Can I whine for just a second? It's been nearly 1 year since Chad started on nights and I just want to say...."Yup I still hate the night shift".......

Ok whining all done.

NOBODY MOVE!!!!!

You might disturb the beast! 

I'm guessing I had better keep a close eye on him later today it looks as though he is in deep thought planning out his next course if destruction.  

My child that is Cooper

Wednesday evenings are a bit crazy at our house. Carsyn has piano right after school then hurry to get dinner on the table then off to scouts and young women's. Tonight was no different. After I got chad headed off to work I changed coopers diaper and got his socks on. Then I sent him to find his shoes while I went to start clearing dishes from the table. He found his shoes and was excited that he also found the socks he had worn earlier. I told him good job but he already had socks on. He of course didnt like that answer. So while I'm standing at the sink doing dishes he pushes the trash can closer to me then tips it over. Now I know you're probably laughing about this temper fit of his but just wait it gets better. Remember I'm doing dishes and the sink with the garbage disposal is full so I was using the trash can to put all of the waist. So when he tipped it over, spaghetti sauce splattered all over the back of my legs. 

The "Bean"Cake

My kids HATE beans. Any kind of beans. Green beans, kidney beans, black beans, refried beans, I could go on. So while I was talking with Corbyn about what kind I cake he wanted for his birthday this year I offered to make him a BEAN cake. He of course protested loudly. Every day leading up to his birthday he made sure to tell me he wanted chocolate cake and not bean cake. I really didn't have a certain cake in mind to decorate. I just knew it had to be chocolate. At the last min I had a thought. JELLY BEANS!! I kept insisting to Corbyn that I was making a bean cake and so I did. I think we have finally found a kind of bean they like.

So Exciting!

For the month of April we have made 3 full amount Car Payments on my car. Oh how I love dumping debt and that we actually can now. 

Summer Job

It's going to be nice to have some help mowing this year

I need a Maid

So tonight's mess was pizza sauce all over the kitchen floor, wall, fridge, pantry door, stove, dishwasher, Corbyn, Oh and the cabinet was open. But it's ok because about an hour later Corbyn dumped the jug of water on the floor so I got to mop it all up with a towel.

My child that is Cooper

Mess number 1 corn starch. Mess number 2 fish food. Mess number 3 (not pictured) broken light bulb. Welcome to my average day.

My New Wall

One of the reasons I wanted a vinyl cutter year ago was so I could cut my own vinyl for my own home. I always wanted to put a really big saying on my bedroom wall but it had to be perfect. I liked some sayings here and there but didn't really love any of them. I heard this saying last year and that was the one for sure. But for some reason I could bring myself to put it up. I think because once it was done I thought it "permanent" we'll I had the cutter out yesterday and I thought "I'm finally going to do it" and so I did. And I absolutely love it ! This is now what I see every morning when I wake up ( it's not over my bed)

Flowers from Hubby make me smile

Peek a Boo

His 1st set of Stitches

Notice how I said "1st" ? Everyone thinks that since I have 4 boys I live in the ER well the truth is we've been pretty lucky. Don't get me wrong we have definitely seen our share of blood. We've actually only had 2 things that were bad enough to think we need to go in. And both of those times have been with this child. (See Here for the other incident) Anyway We took the training wheels off his bike and he actually picked it up really fast (even better then his older broth did but shhh don't tell him I said that). the 3rd day on his own he was out ridding and he crashed I gave my typical hug and kiss then told him to get his helmet on and sent him back out. The story is that there was a car coming so he was getting to the side of the road and hit the curb and went down. Darn it. I do have some other close up pics but decided not to post them because, well, they are kind of gross. He actually is a pretty tough kid. He only cried until he got to the bathroom with me. Then was totally fine.However He did NOT like it when she started to work on him. He cried when she gave him the shot to numb it and so then he was upset through the rest of it. Chad on the other hand had to leave the building and get some air and when he finally did come back in all the nurses thought he was in need of care and were all panicked wanting him to sit down. The Dr said she could just super glue it but because of they way it was open (more of a flap then cut) she did recommend stitches because the scar would be much better So to preserve this handsome face of his he got 3 stitches. 

Happy Day.

Today is a good day. Our Family reached a milestone. We have worked hard to correct our mistakes and the light at the end of the tunnel is getting brighter. Today our Family paid off the last of our credit card debt. Chad and I have had credit card debt since we were dating. It's NOT something to be proud of. At one point in our early marriage we had 15 open credit cards all with maxed out balances. Sure it was only $500 here and $500 there. We learned  how quickly things add up but by then it was too late. over the years we would start to get really close to having one or 2 paid off but then something would happen. We knew that once Chad got promoted things would look up. And they have. 

We aren't completely out of the woods yet. My car will be the next focus. We have a plan in place and can start counting down the months. Oh what a blessing it will be when we will be able to say 

"We Are Debt Free"

A Day as a Mom of Boys

Me witnessing Cole Pick his nose then proceed to eat it I say to him 

"Cole, don't do that it's really yucky" 

He then looks at me and says with a Matter of Fact look on his face and sternness in his tone of voice 

"Mom, I do dat all duh time"

A good reminder to stop and listen sometimes.

“A man sat at a metro station in Washington DC and started to play the violin; it was a cold January morning. He played six Bach pieces for about 45 minutes. During that time, since it was rush hour, it was calculated that 1,100 people went through the station, most of them on their way to work.

Three minutes went by, and a middle aged man noticed there was musician playing. He slowed his pace, and stopped for a few seconds, and then hurried up to meet his schedule.

A minute later, the violinist received his first dollar tip: a woman threw the money in the till and without stopping, and continued to walk.

A few minutes later, someone leaned against the wall to listen to him, but the man looked at his watch and started to walk again. Clearly he was late for work.

The one who paid the most attention was a 3 year old boy. His mother tagged him along, hurried, but the kid stopped to look at the violinist. Finally, the mother pushed hard, and the child continued to walk, turning his head all the time. This action was repeated by several other children. All the parents, without exception, forced them to move on.

In the 45 minutes the musician played, only 6 people stopped and stayed for a while. About 20 gave him money, but continued to walk their normal pace. He collected $32. When he finished playing and silence took over, no one noticed it. No one applauded, nor was there any recognition.

No one knew this, but the violinist was Joshua Bell, one of the most talented musicians in the world. He had just played one of the most intricate pieces ever written, on a violin worth $3.5 million dollars.

Two days before his playing in the subway, Joshua Bell sold out at a theater in Boston where the seats averaged $100.

This is a real story. Joshua Bell playing incognito in the metro station was organized by the Washington Post as part of a social experiment about perception, taste, and priorities of people.

The outlines were: in a commonplace environment at an inappropriate hour: Do we perceive beauty? Do we stop to appreciate it? Do we recognize the talent in an unexpected context?

One of the possible conclusions from this experience could be: If we do not have a moment to stop and listen to one of the best musicians in the world playing the best music ever written, how many other things are we missing?”

Lets start the year with a blog post.

I don't have much to say today. Things around here have just been chugging along. We had a good Christmas. Chad has been working hard (Love that man) The boys are growing like weeds. And I've just been cleaning house. Isn't that how every family works? I do have a couple of big projects in mind to do in the next few months that involve cleaning scrubbing de-cluttering and crafting. I didn't set any "New Years Resolutions" I think those are just silly. I think every one should always have goals in the back of their mind to better themselves. So I will always be working toward those. But I am looking forward to this coming year. It will be a good one for our family.

Hubby Said it Best

He took the words right out of my mouth. Ok well maybe not but he sure does make a good point. 

Click Here to see what Hubby had to say about the new year.

Have you checked out my Creations Blog lately?

Happy to be Me

As I sit down to write this post I have mixed feelings. I seriously thought about deleting my blog and Face book all together. I didn't post on either one for nearly 4 months. Yes I did that on purpose. I have my own reasons that I won't go into. But over the last few weeks I have been thinking about lots of different things. I've decided that I cannot let the bad define me. I am who I am. I have a hand full of people who genuinely care about me, and I'm not talking about the "oh yah I know her" type people. It is the people who care about me, who lift me up when I'm down, who love me despite of my short falls, who give me guidance when I need to vent, and enjoys a good afternoon lunch with no kids =). These people know who they are and I love them all so much and I only pray I can be there for them as much as they are for me.

Today I'm breaking my silence and going to stop being a hermit for a little bit because I have so much to share. Last Sat was one of the best days I could ever imagine. It started at 7am when I got up and was getting showered. Chad called to inform me that he had done it. After Years of frustration, tears, stress, moving, patience, being tore down, interview after interview, Chad has finally been promoted!! We are so excited for this new opportunity. Although He will still be working the night shift it hasn't been as hard as it was years ago. So we will take it =)
As the day progressed it just got better from there. at 8am I went down to pick up our tickets and my parking pass to be able to take the Young Women of our ward (you probably didn't know but I"m the Beehive advisor now) to the cultural celebration that we put on for President Thomas S. Monson. You see Our Temple has been under renovation for over a year and it was being rededicated this weekend. So Sat night I got to sit in an arena with 9,000+ youth in the presence of our Prophet. And to make the day even sweeter I got to have lunch with one of those amazing people I mentioned earlier.
Words can't express the feelings of happiness I had that day.

Although this next item happened a few months ago it was a huge decision and we made it with heavy hearts, lots of prayers and tears, and weighing good and bad. We had been talking about it for months (see post HERE )In the beginning of the year we took Carsyn to take the ISAT just to see how we were doing with is homeschooling. Well he scored awesome! Then towards the end of the summer he came to us and asked to be able to attend Public school. He needed a change. I also needed a change. The contention in our home was off the charts. I felt that Corbyn was being left behind because of our focus on keeping Carsyn caught up. So after months of contemplating, we decided we would enroll him ONLY if they would let him be in 5th grade. We were told they probably would give us a hard time about that because he was only supposed to be going to 4th. We were also told by people that someone they knew was aloud to skip a grade but really struggled and advised us not to. Well for one he wasn't "skipping" 4th we had just done it already. Well when we went down to enroll him we put down 5th and nobody questioned it. We took it as one of the signs we were doing the right thing. Later on We had his IQ tested and he is a smart little turkey. In 1 section of the test he scored in the 99th percentile. So with that he was accepted into the GATE (Gifted and Talented) program. Carsyn loves school so much and is having a great time. He just finished up his first trimester with straight A's
As for me it is a love-hate situation. I just always pictured myself as one of those amazing Mom's who home-school 10 kids and they were all musically talented and perfect. For for me to admit defeat and face the facts that I am not going to be able to do that, was really hard to do. But I learned that it's not about "Me" and "My Needs" it was about Carsyn and his educational needs. I was no longer able to provide what he needed. My homeschooling will continue with the other children until the day comes when we feel they need something more.

On Oct 22nd I made a commitment to get healthier and lose some of the extra baggage I have accumulated. So far I have lost 8lbs. my ultimate goal is 20 so we're getting closer. Once I've lost  20lbs I will look into losing another 10 but right now 20 is my goal.

Anyway this post is getting long so I will wrap it up by saying I'm so grateful for my Heavenly Father and the  love that he has for me. I'm so grateful for my Husband and my boys they are all so awesome and I couldn't ask for more.

Too Much Reading?

So today we took Carsyn in for his yearly eye exam. His eyes are terrible. The Dr. asked if he read a lot Ummmm yeah he reads at LEAST 2 hours a day. Well the problem is that his eyes aren't getting enough "exercise" looking far distances (He is near sighted) So the Dr said he really needs to set time limits in his reading to take a pause and focus on something far away. He was NOT a happy camper. He started to cry in the office at the thought that he wasn't going to be able to read more then 15 min at a time. Luckily his reading breaks only have to be about a min or so.

We just got a chuckle because we didn't know anybody could ever read "Too Much"