"As is" tag

So Deirdra tagged me with "As is" tag. And for the record, I am not the cleanest person you know, you've seen how bad my house is. (not sure how the it all got out of order, I was copying and pasting. I'm too lazy to try to figure it out tonight.) Here are my pictures:


#8 my dream vacation-I am really missing Maine right now. They are having the annual Lobster Festival right now and I wish I were there to enjoy it. I also miss the wild blueberries that grow only in Maine, they are being picked this week. I would love to go back for a visit to see my friends, go to the beaches again, smell the ocean and oh yeah, eat a #40 at the Camden Deli- a roast beef with boursin on a baguette. Maybe one day......


#9 my closet- at least my half of it. I have to admit that before I took this picture I was hanging up the 7 loads of laundry that I had just folded. Somehow I never have enough hangers, so I had to rearrange a little and in the process, somehow the closet got organized, oops. Not that it was a disaster before or anything, just a pile of folded clothes with no hangers to call home.


#10- a picture of me-courtesy of Janae, thanks honey. What an ugly face with ugly cabinets in the background!
#1 my kitchen sink- At any given time you will find clean dishes in the left sink. I always wash the things that I don't put in the dishwasher when I do the dishes, but never put them away right away. They usually get put away the next afternoon when I start making dinner.


#2 my toilet- You don't really need to see the inside, do you? It probably has an orangish-pinkish ring at the water level. I rarely use this toilet, so I can't say for sure. Don't look too close at the floor, it needs to be swept.

#3 my laundry/mud room- Yes, that is a basket of towels that need folding, another load is in the dryer. I am horrible at folding clothes, towels especially. I have a really good excuse this time though. We just got back from camping and I have already washed, folded and even put away 7 loads. These will wait until I get around to them or we will just pick the towels out one at a time as we need them, until the basket is empty and then start over with a new load. I got the new washer last November and am still hoping that the old dryer will kick the bucket soon so I can get the new one to match.

#4 my fridge- Not much exciting here, except maybe the three 1 gallon containers of ice cream. I had a girls night at my house recently and in the process of spreading the word, one girl told her whole ward they were invited. How do you plan for that?? Needless to say, I bought too much. I try to keep the freezer organized so I know what I have, but after buying the food for camping and all that ice cream, if the stuff was in the freezer, it was good enough for me. One of these days I will take everything out and start over. And yes Deirdra, that is a container of your freezer jam on the top shelf, the last one. Hurry back so you can make us more.

#5 my girls- eating lunch. I have to have them sit across from each other or the fighting is ridiculous. They can't seem to keep their hands off each other. But they are cute!

#6 my favorite shoes- at the moment. I live in flip-flops all summer, no wonder my heels look horrible! I am getting a pedicure this weekend though, the girls and I are going for girls time while we are in Utah- can't wait. I need to find another pair, the material is starting to fray up at the toes and on the heels. Too bad Land's End no longer makes them :(

#7 my favorite room-family room downstairs. It is still clean at from when a few weeks ago when I had girls night here, well mostly clean. Janae was supposed to put the bag of groceries in the food storage room, but never made it apparently. There is always a blanket left in a pile on at least one of the couches, no need to fold when I will use it again. The girls watch tv in our room, unless it is a movie, so the family room is pretty much my room that no one else uses.

the other end of the family room. Notice how the toys are picked up in the picture? After snapping the photo, it is no longer straight. The girls dragged out a ton of toys in case Lincoln wanted to play and then threw it all down in the middle of the floor when I made them pick up. I feel like I am doing good if the toys get picked up at least once every couple of months. Is that lazy or what?!?

I tag any one who has the guts to show me what your house looks like with no prepping. I dare you, double dog dare you!!

Ouch!

So I said in my last post that the bugs were horrible when we were camping. There were swarms of mosquitoes, flies, wasps, etc. We kept the girls sprayed to minimize the bites they got, although from looking at them you couldn't tell. The bugs were even biting through clothes. On Saturday night around the fire, I noticed that Addyson's eye looked a little red, but didn't think much of it. When we got up on Sunday morning, this is what her eye looked like. It seemed to get worse after we got home, so I called first thing Monday morning to get her into the doctor. I was more than a little concerned when the receptionist asked how soon I could get there. We rushed over and come to find out, it is only a mosquito bite. Isn't that how it always turn out? You rush them to the doctor, it's nothing; but if you wait, it turns into a double ear infection on top of bronchitis on top of strep throat. Who knew! Thank goodness it is just a bite and nothing more.

Camping at LaBarge Creek

We went camping with most of Scott's family last week and weekend-a 5 day camp trip. Scott found out that we could rent Forest Service cabins for cheap and thought that it would be great to do just that. When we got to the cabin, I was ready to turn around and come back home. On the outside, it was a lot smaller than I had imagined. When we went it, holy cow!! It stunk something fierce, had about a billion flies swarming around and it was filthy. I took one look and told Scott that we were sleeping in the tent. The only thing that kept me there was the fact that the bathroom was clean and working. We had been told just the day before that the shower didn't work, the toilet may not be working and that there was no hot water in the cabin. HELLO! Those were the reasons I agreed to go to begin with. Janae held her nose and screeched when the bugs came near her, which was about every 1/2 second or so. After getting out the rubber gloves, air freshener and Clorox wipes, the place was passable. It was nice to have a bathroom where with a flush toilet and a shower, I have to admit.

Addyson is our little bug lover. Here she is holding a handful of worms that she insisted on carrying around for along time. She didn't put them down until she had squeezed every drop of life out of them and then only when we insisted. The cabin had the creek running almost all the way around it, which meant lots of mosquitoes. The girls had a great time playing in the water "cleaning" their feet. They worn flips flops almost the whole time, imagine what their feet looked like! Before bed at night, we took them in the cabin and gave them the scrub down and then threw them in the shower in the morning.

I always do the cooking when we go as a family, I am a little bit of a control freak. But that way, I know what we are eating and if the girls will eat dinner each night or not. Janae helped me decide on some of the desserts, she chose her favorites. We made an upside down chocolate with raspberry topping cake one night, yummy! The last night, we attempted a cheesecake. It actually turned out pretty good. Janae was a great help with measuring and mixing. Thanks, Coley.

The day before we left, the library had a fairy day where the girls made fairies and/or fairy houses. We went and were able to bring home some of the supplies to make fairies with grandma. Then the girls made fairy houses around the cabin. Janae's is the bowl of water. She thought the fairies might want to take a swim, so she left a swimming pool for them. Addyson made one with plastic knives as supports and a cup of water as a pond in case the fairies didn't want to fly all the way to Janae's pool. They both were a little disappointed when we picked up the knives, cups and bowls when we left. They didn't get that the next people might see it as garbage instead of fairy houses.

One morning, all the boys decided to do some target practice. Never fear, the girls were not about to be left out. Scott had them take turns shooting a pistol, but not before teaching them gun safety. It was a little nerve-racking to watch my 4 and 6 year old shooting a gun, but they seemed to enjoy it.

All in all, it was an okay weekend. It was great to try a cabin, once. I don't think I am in a hurry to rent another one any time soon.

YIKES!!

So this is what Addyson looks like when she chooses not to take a nap but play with her hair instead. Yikes! (But she is still so dang cute!) I have been trying to get her to stop playing with her hair for about 3 1/2 years, about the time she started. It used to be cute to see suck her tongue and play with a chunk of hair, used to be being the key words. I tell her no less than 50 times a day, "Addyson, stop playing with your hair!!" Apparently I am not getting through to her. Lots of times, I know she is playing without even seeing her, her tongue sucking gives her away every time. She can't figure out how I know every time. I have begged, pleaded, bribed and yes, even threatened her, but to no avail. Recently I told her that if she didn't stop, I was going to have Kada cut it like Scott's. She doesn't really care. So if anyone has any ideas, short of shaving the kid bald, please feel free to share.

Sleepover

Janae and Meghan have been planning a sleepover since school got out. I finally let them have one one Thursday night. We were at Brock's house until about 9:00, so when we got home it was time for bed. After a very long time getting into pj's, having a snack, brushing teeth, etc... they finally made it downstairs to sleep. They all thought it would be fun to sleep on the floor in their sleeping bags. Great idea! I think the last time I heard giggling was about 11:30. I threatened several times that they would end up in separate beds if they weren't quiet, but Scott informed me that they were supposed to stay up late and laugh all night at a sleepover. I guess I am just mean! I am the one who had to deal with tired, whiny kids the next day.

Soccer!

Addyson started playing soccer last week. This is her very first time playing. She has been waiting for a long time to play, something like 2 years. She was pumped to go until it was actually time to go and then she wasn't sure she wanted to. I explained that when you start something, like soccer, that you have to finish it, even if you don't want to do it any more. She was unsure of it while practice was happening, but later that night she told Scott that it was a lot more fun than she thought it was going to be. Her first game is Monday night, if anyone wants to come. I'm not sure how the game will be, her team plays Carson's team. It will be interesting to see how the two of them work it out on the field :) What a cute goalie!

Tag, you're it!

I was tagged by Raquel and I have to tell you that this made me think:

3 Joys...

my girls (most of the time)
warm weather
Scott

3 Fears...

something happening to Janae or Addyson
dying young, before I meet my grandkids
losing Scott

3 Goals...

lose weight
lose weight
get out of debt

3 Obsessions...

my girls eating balanced meals
a clean, organized house (I wish)
pepsi

3 People I Tag...

Deirdra
Kristin
Christine

Lillies!!

For any of you who know me well, you know that I am not a gardener. For that reason, I plant only bulbs that multiply. I spent a long time last summer going through mail order bulb magazines looking for just the right bulbs for the empty flower beds. Why are they empty you ask? Because the lady who lived here before had nasty, gawdy things planted and I took out almost everything she had planted. You may be wondering why some one who has no clue about flowers would do that and I would tell you that they were awful and the bare dirt looked better in my opinion. Just mine, not Scott's. So I finally decided what to get and ordered them. I planted them all in the fall and have been anxiously awaiting the blooms. Out of the 200 or so bulbs I planted, only these orange lillies came up. If any of them were going to bloom, I'm glad it was these. I had to laugh the other day as I was sending an email to the companies I ordered from. They have a lifetime guarantee on all their bulbs. I realized that one of the collections I ordered was called the "Foolproof perennial garden". So since they didn't bloom, who's the fool, me or them?

Century Park

Over in Rock Springs, there is an outdoor pool and water slide that the girls love. We invited a bunch of people to join us on Friday and we pleased to see so many of them show up. It is our favorite park to go to. There is another water slide, but it is much shorter and usually more crowded. Addyson loves the long slide because of how fast she can go down it. Janae usually prefers to stay in the pool swimming. The picture of Addyson looks out of the place, but I have a good reason for putting it in the group. This is what a four year old looks like after getting up at 6:30 in the morning, being in the sun all day, not getting a nap and then staying up late. She was so exhausted!

Splash park and Lincoln

On Thursday we decided to head out to the splash park for some wet fun in the sun. Janae asked if she could invite the boy across the street. I assumed, and we all know what assuming does, that he was outside. Later I found out that she'd gone over and pounded on the door to ask him. Hopefully no one was still sleeping! So we packed a lunch and headed out. Even though the water is recycled, it is still freezing, brrrr. The girls prefer to spend most of the time at the playground and not in the water, not that I can blame them. Lincoln and his mom met us there and we brought Lincoln home with us while she went to work. I've been watching him for a while now and he is a really good baby. The girls love when he is here and fight over who gets to hold him. I let them both have a turn feeding him. As you can tell from their faces, they are delighted to get to do it.

Swimming lessons

The girls have already done 2 sessions of swim lessons this summer. It's a good thing they both like the water so much, they've been in it enough to be fish! Janae did really well in her class. She was the youngest student but did a great job keeping up. She improved her strokes, which helped to make her faster in the water. She also learned to dive, both kneeling and standing.

Addyson also did a great job. She is taking after her sister and swims like a fish. She is practicing her front and back crawl and getting better every day. She is not at all afraid of getting her face wet, unlike some of the other kids in her class.

She has no fear anymore of jumping off the diving board. Recently we were swimming as a family and we finally talked her into jumping just once. Since then, if we go to the rec center as a family, we spend our time hanging out in the deep end, watching the girls jump of the board. Addyson wanted to trick her teachers by making them think she was scared to jump and then running off the end. Boy, I'm sure they were surprised!! Janae likes to hang out in the deep end too, seeing how long she can stay under for.

Happy Birthday Skyler

Today Skyler turns 22. Wow, he is getting old! I remember when he was born. I was 10 and he was better than a doll to me, he cried and pooped his diaper for real. Way better than any doll! It's hard to believe that he is grown up and in the Army now. I don't say it often, but I am proud of the choice he made to join the military and defend my freedoms. Happy Birthday brother!

Fourth of July

We had plans today to get started on some projects around the house. We spent a lot of money last night at home depot buying a wooden swingset for the girls and landscaping bricks to make a raised flower bed. The morning started out slow, like usual. Our plans changed when Marcia called to ask if we wanted to go fishing with them. Fishing or work? Not a tough choice for either Scott or I. So we packed a lunch and the girls fishing poles and headed out to the county park where there is a kids fishing pond. It was very hot and windy, so the fishing didn't last long for lots of pictures, but Addyson did have fun quacking back at the ducks.

Janae taking it easy while fishing

Michael fishing, think he cares that he's trying to catch duck feed?

After a nap and getting some things done around the house, we headed to Marcia's house for yet another family dinner. Scott loves being in GR to have so much time with my family, just ask him. The girls had a fun time with Meghan and Michael. Tom lit sparklers for them, which they thought was neat. Janae helped me decide what we should make to take with us to dinner. She put both dishes together with very little help. The look on her face shows how proud she is of her accomplishment.

Janae's dessert flag made from candy

Red, white and blue appetizer

A little volleyball with mom

Addyson and Meghan

Janae with a look of pure delight

The girls had a great time watching the 8 minutes of fireworks that we saw. We waited about a hour for 8 minutes of fireworks. No one could believe that they were over that fast. Oh well, both girls were just happy to stay up late. Happy 4th of July everyone!

Go Janae, go!!!!

Tonight the girls wanted to ride bikes/scooters after dinner. Santa brought them both new bikes last Christmas. Addyson is a speed demon on hers and Janae hadn't been on hers yet. She is scared of falling off, so the easiest way to prevent that, is to not get on. When it finally got warm a few weeks ago, Janae told me she was not going to ride her new bike but stick with her old one with training wheels. I made a deal with her, she could ride her old bike one last time before she gave it to a young friend. She took that to heart and rode about 4 miles around the track one night. She was going to get the most out of that last ride!! After Scott got home, we coaxed her into just getting on the bike to see how it felt. As you can see from the pictures, she was terrified. She rode to the neighbors driveway and back. I love the picture in the middle, even though it is blurry. She cried pretty much the whole time, but she did it. I tried to us some psychology on her by telling her that the first time is always the worst and now that the first time was over, it would be easier. She must have believed me because she got on two more times. Before we know it, she'll be speeding through the neighborhood on her two wheels!!