ZZZzzzzzz

I walked into Laurie's room late last night and this is what I found. I laughed and wondered at the way that some kids are able to sleep.

She is in there somewhere.

New Glasses

Josh got his new glasses today. He is very excited.

A Day of Discovery

It wouldn't be right not to post on an activity that was literally an all-day event. We left the house at 9:30 this morning and got back just in time to make dinner and eat at 6 pm. I took the kids to the Discovery Gateway and they had a blast. I will have to get the house clean tomorrow.

Thank you Janay for sending me the wonderful deal on admission.

What We've Been Doing

I finally off loaded my camera and thought I would share what we have been doing lately.

We have been struggling with the kids being reverent, listening, and yelling at mom. For two weeks in September we had them earn stickers for specific behaviors. With the stickers they would earn a trip to Boondocks. The kids did very well and now we know what they are capable of doing. We know that it will always be a challenge, but at least for two weeks they were great and they earned the prize.



Our city fire station had an openhouse. The building is very nice and they had a great turnout. The kids really enjoyed themselves. They even got to spray a fire hose outside in the rain.

For another Family Night we decided to drive up Trapper's Loop to try to see the fall leaves. We were late in leaving so we didn't have much light but it was still beautiful and we had fun together.

First Soccer Game

Today Josh played soccer for the first time ever. He had a lot of fun and did very well. His coach is so good with the boys, making sure each boy got a turn to do certain things, and game was very relaxed with no pressure. They didn't even keep score. We look forward to the next game.



This was his turn at the second half starting kick

Father and Son Trip/ Girls day out

The last weekend of August Graydon took Josh on a trip...just the two of them. Josh was so excited. They left for Wyoming early Friday morning. Josh got pretty bored on the long drive to Cheyenne, arriving there around lunchtime. There they had an appointment to see two large, working steam engines with a personal tour given by the conductor. The tour included the turn table and roundhouse along with a very fancy coach and the machines used to make replacement parts for the engines.

They were able to visit a park see Cheyenne's Big Boy Steam Engine and chase ducks and squirrels and stay in a very nice hotel room with a fully-equipped kitchen.

After the boys left on Friday the girls went to the Boondocks to have fun. We spent time crawling around in the Kiddie Cove, playing mini golf, bowling, and playing in the arcade. We finished the day with dinner at Olive Garden and going home and painting our nails.

Saturday, Graydon and Josh left early to head to North Platte, Nebraska. Here they were able to go to the Golden Spike Tower and observe the largest train yard in the world, Bailey Yard. It is 13 miles long and two miles wide and moves around 10,000 cars a day. Josh was able to sit and watch the freight cars roll down the hump as they were sorted. He also got a new toy train and enjoyed picking gifts for his sisters.

Sunday was the wonderful day that they had to drive all the way home. However they made good time and arrived just in time for a family party.

The funniest part about this trip is that Josh and Emily wanted to constantly call each other. They probably called each other 3 or 4 times a day. Then as soon as they arrived home, after the party, they started to fight.

Still Waiting

I had a doctor's appointment today and I was hoping to find out the gender of our baby. Last month he was guessing it was a boy (60%)and all my cravings have said boy, they are similar to what I had with josh.

This morning he said it was a girl (90%). I am not completely convinced yet, the baby was not in a very good position and I could barely see what he was looking at. To me, it looked like the baby was keeping its knees together. Not very helpful.

Anyway, I am going to have to wait until my 3-D ultrasound in four weeks to be absolutely sure of the its gender.

I can't wait to see which of my two names I will get to use.

Mission Memories

About two weeks ago we had the chance to have a FHE with a family that Graydon had taught and baptized while on his mission. He had a great time reminiscing and seeing how they had changed and what they were doing now.

Dinosaur Park

Monday, Aug 16, we went to the dinosaur park with Cindy and her girls. It was so nice to spend time with them and the kids had a great time. Thanks Cindy for inviting us.

County Fair

Yesterday we went to the county fair. It was opening day and they offered ride wristbands for a lower price. The kids had a lot of fun. Emily was excited to be able to ride the larger rides by herself. Laurie only liked one ride...the boats (and she only rode those after a lot of convincing). She refused to ride the others. we did get her on the motorcycles, but she soon decided that she didn't like it. Graydon was a good sport to accompany Josh on the larger rides. Then they all had fun on the bouncy toys.

We also went to the petting zoo, rode the ponies, and watched a tiger show. It was a fun day.

I want them back in school!

So yesterday was the kids' first day off track until the first week of september. At first I was excited because then I would get to sleep in a little, but the excitement wore off when I had to grocery shopping with all of them. While at Macey's I found whole chickens on sale and purchased three of them. This was when the fun began.

I arrived home and fed the kids lunch and told them to go play while I cut up all the chicken. They decided to go ride bikes, but to do this I had to replace Emily's front innertube. Then Laurie insisted on riding her bike, which I have to help or she can't go anywhere (we are working on this problem). This activity took 45 minutes.

Just as I got into the house Emily and Josh come in and want to play with friends, but all their friends are on different tracks and had school. They found some kids who attend the charter school and won't start until monday, so soon my house was full of six kids instead of three.

I finally started to prep the kitchen to cut chicken and got one wing off when Josh and Friend needed help setting up a car track which also required finding new batteries. I get that done and cut up one chicken.

Starting on the next chicken I am inundated with requests for help with a computer game, drinks, snacks, and wanting to go swimming. I tell them that I can't fill up any pool until I am done with the chicken, and I keep working. I then get asked if they can go to their friend's house and run in the sprinkler. This idea sparks a search for their swimsuits. I keep telling them they are going to have to wait because I was all messy.

Long story short. I finally get the chicken cut, sorted, bagged, marinated and in the freezer. While keeping track of where the kids are and what they are doing. I also fill up the pool in the back yard and find all swimsuits.

I never thought that cutting up three chickens would be so hard. I do have three pounds of legs, two pounds of breasts, and a quart of chicken broth. Is it time for school yet?

Testimonies

Emily and Josh love to share their testimonies in Sacrament meeting every month. They go up together, Emily goes first then waits for Josh. Most of the time they end up saying the same things every time.

Today was no exception. The funny part is that Josh will get up and say he wants to bear his testimony and then procede to say something identical to his personal prayers. Today he got up and literally said his prayer. I felt my face flush and Emily was on the stand telling him he was doing it wrong. I am sure nobody really cared.

I am proud of him for getting up there every month, but I think we are going to have a talk about testimonies again.

Great Advertising....

Being a business major and having taken marketing classes in college and doing marketing for my business, I'm always impressed with great ads.

The recent Old Spice guy ads are phenomenal! I've been totally mesmerized by them. Now BYU (Brigham Young University) pulled off an amazing ad similar to the Old Spice guy ones.

Here's the original:



And here's the one from BYU:


Awesome marketing! Way to go BYU!!!

Things you forget

I have discovered that there are things that you forget about being pregnant:

-How often you have to eat...things of substance,even when the thought of eating makes you sick.
-the heightened sense of smell.
-extreme emotions
-forgetfulness/absentmindedness and
-how in the first trimester you look chubby not pregnant.

I am sure as this pregnancy progresses that I will have even more little reminders, but I am not going to complain. This has been the easiest one of the four and sometimes I feel so good that I start hoping for a little reminder that I am still pregnant...beside the fact that my clothes don't fit anymore.

Our Year So Far

Every year I love to put together a photo book of what we did and how the kids have grown and then order the book through Winkflash. Last year I learned that I could put collages together for these books. I have just put the first half of collages together and thought I would share what we have done so far this year.

Mamma Mia!

So I finally saw the movie Mamma Mia! last night. I really like ABBA and with this cast I had always had a curiosity about it. It was so different that I laughed through most of the movie. Graydon watched it with me, but felt it was one of the worst movies he had ever seen.

It was weird for me to see Colin Firth in this role since the main movie I know him from is Pride and Prejudice. I didn't know he or Pierce Brosnan could sing. That really surprised me.

I found myself wanting to watch it again today and it is really growing on me. I haven't listened to ABBA for over 12 years and now I am looking up their songs on youtube. I do have to be careful because the content is not appropriate for kids...especially my kids that pick up on everything and will start asking questions.

I really enjoyed it.

Member Missionaries

We had the a very fun primary activity on Friday. The presidency really put a lot of effort into this.

Two weeks before each of the children received an official-looking mission call in the mail. Emily was going to the Russia Vladivostok Mission and Josh was going to the Argentina Salta Mission. They were told to report to the MTC where they would catch the FUTURE MISSIONARY AIRLINES, FLIGHTS 2910 AND 722.

When they arrived they each had their picture taken and received a name tag. In the MTC they had to dress up like missionaries and make a peanut butter sandwich in a relay race.

Our chapel has a small upstairs with two classrooms. The kids were then told to go upstairs to board an airplane. They all croweded into a small room where they received snacks and watched a film of an airplane taking off, missionaries, and then the plane landing.


Afterward they all got off the plane and headed for their missions. There were four missions: Brazil, Argentina, Russia, and Oregon, and the kids were divided into four groups and spent 15 minutes in each mission. Graydon had a blast telling the kids all about the Oregon mission. Our friend Aaron told about his experiences in Brazil and then two sisters shared their experiences in Russia and Argentina. It was really neat. They then got a "Welcome Home" and almost listened to the actual missionaries in our stake, before devouring all the cookies and going home.
Russia
Oregon
Argentina
Brazil (He didn't have props, but his laptop presentation was great.)

These are the four groups as they reported to the Oregon Mission.

Sewer Problems, City Ordinances, and REALLY deep holes! Part 1

A few weeks ago someone from the city stopped by our house to inform us that they thought our sewer was connected to the storm drain in the area. Turns out they were right....

(that's the sewer in the middle of the road....our house somehow isn't hooked up to it.)

Now, when your home is built over 18 years ago, it's kind of hard to find the blue prints (Hint: They don't exist) and when your house gets connected to the wrong pipe, it's even harder to figure out where the sewer on the house meets the pipe that goes out to the road because the line it's hooked up to doesn't have a "clean out" on it. Go figure!

So, seeing as the city didn't want our "poop" going down the storm drain (and turns out neither did the county), we had to figure out where it was all connected and then figure out who gets to fix it!

How do you do this if you don't have blue prints? Why you get to hire some nice folks to come out with a really cool camera hooked to a long, long piece of wire/pipe like thing and they put it through your pipes and spray paint your lawn and street with where the pipes are!

(we had to take our toilet out in the bathroom and they stuck their camera down the hole...yes..eww, gross--But the camera was wayy cool!)

This is what the camera saw...

That would be the end of our "sewer" line out in our front yard dumping into the storm drain...not exactly where it's supposed to go.

So, they stuck the camera down the sewer lateral clean-out in our front yard (fancy word for "sewer pipe") that had never been hooked up to the sewer (stupid builders!) and lo and behold, out in the street look what it found?

The camera went through the pipe just fine until it got out in the street by our mail box and found a big, gaping hole. Turns out the "real" sewer line wasn't even hooked up! There was a piece of pipe missing (and a big cavern where the pipe should be). You can see the other piece of pipe in the shot above. This is the shot coming out of the pipe in the lawn.

So, out came the spray paint....

See that mark by the curb? That would be where the pipe is missing!

Here's a diagram of it... See the missing pipe?

Next came the fight with the city on who would fix the broken pipe. Thanks to my savvy brother-in-law lawyer who specializes in this sort of stuff, we got the city to fix the problem in the road.

Enter lots of big city trucks and big holes!

This is the truck that came to dig the hole

And that's the hole they started to dig.

 They dug it with a high pressure water thingy and a big vacuum. Quite impressive!

It got really deep! That pipe you see is our water main. The missing pipe was another 3-4 feet down!

So, they dug down to it, muttered a few "What in the world? I've never seen this before!", and fixed the pipe and filled in the hole.

 This is the finished hole. All fixed and ready to be re-paved.

The next day this showed up!

And, along with fixing our mess, they went about fixing potholes in the road as well.

I'd say they did a pretty good job!

So, now we have a sewer line all the way from the house to the road that's actually complete...but not hooked up to the house yet! That'll be part 2! You see, we get to dig an even DEEPER hole in our front lawn (7 feet to be exact) and unhook the pipe from the storm drain and hook it over to the newly fixed sewer line!

Have you ever heard the phrase..."A house is nothing more than a big hole in the ground that you throw money into!"?...well, we're living it! And it won't get us a single benefit! (well, except that now our poop ends up in the sewer instead of the storm drain...but hey, the storm drain worked perfectly well for 18 years. For some reason the city & the county didn't like it that way though....I sure wish the inspector for the city that "supposedly" inspected the sewer & land drain lines when the house was built  & said it was hooked up right was still around though! I'd love to give him a word or two!

Stay tuned for more big holes! They're coming soon to our front lawn!