Merry Christmas!!

So far we've had a great Christmas Holiday. My mom's for a few days of California sun and Disneyland. Now we're at home spending Christmas with Stew's parents. Never a dull moment around here.

Bad Habit?

Last night the youth at church went Christmas carolling. I am always finding Jackson a ride home from these activities as I hate to drive back and forth all night long to drop him off and pick him up. So, as the activity was about to start I went inside the house they were meeting at to find someone who would give him a ride. This is where my "bad" habit took over. I walked in to see a couple people sorting gift baskets. Trying to match up the baskets with the correct address and then group them together. I could have walked in, found a ride, walked out. But I couldn't. I have this problem. I see something that needs to be done or something that needs an extra hand and I just have to jump in. I stayed for a good 20 minutes making sure everything was set up so they could easily grab their baskets and get going when the time came. Seriously - why am I not one of those moms who drops their kid at the curb and goes back home? Is it my way of payback for begging someone else to make sure my kid gets back home at the end of the night? Actually I know what the cause of my problem is. It's genetic! My mom is the same way and as much as we would like to sit back and enjoy or socialize you'll often find us jumping up to take care of something else. I'll continue to blame the bad habit on her. Oh well, guess there are worse things.

What would you do for a pair of shoes?

The other day I stopped at the shoe store for a new pair of tennis shoes. The kids were with me so they wandered around the store. Of course they each found a pair of shoes they thought they needed as well. Truth was the boys did need new shoes so I was easily swayed....almost. Jared picked a pair of converse. Totally acceptable shoe except for one thing - he coudn't tie his shoes. It isn't that we hadn't tried in the past, we had. We had sat on the couch several times and his little fingers just flopped lazily and he would say he couldn't do it. I never pressed. Between velcro, slip ons and shoe laces you don't actually have to tie I figured he would be fine for a while.

So, we sat at famous footwear and I made a deal with him. I will teach you how to tie your shoes and you have to tie them all on your own 5 times and I will buy them for you. At first I thought for sure I would be saved the purchase of the shoes. Nope, he was determined. Unlike all of the other times when he didn't see the point - this time he had a goal, a reward within reach. He finally got it and sat there and tied and untied them five times. He was so pleased with himself he wore the shoes right out of the store.

When I was 4 I taught myself to tie my own shoes. I tied my brother's shoes for several years before he decided having his little sister tie his shoes wasn't something he wanted to to do for the rest of his life. My other two picked up the shoe tying thing pretty quickly - each by the time they were 5. I'm now able to say that all 3 of my kids are shoe tyers (if that's how you even spell that)!

Talents I Don't Have

Today Jackson went to a chess meet with the school chess team. He is not really on the team if you consider he doesn't go to practice but I guess he plays during his first period home room class with the chess coach. He was on the chess team last year so the coach is trying to bring him in again. I guess he's not too bad he just isn't patient enough sometimes to really sit and think about the next move. Not good when you're playing chess, right?

Well anyways, at the meet today he was playing and the coach came out and started talking to me. At this poing I'm not sure how he didn't see the glazed over look in my eyes. Something about board one and then something about the bishop. Which one is the bishop again? Oh right, that guy that's looking up all the time with his mouth open in a funny smile. What does he do? Heck if I know!

Just proof to me that our kids are so different than we are. That they develop talents and interests in things that we have no clue about. Yes, my husband knows how to play chess if you're wondering. But really, it is truely a talent I do not have. I also can not skateboard, play with a hackey sack, draw, sing, or...oh let's just stop now before this gets out of hand.

Veteran's Day

My Grandpa and Grandma. They met while my Grandpa was in Texas during World War II. He was in the Navy and she was in the Women's Air Corps. I think it is totally cool that my grandma flew airplanes. She was a test pilot so when they would make repairs on airplanes she would then take them for a test flight to make sure the planes were fixed completely. She crashed more than once and broke her nose two times.

Costume Party

I know, halloween was last week but I have a costume party to attend tonight. I've had sick kids home all week and totally forgot about it. I have no costume. The theme is "dress up like you would if you were a kid". I don't have any princess costumes on hand in my size, no cheerleader costumes, no cowgirl. I have 10 hours to pull something together. I may just have to drop by the costume shop and see what they have. What was it I wanted to dress up as when I was a kid and never got the chance? What did you always want to be?

I guess we'll see what I come up with....if all else fails I'll dress up as a baby and just wear my jammies. Hmmm that sounds comfy.

Kid Talk

In the car today the kids were talking about who knows what. Something my Dad told Jordan came up. The fact that almost any bug out there tastes like popcorn. Jordan says "I'm not sure if they really do taste like popcorn." Jared's response? "He's an old man - he can't lie you know!"

Halloween is Coming!

Amazed is a Halloween junky (actually I'm pretty sure she loves ALL holidays) and has a lot of really fun ideas for Halloween on her blog. Pumpkins and witches and cupcakes. I'm thinking the cupcakes are all just too cute. I decorate a little bit at my house. Mostly stuff that I've made at one relief society activity or another. Some of the stuff I have purchased but not much. I'll admit right here that I'm kind of cheap. My previous shopping partner was probably more frugal than I am so there were years that I would have never bought anything just because I thought it was too cute. Now I tend to wander out in to the world with my neighbor. I should say that a lot of my decorating is done with my mom - but she also does some of the purchasing so it allows me to still be cheap. But now with my neighbor I don't see her buying me stuff for my house but she sure helps me spend my own money. We were at Kirklands Home store and I saw the candy corn/pumpkin girl and we both thought she was really cute. Being the frugal girl I am I went home printed off a coupon and went back a few days later. When I was told that they only had the two on display and they wouldn't get any more halloween stuff I knew she had to come home with me. My only thought now is wondering where she will live after halloween is over.

The Stay at Home Mom

I am a stay at home mom. My kids are all in school, in fact my youngest is in 2nd grade so she's been in school for a while. I am still a stay at home mom. I have my degree in English and before we moved to Arizona I taught 7th grade English and Utah History. We then moved to England and I dabbled in working. I was a substitute teacher and I worked in the Education center on the base. Now we're back to Arizona and I'm back to not working. I don't think I've ever had another stay at home mom ask me what I do all day but I have had a few others wonder.

Today was a prime example of why I don't work. I spent the morning gathering things my husband needed in the colder weather, as well as a colder lab at work, while he's on a business trip. I then drove those items in to town to have the shipping guy at work mail them to him. While running this errand Jackson called to tell me that basketball starts TODAY and he needed his shoes and clothes for after school.

Off to Target I went as he wore his tennis shoes in the river camping with the scouts and he didn't really have the appropriate attire for basketball - he needs new shorts. Easy enough if I had remembered which child I was shopping for and didn't bring home shoes 2 sizes too small. I will exchange them tonight when I need to go back that direction.

Then once I returned home I had to call the guitar teacher. A 3:30 lesson time won't work when the basketball player doesn't get home until after 4:30. Rescheduling to 5:30 on Wednesday was the option.

After I pick up the younger two from school I'll take Jackson's things to him at his school.

I'm not sure how I would manage this all if I did work. And I'm really not sure who made up the term STAY AT HOME mom because I'm hardly ever home.

Hiking is Fun?

Since Stew is out of town I'm doing double duty with the kids. Today Jared had a hike with the Webelos and the 11 year olds and a parent was "encouraged" to come. Since Jackson also wanted to hike that left Jordan. I suppose I could have put some effort in to finding her some place to hang out for the morning but sometime during the week a little "family hike" sounded like fun. We loaded up the backpack and met everyone at the church. 27 hikers - 25 men/boys - and then me and Jordan. At one point I thought about backing out and one of the dads even gave me the option but nope - we're going to hike. At 2.8 miles I wondered if this was really a good idea. At 4.8 miles I wasn't sure I was actually going to make it as it only got hotter this morning. But .6 miles later we were in the car with the A/C going full blast and headed to McDonalds. Sounds like a successful morning...now if we only had the energy to get some chores done. Oh well.

-And that is a picture of a tarantula we came across on our hike. Some boys were disappointed we didn't see any snakes - I was not.

Wonderful Do Nothing Day

Today is a do nothing day. I've had days and days of this vacation running around. Not today. Today it is 11:30 and I'm still in my jammies. The kids are up and dressed and playing Clue. I did get dressed enough to let the garage door repairman in the garage to fix the chain but that has been my big activity of the day so far. The kids don't even seem to care that we're not going anywhere, that nobody is coming over. They are probably as worn out and ready for a do nothing day as I am.

Crazy Mom Life

I'm in the midst of a crazy mom life. Actually I'm in the beginning of 5 weeks of craziness. My husband just left for a 5 week work trip. That's 5 weeks of me being a single mom. I saw a blog the other day where the girl took pictures of all of her activities during a day - I'm not sure my blog has enough room for that some days. Just today my schedule was this:

Leave house at 9am for a 10am allergy appointment for Jared.
Sit in waiting room for 40 minutes.
After 2 1/2 hours at the allergist (including waiting room time) we left at 12:30. This was after Jared was poked and prodded and covered with welts. Apparantly it's easier to say what he ISN'T allergic to than to list those things he is allergic to.
Our next stop was Chuck E Cheese because the boy deserved it and we were all hungry and needed a fun break.
Run home and get Jordan changed for Gymnastics at 4:00
Organize a ride for Jared to scouts at 4:30.
That's where we are now - so at 5 we will be done with gymnastics and head over to pick up Jared from scouts.
We will be home for an hour and a half and Jackson will be off to scouts/mutual at the church. I was just called to give another child a ride because her husband is out of town. I laughed to myself - said I would pick him up - no problem.
At 8:30 I will have to pick up the boys and bring them home again.
Hopefully around 9:30 all kids will be in bed and I can chill for a bit.

Of course that will last for hours longer as my chilling will turn in to late night tv viewing because when the husband is gone it takes me much longer to fall asleep.

And then tomorrow - we can do it all over again. Just substitute the allergy doctor for the orthodontist and one activity for another and I'm sure I'll be just as tired come 9:30.

If you're wondering - the kids are out of school for fall break - they will go back on Monday and then my crazy life will be strictly an afterschool affair. I may just nap all day while they're gone.

Back to Blogging - or trying

I actually read some blogs today. The strange thing is that I read blogs of people I actually know. If you look at my list of favorite blogs I don't actually know any of those people. I have read and followed and even retold stories of blogs I have read but I didn't know anyone that actually blogged. And I wasn't sure I wanted anyone I know reading what I blog. Like a secret journal that can be read by people you don't know. It seems safe. Now I'm thinking that I might want to branch out. That I might want to read those other blogs - that I might want to be part of that group. Then I wonder - what if those girls don't want me reading their blogs. Is there a rule about reading the blogs of people you actually know? I got the one blog address from facebook and it snowballed from there. Do I casually comment on something that is written that I relate to? I'm on totally different ground. I'll let you know how it all works out.

You Can't Pick Your Family...

Actually you can pick your family when it comes to the inlaws but it doesn't really work very well. When I met my husband and consequently his family I thought they were all sane. I remember sitting in the living room while we all enjoyed a Buster Bar from Dairy Queen...good times. I also remember the day I got married when my mother in law said, "Well, now it's a done deal we can all quit pretending we're people that we aren't." At the time I thought it was a joke. 16 1/2 years later it is certainly no joke. I have a brother in law and his family and then a sister in law and her family that are all normal. And then there are the mother/father in law and the oldest brother and his family. Sometimes you have to really wonder how people end up like they do when they come from the same parents.

You may wonder what spurred this blog. My oldest son is 12 and in our church this is a pretty big age so the events that occur has brought in quite a few family members. I'm pretty sure that when they are all on "my turf" their quirkiness shows 10fold. Fortunately for me part of their craziness also includes them driving many miles to be here only to turn around as quickly as they can to head back.

My Lack of Blogging

Why is there no blog here? Where have I been? I've been lazy, I've also been busy, and I've been on Facebook. Horrible addiction.

Life is good. I'm enjoying having the kids home for the summer. We've had adventures to California to visit Grandma and Grandpa and coming up we have another adventure to Utah. My niece leaves on her mission for the church on July 2nd. She's going to London England (London South) and I just know she is going to love it! I have known her since she was 3 years old and now she's a beautiful young woman getting ready to go on a mission. She will experience so many new things, including her very first airplane ride. I'm going to need a lot of stamps and stationary too so my kids can write her all kinds of letters.

So, I will try to do better. I will try to think of fun little stories to get this blog going again. I will...right after I get back home.

Senior Pranks

This morning I got the kids ready for school and Jackson headed out the door. He is the only one that rides the bus. The other two could but we enjoy the extra 20 minutes we get to sleep in and watch Sponge Bob in the morning so I drive them. I left the house and noticed Jackson still standing there with all the kids. Not unheard of as there are sometimes issues with a later driver or traffic incident. The elementary school kids were still at the bus stop too - that is a little bit more eyebrow raising. I head to the school and there are no busses at all at the school. Before you ask if there was actually school this morning, there was, that's why all the kids were waiting for the bus. I head back home and there is my son still at the bus stop. I make him get in the car and we head off to his school. It seems that the senior prank this year was to let the air out of the tires of 76 school busses. They also painted Class of 2009 on the busses, in washable paint. It seems like a harmless prank, nobody was hurt, a few kids got to be late for school - all fun right? Of course they weren't thinking about the man power that would need to be called in to get the busses operational. The checks on the vehicles to make sure they were safe to drive. It seems that harmless prank is costing around $10,000. not so harmless is it? Maybe I'm just old and ornery? I don't know.

I did not participate in a senior prank when I was in highschool. In fact I can't recall one happening my senior year - but I could be wrong. When my brother was a senior a group of his friends did pull a prank on their English teacher. At the time Trinity Broadcasting Network was a pretty small operation located not far from our house. The group of boys went over in the middle of the night and loaded up pieces of the lifesize nativity and transported them to the front lawn of their teacher's house. In the morning he woke up to his children excitedly talking about the camels, sheep and cows in the front yard. Monday morning the teacher told each class that whoever was responsible needed to remove the animals and take them back where they came from. So, in the middle of the night they went back and got the animals to return them to Trinity. As they were unloading the van the police cars pulled up and the boys got a bit worried. My mom received a phone call at 4 am that she needed to pick up her son. The broadcasting network didn't press charges but all of the boys were handcuffed to the stop sign next to the van. The best part of the story is that a month later the mom whose van they used was loading some stuff into the van and went to move all the blankets that were in the corner only to find that there was still a sheep in there. She had to drive back and return the long lost sheep to it's flock.

Death by Car

Many many years ago my brother came to visit me while I was in college. He had been there for a few days when we were all in the car and he had a confession to make. He explained to us that he had done something really bad and that he didn't know if he could even talk about it. How intriguing is that? WHAT could he have done? So he proceeded to tell us that on his drive from Spokane to Rexburg he had hit something? What had he hit that would have been so horrible? I had to ask if he had hit a PERSON, which of course he had not. My next question was if he had hit a horse? He then asked what kind of idiot hits a horse - well I have a roommate who actually hit TWO horses head on. She was driving to seminary (religion class before school) one early morning and only had one working headlight. She drove with her high beams on until a car came towards her and she turned down to 1 headlight. When she flipped her brights back on it was too late - two horses were RUNNING right towards her. She was lucky to have walked away uninjured - the horses were not so lucky. Back to my brother's story - once he stopped being completely shocked at the horse story - we continued guessing what he could have hit. A dog? A porcupine? A cat? Ahhhhh yes a cat. He hit a cat and for 3 days could only think about some little girl getting up in the morning and going outside to look for her cat and finding the aftermath. For three days he couldn't even TALK about that he had hit a cat.

I have been fortunate in the fact that I have never hit a cat, dog, horse or porcupine (I had a roommate who hit a porcupine too if you're wondering why I brought this up two times.) I have, however, been at fault for the death of several birds. I'm always amazed when the birds make it without being hit by the car but even MORE amazed when they don't fly fast enough. I hit a bird today that didn't fly HIGH enough. I've gotten over it though...I didn't even have to wait 3 days to blog about it.

Birthdays

I had a birthday 2 days ago. Not a monumental one, nothing even to blog about really. However, that in itself has led me to the blog. I can remember some birthdays I have had in vivid detail. I know that when I turned 5 I had a birthday with all the party games: Pin the tail on the donkey, drop the clothes pin in the mason jar, musical chairs, all the fun you can have in ones backyard. When I was 10 I had a combined sleep over birthday party with my neighbor. It was at her house and it was a disaster. I went home at 3am but my mom didn't hear me knocking on the door so I had to go back. When I was 16 I didn't have a fantastic party or anything but the boy I liked came and picked me up and we had lunch - our first "real" date that was interrupted by a phone call that I got my first real job and they wanted me to come in that day. When I turned 18 I spent the day horseback riding with my on again off again boyfriend - we were currently off. And then the guy I had been dating a bit took me out but suddenly remembered he needed to get his car back home for his sister so we needed to swing by my house and get my car. Voila a surprise party was waiting. Many more birthdays passed that I can't recall but when I was 30 Stew was out of town and I had lunch with my neighbors and we had cake and then dinner at another friends with more cake. When Stew returned home after his business trip we went to Vegas. Six birthdays have come and gone since then. Not sure in 30 more years I'll remember any of them but I suppose I should be happy I keep having them.

I'm A Lazy Blogger - here's a meme!

1) What is your salad dressing of choice? Ranch - the occasional bleu cheese.

2) What is your favorite sit-down restaurant? Anyone without my kids? Haha just kidding - claim jumper. Can't wait for The cheesecake factory to make its appearance here.

3) What food could you eat for 2 weeks straight and not get sick of it? Peanut butter - as I probably eat it everyday anyways - pb crackers/pb toast. It's the breakfast of champions.

4) What are your pizza toppings of choice? pepperoni and pineapple


5) What would you like to put on your calendar today? 2004 and I would go back and make that phone call I never made.


6) How many televisions are in your house? Three - one in the family room, one in the kids hallway with the play station and then one that isn't even plugged in in our bedroom.

7) What color cell phone do you have? Black - but I really miss my pink one.


8) Are you right-handed or left-handed? right


9) Have you ever had anything removed from your body? No - unless you count the pieces of road that were stuck in my chin when I crashed on my bike once.


10) What is the last heavy item you lifted? I would guess boxes as I'm still not completely unpacked but I move boxes from place to place as needed.

11) Have you ever been knocked unconscious? Nope.

12) If it were possible, would you want to know the day you were going to die? Absolutely not.


13) If you could change your name, what would you change it to? I would change my last name. LOL JUST KIDDING! I don't know - I've had this one for long enough I've sort of gotten used to it.


14) Would you drink an entire bottle of hot sauce for $1000? I might entertain the idea but I doubt I could.


15) How many pairs of flip flops do you own? None - I really don't find them comfortable.


16) What’s your goal for the year? get all those boxes unpacked and my office organized. Organize the garage too.


17) Last person you talked to? My neighbor


18) Last person you hugged? My daughter.


19) Favorite Season? Spring


20) Favorite Holiday? Christmas


21) Favorite day of the week? Friday or Saturday


22) Favorite Month? March


23) First place you went this morning? The bowling alley - I had to prebowl since I'll be travelling to Utah on Wednesday.


24) What's the last movie you saw? Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory - the night before it was Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. In the theater it was Bedtime Stories.


25) Do you smile often? I think so.


26) Do you always answer your phone? I have caller ID - if it is a telemarketer I do not.


27) It's four in the morning and you get a text message, who is it? A wrong number because the guy who had this phone number before me didn't tell his friends he changed it. It's usually related to something I do NOT want to know about.

28) If you could change your eye color what would it be? Maybe green? I like my blue eyes though.


29) What flavor drink do you get at Sonic? Orange Creme Slushie.


30) Have you ever had a pet fish? Yes - many. In college we had 4 - John, Paul, George and Ringo - you'll never guess which one died first.


31) Favorite Christmas song? I don't know that I have a favorite - I love them all.


32) What's on your wish list for your birthday? I better get thinking about this one since I only have a few weeks. Lyposuction and a tummy tuck maybe? hahaha


33) Can you do push ups? Yes, as I demonstrated to my Webelos the other day - those 10 year old boys could NOT do them.


34) Can you do a chin up? That would be a no.


35) Does the future make you more nervous or excited? A bit of both.


36) Do you have any saved texts? I have a ton on my phone but not saved for any particular reason except I just haven't deleted them.


37) Ever been in a car wreck? Nothing where anyone has been injured.


38) Do you have an accent? No.


39) What is the last song to make you cry? I Can Only Imagine - but sung by Wynonna because that's who sang it when I heard it the first time.

40) Plans tonight? Taking the girl to Gymnastics - that's it.


41) Have you ever felt like you hit rock bottom? No, I don't think so.


42) Name 3 things you bought yesterday. Nothing, it was Sunday.


44) Current hate right now? I don't know that I hate anything. I dislike when people do NOT use their turn signals.

45) Met someone who changed your life? Yes - I think most people influence your life one way or the other - it's all part of life.


46) How did you bring in the New Year? At my mom's neighbors eating jambalaya mmmmmmmm.


47) What song represents you? I have no idea - I guess I don't have an anthem.


48) What were you doing at 12 AM last night? I was sleeping.


49) What was the first thing you thought of when you woke up? Wondering if the kids were up yet and if they took the dog out.

Seven!

Seven years ago my baby was born! Hard to believe it's been seven years and that she is still the baby. She is everything I ever wanted in a girl - I think I said that in my last post about her reading but it's true. She's kind and sensitive and she just has a joy about life. She also has a passion for animals. At Christmas she asked for a puppy. She wrote letters to Santa asking for a puppy. In fact at school she wrote a letter and whoever the genius was that wrote back to her focused on her request for a puppy. Seriously, who does that? She cried when she did not get a puppy for Christmas. So, February rolls around and what do you think this little girl wanted for her birthday? A puppy of course. I have spent the last two weeks looking in the newspaper and on craigslist in search of a puppy. Checking the lists of the dogs at the shelters. I have really no desire to spend 100's of dollars on a puppy. I also was picky about the age. I didn't really want a brand new puppy but I didn't want a DOG either. So yesterday we went to the animal fair. What better place to find a puppy than to go to 1 place where all of the rescues/shelters bring their dogs. We wandered around and didn't see anything. Too big, too old, too mean looking, not what I was looking for. Then we spotted him. A small black dog. The rest is history. He is 8months old and a chihuahua/jack russell mix. So far he's been absolutely wonderful. And my 7 year old is having the best birthday ever - and now she isn't the baby anymore.

Bragging!

I'm not big on bragging normally. In fact I come from a family that just doesn't do it very well. This comes from both sides actually - I married in to a family that takes pride in one another's accomplishments but they just don't brag about them. When we have family reunions with my husbands extended family we usually spend one night all hanging out in one big room and everyone updates on what is happening in their lives. Stew's dad is the oldest so he ALWAYS goes first. He gives a very matter of fact update on each of his children and grandchildren. It then moves on down the line, there are 8 siblings, and as it goes the accomplishments become BIGGER and BETTER. We often sit and think - well so and so has a 4.0 too and so and so conducted the Utah Symphony but it just doesn't occur to us to BRAG like that. And it does feel like bragging. In my opinion a family update is "Stew and his family live in Tucson- we're so happy to have them back from England." Not "Stew spent 4 years saving the world, his children are all merit scholars and his wife just wrote her first novel." Even though sometimes I think we should get a rebuttal at the end of the reunions so we can add all the things we didn't THINK to brag about being the first in line.

Well, anyways - the whole point of this post is so that I CAN brag! Yep, it is my blog and I'm going to do it. I have to say I love my boys they are fantastic and they are both very smart. Their interests and abilities are sometimes different than mine but this is to be expected as they are 1/2 of someone whose interests and abilities are also very different than mine. So this brings me to the girl. I really WANTED a girl and I am so absolutely thrilled how similar her interests are to mine. She is just so sweet and she loves school. Absolutely loves it. However, the thing that I LOVE that she loves the most is reading. I love to read, I have always loved to read. I can remember learning how to read and then that was it I was off. Jordan is the exact same way. She will be 7 next week and she is in 1st grade. She was retested for her reading level this week and her ability is 5.0. This means she is on a 5th grade reading level!! I absolutely am thrilled - there is nothing I DID to make her a good reader - she just IS. And I'm going to brag about it!

The Proposal

Over at Amazed she's having a little contest to gear up for Valentines day I would guess. I figured I would play along and tell about how I got engaged.

Of course when I met Stew I was not at all interested but those things change. We dated a while. We talked about marriage and we talked about rings. I told him exactly what I did NOT want and some of the things that I did want, being very materialistic obviously at 19. So, while at Rick's when a girl would get engaged she would announce it to her friends/dorm roommates through something called a candle lighting. We would all sit in the dorm lounge and pass a lit candle around the room. Everyone would say something to the lucky girl - without knowing who it was. When the candle would come to the newly engaged girl she would blow it out. So one evening my roommates and I all attended a candle lighting. The candle went around the room and when it came to me I leaned to my roommate Shelley and informed her that if Stew asked I wanted a ring JUST like the one on the candle. The candle was passed and it continued around the circle again. Strangely nobody was blowing it out. As the candle reached me for the 2nd time Shelley leaned over and whispered - blow out the candle. I was shocked. The door opened and Stew walked in and YES I blew out the candle.

Of course - I do enjoy another proposal story. A friend of ours took his girlfriend hiking up a mountain and when they reached a nice area they stopped and had a picnic. He then pulled out 2 ring boxes and asked her to choose one. When she picked he promptly threw the other box over a cliff. As she opened the EMPTY box and started freaking out he then pulled a 3rd box out of his other pocket. He's pretty lucky she didn't throw HIM over the cliff if you ask me - but it makes for a great story!

Making a House a Home

Yep, I've been busy lately and neglecting my blog. First we had Christmas which was great. Then we went to my mom's in California and we all went to Disneyland with my sister in law and her family. Her oldest Daughter turns 21 in May so this was the last family vacation for a while - as she hopes to go on a mission. Their 2nd oldest daughter got married right before we moved home from England so this was also the first time we met her cute husband. We all had a great time.

I've also been busy with the house. My mom came back with us after our trip to California and she was busy helping me organize and all of that. I do NOT enjoy hanging pictures on my walls so the 2 of us tackled that together. It took us almost a week to have to nail more than one nail to get something hung correctly. We should have stopped there because our last bout at interior decorating was disastrous. As was said by a good friend when I told her the story "they shouldn't be called window TREATMENTS they should be window PUNISHMENTS". This is after I first installed one part of the rod and it was crooked - and then fixed it and installed it upside down. After the rod was hanging and even we lifted up the curtains to begin putting them on and wouldn't you know it - TOO SHORT! We won't mention that my mom was ironing the creases out of the sheers and panels while I was hanging the rod. All that work gone to waste as we folded them back up and put them in the little plastic sleeves they came in. Fortunately the store was able to exchange them and order me the correct length so in a few days I'll tackle that job again.

So, if I'm missing in action for a while longer you'll know I'm tangled up in sheers in my living room!