Who did it? Where? With what?

We dressed the kids up as murderers this year.

Don't they look threatening?

Was it Mrs. Peacock in the Lounge with the candlestick?

Or Colonel Mustard in the Conservatory with the rope?

Or Miss Scarlet in the Ballroom with the lead pipe?

Or Mrs. White in the Kitchen with the knife?
(She's wearing a chef's hat, if you can't tell. She's not a nurse.)

Or Mr. Green in the Dining Room with the wrench?
(Isn't he a handsome pot-bellied plumber?)

Or Professor Plum in the Study with the poopy diaper?

We weighed the candy when we got home - This was Jason's 2lb. 10 oz. share.

We collected about 15 lbs. of candy (no poisoned pirate coins), gave out none (we were one of those bah humbug dark homes that you cursed as you walked by as a kid.) So as much as I hate Halloween, I guess it paid off.

I think the best part of the evening was when one neighbor was handing out full sized candy bars. Jason grabbed one so quickly in fear that the man would take the bowl away before he got a chance to take one. Then as Jason walked away he just stared over his shoulder at the neighbor in amazement. I think Jason's thoughts were, "You are the awesomest neighbor EVER!"

Halloween was good this year.

Now, moving on to Thanksgiving...

Caught on Camera

Trunk or Treat Mormon Style

Tonight was our ward's annual Trunk or Treat event. This year the Primary president introduced a new tradition of "The Scripture Hero Wax Museum." I wasn't so sure how it would turn out, because our ward can resist change sometimes, but it turned out well. All the primary kids ages 4 and up dressed up as scripture heroes (from all books of scripture including the Old Testament, New Testament, Book of Mormon, and church history.) The children had the freedom to choose who they wanted to be in Sunday School a couple weeks ago. The 4, 5, and 6 year olds marched in a parade while the older kids sang "Scripture Power." After the parade the older kids positioned themselves around the cultural hall and when you touched their scroll they would read about their character to you. Then we all went outside and collected candy from people's trunks. These are the characters that my kids chose:

Wife of King Lamoni

We copied the costume from the The Living Scriptures video that we have. I'm pretty sure The Living Scriptures have it 100% accurate. I'm also pretty sure that they wore a lot of pink in 90 B.C. ancient America. Emily was thrilled to be dressed as a queen. She was also disappointed that the feathers in her hair aren't showing in this picture.

Joseph Smith

Complete with old timey Book of Mormon. Isn't he handsome?

Eve

I didn't even know Sarah knew who Eve was, but the primary leaders told me that she was adamant that she wanted to be Eve. Sarah loved her costume. You can't quite tell in this picture, but she's not actually topless. Her bodice is a pair of pantyhose with the crotch cut out and some glued on fig leaves.

The little ones didn't have to dress up as scripture heroes so Wendy was Minnie Mouse and Jason was Mr. Green who did it in the Dining Room with the candlestick. (He even looks guilty, doesn't he?)

It was a fun evening!

Twiddle my thumbs

(Twiddle my thumbs.) I don't know what to write today. I think I might take the day off and do a whole lot of nothing tonight. My day was better today.

Taking up some blog space

I had to post another picture tonight so that when I open my blog in the morning I'm not welcomed by a haunting picture of my ugly floors. Anyway, as you can see, Jason definitely has the hang of "cheesing" for the self timer camera. This is our weekly family home evening photo. Tonight we played Charades. The kids love it. I made up the terms and assisted the children in their charades. I was the master charader in my family growing up. I thought I could teach my children a thing or two.

I also improved my sour mood tonight by popping a Diet Coke and blaring some ABBA. Then I sat down with my husband and watched an episode of Chuck. Four of my favorite things seemed to console my bitterness.

Rain Rain Go Away

I was in a sour mood today. Mainly because of this:

We had a torrential rainstorm this past Friday. It dumped something like 9 inches of rain in our town. It caused lots of flooding, stalled cars, and apparently this leakage into our home. Blah! I hate stuff like this! I don't quite know what the problem is and I don't know who to call. Anyway, I thought I'd post about it because sometimes I think it's therapeutic. It probably won't seem like such a big deal tomorrow. Perhaps I made your day seem good?

My Rachel hasn't been very good at napping lately. She requires less sleep, but isn't quite ready to give up her 10:30AM nap. Therefore, she remains awake during the afternoon and gets grumpy by dinnertime. Today I couldn't get her to fall asleep so I could make dinner. But this brilliant idea came to my mind:

I put her here and it worked like a charm. It took about 3 minutes for her to fall asleep.

Celebrate Day 2008

Yesterday we celebrated our second annual Celebrate Day. It's a holiday that Bradley created last year. It's a holiday that falls on the last Saturday of October. The tradition is:

1.You can't work on solo projects, which ensures that Mommy and Daddy have to spend the day with the kids.
2. You have to have fun.
3. You must eat french fries and ice cream or some other yummy cold dessert.

It was like Christmas this morning. The kids woke up early despite the fact that I closed the blinds in their room in hopes that they would sleep in and give us more than 5 1/2 hours of sleep. We went downstairs, ate breakfast, and decided to watch Star Wars. The movie allowed David and me to sneak in a little power nap for the rest of the day. Then we showered, ate lunch and played games. Each child age 3 and over got to pick a game to play starting with the youngest child:

Wendy - Cootie
Sarah - Trouble
Bradley - Chutes and Ladders
Emily - Twister
Mommy - Dominoes (not the actual game, but setting them up and watching them fall.)
Daddy - by the time it was Daddy's turn, it was time to go return some library books and eat some french fries and ice cream.)

We also continued the tradition of listening to Madonna's Holiday song.

If we took a holiday

Took some time to celebrate

Just one day out of life

It would be, it would be so nice

It was nice. Here's some pics:

Chutes and Ladders

Twister with Sarah and Mommy (I won.)


The Dominoes

A little groovin in the van. Emily was the most excited kid and you can slightly see her dancing in the back seat.

The big decision on what cold dessert to get. We convinced the kids that the package of 12 ice cream sandwiches was a far better deal than the package of 5 giant M&M ice cream bars. If they picked the ice cream sandwiches, they could have them two nights. They quickly agreed that was the better choice.

Respect the Bread

Tonight my husband requested that I respect the bread. I have a bad habit of smushing the loaves of sandwich bread when I go to the grocery store. I either pile the subsequent groceries on top or put the bread on the bottom when I am placing the bags in the car. My goal every Saturday afternoon or evening is to do the grocery shopping as quickly as possible and that usually means I don't take extra special care of the fragile items as I probably should.

My husband complained that when the bread gets smashed, his sandwiches are smaller. I explained that it's still the same amount of bread because the loaves are presliced. He stated that there is less surface area for the peanut butter and jelly. I suggested to slap it on a little thicker. Somehow I lost and ended up agreeing to respect the bread in the future and gave him a kiss.

Now I must right some other wrongs:

I apologize for my over exaggeration last week. Our Super Walmart does not have 43 checkout lanes and only 25% of them open at a time. I counted this evening and there are 28 checkout lanes and 10.7% of them were open. (2 of them were for customers with 20 items or less.)

I apologize for my lack of responding to comments. Some bloggers are so good at following up with comments that are posted on their blogs. I'm not. There have been times when I've commented on a stranger's blog and thought, "Oh, I hope she likes me," or "She's totally going to want to be my cyber friend because I have six kids too," and I get nothing in return and it leaves me thinking, "Did I say something wrong?" or "Am I that dorky?" Anyway, I try to at least respond to first commenters because I know the fear that goes along with it. Just know, if I don't always respond, I still love you. Please keep commenting. It helps boost my blog esteem.

I said yesterday, "Sarah is one of my favorite kids." I don't really have favorites. They're all my favorites.

I think that is all the apologies that I have for now....

I Am a Child of God (and a child of a blogging mom)

I heard Sarah singing the lyrics to I Am a Child of God the other day while she played in an adjacent room. This is what she sang:

I am a child of God

And he has sent me here.

Has given me an Earf-wee (Earthly) home,

With parents kind of near.

("With parents kind and dear.")

Do you think I blog too much? I'm sorry Sarah. Come sit on my lap while I type.

I love that Sarah! She's one of my favorite kids.

For the past three weeks I've been wondering why Sarah has been crawling into our bed at 2 AM every night. Do you think this might be a clue? I think the Mickey Mice might need to migrate to a box in the attic until Sarah relearns to sleep in her own bed.

Thursday at the homestead

Yay! My car oil drain plug was fixed today and I was able to get the oil stain off the driveway with kitty litter. Good as new! Hip hip hooray!

Now a little bit about Rachel. She hasn't learned how to get herself to the sitting position from a laying down position yet. Instead she finds something to hold onto, gets herself to her knees, and then gets herself to standing, and then she gets tired and manages to sit while holding onto something for support (usually a rung of a chair or stool.) The poor thing got so worn out this morning that she konked out in the process. The whole process from laying down, to standing, to sitting, to cranking her head over her shoulder to watch her siblings play behind her took probably about 45 minutes. Of course I couldn't pass up on the picture moment of the prized nap at the end.

I did actually put her in the crib after I took the picture.

Again later this afternoon, under the kitchen table.

Now, this narcoleptic eating is getting to be a little bit of a problem.

(If you're wondering why she is always naked in her high chair, I believe nudity is nature's bib.)

I've been wearing pants this week because of our 67 degree weather. At the end of the day the skin on my legs was stinging so I pulled up my right pant leg to discover this. I was very confused because I didn't recall any cat crawling up my jeans. Then I realized I was suffering the consequences of buying cheap razors all to save $2. Bad. Very bad!

A quiet house paralyzes me.

Today my husband took his unemployed self, Emily, and Sarah on some errands (hair cut, dentist, chiropractor, oil change, Barnes & Noble, bank, Boy Scout office.) It left me home with only 4 children. It always surprises me how quiet the house is, when even just one child is missing (not naming names.) It was so quiet that I didn't know what to do with myself. Bradley got his school work done extra quickly without distraction. I put Jason and Wendy down for their naps.

(Side note: Kids have no sense. I put Wendy down and she climbed out of the crib and came downstairs five minutes later to tell me she was finished with her nap. Did she actually think I would fall for that? I guess it was worth a try.)

Then Rachel fell asleep in my arms as I sat at my computer learning Chinese. So now I only had one waking child watching Smurfs in the other room. Wow! What do I do? I decided my options were:

1. Get something done, like clean the refrigerator.
2. Take a power nap.

The quiet of the house paralyzed me and I wandered for several minutes trying to decide on the responsible thing to do. I opted to lie down on the couch and drift off for a quick nap while the sounds of Papa Smurf, Brainy Smurf, and Smurfette echoed loudly in the background. I think I made a good choice, but now it's time to clean the fridge because tomorrow is trash day.

We would really like a bigger refrigerator.

Oh yes, and the Lube shop stripped our oil plug and now we have a nice puddle of Shell 530 on our driveway because it's leaking. I'm sure there will be 5.5 quarts drained by morning. Grrr!

I got out of the house

Today was a good day. I think I will just list some of the things that happened:

• This morning Wendy hurt her foot and she wanted me to know it. She said, "Mommy, I hurt my foot!" I said, "You did? I'm sorry." She said, "No, Mommy! I did it!" She doesn't comprehend the concept of sympathy yet.


• I actually got out of the house on a weekday all by myself! Unfortunately it was to get a cavity filled, but when I got there he said he didn't even need to use Novocaine. That was awesome. A simple fix. My new dentist is a talker. I concluded today that dentists are the type of people who are comfortable with one-sided conversations. He told me all about his daughter's science fair projects, her camping trip this weekend, his daughter's invention, his dislike for cold weather, the fact that he moved here in 1990, that he loves bicycles, etc. I would've loved to have responded to him, but my mouth was filled with cotton and tools. I could only attempt a muffled, "Uh-huh....ah....enh." and use my eyebrows for some expression.


• On my way to my next errand I saw a white pick-up truck with a covered cab. On the cab it said, "Bullet Deliveries" and a phone number in plain text. So do they actually deliver bullets? Or do they just deliver fast? Or both? This is when a logo or tagline might be helpful.


• I heard a political ad on the radio for a state congressman. The whole ad was a narrator talking about how the opposing party's candidate was using negative campaigning and talking bad about her opponent. Seriously, the whole ad was talking about how bad it was that his opponent was talking bad about him. It made me laugh. The ad was supported by the same candidate that sent some literature to my home several weeks ago. The literature had recommendations on how to save energy. Most of the recommendations made sense like use weatherstripping, set your thermostat high in the summer, and use fans and open windows to cool. He also recommended, "Eat cold food instead of warming every meal, especially leftovers." I'm not sure about every meal, but I'll vote for anyone who eats cold pizza.
  
• When I came home from my two hour mid-week excursion, Wendy greeted me at the door. She said, "Mommy, I thought you were upstairs!" I laughed and said, "That's funny!" With a straight face she said, "Actually, it's not." That girl takes things so literally!

When I got home, I realized that I forgot to take the tag off my new jeans.

A little deja vu from yesterday. She looks naked, but she's not.

Eating is seriously so exhausting!

I know all these things are probably funnier to me than they are to you. But today was a good day. I got out of the house all by myself! I even went to Walmart to get the kids some new socks. They've been complaining about having cold feet in the mornings and I can't seem to find any socks for them that fit or aren't severely stained. (My kids wear only sandals May thru October because I love having 6 months of sock-free laundry.) This morning it was 67 degrees downstairs. Brrrr!

My Day in Pictures

Yumminess

A little hot chocolate to start the chilly morning.

Messiness

Very typical.

Whoops!ness

Rachel has outgrown her infant portacrib. I didn't see it happen but the proof is on the forehead.

Creativeness

"You are Next" (Wa-ha-ha-ha-ha)

Emily has been making Halloween decorations and taping them to our windows. In previous days she has made a witch, a pumpkin, and a ghost. Today she made this tombstone and since the front windows are occupied with her other creations, she taped this one to a side window that faces our next door neighbor.

Sorry neighbor! We're not really vampires.

Playfulness

I hope Rachel's arms get more proportionate as she grows.

Family Togetherness

Well, kind of. Sarah looks a little disconnected off to the left there.

Sleepiness

Eating crackers is such hard work!

Primary Program - A Success!

As expected the Primary Program was a success. Bradley's class signed I Am a Child of God (And, no, I did not spell that wrong. They actually silently did sign language as the piano played.) Sarah's class said something in unison. Emily's said, "I like Family Home Evening. It is fun. We learn about the Priesthood and many other things. I like having family prayer and playing games."

I couldn't help but notice that my children are so short. Emily seemed to be on target, but one of the children who is only a couple of weeks older than Sarah is a whole head taller than her! Bradley seemed quite midgety himself. I guess I need to pump some more chicken nuggets into their diet.

Bradley also didn't seem to want to be up there. He yawned several times and did not make much eye contact with me. I think he was avoiding looking at me because he wasn't wearing his tie after I told him over and over this morning not to take it off before the program. Whatever! At least he didn't turn around with his back facing the congregation when he didn't know the words to a song like he did two years ago.

Then our Bishop spoke about how we should be as little children. Good stuff! I'm going to go drink some hot chocolate now with a pile of whip cream on top.

Blogger Pep Talk

Ok, 'yall. I think we have some lazy bloggers out there. Everyday when I sign into Blogger to do my daily post, I anxiously check my Reading List to see what my fellow bloggers have to say about parenting, wifehood, or whatever. But my reading list usually consists of my own posts and a fellow blogger with 7 kids. So let me say this:

If you're too busy to blog, then you're too busy!

I don't care what you write. Tell me about your awful shopping trip to Walmart. Tell me what you cooked for dinner. Tell me what you learned at church. I know you have things to say. You're my connection to the outside world. I'm depending on you!

With that said, I will tell you about my weekly Saturday trip to Walmart. It wasn't all that eventful, until I got to the checkout. Even then it wasn't all that eventful. But it affirmed to me why I dislike shopping there. 1) The conveyor belts are way too short. Super Walmarts should have longer conveyor belts than regular Walmarts. It's a grocery store for goodness sake. 2) The cashier had to manually move the belt with a switch! There are like 43 checkout lanes and only a 1/4 of them are ever opened at one time and they have to open one with a broken automatic conveyor belt? 3) The cashier was handing me my grocery bags before I even finished emptying the items from my cart onto the belt. So I took them and placed them at my feet until I finished emptying the cart. Super Walmart should really have baggers. 4) I use the reusable shopping bags because I like them and the cashier was inefficiently filling them and making them super heavy. 5) What's the point in the circular, lazy susan style bagging station anyway? I'm always fearful of leaving a grocery bag with the most essential items in it at the store because I have done so at least a dozen times. And the spinning bagging station always causes the employees to have to tell my children to watch their fingers because in a child's eyes the thing is a merry-go-round or the Wheel of Fortune . 6) Customer service is extremely below par, but I suppose that is why the prices are so low. 5) The cashier handed me her laminated cardboard cheat sheet to find the scan code for the ginger root I was purchasing because she didn't know what it was.

In my opinion, Walmart has very few redeeming qualities. I do like the tubs of Tollhouse cookie dough which I have not seen at other grocery stores. Hmm...I would have to say that's about it. Other than the cookie dough, it's the low prices that drive me there.

So that was my day. I look forward to the Primary program tomorrow at church. I have 3 children in it this year and I have the challenge of giving them all equal eye contact.

Rachel's New Trick

David was the smart parent who put the pillows behind her. I'm not so sure about the pillows being on the kitchen floor, but I suppose safety comes before sanitation.

Dinner at our house

It's been a long day. We had the missionaries over for dinner. I served scrambled eggs, grits, blueberry muffins, toast, canned pineapple and apple juice. They were so polite in telling me it was delicious. I know it wasn't. The eggs tasted burnt because I used a larger pan than I normally use. Apparently it cooks eggs faster and I caught it just in time before destroying the dozen and a half eggs in the pan, but not early enough to avoid them tasting like charbroiled eggs. The grits turned out pretty good. The muffins were burnt on the bottom. I also made a batch of brownies, but purposely didn't serve them because I knew they were going to be too gooey. My kids turned the oven and timer off while they were baking so I didn't know how much longer to bake them once I turned the oven back on. Now I remember why I usually pass the missionary dinner calendar quickly every Sunday morning. It's because I'm doing them a favor by sparing them the torture of eating a meal at our house.

The Grass is Greener in Eternity.

Someone recently asked me if they could download my brain in hopes of gaining a positive disposition. Although I was flattered, I feel like a con because I certainly do have my moments when I think life is kind of crappy. I try to keep those moments short though, because what's the point in dwelling on it? Anyway, here is a thought:

Life can throw us some unwanted conflict at times. It may come as a painful zit in the ear, unemployment, a leaky sink, car trouble, a decreasing bank account, uncooked ditalini scattered throughtout the house, faulty smoke detectors that go off in the middle of the night, or a cockroach in your bedroom. Sometimes life might even throw illness, death of a loved one, natural disaster, foreclosure, or loss of internet connection. Whatever trials we might face, it's comforting to know we have a Heavenly Father and a Savior, Jesus Christ, who love us dearly. It's comforting to know that we can pray at any time to a Father who is willing to send us comfort through the Holy Spirit. It doesn't matter how trivial the matter might seem, he still listens. It's comforting to know that although we might lack the ability to control the ills we must face, we have the ability to control our reaction to them.

Employers might eliminate jobs, natural disaster might destroy homes, illness might limit functionality, children might rob us of sanity, but NOBODY can take away the promise of eternal life from us but ourselves. We can live everyday with a spirit of hope, knowing we have a wonderful eternal life that lies ahead of us. It's going to be awesome guys! I'm telling you. So take the turmoil in stride. Live life in righteousness. Enjoy everyday even if you have a sinking pit in your stomach from whatever trial you are facing. Reach out beyond yourself and serve others. Take a moment on your way to bed to gaze at your sleeping children, give your spouse a special kiss, enjoy the beauty in nature. Realize that this life is good and the next is going to be so much better. Now that is worth living for! It puts a smile on my face and a tear of joy in my eye.

Now you might be saying, "Much easier said than done." So, let me ask you this - Have you ever envied the lives of children?

I have. Even though I had a great childhood, I still envy the fact that my children are children and basically have no major responsibilites. Meals are cooked for them, they don't have a clue what a mortgage is, and all they have to do is eat, play, learn, and a little bit of cleaning while Mommy and Daddy do all the hard stuff. As adults, I think we sometimes forget that we are actually still children as well. We are children of a loving Heavenly Father. It might do us some good at times to act like little children - good little children, of course. It might benefit us to take a moment from our busy day to dip some graham crackers in milk, do an easy puzzle, take a bubble bath, read a simple book, watch a silly televison show, undress all the Barbies, or not let a messy house bother us. I know it will benefit us to snuggle up to our Father through prayer and tell Him what's on our mind, express gratitude and ask for help. I've tried it and it works. He's a good listener and reliable at following up.

When we remember our role as "grown up children," it helps to put things in perspective. We're not here to live life on our own. Although our Father in Heaven can't cook our meals for us, He can lead us, guide us, and walk beside us throughtout this mortal journey as we work to lay up for ourselves treasures in heaven. That is comforting. It is these thoughts that help me stay positive and put a smile on my face.

Tonight I took a moment to gaze at this little treasure of mine.

I wonder if he is still going to have crazy hair in eternity?

Can we do it?

I doubt Bob the Builder would approve of this fix-it solution, but it's good enough until I get gain the courage to replace my leaky garbage disposal.

Happy Fall

There are days that I have so much to say, but by the end of the day I'm just too tired to spit it out on my blog. So this picture by Emily will have to suffice for today:

Ok, I soaked up a tiny bit of energy to tell this story. It was recently recommended to me to check out byu.tv and a series they run called Real Families, Real Answers. It's a series to help families learn how to become stronger. The website is http://www.realfamiliesrealanswers.com/. I watched one episode this evening about protecting family time on http://www.byu.tv/. There was a professor who talked about how today's society expects you to farm out specific educational activities to other people. For example there was a family who wanted their four year old to have a musical experience so they enrolled her in a Saturday music class. To the disappointment of the parents, the class did not fill so it was cancelled. But then the father thought, "You know, I can play the banjo." And the mother agreed she could sing a bit so they decided to give their children some musical experience at home. The professor telling the story said, "So what they did instead of having music class, was on Tuesday nights to have burritos for dinner and then afterwards they make music."

Hmmm...that's an interesting family tradition. I am assuming those are bean burritos.

(By the way - it's a good series.)

The Big Day

So tomorrow is the big day. My husband's first official day of unemployment. Yes, he was officially laid off on Friday, but we are so excited. We closed a dark chapter of our lives and are entering a new and brighter one. But not to worry, he's not going to be a dead beat and watch Comedy Central all day. He has his office all set up upstairs and is ready to work and make the project of his dreams come true starting tomorrow. He has a lot of work ahead of him and a load of ambition to get it done. I am thrilled to be able to see him thrive in his element. Unemployment is so sexy!

Cause and Effect

Jason observes the effect of pushing his little sister down.

But it's nothing a couple of fingers can't fix.

Happy Birthday, Jason!

Just two years ago you popped out in my gaucho pants.

(For full birth story see October 10, 2006.)

Who knew that you would have such crazy hair?

(It's late and I'm too tired to Photoshop out the snot lip and cake crumb on his cheek. This birthday picture comes "as is.")

After I realized that the poor kid has gotten totally jipped with boring plain white Cool Whip frosting birthday cakes for his only two birthdays, I decided to add some Hershey bar pieces. Kids are so easily pleased as is evidenced by an eager sibling's hand! It sure beats buying a $17.00 cake at the grocery store!

A Second Opinion

I do NOT have 6 cavities! Just one small one. I love my new dentist!

3 Joys, 3 Fears, 3 Irritations

Yay! I've been tagged.

Joys
1. My family. (Both immediate and extended)
2. Knowing I will be resurrected and have a perfect body for eternity.
3. Pickled ginger and wasabi (the kind that comes with sushi.)

Fears
1. My van falling off a bridge and me not being able to save all my children.
2. Cockroaches in my bed and in my cereal.
3. Dying in childbirth.

Irritations
1. Messy floors (like when crumbs get stuck on your feet.)
2. Bad customer service (Walmart, for example.)
3. The house never ever being perfectly clean.

I have no pictures to post. I'm a boring person. I tag whoever reads this (Yes, I'm lame like that. I don't like putting people on the spot. It makes me uncomfortable.)

A Simple Rule

I've been trying to teach Bradley that if something is on a shelf that requires a 3 foot stool to climb onto an adjacent stack of bins, shelf, counter, or piano in order to reach that item, then the item is probably put there for a reason, that reason being to STAY OUT OF THE REACH OF CHILDREN! In other words, if the item is within 2 feet of the ceiling, heck, if the item is anywhere that you need a tall stool to get it, then you must ask permission before retrieving it. He doesn't seem to comprehend. This morning he was trying to get his sleeping bag on the top shelf of the closet. Not that a sleeping bag is anything dangerous or breakable, but who wants to roll that thing up and try to stuff it in it's bag tonight? Not me. I have enough other toy tornados and Cheerio spills to clean up.

This is also the kid that I have to repeatedly remind that the bathroom sink is not for recreation and that he should not return with a drenched shirt and wet hair after a simple trip to the potty. Also the kid that will predictably trip and fall while carrying a plate of spaghetti to the dinner table. Also the kid who will accidentally tear a page out of a brand new book while seemingly turning the page gently. Also the kid who tries to freeze everything, such as a AA battery in a cup of orange juice. Also the kid who even makes getting a drink of water from the refrigerator interesting:

I'm going to profoundly miss these days when I'm old. Yes, I'm finding joy in the journey.

I find the Sleep Mode an especially joyful part of the journey.

(Is that not the ugliest sleep pose ever?

It looks like he's looking into the convex side of a spoon.)

I love you, Bradley!

A Poem and Song for Me

Emily wrote me a poem last night.

My Life on Mars

It is hard,

Life on Mars.

Mars is red and big.

It is smokey.

It is hard

To breeth on Mars.

But I like Mars.

She also wrote me a song:

Baby

Baby baby

I loveyou.

You are funny too.

Baby baby

I Love you.

I Love you.

I Love you.

Baby baby

I Love you.

You Love me.

Nothing warms my heart more than to know that my child thinks I'm funny. Emily, you rock!

General Conference

This weekend was General Conference. Basically it's 8 hours of church. Ok, so when you put it that way, it can sound really dreadful, but it's not. It's like a feast. The Prophet and the Apostles speak to us and counsel us to do things in order to make ourselves better people and more Christlike. It's broadcast from Salt Lake, which means we get to sleep in and watch it from the comfort of our home on the Internet. It also means I don't have to iron dresses, shirts and curl hair on Sunday morning. Hallelujah! We played conference Bingo. We all had cards with different words on them such as faith, hope, sabbath, church, etc. Whenever a speaker said one of the words, you marked your card and hoped that you could acheive Bingo in one talk.

This weekend was awesome. I really needed to hear the things that were said. It's part of the reason I didn't post yesterday. I was soaking it all in. I was also busy getting the kids bathed and tucked in bed while my husband attended an additional 2 hours at the church from 8-10 PM last night for the men.

President S. Monson spoke this morning. He spoke on change and how we should make the effort to enjoy every day. He made a comment for those in the midst of raising children. He told us that, "One day the fingerprints that show up on almost every newly cleaned surface, the toys scattered about the house and the piles and piles of laundry that need to be tackled will disappear all too soon and that we will miss them profoundly." I'm a faithful person and I will take his word for it. I suppose I can assume I will also miss this:

Laundry surprises,

torn books,

naked Barbies (and Ken dolls),

ham in my bathroom sink,

finding $1.09 in my brand new orange juice container.
(Not a good piggy bank, Jason.)

So this was a very enjoyable weekend. I am stuffed full of spirtual thoughts to ponder for the next 6 months until the next General Conference on the first weekend in April. If you are interested in taking a look at what I watched this weekend the link is here:

http://www.lds.org/conference/languages/0,6353,310-1,00.html

Elder Wirthlin wins the prize for humor. He told a good story about his daughter going on a blind date and her ability to laugh at an embarassing situation (he spoke Saturday afternoon.) President Monson also announced 5 new temples that will be built in Calgary, Kansas City, Philidelphia, Argentina, and Rome, Italy. He paused. The congregation laughed. Ahh. Such good humor! Mormons builing a temple in Rome!

I leave you with a quote by President Thomas S. Monson:

"Let us find joy in the journey."

Amen to that!