Lots of firsts for us!

This last week was the first day of school for Colten and Bethany.  Colten started kindergarten and is totally excited to be in school.  His attitude and excitement for school is completely opposite of Bethany.  She wants to go, but gets nervous about the new things that could happen in 3rd grade.  In the morning there are a lot of "what if" questions.  I have to reassure her that everything will be OK and if she has a question she can ask the teacher.  I reassure her thousands of times, it seems, and send her off to school with a nervous stomach.  I hope it doesn't last forever.  I hope she learns to go with the flow and realizes that she is a smart girl that everyone will love.  To make the nerves worse was this year she had to miss the first day of school because she had the stomach flu.  She is doing pretty good so far this year considering she missed the first day. 

Another first is the kids are riding the bus to school this year.  We know kids in the neighborhood and they are really only on the bus for about 10 minutes.  Perfect opportunity to introduce the wonderful world of bus riding.  Again, Colten thinks it is totally awesome and Bethany is still warming up to the idea.  It makes my life easier because the two kids have two different drop off and pick up areas in different buildings that are across the street from each other.  So them taking the bus gets them home earlier than if I picked them up.

Another first is Colten lost his first tooth yesterday.  He was so excited to show everyone at church.  He was eating a peach before church and it made his too loose enough to yank out.  And of course in true tooth fairy fashion, I forgot to take care of business before I went to bed so the tooth ogre (Bethany's nick name for Daddy) had to take care of everything for me.  Thanks honey!!

Another first... I went on vacation by myself!!  I had a wonderful time in AZ at the end of July.  My family had a reunion.  It was nice catching up with all of the cousins that I haven't seen in years.  I also got the spend a day with Adam's family.  It was a visit I really needed!!!  I was missing everyone like crazy.  Also, while I was in AZ I finally got to meet the nieces and nephews that I hadn't met yet.  Thanks Megan for having your baby a week early so I could meet Tatum.

Another first...Since Bethany was born I have only had one child in the house for only a few months.  The house is quiet with just Emma at home.  I babysat most of the time we lived in AZ, so there was always other children in the house.  It's not too often that you have a mother of almost 4 completely oblivious to how to entertain her only child at home.  It needs to cool off soon so we can do fun things outside before this new baby comes.

I think there have been a few other firsts, but I think that is enough for now.  So long for now.
 

Come what may!!

This last year and a half has been full of ups and downs.  Survival and living.  Excitements and disappointments.  But isn't that what life is about.  For some reason I just have not had the desire to blog.  It has seemed inconvenient, but really I didn't want to share the disappointments, the downs and the survival the consumed most of the last 18 months.  It is hard to have a husband who works nights all the time.  We are super grateful for the job, but working nights is not good for a young family...heck for anyone.  I have been absent for so long that I don't expect anyone to be reading this, but these are my thought and that doesn't even matter right now.

This month we learned that we are expecting #4.  The new addition will arrive sometime in October.  We are thrilled.  We were a little surprised.  We were starting to get used to the idea of being a 5 person family, but we know that the timing is right.  It would have been nearly impossible for me to handle a pregnancy on top of the night shift.  The kids have already been giving my somewhat normal sized belly a hug.  I am only 7 1/2 weeks so there really isn't much to hug.  Just left over flab from previous pregnancy.  In fact before the kids even knew that I was pregnant they were discussing if our next baby would be a boy or a girl.  They decided it should be boy so that Colten could have another brother.  In about 12 weeks we will find out.  It has never mattered to me, I just want the little peanut to be healthy. 

Bethany is turning 8 tomorrow.  When I realized at another Baptism that Bethany was turning eight in less than a year I could not contain myself.  So imagine how I am feeling now.  My emotions are already unstable because of the pregnancy so add that my little baby girl (who isn't so little anymore) is getting baptized.  Whew!  Who knew it would be so hard. 

In the last 1 1/2 years Emma has turned 2 and 3.  Colten has turned 4 and 5.  Bethany has turned 7 and tomorrow it will be 8.  Time flies by so fast.  It is hard to keep up with everyone growing.  Emma is potty trained and Colten can hardly wait for school to start.  He got his shots so he can start kindergarten and he asked if he could start tomorrow.  Of course he can't because it's March, but the poor guy has been waiting since October and he has to wait still another 5 months. 

To keep this post from getting to long I'm going to end, but know that we have been blessed.  Even though it has been hard it has only make us all stronger and now the sort of hard things are a piece of cake. 

Busy Family

This last month...OK maybe these last couple of months have been busy. Emma had a birthday, Adam and I had our 9th anniversary and Bethany had her birthday. You can't forget about Valentines day and St. Patrick's day. Bethany also had a birthday party with her friends. It was a lot of fun. Soon I will post pictures and more specific descriptions of what happened for these events. I PROMISE!! Our callings, being sick, volleyball games, work, exercise and sewing 2 Easter dresses has filled in the blanks. Really I will post again before 2 months from now. I have to document the Easter dresses. They are too cute to go unseen. Well that's all for now.

Colten the Walking Advertiser

Colten will tell me things that he hears on TV. Like if I use spray and wash he tells me, "Yeah mom, use that stuff because it gets the tough stains out." Today after his bath I slathered lotion all over him and he said, "If her rub it in really good mom it will get down deep." To cute if you ask me.

Our News for January

No we are not pregnant. I would tell you that over the phone. Emma did stay in Nursery the last two Sundays. My arm is grateful. The first week she had a poopy diaper and instead of the ladies bringing her to me they changed her. They knew that if they did there was no way she would go back. They are so smart. Adam is still working hard as ever. If someone wants to go to work for him so he can catch up on some sleep, I'm sure he would appreciate it. I was just called as the Primary President which creates a whole new set of challenges. I'm still working out with the same ladies from the ward. Our car lost a bolt which made the front part of the car make weird noises, but that is fixed now. Bethany is doing great in school. She is now showing that she understands what it means to get a 100% or a 10/10. She gets really excited when she does. Hey 8 or 9/10 is great, but if she misses one she feels like she has to correct it and take it back to school and have her teacher grade it again. It makes me laugh a little. Colten still makes me laugh on a daily basis. From telling me that dinner is yummy when clearly his face is saying something different, to laying in bed with a smile on his face pretending to be asleep when it is time to get up. He's pretty funny. I think that sums it up for us over here in Missouri.

Christmas 2009

We had a wonderful, unexpected white Christmas. I guess it is rare for Clinton to get snow for Christmas. Well I guess our luck is turning up since usually where ever we go, that area gets unseasonal warm weather. Not this year. We made it extra cold. The kids loved all of their gifts and I loved my gift from Adam. I have had about 6 rolls of film that has sat in our fridge for the past 5 years. They were never developed because they were forgotten about or we didn't have the money to spare on silly pictures that we couldn't even remember what they were, or if they would even turn out. What a fun surprise to look at pictures that I had completely forgotten about. Pictures of Bethany learning to crawl. Pictures of Bethany's first birthday cake that took me forever to frost. Since we had just moved into our house, the party was a birthday party/open house. It was so fun. There are pictures of my grandma that I didn't know I had. So many memories that were forgotten because of the digital age. Thank goodness for digital cameras. I don't have to spend $$ to see my pictures. I can print the ones I want. I can delete the ones that should never be seen. You know the ones I'm talking about.

December, Christmas for that matter, has come and gone and all I can do is sit back and enjoy a sigh of relief. We did it. Adam and I managed to survive the year. Every one's limbs are intact, mostly, and we have a roof over our heads. Not everyone in the world can say that.

I am so grateful that Adam graduated. He did it with not to much of my help. He had to to spend 2 months in CA (summer 2008) all my himself. It was the longest, most not so fun job interview he could every have. I can give him a hard time and say that I had the hard part of the bargain, but really, since Emma was still so small, all I pretty much did was everything I already do and watched movies with the kids when I didn't feel like doing it. How hard it that? So yes there wasn't really anything I could do to help Adam graduate. I could only be the emotional support, but even at times that didn't seem like enough.

After graduation we waited for a job. We only waited 3 months, but 3months can feel like 3 years when there is nothing you can do to make all of the ducks fall into place. Just thinking about how out of control I was makes me want to scream. All I could do was wait. I am so grateful for this job. Although it is miles away from family, we are happy. We have cars the work and food to eat. This year we have been blessed with everything we need and so much more. So at the end of 2009, all I can do is sigh and brace myself for what is to come in 2010. Whatever it is, I'm ready. Bring it on, but not all at once...PLEASE.

Thanksgiving 2009

November was filled with the normal stuff until the end. Thanksgiving was at the end of November. Duh! Well we are lucky enough to have friends that invited us over for Thanksgiving. It was fun and perfect. We cooked and ate and sat around talking, trying to not fall into a turkey induced coma. The food was delicious and I will get the stuffing and sweet potato recipe. Those were my families favorites on top of the marshmallow fruit salad. We all took a turn going out to feed the animals until it got to cold and dark. Thanksgiving is never the same with out family, but this was a close second. It's always good to feel loved by others.

The other mom and I also planned our Black Friday shopping. Living far away from shopping means you have to get up at 2:30am so you can be at the first store by 5am. By about 10:30 we could tell that we were fading fast and needed something to eat. So we stopped at TGIFridays (which I haven't had since I was pregnant with Emma, yum) and waited until they opened at 11am. I know that is a long time, but every where else was packed and we would have had to wait any ways. After that we hit 1 more store and then headed home because the food energy only lasted a short time so we need to start heading home before we were beyond sleepy. I don't think I remember much about the ride home. I know. We are crazy. But it was so much fun. 95% of Christmas was bought on Black Friday. And it is so nice to walk around the stores now and see how much I saved.

We had a great Holiday and I hope everyone else did to.