Cute Story

A few weeks ago I didn't sleep well, imagine that being pregnant not sleeping well.  When my daughter woke up she said she had a bad night, I said me too.  She said she didn't like her sleep.  I said oh no.  She said bad guys chased me all night.  I felt so bad, but thought it was cute she could tell me her dreams.

Well today on the way to dropping off the kindergarten, she said, I had a dream with Daddy and J.  Oh really? Yes, it was fun, daddy came and got us.  Oh really.  Yes, and then he chased us it was fun.  The whole time she was smiling so big thinking about all the fun she had with her daddy in her dream.  (Obviously she was talking about chasing as in playing, not bad guys this time.) I just thought it was so sweet she had a dream about having fun with her daddy while he was out of town.

Cold or Flu

I got sick this week, it was an awesome week to get sick because my husband was out of town for five days.  I caught it from my son so I knew exactly what to expect and how long it would last. Four days total, sore throat, and very tired and lethargic. When I woke up Monday morning with a sore throat, I knew exactly what as happening, I wasn't too thrilled. But then by Monday night, I felt so tired and achy. I had been feeling achy for over a day, but didn't realize it was from the virus, I thought it was because I was pregnant. I struggled sleeping my body was so achy.  Looking back I'm pretty sure we got a flu, but not a stomach flu.  I did have a runny nose, but I wasn't congested at all, or stuffed up.  Just a sore throat, headache, achy body, and extremely lethargic.  Sounds like the flu to me, but that is just because I don't get achy when I have a cold.
But a temperatures necessary for the flu?
But then after the flu past, I got a head cold, minus the cough.  All normal with whatever is going around.  But seriously not a fair illness both symptoms.
Who cares the point is, I was sick while my husband was out of town, it sucked!
But I'm a rock star, because I cooked my children dinner every night. Plus in case you forgot, I'm pregnant, so I'm a double rock star.
It actually wasn't a bad deal though, I didn't have time to miss my husband as a friend, I only had time to miss him as a caretaker.  I just wanted some to take care of my kids, not spend time to me.  So the week actually passed quickly since I didn't feel good enough to miss my husband's company.  (Except for the last two days.)  Plus hopefully now he won't catch.  The other positive is when I don't feel good and I'm sleeping poorly, I'm always worried to bother his sleep while sharing a bed with him, but I didn't have to worry about that this time.  The funny thing is I'm only worried about his sleep when I'm not sleeping well, when they kids aren't sleeping well, I have no problem with them bothering his sleep.

Vacation #2

I should be cleaning my bathroom, but bathrooms will always get dirty again, no time like the present to blog about a vacation that happened a month ago.  Apparently the volcano was not enough fun, so we went on another vacation five days after the last.  This time we went to Kansas City to meet my brother's family.  It was you know eight hours out of the way, but Alisa no longer spends her summers in Park City, and I no longer live in Salt Lake, so I was willing to go the eight hours.  Plus my husband was game!

 We saw all the LDS Church History Sites in Western Missouri but a few guys graves.  I don't know if that is true, but all of them on the map but the graves.  Oddly enough Haun's Mill spoke to me, even though there is absolutely nothing there, except for a little sign.  Really NOTHING, not even a paved road, or a latrine. But David learned an important lesson, one that Jackson learned years ago, just because Uncle Brent is crazy enough to do something, does not mean you should or get to follow. Well I guess the lesson is slightly different, Jackson knows Uncle Brent is crazy, while David was confused on why he wasn't allowed to follow crazy Uncle Brent down into the muddy riverbank. And here is why, Uncle Brent owns his car, if he fell in, life would go on and he wouldn't cry or stress out his mother with his wet clothes.

 Then we drove to a town who had moved a stone from Haun's Mill and built a memorial in their city park.  Turns out I didn't rotate the picture so good luck reading it.  But maybe this is the reason I liked Haun's Mill, I appreciate this memorial a lot.  You can tell it was written by someone who doesn't attend the same church as me, but it was so respectful.

 We were gone for Easter weekend, and so before we left we had had a months worth of Family Home Evenings, trying to teach my three year old about the real meaning of Easter.  Each one turned J in a master scholar, but I still wasn't getting basic enough for my three year.  The Monday before I finally got it, and it totally clicked with her.  So then we when we said we were going to see Mary, she said and Jesus!  I tried to explain that Jesus would not be there, because we were seeing Mary our cousin, not Mary in the picture with Jesus, but she was confused, and convinced Jesus would be there.
But then guess what we found, Jesus! sort of, this is as close as we got to seeing him.

 We also went to the National World War I Museum.  This was my favorite picture, just imagine there are four cute faces looking at us.  The museum was of course haunting, World War I was scary stuff, its just the american education system seems to be so obsessed with Rwanda and World War II we never make it back to the Great War.

 The last but not least we saw the Kansas City Temple Open House.  It was lovely, and so different then the HUGE open houses we went to in Utah.  I makes me excited for Fort Collins Temple Open House, who is meeting us there!?!?!?

 Ahh, goofy fashion and pregnancy.  I swear half sweaters are fashionable, despite what my husband says. This sweater is practically new from Anthropologie.

Alisa's blog has a lot more pictures and info about the vacation if you are intrested.
Here
here
and here

I'm just proud I mentioned it on my blog, too many pictures and uploading on my blog overwhelms me.  I never really been able to handle more than five.

Vacation #1

Back in March we had spring break, we had all sorts of plans, but they were all fizzling to nothing.  But I married a good man, so on Monday night my husband said why don't we just drive to Texas.  So we did!

Saturday morning we left bright and early.  The trip went very slow in the beginning, our GPS, was two hours off, and we couldn't see the car clock, because of drinks (thank you Subaru), but the end was super fast, all of sudden it wasn't 4:30 it was 6:30! The other benefit is we only ate two fast food meals, instead of three since our clock was off.  One of the reasons we moved was so we could drive to both grandma's houses.  If I was a good mommy blogger I would have posted all sorts of fun pictures of everything Grammy did with the kids so they could have a super awesome spring break.  Instead, I won't, remember we talked about this in January I don't want to be a super awesome mommy blogger.  But I will tell you what we did, my husband took the kids kayaked in pool,

My daughter sneaked out to the pool and almost gave her daddy a heart attack, my husband telecommuted from Texas, grandpa made smores with the kids (like the blurriness, the menfolk thought me taking my children away from the fire was more important the pictures for posterity),

 j and grandpa walked to get donuts, grammy drove us to get donuts, grammy took us to the zoo (for me),

 and to the aquarium (for J) and to the butterfly museum.

  I saw the chiropractor (what you don't visit the chiropractor on vacation?!), Brent and I went to the temple, my mom and I sewed, I took naps, we saw big metal cows (ok that is a horse and COWboy),

grammy made cookies with the kids, grandpa frosted the cookies with the kids.  Yes, a good time was had by all, and encase it wasn't we stopped by a volcano in the middle of no where on the way home that hasn't been active in about 6 million years (yes, I made those numbers up, but it sounds about like it.)

It is Capulin Volcano National Monument. My children usually participate in the Junior Ranger program, and get a nice gold plastic badge.  Well I just happened to ask the 6 year old if he liked hiking to the top, and because of that they got an extra patch!  Who would have thought, an mile and half walk constituted an extra patch!  Pretty lame if you ask me.  Americans you are lazy!  I don't get driving 6 hours out of the way from anywhere, to drive up look out on a scenic view then getting back in your car.  What?  Oh well, it means the trails are less busy for people like me. I guess all you who only drive in National Parks do pay your fees, and so it provides money to keep the parts I walk through kept up, so keep on driving and stopped, and turning back around.

Number 3

I'm pretty sure my children are super adorable, and I can't figure out why they don't want to spend more of their day hugging me.  But I keep wondering what will number 3 look like?
Like #1?
Like #2?
Or like some other strange hybrid of my husband and my's genetic code.
I know my son is secretly wishing his baby brother looks like him.
My son has a lot of both of his parents, while my daughter seems to look a lot like my side, but I've found plenty of physical traits from her father.  Its anyone guess how the dna forms.
My only clue is the ultrasound technician told me the baby has a big brain.  (Not in a birth defect, too large way.)  So I assume that means he'll have a nice perfectly round head like his brother and father, none of this teeny narrow head like us girls.
Ahh, waiting...

Clicked

I was talking with a friend today, and I said something about or something to the effect, about when my daughter hit two feeling like my biological clock was ticking, but every time I prayed about it getting the answer no.  Actually it actually start when she was like less than a year old and my husband told me I was crazy and I still prayed about it anyway, and luckily the Lord told me no, because I then ended up with health problems for a few months, and a crazy unexpected bout of depression neither I or my husband saw until way late in the game.  Yes, I was grateful for those nos, but what about the nos when she was two and my health was in order, or the nos after she was three, or the nos after we bought our house.  I didn't feel lucky for most of them, I often wonder what was wrong with me, that the Lord would tell me not to have another baby.  All those years, I would ask should I have another baby, because EVERYONE was having another baby, I thought its because I was doing something wrong, or He didn't trust me.  But at the park today, all of sudden my mouth said, I now realized it wasn't that the Lord didn't trust me, it was that He loved me.
I had never thought that before, but when I said it, I knew it was a 100% true.

P.S. By the way I do realized three years of asking for a baby isn't actually a long time for some.

FHE this week

Out on the web, there is website after blog about all these family home evening ideas. They give you lessons, diagrams, handouts, coloring pages, and even desserts that fit the theme of the lesson.  Yeah those don't work so well for us.  But last week I got this ingenious plan, at least for my family.  I was finishing up last October's conference edition, yes I'm behind. I got to President Monson's closing remarks.  The last column of it had all these great things that President Monson hopes for us, our families and homes.  I wanted to share it with my kids, but I also wanted them to understand it.  This is the part I focused on:

May we show increased kindness one toward another. May we ever be found doing the work of the Lord.
May heaven’s blessings be with you. May your homes be filled with harmony and love. May you constantly nourish your testimonies, that they might be a protection for you against the adversary.
As your humble servant, I desire with all my heart to do God’s will and to serve Him and to serve you.
I love you; I pray for you. I would ask once again that you would remember me and all the General Authorities in your prayers. We are one with you in moving forward this marvelous work. ... May God give us the strength and the ability and the determination to play our part well.

Then we drew pictures for each of the blessings.  We used scratch paper, and markers, the kids totally got into the pictures, and stayed focus for at least twice as long as normal.  We all had fun, it was so easy, and they were able to internalize what the Prophet said.

For dessert, it didn't tie in with the theme at all.  They asked for cool whip and ice cream cones, I have no idea, I didn't eat it, but they are 6 and 3.