Wishful Thinking

Brett had someone offer him their hotrod while they were gone for the weekend. I don't think they really thought he would take it....HE DID! He loves corvettes so he jumped on the chance. He is just like his boys and can't think straight when it comes to hotrods. He is a little more discriminating than his boys however and knows what a real hotrod is. Our boys think that if something comes in a color other than white or grey it is a hotrod. Therefore a red Geo Metro is a hotrod, a yellow Hyundai Pony is a hotrod. A lime green Nissan Sentra is a hotrod. You get the idea.

When Brett came home with the Corvette for the weekend, the boys were drooling and dreaming of hotrods. They couldn't wait for their turn to go for a ride.




Yes I went for a ride too but there was no one there to take a picture of me. That's the story of my life. I'm getting too wrinkly anyway to have my picture taken. While Brett wishes he had a corvette (he has had this wish for many years) I'm wishing I could skip my 40th birthday (I have also had this wish for many years). Both of us will have to go with our wishes unfulfilled. So Brett will have to be satisfied with borrowing the car or renting Corvettes when he goes on out-of-town jobs and I will have to be satisfied with Photoshopping my wrinkles out and just avoiding going out in public after my next birthday. I think it's a good solid plan.

Life

Life is a balancing act of many things. Whether you have to balance work, home, school, family, community, finances, emotions... it takes great skill to find the middle.

Frankly life is hard. You may, on occasion get an unexpected winfall -


But sometimes life catches us unawares like an unexpected bite to the head -


We may put on a good front and it appears to the outside world that all is well when on the inside we are crying -



Sometimes we don't even bother to pretend -

Because somethings in life are just too hard to swallow -


Some things require a leap of faith -



But going through hard things makes the joyful moments all the more precious -


And we realize that life really is a gift -


If we need help staying on track there is help -


Live your life to your fullest potential!

Growing Up

Ever since meeting Smiley almost 3 years ago we have been working with him on his language skills. At two years old we could not understand a single word he was saying. Not one. His words were garbled and unintelligible. He has come a long way since then although he still likes to use his nonsense language every chance he gets. There are still times when he says things that we have no clue what he is saying.

Yesterday when we came home from church I almost fell off my chair when he was eating his lunch and clearly said "At Primary we didn't sing the temple song." He always calls it "Crymary". I think my older boys consider Crymary a good name for it because all the singing makes them want to cry. Plus they always complain about how long it is so I tell them to go grab a mop and wipe up their tears (just kidding - I don't really say that - I just think it.)

So Smiley is growing up...kind of... now I need to find a way to keep him in bed when the babysitting is watching him.

Are We Done Yet?

I don't know about any other A-track moms but I'm sooooo done with this round of off-track days. In fact I was done at day 2. I'm not one of those people who enjoys the track system and I make my views known at every opportunity. I often wonder if the person(s) who created the track system even have kids because if they did there is no way they would have thought this system up. Personally I like to get all of my "quality/quantity" time with my kids in the summer when we do all of our vacations. It is really hard trying to shorten trips with extended family members that my kids rarely get to see all because of the track system. It chaps my hide so to speak. And don't get me started on the whole division of friends when they don't get on the same track! Argh!

Anywhoo! We are coming to the end of week two (at least I have the brief off-track this time around) and to alleviate the boredom yesterday I pulled out a bunch of the craft supplies for boys to work on... stickers, pipecleaners, pompoms, glue, markers, crayons, coloring books, glitter glue, googly eyes etc. They sat for two hours working away at the table.
It was interesting to see that the first things made with the pipecleaners were bracelets and a crown.


Remember I have all boys. They decided to give the bracelets away to their girlfriends (meaning friends that are girls of course).

I thought I would try my hand at a pipecleaner animal and looked online for some ideas. I saw this really cute creature:
I didn't think it would be very hard. Apparently I'm no Martha Stewart and so I had to adapt mine into this:
Oh well, we can't all have our own show and make millions of dollars right? But at least 3 out of 4 of my kids think I'm the best mom. I'm still working on my 6-year old who when I made a treat and I said to my boys "who's the best mom?!? he shouted - Austin's mom!"

Dang!

The Truth Revealed At Last!

Writing a family history is a daunting task. As you know I'm not writing your typically family history with stories of ancestors from the past. I'm doing my immediate family (parents, sibliings) and our stories of growing up. I thought I was crazy (well actually Brett thought I was crazy) for keeping all of my letters and most of my cards that people have sent me over the years until I took upon myself the task of writing our history. I was reading over some of the letters and found some great gems in them to include in the book. Then I struck gold!

But let me back up for a moment. As I was growing up I was very secure in my father's love for me. A little TOO secure. I thought he loved me THE MOST. Even more than he loved my mom. I was shocked when I discovered that he loved mom MORE than me. How was that possible???? My sisters thought that was really funny. I didn't. I really couldn't believe it. They made a joke of it saying that dad loved me more than life itself. My sister Sheri was life and my sister April was itself.

As I was going through my letters, however, I found the real truth in my dad's own handwriting:



If it is difficult for you to read my dad's writing the critical part of this excerpt reads: "Since mom will never read this I really do love you most"

I love being loved the most! :)

Two against One

With kids off-track (aka driving me insane) I have been trying to send them outside as much as possible. When we had our recent snowfall (snowdump), they took the opportunity to have a snowball fight.

Giggles only lasted seconds and quickly decided that a snowball fight was not his thing. He liked throwing the snowballs but not being hit with them so he wandered around the yard with a football instead.
The others lasted much longer. I noticed a decided inequality, however, in how the fight was divided up...







Brett would say that it will help Smiley toughen up. That's a dad response though isn't it.

Easter Blessings and The Fleas

We had a fantastic Easter spending time with Brett's family. There were, as usual the traditional egg dying and multiple egg hunts to be had as well as overloading on food and candy.


I stepped out of my comfort zone and made a dessert (gasp!) but the surprising part was that it was edible if not a little creepy looking.
One of my Easter blessings was to have my oldest niece visit from the great white north for the week end. It was great just to have her come and she was so cute with my boys (and super patient with Smiley who smothered her the whole time). It was extra helpful for me though to have her stay in Boots' room as I had to change the room around in order to get it ready for my niece to stay in it. I could finally walk past the room and have the door open for a change.

We keep egg hunts and Easter bunny separate from Easter Sunday so Sunday was quieter as we watched General Conference and enjoyed the talks given. For me it doesn't matter what topic the talk is on, I always hear in it that I need to be a better mother - probably because I've just finished getting mad at one of my kids for something (usually Smiley or Giggles). I'm really reconsidering changing Smiley's name to Patrick from Spongebob. April is routing for the namechange too! It's the blank look he gives you when you ask him the same question 5 times in a row with no response.

But I digress..... Sunday was great and my niece was leaving that night so I took the opportunity to take a few pictures of her with my boys in our field across from our house before she left.





This morning when we woke up Giggles was not giggling. He was complaining of a stomach ache and within moments he ran to the bathroom and emptied the contents of his stomach. I told him he had the flu. A few minutes later he said with a sad look on his face, "mom I don't understand how I got the fleas." A few minutes later Brett was also struck down with a case of "the fleas" and is in bed as I type this. I don't know who it will strike next so I have diligently sprayed door handles and light switches with Lysol and I am washing my hands scrupulously. I'm praying that "the fleas" will pass me by.