Let's Talk About Change!!!

I haven't blogged in a while and part of that is because my Mom was here visiting for two weeks. We did all sorts of things including looking at houses. Not for me but for my parents. They put their house on the market in California and we were just seeing what was out and about in Tucson. It has been on the market several times in the last 4 years but nothing ever came of it. This time they have had more people look at it in the first 2 weeks then probably the last 4 years combined. And then the offer came in. THE HOUSE SOLD! It has gone from "someday" we might come live by you in Tucson to "it looks like this is it!"

Of course we looked at house after house finding nothing up to her specifications. Single level, living room and family room, not trashed, and not squished in between 2 other houses. We might have found a couple if it were not for the "not trashed part". You do have to wonder in some of these houses how the children colored so high on the walls and if they touched the wall with dirty hands EVERY time they walked down the hallway. So, we found nothing....until.

Until what you ask? Until we walked around the corner from my house. Literally 3 houses down and one street over. An empty, brand new, smaller home. It's on a corner and the lot is huge. All of a sudden the idea of my mother moving in to a home that I can see from my back yard got a little crazy. 7 hours is the closest we have ever lived to family (oh wait at USU we were 2 hours from my sister in law.) Obviously in England we were an Ocean away. This is walking distance. Exciting and scary all at the same time. No offers have been made though as they are waiting for the sale of their home to be finalized. It should be an interesting couple of weeks ahead of us.

Happy New Year!

Yes - I know I'm 4 days late. That seems to be the trend lately. We had a fantastic 2 weeks off just hanging out with the kids and working on things around the house. I guess we were so happy not going to school and work that we figured we would skip it today. Well, almost. I managed to wake up 5 minutes before Jackson needed to be on the bus and 25 minutes before the other 2 needed to be to school. Great start!

I'm also a bit late with the goal setting. Not really sure what goals I have. I know I would like to lose weight - this has been a goal 4 years running...so far with no success. I suppose if I was out walking the dog instead of sitting here in my jammies while he is sleeping on the floor next to me that might help.

So, before the day gets away from me and it's time to get the kids from school I suppose I better get on that walk.

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.