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My Little Monkeys

2012-02-04T18:27:00.000-08:00

Ty climbing the rope in gymnastics. He took forever, but he finally made it to the top.

Elias climbing the rope in gymnastics, he didn't quiet make it to the top. But he showed off some major monkey skills

Oliver

2011-10-14T09:34:00.000-07:00

Welcome baby Oliver

born 10/12/11 at 6:40pm, 9lbs 11oz, 22in.

Madeline and Ty were very excited to hold the new baby, Peter and Elias were not so interested in touching Oliver.

My wonderful neighbors Sara and Angela

Baby Oliver.....? we haven't given him a middle name yet.

Ready to go home

Wonderful grandma and Oliver

(thank you grandpa for loaning out grandma for 2 weeks)

All settled in!

big boy

2011-08-26T14:04:00.000-07:00

Peter has moved out of his crib and into a bed. The transition has gone pretty smoothly. Peter loves being in the same room as his other two brothers.

And since Peter thinks he is a big boy because he sleeps is a bed, he thinks he can be naughty like a big boy!
I was in the process of refinishing this set of drawers(this is the final product). I just finished all the paint stripping and sanding so I got out our cans of primer and paint. Peter was outside wathcing my every move. After opening the primer, I found the it was no good any more. I opened the paint and it was just fine. I threw the primer in the trash and I was doing that Peter picked up a srew driver and started to try and open the can of paint just like I had. I needed to go inside and brush my teeth before we left to Homedepot, so I got a hammer and made sure the lid was on very securely. But nothing is safe from an English boy.

After about 2 minuets, this is what I came back outside to..... A little boy who was very proud of himself. But he knew somthing was wrong, becasue he immidiately threw down the paint brush. And if painting the driveway wasn't bad enough.....

In the two minuets I was gone, he had painted my car also. Luckily it was the tire, mirror and windows that he felt needed the paint job, so it came off no problem.

And just to prove his skills, when we got home with the new can of primer, he immidiately grabed the primer and ran from the car. He picked up his weapon of choice, a screw driver. With in seconds he had the can of primer open. I still had my camera on me, but I had to snap this quick and get the primer from him before damage was done.

So if anyone has trouble opening a can of paint, Peter can do it no problem!!

Reuion

2011-08-24T15:49:00.000-07:00

We went to Washington State near Mt. St. Helens for a week for a family reunion. We had a great time exploring the area, and spending time with family.

We hiked through a lava cave. It was awesome. I had never been in pure blackness before. It is crazy to not be able to see anything.

This is a brother-in-law Randy, on the hike to the cave entrance.

Desending into the cave, Russ, Ty and Elias.

Inside the cave we turned off all the lights and took a picture. It was scarry and exciting to have complete darkness. Russ (brother-in-law) Randy, Madeline, Ty, Elias, Chris, Peter (in pack)

The cave had a few tricky parts like this 8ft verticle drop. A few places that we had to crawl through, and some tricky boulders to manuver around.

We found someone to take our picture so I could join the picture.

Our cabins that we stayed in were right near a lake. One of Chris' sisters brought her wave runner. We all had a great time on the lake.

Madeline and Chris on the wave runner. She loved the wave runner, but just about broke Chris' ear drums with her screaming when they reached 40 mph

Peter just liked being outside, but was never a fan of the water, boat or wave runner.

Chris' cousin broght his boat Madeline Ty and Elias enjoyed just riding on the boat.

Elias was the only one brave enough to dare the tube dragged by the boat.

Madeline having a good time on the edge of the water. This girl is still a big chick, She wasn't sure what lurked below in this lake water.

I didn't go on the boat, but I had a great time taking the wave runner up to 60mph. I am not sure this is an appropriate activity for someon 31 weeks pregnant, but I had a great time.

We loved visiting with family. This is Sally (chris' mom), and Wendy (chris' sister) with Peter.

Peter had a tough time adjusting to all the people. But he learned to love his Papa pretty quickly, they were best buds by the time the week was over.

This is GG, or Grandma Marion, She hosted the reunion for all her children, grand children, and great greand children. There was about 89 people who attended

This is Elias's new best friend, his uncle Ricky. He had to have uncle Ricky spike is hair like him. And the hair stayed in from Friday until Sunday when we made him bathe.

The air plane trip was pleasant as long as Peter was sleeping. The rest of the time it was a challenge, but only because of Peter. Ty, Elais and Madeline were perfect angels on the air plane.

Kiki

2011-08-21T04:42:00.000-07:00

My niece Kiki came to visit us. She lives in Hawaii so we don't get to see her very often. We had so much fun while she was here.

We went to the County Fair and saw lots of animals.

And got our faces painted...

did a hoola hoop contest, kiki barely had to move to keep it going, and never dropped the hoola hoop. She gets her hoola skills from her Aunt Adele who apparently still loves to hoola hoop!

We did rides, but not very many. After I promised the kids they could all pick a ride to go on, I was shocked to find out that they were 5$ a ride per kid!

With Kiki here, I did the girls hair. Madeline doesn't let me do her hair very often. Kiki wanted me do her hair everyday, and I loved it! It was good peer pressure for Madeline.

What would be summer without making flower necklaces.

The girls had a blast swimming together.

Madeline and Kiki made me jewelry

Peter, who is not a very big fan of strangers, warmed up to Kiki very quickly. After just a day, Kiki was his new favorite person. But really... who could not love this sweet little girl?

Adele, my sister, flew over to visit Kiki while she was here, and we all love having Adele over.

It was nice for the kids to have someone else to hang onto in the pool besides me.

We went to the children's museum, where the girls learned to climb walls.

We went into the butterfly-room, and saw hundreds of butterfly's.

We visited our neighbor Marice who has the most incredible tree houses.

We LOVED having Kiki visit Rochester. Our house felt empty when she left. It was sad to see her go.

These two two silly girls have been best friends since they were 1 year old. Madeline is already making plans for her next visit with Kiki.

family photos

2011-07-28T20:16:00.000-07:00

We finally took family photos, and I am sooo happy with how they turned out.

My niece Kiki and madeline are 6 months apart and have been bestfriends since they were 1year old. Kiki stayed with us for the past two weeks and we loved having her here!

The boys!

Madleline

Kiki

Peter

S. Elias

all my wonderful babies!

And this is my wonderful sister and photographer!!

The Wonderful World of Madeline!

2011-07-04T05:37:00.000-07:00

Madeline is moving on. My baby girl is going into 6th grade and into middle school. Madeline always amazes me at how wonderful she is!

Madeline receiving an award

Madeline and her teacher Ms. Foote

Madeline received and Academic Excellent Award (for being super smart and doing well in school), Principle Excellent Award(for being a model student and all around perfect at school), and an art award with a scholarship to an art school over the summer (she was one of two students who received the award).

Madeline is wonderful at school, and she will continue to excel in middle school.

What is wonderful about Madeline is she is great at so many things.

Madeline is a great big sister.

She loves to tease and bother her brothers, but when they need her, she is always there to help them. She help both Ty and Elias navigate their first day of kindergarden.

Madeline is a great runner. She ran two 5K races this year. I was bursting with pride as she crossed the finish line. She ran both races without walking.

Madeline is great at gymnastics.
She tries hard to improve and move on to the next levels. Unfortunately she had so much going on, she had to take a break from gymnastics the last part of this year. But she is excited to start up in the fall.

Madeline is a great baseball player.

Madeline started playing softball this year. She played when she was 6yrs, and she did not like it at all. So I was surprised when she asked if I could sign her up. She loved playing and always wanted to go outside and practice catching, and hitting. What ever Madeline does, she always tries her hardest to be great.

Madeline is a great violinist
She has been playing for 2 1/5 years now. Like every child, this is what she thinks of practicing lately. But she is a wonderful player. Click on this link to listen to her latest recital.

Violin Performance

Madeline is a great Snow boarder.
She finally had the guts to try out snowboarding and did awesome. Chris and Madeline had a great time snow boarding together this year.

Madeline is a great swimmer.
Because Madeline loves everything, she has to pick and choose what we sign her up for. We would go broke if I payed for all the lesson that she wanted. So swimming is purely recreational, but she absolutely loves it. When we go to the pool we spend about 3 hours there, and I still have to drag her out of the pool.

Madeline is a great adventurer.
A tree fell down in our backyard, Madeline didn't come inside for the entire day, she was so busy exploring, climbing and playing on the tree. She loves to hike, camp and to just be outside.

Madeline also enjoys
~ to Read, it is a challenge to keep her supplied with books to read
~ her long hair, she takes great care of her own hair
~ to brush her teeth, which is a funny thing to love, but she loves her teeth to be clean and will spend 3 min just scrubbing her teeth to get them clean
~to wear jewelry, I rarely wear any, but she loves to go through her jewelry box and decided what earrings and necklace to put on.
~all types of art, it was hard for her to decide which art class to take this summer.

I love Madeline and I am excited to see what this next step in her life brings. What ever she does next she will be wonderful at it!

The Bad and The Good

2011-07-03T15:58:00.000-07:00

So Peter fell out of the shopping cart, He was just in the basket part, when he reached out for something and took a dive to the ground head first. He smacked his forehead, but that whole section of his head swelled up, and bruised. Yes, I feel like a horrible mom... but I learned my lesson, he now gets buckled into the shopping cart, and so tightly there is no way he can wiggle out.

This is one week later, the swelling had gone down a little bit, but he maintained a nice black eye for two weeks. And the lump on his head has been there for three weeks now, luckily he has cute hair to hide it.

Summer is here and we got out the big bubbles, Sally (my mother-in-law) bought these for Madeline, and all the kids love them.

1170 pieces

2011-07-03T15:22:00.000-07:00

Ty received this Lego set from my brother for his birthday when he turned 6 years old. Ty is now 7 1/2. It only took us 18 months, but we finally put together all 1170 pieces. The plus side of taking so long to get it together, By the second half of building it, Ty was able to do it by himself.

Broken Elbow

2011-03-20T17:26:00.000-07:00

Our week started off with a trip to the emergency room. Peter was in the room playing with his brothers when I heard a blood curdling scream that didn't stop. Ty said Peter just tripped on the carpet and landed on the wood floor. Since that seems like such a small fall, I had thought that maybe he dislocated his elbow like Madeline did many times at that age. The Emergency Room thought so also, so they attempted to relocated his elbow. A few failed attempts at relocating his elbow, and the lack of any obvious fracture on the x-ray, left us no option but to follow up with a pediatric orthopedic. Chris put this pretty temporary cast on Peter, and we were sent home with a sad baby.

A week later we got to see the pediatric orthopedic, he confirmed the fracture and gave Peter a nice pretty green cast. Now Peter is a happy baby, and he like his cast. (thank you to our awesome neighbors for the superman t-shirt present). There are some great benefits to Peter's cast.
1- He can't open markers, he just brings them to me
2- He can't open water bottles and dump out all the water on the floor.
3- When taking something from him that he shouldn't have, it is easier to pull it from his one hand.

Lynette and Sam came and visited for the week end. Chris, Ty and Madeline all hit the slops with them and had a great time. Madeline has started snow boarding for the first time this year, she is a quick learner and is already better than me.

Lynette and Sam got to go skiing for the first time and had a blast. Ty skis, and LOVES it.

Happy birthday to Sam. This is my sister Lynette and her husband Sam. They live in DC, and drove up for the weekend.

I have no picture for this, but I am pregnant again! I am due Oct. 12th, and am miserable sick.

Skunked!!

2011-02-26T13:04:00.000-08:00

So the title is just about enough explanation that is needed. But just so you can laugh a little harder(because I know you are laughing because everyone does), I will give you the details of how the inside of our house got skunked.
It was about 9:30pm and Chris gets a call from our neighbor and hears "...static...static..static...your garage is open." So Chris says "OK thanks", and goes and closes out garage. Then sits and relaxes with our dog, while I was in bed sleeping because I was sick. At about 10:00pm Chris hears some noises on the steps in our garage that leads into our kitchen. Chris opens the kitchen door to investigate with Farley as his back up. Chris sees the skunk, but is not faster than Farley. As Farley lunges onto the steps he gets a mouthful of skunk spray along with the floor, door, walls, tool box, and all the random stuff that tends to accumulate by kitchen garage doors. 360 degrees of skunk spray reaching lengths of up to 12ft. Within seconds Chris shuts the door, with Farley on the inside. But in moments every crevice of our house is contaminated with the most awful skunk smell, that you really just can't imagine. Then to make matters worse, Farley runs through the house foaming at the mouth, drooling, spitting and oozing skunk spray.

The next few days, we found out from our neighbors that the skunk was so bad at all of their houses that they thought the skunked spayed right outside of their houses. But nope, it was inside our house and garage.

Chris spent 2 hours that night cleaning the impact zone. The stink burned so bad that we only half slept all night, before the main clean-up began in the morning. All of our kids slept right through the night. When they woke in the morning they thought they were going to die. Since the kids were sleeping on a different floor than where the skunk sprayed, we thought that they didn't smell too bad, so we sent them all off to school in the morning. Ty's teacher immediately bagged up all his belongings, and sat him apart from everyone. Madeline's teacher sprayed her down with perfume, and Eli's teacher just reported him to the nurse. So all our kids got to come home from school early for stinking too bad.

CLEAN UP
I left (in a car that received it's own share of the spray) the kids on the front lawn waiting for the bus and left to go shopping to find anything to rid skunk smell. Chris call just as I was leaving the hospital, he stunk to bad to stay, so he was coming home to help me tackle the stink. We split the stores, I hit up Walmart and Country Max, Chris got Home depot and Petsmart. We came home with an arsenal of cleaners and started the cleaning process. Every bit of fabric on our main level had to washed, and every surface had to be scrubbed. But then there was the problem, if we start washing laundry, it will just stink again from the house, but we can't get the house to stop stinking until we get all the fabric cleaned. So rugs, jackets, hats, laundry, all got thrown onto the porch to wait for the house to smell better to get washed. Then we washed and sprayed and washed. Slow, very slowly the stink began to fade. The next morning, an awesome friend (Gillian Bowman) then came and picked up about 15 loads of wash from my front porch and latter delivered it clean and folded. Then some more wonderful friends came and finished the last of the house cleaning for me while Chris and I went out to a hockey game together and got a break from the stink.

It's now one week from skunkfest 2011. Our house is definitely livable. Most of the time inside I don't even smell the skunk, there is just a slight residual skunk stench that I smell periodically and will fade with time. Our garage, is still pretty awful, but that will have to wait for warmer weather for us to spend more time in there scrubbing it down. Our cars also still smell, we will just have to wait it out for the smell to fade.

Oh, and what our neighbor actually told Chris was "there is a skunk walking up your drive way and your garage is open" So Chris just went and closed the skunk in our garage.

2011-02-08T12:03:00.000-08:00

This picture is for all my siblings. I have finally resorted to making a job wheel. It rotates every Saturday. It has been going wonderfully, and surprisingly, Elias has been the best at getting his job done. But it is not quite as bad as the wheel when we were growing up, because I have add my name.

Rochester is tough stuff, this is Ty and Elias waiting for the school bus as snow is coming down heavily. There is so much snow, that the snow plow has already come by but the roads are already covered. And of course, school is not canceled.

Peter all bundled up to go outside and play in the snow. He loves to go outside. He will love when spring comes and he can spend all day outside.

And lastly, this is a thank you from our cat Riley.

Full House

2011-01-13T14:17:00.000-08:00

My sister-in-law, Heidi and her 5 kids came to stay with us for Christmas and New Years. For some reason, I never took pictures on Christmas. But here is us with our New Years Eve celebration.

It was quite a household with 9 kids and believe it or not, I am not the only adult in this picture.

All the kids got along great. Madeline loved having little girls around especially Heidi's twins Hannah and Clair.

Heidi and her baby Sophi, who is 2 weeks younger than Peter.

Ty and James got along great except for a few instances. Like when James told Ty "wow, you have one fat bottom" When Hiedi told James that wasn't nice to say, James said "well it's true he has a very fat bottom" To which Ty protested, "It's OK if he says I have a big bottom, but I don't have a fat one"

Madeline also had a great time with Jillian, both are calm girls who love to read. This is them on the carousel at the strong museum of Play.

Lastly Peter and Sophi, All I can say is I am glad I don't have twins. And getting two babies to look and smile is just about impossible.

It was wonderful having them here. Thank you Heidi for making the effort to come all the way out here with all your kids. We loved you being here and miss you.

Christmas Tree

2011-01-13T12:46:00.000-08:00

We took the kids to a Christmas tree farm this year for our Christmas tree. They loved it. There were acres and acres of trees. The kids loved running around and picking a tree. We are hooked, I don't think we can ever go back to buying our tree at Homedepot.

This is the first time we bundled up Peter and brought him outside. He loved being outside... for about 10min until he got snot-cicles and frozen toes. Madeline found "the perfect" tree about a mile away. Despite me wanting to just cut down one of the million trees that were right next to us, Chris followed Madeline and retrieved her perfect tree.

Here is our perfect tree. We went with out ornaments this year for the sake of Peter. And thankyou Heidi for helping me put on the lights.

Gavotte

2010-11-21T18:48:00.000-08:00

Madeline had her 3 violin performance. The poor girl gets more and more nervous with each performance.
The week before the her recital she played this song over 70 times. I am so proud of Madeline for all the work she puts into learning the violin.

Click on the link to watch her performance:

Madeline's violin performance

Jen's designs.

2010-11-21T11:51:00.000-08:00

I've never been happy with how long sleeved shirts fit me. So this year I decided to make my own.

Jen's Fall Shirt collection.

I designed and sewed these shirts.

fitted black with a slight V-neck

A thick knitted fabric. It stays very warm, and the ruffle makes me feel a little more dressy.

Dark Rust fitted shirt with a bright flower appliqué.

best description is warm and fuzzy.

This has a much looser fit, a long sleeved T-shirt.

This shirt is my favorite. It looks great with jeans, and adds variety to my usually plain shirts that I wear.

This is my Christmas outfit that I designed and sewed. Chris says it is not "Christmasy enough" But I am very happy with how it turned out.

And lastly, my beautiful photographer.

North Carolina, Outer Banks

2010-10-31T18:33:00.000-07:00

Chris planned to go surfing during one of his vacations. The kids and I love the beach, so we crashed his surf trip. The house we rented had so much room that my brother and sisters were able to crash our vacation and join us. And lastly, Chris hurt his shoulder 2 days before we left, and ruined his surf trip. So Chris' Surf trip turned into my families beach vacation. We had an AWESOME time.

There were 12 of us, 5 adults and 7 kids.

This was the Hatteras Light House. We were here during the off-season, so the light house was closed and we couldn't climb to the top. But it was still fun to see, and I loved being able to hang out with my family

Me and my sibs: Adele, Nick, (me), Steph. The Outer Banks is a long strip of land that juts out into the middle of the ocean. This is us on the Sound side. The water was calm and there were lots of wind surfers to watch.

I told the boys to pose for me, I'm not used to there being any boys but mine, and Phillipi just jumped right in the picture. It was so fun to have my nieces and nephew there with us.

Peter and Aunt Steph, the kids always love their Aunt Stephy.

What fun is having a camera if you can't pose for a picture?

Nick did a great job entertaining all the kids playing Toon Town with them, actually he played and they would watch.

Arg..Shiver me timbers if this ain't the scariest pirate ye ever seen.

Then this be the scariest that there is!

We played hard and slept hard. I'm not sure why Elias thought this would be a good place to crash opposed to somewhere like the couch or his bed.

We had great warm weather, but it could get a little cool when the wind picked up. Chris loved being able to spend time with us and the kids.

We spent almost everyday at the beach. Our rental was just a few houses away from the beach and it was great to be able to just walk to the beach. Except for the patch of deadly mosquitoes that we had to pass to get to the beach.

Look at this skill!

It is so wonderful when kids actually play nicely together. Madeline pulling Ty in the waves.

Ali, Steph's daughter

Phillipi, Nick's son

Peter deciding if he likes the taste of sand or not.

Ty, loved the beach

My Beautiful Madeline

goofy Eli

The best part of everyday was ending it in the hot tub, I think we might have reached the capacity limit.

Everyone was sad to leave the beach house, especially chris who spent long over-due time with the kids, caught up on lots of sleep and actually had a chance to sit and relax. And look, can you believe we all still fit in this car, luggage and all! It was a 12hr drive home, and everyone survived the trip.

2010-10-29T00:03:00.000-07:00

Peter turned One!! Happy Birthday Peter.

This is as close as Peter got to wanting his birthday cake. After taking one bite he chucked the rest of his cake on the floor. We hadn't given Peter any sweet food, so he wasn't used to it and just doesn't like it. I have since tried brownies and cookies with him, and he just takes one bite then throws the rest on the ground.

Peter is still a crawler. A few times he has crossed the room walking, and he loves the game of walking between two people. But he still prefers crawling to walking.

Peter is such a fun baby! He loves to make all sorts of sounds except for mama.

Happy Birthday Peter We Love you!

Just for Steph (again)

2010-09-16T12:04:00.000-07:00

summer, 2010

2010-09-01T09:24:00.000-07:00

I have not been inclined to post all summer. I post much more on a regular basis in the winter because we are stuck inside with out much to do. But with summer we have been out and about and taking every advantage of the sun and warmth while we have it here.

What motivated me to post today is this picture. It cracks me up. Look at the attitude in the eyes of that girl, and the misery in Ty. My three olders kids have been fighting and bothering each other non stop. So my solution, I make the two who were fighting do a chore together. Unfortuately the kids haven't stopped the bickering, but on the plus side, my kids are getting lots done around the house. Madeline and Ty doing the dishes.

If I could say what we have done this summer in one sentence, It would be; We spent time with chris! We actually see Chris now, don't get me wrong, he is still very busy. But he actually comes home now and not just to sleep.

This is us on a hike down by the finger lakes.

At the beach, it was a pretty pathetic beach, but it did have awesome sand/wet dirt for a sand castle.

My 31st birthday Chris made me a pineapple upside down cake..... it was yummy. (Picture compliments of Ty)

This is Elias, he is a funny little boy. He turned 5 this summer and he is growing so fast. He had barely tuned 3 when we moved here from Los Angeles and was so little. He doesn't remember anything from LA. Chris found these cleats on a great clearance, and Elias is in love with them. Here is Elias in his summer out fit with his best friend, Farley.

and finally... Here is out little trouble-maker who current favorite activity is to help empty the dish washer.

Just for Steph

2010-07-20T15:17:00.000-07:00

Peter is getting close to 10 months, but here he is a few weeks ago at 9months old.

Peter is a wonderful, very busy baby. He keeps us all on our toes. The three older siblings are always helping out with Peter. They keep stuff out of his mouth, keep him away from cords and always double check that the stair gate is closed for me. Peter is a handful, I don't know how I would get along with out all my helpers.

Peter at 7 months

2010-05-19T11:54:00.000-07:00

Peter is mobile! It is very slow moving, just the kind I like. Peter moves just enough to get to all his toys, but not enough to get into trouble very quickly.

Friday night Chris went on a father sons camping trip with the boys. They had a great time and Ty and Eli loved camping. Friday night Madeline also spent the night at her friends house, which left me at home alone with Peter. As soon as I was alone I planned to shower. But I soon realized that I had lost all my help. Peter is mobile enough that he can't be left alone, and there were no kids to watch him while I showered. Having older kids is very useful, I don't think I could do it with just one baby anymore. I need all my little helpers.

2010-04-12T10:42:00.000-07:00

Peter is 6 months old!!

I tried to take pictures of Peter outside since it has warmed up, but i fail. Peter was too busy looking at everything new and exciting outside that I could never get him to look at the camera or smile. This is the best shot, even with out the smile he is a cute baby.

I set Peter on his back on his play mat and then went and started a load of laundry. When I came back this is what I found. So I guess Peter can roll over now and scoot.....but I missed it.

The English clan all in their new Easter clothes. Arn't these some cute kids.

With the warmer weather, we have loved spending time outside again. Madeline made this beautiful flower crown for Peter.

I added this just because I thought it was funny. When I uploaded my pictures to my computer there were a few bonus videos, compliments of Elias.

April

2010-04-01T07:34:00.000-07:00

Awsome dad

Having a dad for a doctor doesn't really have much perks. It actually really stinks for my kids because they don't get a lot of daddy time. Chirs is on a service right now where he only gets to come home every other day.
But there are a few good things to having a dad as a doctor........you get to have a really awsome April fools joke!
Chris put a cast on madeline's Arm so she can go to school and tell everyone that she broke her arm. He made it just lose enough that she can squeeze it off. So at the end of the day she will take it off and say "April Fools"

Teeth
Ty had a wiggly tooth since Nov. and it finally fell out.

There was lots of blood a drama.
But Ty was thrilled when the next morning he hada "Spanking new dollar"

Peters Is 6 months today

Last week he got two new teeth.

The Perfect Storm

2010-03-06T18:18:00.001-08:00

Let me give you some background. During my recent pregnancy I had a few cravings. I've never been a huge soda drinker, but Coke was just so tasty while I was pregnant. Chris would always get after me for drinking it. Another thing I liked was dried salted plums. I liked these before I was pregnant but wouldn't eat them much. I craved them so much during pregnancy that I begged my sister to send me some from CA....and she did. Each plum probably had a weeks worth of salt. The last thing that I ate a lot of wasn't really a craving, but a necessity. I had horrible heartburn and was popping Tums like candy. Come to think about it, it may have been due to all the salty plums with CocaCola.

Now, fast forward to the present day. On Friday, I had an appointment with the Urologist. We were discussing the causes of kidney stones. This is what the urologist told me. "Pregnant women are more likely to get stones and there couple different causes for kidney stones. One is genetic, which may be a cause for your kidney stones because a few people in your family have had them, another is dehydration. There are also some other things that could cause kidney stones such as drinking dark color soda like coke or pepsi, high sodium diet (eating a lot of salt)." At this point Chris asks, "Well what about taking calcium pills." The doctor says, "well it is good to take calcium and it wouldn't cause kidney stone unless you were really popping the Tums like 8-10 a day."

I was the Perfect Storm for a Kidney Stone. I was pregnant, I was drinking dark colored soda, eating salted plums (a few a day), eating 8-10 Tums a day, and it is in my genetics. I might as well have cut my self open and put the stone directly into my kidney. Afterward, I told Chris that Coke just isn't worth it.

The Beach

2010-03-06T15:45:00.000-08:00

We went to Los Angeles Feburary 11th -22nd. The highlights of that trip were spending time on the beach and getting some long over due sun. We had several friends that we didn't get a chance to meet up with. Our vacation just wasn't long enough.

Huntington Beach
Madeline's favorite part of the trip was seeing Kiki.

Peter was right at home on the Beach, He slept very well with the waves as background noise.

Crystal Cove, Laguna Beach
We had a picnic at the beach with Grandma Marion, Aunt Cynthia, Sally,Wendy and her two kids. This was probably one of our favorite days while in LA. The weather was 80 degrees and so wonderful, and it was so nice to spend some time with Grandma Marion and Peter got to meet his great-grandmother.

What made this vacation most wonderful was that Chris was able to join us in California
Wendy joined us last minuet and didn't have a chance to plan for the beach, these are my kids with Wendy's raggedy girls.
Peter loved the beach,
Dispite the lack of proper beach atire, Malorie and Julia had a blast.

Torrey Pines, San Diego
This beach has a nice 3 mile hike that all the kids enjoyed. Thank you Laurie for introducing me to Torry Pines, it is a favorite place of ours to visit every time we come into town.

Family

Lisa and Russ came into town. We had so much fun with them.
Uncle Randy and Ty, Cynthia and Randy drove up from San Diego
With everybody in town we celebrated Sara's birthday and Christmas on Feb. 14th

Mallory and Sara

Melissa drove down from Utah to see us. She has always been a favorite among the nieces and nephews. Stephs kids; Ali and Kat are in this picture also.
Ty and James became best buds.
Elias has always loved to snuggle up with my mom. Elias has always said he wants to move back to our "other" house and especially after this vacation, he just wants to move into grandma's house.
Papa and Hannah
Adele and his favorite Aunt Adele. Adele was there for Peter's birth and I think he remembers because he and Adele are best buds.
We got to see my baby brother Sam, He submitted his mission papers and is waiting for his call, we are all excited to find out where he will go.

The kidney stone

2010-03-02T07:16:00.000-08:00

It all started Sunday morning at 4am when I woke with sharp abdominal pain. I thought it was just really bad gas pain, or maybe too many sliders from the resident bowling party the night before. At 6:00 Chris left to go to work, and I was still feeling pretty sick, so I took a long bath. The bath felt good, but I was still having a lot of cramping. I crawled back in bed, hoping to go to sleep, but, I only started to feel worse. I thought that I was coming down with a bad stomach flu. I called Chris at work to let him know that I wasn't going to church and to let him know I was feeling awful.

I knew that I wasn't feeling good enough to take care of my kids especially Peter, so I called my friend Rebe to come and help me out, She said she would come over right away. The pain continued to get worse and more localized into my right side. I went to the bathroom and there was blood in my urine. I called Chris and he said that I should probably come into the ER, but to give my Doctor a call first. I am lucky that I have a doctor that I can get a hold of on Sunday morning at 8am. He told me it was probably a kidney stone and that I should go to the hospital to make sure it wasn't too big to pass and that it wasn't infected.

Rebe came in and took charge, she got all my kids dressed and ready to go. I called my neighbor Sara who came over and took care of Peter for me. Rebe loaded the three older kids in the car and took me to the Hospital. At the hospital it took about an hour for me to see a doctor and get some pain meds, by this time I was in extreme pain and was glad that I was at the hospital and not still at home. I got a CT scan of my abdomen and it confirmed that it was a kidney stone and my ureter was swollen and in bad shape. The urologist came and saw me and let me know that the stone was 6mm and was unlikely to pass without some intervention. The options were lithotripsy, breaking up the stone with shock waves, or ureteroscopy, putting a camera up the urethra into the bladder then through the ureter and break up the stone with the laser. He explained that the lithotripsy may not work due to the location of the stone and that although it was an invasive procedure, the ureteroscopy was more likely to get rid of the stone. We agreed that this would be best, so I was admitted to the hospital, brought up to a room and put on the stand-by list for the operating room the next day. I was getting a load of Dilaudid and Toradol and just felt out of it but still had lots of pain. Chris left and got our kids all set up to stay at friends houses. I stayed the night in the hospital and shared a room with a girl who had been in the hospital for 2 months after being shot in the abdomen. It was hard to sleep due the the pain, the confusion from the pain meds, and my roommates TV being on all night.

Monday morning I felt even worse, I was delirious from the pain meds, had a horrible head ache, and had horrible pain if I moved any part of my right side. At 2pm they took me down for surgery. 3:30 I was waking up in the recovery room and feeling much better. I was able to move with out shooting pain up my side. The surgery went well they were able to find the stone and blasted it to smithereens. They also found pus and were able to clean out the infection in my ureter. Because there was infection and swelling, the surgeon decided to leave a stent in my ureter. The stent is to keep it open while it heals so it doesn't close and scar shut. It will be in for 4 days and will be taken out in the office.

I got to go home just a few hours after the procedure. I had the option of staying in the hospital overnight, but I decided that I would rather be home and have Chris take care of me. So now I am home and happily healing. I feel like I just had a baby. I get sharp pains where the stent is and my abdomen is sore and achy, but I will take this pain over a kidney stone any time.
And just for the record, a kidney stone is as painful as labor.

Fun in the snow

2010-01-10T14:14:00.000-08:00

Peter at 3 months, I LOVE this baby.

Peter in his Sunday best for his baby blessing.

last year I created an igloo from piling up snow then hollowing it out. This year my igloo is better than last years, I created it from stacking snow-blocks.

Inside the Igloo

outside the igloo

Chris turned the top of the igloo into a sledding hill. The kids loved it.

2009-12-22T17:43:00.000-08:00

Peter in the Kitchen helping me cook!
Or more like distracting me from cooking.

He finished smiling at me and decided to just suck his hands.

Today was Cave-Man day at school. So last night I whipped out these cave man outfits. The kids enjoyed wearing them to school.

violin performance #2

2009-12-22T17:17:00.000-08:00

I wish I had learned to play an instrument. Nobody ever says "I am so disappointed that I wasted all that time learning to play an instrument." Both Chris and I think it is definitely worth the money, time and effort to have our children learn music.
I am so proud of Madeline. Like most children, she often complains about having to practice, but some days, she will just pick up her violin and play for an hour. I was so proud of her as I watch her performance. I know how much hard work she put into it. She played silent Night and she was so nervous, she could have cried. But, I think that she was even more scared to cry in front of everybody. So, she just got up in front of everybody and put on her brave face, and played beautifully!!

two months old

2009-12-04T10:59:00.000-08:00

My sister stephs says that I am a bad mom, You may not understand this picture at first...but here is what happened.
while Peter was naping, I decided to paint our stair well. I had gotten it all ready to paint....cleaning the wall and filling holes but then it sat like that for three days. As soon as Peter went down for a nap that I thought would last a long time, I started to paint. Peter did take a long nap, 2 hours, just not as long as I needed, it took me two hours and 15 min to finish painting. When Peter woke form his nap, I was almost done. I couldn't jsut stop painting right before I was finished. So I tried to quickly finish and clean up. Well in my hast, I spilt paint all over my arm and didn't know it. I went and picked up my screaming child who thought he was going to die of hunger and layed him in my arm to nurse him. 15 min later he was finished, I sat him up and saw my child with half his head painted. Fortunately only a little of it had dried, so I was able to wipe most of it off. The picture doesn't show the paint very well, But there was enough dried paint on his head that Chris came home and said "Why is there paint all over the baby's head"

Here is my adorable baby at two months old

I did my own photo shoot but Peter wasn't always very cooperative. I needed another set of hands to help hold him, This was Chris' favorite picture

and peter didn't last very long before he was done with me taking his picture.

Lyntte and Sam drove up for Thanksgiving, it was wonderul to have them here, especially when it was time to clean up. Unfortuately, we didn't take any pictures of all of us or of our beautiful feast, just the after math.

Thanksgiving weekend, we always go and pick up a live Christmas tree. These are my cute boys all bundled up and pink from being outside, and on our way home to decorate the tree.

This was peter's fist time getting bundled up, and he wasn't very happy about it.

Here is our tree beautifully decortated by Madeline Ty and Elias.

We were fortunate to have Chris around for the whole 4 day thanksgiving weekend. Chris really enjoyed the time off and catching up on so overdue sleep.

Happy Halloween and one month old

2009-11-03T07:12:00.000-08:00

This is my sweet little baby at one month old.

He has been smiling since he was 2 weeks old, but getting it on camera is not easy. Ty actually took this picture while I was prompting Peter to smile.

My happy little vampire, this is his scary face. He couldn't ever help not giggling while trying to growl.

Ty the Star Wars Clone Trooper.

And Madeline the Halloween Girl.

violin performance

2009-10-25T17:44:00.000-07:00

Madeline has now been playing the violin for one year, and this is her first performance, I was sooooo proud of her. Madeline and the other little girl are playing the melody, and the other two are playing the harmony.

Happy 9th Birthday Madeline

This is Madeline's favorite meal her dad makes for her...Crepes with whip cream, a variety of fillings, fried banana's and sausage. I must admit it is one of my favorites also.
Madeline didn't have much of a birthday party, just some friends over and a pinata. She had a great time and said she was sad that the day was over so quickly.

Here is baby Peter, he has started to smile now, but getting the smile on camera is kind of tricky. This is a picture just after the smile.

Two weeks and all alone

2009-10-17T10:34:00.000-07:00

This is my wonderful sister Adele.

She stayed with me for three wonderful weeks.

She cooked me wonderful dinners, and dessert every night. Drove my kids to swimming, gymnastics and school, kept my kitchen clean, and was great company. But now she is gone and I am all alone....it is very sad.

This is one of her desserts. It doesn't look that great, but it sure was yummy.
While Adele was here she was also my photographer. She took some much over due family pictures.

Our tree house that Chris was able to finish on his week vacation.

This is my little monkey, you can't tell me he doesn't look like a monkey here.
I love this little boy, I could eat him up he is so precious!!
Aside from having PUPPS (Horrible itchy hives all over my body from the increased hormones ) and a baby the isn't a great at nursing, and bleeding cracked nipples, things are going great. This is a picture of how we feed peter half the time, with a medicine dropper. Nursing is so painful that I can hardly stand it sometimes, but giving him a bottle makes him not want to nurse so when I do nurse it is even more painful. The lactation consultant suggested using a medicine dropper, and so far it has worked great. It gives me a break from nursing, but doesn't give the baby nipple confusion like the bottle was doing.

Baby Peter.

2009-10-07T14:29:00.000-07:00

Peter Nicholas English was Born!!
9lbs 1oz and 21 1/2 in.

With my due date the 27th, my sister Adele arrived on Sept 26th to help out. However, Peter was content where he was in my belly and didn't want to come out. On Oct. 1st at 10:00am I went to the hospital to get induced.

Here is the short version of my delivery.

10:00 AM arrived at the hospital

12:30 Dr. Christensen arrived and stayed either in my room or just outside my room until the baby was born. It was nice to have my own Dr. at my beckon call.

1:00 got my epidural.....I wanted NO Pain! with the epidural my legs immediately went numb, and my belly was mostly numb.

1:30 pitocin was started.

4:00 contractions started, and I was feeling them!!??

5:00 contractions were were regular and painful, my goal of no-pain....failed. The anesthesiologist came to check on why my epidural wasn't working. He gave me a large dose of medication through the epidural. All it did was make my legs go completely dead. At this point my legs could have been amputated and I wouldn't have known.

5:30 the first epidural was removed and a second one was placed. Life was good. Except that by now I felt as if there was no chance my legs ever coming back to life.

6:30 began to push baby out.

6:42 PM baby Peter was born.

2:00 AM My feeling returned to my legs and I was finally able to get out of bed.

This is Dr. Christensen and my delivery nurse Rebecca (I was her only patient the whole day).

proud daddy!

Big sister loves her new brother. Her goal is to Make Peter love her and not her brothers.

The cute baby

He immediately wanted to suck on everything. But I am not a fan of finger/thumb sucking, he has already adjusted to his pacifier.

Adele was a wonderful help during the delivery and has been awesome helping out at home.

This is the lot of the fourth child. Here is his going home outfit. Madeline and I picked out an outfit for him to come home in, but unfortunately, Chris forgot it when he came to pick me up. So we put a hospital shirt on his legs to help keep him warm. Poor 4th child.

This is the first time we actually have space for a baby. The baby doesn't have to be squished into some corner of an apartment. This summer I spent finding baby things at garage sales and on craigslist. This is our first baby nursery, and I love it! And the kids love the new soft carpet.

Chris's vacation and the first day of school.

2009-09-09T06:56:00.000-07:00

When Chris is Home...

Chris has this week off for vacation, and it has been wonderful to have him around. The kids especially love him being around because they get to do things with Chris that I just don't do. Like set up a tent in the kids room for the kids to sleep in. Chris has also taken the kids on bike rides, jumped on the trampoline with them, and spent countless hour wrestling.
With Chris home, we were able to can peaches. Our pears are waiting to get ripe so we can can those also. It is a beautiful site seen all the peaches finished and the canning mess all cleaned up.
Madeline was a big help with canning. She peeled the skins off the peaches after they were blanched.

An empty nest....Well at least for 3 hours a day ( and only for about another week until the baby is born).
All my kids were off to school today. Madeline in the 4th grade, Ty started kindergarten, and Elias is now in Pre-K; Ty and Elias both have school from 9-12.

Ty rode the school bus for the first time, Madeline was a wonderful big sister and sat with Ty on the bus, even though she had to sit in the front with all the rest of the kindergartners and not with her friends at the back of the bus. Ty was such a "big boy" he just hoped on the bus with out any concerns or looking back. When Madeline was in Kindergarten she cried every morning until January that she didn't want to go, I'm glad that we won't have to go through that same ordeal with Ty.

Madeline was sad she was going to have to last a whole day without seen her beloved cat "Riley". But she really looked forward to seeing her teacher and all her friends again.
Elias cried all morning that he was too scared to go to school, but once he saw all the boys playing with cars, he was just fine.

A side note on my pregnancy...I'm 3cm dilated, and the doctor says the baby looks like it could come any minuet, so I'm hoping it is soon.

all in a days work

2009-08-20T11:49:00.000-07:00

So I haven't posted about my naughty boys for a long time. That's because they haven't been naughty. They have been really wonderful the past year. I actually thought that they out grew been just plain trouble makers. But really they were just waiting for me to let my guard down.

The day started off like any other day. Breakfast, get dressed then brush teeth. Well Ty was particularly quick getting ready and he ended up in the bathroom all by himself brushing his teeth. I was happy with him that he was all ready to go so quickly, that is until I went into the bathroom to brush my teeth. That is where i find ty's first disaster of the day. There is blue liquid all over the walls, toilet, floor sink. It's the new mouth wash that we bought for Madeline the kind that is supposed to stain your teeth blue then the kids can brush it off. The mouth wash also comes with a cool squirt spout which can double as a great squirt gun Which is how 3/4 of the bottle of mouth wash ended up all over the bathroom. I was very pleased to see that the mouth wash only stains teeth blue and not floors and walls.
After that mess was cleaned up, it was off to the doctors. Ty is going to start Kindergarten, which means kindergarten shots. I made the mistake of letting him know that he was going to get his shots. So as soon as we got to the doctors office, Ty hid under a table. And he wouldn't come out even when they called us back. So i had to move some chairs and drag him out by his feet and this is when he started screaming. Then the kicking and throwing his body on the ground started as we walked down the hall to the exam room. Ideally i would have sat him on my lap, but with my large belly I don't have much of a lap. The two nurses, worried for my unborn child told me to step back and they would restrain him to give him the shots. They sat him on the table (still kicking and screaming). Once the needles were brought out is when he really started convulsing his whole body. He was too much for the nurses so i joined in by pinning his head down. He got two shots in each arm that took about 30 seconds once we got him restrained enough that they could quickly stab him. Then back off home.
The rest of the morning was spent with me picking up house and the kids helping a little but mostly playing. In the afternoon all the kids went out to play in the sprinkler, I grabed the sunscreen off the bathrrom counter (I had asked Ty earlier that day to put it away, but it only made it as far as the bathroom counter). I turned the sunscreen over gave it a good shake down then popped the cap and squirted. Instead of the thick ooze i was expecting to land in my hand. High powered watery, sunscreen with a few thicker clumps squirted all over my belly. I glanced down at Ty and the look of guilt was all over his face. Who knows why kids do things, at least spraying the mouth wash was probably lots of fun, but filling my sunscreen bottle with water, I just don'tget it. But i will tell you this i was furious. Sunscreen isn't cheep, and neither is specialty mouth wash, the wasted money was quickly adding up in my head.
But unfortunately this wasn't the end of Ty's naughty day. Madeline has started her first very, own scrap book. I let her pick out pictures, then get them developed for her then let her go to town with any of my scrap booking supplies that she wants. Well Sometime that evening, Ty slipped into my sewing/scrap-booking room and thought he would help Madeline crop her pictures. He didn't do quite as good of a job as Madeline would have like. Below is the lovely mess that Ty created with the photos. This time I didn't let myself get too mad, Ty is the one who got furious when he found out that he gets to keep all his cut up pictures and we are going to use his money to get new pictures printed for Madeline.

Here is me at almost 8 months (5 more weeks to go). And if you havn't seen it on facebook, I chopped off all my hair.

And here is my baby girl. She wanted to earn some money, so Chris told her to mow the lawn and he would give her 5$. She only made it half way before she died of sweat and exhaustion so she got 2.50$. But she says next week she is going to mow on a cooler day and she thinks she will do the whole thing so she can get the whole 5$. Isn't she Great!

Monroe County Fair

2009-07-22T11:45:00.000-07:00

This is definitely a highlight of our summer, the demolition derby at our county fair. These two cars that you see closest came in 1st and 2nd place. They could both actually drive still, 28 just had to call it quites because he was getting smoked out. We also love the "car roll over contest" This is where the cars actually see how many times they can make their car roll....It is pretty awesome.

here are my kids dominating the push-up contest.
And Madeline loves all the animals. Although this is as close as she would get, she swore the mom cow was going to break free of the rope and trample her for getting too close to her babies.

from garden to table

2009-07-22T11:25:00.000-07:00

This is Basil in my garden that is very happily growing, with plenty of leaves to pick.

Here is the Basil being turned into pesto.

Then to the dinner table, and the kids are happily eating, it was a success!!

Nana and Papa's visit

2009-07-22T10:48:00.000-07:00

Chris' parents were here for 10 wonderful days. We all loved having them here, and I was especially sad to see them go. It is nice to have someone else around to help clean and take care of the kids, and to fix anything you want done. They worked hard finishing all our house projects that had been postponed due to Chris' busy schedule.

My in-laws were here for 10 days, and Chris got one day off while they were here, so we all went to a place called Watkins Glen and went on a hike down a gorge. It was beautiful and the kids especially had a good time.

I may be a mean mom, but these two pictures crack me up. This is Elias not happy about sitting on this tree, because he was not very stable. We say "hold it, one more picture"

Then here is Elias a second later falling off of the tree.

My kids had such a wonderful time with their Nana and Papa. Here is a great picture of them all having blast in the swimming pool.

Thank you Sally and Steve for all you hard work and for the wonderful time we had with you.

for Steph

2009-07-08T16:18:00.000-07:00

My in-laws are in town and they do nothing but the list of chores I give them while here. They have ben here for 4 days and painted my house. this is Sally finishing up the trim.

This is me at 27 weeks or 6 months pregnant.

Summer

2009-07-05T15:59:00.000-07:00

Summer is finally here and has brought with it all the exciting things that happen with warm weather.

#1 biggest news of the summer, we finally gave in to Madeline and got a pet. He is an out door cat and very low maintenance. But a joy to all the kids, especially Madeline, "Riley " is the love of her life.
#2 Swimming lessons have begun and all the kids love their swimming lessons. Especially Elias, he couldn't be more thrilled with his lessons.
#3 fun in the sun, and of course the summers first sun-burns. Our very wonderful neighbors bought us this pool as a summer present for my kids, and the kids love it. And after their first sun burn they are more patient while I apply the sunscreen.
#4 Staying up late, and playing outside. This picture was taken at 8:30pm and it was not even getting dark yet (gets dark around 9:30). I was baking and Elias was dying to poke at the baking flour. So I fill a cookie sheet with flour and they played until it was all on them and none left in the pan.
And the best summer activity...... getting stitches.

Elias had his 4th birthday on Wednesday July 1st. But it was a very traumatic birthday this year for him. The night before his birthday, Elias fell on his scooter, as you can tell by the picture, it earned him 5 stitches (and yes he was wearing his helmet at the time) . Then Wednesday morning, Elias had a dermatology apt. for some bumps that he had on his legs and were starting to spread. Turns out he had molluscum contagoisum, which is a viral skin infection and best treated by burning off each individual bump. So Happy Birthday Elias, now lets burn you about 20 times. But he was a trouper, he cried and whimper, but never flinched and held still while they burned all his bumps.

Elias was very specific on his birthday cake. He wanted a chocolate cake with strawberry frosting, and covered in candy. I took the kids to the grocery and let them go wild in the bulk candy section picking what they liked best, then covered the cake in it. You can tell by the picture the cake was a success.

We are all LOVING the warm weather, and being able to spend lots of time outside, and I am especially happy to be finally over my morning sickness, it only took me until about my 25th week for me to stop throwing up. I hope everyone else's summer is going as well as ours. And I am looking forward to a wonderful week with my in-laws in town!

This summer!

2009-06-17T13:22:00.001-07:00

I'm going HOME ! ! ! My sister Lynette is getting married August 1st. And I will be in LA July 25th through August 10th. I can't wiat to see family and friends.

Also this summer I will be teaching a sewing class along with a good friend Jaime Mitchell. Jaime has posted great pictures of what we will be making, check it out!

http://jbmitchell.blogspot.com/2009/06/announcing-fun-new-class-for-girls-this.html

Gettin' stuff done

2009-06-07T15:04:00.000-07:00

So we are all soaking up the warm spring air. We are getting as much stuff done as possible before the cold winter is upon us again. We started our spring by going to the lilac festival taking pictures of the kids. Now, I finally have photos of all my beautiful babies up on the wall. I am very happy with how all the pictures turned out. And since I took all the pictures myself (with the help of my sister) it wasn't too expensive. I love seeing these pictures up in my dinning room.

The next on-going project that we finally finished was Madeline's bedroom. She is very happy with how it turned out, and so are we. Our first adventure with a wall paper border was tricky but it was a success. We will have to see how it with stands up to being in a kids room.

Here is my garden, It is not the most beautiful, but it does the job. Chris did what he could for me with the dirt, Then I did the planting. I've got tomatoes, basil, and cilantro. I am hoping for lots of yummy fresh tomatoes.
And here is my final summer project, BABY. At about 23 weeks, the morning sickness has finally ended. It is wonderful to not be throwing up every day, but this pregnancy is still difficult. As the nausea left, on came the heartburn. I'm always starving and I've gained 25lbs already! It was much easier to be pregnant when I was 20 years old.

Today I am 24 weeks along.

Exciting news!! My sister Lynette just got engaged. No date yet, but likely this summer. I'm looking forward to being back in L.A. for a bit and visiting with friends and family.

Family photos

2009-05-11T05:50:00.000-07:00

It's a BOY
We found out we are having another boy. Madeline was actually very happy about it. She enjoys being an only girl. Ty was the upset one, he was really hopng for a baby sister. The due date is Sept. 27th.

My sister Lynette who just got back from her mission in Brazil came to visit me for a week. It was wonderful ! ! My kids LOVED her. This morning Lynette left and Elias wondered the house calling her. When I told Elias she already went home he broke down crying. We will miss her.

Lynette helped me get my kids pictures taken, I was really happy with how the photos turned out.

Ty's smile is the kind of smile you get after you have been trying to convince your children to smile and look at the camera for a long time.

Yellow teeth....maybe you should brush

2009-04-17T07:38:00.000-07:00

Madeline was just sitting and chatting with me while I was folding Laundry. When Madeline tells me as she is staring directly at my teeth.
"Mom you know Sometimes it is hard for people to brush there teeth all the way along their gum line. So then they just end up brush the edge of their teeth. But it is really important to spend the time to brush all of your teeth. Because then if you don't the top half of your teeth will turn yellow and just the edge of your teeth will be white. "

I say "Madeline, you know my teeth aren't yellow because I don't brush them, They are yellow because they all fell out and died and are yellow from the inside, But thank you for your concern for my teeth"

Leave it to kids to let your know that your looks are not quiet up to par. And isn't it great to get hygiene advice from an eight year old. But at least she tried to be very tactful, and not insulting.

Our family picture Easter morning. Easter was a little anti climatic this year for us. Madeline spent 5 days including all of Easter weekend with a 102 fever. So we didn't do much.

Betsey Hawkins

2009-04-04T07:32:00.000-07:00

Betsey and her cute baby Nora came and visited me. I loved them being here. It is always nice having company especially when all they do is hang out with me and help me clean my house!! I miss our UCLA ward, So it was nice to see Betsey(the greatest visiting teaching companion ever)
My kids were not quiet as thrilled to have and obnoxious 1 year old always following them around, slobbering on all their stuff and invading their personal space. Especially Elias was happy that baby Nora was leaving today.

While Betsey was here we went to go see an Opera "Le Nozze di Figaro." Betsey tried to enforce the rule of "no flash photography" So I only got a picture of us. It was a fun night out (even though there were very few people there under 60yrs.)

We also went to the Rochester Museum of Play, Number one thing to see in Rochester according to tour guide books. This is Betsey jumping a digital rope, with a counter....go Betsey!

Nora was in awe most of the time we were there. She especially loved the fish tank and Elmo.

We went to Palmyra and waked around the Sacred Grove even though it was cold and rainy.

My boys loved all the puddles and full streams running through the Sacred Grove. Nora was not happy that she couldn't jump in with the boys. Still she got her fair share of mud and water. Everyone arrived back at the car wet and muddy.

Trip to Brazil, March 2009

2009-03-28T13:21:00.000-07:00

March 13th to March 24th, I went to Brazil with my two sisters Steph and Adele. On the 18th we met up with Lynette(another sister) and my mom. We Had the time of our lives. We enjoyed lots of time on the Beach just relaxing and enjoying the sun and warmth. The air was 85 degrees and the water was 90 degrees. I went during Chris' week of vacation and he stayed home with all the kids.

We spent 4 days in Porto De Galinias, where we snorkeled all around a huge reef, swam, surfed, played in the water, built sand castles, shopped, ate lots and lots of food, laughed and just had a wonderful time.

In the evening we always went to the center of town. One night they had a huge group of drummers, they were fun to watch.

"We are free, no kids, no responsibility, and lots of warm Beach"

We went Banana Boating. It was this large inter tube that was dragged by a speed boat. We were thrown off every few minuets. It was a little too much time in the water for Adele, but Steph and I loved it, Well I loved it until the last time I was thrown off I did a belly flop that left my stomach red for 2 days.

Another beach called Muro Alto. It was so beautiful.

We went to a city called Olinda, it is a big place for Carnival, these large people-puppets were used for Carnival. They also have a lot of old 16th century churches that were nice to look at.

After we picked up my mom and Lynette, we went to an island with another nice beach (but not quite as nice as Porto De Galinias) We ate shrimp and raw oysters. Well I didn't eat the raw oysters, but everyonse said they were really yummy.

Us on a fairy boat to the Island.

We went to a city called Cararru, it was more inland, We visited a few water falls there.

This is my all time favorite picture. I love this picture of my sister steph, It cracks me up every time I look at it. The water was a little cold, the rcock was very slippery and the waterfall was coming down hard.
We had lots of fun in the water falls.
Drying off and enjoying the warm sun (although the rock was a little hot. )

Sisters

2009-03-07T12:48:00.000-08:00

THANK YOU, Adele!

I just got this package in the mail from my sister. Wool socks to keep my toes warm and chocolates to help keep my feeling well. Adele, you are wonderful.

I am going to Brazil in One week with 3 of my sisters and we are going to have the time of our lives, no kids, no husbands, beaches and 80 degree weather, what else could a person ask for!

Besides good for traveling with, my sisters are good for talking on the phone with, getting sympathy from , sharing maternity clothes with, complaining about all of life's' troubles to, having some one to talk to when you are lonely because you haven't seen your husband in three days, there is nobody who understands me like my sisters, I don't know what I would do if I didn't have my sisters. I love you guys!

For my brother nick, I wouldn't have posted this picture if my brother hadn't insisted on it. He wants me to post a monthly blog of my belly growth or for right now, the lack there of. So here is skinny me, and my little baby bump.

We went to the local fire house, with our play group. Despite the awful, terrible morning sickness that has me throwing up several times a day. I try and take my kids out sometimes. They had a blast at the local fire station. For 40 min they got to climb in and out of the fire trucks, hit buttons, turn on light and try on clothes. The kids had the time of their life, it was hard to get them out of there.

February, a long long month

2009-02-23T06:18:00.000-08:00

This has been the most eventful month for me to make is through in a long time. I would have posted events as they hit me, but our computer crashed. So that is the first thing. I have had to go with out my computer for awhile. Second, I have been troubled with extremely painful toes, that have swollen, turned blue, itch and burn like crazy since November. After several doctor appointments, I finally went to a dermatologist and was diagnosed with a condition called Perniosis. To explain what it means in simple terms….my toes are allergic to the cold! So the solution is to keep my toes warm. Which isn’t the easiest thing to do living in these arctic conditions. It is a little ironic that I have this condition. I would have known sooner, except I have never been in the cold long enough for it to effect me. There are benefits to my condition; I now turn up my thermostat to 68 degrees and don’t feel guilty(it is a medical necessity) and I get new boots(which are coming in the mail). I have to give my self a hot foot bath twice a day(which is sometimes inconvenient, but usually very enjoyable. ) With the added effort of keeping my feet extra warm, the pain is almost completely gone.
Next is the fact that for most of this month I have been sick in bed (which has made it extra easy for me to keep my feet warm). But I have felt completely miserable. When going to the doctor, I found out that the only cure for my sickness is to wait it out 9 months. So baby number 4 is on the way. I am sick, very very sick. I wasn’t nearly this sick with any of my other kids. But my mom says that she always got a little sicker with each pregnancy, and since I am like her in every other physical way, I guess I will too. But my poor abandoned kids. Cereal is now a staple of our lives. Dirty laundry piles are everywhere, and only get done when we run out of socks. Chris steps up and has really helped out…when he is home. Hopefully this sickness will pass soon.
Due to a computer crash, there will be lack of pictures for awhile.

snowboarding

2009-01-29T07:00:00.000-08:00

There is a snowboarding hill that is not too far from here. Every Thursday they have what they call "ladies day". On Ladies Day, lift tickets for women are 25$ and childcare is free. We have friends that happily lend us their snow boarding equipment. So last Thursday, happened to be Chris' day off, so we got to go snow boarding together. We had such a wonderful time. Although I am a miserable snowboarder, my only experience is when my friend Laurie took me out a few times in Utah about 5 years ago. I never really got very good, but I did love it.
Chris was very nice, and stayed with me the whole time I was snow boarding, even though I never left the bunny hill. After three hours, and a few very painful falls, I sat and drank hot chocolate for an hour and relaxed while Chris was able to get in a few runs. It took until Monday before I could move without being in awful pain. But I look forward to going again.

I forgot my camera, so the only thing that I have for evidence of our fun day is the pile of snow gear there was to clean up afterward.

The snow still fascinates me. I love how everything turns white, and is silent. This is my street in front of my house yesterday afternoon.

Ok, snow shoveling my dvieway is getting very old. I didn't want to shovel my drive way before I had to take Ty to school. But comming home it took quiet the effort to make it back up my drive way. So before I had to leave again, I did lazy shoveling. I cleared out just enough room for my tires.

The city snow plow half buried our trash can. I wasn't in the mood to dig it out.

Adventures in the snow

2009-01-17T13:55:00.000-08:00

The weather has reached zero degrees.

I have learned why nobody goes out when there is a blizzard. Of course I knew the obvious hazards, like hard to see while driving, slippery roads, and very cold. But when it is a Thursday night, and it has been snowing for two days, and you are all out of milk, eggs, bread, and cereal; those things just don’t seem like a huge deterrent to going out. I can drive very slowly and cautiously, I have winter tires on my car, and I will make sure everyone has their coat on.
Well, all of you who are acquainted with the snow might see my folly.
With plans to go to the store (and no hopes of a husband coming home within the next 24 hours) I went outside and spent an hour shoveling the foot of snow that had already piled up in our driveway. When I had the drive way cleared, everyone put their coat and shoes on, and we were off to the store, Blizzard and all.

A photo of my freshly shoveled drive way. But with all the snow, It was ready to be shoveled again by the time I was finished.

With in seconds of leaving I came across our first problem, With the heavy amount of snow, all the city snowplows were in full force trying to keep the main roads and Freeways clear, they were not even close to getting to our street. Our street was beyond slippery; it took us 10min for us to make it out the .5miles to the main street. We were just inching along as I was working my hardest to keep my tires from just spinning in 8inches of slush and snow. And of course there was whining; Madeline started it off complaining that I was going way to slow and it was taking so long to get to the store. I was doing my best to just move let alone not get stuck in the snow.
Elias hates the snow blowing in his face, he howled as I took him out into the windy, snowy air. So I carried him in with his face buried in my neck.
Our grocery store here is great, they have free child care, while I grocery shop for up to one hour. Whenever I go shopping, no matter what I need, I will spend a whole hour at the store. Often I will bring a book and read in their coffee shop to fill the rest of the hour that I don’t use shopping.
Well after my hour of childfree shopping, we head back to the car.

I now know why people don’t go shopping when there is a blizzard. I’ve got one kid who refuses to walk in the snow, 3 kids who won’t be left alone while I run to get the car, one shopping cart full of groceries that can’t be pushed through the thick snow and slush. One car with 4 inches of snow ice built up.
So this is what had to happen, I gave Madeline one gallon of milk to carry then loaded the other three gallons of milk and 7 bags of groceries on to my arms. Had Ty hold Elias’ arm so he could drag him along as Elias protested walking with the snow blowing in his face. Then we tried to hustle to the car before my arms broke off. Madeline by far thought she had the hardest job. But I was grateful she was carrying at least one gallon of milk. I tried to encourage them, and ignore the whinning as we made our way to the car.
Once at the car, I dropped the groceries in the snow, buckled in kids, then tried to start the car but it was dead. (I keep a car jump starter in my car.) Pop the hood, jump-start the car. Put the groceries in the car, scrap the car down so I can see. Then get in the car and try to defrost, this was so much work and it was so cold, painfully cold. I sat in the car and have now sworn to myself, never again are we going grocery shopping in the snow.
And to top off our trip, on the way home the snow plow finally made it down our street, and completely blocked off our driveway. So I get out and dig our way in. My fingers were so painfully cold, I could hardly move them when I finished.

Lesson learned, no shopping during a blizzard.

Another side note, I saw the largest vehicle that I have ever seen in my entire life…a snow plow. They are absolutely enormous. In my little car I was very humbled, and intimidated, and the kids were a little scared when the plow made a u-turn just feet from our car. This is the first time I have ever seen a snow plow. In awe of their size, I talk about the snowplows a lot, and have been told that the snowplows here are much bigger than the ones in Utah

We got to have Kiki stay at our house for two weeks after christmas, and we LOVED having her here.

Ty armed with a deadly snow ball (well actually not too deady because it was too heavy for him to throw)

If you click on the next two pictures, you can see Madeline and Kiki catching some air.

We all miss kiki and are already looking foward to her next visit!

This picture is compliments of Chris. I know every Thompson will instantaly recognize this coat. My mom lived in this coat all through our childhood despite the fact that we lived in So. Cal. Once my parents built their new house with central heating, this coat got pushed to the back of my moms closet. So now my mom has passed it on to me. Mind you I won't be seen in public with it on, But it is a great house coat. We are able to save a few dollars and keep our thermastat lower thanks to this coat.

snow, snow, lots of snow.

2008-12-27T14:15:00.000-08:00

Growing up in California, I haven't had too many encounters with snow. As a child, I always had dreams of playing in endless snow. Well my endless snow came last week. Madeline had her first "snow" day (meaning school was canceled due to snow). I was actually really excited to go out and shovel the drive way for the first time. But the snow kept coming, and After 4 days of shoveling snow, needles to say, I don't feel quite as excited. Despite the shoveling of our mile long drive way, we have had lots of fun.

We built an igloo ! ! Chris kept threatening that if I actually finished the igloo he was going to make me sleep in it. Well I did finish it, even though I didn't sleep in it, Madeline and I had lots of fun hanging out in it together. These are pictures of me and Madeline inside the igloo. We put the camera on a timer to take our picture which was quiet the challenge with thick snow gloves on.

We all went to a local sledding hill after Christmas and had a great time.

our back yard as winter wonder land. The circle formation is my attempt at forming an ice rink. My ice rink failed when all the snow melted completely yesterday and not partially as I had hoped. But I am not worried, I have 4 1/2 more years to master my ice-rink-making skills.

and finally what you have all been waiting for.....the largest snow man ever built standing at a enormous 6ft 5in.
Actually I was very disappointed when Chris told me that the largest snowman ever built was 25ft tall. So I guess I'm not going into the Guineas Book of World Records, but at least I was able to impress Chris with my snow man making skills

bigger is better

2008-12-13T07:47:00.000-08:00

I don’t know why, but it is something that is just ingrained in me and I just think this way. I’m pretty sure it is a Thompson thing, because all my brothers and sisters feel the same way. If a little bit is good, then a lot is better. If a little dollop of whip cream on a pie is good, then completely saturating the pie is better. If having a warm jacket is good, then having a jacket that can survive artic temperatures (even though you live in Southern California) is better. If camping for a weekend is good, then camping for 2 weeks is better. If a little tape is good, a lot of tape it better (you would be amazed at the amount of tape used over the holidays). It is this way in all walks of life. I know my siblings are cracking up at this beacuse they know it's true, bigger is better. Chris has spent the last 9 years of our married life trying to convince me that this is not always true. And in retrospect, I see many times why bigger is not better. But when approached with a new situation, I immediately think, “If a little was good then a lot must be great.”
Well if you scroll down, you will see that we (more like I) built a snowman a few weeks ago. The kids had a great time patting down the snow on it while I built it. And they loved to see the snowman. Well last week it warmed up and rained and the snowman disappeared. So of course the kids needed a new snowman. And I thought….Bigger is better. If I make it bigger, and it warms up for a day, our snowman won’t melt. And bigger snowmen just look better than smaller snowmen. Well after Madeline got home from school, we all got on our snow gear and went out to create our snowman. The snow was just freshly fallen, and still falling. So the snow wasn’t packing very well. But I couldn’t convince the kids to give up the snowman, and I had promised to make them one that afternoon, and I could break that promise. But why didn’t I just go for a nice small snowman? It’s because bigger is better. If I’m going to make a snowman, might as well make a big snowman. Well it was 3:30 when we started, and it was 4:45 when I finally finished the base ball. And it was 4:30 when the kids decided they were too cold and all went inside. So there I was, in the dark (it starts to get dark at 4:30), freezing my tail off, building my big snowman. The kids were hollering from the house that they were hungry and wanted me to come in; Madeline said “mom, you don’t really have to finish the snowman today.” But little to Madeline’s knowledge, it was just about impossible for me to not finish that snowman; I had started this snowman, I had to finish it. So, I finally conceded to not having the biggest snowman. I downsized the base a little, and made a smaller middle section and head, but it still took me until 5:45 to finish him. Now, I see my snowman and he looks great, and if I hadn’t had such grandiose ideas, I would have been able to finish the snowman much sooner, and gone into my warm house. Maybe one day I will learn, bigger is not always better. It took so long the kids lost interest and hence the lack of a face. This morning, I could only get convince Elias to stand outside for a picture, with the bribery of candy.

scroll down further to see the smaller snowman. This is my attempt at a big snowman.

10 Things.

2008-12-11T07:29:00.000-08:00

Convincing myself that I don’t desperately want to be in warm So. Cal. is very hard. I really do miss having the sun feel warm against my skin. And there is nothing like being able to let my kids play with their grandparents anytime they want. But I must admit, there are a lot of great things about living here. The kids love it! And there are a few benefits to living in the snow.

Here are the 10 best things when living in the snow.

10- Using my heater blanket.

9-No lawn mowing until spring

8- I never have to do my hair any more because I’m always wearing a beanie.

7-I can wear my cute boots every day.

6-I take my kids to lots of places now, There are tons of indoor activities for the kids during the winter. And I want to avoid our cold home as much as possible.

5-I never have to clean bikes, scooters, toys, etc off the driveway.

4-We finally organized our garage so that the cars fit in it. No more windshield scrapping

3- The kids never beg me to take them to the park.

2- Warm snuggly kids.

1- No birds.

the best reason for the freezing weather is the lack of birds! I was up many mornings at the crack of dawn not because of my kids but because of the many thousands of birds chirping out side our bedroom window. It was awful, when one like me, raised in LA, used to the beautiful humm of the freeway, birds can be very sporadic, obnoxious and loud. The peace and quiet of the winter snow is wonderful.

Ty and Elias spent all summer waking at 6:30 and immediately begging for breakfast, and spending the morning loudly playing, so any hopes of further sleep are lost. Well now every morning I have three snuggly little kids all pining for the warmest spot in my bed. Then just quietly snuggle with me until the heater kicks in at 7:30. I love snuggly little kids.

My three adorable, snugly little babies. There is nothing better than a sleeping baby.

Chris' very hideous mustache. I didn't mind the beard that he has had for the past few weeks. But seriously have you every seen a more hideous mustache? Actually I'm sure it is possible that there have been more hideous mustaches than this one, but just not on a face that I was expected to kiss.

Snow

2008-11-25T18:19:00.000-08:00

Our first snow man of the year. Rochester gets what every one calls "lake effect" snow, It is snow that comes with out a storm. All the moisture from the lakes drops out of the air as soon as it gets cold, and gives us lots of snow. So our weather is in the 40's and every night we get a couple inchs of snow. Which means my kids don't get too cold, and I don't have to bundle the kids up for them to play in the snow. You might notice the lack of jackets in the picture.
Our first day with all the snow gear on (and only day until chris has another day off). But at least when they are fully geared-up, they stay outside playing for hours.
My boys get far more use out of Madeline's head bands then she does. Each color represents a different super power. And this picture is Ty flexing with all his super power strength.

Our neighbor, George, put together his train sets for my kids to play with. My boys cried when it was time to go home, but luckily his is our neighbor and we can go back any time!
Doesnt' this look like a great sleding hill! Well this hill wasn't here a few months ago, and I was really hoping that it wouldn't be here before it started snowing. So what is the hill you ask? It is the large mound of gravel, that should have been used to fill the holes of the house project that we started working on in September. But like all home improvement projects, It might never be finished. And who knows, maybe next year we will still have a great sleding hill in our frount yard.
One of the holes to be filled with gravel. Picture taken in October.

The other hole to be filled with gravel, but unfortuately, this hole is not even finishe been dug!

English clan working on covering the large window holes that we cut. Luckily we were able to seal off the window holes before it got too cold.
So a blog post of mine wouldn't be complete with out a great story. Well this one is about me. Last week was our first snow, and I had lots of errands to run. Chirs said before he left the house, "Please drive very carefully and don't kill your self today." Somtimes Chris knows me better than I know myself. Being from California, this is my first experince driving in snow. (I've driven in snow once before, but not with out tire chains.) Of coursse i thought i would be safe and careful. With the first snow, none of the roads were plowed or salted. Well I came to my first intersection, and driving 5 miles below the speed limit, I started to break at the red light. Well my gardian angel made sure that there were no cars in frount of me when apraoching the red light and the opposing traffic seemed to know that I wasn't stopping. Breaking didn't stop me, the ABS breaks started, to no effect. I released the break and tried to break slower to know effect. And i just slowly glided right through the intersection and red light. The light had been red for a little while before I slided through it, but no one honked at me, no one even started to go until I slided safely to the other side to the intersection. Well, I learned my lesson with no harm done, and now I always break before I have to break especilly with icy roads.

Also can I say a garage is just about the most wonderful thing in the world to have so we don't have to trudge through the snow every day jsut to get to our car.

Just a short nap....

2008-11-13T19:26:00.000-08:00

You think I would know better, yes, I am and educated person. I know that I have naughty boys. But yet, I was so sleepy. I started my morning at 6:00 to clean up the Christmas decoration project that was left to dry. Then on to dishes, getting Madeline ready for school. Next was the farmers market in down town (Which I got the worlds biggest cabbage for only 1$). Then, speech therapy for Ty, next off to the bread store, and last, an hour at the library. After lunch I was really tired and wanted a short nap. For some reason, this was one of those day that my boys had just too much energy, and a nap was not in their schedule. So I thought I had given them enough entertainment that if I threatened them to be good and stay in the playroom and play quietly while I took a nap it would be OK. I wasn’t going to sleep long, just 20min or so. But as I said before, I should have known better. Really what was I thinking when I let my boys know that I would be leaving them unsupervised for a period of time. If I had just lain down for a minute while they were busy playing they probably would have never known that I was sleeping. The possibility of mom coming down stairs would have kept them out of trouble.
20min later, and feeling happy that I had been uninterrupted during my quick nap I went into the play room to see my wonderful boys. And all I could think is, where do they get these ideas, and what could possibly make them think that it is a good idea. What I saw were two naked boys sitting on the floor watching a movie on Chris’ laptop. Which was the first shocker, because they know the laptop is completely off limits, after they dropped it twice last week. Second shocker was because they were watching a movie on it…..How did they know how to click through all the icons to get the movie started? They don’t’ know their alphabet let alone how to read. And the laptop was dead, but they went and found the charger and plugged it in. After a quick reprimand for touching their dad’s laptop (I wasn’t too mad because I was shocked by their ingenuity in getting a movie for them selves) I asked them where their clothes were (also shocked by this because it was about 58 degrees in our basement, but they were just sitting naked watching the movie). They said they took them off because they were socking wet with juice. JUICE …? After a quick glance around the messy room, I first noticed the pile of about 20 smashed juice boxes, and the large juice puddle in the middle of the carpet. They had snuck a Costco size case of juice boxes downstairs, after drinking a few; they thought it would be fun to squirt them at each other. Next squirt on their toys, then fill every crevice of my vacuum cleaner with juice, then lay them on the ground and stomp on them and watch them explode. Yes, sticky juice all over everything. Why? Why? Why? That 20 min nap was sooooooooo not worth it.
Part way into clean Madeline got home from school and I got the usual from her, lots of crying, complaining of her brothers, and telling me that life is not fair. Because of course, there where her toys on the floor that also got covered in juice, besides the fact she had to come home to a very put out mother. But, she was “preaching to the Choir”. This seems to be a weekly thing, scrubbing down the playroom. At least our playroom is pretty sanitary.
The boys spent the rest of the day sitting on the couch considering what they did. And when dinner came, I fed them the biggest plate of broccoli they had ever seen. To my shock Ty actually ate the whole thing, Elias ate some of it complained that he wanted something else, then reluctantly ate the rest. I told them if I have to spend my day cleaning up their mess, I don’t have time to make a good dinner. It took me hours to get all the sticky out of everything, and who knows if our vacuum will work. And they are band from going into their playroom until they can show me that they know how to behave. And lets hope the carpet dries out before mildew sets in.
Oh, the trials of Mother hood. Some day these stories will be amusing, but definitely not today.

We blew out eggs and decorated them as ornaments. The kids loved it, but the craft glue that we used didn't work out very well, Anyone have any suggestions on a better glue to use?

worlds biggest cabbage from our Farmers Market, and it was only 1$. Good thing Chris loves cabbage.

A very sad day, we are no longer Californians. We are officially New Yorkers.

Aren't big sister's wonderful. Despite all her complaining about them, Madeline loves her brothers. Ty was more than happy to be Madeline's sister for the day, especially when it gave him rights to enter her room.

Trouble with Breathing

2008-11-02T15:31:00.000-08:00

I can BREATH! ! I feel like someone is holding both my nostrils open. Although my nose looks great and i can breath great, all is not perfect, my nose is extremely sensitive, and I don’t have much of a sense of smell. As a mother, a smell is very important. Saturday night I was in a lazy mood, and didn’t clean up the play room before i went to bed for the night. Yes I know “Saturday is a special day, the day we get ready for Sunday…….” Sunday morning, after I drag my self out of bed, I go to clean up the play room with the boys. About 5 min into cleaning, Elias Picks up a blanket and throws it into his bed, as he does this a dirt clod flies out. Well I keep cleaning and make my way over to the dirt clod. I absentmindedly pick up the dirt clod to chuck it into the trash. But It only take me a second to realize this is no dirt clod. So there I am, Standing with a large piece of poop in my hand, yes, very disgusting. And to think this could have all been prevented if I could smell, I probably would have smelt the stinkyness from the other side of the house. But no, I couldn’t smell so there I was. Some of you might have been more weary of a large brown clump, but it rains here a lot, and dirt clods are a common thing with my boys. The larger the dirt clod that they can find the better. Well after disinfecting myself, I found that Ty pooped his pants and didn’t want to get into trouble, so he hid it in Madeline’s blanket. Which then got thrown into the bed and subsequently, launched poop across the room.So the boys went into the bathtub while I spent the next hour disinfecting all the toys, washing sheets and scrubbing floors. Madeline spent the hour hollering and crying that it was her blanket that was the victim of the poop. And if i didn't get it all out i would have to deal with her wrath.
Well an hour is far too long for my boys to be left alone. I go into the bathroom to find the thickest whitest bubble bath I’ve ever seen. It’s happened before, with just Ty, dumping all the baby shampoo into the water.But now I’ve got two boys with great ideas. It wasn't only the baby shampoo this time, but I had gone shopping Saturday and bought all new shampoos and conditioners for Madeline Chris and me (we all use different ones). It was all the shampoos and conditioners, Old and new. Yes, my boys are luck that they are still alive. They had bumped everything into the water. Some days they can be the sweetest things and other days, well lets just say other days I wish I had stopped at Madeline.
But sadly my day doesn’t get any better. With Chris at the hospital, as he is many Sundays, we had garlic bread and broccoli for dinner. As I was just finishing up my piece of bread, there was something very hard in it. Very confused at first, I spit it out. I found that it was part of a tooth that seemed to not want to be in my mouth any more. Half of the tooth just crumbed apart. But luckily it was one that was a little further back so it can’t bee seen to well. Well, back to the dentist Monday morning, then to the store to buy shampoo...again
Can i say thank heavens for day light savings, all the kids are in bed and sleeping, from now on, bed time will be at 7:00 and not 8:00pm.

On a more cheerie note, Madeline had her 8th birthday and was baptized. It was a great day. Chris' sister Sara was in town and decorated Madeline's birthday cake. And my sister Seph was there for the baptism also. Chris managed to get out of the Hospital and just in time meet us at the church.

My sister Steph was intown for a whole week and for some reason this is the only picture i have of her, so i had to post it.

SNOW

2008-10-29T16:23:00.001-07:00

By request of Madeline, here is her playing in the first snow of the year.
Although it snowed a lot, nothing stayed onthe ground.

Fall leaves

2008-10-29T08:38:00.000-07:00

On one rare occasion, Chris had an afternoon off. It was noon, and Chris was actually home and not sleeping from working 36 straight hours. So he took the boys out side and raked leaves. Don't be deceived by the lack of warm winter clothes in this picture, I was behind the camera in full winter entire. Well the boys were so excited for this large mound of leaves, they wanted Chris to throw them on top, and Dive and roll around.

Well jumping in a large pile of leaves is not quite the same as jumping into a large pile of let’s say blankets or clothes. Saying Ty didn't like the feel of the leaves is just putting it lightly. Ty was freaking out so bad that he couldn't get himself out of the massive mound of leaves and Chris was laughing too hard at Ty's reaction to help. I was too busy trying to take pictures of Ty freaking out, and being stuck in the large pile of leaves to do anything. Poor Elias, he got out of the pile as fast as he could thinking there was some type of boy eating monster inside that pile of leaves.

After Ty got out of the leaves he was perfectly content to watch Madeline and Elias roll around and love the fall leaves. Ty skirted around the pile and periodically picked up and handful of leaves to throw. But he never embraced the joy of playing in a pile of leaves

People keep telling me that I will love Fall. They say it is so beautiful. But it is too freaking cold to enjoy it. This is what my car looks like many mornings, and can you believe it, we had snow today, it is still October.

But really my boys are embracing the change in weather and it doesn't even seem to affect them. I can never take off my long sleeve shirt and sweater. Afternoons do warm up sometimes and one day after doing laundry I went outside to check on my boys and I find them like this. So maybe i am just a big baby and will just have to get tougher.

Healing

2008-10-28T06:14:00.000-07:00

In my horse accident that occurred 2 years ago I crushed my nose. But because of the lack of insurance I couldn’t get it fixed, and was fortunate that the bones didn’t look too bad. But the problems needed to be fixed. So once Chris started our residency out here in Rochester, I finally had insurance and was able to got my nose fixed.
It was a 3 hour surgery. They had to break my nose in a couple places to straighten it. They straighten my C shaped septum. They gave my nose bone grafts. Lastly they began to take out the bits of asphalt that were in my skin. The asphalt “tattoo” will take a few minor surgeries to remove it all.

Healing has been painful, but not unexpectedly so. I've had tons of swelling, but hardly any bruising. And keeping two very active boys away from my face is almost a near impossibility. Two nights ago I leaned down to give Ty a hug, as I bent down Ty quickly reached his hands up and before I knew it, I was blinded with pain and Ty was hollering “sorry mommy, sorry” Ty’s hand made solid contact with my nose. From now on I am very careful with hugs.
Well on Monday my sister Steph came into town to help manage the kids while I recovered. It was wonderful having her here. And my kids loved the extra kids to play with.

2008-10-16T14:20:00.000-07:00

So i personally like the blood and gore pictures. So here is a picture of me about 5 hours after surgery. And two days later, I'm still oozing blood and liquid from my nose. Well i stayed in the hospital one day, and i'm home now, but I'm either in too much pain or too dizzy form the pain medication to write too much. So this is just a short post to let all know that I'm finally done with my surgery! (that is as long as my teeth continue to do well)

Here are the before pictures. They removed the black mark that is on my nose(it was bits of asphalt that was stuck in there. And straightened out my crooked nose. Give me a few days and i will give a more detailed version of the surgery.

Madeline

2008-10-02T04:46:00.000-07:00

Madeline is becoming a super reader, She has been reading the Series of Unfortunate Events. She just finished the 3rd book, and it only took her one afternoon. But all this reading is making her too smart; I need to stop it before it is too late!
I went grocery shopping the other day on one of the rare occasions when Chris got home before the kids had to go to bed. The thought of shopping by myself was exciting, I quickly just ran out of the house. Of course I got to the store and realized I forgot my list. Well I did all the shopping, then gave a call home to see if I forgot anything on the list (aren’t cell phones wonderful). Madeline answered the phone, so I just had her go and get the list and read it to me. “Bread, eggs, basil, milk, beagles” I say oh, no Madeline, that is bagels. And she says, “no mom, you wrote beagle, and a beagle is a dog” I say no I meant to write bagel, and of course my smart-aleck child says “no you wrote beagle that means you said your buying a dog, you better bring home a dog.” ………. Just another example how my children have sucked out all my brain cells. And if course when I got home I had to look at my shopping list to double check my spelling, and I saw that I did write beagle, and i saw Madeline had written next to beagle…It’s a dog.

Last week was Chris' birthday. I made the yummiest German chocolate cake ever; actually it is the first and only German chocolate cake that I have ever made. But it turned out pretty well. Our wonderful friends from LA who also moved out here to Rochester were able to come eat cake with us. It was a fun evening, except that Chris didn’t get home until 8:45. The kids are always happy for any excuses to stay up late especially one that involves cake and ice cream.

getting to know rochester

2008-09-12T08:40:00.000-07:00

In the end of August my brother and sister-in-law came out for a visit. With my mom still in town and with their help, we explored the fun things to do in Rochester.

We went to a Butterfly room it was filled with beautiful butterflies and moths every were. One butterfly landed on Cynthia's shoulder, I saw her flinch at the first thought of an insect on her shoulder, but then she posed happily for the pic.

We went rowing on the Erie Canal. It was beautiful, peaceful, and a lot of work. My back was tired the next day. The boy who rented us the boats told Ty it was good he had a sword in case we encountered any pirates. Ty held tight to his sword the whole time.

We went to the Strong Museum of Play. Which is actually the largest indoor play zone for children ever. We have been there about 5 times for 2-3 hours and still have not played every where.
We went there with Cynthia and Randy and had a really good time. They had more fun then the kids.

We had lots of fun at Niagara Falls. We took boat ride to the bottom of the falls. Elias didn't really appreciate the boat trip. A little too much water for his liking. But they loved the look out on the bridge.

School buses are great

2008-09-12T07:53:00.000-07:00

Ready for the first day of school. Madeline was very nervous, but excited. Getting on the school bus for the first time.

Yes, I was one of those moms that put my child on the school bus than drove to school to meet her. What can i say, she is still my baby girl.

I was initially sad that there were no other kids on my street. But the lack of children has now paid off. There is an older couple that lives directly next to me. The husband is George, and Ty and him have become good friends. George has started working on putting together one of his old miniature train sets that fills his basement for Ty to come play with. Across the street is a family with teenagers. They babysat my boys once for me and now haven’t stopped asking when they can babysit again. They love my kids. And now for the greatest part about Madeline been the only child on our street; the school bus just pulls in front of our house and waits for Madeline to run out. Then after school the bus just drops her off in front of our house. It is wonderful. I can’t tell you how many times in LA, at clover elementary, I lost track of time and was sprinting to school while pushing my boys in the stroller to get Madeline. Yesterday, after the dentist, I laid the boys down for a nap, and being emotionally drained (see latter post) I think I was asleep before the boys were. Well the next thing I knew, Madeline was tapping me on the shoulder, “mom, I’m home from school”. Well now I know that I don’t have to be out side waiting for Madeline, and the bus driver will still drop her off. Life couldn’t get any better.

What makes it even better is Madeline loves riding the bus. She made a friend on the bus that always saves her a seat. School is going very well for Madeline. We really wanted to keep Madeline in second grade, for several reasons. But then we ended up letting her continue on to the third grade, and she is doing great. Her school is wonderful. Madeline has a few things she really likes about her school:
-One, She never has to go out side, the bathroom is right down the hall, the cafeteria is at one end of the hall. They get to have PE in the gym and don’t have to stand outside in the hot sun. The schools are just set up very different out here and it is new and exciting for Madeline.
-Two she gets to keep her teacher and all the same classmates for 3^rd and 4^th grade. Which would be bad if she didn’t like her teacher; but she loves her so it is great.
-Three, after the first day of school Madeline came home and said, “You are never going to believe this mom…. We are allowed to run on the playground!” I never thought running during recess would be such a novelty, but at Clover Elementary (our last school) running on the playground was not allowed because they didn’t want children to fall down and get hurt. Now Madeline is allowed to play were and how she wants during recess, and she loves the freedom.

Blessing and a Curse

2008-09-12T07:42:00.000-07:00

So Insurance has been a blessing and a curse. I’ll tell the exciting news first. On October 15^th, I’ll finally get my crushed nose fixed. For those who don’t know, I was in a bad horse riding accident two years ago and I had no health insurance. Chris and I paid for what I needed to live but anything not life threatening had to wait. Well my nose broke in a few places, and my septum is curved like a C. I still have pavement under the surface of my skin that didn’t come out; it looks like a black splotch on the side of my nose about the size to a dime. Well I will get all my bones straightened out and the “tattoo” removed. And insurance is going to pay for it,Yeah!

The curse, the insurance pays for all preventive dental measures, but nothing if there is actually anything that has to be done. Well everyone had their dental appointments, and Elias and Madeline had no cavities. Ty had 4. We went to a family practice dentist; they are a little cheaper than a pediatric dentist. Ty would not be seen so we had to get referred to a pediatric dentist. After the first Appointment, they didn’t do anything and decided Ty would have to reschedule for another time with sedation. But I still had to pay for the consult and came back. At the second appointment with sedation (atarax) and nitrous oxide, Ty fought like crazy, but they drilled part way into the tooth before they could no longer control him and had to put on a temporary and reschedule when they could give him something even stronger. And of course, I had to pay for the appointment, and come back again. Third appointment, I don’t remember what it was that they gave him, but it sure didn’t take away his voice, it just took away his strength to fight. With oral liquid combined with nitrous oxide, and a straight jacket on a board they got some of the fillings finished. Well 800$ later, they got two of the filling finished and one had to have a silver crown. The other two fillings are going to just rot out of his head before I take him back to a dentist, and have to go through the drama and have that kind of bill again. Not only are the appointments long and painful, but Ty is HORRIBLE the rest of the day. He is completely irrational and inconsolable. I have mixed feelings of despising this child for not just letting them do the work and feeling sorry for him that I have to put him trough this nightmare. Don't be surprised if next time you see Ty he has missing teeth.

A day in thelife of Jen

2008-08-22T12:48:00.000-07:00

So today I went to Sams Club one of the big warehouse stores. When i go i can never get out of there with out a whole load of groceries. Well today was no different. After shopping I went out to my car and I always strap my boys in first, so they don't get run over by a car while I am trying to load my groceries. But today they were especially troublesome to get them in their car seats. And when I was done getting them in, I was ready to get them home and put them down for a nap. So that's what I did, I drove home and made the boys take a nap, and I lied down with them to take a nap also. When I woke for then nap, I went to go make some grill cheese sandwiches. Well when I looked in the refrigerator, there was no cheese, but I swear it was on my shopping list and didn't I just go to the store, but then I thought for a minuet and I realized that I hadn't brought groceries into the house. Well I went out to my car, and behold, there were no groceries there either. So to my dismay, I realized I completely left my entire shopping cart of groceries in the parking lot. Ohohoh, how sad I was, I only could imagine how happy some one was to have an entire shopping cart of free groceries.

After spending an hour shopping I have no idea how I completely forgot about all my groceries, And it's not like I even remembered them when I got home, no. It wasn't until hours later. And at first when I woke-up I probably could have sworn that I brought everything home and put it away.

But alas, I went to the store to get more groceries. But it was my lucky day. A store clerk had found the shopping cart when he went out to collect the carts. So all my groceries were sitting right there at the store. Half of my food was out of the refrigerator section or freezer, but the nice store clerks went and got me all new things. So now I have made it back home and all my food is in the refrigerator.

It still amazes me how I completely spaced it. I'm sure many of you have had days like this.

mom visit

2008-08-10T14:25:00.001-07:00

I climbed a tree for the first time in my life to hang a tree swing. Tree climbing is not as easy as it looks, especially when I'm about 30ft up. Getting down was even trickier. But it was definitely worth it because i got this great picture of my mom on it. My mom is visiting for two weeks.

With my moms input and extra help. And once Chris pulled the out the cabinet where the dishwasher is now. I was able to build this island/breakfast bar for my kitchen.
Elias is finally starting to adjust. He actually went and got dressed all by himself. This was his complete outfit. When i brought out the camera, he struck a pose. Although he thinks he is too cool for Rochester and belongs in LA.

Every week our house becomes more and more child proof as my boys break anything that is breakable. In the boys room there is a ceiling fan off set in the room, closer to one wall. After hearing a VERY loud crash followed by a scream, i ran into the room. Elias was just laying on the ground. And our ceiling fan that was not on was slowly spinning. The scene was very suspicious. Ty filled in all the details, although there were not many.
Elias had climb the drawers near the fan and had tried to jump to the ceiling fan and swing from it. The fan no longer works. I guess the fan will be coming out and replace with just a light fixture.

New couch

2008-07-28T06:59:00.000-07:00

This week we also finally got couches. It's nice to have a place to relax, to read books. And my house is looking more like my home.

Ty was begging me to take a picture of his strong muscles, It's such i great picture, i had to post it.

My sister came !

2008-07-28T06:31:00.000-07:00

So the weeks are getting better and better. My sister heather spent the week with me. It was so wonderful to have her company and all her help. With heather babysitting i had an empty car while shopping so I was able to pick up a dishwasher(although it will probably still be a few weeks before Chris gets it installed), a filing cabinet, and a wheel barrel. All of which i couldn't have done with a car full of kids. And Chris and i actually got to go out alone, while heather babysat, it was wonderful!
Heather, Ty, Elias, Madeline, Kiki, me at a local farm. Rochester is a funny place because it is a pretty big city, but then there are farms all over the place.

I knocked down a wasps nest off of our back porch, and there was still a baby wasp in the hive. The girls were appalled that all the mommy wasps would leave and just abandon their baby. So they made a wasp sanctuary for him full of flowers and sticks. The wasps name was Polly.

So none of us had ever seen a Cat tail. So Chris pulled over to the side of the road one day and we all picked Cat tails (i think that is how they are spelled). This is Elias holding his precious Cat tail.

Our new king size bed is put to use when Chis is on-call at the hospital. I can't believe i didn't get one sooner.

Elias, exhausted from a long day of tantrums and playing, lay dead on the floor. He is not quiet sleeping, just laying with no energy or fight left in him.

Pictures of Rochester

2008-07-19T14:06:00.000-07:00

So this is my new house. Home Sweet Home.

Lynette sent me this Homock from Brazil. It is great. This is one of the few peacful moments of Ty in our backyard.

Moving to Rochester

2008-07-19T13:33:00.000-07:00

I’ve been in Rochester two weeks now and things are starting to settle down. Today has been a great day; Elias hasn’t thrown a fit to go back to our other home, or peed his pants yet. Ty has been playing outside all morning pretending to be Indiana Jones, using ropes and porch poles. And Madeline and Kiki have spent all day working their lemonade stand.
But my time here so far hasn’t been all pleasant, for the most part, the kids have had a tough time adjusting. And learning to play out side has been hard for the kids. I thought I would help the kids want to go out side by getting them a trampoline. So the third morning we were here, I got the trampoline. I don’t know why I thought that it would be simple to set up, but I was very wrong. It came in two boxes, one was 110 lbs, and the second was 30 lbs. After managing to get the boxes home and into the far corner of our yard where the shade is plentiful, I was already tired. But I had promised a trampoline and I was determined to get it together for the kids. Well I just read the instructions as I went along, and things got really tricky when the instruction showed how to do it with two adults, and all I had was me and a bunch of whiny kids. And to make things worse the day was heating up and it turned out to be the most hot and humid day of the year. As I was struggling to put large poles together, all my kids sat around me whining that the bugs were getting them, the grass was tickling their legs and they were too hot sitting there in the shade watching me. So after 3 hours of grueling labor, I got the trampoline together, then went inside and collapsed from exhaustion. And of course I couldn’t have paid the kids to go outside and jump on the trampoline. They all followed me inside.
The day after I got here the refrigerator stopped working. And the new one doesn’t come until August 1st,so we have been using a cooler and getting more ice every two days. Elias wets or poops in his pants at least once a day. But this is where something positive comes in. I get to just wash the clothes immediately. I now have my own washer and dryer in a washroom in my house. I love not having an over-flowing mound of laundry. It is so much easier to do laundry when I don’t have to lug 8 loads with me. And to try an keep kids entertained while I do the laundry. I love it.
Elias completely loses it about 10 times a day. The tantrum is complete with collapsing on the ground and always banging his head in the process, then screaming at the top of his lungs, which if you have ever heard my kids can be very painful to the ears. Then, if I ever have to pick him up he does full body thrashing around which is only painful when I’m not careful and he head butts his head against my nose. And it never fails that he starts a tantrum every time we come home from running errands. We pull up to the house, and he yells, “No not the new one, I want to go home”. Once we are home, I just leave him screaming in the garage and he can come in when he is done. Which leads me to the second greatest thing about a house is an attached garage. No more parking tickets from street sweepers, no more lugging groceries from half way down the street, and cleaning out the car has never been easier.
On Sunday morning after being here one week, the boys had made a huge improvement. They woke up and went outside and played. But it was a short triumph, Chris left to work and I went outside to check on the boys. It was bad news. We had little lights surrounding our planters, wired to a timer to come on after sunset for an hour or so. Well all the tops (about 15) were knocked off and broken, I asked the boys or more like yelled at the boys "what happened," and Elias said “we are super heroes and we killed all the bad guys.” You could only imagine how mad I was. Ty gave me the story of how it happened. He said “we used our stick swords to kill the lights.” Then the waterfall of tears came following “I’m sorry for being naughty”. But nothing could calm my furry. I went in the boys playroom grabbed the first handful of toys that I found and chucked them in the large outside trash. I told them if you break mommies things, I will throw your things in the trash. Well I didn’t really want to throw away their toys. So after they were gone I went and got them out and hid them in a corner in the garage. Funny thing, that night when I was picking up after the kids were in bed, I saw that the trashcan had been knocked over and dug threw. And it is not a small can; it is about two feet taller than Ty. I’m sure they were disappointed to find nothing, but didn’t dare tell me.
Madeline and Ty have had their moments too. They constantly fight and bicker. After a week, Madeline told me “mom I’m not sure about Rochester” I asked her why and she said “I don’t know, I’m just not sure about it” But she is warming up to our house, After watching kiki (my niece ) climb a tree for a week and a half, she finally attempted it. She was successful, had a good time, then tore up the bottom of her foot on one of the lights the boys broke while jumping out of the tree. It took her four days but she is back in the tree again today.