Rejuvination

Friday I spent 8 blessed hours with my wonderful husband and NO children!!! 8 amazingly relaxing hours sitting/standing in the sun watching some great golf (and some not-so-great that made us realize these men are human after all.) It was a perfect day. Not that all perfect days exclude my children but this one did.


This picture isn't a very good representation of our day we spent very little time with the crowds on the 16th hole, most of it was spent on the quiet holes sitting in the sun.

Any other perfect days out there?

Love Affair

I have been thinking a lot about food lately. Well, to be completely honest it's not just lately. It's always. I love food. But the problem with my love for food is that I am completely, 100% non-discriminitory in my love. I am just as willing to eat the crust from a left-over pb&j as I am a Lion House Chicken Cordon Bleu. I have no control.

When Seth and I were first married it used to boggle my mind when I would ask if he want some ice cream and he would say "no, I'm not hungry." What? I didn't ask if you were hungry, I asked if you wanted some ice cream. I'm not hungry either I just want some ice cream. This could be why I've outweighed Seth for most of our marriage (that and the fact that I've been pregnant for roughly 40% of our married life.)

Anyway, I was realizing the other day that I need to be more selective in my loving of food. I have those dreaded last 10 lbs to lose and for some odd reason (gold fish, cookies, fruit snacks, soda, ice cream, etc etc) I can't seem to shed them. I often think, if I could just exercise maybe I wouldn't have to eat less, oh but me and exercise is another blog post all in itself. So I hereby vow to be more conscience of what goes in my mouth. I will no longer eat the left over pizza crust that doesn't taste good anyway. I won't finish off pudding just because it's there. I will save my love for the foods that deserve to be loved. Now I'm going to go brush my teeth and pop in a piece of gum because there are some not so delicious but extremely tempting gold fishies on the table just waiting for me to succum to my food floozy ways.

Parenting 101

I've found one sure fire method for getting your children to do what you want. Bribery. That's it. Just tell them you'll give them something they really want and all your dreams and wishes of happy, obedient children will come true. They may end up a little spoiled and you may end up broke but you'll have to figure out a fix for that on your own. After all this is just Parenting 101.


About 3 weeks ago after getting really tired of A) being woken up in the middle of the night and B) tripping over children sleeping on the floor next to our bed, we pulled out all the stops. We told the girls if they could stay in their bed for 5 consecutive days we would do something "special" with them. They perked right up. McKay decided she would want to go to the snow and Kimball, sweet, sweet Kimball said she wanted to go trick-or-treating.

It took a total of 5 days to accomplish that. No starting over. Apparently they were capable of it all along, they just needed the right incentive.

I took these pictures on the "snow" setting on my camera,

silly me I thought that meant I could take pictures in the

snow and they would turn out.

Luc didn't accomplish the goal but Seth's a softy

and let him play in the snow anyway.

I love their outfits, all borrowed from those who love their

kids enough to take them to snow on a regular basis

Luc only lasted about 15 minutes, might have had something

to do with the fact that he was using socks as gloves.

That's ok though because he loves nothing more

than playing in the car.

McKay said her favorite part of snow was that it tasted like slurpies....?

Reward #2 was given after 2 weeks of staying in bed.

Nana and Papa were very kind and not only allowed

trick-or-treaters in January but also called two friends who

let us come bug them too.


Nana even dressed up and put out some Halloween decorations.

Simple Pleasures

Seth has this sweet job where they only work 34.5 hours a week. Fridays are "Family Friendly Fridays" so they only work half day. Which is awesome. It makes our weekends seem so much longer. Usually he works until noon except once every 8 weeks when he takes the late shift and works 12:30-5. So that leads me to my simple pleasures. We slept in until almost 8 and had a fairly lazy morning and then I took a shower. Before 10 am, I took a shower! And it was almost completely uninterrupted. I even shaved my legs. There was no one in there with me telling me that I was hogging all the hot water (Kimball), there was no one sitting on the bathroom floor crying because I won't let him play in the toilet (Luc) and not once did anyone come in screaming because they were positive that someone is knocking on the front door (McKay). Kimball did come in the bathroom at one point and ask me if I needed any help, but I assured her that I was fine and she left to go pester someone else. It was sweet, sweet bliss. So that got me thinking, what are my favorite simple pleasures? Not like a massage or a pedicure because while those are certainly pleasurable they cost money and anything that costs money is anything but simple in my opinion. Too much worry about where else that money could be spent. So here are three of my favorites:

1. Uninterrupted Showers. (must be more than 5 minutes long and include hot hot water and a freshly laundered towel)
2. Silence. I love hearing my children laugh and be cute but at the end of a long day, I love to just hear nothing.
3. Non-committal back rubs. Its just nice sometimes to get a back rub from my hubby and know that there are no further obligations on my part, if you know what I mean.

What are your simple (free) pleasures?

Redheaded Step-child

Luc has just the tiniest bit of hair. Just like my girls, virtually bald with just a little bit of fuzz. My girls' fuzz was blonde, almost white. Luc on the other hand looks like he may be a redhead. When he was born we kept saying "is his hair red?", wondering where that might have come from. I thought it would fade so I tried not to get too excited about it and while it may still turn blonde for now I am convinced that he is, in fact, a redhead. That conclusion has not been drawn from the growth of long red locks of hair but from his spit-fire personality. This kid has a kick. He has already smacked me a number of times and screams at the top of his lungs if the girls don't give him what he wants. He's sassy and thinks it's funny to make the girls mad. Just try to get him to sign "please" when he wants something, I dare you. You know they say that redheads are becoming extinct, that there just aren't as many of them as there used to be. I wonder if that's because their parents are shaving their heads and/or dying their hair in hopes to find some peace!!!

As a little side note, an admission if you will, I love red hair, I always wanted red hair. I have secretly coveted my college roommate's hair since the day I met her, thus all the teasing and telling her that she can't wear pink because it doesn't match with red and calling her that awful nickname.... all because of my jealousy for her beautiful stunning hair... *sigh. So in truth I wouldn't change Luc's hair just to get a calmer more docile boy but some days I sure do feel like sending him off to an orphanage for redheads!

Words for Thought

First off I love how conversations with kids are like a crazy rollercoaster and you're never sure what could come next. Sometime I'll have tell you about Uncle Seth having a "rectangle head", that's a classic. But for now I'll just post this great little converstation we had with McKay in the car the other day.

McKay: Mom what happens if we can't breathe?

Me: We die.

McKay: We die?

Me: Yep

McKay: I know someone who died.

Me: You do? Who?

McKay: President Hinckley.

Me: Oh yep, you're right, and where is President Hinckley now?

McKay: In heaven.

Me: Yep.

McKay: Mom, does President Hinckely still wear his clothes in heaven?

Me: Seth, did you hear McKay, she has a question for you.

KI YI

Just a quick shout out for my alma mater Utah Utes. A perfect 13-0 season. An amazing win against a prior No. 1 team in a BCS Bowl. And finally, No. 2 in the nation right behind former Utah head coach Urban Meyer's Florida Gators. Go Utes.

Vacuum Woes

Just a quick question. How long should a vacuum last? Oh wait and one follow-up question. Is it worth it to go get a vacuum serviced or is it's lack of suckiness just due to old age?

Details: 5 year old Bissell Bagless Upright.

Oh *^@##!

Out of the mouths of... well babes but straight from their oh so righteous parents. Last night while sitting with kids for some nice family time. Something spilled or dropped or broke or something and Seth said "What the ..." to which Kimball responded oh so innocently "crap?" It really was a question, like "is that the word you were looking for daddy?"

On a side note, I changed my background html thing-a-ma-jigger and lost all my blog friends, so leave me a comment, even just a "hey" so I can link to your blog and add it back to my list and get back to wasting my day away reading your wonderful blogs. Oh and even if I didn't have you on my list and you've never commented, I'd still love to see what you're up to. Thanks.

Happy 2009!!!

I'm thinking I should be blogging about New Year's resolutions or goals or aspirations or something to that affect. But it's just over an hour into the new year and my brain doesn't function at this hour. I'm pretty much just impressed that I'm even awake. Seth and my brother are playing some wii game where apparently it requires yelling at the other players and talking smack to other dorks who are playing their little games at this awful hour.

So instead of posting some great post about my intentions for the year I'm just going to post these cute pictures of my adorable children, who are extra adorable right now because they've been asleep for hours.

Luc sitting at the new kids' table, he thinks he's so big.

So big that he should probably just climb up on top of it because that isn't an accident waiting to happen, or should I say wasn't, since it has already ended in disaster once or twice.

All smiles on Christmas Eve, not long before this picture Kimball came to me with a very serious concern, "mom, I don't think Santa is going to bring me any presents, he knows how bad I've been." Well she was right he did know how bad she has been but he must have a forgiving heart and known of her promises to be "better", Too bad the Santa threat doesn't work all year long.