This and that...

~FYI: Apparently there is a limit on how long you should leave rechargeable camera batteries on the charger. We didn't discover this by reading the directions. No that would be much too easy! We discovered this by leaving the batteries on the charger too long and the acid started oozing out of them. Apparently overnight is TOO long!!! OOPS!!
~Today I wanted to smack a chick! She was walking down the street with her son in a stroller. He had a coat on. But NO SOCKS!!! It was like 25 degrees today! He was 18 months to a year old I'm guessing. Think how freezing cold your feet get in the morning. Inside your house. Now imagine being outside for who knows how long without socks on your feet in 25 degree weather. I can't imagine what was going through this chicks head! One time I saw a woman with a baby with a onesie and that's it in the dead of winter. Of course the mom had on a coat and warm shoes and long pants. I just can't figure out what the heck people are thinking. At least figure if you are wearing 3 layers of clothing your baby needs 3 layers of clothing too! It's winter....put socks on your baby!!!!! Geez Louise!!!!
~I am so glad Brian doesn't work for an accounting firm this year. NO MORE BUSY SEASON this year!!! I LOVE that!! We actually get to see him! AWESOME!!!
~Have you seen the movie Up? It is the cutest show! We laugh every time we watch it! I usually don't watch the kids shows with them anymore but I do watch this one with them. Enjoyable for adults as well as kids. It's my new favorite!
~Did you ever notice how Sunbeams (the sunday school class I teach at church with 3 and 4 year olds) have absolutely NO BOUNDARIES!!! We had a little girl in our class today that we hadn't had in class before. I knew her for all of 20 minutes before she started leaning on me and pulling my skirt up on the side of my leg repeatedly and basically MAULING me! I wouldn't have minded that much except that she sucks her thumb too. She has slobber stringing from her thumb every time she takes her thumb out of her mouth. Then she touches Gracie's toy. I'm not sure this germaphobe can handle Sunbeams with a baby!!! They are awfully cute and I like the calling most of the time but I'm just not very good with bodily functions and secretions!!!
~Some people are just so dang good at what they do that you just can't get over how good they are! The song leader in primary in our ward is OUTSTANDING!!! The kids love her and she does and excellent job and I am in awe of her each week. One of my most favorite parts of a primary calling is that I get to hear and sing the primary songs. They are so wonderful and nothing is sweeter than the voices of the little primary children singing the beautiful primary songs. I just love it!

Stick a fork in us...we are DEFINITELY done!!!! (we think!!!)

We think we've finally decided that we are DEFINITELY done having babies. We've been deciding this for quite some time now. It's been quite difficult for me to finally, officially make the decision that we're DONE. When we decided to have children it was really a no brainer. We loved each other and wanted to have kiddos and I was having problems that the dr. said would cause me to have difficulty getting pregnant so we just decided 6 months into our marriage that we'd leave it up to the Lord and when he saw fit to bless us with a child we'd be super happy!!! 6 years, 3 miscarriages, trillions of tears, many blessings and prayers later...our little Zackary was born. I will never forget the joy I felt as I held him in my arms in the hospital room when they brought him to me after they cleaned him up and Brian had gone home for some zzzzs after a very looooonnnggg day and night. It was just me and him. He was kind of funny looking with his cone shaped head but he was mine and of course I thought he was the most beautiful baby EVER!!! I remember counting his fingers and toes and praying and thanking my Heavenly Father for sending this precious baby to me. It was a beautiful moment I will always cherish. Each of our children have been such a blessing to us. I didn't expect to have my first baby at the age of 27, #2 at 30, #3 at 33, and my 4th at 36. The older I am the HARDER the pregnancy. My first and second pregnanies were great! Especially the second. The delivery and recovery were even great for me physically. Emotionally it was the hardest since Matty had to be resussitated when he finally was out of me and that scared us to death! He was the dreamiest baby and I think part of it was that I was so much more relaxed with him. I had done this before and Zack was still alive so I must not be too bad at this. I could do it again. Well, my pregnancy with Max was a little more difficult. I was EXHAUSTED beyond anything I had ever felt before! I was also older and I could tell! I felt more queezy too and just not so hot. I was POSITIVE he was a girl because my pregnancy was so much different than it had been before and I actually felt worse than I had before. I never felt 100% with my pregnancies but I never was very sick at all. Never threw up except the occasional gag from my tooth brush. With him I felt a little rougher. I thought each of my boys was kind of difficult to keep up with until I had Max. Well, I still can't decide if it was just Max or the combination of Max and Matthew. There came a time when I felt strongly I should just stop preventing pregnancy again and leave it up to the Lord again but I was TERRIFIED because I didn't know how I would ever handle another baby since the destruction and craziness of Max and Matthew were about to kill me off. After a while I was sad that we hadn't had a baby yet and then we went somewhere I can't remember where. We didn't need a stroller or a diaper bag. The kids were at great ages. I decided maybe I didn't want to have another baby after all so I took all the clothes and garb to D.I. and figured we would make things permanent and we could move on with our lives and it was going to be great! The next month I found out I was pregant with Gracie. First, I was SCARED to death!!! Then, I was sick as a dog. I lived the next 4 months in a constant state of nausea. I felt like I was car sick and had a stomach virus. You know the feeling where if you just hold still enough you don't feel like you are going to lose your lunch but any movement makes you feel like you are just going to lose it! Well,the only problem with that was I had 3 other children to take care of and that was pretty rough. I am such a wimp. I kept thinking of women I know like Tara, Cassie, Anna, and Heidi who get so incredibly sick it isn't even funny. I had been so blessed with my previous pregnancies. I just KNEW this time it was a girl because I had truly NEVER felt like this and people said that was usually a sign that it was the opposite sex of what you already had. Surprisingly I only threw up 5 times the whole time but I WISHED I could throw up and feel better the rest of the time. Packing the kids in the car to take Zack to school and pick him up and to take Matty to preschool and pick him up and grocery shopping and every other thing that required a drive in the car felt like a nightmare! Carsick on top of carsick was NOT fun! Doing dishes or any household task became increasingly difficult. I only bathed the kids when I couldn't remember how long it had been since they had had a bath. I know...terrible!!! It was a horrible 4 months!!! Then once I felt better I experienced so many ups and downs wondering if I could REALLY do this again! And with a GIRL!!! I didn't know anything about girls. Well, sure, I was one but I'd been the mom of boys for 9 years and knew NOTHING about girls anymore! The maternity books call it "misgivings". I call it SCARED TO DEATH!!!! The MOMENT they handed me my sweet little Gracie Sue all of the worries and fears and "misgivings" went away. I could do it! She was the sweetest baby! She has adored me from day one and I have adored her right back along with each member of our family! She is a total mama's girl. She's turning into quite the little daddy's girl, too! The minute she hears his voice when he comes home for lunch and after work she crawls to where ever he is as fast as she can. She flirts with him and smiles the sweetest smile at him. One day she had a dress on and got stuck and just sat there staring at him making this funny noise to get his attention until he came and picked her up and then she just SMILED at him! She LOVES him so much! Of course she has him wrapped around her little finger! He's always been such a wonderful father and has always loved his kids so much. They have all thought he was the greatest! It has been such a beautiful thing to watch! Our whole little family is absolutely SMITTEN with Gracie and we can't imagine life without her! Heavenly Father knew we needed her! She brings us so much joy and I just can't tell you how grateful I am that she is a part of our family. By the end of the pregnancy I was POSITIVE we were done making people. This factory was shutting down! I NEVER wanted to feel like that again! I was having such a hard time breathing and I had several panic attacks because I couldn't breathe. I also started feeling sick again during the last month. I told Brian I wanted him to do something permanent because I NEVER wanted to feel that way again and I NEVER wanted to FORGET how horrible I felt and do it again!!! Well, Gracie has been such a wonderful baby that I just kind of forget sometimes and think about how wonderful it would be to bring another precious child into the world. The hard part is that EVERYONE in the family suffers when mom can't function fully for 4 months straight. Things slip and we are STILL trying to get back to normal. Gracie has been a wonderful baby...as long as I am holding her CONSTANTLY since the day she was born!!! But if I'm holding her I don't have to be doing anything special like bouncing, playing, walking...just holding. I have had to cook many meals while holding her. I've loaded and unloaded the dishwasher many times while holding her. She eats well. She sleeps well. She is super easy to keep happy. All she needs is ME!!! As wonderful as that is it hinders my ability to keep up with my duties as a mother and housewife. It takes a lot out of everyone to have another baby. But all that said. Are we done?! It sounds like it would be the easiest decision to come to EVER! But it isn't! Are there any other babies in Heaven that are meant to be part of our family forever. It's a big decision to make! It's one of the most important decisions we'll ever make. We need to KNOW! You know! If we KNOW then we can officially decide and proceed in whatever direction that decision takes us. We need to earnestly pray about it, I know! But I'm afraid of the answer! I'm afraid of EITHER answer!!! I don't think I want to do this whole thing again but I also don't know if I'm ready for this part of my life to be finished. I LOVE my kids so much! I love each of their personalities and I love the beautiful parts of the whole process of bringing new lives into the world. If I could GUARANTEE that the pregnancy would be just like my pregnancy with Matthew minus the scary parts, of course, then I would do it 10 more times. Unfortunately there are NO guarantees! Once you KNOW do you ever have regrets about the decision? If you have had this experience where you KNEW that you were done and you stopped please tell me your feelings about it. Maybe it will help me out! I'm afraid we'll make a permanent decision and later regret it! UGGHH!!

My "powers are weak"....

~My kids built the sweetest snowman the other day. It was their dad and he was holding a baby snowman that was Gracie. How cute are they?!
~For some reason the boys have started using a shovel somehow when they build the snowmen and now it's buried in new snow. OOOOPS!!!
~Our primary class went really well Sunday. They are ADORABLE kids!!! Max gave his talk. Well, he stood there while I gave the talk. It was only his second time to go to big kid primary and he got stage fright. No tears just...speechless. Matthew volunteered in his class to give a talk this week. We're trying to be SO PROUD of his desire to give talks in primary. The topic is "We believe in God the Eternal Father and in His Son Jesus Christ." Not too difficult at least. I was proud of Matthew for volunteering to recite the first article of faith in primary last Sunday. He did a great job! He's pretty shy so I was surprised he did it!!! He's very brave!
~My "powers are weak"!! I decided to shovel Ruth's driveway yesterday. I could use the exercise and her super nice neighbor who usually plows it with is 4-wheeler didn't come over and plow so I just figured what the heck might as well. I only lasted an hour and only shoveled like a quarter of it. It totally kicked my trash!! I'm so sore today! The neighbor came by this morning thankfully since it snowed at least the same amount last night as the night before. Can't get over how much snow we have!! My biggest problem is that it started kind of melting on the bottom but there were still several inches on top of that so I was shoveling slush and snow. HEAVY STUFF!!! I am pathetically out of shape!!!
~I have almost finished another book. It's only taken me weeks of reading a sentence here a paragraph there. I haven't been sleeping well so I have been reading at night when I can't fall asleep and in the morning when I wake up at 4am and can't fall back to sleep and finally give in and read. I only have like 30 pages left. I LOVE reading! I am so glad my mom shares her books with me. She gives me the books in perfect shape. You can't even tell they have been read. Then I return them with covers and pages bent. I even spilled a little water on this one. I feel just terrible returning them in such shape but she never complains and is so nice about it. I appreciate it so much! After carrying a book around for weeks it starts to show wear. Especially when I have a super cute little 3 year old running around destroying everything in his path. Anyway, I have really enjoyed this book. It's set in the 1870's and it makes me so grateful for blessings, conveniences, medicine, emergency services, lots of things we take for granted every day! I am spoiled and so grateful for that! So glad I can throw a load of clothes in the washing machine and then in the dryer, load and unload the dishwasher, turn on a light when I need it. DRIVE to the store if I need a loaf of bread, jam, fruit, vegetables, milk, butter, etc., etc. I can buy my family socks instead of knitting them myself. Use the very convenient freezer, frig, toilet, shower, furnace, air conditioner, school bus system. On and on I could go!

I quit!?!?

Last night I was thinking of quitting my job. Today is a new day thank goodness! I think I'll keep the job!!! It's snowing too! It's so beautiful to watch! I love waking up to see a blanket of snow covering everything! I'm just going to be happy and ENJOY the kids and the "job" I have. Soon enough I'll be "unemployed" ...and then I'll wish for this time back. Gotta take the time to ENJOY it while it lasts!!!!

Love it!!!!

I am a HUGE fan of Gilmore Girls!!! I didn't actually discover it until the summer of 2006 (unbeknownst to me at the time they had just had the SERIES finale the month before) when I started watching the reruns while I prepared lunch for the kids and cleaned up the mess. I instantly fell in love with Lorelei and Rory!!! Not to mention...LUKE!!! Hubba Hubba!!! I own the DVD box set of Gilmore Girls and every thing! They are my FAVORITE!!! All I have to do is hear the theme song and I feel happy! I smile, dance, and sing! It's the best!!! Well, I decided to change my ringtone today to something fun and I thought of the theme song to Gilmore Girls. I've had 2 calls since I changed it and it just makes me so happy to hear it! I should have done this a long time ago! I have REALLY needed a pick me up lately and something to try to keep me positive and in a good mood even though things around me aren't always going so well. Music has such a HUGE influence on my moods and I'm hoping this will help a little. If I answer the phone by singing that song instead of saying hello just go with it! I put the song on my play list so turn up the volume and listen to the song and SMILE!!!

My keester survived!!!

~We went ice skating today with Brian's brother Jared and his wife Becky, their kids, Becky's family, and Brian's Mom and brother Chris came along to watch. Well, it was the first time for all of us and it was a lot of fun! I was a HUGE chicken poo and couldn't bring myself to step on the ice with both skates. Finally, Chris let me hold on to his arm (he was in tennis shoes and didn't slip at all) and he we went around the rink once. My knees were killing me! I was so afraid of falling and breaking my tailbone...again!!! Thankfully I made it back to safety! I almost kissed the ground when I stepped off the ice. I changed out of my ice skates, put my shoes back on and let my little Max around the ice. He didn't fare so well! He started running on the ice and slipped and fell and landed on his poor little noggin. He had a bad head ache after that! Poor little guy! Brian did a FANTASTIC job!!! Matty did super well, too. Zack got the hang of it eventually. I was so proud of them for trying and trying over and over!!! Becky brought hot chocolate for everyone. Her friend brought my FAVORITE...SCOTCHEROOS!!! LOVE them!!! And Zacky made some brownies to share. It was a great time! I'll post pictures on my word from the zoo blog soon. Even though I'm a chicken I can officially say I have tried ice skating now and I can mark it off my bucket list.
~I am the WORST at writing in a journal. My blogs have really helped this along I think. I mean at least I have SOME sort of record of our lives and our comings and goings and my feelings on things. Well, another great journal resource is my calendars. I keep our calendars every year. Some people think it's very weird that I do this but it has come in handy many times as a reference for when certain things happened. Also it's kind of fun to look back over the events written on the calendar. The other day I was looking over my 2009 calendar and last year about a week ago we had the ultrasound that told us we were having a precious little girl. It was kind of fun to think back on a year ago. Anyway, I hope you all keep your calendars as well. What better journals of what actually goes on in our lives and some of the fun activities we took part in.
~Tomorrow is the big day...our first day teaching Max's church class. He also gets to give his first ever talk in church. I'm excited and kind of nervous.
~I am so thankful for my children! I love each of them so much and hope they all know that! Some times life gets so crazy and one or the other gets more attention than the others and I worry about how they are handling everything and if they all feel enough love from us.
~Brian took Zack on a date in May to a baseball game. In July he took Matthew on a date to the Rodeo. Max has been REALLY needing attention so Brian decided to take him to see Alvin and the Chipmunks 2 last night for their date. He really had fun and looked forward to it all day. I hope we can be better about doing that this year with the kids. Maybe do it twice with each kid. It's kind of nice because it makes them feel so special and it's not too expensive since it's just 2 people going. The kids LOVE it and that's the whole point of it!
~Well, I hope everyone has a great day and that things are going well for everyone!!!

Cute girl!

~Yesterday my little cute Gracie (7 months old) was sitting on my lap while I was applying my make up and The Today Show was on. When they were panning through the audience that stands outside the studio as they went to commercial apparently Gracie thought they were all smiling and waving at her so she smiled and waved back. So cute!!!
~Today I was standing in the bathroom holding Gracie and letting her look in the mirror. Usually she just looks at the mirror with a confused look on her little face. Today she was smiling when she looked at the mirror and saw the CUTEST little girl on Earth and just couldn't resist smiling back and waving at her reflection. It was the sweetest thing!!!

My b-day. The big 3-7!!! WOW I'm OLD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

~My mom, my sister Stephanie and Steph's son Josh came to town to take me to lunch for my birthday. It was nice to spend time with them! My mom made me a cake and brought it with her and I thought that was very nice of her! It's interesting how most birthdays come and go and I don't even care but this year it seemed more important to me. Meant more to me. I don't know why that is but I sure did appreciate all of the nice gestures by everyone to make the day more special!!!
~I'm kind of wishing I would have asked Brian to take the day off so he could watch the kids for me and make dinner for me and do the laundry and basically give me a break for a day.I always feel like I'm able to give more as a mom and be better and nicer when I have a little time to relax and just BE once in a while. Does that make me selfish or does that make me normal and human?
~Man I can't believe how dry it is here! We are going through Aveeno like crazy and my hands are still cracked and bleeding. My feet are atrocious!!! I stocked up on a good foot cream, foot scrub, and pumice stone the other day. I sure hope it helps!!!
~I've decided we should buy stock in kleenex, cold medicine, ibuprofen, tylenol, hand sanitizer, and lotion before next winter. By Spring we'll be raking in the cash!!!!! We've spent an absolute fortune on these things this year. Not to mention copays for Dr. and dentist visits, prescriptions, hospital visits, and cough drops. Sheesh!!!!
~I'm having an -I really miss my dad- day!!! When I woke up this morning I was thinking about how special my birthdays were when I was a little kid. At my mom's house she would get a baby sitter and take me out to eat and I could pick where ever I wanted to eat. It was just me, Mom, and Stan. She would also make us our favorite cake and we would have ice cream. I don't remember anything about the gifts although there were gifts I just remember the feelings I had of being special and getting to do special things on my special day. She also made cupcakes and took them to school for a treat for me to share with my class that day. When we went to my Dad's for Christmas break he would always have a party for me. My birthday was in the middle of January so we wouldn't see each other on my birthday but he always made a special point to have a party for me while we were together. He would always make a special dinner for me. My most favorite dinner always was and always will be spaghetti. Italian in general really. For a few years in a row he actually made the spaghetti noodles from scratch and the sauce from scratch. I am sure there were presents and a cake involved there too and but once again I can't remember those details just the feelings of being special and having a special day. I told Brian about it when I woke up and thought about it all day. I was able to spend some time time with my mom and sister and that was so nice and then dinner with my family and cake and ice cream. I was missing my dad. He always called and wished me happy birthday and I know that he loved me. He wasn't perfect. None of us are. But he was a person in my life that I knew loved me, and wanted me to be happy. I loved him too and miss him!!!!!
~So Brian gave me the BEST gift for my birthday!!! He knows how addicted I am to facebook and blogging and how hard it's been to not have my own computer since we've lived with his mom and our computer is broken so he bought me one of those tiny little computers. They had them at Walmart for $229.00 so he got me one. I absolutely LOVE it!!! I don't remember when I've had a more perfect gift!!! Now I just need to keep Max away from it and I'll be in great shape!!! Brian also made one of my favorite cakes ever. My mom's strawberry cake. So delicious!!! And it's a "from scratch" recipe and everything. LOVE it! LOVE that he made it for me!!! What a great guy!!!!

My ring....

One of the prongs on my wedding ring bent a couple of weeks ago so I took it into the jewelry store to have it fixed. They said it also needed to have the prongs replaced or redone or something because they were so worn down. I have been without it for over 2 weeks and finally got it back last night. I missed it so much! I've been wearing it for 17 years now (well February it will be the 17th anniversary of our engagement) and it is just kind of...part of me, you know. It's just always there and to not have it made me appreciate it even more once it was back. It looks so BEAUTIFUL again too! It was REALLY, REALLY dirty! Mommyhood is a DIRTY job!!! Anyway, I mostly love the feelings behind which all came flooding back to me of when Brian gave it to me and asked me to be his wife. And when he placed it on my finger at the temple after we were sealed for time and all eternity. To me it is special and lovely and will always be a part of me and a wonderful symbol of our love for each other. I once had a sister in law (she and my brother in law have since divorced) who, after a year of marriage traded her ring in on a new model. Yes! She did this! It still blows my mind! To be completely honest, my ring is much more flashy than anything I would have ever chosen for myself. I would have chosen a plain white or yellow gold band with a single diamond in the middle if I were the one doing the choosing because I'm just more simple and plain I suppose. Well, Brian chose this ring for me and presented it to me with LOVE and I will always cherish it and LOVE it more than any other ring on earth because HE gave it to me and it is our SYMBOL, you know?! Not having it really got me thinking these last couple of weeks about all the ring symblolizes for us. I was almost as happy last night to have it back as I was to get it from him the first time he gave it to me. I seriously got teary. I hope you all take a moment to remember back to the sweet moment your husband asked you to marry him. Think back on those feelings. Think about what the ring symbolizes and the feelings and emotions that were wrapped up in that beautiful moment that was sealed with a kiss and a ring.....

If you can read this you are in my way...

~I found a t-shirt I need to get. It looks like an eye chart and said If you can read this you are in my way. Cracked me up!!! I think my sister Katie would like it too!!! hehehe
~The other night while Brian and I were making dinner Max decided it would be super fun to smear Vaseline all over the rim of the toilet. When I walked in the bathroom after he had gone to bed and saw it my mind was having a hard time processing what my eyes were seeing. Did someone do that vaseline on the toilet prank??? No who would do such a thing??? Zack? NO!!!! Matthew? No.? Max (age 3)? Well, sure!!!!! After all he once painted the garbage can with honey using an actual paint brush. No one else's mind works like this!! So the next morning we asked him about it and he said he didn't do it. It was a ghost boy. He tried to stop him but he wouldn't listen and did it anyway. If he wasn't so stinking cute I just don't know what would have happened to him by now! Santa totally knew what he was doing when he put that Dennis the Menace DVD in his stocking this year. Of course it will probably give him more ideas.
~I'm going to really sound like a parent for a second now but I SERIOUSLY think my boys drink the shampoo!!! They at least just literally poor money down the drain! I told Max yesterday that we could buy him more toys and we could eat out more if we didn't have to buy so darn much shampoo. He probably thinks now that if he stops pouring it down the drain we can live in a mansion, go on vacations, have all the toys he ever dreamed of, eat out all the time, and drive a super great, fancy, sports car seeing as how the answer to all of our financial woes hinges on whether or not he pours shampoo down the drain. Kids are so literal after all! Do you ever say stupid, overly dramatic things to your kids in frustration or is that just me?!
~It occurred to me yesterday afternoon that maybe Max could use a little more one on one attention from me and his dad. After all he was the baby for 3 1/2 years and now there's little Princess Gracie now to compete for attention with as well as the fact that everyone keeps getting sick and taking attention that way as well. Last night Brian and I were asked to teach his Sunday School class at church from now on. I have about a zillion reservations about doing this but we accepted thinking it will be a great opportunity to spend that one on one time with Max. And you've gotta say yes anyways! Wish us luck!!! Hopefully they don't eat us alive! Max is the worry! He is an angel until WE teach him and then he swings from the rafters...Heaven help us!!
~I can't get enough soup this time of year! I just LOVE it!!! Does anyone have any yummy soup recipes? My mom makes the most delicious chicken stew. So good and back when she did Weight Watchers it was 0 points or just like 1 or 2. Very minimal. I could eat it for lunch and dinner for a week it's so yummy! If you don't mind sharing a good soup recipe please email me at btzmm@yahoo.com Even if I don't know you please share anyway!!!
~I am so glad I don't live in the big metropolis anymore for two very BIG reasons...SUNSHINE AND CLEAR SKYS!!! Every winter the air gets so nasty there and it's just so gray and cloudy from the smog. HORRIBLE!!! I would get really depressed every year at this time because dark, dreariness, lack of sunshine, and being cooped up in the house with kids all day as a stay at home mom eventually wears on you!!! So I am so grateful for sunshine. The last couple of days have been kind of cloudy but that's totally fine sometimes. I love a good cloudy day to make me want to snuggle up on the couch with a warm blanket and a good book. Just not every day for months on end!!!
~Well, that is all...have a good day!!!

I guess I'll call it Fat, Ugly, Old, and Toothless....

~There are millions of people that are joining gyms or going back to the gym as part of their New Year's resolutions. The problem is that by February most of them have lost their motivation and stop going. I'm so pathetic that I can't even find the motivation to only be motivated for a month! I'm in trouble! Luckily I didn't gain any weight over the holidays. At the rate I exercised my elbow it's actually a miracle I didn't gain. I need to do something though. I REFUSE to go on a diet though. I just need to make smarter choices. Add more fruits and veggies to my diet, add more fiber, eat smaller portions, exercise more, drink more water, etc. Stop exercising the elbow so much!!!
~My complection has been terrible for the last year. It's down right yucky! Any suggestions? I think it might be because I'm old. I turn 37 this month!!! THIRTY SEVEN!!!! That my friends..is...OLD!!!
~15 years ago I decided to make some homemade bread. I mixed, kneaded, let it rise, punched it down, shaped it, let it rise again. This is such a process for an impatient person to go through!!! It was worth the wait as I smelled it baking and could almost taste the deliciousness of the bread as I waited for it to finish. You can imagine my disappointment when I took the loaves from the oven and found that they were like unleaven bread! What did I do wrong?! I have no idea! I have only ever attempted making things that require yeast a couple of times since because I just couldn't handle the disappointment. I did find a yummy recipe for breadsticks from my sister in law Stephanie that is tasty, easy, and if I can make it anyone can make it. Yesterday I decided I was in the mood for homemade bread of some kind. I flipped through cookbooks and found a roll recipe that sounded good. I mixed, kneaded, let rise....but wait...they didn't rise. Oh, well maybe if I punch it down, shape into rolls and let rise for the last 30 minutes as directed it will actually rise a little....NOPE!!! Still nothing!!! Well, I decided I had come this far I'd bake them and hope for the best. They rose a teensy, tinsy bit while baking. They tasted good but did not look right AT ALL!!! It's official...yeast is not my friend!!! I would LOVE to find a really tasty whole wheat bread recipe to make that would actually work out. If you have one please share! Please also include very detailed instructions so I might have better luck this time. From the words of W.C. Fields,"If at first you don't succeed, try, try again."
~I hate cleaning out the car but I'm going to have to do it! I always swore my car would never be disgusting when I had kids. I thought people that had kids and let them make their car nasty were crazy loons and I swore I would never do that! Well, I do that! I cringe every time we move the car seats and see the disgustingness under neat on our cars seat. It's a dirty job and like all other dirty jobs my family create I have to clean it up! Hopefully I don't end up with a fungus...
~I have been in pain morning, noon, and night for like 3 months now. At first the dentist just thought I was clenching my teeth at night and that that was causing my whole mouth to hurt all the time especially when I eat something. After an x-ray he discovered that I have a tooth that I paid $600 five years ago to "fix" with a root canal and crown. Well, it has bothered me ever since and now it has to have the root canal redone which will cost $800-$1200 to have done. I've decided to just have the stupid thing pulled. I am not spending another dime on a stupid tooth that is most likely going to have to be pulled anyway! I have to take ibuprofen round the clock to avoid excruciating pain so although it's not my dream to be toothless or anything I am really, really looking forward to having this tooth taken out tomorrow!!! It will be nice to be pain free in a few days!!!! Can't wait!!!
~I am so grateful for antibiotics and modern medicine. I have been reading a book set in the 1800s and one of the characters is a 6 year old boy who has pneumonia. He struggled for so long and finally over came it in the story. It makes me think about how grateful I am to live in a time when we have medicine, knowledgeable doctors, xrays, elecricity for nebulizers, etc. I think about my Grandma Leota who buried a tiny son who died from an infection from his circumcision the year before penicillin was discovered. How lucky we are to live in this time of wonderful modern medicine. Of course it still doesn't always guarantee anything but it often does and at least gives us a better chance than people who lived not too awfully long ago.
~We played a fun card game over the Christmas break called Swap. It's not the Wife Swap game ;) it's just called Swap and is more like Uno. It is so much fun! My kids are addicted now! If you are looking for a fun new game to try pick it up!
~Well, I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas and a super fun New Year's Eve! We did! We are getting so old though! We fell asleep in the 11:00 hour. We had even put together puzzles, played games, and ate tons of snacks to try to keep us awake to no avail. I woke up at 12:02. I nudged Brian and said It's 12:02. He said oh, Happy New Year! We kissed quick and went back to sleep. I was ready for bed by 7:30 that night. It's official...we're old!!!

I put some Christmas pictures on my Word From The Zoo blog. Once again if you want an invite just tell me your email address and I'll send ya one!