Too funny

Hilarious story from Latter-day laughs on Meridian Magazine:

At a recent testimony meeting, a 5-year-old girl stood up and bore her testimony. After mentioning everyone and everything she was thankful for, she ended with this: "I am especially grateful that our house has been much happier since our family stopped using the "S-word" and the "F-word." As the little girl proudly walked back to her seat, nobody could say a word. Needless to say, they were a little shocked by what the stake president's daughter had just said. Quickly, the red-faced stake president stood up, smiled shyly, and went to the podium: "I feel I should make a clarification as to what my daughter meant. In our house the S-word is shut-up and the F-word is fart."

Y am I telling you this?

I'm not sure. But I got a lot of comments about my decision to join the YMCA near my house, so I thought some of you might be interested.

It has been lovely going. I've really enjoyed it. My boys love their swimming classes, and that alone would be worth it to me. I get to take C to the child care while the boys are in class, so I go play racquetball. By myself. Seriously, anyone want to play twice a week for 30 minutes? It is good practice for me, but I'm afraid I'll get used to playing alone and stop getting the ball before that second bounce. Even when I go by myself I love it. There is nothing like the feel and sound of smashing a ball with a large instrument to ease stress. :) And unlike baseball, I don't have to chase the ball down after I smash it, it bounces back. We've also been going to the zero depth pool which has been a blast. It has dumping buckets, sprinklers, etc. And it is really really warm. The kids love it. C is a bit of a fish. She'll walk as deep as she possibly can. She'll keep going until it gets up to her chin. And if the water isn't deep enough to reach her chin, she'll bend her knees until it does. She gets mad if I take her to more shallow water. Sometimes she'll trip and go under completely and it doesn't even phase her. She just wants to be a deep as she can. Scares me more than it scares her!

And I started going to a cardio class with some of my volleyball buddies. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I've really enjoyed it so far. Well, not so much today. Yesterday we went to Hawk Island for a couple of hours and while I remembered to slather my kids, I forgot to get myself. In other words, I have a really painful, awful red subburn that is causing me great pain. I decided to to go to cardio anyway as penance. I'm actually a little anti-sun (melanoma has caused my family a lot of pain, not to mention Brad's stint working for a surgical dermatologist removing skin cancers), but someone I forgot to put sunscreen on me. Probably because it is stressful trying to lather 3 kids in sunscreen and keep an eye one them all near a body of water.

As if volleyball weren't hard enough with a nasty sunburn, last week I played with that lovely blister. Apparently my brain was on hold, because on the way there I was thinking, "I guess I won't be spiking much today." It wasn't until I got the ball to serve that I realized the blister might hamper my serving ability as well. Thankfully, no one has kicked me off the court yet, though I haven't been 100% the last couple of weeks. It is crazy what I'll endure to play some volleyball. :)

Did I mention already that Brad is in his final days as an intern? YEAH! He'll officially be a resident on July 1st. We are quite excited about that.

I think that's about it. The next couple of weeks will be spent trying to grow some grass and hopefully getting some plants in! We'll stay busy!

Seeing green!

We have been super busy on the yard, and I'm excited to say that we hydroseeded the lawn today. YEAH! I'm finally seeing a color other than brown in our yard.

Here are pictures of all the changes the last few weeks:

Show #1

Miscellaneous pictures of kiddos and such.

Slide #2
Leveling out the dirt and getting the right grade. The retaining walls just before finishing them.



Slide #3
Chipping the berm, inside the trees and sidewalk. The yard is leveled. The retaining walls are finished!



Slide #4
The hostas in their new home. Yes, those were the cause of my nasty blister. Don't use a hand trowel for an extended time. Just so you know. And the hydroseeding. YEAH!




I hope the next slide show I add will be of lots of grass! And we are hoping to get a couple of plants in sometime in the next week or two. I HOPE I HOPE I HOPE!!!

Sidewalks part 2

Okay, here is the first half of the sidewalks, the pouring. I don't want to show you the rest right now because you'll get the wrong idea of how it will look in the end. So, enjoy this part!

Well, it was a really crazy day to say the very least. But, I survived it. Yes, C fell off while watching, but at least it was before the cement was poured. D and J thought Kevin was cool because he had a hat and a bandana on. They asked me to take pictures of him.

Y not?

I forgot to mention this earlier, but we signed up for the YMCA this week. My boys had a blast at the swimming lessons last week, so I got them signed up for classes this month. In order to get to the pool, you walk by the racquetball courts. I started salivating. Oh, how I LOVE racquetball. The problem is, it requires having multiple friends/help. One person to play with and one to watch the kids. So, if any of you out there know how to play racquetball and want to play, PLEASE let me know! You might need to be a little flexible with me as I'm at the mercy of Brad's schedule. I'm also very open to going to other classes or workouts or whatever. I'd just love to have some company. I'd rather not go alone. If you are looking for a workout buddy, please let me know!

Plethora of pictures

There are waaaaaay too many to add individually. You can pick which slide shows you want to see. I'll never know if you skip one anyway! :)

I feel the need to preface these pictures. Most of them are blurry to some degree or another. It irritates me to see, so I can only imagine how annoyed other people would be seeing them. Our camera is older than Daven, and if all our money weren't in the house, we'd probably buy a new one.

First we have J graduation from Kindergarten. He will be in school all day next year! Sigh... We sat in the very back, and we have no zoom, so it is really hard to see. Heavy sigh. It was sooooo hot too! I felt like I was in OK again.

Next up are the pictures of the sidewalk. We've come a long way! We hope to pour on Tues, but rain is complicating things. We'll just have to see. If you notice in the picture of the house (#7 I think), the tree has 2 trunks branching out. That is the tree that broke in the following storm pictures...


And here are the storm pictures. You thought I was kidding when I said we have water issues? I wasn't. Now you see the necessity of the ditch. And why we should have finished the ditch before starting on the sidewalks. (Check out the storm we had last year!) We only had one more down spout to connect to a pipe and run to the ditch. We even had the pipe laid (it has now floated off)! All we had to do was glue it together, drill a hole into the ditch pipe and then cover it all. Now we'll have to wait for the water to dry up. But it won't stop raining. Ugh. And I also wasn't kidding that we took down 20 trees. And now you see why too! I don't want all of those huge branches landing on my house! We cut down all of the trees closest to the house. Such a wise investment!


C provides a lot of entertainment for the family. She is such a cutie! She was playing with a can of soda for about 10 minutes before dropping it on a rock and then enjoying the resulting shower. The restaurant pictures are a great place we just found and fell in love with. SOOOO YUMMY! We asked to be seated on the train part. It was great. Right before we left, a train went roaring by on the track. The kids loved it! We were shaking! It was awesome!
I guess my jealousy is showing. I'm soooo tired of all of the brown and dirt in my yard that I went across the street and took pictures of my neighbors' yard. Technically, the house is abandoned months ago and a foreclosure sign was put up yesterday. I'm tempted to go steal all of the flowers since no one will care for them anyway (no, I won't). They have a cute pond that had a fountain too. But now the frogs have taken over. Most of these are blurry as well. Feel free to skip.

Okay, so those are the pictures in the last week. It has been really crazy this week, as you can see.

Just some random pictures

Not many updates on the yard work. It has been raining too much. Having said that, we did get the new gutters installed the day it really started raining. They weren't hooked up to the drain system yet, so when Brad got home, he got in some shorts and went into the mud to hook up all of the down spouts. I think he enjoyed sloshing in mud barefoot.

As I speak, they are doing forms and getting ready for the sidewalk. It is still pretty wet out there from all the rain the last 2 days.

The boys said their Webkinz wanted to watch them drive the Jeeps, but I didn't want them getting dirty. The frog and duck were J birthday presents from Aunt Brookie. The pig and monkey were Easter gifts from Grandma Jessie. The dogs and elephant were acquired last week while my family was here. Grandma Jones couldn't resist getting them some too!

The clip magnets I made this week. There is a "This Week" "Next Week" and "Spicy Kitchen"

Ahhh, the wonders of a laminating machine and hot glue gun! My favorite part is the glass chili bead I have on the bow. I've had them for over a year wondering what to do with them.

Did I already mention the picture I got for $12 at a garage sale? It looks very Kinkade-esqe to me and I love him. It hangs above our piano. And you can also see why I'm so desperate to get the wallpaper down and paint. But alas, the yard is the priority right now.

We found this in our backyard yesterday while eating breakfast. I have friends here that frequently have herds traveling through their yard, but this was my first time seeing one in our yard.

D graduation

Sick of my posts yet? Don't answer that... I told you I had a lot to catch up on.

Here are pictures of D graduation. Before you ask, no, I have no idea why he is doing a peace sign. He did it for the first 5 minutes. And yes, that is C sitting behind D. Someone, who shall remain nameless, was in charge of C so I could record the evening. We apparently have different ideas of what that means... ;)

More Twilight

Okay, don't hate me if you don't like Twilight, but check out this clip of the dance studio scene!

http://moviesblog.mtv.com/2008/06/01/watch-our-exclusive-twilight-clip-from-the-movie-awards-preshow/

Week of work!

Wow. I thought I'd have time to get this post done, but C thought I'd have more fun if she removed her diaper and scattered its contents throughout her crib. Lovely. And stinky. No, this isn't C. I didn't think to take a picture. But you get the idea.


It was wonderful having my family here. Thankfully our renter moved out the day before they got here, so they had the entire rental to themselves. It was my parents and brothers Jeremy and Gerrick, by the way. Gerrick got home from his mission to Alaska last year and we hadn't seen him in years. It was nice to catch up with him before he gets married this summer. Jeremy has an extremely busy social life out in AZ, so we are grateful he took the time to come and help us. And get my boys to belly fight. Sigh.

Anyway, we got so much done! They got 3 ceiling fans installed. And by installed, I mean cutting open the ceiling, putting in the track and electric box, running the electrical and assembling and installing the fans, oh, and adding another switch so the light and fan will be on separate switches. That alone should have taken a week. But they also repaired the fan in the master bath (one switch had no power and the other ran both the light and fan), ran electric for the light on the master porch, figured out what was wrong with the electric in the closet (we had never been able to turn on the light) and no one was seriously shocked. Yeah! Outside, we got walls put around 4 trees, the utility box, and along the side wall. We still need to finish them off, but we are light years ahead of where we would be if it was just me and Brad working. Oh, and the patio in back is started too. That will take awhile to finish yet. We are hoping to get the sidewalks in this week (I can't wait to have a functioning front door again!). Then level the yard and start grass before it gets too hot. So, there will probably be more pictures to come in the coming weeks.

Lack of faith?

Okay, I do trust Edward. Really I do. But the Breaking Dawn preface has me a little concerned. It doesn't sound like a good thing...

I will try to get a real post together, complete with pictures from our week with my family here by tomorrow. Wish me luck!

Article

This is a great article on women and their sacrifice. You might enjoy it especially if you have ever been pregnant or gone the route of adoption.

http://www.ldsmag.com/articles/080527sacrifice.html

My family just left today and I have a ton of pictures, but I'll have to do it later!

Must see!

Okay, I am really bad about using my recipes the way I should, but these seem like great ways to aid in organization. They are 3x5 recipe card holder magnets. Watch the video, it is kinda amusing and you can really see how they could help out! They come in a pack of 5. And you can't beat free! You just pay shipping. I just ordered a ton, so if someone wants to split the cost of shipping with me, let me know! Check out the link! https://www.dvo.com/recipe-card-holder.html

Rest and help

Since Brad hasn't slept in ages, he decided to take today off from working on the yard and I happily agreed. I found out this morning while lifting C that I tweaked something in my shoulder, so I really appreciate the break. Hopefully having a day off will renew energy and desire and we can plug away at the other walls.

Okay, now onto the help part. I've been thinking of putting together a CD with some songs that I think go along with the Twilight books. Just for fun. So far, I want to put on Forever by Breaking Benjamin. My sister wants to contribute Stop and Stare by One Republic. Feel free to check out the playlists that Stephenie made and see what you think would go with it. Thanks for any ideas!

Ouch

I'm getting sore. I've lifted more weights the last few days than I have in years. Unless you're counting my kids, but I didn't lift them 40 times a day. Well, sometimes I did...

I got some pictures of the wall today. But I didn't get any of it at the height we are leaving it at. And we put another much shorter wall around one of the trees. The 5 piles of dirt got spread around the front yard and made a berm along the ditch. The drainage pipes are mostly done, which will be nice. So, it was a very productive day. Yeah! We still have 4 trees to put retaining walls around and a long one along our property line. Poor Brad is already hating the thought more doing more walls. Maybe I'll make my dad and brothers do it when they get here next week.

Progress!

Brad worked all day on Saturday, so the yard remained the same. But he had this morning off, so we got crackin' on the retaining wall. Once the wall is done, we can start leveling the rest of the dirt. The sooner we do that, the sooner we can get grass! It was soooo cold today too! I think the high was in the low 60's, but it didn't feel that hot. I was freezing! I had to put on extra layers. Of course, we have lots of shade still, even after taking down 20 trees.

I have to confess that I had no idea what a pain it was to build a retaining wall. Besides the digging, laying limestone and smashing it, laying the sand, laying the bricks at exactly the same distance and then leveling them all, it took pretty much all day, just to get what we did done. Of course, we did other things too, like lay down the drainage pipe that will be going through the wall. And digging up the bricks in the way of the drainage pipes. Holy cow we brought in a lot of dirt. I didn't realize how much until I had to dig down to the bricks. They had been under the stairs we removed, so they weren't taken out before the dirt was brought in. Once we got the initial layer of the wall down, the rest went a lot faster. But that first row took ages!

Brad thinks I'll be in too much pain from all of the bricks and such, so he had me take some Aleve (a benefit of not nursing!) and gave me more to take tonight.

Here are the pictures. The first 2 pictures are before we started the wall. No, I don't dress up to do heavy lifting, so stop laughing now. It is going to be a 2 layer wall since the basement window and the utilites prevent us from coming all the way across. It should look good when we are done. I just wish we had more time with Brad home so we could get it done sooner.

Black dirt

Last night while I was cleaning and Brad was cooking a fabulous recipe called Red Curry Chicken with Basil, the boys decided to play outside. And if you noticed, our yard is all dirt. BLACK dirt. And if you caught the quick mention, it rained ALL DAY on Sunday. Can you see where I'm going with this? There were black footprints through my house. Apparently the mud was so strong the boys shoes got stuck, so they left them in the mud and walked in their socks. And then acted shocked because we got mad at them even though they took off their shoes before coming in. Yeah. Lovely. Of course, I had to take pictures before starting the laundry. Did I mention J was wearing light jeans and D was wearing light khakis? And that they were pretty well covered in dirt? I have to say though, I was really impressed with Shout. I squirted the clothes like there was no tomorrow and honestly, I can't even tell they were ever dirty. I am shocked. And thrilled. We had already set up a carpet cleaning appointment before this happened. I wanted to cancel it until we get some grass because I know it is going to happen again. But Brad was insistent that we do it ASAP, and it wasn't worth the fight, so I didn't cancel it. They came today and it looks amazing! I love it! I'm glad I listened to him!

Happy Mother's Day!

I hope all of you women out there are having an awesome Mother's Day!

And here are the next chapters of previously started stories:

Lex Luther has fully recovered. His tensioner system broke causing his serpentine belt to snap. And, no, I don't know what I just wrote. He was fixed that same day, so Brad was able to go pick him up and pay for him before going back to work for the night.

Volleyball was fun this week. I didn't have any scary ankle incidents, which is reassuring. I didn't even have bruised knees! That is in a large part due to the fact that the people playing this day were actually really good. It is hard (embarrassing) being the worst player on the court, but at least you don't end up diving for shanked balls because either they play too good to shank balls, or someone else is already diving for it. And I finally did some jumping without having a heart attack after. I even won a couple of jousts. Not as many as I lost, but still, the fact that I even jumped was a victory for me. I did do something not fun to my index finger joint. I don't know what. I don't think it was a jam because it was on the outside of the knuckle. Maybe I accidently bumped a ball with my hands instead of my arms? Either way, it was pretty painful and resulted in a lovely purple bruise. It made it difficult to set because that finger pretty much guides the ball along with the thumb. And my team wanted me to be the setter for the big hitters. Quite intimidating. But, I managed to get the sets placed and we actually won that game. Brad is going to be working during volleyball the next couple weeks and I'm really going to miss it. I hope I don't revert back to my fears after taking some time off...

Saturday was busy. Brad and the boys went to see Speedracer and I put C down for a nap. I love that he has someone to go watch those kind of movies with so I don't have to go. ;) I went outside and worked with Ken (the dirt/ditch guy). We spent quite awhile putting sand under the pipe from the house and compacting it so it wouldn't move when driven on and such. Then I watched for rocks and branches, etc while he dropped dirt on it. I tried to gather wood left from the downed trees, but I couldn't get the wheelbarrow back over the ditch. Then I drilled holes in the bottom of the large pipe until the battery ran out. Now I have a blister on the right side of my thumb knuckle that matches Brad's. How romantic. While waiting for Brad to get back, I got on the computer for a minute. I noticed something large and dark moving in the dining room. I just about peed my pants. When I finally saw what it was, I was shocked. A stray cat had wandered in from the basement and come up the stairs. I had left the door open down there when I ran in to answer the phone. When Brad and the boys got back, just as C woke up, we worked on getting the pipes down and ready for the rocks to bury it. I finished drilling it, with a different drill and an extension cord, and then we attached the pipe from the house. Then we gathered large branches and stuff in the dirt and helped with the rocks getting dropped. So, to summarize, both the ditches are now covered. YEAH! I have oodles of boring pictures if you are so interested.

And here are the slide shows:

This first one is pictures when we very first looked at the house a year ago this week. You can see all of the trees we took down. The last pictures are ones the appraiser took. I didn't take any of the back before we dropped about 5 trees back there.

Good indication

You know you are officially broke when the money is all gone and then a car breaks down. Why does it always happen like that? It must be a conspiracy.

Brad was driving to work yesterday when Lex Luther started smoking. Lex is our 1992 Lexus with nearly 180K miles. Our Odyssey is Odie, an '06 who just got a 30K check-up last week, which wasn't cheap. I take total responsibility for the fact that our cars have names. It is my family's tradition. Brad thinks it is loopy, but plays along. Anyway, Brad managed to get to a shop that was within a 15 minute walk to his work.

The is no news on the yard. It looks quite the same as Brad has been working an insane amount of hours this week. I am really excited for the big massive ditches to be filled and the huge piles of rocks to be spread. And it will be great to finally have a sidewalk and a porch so people stop going through my garage to knock on the door. Oh, and grass so that my carpet isn't coated in dirt being tracked in. It is going to be awhile, but I'll take more pictures when something changes!

STOP!

Stop whatever you are doing and check out this Twilight trailer.

HOW CAN I WAIT UNTIL DECEMBER??!?!?!

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=33429578