to put sunscreen on.

so, back to my earlier thought, i really don't like the outdoors. i would much rather be inside. when i was a kid i liked being outside. i went to the park almost everyday unless it was wintertime. then i would play in the yard. i guess as i got older i just got more irritated with the outside. i don't like the sunlight, the bugs, the morning dew. i always laugh when my sister tells me that on dating sights everyone seems to love the outdoors. taking long walks on the beach. i don't live near a beach, but if i did, i don't think i would go for long walks there. i like water, to an extent, but at a beach it always seems so cold. like lake michigan, for example. i went there several times as a kid, but it was always cold. the sun would beat down on it all day long, but it would never get warm. that's why i like pools. especially indoor pools. you can heat them. anyway, that's why derek was shocked. he thinks i think i'll melt if i'm outside too long.

The Blogosphere

why is it that some people will blog when others won't. i come from a family of nine and my husband is from a family of ten. my mom and three of my sisters blog. one brother's wife has one, but she doesn't do it anymore. basically half of my family blogs. now my husband's family is mostly brothers and their wives. it's the wives who blog. in that family four of his brothers have wives who blog. so, half of his family. why is it just the girls? is the blogosphere really unequally proportioned like that, or is it just us? a lot of the family blogs are said to be couple blogs, but i never see the husbands contributing. i wonder what it is about blogging that appeals to women so much. i just like having somewhere to go and say whatever i want to say. is that it? is that how all the women feel? well, i guess not all the women. i have a sister who doesn't blog. i don't know why. sometimes she'll log in as my mom just to look at a certain blog if it was really funny. i don't know why she just won't do one for herself. i think one time she said she didn't have anything to right about. i can think of plenty. anyway, she just doesn't want to. my dad doesn't have a blog, but he does have a log in id. he gets on here sometimes and reads our stuff and makes comments. he just blogs on myspace. well, i guess so does my one sister. i used to blog on there, but now i just come here to do it. i like that i don't have to do anything but write. anyway, green olive just wanted to know why our one sister doesn't blog. sorry, i just don't know.

Easter Ham.

well, it's easter sunday. derek is gonna go to church with us today. sometimes he has to work on sundays, but his work is closed on easter. isn't that nice? anyway, his mom might also come with us to church. she goes to a different ward at a different time, but she said she'd be up late last night, so she may come with us since ours is later. church starts at 11am for us. that's my favorite time. not too early, don't need an alarm to wake up, but not too late so you lose the whole day. after church we're gonna go to derek's mom's and have dinner. we're gonna eat ham. i was wondering why people eat ham on easter so i looked it up. turns out there is no religious significance at all, christian, pagan, or otherwise. it turns out that back in the day the romans used to bury their pork near the sea to get a salty cure in the fall. it took so long to cure that it wasn't ready until spring. it just happened to be around eastertime so it was a convenient. this tradition of eating pork in the spring, or more to the point, easter, has been around for thousands of years. the early american settlers continued this tradition, brought over from europe. it's amazing to me that this tradition has survived into this day and age when we can get pork at any time of the year. well, at least it's a tasty tradition.

Easter Bunny?

well, easter is upon us so it's time to dig out my one and only easter decoration.

Emmy's Interview

What is your favorite color?
my favorite color is pink

What is your favorite food?
uh, i like to eat cereal
(magic stars)

What is your favorite movie?
yo gabba gabba

Who do you like best on Yo Gabba Gabba?
foofa

What is your favorite day?
foofa

What animal do you like best?
blue

What's your favorite book?
blue
(i think she's confused...)

well, i don't think we're going to get anything but colors out of her for now. she is only 2, after all.

Interview Time

interview with andrew.

what is your favorite toy?
a big car
(it's a new little tykes coup)

who is your best friend?
i don't know who my best friend is

what is your favorite game?
computer
(i think he means mario party 8)

what song do you like the most?
the doodlebops
(okay, we just saw a comercial for them. he doesn't actually watch the doodlebops because i hate them)

how old are you?
four

what do you like to eat?
i think, uh, cereal. cereal
(well, it is breakfast time)

what is your favorite animal?
a train

what is your favorite movie?
little tykes land
(it's new)

what do you love about daddy?
gives me a hug

what do you love about emmy?
my emmy is a girl

what do you love about mommy?
for computers
(i guess 'cause i play the wii)

what is your favorite day?
tomorrow

what is your favorite color?
green
(he's wearing it today)

well, he's busy watching pollyanna so i don't think i'll get much more out of him.

Andrew

andrew's first word was hi. one day he went into the bedroom and climbed up on the bed to derek and derek said "hi andrew" and then andrew said "hi". we were so happy. his next word was duck. he loved ducks. of course he thought that every bird was a duck. we put duckies on his first birthday cake. on his second birthday somebody gave him a thomas the tank engine and track. it was just something simple, but andrew loved it. he would play with it for hours. that's how his train obsession started. he has a lot of trains. i don't even know how many he has. probably about thirty or so. he has lots of track, too. he builds track all over the apartment. we just step over it, we're so used to it. he builds track that extends from one room to another. he builds bridges and tunnels. he loves to watch thomas videos. he does like other stuff, too. he likes the backyardigans, care bears, pingu, and some others, but his favorite is thomas.


andrew loves to wear yellow, orange, and red. he likes anything with thomas on it. he loves to wear sweater vests on sunday. lucky for him, he absolutely rocks the sweater vest.

andrew's favorite food is probably meatballs. he's not very picky when it comes to food, but if there are meatballs that's all he wants to eat. and eat and eat. that kid has some appetite. all day long. he's constantly snacking. usually he'll eat cheese, apples, lunchmeat, stuff like that. i guess he must be growing. he wears a size 6 in clothes. he's so big around. anything less than a six is too tight around his waist. his feet are size 11. he's only four and i'm starting to leave the toddler section for the little boys' section.

andrew loves to have fun. everything is a joke to him. he doesn't take anything seriously. well, he is getting better i guess. he's starting to do really good in church. my sister is his sunday school teacher, so she always tells me how he did. he usually sits still in class and participates. andrew has also learned to not run away from us so much. especially when we are anywhere near cars.

andrew's a rough and tumble kinda kid. he's fallen so many times, and hard, we are amazed that he hasn't broken any bones yet. he has gotten stitches. this past xmas we were leaving nana and grampa's and andrew was saying goodbye to everyone and he tripped and hit the coffee table. six stitches. that's the only time. we've taken him to the hospital for other things, but they've never had to do anything. andrew's daddy tends to overreact i think. anyway, i think andrew has a really hard head. with as many times as he's hit his head he should be a blithering idiot, but it doesn't seem to affect him at all. so glad he's got a thick skull.

andrew is a good brother. he looks out for emmy a lot. he doesn't like it when other kids pick on her. he's got a cousin who sometimes bugs emmy and andrew goes after him for it. we have to be careful when they're all together. a lot of times andrew starts things with this cousin and fighting ensues. anyway, sometimes they get along well. the other night they did okay until they started to get tired. andrew can be really moody when he's tired. he gets it from his daddy. he also gets his good looks from his daddy. i think andrew is extremely good looking for a boy. not a pretty boy, but more ruggedly handsome. if i were a little girl and not related, i'd have a crush on him. just sayin'. the other day we saw one of derek's employee's and she took one look at andrew and said that there was no mistaking who his daddy is. they do look a lot alike with just a tinge of me thrown in.

well, that's my wonderful little boy in a nutshell. i'd interview him, but he's asleep right now. maybe later.

Twilight

i know that it's been a while since i wrote last. i've been reading a lot lately. within the past week i read the whole twilight series. that's four books that are pretty long. no, i'm not a fast reader, i just stayed up really late a couple of nights. last night i was reading the last one while i was in the tub. i was probably in there for about four hours. i just didn't want to put the book down long enough to get out. i finally did get out after everyone was asleep. my husband fell asleep while i was in there, but he didn't wake up when i got out. this morning he told me that he dreamed i'd fallen asleep in the tub and drowned. as soon as he woke up he bolted to the bathroom to check on me. i was sleeping on the couch, so i didn't know any of that was going on. no, we're not having marriage problems. by the time i got out of the bathroom both kids were sprawled out on my side of the bed. pretty sure andrew fell asleep there, but i know that emmy was in her own bed when i headed into the bathroom, so at some point she woke up and joined the guys. this happens a lot. that's why i'm glad my couch is kinda big and comfy.

Andrew's Potty Time

andrew won his prize! he's gone potty just enough times to win a ferris wheel for his train track! yea!!!

The Bedrooms, Finally

well, my sister's kids came over and helped me get the kids' rooms in order. technically i didn't hire them because i didn't pay them. i did, however, feed them a spaghetti dinner, and chocolate cake. we also played games and watched videos. then they spent the night. they're on spring break so there's no school to worry about.

anyway, here is andrew's room.

here's emmy's room.

i hate blinds of all kinds, but since i live in an apartment there's nothing i can do about that.

Sorry I Didn't Come to Your TupperWare Party, Emilyjuice.

so i came home tonight and andrew was asleep. i put him in bed and then emmy started watching charlie and the chocolate factory. she got up behind me in my chair. she's doing the head bob. that's right ladies and gentlemen! both kids asleep and it's 8:15 pm!

Bedrooms

so, yesterday my sil reminded me that i had not taken pictures of the kids' rooms since i'd changed 'em all around. well, the rooms are messy. i think i'll hire my nieces and nephew to help me clean them and get them all ready for pictures. i could do it myself, but the kids like to help and undo everything i've done. with a couple of us we could distract them and get stuff done. when everything is clean i'll take pictures and put them up. can't guarantee it'll be anytime soon. i've got things to do this week.

Not One, Not Two...

Not three...

Not four...

Not five...

But six eggs! that's the most i've ever gotten to stand at once!

Spring Time‼

♫ spring is here, spring is here, life is skittles, life is cheer. i think the loveliest time of the year is the spring, i do, don't you? 'course you do. but there's one thing that makes spring complete for me. makes ev'ry sunday a treat for me. all the world seems in tune on a spring afternoon when we're poisoning pigeons in the park. ev'ry sunday you'll see my sweetheart and me as we poison the pigeons in the park. we'll murder them all amid laughter and merriment, except for the few we take home to experiment... ♫

ever here that song? it just cracks me up. i heard it years ago on a tape that my mom has. i don't even have a tape deck anymore so i can't listen to it at my house. i wonder if i could find it on the internet. i don't even know who sings it. i think it's a dr demento song. it's right up his alley anyway.

so, today is the first day of spring. time to balance your eggs to stand on end. now, according to snopes.com, this is not because the equality of the day and night makes it easier to do. in fact, they say you can balance eggs to stand any day of the year. they say that standing eggs is all old tradition thought to have originated with the chinese a long time ago. the egg is a symbol of spring (hello, easter!) and so we really should only balance eggs on the vernal equinox and not the autumnal equinox. my guess is people didn't know why they were balancing eggs and just made up a reason. like so many things we do. so, i'm off to hard boil some eggs and stand them on end.

Kids are Way Funny

so, i'm at church, right, and andrew wanted a drink. so we went out of sacrament meeting and got him one. i don't like to go back in the chapel during a talk, so we were in the hallway. we saw the ward membership clerk and i told him that i needed the new rolls for the next few months. i'm the relief society secretary for the ward. side note-i told him the wrong months. anyway, we were waiting at the office door and i asked the guy how old his son was and then i said something about emmy turning three soon. andrew asked about that and i told him that emmy turns three after he turns four. so he's all, "four? here's a four" (shows his hand with five finger) "no, that's a five. i have a four in my pocket." then he pulls his hand out of his pocket with four fingers up. i laughed so hard. i told him he was really funny. he seemed to get a kick out of giving me a laugh.
yeah, i told the guy the wrong months. i told him to put april, may, and june on the roll, but it really should have been may, june, july, and august. i guess i just wasn't thinking straight.

Crying

i am a huge crybaby. i cry at every little thing. i could be watching a kids' show and just well up with tears. or a hallmark comercial could come on and i lose it. last night i went to the temple for (derek's sister) heather's endowment session. for you non-mormons out there, this is a pretty big deal. anyway, afterwards a bunch of us went to chili's to eat. when we were all getting ready to leave i gave heather a hug and she said that it meant a lot to her that i was there. this did not make me tear up. no, it wasn't until i told her that derek wanted to be there that i teared up. she's getting married this saturday. i won't see her again until next week. she's going all the way to illinois to get married. i can't afford that trip, plus i have to leave my kids with someone while i was at the wedding, so the next time i see her she will be married. i get teary-eyed just thinking about it. i'm so happy for her and her fiancé. i'll probably cry at the reception, too.

Good Skills

andrew is getting to be such a big kid. i have locks on my refrigerator and freezer. andrew has learned how to unlock them, get something out of the fridger, and then lock it up again. the other night he poured himself a cup of root beer. i saw him putting the lid back on the bottle and asked derek if he poured the cup and he said he didn't. i don't know where andrew learned to do that. i'm still keeping locks on the fridger so that emmy can't get in there. it's nice to have a child who is a little more independant. not that i would let him do all the things that he wants to do. there is no way i would have let him pour the root beer if i'd seen him starting to do that. it could make too big of a mess. it's really neat to watch them grow and develop their skills

My New Glasses

well, here they are. these are my new glasses. just imagine them on my face.




they are dark purple on the outside and light purple on the inside. i really like purple and the glasses will match most things that i wear.

can you imagine it?

I Need an Attitude Adjustment

why are kids so particular? they need a certain cup, or a certain bath towel. if their cheese is broken then it's the end of the world. if something isn't working then andrew thinks it needs batteries. even if it doesn't use batteries at all. i guess i was like that, too, when i was a kid. i just don't know why things like that mattered.

okay, now that that is out of the way...
yesterday we went to my niece molly's blessing. she's about ten weeks old. she was blessed in her ward in Reno. for those of you who don't know what i'm talking about, a baby blessing is kinda like a christening. anyway, afterwards we all went to an aunt's house in Sparks. she has a big house with a big back yard. yesterday was cold and windy, but people kept telling me to take the kids outside to play. i was fending off their verbal "suggestions" pretty good, until derek told me to take them out. i'm wearing a gauze dress, sandals, don't have a coat, and don't like being outside anyway. while we were out there a bunch of other kids came out to play, too. no other adults came out. finally derek and another aunt come out. she puts a blanket on me and says that she's cold just looking at me. i just wanted to yell at her. she was one of the ones who was really pushing me to take the kids outside. just after this andrew hits his head on something and starts to bleed. derek took him inside and kept him there. luckily, he didn't need stitches. last time we were at this house emmy got hurt in the back yard. i just don't think that it's a safe yard for little kids. anyway, i finally got emmy inside and kept her there. this was after i'd been hit by three rain drops. it hadn't quite started raining. it actually took a few hours before it started raining, but i didn't want to be out there when it did. basically, i just had a bad attitude until i was inside for a while. i wouldn't mind if i never went there again. i guess i still have a bad attitude about it all.

p.s. i got my glasses on friday.

The Gift

i didn't end up wrapping the gift. i put it in a bag. i made the bag myself, so it's nothing special.

i just thought it would be cute. i went with spa products.

shhh, don't tell derek's sister what i got her. i don't think that she reads my blog, so i should be safe.

The Rules of Gift Giving

i'm still waiting for my glasses.

i just don't know what to get for derek's sister. she is getting married next month, but her bridal shower is this saturday. i only have a couple of days to go shopping. i had a couple of ideas that i thought would be okay, but derek made them sound stupid. maybe i'll do them anyway. he's a man, what does he know? somebody told me that if i get her a bridal shower gift then i am not expected to get her a wedding gift. is that true? to me a bridal shower gift is just for her, but the wedding present is for her and her (soon-to-be) husband. shouldn't i give a gift at both. i don't want to leave him out of the gift giving. "she's good enough, but not you!" that 's not very nice. i don't know. i don't care what anybody else does, but as for me and my house, we will get two gifts. maybe i should let derek choose the wedding present. hey, now there's an idea! they'll get something wrapped in a paper sack with marker written on it saying "congrats" or something like that. derek thinks wrapping paper is pointless and a waste. well, i do agree that it's a waste. all that paper that just gets tossed. well, i toss it. i'm not one of those people who carefully unwraps presents and then saves the paper. hmmm, maybe i'll wrap it in fabric. that would be fun. i have some green fabric with hearts on it. her wedding colors are green and purple, so that would work out nice. now i just need to get the present.

New Glasses

well, i ordered glasses. i haven't been wearing any for a few years now, so this is pretty big. they should be in this week. i'm just waiting for a phone call to go and pick them up. they are the plastic kind, not the wire kind. i've never had this kind before, but i really hate the nose thingies on the wire kind, so i tried something new. i hope it all works out well. anyway, when i went to go order them and pay, the man who was measuring my face and i were talking. i can't quite remember why, but he asked me how old i was. i told him i was 28, which i really am. i feel no need to pretend i'm younger. he said that i looked a lot younger than that and his coworker said that i could pass for 17. i know this. i have no wrinkles. i just have good genes and i'm chubby. double pluses for no wrinkles. well, this was coming from two older people. the other day my niece asked me how old i was and i told her 28 and she said that i looked more like i was in my late 30's. what does she know anyway?!

Burn Victim

wow, has it really been like a week since i posted? i guess so.

well, i guess i will talk about the excitement we had last night. i was gonna cook noodles so i turned on the burners so that they would heat up. andrew almost immediately put his hand on one and screamed right away. i took him to the bathroom and ran cool water over his hand and then got a washcloth and got it wet with cool water and had him hold it on his hand. i called nursemom at work and asked her what i should do. she asked what had happened and said that i should put burn cream on his hand. so i called derek and told him everything. he went to the store and got the cream. i put it on andrew's hand and then put a bandage on it. later i changed the bandage. this morning the burn doesn't seem to be bothering him at all. so glad it wasn't bad enough to go to the hospital for. they'd probably investigate me again. oh, in case you didn't know, we were investigated for neglect when emmy fell out the window. everything was resolved in just a couple of days. that was back in october of '07.