The Swing

My sweet little Macy, I fell in love with you the first second I saw you. Your beautiful blue eyes and squishy little cheeks just melt my heart. I know you feel the same about me. How do I know this you might ask...

You hate your boppy swing, you hate your car seat, you hate your stroller, and you hate your bouncy chair.

But you love to be in my arms..or on my boob. Mostly the second one.

For the most part that's OK, I love holding you in my arms, I don't so much love the second one, but that's OK too.

The problem with this lies in me going anywhere without you...IMPOSSIBLE. And it's really pretty daunting to go anywhere with you.

Every week we take a trip to the grocery store.

I feed you, I change you, and I burp you, at least three times to insure our trip runs smoothly. We set out in the car where you usually cry but eventually give in and fall asleep. "Ahh" I sigh, a peaceful trip with no toddlers grabbing everything in sight...or knocking over giant toilet paper towers.

At the store I always start at the back and work my way to the front to move things along as quickly as possible. However, about the time I reach for a gallon of milk I start to hear stirrings from underneath the blanket and inevitably an "oh crap" escapes my lips. I quickly push the cart along hoping the movement will put you back to sleep, but by the time I am reaching for a carton of eggs you are beside yourself in a fit of rage. Why? I don't know. Someday please explain.

So, I scoop you up and with another sigh I set off on another adventure of holding a crying baby in one arm and pushing the cart with the other. This works out fairly well until we reach the frozen food isles. By this time the cart is really full and really heavy and although I've been working out I just don't have any arm strength which makes this task very difficult.

If I was your aunt Kory who has guns of steel and can bench press 110 pounds maybe it wouldn't

be so hard. (see picture below.)

(She's not even flexing!)

So, I have been asking myself over and over "will I ever have time to myself? will I ever be able to leave you with your Dad?"

Enter THE SWING

This wonderful mechanical devise came into our lives just a few short days ago, but we already have a bond so strong that I would cry if it ever left us. Because..

You sat in it, you smiled in it, you loved the way it rocked from side to side, you loved the soft ocean sounds and colorful fish, and you even FELL ASLEEP in it!!

And now, I will be going out tonight with Aunt Kory to eat some yummy food and to shop for things that I wish I could have but don't have the money for, without worrying if you are screaming bloody murder because you are tired but don't have mom to put you to sleep. (and by that of course I mean my boob) Love, Mom

To my beloved swing. I promise to love and cherish you always. I promise to change your outrageously expensive D batteries with impressive swiftness. And I promise to never let James sit in you, because I know he will try.

Loving the warm weather

Spring has been teasing us the last couple of weeks. We have 70 degrees one day and then it snows the next. The last few days have been beautiful though and the kids are loving it.

Days like this make me excited to work on my flower beds. I attempted it last year but as this is the first home we have ever owned it was also my first attempt at any type of gardening.

I have decided though that I'm not going to dwell on any of my failures from last year, just look forward to a new start.

...And since I am starting over I was thinking of doing a container garden instead of in the ground. Our soil out here is terrible. I don't know much about either type of gardening so I'm wondering if anyone has any words of wisdom for a beginner. Is there a down side to container planting or is it just visual preference?

A great laugh for all you moms

I received a Victorias Secret catalog in the mail today and came across this while I was flipping through it. I seriously doubt anything other than surgery can help me now, but it did give me a good laugh.

For eye-popping, extreme cleavage and a smooth, dangerously voluptuous bust. The warm, tingly sensation lets you know it's working while the fast-absorbing, creamy formula delivers intense moisture for wow-worthy, visibly sexy results

A really Awsome weekend

I'm a whole week behind in putting up this post, but I just couldn't not share our fun weekend!


We had a bunch of family come in to town on thursday and of course the girls can't get together without doing hair so... Friday night we kicked off the fun in my beauty shop...I mean tiny kitchen. This is my adorable sister-in-law Natalie getting some serious root action taken care of!

Of course there was plenty of video game playing Saturday afternoon. (This photo courtesy of Samm.)

Saturday night we had a big suprise party for Josh who turned The big 30! The best part was that he was genuinely suprised. We went out to eat the night before because it was his actual birthday and he was a little upset that I didn't make a big deal out of such a big day. Ha Ha! Ps.Thank You everyone for helping me with the party and bringing all the yummy food.

And another big thank you to Joni for this amazing cake. It tasted as good as it looked!

And The really really great part about this weekend was having so much of my family here on Sunday when we blessed our sweet baby girl.

(L to R) Brother-in-law Chris, Josh, Brother Keith, Dad, Brother-in-law Corey, and Father-in-law Linne.

The dress that Macy wore is 50 years old! My Mom wore it as a baby when she was cristened, my sisters and I all wore it when we were blessed, and Samm also wore it for her blessing. Josh absolutely hates the bonnet, but I think it is kind of cute so she wore it for some pictures.

And no family get together would be complete without my Dad making his famous omlettes. SO YUMMY!
I feel so incredibly blessed to have such an amazing family. I loved having them all here and was sad that the weekend passed so quickly.

Embarasing Mom moment

Well it was bound to happen...I was in a hurry this morning and didn't have time to pump

before I dropped Samm off at school and hit the gym, so I just left my friend with some

formula for Macy when she got hungry. About an hour into my workout I was sitting at the

bench press machine when the manager walked by with a funny look on his face. That is

when the Oh No hit me and I looked down to find a nice big wet spot on the front of my shirt!

Fortunately I had a jacket with me, so I hurried to the dressing room to slip it on and quickly

finished the rest of my workout.

Valentine Dance

Samm loves her dance class and gets really excited any time they have an in class performance. The memory card on our camera isn't very big so we couldn't get the whole thing, but here is a little piece of our future ballerina!

Fun with the kids

I was just cleaning the house yesterday when I started thinking about how my

conversation was going to go with Samm when I picked her up from school.

Samm: Where are we going Mom?
Mom: Were going home.
Samm: What are we going to do at home?
Mom: Nothing honey, just play.
Samm: Aww Man!

For Some reason Samm has this idea that we should do something really exciting

everyday. Unfortunately for her though she has a very unexciting Mom. The

McDonalds play place is about as creative as I get. So....I decided I would plan

something fun for us to do that way when she asked what we were doing that day I

wouldn't get the aww man. Then for some reason I suddenly thought about popcorn

balls. I don't have any specific memory of making them as a kid, but I'm pretty sure

we did a few times, because my mom gave me the recipe for them. The kids had a fun

time making them and they were really easy and very tasty. My recipe is a little vague,

but I thought I would share it anyway in case anyone wanted to try it out.

1/4 C water
1 C corn syrup
1 C sugar
1 small package of Jello

Mix all together and boil for 3 minutes. Pour over popcorn and form into balls. (you'll
want butter on your hands for that.)

The part that it doesn't specify is how much popcorn. We have an air popper so I just

used one big scoop of kernals. I've never made it with microwave popcorn so you'll

probably just have to experiment. I'm guessing it would be at least two bags.

Daddy Daughter Dance

The Stake puts on a Daddy Daughter dance every year for Dad's and Daughters of all ages. This was the first year that Josh and Samm went. Don't they look so cute!

Josh stopped by a florist shop on his way home and got Samm a corsage. So adorable!

Samm was sooo excited about the dance that she talked about it everyday for two weeks before it happened. Hmm...I wonder where she gets that from?!?

I have the blahs

So does anyone else ever feel like they are just stuck in a rut? I really don't feel like I have the

baby blues...honest I don't...just the blahs. I'm dying to wear my regular clothes again...ok so

just a pair of pants with a zipper instead of elastic would be great. I'm tired of sitting at home all

day because the thought of going anywhere with three kids is terrifying. I want to fix my hair

and put on makeup...but whats the point if I'm not going anywhere? So I'm doing the only thing I

can right now and I'm dying my hair. Nothing drastic just getting rid of the blonde bangs. I

suddenly thought they looked trashy. Normally when I start feeling like this I go shopping. For

some reason spending money always makes me feel better. However, I thought maybe I should

be more practical this time. So I'm just wondering what you all do when you start feeling a little

bit blah?

My beautiful Kids

My Mom took this picture while she was here and just sent it to me. I was laughing when I saw it because it totally looks like I bribed them with ice cream to smile.