Beautiful Morning

Miriam gave me quite the treat last night.....I fed her at about 9:45 we played and talked until about 11:15 then we climbed into bed. She started groaning and squirming about 4:15 I put a binky in (I love those things!) thinking that might hold her off for 1/2 hour or so, but to my surprise she didn't wake up until

........drum roll please.........

6:40!!!! Oh happy day!!

She must of talked to everyone else as well because no one else woke me up either. I feel like singing!! Thanks my little friends, Mom needed that!

There was an Old Woman

There was an old woman who lived in a shoe.

She had so many children, she didn't know what to do;

She gave them some broth without any bread;

Then whipped them all soundly and put them to bed.






This nursery rhyme has been going through my head lately....I wonder why? Maybe it has to do with the number of kids I have and how I feel like I am constantly having to feed someone!

Desperate Measures

Ice Skating

Joseph has a problem with listening and this post demonstrates it perfectly. "Hannah, Peter, and Joseph get your socks and shoes on, please." "OK, make sure that you have a coat, hat, and gloves, and then go get in the car." We pull up to The Gardens Ice House to participate in their free skate day. We get all the skates, go to put them on, and Joseph is not wearing socks. Nice!! Took a deep breath and asked him if I had asked him to put on sock and shoes. Yes....OK so we are going ice skating with no socks....good. Everyone now has their skates on, making sure they are all bundled up. "Joseph where are your gloves?" "In the car, I didn't want to carry them." Another deep breath. Okay, we will skate without gloves or socks!! Maybe he will get cold enough that next time he will listen!

Hannah and Peter have never been ice skating before and they LOVED it! They thought that it was so fun and awesome!! Joseph was convinced that the ice would break and the he would fall through and drown. I tried to explain that it was only a couple of inches thick, but it fell on deaf ears. Joe and I went around twice and then I left Joseph to take Peter around once, and then we watched Hannah and Peter go around. There were other friends there to watch as well. Mom also got to try out her new camera, which was a lot of fun!!
Joseph did get cold and was crying by the end to go home....hopefully the lesson is learned. I can always hope!!

June Bride

"They say when you marry in June you're a bride all your life"

I got the opportunity to do the wedding flowers for Natasha Nielsen. It was a lot of fun to use such bright beautiful flowers. I think they turned out just right. The bridesmaid bouquets were very similar to the brides bouquet. (the one in the picture to the left is laying on it's side)

I thought that I got a picture of the boutonnieres but I didn't. They were made of delphinium, lemon leaf, and tree fern. and looked more modern then traditional. I have not worked with or used orchids very much and the mother's corsages had a smaller orchid. They were suppose to compliment the color of the Gerbera Daisies, but turned out to be more purple than hot pink.

First day of summer

I don't care what the calendar says the first day of summer is. The first day of summer is when the fire flies come out, and today is the day. I went outside to close up the van and sure enough I saw little lights floating through the air. I remember living in IL as a young child catching fire flies. It was always fun, happy times and nothing brings a smile quicker then to see them flying around. Happy summer days!

Precious Time

Today I had literally 20 minutes to take a shower and get ready for the day before every other minute was spent on something else. I said to Joseph, "Mom is going to take a shower, and then your friends, my visiting teachers and their kids are going to be come over." Next thing I knew Joseph was naked and in the shower. Shocked and bewildered I asked, "What are you doing!?" His reply, "I'll only take a minute." I couldn't believe it. So Joseph got the shower, not me!!

It made me think though....I never have heard a man say, "If I just get a shower sometime during the day, it's a good day." or "My shower is the only time I get to be alone." or "It seems like the hardest thing is finding time to get ready for the day." or "I have to wake up 30 minutes before my kids so that I can get ready for the day."

I love taking showers. It is 15 minutes to myself to relax and enjoy all the noise being drowned out, unless of course my kids are asking 101 questions or talking to me about something that is super important, I am sure. What would life be like if whenever I wanted to I could jump in the shower and spend time getting ready for the day without having to do things first, like......turn on a movie for the kids, or make sure Joseph has something to eat, or put Eden down for a nap, or... A feeling I won't know for a very long time from now. Maybe one day.....

Busy, Busy, Busy

This was probably the busiest weekend so far this year...I hope there aren't any that top it!! Here is a quick overview, with pictures!


Friday:
Day started at 6:45......got the kids ready, dropped them off at school. Then went home to get Eden and Joseph situated. I went to pick up the flowers for the wedding I was doing for a friend. There was 1 bride bouquet, 1 groom boutonniere, 11 corsages, 9 boutonnieres, 1 throw bouquet. My friend Becca came over to give moral support, opinions, and help, plus she has a little girl Joe's age to keep him busy. She also fed the kids lunch and made cookies for the school carnival. After finishing 3/4 of the arrangements, the kids and I headed for the church to use the church fridge to keep the flowers cool and to go buy a present for one of Hannah's friends, Sabrina, who I sometimes watch after school. She is an only child so they consider our kids her siblings so everyone was invited to the Birthday luau. We remembered to turn the fridge up so that the flowers wouldn't freeze (I still lost sleep over it, though!!) Went running into Micheals to finish getting Sabrina's gift. While paying Joseph knocked over a display!! Nothing like trying to hurry with 4 kids in tow (one word: impossible). We made it on time to the party, had a great time, had to leave early so that I could drop the boys and Eden off at home before going with Hannah on a little date to see the BYU Chamber Orchestra at the DC Temple Visitor Center. It was fun to have Hannah tell me all about the different instruments and to listen to them play. We got to listen to a master with the violin, Jenny Oaks Baker. She was truly amazing! Hannah got to meet both Jenny and the Maestro. I was hopping that this would inspire her to want to be more diligent with her violin. When we got home about 10:45 I put her to bed and finished the flowers, lucky for me it was cool enough outside that I didn't have to go to the church at 12:30 a.m. to put the flowers in the fridge.


Saturday:
Eden woke up about 6:30, I fed her. Then she and I went to the church to put the other flowers in and to check to make sure that I didn't have to redo anything. All was well, so I could began to relax. Then we went to the store to get eggs needed to make a cake for the school carnival cake walk. I copied the cake from Jamie, I thought it was so cute and creative. I can copy almost anything but coming up with the stuff takes too much thinking. Went home made a cake, got the kids ready, got myself ready, frosted and decorated the cake, and then jumped in the car with our cookies and cake. We had a blast at the School Carnival between the rock wall, the pony ride, the twirly ride, cake walk, bounce around and cotton candy life could not be better.

Eden was so tired she just couldn't stay awake any longer. I got home, changed into something nicer to go drop the flowers off at the temple. They really liked them, which was a relief because you know brides have an image of what they want in their head and you hope that the one in your head matches! I was really dumb and lived up to my hair color... I locked my keys and phone in the car. I asked some random person to use their phone and called Al who had just put all of the kids down for a rest (hopefully sleep) time. He called AAA for me and I waited, at least I had a great view!! I also figured that this was Heavenly Father's way of saying "slow down, your life is too busy!" I don't know what I am going to do when all of my kids have activities going on and not just the older ones. Sometime later my hero came driving up, no it wasn't AAA it was Alan, he came to rescue me. He had decided to cancel the AAA order and come himself. What a guy!! I took Hannah and Eden with me to run to the store quickly to buy another gift for another birthday party. Then went home and couldn't find the address for the reception. After much searching on the Internet I found where it was and I was off once again with Eden to drop off the throw bouquet. I made it just in time for them to throw it. Stayed for a moment and chatted with some wonderful people. Then I went home, dropped Eden off, picked up Hannah, dropped Hannah off at her party and then I went to a Birthday party for some friends. I had a blast and the evening could not have been better, unless it had lasted longer. I sat next to a women who refers to herself as Sister Chocolate aka Debra Rambo and we laughed and laughed and laughed. I really needed that. I had to sneak out early to pick Hannah up so that she could go to bed. I then went for a late night walk to clear the mind. Came home and crashed!!

that's who I am

Parading in the rain

Our ward decided that it would be fun to have the primary kids walk in the Main Street Festival Parade. I don't recall ever wanting to be in a parade, but here we were, in the rain no less, walking in the parade. I kept waiting, checking email thinking that they were going to call it off....no luck! We had a good time and the kids loved eating donuts and drinking hot chocolate before it started. I let Alan off the hook and told him he didn't have to stand out in the ran to see us, more for Eden's sake then his but he still got out of it!Little did anyone know that I had earphones in and was walking to my own beat!!Afterwards I dropped the kids off at home and went back to work a shift in our booth that we have every year using one of my talents making balloon animals or art, depending on how you look at it! What would life be like without fabulous neighbors always willing to support you and document everything!! At this moment I was talking my turn at face painting. Thanks Grandpa Dan!
This year I made a fabulous hat for myself that I will have to get a picture of from one of my teenagers that happened to have a camera with her. It was a beauty!! I actually think it is fun to make the balloon animals (side note: this is the 4th year that I have made animals for our ward booth!) and it always cracks me up when some kid wants a zebra or a turtle, such a disappointment to get a sword or a dog instead!!

beautiful days and beautiful nights

The weather has been perfect!! I got a little bit pink today, but it is a welcome feeling compared to the cold. Most likely it will turn to tan, which will only reinforce my horrific farmers tan. Look out swimsuit season!!

For the last two nights I have gone for a wonderful, long, refreshing walk. It couldn't be more perfect in terms of temperature, humidity, and peacefulness. Nothing clears the mind and puts you at ease as the the beauty of spring with everything being renewed, wonderful whiffs of beautiful fragrances, and perfect weather. It calls to me.....I can't wait to go exercise. I would love to move somewhere, where the weather is constantly like this, I don't think it really exists though, so I can just keep dreaming.

lucky flowers

I just got back from a local flower wholesaler, Potomac Floral. It made me miss the days that I worked with flowers everyday. There were flowers everywhere, people running around, wonderful smells, bright colors, and to look at the outside warehouse you would think nothing of it. While there I put in an order to get flowers for a friend's wedding that I will be arranging. I had previously signed up on the Internet site, but wanted down to go look around to get a feel of who I was doing business with. After placing the order I started to ask a sales rep about pricing and what kind of a price cut you would get if you had a business licence. He looked at me and said, "Didn't you already put a business ID in the computer when you signed up?" I said that I had not and that I only do arrangements for friends and that this wasn't a business nor did I have a business licence. He then looked at me shocked, and showed me that they have three degrees of discounts and that I was already getting the 2nd level. 1st level would be the people that walk in off of the street to buy flowers (ME), 2nd level being those who do small quantity purchases, and the 3rd those that buy by the case. I asked him how that was possible that I could be at that level, he said that he didn't know and he wasn't privileged to that information and only went off of what was on the computer. Call it blessings from above or pure luck, either way it made me happy! Unfortunately the wedding is the week after Mother's Day and prices don't go down until the following week, but it was still better then having to pay retail prices.

Getting old

Have you ever played freeze tag? Have you ever played freeze tag when you were 29 1/2?

Today I did and I felt old. We went to Bond Mill, the kids elementary school, so that they could show me all of their moves on the monkey bars and other playground equipment. They decided that they wanted to play freeze tag and asked if I wanted to play. I was laughing so hard after about 3 minutes of sprinting around the playground. My whole body ached as I zigged and zagged around trying to dodge whomever was "it" and saving those who were frozen. I couldn't stop laughing which probably made everything worse because I wasn't getting the oxygen my body needed. Such is life, maybe it's not that I am old, just out of shape. So many possibilities to why I can't sprint around like the good old days. And to think that I was thinking of maybe training for a mini-triathlon, maybe I should rethink that.

Witch in training

The word witch seems to have a negative connotation associated with it. Probably because it rhymes with a word that does. Plus it always seems like the wicked witches stand out more in our mind.
This is nothing negative......I am not going to turn green or start riding a broom or start casting evil spells on anyone. Although that might be fun!


Whenever I wear these socks I feel like I am a witch in training!! It makes me giggle and giddy. Little warm things that bring happiness to my life!

Sissssters

All I ever wanted when I was little was for my mom to have a baby girl so that I could have a sister. I had to wait out 3 pregnancies before I got my wish. In fact, I told my mom that I was going to move to Grandma's house unless she had another girl. By that time I had 5 brothers.

My one and only sister, Tamara, hasn't flown much and we figured out that the last time she had been on an airplane was 7 years ago, and that was when she was a lone teenager on a couple hour flight from Utah to Los Angeles, CA to visit none other than ME!! This time it was kind of different. She was traveling as a mom of two small children, solo, on a 5-hour flight. I was so proud, she did well and so did her kids! They stayed for two weeks. It was so much fun having her here. Her girls are so cute and fun! We did have some moments that are bound to happen when you get 6 kids living under one roof, but we all survived. Thanks for coming Tamara! I love you!

Highlights:

• Cherry Blossom Festival


• lots of rain


• DC Temple


• University of Maryland


• National ZOO


• Haircuts


• Car breaking down on I-95 in Virginia


• Picnic in the park


• IKEA


• Arundel Mills Mall


• Movies


• Late Night Games

Pictures:

My stylin' little old bitty!!!

Create Fake Magazine Covers with your own picture at MagMyPic.com

Memory Lane

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wf-ecpV4304

I saw this video and was reminded of "my" sweet African Gray Parrot, Crackers, that I had during my high school years. I stole him from my science teacher...kind of. As you can imagine, living in a high school science class room for years, he was very afraid of people because he was constantly poked at with pencils, or kids would just rush up to his cage and bang on it. It really made me mad, so after taking him home for winter break I just never brought him back.

My science teacher, Brent Brown, was a dear friend of mine. I was his unauthorized TA during his planing period. I graded papers or set things up for him, but mostly we just talked and enjoyed each others company. Of course I ended up with an "A" in science that year! When he had a sub I would get a phone call telling me not to come to "class" that morning. During that time I fell in love with this bird. He would let me hold him and feed him. He could say good morning in about 20 different voices and would do so every morning. "Good morning Lakers", "good morning". A bad habit that he had was when he got mad he would start swearing up a storm. He would just run a blue streak under his breath. The first time that he did it I couldn't stop laughing. I taught him to say "I love you." He loved to look at himself in the mirror and would say, "I love you Crackers!" His cage was always open, yet he hardly ever ventured out. My mom tried so hard to get him to like her and would always try to give him apples, but Crackers would always try to bite her, so she would drop it and then he would pick it up and eat it. My mom said that if I was ever gone for long period of time he would wander around the house. She said it was as though he were looking for me. He would go check everywhere and then just go back to his cage and sit there and wait. He got wildly jealous when I met Alan. He really didn't like him at all. Once Alan was laying on his stomach on my bed, and Crackers took advantage of the moment...got to the level of his feet and bit the back of his ankle. When I got married I had to give him back to my science teacher with a promise that he wouldn't bring him back to school. It was a sad day to part with my friend Crackers.

Girls will be Girls!

Nothing like celebrating spring with painted toe nails!

Go Team Claire-Bear!

This year I decided that I wanted to try something different for the benefit of others. I have a friend whose niece has epilepsy. She invited me to walk with her in the National Walk for Epilepsy. It is the second year that they have had a walk for Epilepsy. The cherry blossoms were in bloom.

There were about 4,000 people there for the walk. People could also do a "virtual" walk if they wanted.

Greg Grunberg, from Heroes, was there as a spokesperson for epilepsy. He told the story of his son who suffers from epilepsy. I love this picture because of the US Capitol behind him.

It was a really good experience and made me think outside of myself and my little box. It was so cold, and of course I didn't bring a coat, but all in all it was a good time.

One of those days...

Have you ever had one of those days when you need a very, very large bowl of ice cream with all the toppings you can possibly find by 2:00 in the afternoon? That's what kind of day I am having!!

*There are times when parenthood seems nothing but feeding the mouth that bites you. - Peter De Vries*