An Incredible Day

This past Sunday was one of the best nights of my life. I had almost my entire family and many close friends at the church to witness two special events.

Mr. T was baptized and confirmed a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints. And Jman was ordained to the office of a Deacon. I don't talk about my religion much on this blog, but it is a very important part of my life. I am very grateful for the gospel and that I have a worthy husband who can perform these important ordinances for my children. Jesus Christ is my Savior and Redeemer and I try to live my life worthy to return to live with him. My heart is full of love and gratitude for everyone who had a part in making this a night I will remember for the rest of my life.

The Big Day

My Boys

Pictures I love

My kids

After much stress I'm really happy about how the pictures turned out. Here are some of them.

Getting ready for pictures

My kids got their pictures taken yesterday and today. It took me all week! Literally all week! Trying to decide what to have them wear was a joke! I looked and looked and finally decided that navy blue and white would be the best option. So I bought clothes for everyone, only to get them home and found that half of them didn't fit and that now that we have new carpet and some redecorating, blue and white no longer work in my living room.

So on Tuesday I started over. Taking clothes back and finding a whole new color scheme. This time I picked tan/brown and white. Thought I had everyone's outfits done, and again, one didn't fit and Boo just flat refused to wear hers. Back again to the stores...

Anyway, you get the idea. It has been a long week. Thursday finally came and we headed to Target. I'm happy with yesterday's pictures and when I'm not so tired I'll post some, but I'm too exhausted to figure out how to do it today.

Then back to Target today for the second photo shoot. Jman desperately wanted his hair long in his pictures, but I wanted it short for his "Ordination" pictures. The compromise, was long hair the first day, short hair the next. Today was Mr. T and Jman in their suits and ties. Very cute, again I'll post pictures soon.

Am I the only one that has this many problems? It shouldn't take an entire week to get your kids pictures taken should it?

Feeling Grateful

I ran (well slowly jogged) outside yesterday. It was the first time this year and if felt SOOOOOO good. There is just something about jogging in the open air that just makes me happy.

As I was jogging along I just couldn't help but think about how truly blessed I am. I have a wonderful husband that I love dearly. I used to just grimace when I'd hear people talk about how they love their husbands more now than they did when they got married, but I'm starting to understand, because I really do. He is such a good man and tries so hard to make me happy and our lives better.

Jman is so full of life! He has the lead in the school play. He is Tom in "School House Rock Jr." He has been playing basketball and had a lot of fun, his team won almost all their games this year. Soccer started again last weekend which means more hours than I care to count spent at practice, training and games. He brings me a lot of stress, but he also brings so much laughter and fun into all of our lives.

Mr. T is such a smart and sensitive soul. He gets everything you teach him the first time and when I was in his class the other day he was telling his teacher an easier way to do the math problem she was doing and he was right. (I'm not sure how much the teacher liked it.) He is also in the school play and loving it. He just played his last basketball game and scored 4 times! He touches my heart by the kind things he says and does all the time.

Boo is still so full of life I can't believe it. I've already told of her antics, but she is such a great big sister. She plays with Roo all the time and always wants to sit by her. She is in preschool and loves every minute of it. I asked her yesterday if she just wanted to stay home with me for a day and she just smiled and said she wanted to go to school.

Roo just turned two and has all the tantrums that come with the age. She was almost completely potty trained before she turned 2, but for some reason she has had a set back the last few days. She is such a sweet little thing and wants to snuggle with me every night until she falls asleep. Having her run to the stairs and yell "Mommy" when I've been gone is a truly wonderful feeling.

Everyone is healthy, and doing well. Who knows what the future will bring but, for today, life is good.

Boo and gymnastics

Okay, after reading that last post, I thought I'd better tell some fun things that Boo has done. Note to reader, there will be much bragging in this post so feel free to stop reading at any time.

Boo is really talented when it comes to tumbling. (Mom talking of course.) She took tumbling classes through our city rec. department for a couple of months. She started in the 3 and 4 year old class. I realized this might be a problem when several kids in the class couldn't do a forward role, and one was crying because she had to take her socks off. Boo had just about mastered her cartwheels.

I wanted to move her up to the 5-7 year class and the teacher said okay, but thought she'd still be the best in her class. I think it really frustrated the other kids in the class when Boo would win every contest the teacher had.

In January I decided maybe it was time to try gymnastics. I dreaded moving from paying $30.00 a month to the $45.00 they charged, but decided it was worth it.

After the first week Boo was right on track with what all the other kids were doing, even though they'd been going since September. After the second week of classes her coach pulled me aside and said she wanted to put Boo on her pre-competition team. This would involve practices two nights a week from 4:00 until 6:00p.m and would cost $85.00 per month. Wow!

I was floored! I'd always thought she was good, but I'd also thought I was just a proud mother. Having the head of a big gymnastics club tell you that was very flattering. In the back of my head I'm thinking $85.00 a month for my FOUR year old!?! I really want to encourage her and I'd love to see how far she can go, but I was really stressing over it.

Finally I went to Boo and said, "Boo, which do you like better preschool or gymnastics?"
"Preschool!"
"Which do you like better, gymnastics or swimming lessons?"
"Swimming lessons!"
"Which do you like better, dance class or gymnastics?"
"Dance class!"

Well we decided that she can stay in the class she's in for now, and we will see how it goes. It's still fun to know that she really is as good as I thought she was.

Boo...need I say more?

When I first started this blog one of the reasons I did was to share all of the crazy antics of my Darling Boo. Well, just a week or so ago I thought to myself, "Boo has finally started out growing all of her...what shall I call it creativity?" Wrong thing to think, SERIOUSLY, wrong thing to think.

Let me see if I can describe just a few of the wonders of the last few days. First I walked into the bathroom to find both girls on the floor having a wonderful time. Surrounding them on the floor were all of their bows, headbands clips, brushes, combs etc., and all of MY picks, clips, rubber bands, combs, etc. Now this might not be too crazy but add to that two brand new boxes of tampons and a full bag of pads. All mixed together covering the entire bathroom floor. (She had to clean it up, and when I came to check on her she was going through each tampon and carefully pushing them out of their holders.)

The next day I realized she had been quiet much too long and went to see what she was up to. Let's just say green magic marker. EVERYWHERE!!! On her new kitchen, her drawers, her books, her brand new book, Roo, herself, and as I walked in she slammed shut her library book that she had colored the first half of with that marker. I about died!!! She is four and a half!!!

So she got to get her allowance and we headed to the library so she could pay for her destroyed book. I thought this would really teach her a lesson, she couldn't buy the new barbie she wanted because she had to pay for a ruined book. Well, that was my thought. The cute lady at the counter saw how old the book was, noted that it had been checked over 150 times and charged her a dollar. ONE LOUSY DOLLAR! Not only that but Boo paid her with a five dollar bill so she got four ones back. She thought she came out ahead!

We are getting new carpet this week so I've spent obviously too much time cleaning and packing things and Boo has found this a fabulous time to just make one mess after another. Her room hasn't stayed clean for more than 2 minutes at a time. Her most recent project involved a whole lot of water and a flooded bathroom. While I was packing boxes she was in the bathroom doing who knows what. I just know there was water everywhere. It leaked into the drawers, the cupboard under the counter all over the floor and even into the hall. I was so angry I finally just lost it. Everything from the last few days came screaming back and I totally lost it.

When I was putting the girls to bed last night I was talking to Boo about trying not to make any more messes. Poor little Roo was sitting there by us and said, "No more water!" while shaking her head back and forth very adamantly . I guess I might have over reacted just a little bit.

Anyway, if any friends or relatives would like to take her for the next few days, weeks, years... she's up for grabs.

What do you do in your sleep?

For years I was plagued with nightmares. I'd dream that there was something in my bed (snakes, spiders, you name it.) My poor husband would get so frustrated because I'd be so upset and promise him that THIS time there really was something in our bed. So he'd throw down the covers show me that there was nothing there and then try to go back to sleep. This was usually with me standing at the door ready to make a break for it.

Luckily they've pretty much stopped. So imagine my surprise when I was reading really late a night or two ago and out of the blue Nate sat up and started pounding the middle of the bed as hard as he could. I asked him what was wrong, but he just looked at me and said "Hello," and laid back down and went to sleep.

I asked him the next day if he remembered his dream and I just had to laugh when he told me there were spiders in our bed.