The POWER of Google!

Josh and I have LOVED being able to hang out all day long! We have played some scrabble, Which most of the time he kills me, but last night I got my first ever win in scrabble. We've gone to the gym and the mall. We have played many game of candy land and memory. But the funniest thing that has happened is the questions that have come up. We have had some questions raised that we couldn't come to a solution, so of course we googled it!


Did you know that some paraplegics can have sex and children? Yes, it is true! In fact we found out all about some of their active sex lives!

And guess what else? Did you know that elephant can swim? I thought the huge mass of weight would sink right to the bottom! They have no arms to help them stay afloat. Come to find out, they float and use their legs to propel them. They are actually great swimmers. I guess it makes sense since they have built in snorkels!


The funniest question that came up, and also one of the most shocking ( brace yourselves)!??!

Men can breastfeed and produce milk! They have milk glands and a little bit of tissues and also the hormones that it takes! With a little "nipple stimulation" they can actually produce breast milk! Weird! I asked Josh if he wanted to breastfeed our next child.....he wasn't to keen on the idea! I'm pretty sure I understand why!

So there you go! Hopefully you learned something new, we sure have!

Our Merry Christmas 2008!

We had a great Christmas. Hope just loved opening all the presents. Both of the girls were very patient and waited their turn, Hope would even hand them out when I told her whose they were. It was very sweet.
I am so glad I spent all night tuesday looking for this baby carseat........

And this Fur real puppy! They ended up being favorites! Brielle hasn't let go of this little puppy. We named it polka.We went to a Friends house in the ward for lunch and it made it feel more like my hometown Christmas! Afterwards we made cookies.
This was the first time we have ever made sugar cookies. The girls loved it and we had a lot of fun. I had to keep reminding myself to be patient. I also kept telling myself that the heat of the oven would kill the germs! Don't know if that one is true, but it made me feel better!

Hope everybody had their very own Merry Christmas!

Videos to come Just for Cody!

The Craziness ALL over AGAIN!

So today Brielle says something about wanting a stuffed puppy for Christmas and my heart immediately sinks!

She asked for this very first, It was the first thing she pointed to in the catalog. She hasn't said anything since and I forgot. I also still hadn't found Hope a car seat carrier for her babies and I really wanted too.

After putting the kids to bed I left my house. It was insane! Almost as bad as black friday. I found myself thinking. "this is crazy! Do people really wait this long to do their shopping." Then I had to stop myself in my judgment when I said "oh, wait I am here! Doing last minute shopping!"

needless to say everything I was looking for was apparently a hot item! I went to 5 stores today looking for a car seat! 3 stores looking for the 'fur real' pets. found both of these finally at walmart! I had to wait in line for 35 mins! I wanted to change Bries baby alive baby to the one with a potty, but never found one. All the baby alives were gone, so i was just grateful to have the one I did!

I hope everybody has a peaceful and happy holiday season! Enjoy playing santa!

HO HO HO!

So sad.......and So sweet!

Brielle often runs over and knocks on the neighbors door to say Hi to her friend Destiny. I am always worried about her bugging them! They have gone out of town for the holidays and so I have let her go over and knock as much as she wants! I heard her crying and this is what I found.......

She was so sad that they hadn't answered their door for a really long time. I explained to her that they went to her grandmas and then she was sad that she didn't get to go to her grandmas! SO TIM AND LAN, YOU GUYS ARE GREATLY MISSED! AS WELL AS THE GRANDMAS!


It was so much fun to have carolers tonight! The Burtons came over and sang and brought cookies and it was so sweet. They sounded great and they are such a fun family!

Mischief

I thought we had pretty much seen it all......

We have opened the door to a stray animal over and over again! Brie called this kitty "her kitty" for 3 days until finally somebody called the pound!

We have endured little hands performing little haircuts 4 times!

We have had food of all different shape, texture, and color strewn throughout the house! Included in these are eggs, flour, spices, yogurt, pudding, cocoa, water, milk, juice, ranch, and probably the worst butter!

We have had many, many, MANY make-up encounters with Brie and Hope!

We have had NUMEROUS sticky fingers and sticky mouths.......

Due to yummy food!


We have had PERMANENT MARKER and pen all over our bodies!




BUT for some strange reason NOTHING prepared me for what Hope did today.....NOTHING!




YES, She climbed into the dryer. Brielle NEVER even came close to thinking about doing this. As soon as I heard the muffled screaming and little knock, I knew what had happened! She actually locked herself in twice. Silly little girl! I think I am in big trouble! She is definitely giving us a run for our money.

We are Screaming and Shouting!

On Wednesday morning Josh was singing the song from Les' Mes 'One more day'! He kept laughing at himself thinking he was so funny, I just kind of ignored it thinking "What the Heck!" I finally asked him "Josh, what in the world is so funny" He just said "I only have one more day"
He was referring to the hours of non-stop studying, (until at least 10:00 or 11:00 at night) because he took his last final on THURSDAY! Yes, I said Thursday! That means we are done! For a couple weeks at least! I kindly informed him that he had way more than 'one more day' he had 5 semesters! That stopped his singing and his laughter!

But as for now......we are screaming and shouting because we are done! And we get a much needed, much deserved break to be together as a family. Thursday night we took the girls to Mcdonalds, in request to Bries prayer, to celebrate! There was a clown there advertising her business so they got their faces painted and balloons! Then today we took them swimming, and Josh took them on a long walk while I took pics! They are loving having some daddy time! Lets face it, we have all been a little Josh deprived!

Brielles day as a comedian!

Brielle said and did some of the funniest things today:

first of all it was BEAUTIFUL here, like 70 degrees, so we went to the park. She told me she was tired and wanted to go home. I said ok, thinking she was kidding. She then turned and rode her bike home. A minute later I chased after her and found her on her way back to the park with 3 cookies in her hand
"Here mom, this one is for you and this one is for Hopey!" I have not made any cookies and have NO IDEA where these came from! So I asked "Brielle honey, where did you get those cookies?"
"From the little old man, he went that way!"
Turns out they were from our upstairs neighbor who is anything but a little old man. She left them at our door and Brie just helped herself! At least she thought to share....she even took one and left it on the nightstand by where Josh was taking a nap.

Then I was trying to get her to come over to eat at the table for dinner. She wouldn't listen so I was counting and had threatened time out if she wasn't there by 5! She huffs and puffs over and says
"Geez mom, just chill out OK, just chill out!"
I do not want to condone her talking to me this way but I couldn't hide my laughter! Did I miss her childhood? Is she suddenly 13?

While we were eating she looks at me and says
"Hey, you thinking what I'm thinking?" I giggled and said "I don't know what are you thinking?"
She laughs and replys "Oh, about pretty elephants!" Nope! definitely not thinking what she is thinking!

In her bedtime prayer she said:
"Please bless Hopey, Mommy, Daddy, Me and oh just bless everybody, and all the animals! and oh yeah please bless that tomorrow we can go to McDonalds!"

Our Mcdonalds trips have been few and far between since hitting the law school budget! I guess she is feeling deprived!

To top off the evening I went in to check on the girls after putting them to bed and found Brielle sleeping like this...........(remember she sleeps on the top bunk!)


Me, being the FANTASTIC mom I am run for the camera instead of saving her from her fall. Don't worry I did get her back into bed before she actually fell, but she was slipping inch by inch and hanging on by a thread!

HOW does a PHONE just DISAPPEAR??

This is the 2nd time this has happened to me! The first time I finally assumed that I had put my phone on top of my car and driven away. After weeks of searching I finally bought a new phone.

Saturday night at about 10:30 I was laying in my bed talking to Josh. We hung up, and I went out to see him when he got home, LEAVING THE PHONE IN THE BED. This is the last time I saw or used my phone. I CAN'T FIND IT ANYWHERE! I have turned my house inside out looking for it! I have called it and walked through my whole TINY little house! You never realize how much you use something until you don't have it.

So friends and Family.......if you are trying to get a hold of me SORRY! You can't! I have no way to talk to you! Shoot me an email I guess......Josh has left me the computer! ugh!

I have a problem......

I crave quiet stillness. I crave time just to peacefully sit and ponder. I crave time where I can think, laugh, look, wonder, cry, stare, and sigh with nobody watching or worrying. This is why I am a night owl. I also love people, and I'm a very social person so it is very contradicting. As I climbed into bed at 1:00 am I tried and tried to relax. My muscles ached and I have the weird leg feeling that I sometimes get. And all I could think about was starting my blog book. Weird I know. I could not stop. I knew that if I didn't get up and install the program I would be up all night.

I then ran across some old photos that made me full on cry, and I loved that nobody was watching. I really don't know why I have a problem with this but I still hate for Josh to see me cry. Weird I know.

Look at my baby! I couldn't believe these pictures! It seems like ages ago, I can only imagine how I will feel when she is 20!

This is her first Christmas!

She was so happy over a pair of shoes!

Little mischievous thing! Look how proud she was of herself. What I couldn't get over were the cute little cheeks.....I wish I could squish them!

Thanks for going down memory lane with me! I love my little Brie! I often say I don't remember what it was like only having one kid because my number 2 came so quick, but this helped me remember the simpler days!

Remember how bald she was?

Ward Christmas Party

So we had our ward Christmas party tonight! It was fun, and hard to keep the kids contained all at the same time! The theme for primary this upcoming year is all about families so I was taking pictures of all the families with primary aged kids. They all turned out great except of course for ours! Why is it that my kids have to HATE the camera soooo much? It is seriously a battle every time!
Cute little Brie just wanted to hold Hope! Of course Hope was being a stink. I got her laughing a little bit though.

Santa Claus Came!
Many of you have seen this picture before! It is a crack up! This is my girls last year on Santa's lap!

When we informed Brie Santa would be there she kept saying "I not afraid of Santa, Hopey a yittle bit afraid, but I not afraid, I brave!" And sure enough she was very brave!
In fact as soon as she saw him she followed him around everywhere he went


Then she PATIENTLY waited in line with her cute little friend Sahara. She was so excited.

And Ta-da! Both kids on Santa's lap, and not one tear! Look at that! Brielle talked to Santa and told him her name, and that she wanted presents for Christmas! Easy enough! All Hope cared about was the candy! Can you blame her? It was mostly chocolate!

I got nothin'

Sorry Cody and Mom, I know you're upset that I have nothing fun and exciting to post on the blog. The problem is there is nothing fun and exciting going on!

Josh is in the middle of finals and the only thing I can tell y0u is it is nothing like the finals he has had before. He studies all day (before I even wake up until 10:00 pm) and then the next day he goes to take the test. They are pretty intense and we could use all the prayers we can get!

That leaves me here with the munchkins! Hope is crazy as ever and is ALWAYS into something! Just this morning she dumped seasoning all over our kitchen, pulled almost everything out of our fridge, and dumped her cereal bowl all over the chair and floor! It is only 9:00 AM!

UPDATE:
By 11:00 am Hope added to her list of accomplishments by dumping yogurt all over the couch, then fingernail polish all over the floor! Luckily it was clear! Yeah, I know you are wondering where I am when all of this is going on....... the truth is I don't know! It just seems to happen, and she is sooooo quiet!

So as you see I got nothin'! Maybe tomorrow!

WE CANNOT CO-EXIST!

I have a fear! A fear that has kept me up for the past 4 nights! A fear that has been haunting my dreams! A fear that, though it may be irrational, is VERY REAL to me! So real, that even when looking for a picture to post on the blog I had NO CHOICE but to go the cartoon route! I took one glance at the "real" pictures and x'ed out of it! Yes, I have a fear! This fear came to visit our house and my loving wonderful husband named it "Chauncey!" I called it "IT"!

It all started when my friend and I heard some bags rustling . When Josh searched the room and came up empty I wrote it off as a can falling. I think I knew then that it was NOT a can but couldn't admit it. Then Josh saw it one day. Thank heavens it was Josh and not me!

Josh immediately set traps, The decon discs that close and lock it in. On a side note DO NOT WASTED YOUR MONEY! THEY DON'T WORK! We had those out for 2 nights with no luck! Meanwhile I am tip toeing around my house, banging cupboards before I open them, purposely not looking along the walls, and avoiding my pantry/laundry room all together! Brielle would ask me for a snack and I would tell her she was welcome to have anything she wanted as long as she went to get it! She wasn't afraid.

Finally on Monday pest control shows up. He put out a snap trap, and a sticky trap (which Josh immediately threw away). He put a chocolate chip on the trap and said they LOVED chocolate. Oh, I thought, no wonder he wants to be here, this is CHOCOLATE HEAVEN! I was horrified the next morning when Josh came in to tell me "Chauncey" had eaten the chocolate chip off the trap, mind you the little decon discs still have had NO appeal! We not only had to have a mouse in our house, it had to be a smart mouse! I went to the store and bought 4 more traps and a plug thing that is supposed to keep mice away. Josh set more traps making it a total of 6 traps, 4 in one tiny room, and we FINALLY had success. Or failure if you are on Josh and Chaunceys side! For me it was sweet delicious success. I have still been a little weary........what if there was more than one? But I think tonight I will be free from dreaming of mice eating through my body! SEE, I told you, a very real fear!

Happy mice free days!

3 couples, 1 baby, Moes and the Beach= FANTASTIC!

We went out on a triple date with some Katrina and John, Johns brother Peter and Jacqi (she is a Burton)! We went and ate at Moe's and then headed to the beach! It was really fun, and the weather was actually really nice!

Thanks Camille and Lexi for being GREAT baby sitters! We love you guys!

CRAZINESS!

The Plan????
Wake up and LEAVE at 4:00 am to our first stop WALMART for the Black Friday sales!
NOBODY believed that I would be awake that early! They already know me SO well! I set my alarm for 3:20 and fell into a very peacful sleep! I sat straight up in bed at 4:13 AM and immediately started freaking out! The alarm didn't go off! What woke me up......I am guessing it was the pull of shopping. I was so sure this is why I could REASSURE everybody that I would be wide awake. As soon as I rolled out of bed I walked out of my room to get my phone and Katrina and Lan were knocking on my door! GREAT! Needless to say I was ready in 10 mins. and we were only a little late!


This is Katrinas GRUMPY face that I made us late! I was so mad at myself all day long that I didn't PROVE to everybody that I could do it! In the haste of leaving I left my phone! Wal-Mart was a very unorganized, crowded, people everywhere, MESS! I was lost for like an hour! GREAT!

This is Lan's I'm calm as ever, never lose my temper even if we are stuck in traffic and Natalie and Katrina are screaming at the cars face! After the fight in Wally world we then fought traffic getting out! GREAT!
We hit Walmart, Target where the line to check out wrapped clear through the store, but actually moved pretty fast. K-mart which was pretty dead! Toys R Us a little crazy but not as bad as expected. It was a pretty big store so the people dispersed well. And Bath and Body works where we were hitting up the $5 wallflowers ( plugin airfresheners). You could not move in this store, you couldn't breath! The line went clear out the store and this was considered "a slow time" by employees. We even saw paramedics there at one point! GREAT!

So why do we go through all this ridiculously fanastic torture?

'Tis the season

Happy Thanksgiving!

I am so grateful to the Burton family this Thanksgiving for making us feel at home! We had Thanksgiving dinner at their house, this is all the girls except for one (away at collage), and Katrina and Sister Anderson from our ward. They were so fantastic to let us join their feast and fun!
The kids were very entertained (thanks to Camille and Lexi) so they weren't around to jump in the photo shoot! They were there and had a ball. Brielle wanted NOTHING to do with the food UNTIL we got dessert out! Then I forced a little bit down her, but should wouldn't touch the POTATOES! Hope ate her plate of potatoes, corn and beans and then moved on to Bries Potatoes. The potatoes were definitely her favorite part. In fact, she had a piece of chocolate at one point and saw that I had a plate of potatoes and immediately dropped the chocolate and came running! She ate ALOT of POTATOES!
These little monkey's were shorter than the food table and couldn't even see the food. Yet I found them dunking the same chip over and over into the 7 layer dip! YUMMY! So I got them a big plate and sat them down to share. They were in heaven!

We played games and had a GREAT day. I will forever be indebted to Caroline for adopting us into her family. I wasn't homesick at all!

My journey for.........

AFTER:

15 cups of flour

5 eggs

12 teaspoons of yeast

2 phone calls and a house visit for help

hours and hours of waiting for dough to rise

2 VERY contradicting and different recipes

one temper tantrum

36 burned, hard as a rock, throw in the garbage suppose to be's

staying up until 2:30 am

3 attempts AND FINALLY.......

The Perfect Rolls! My favorite part of Thanksgiving dinner!
OK, OK, they are far from perfect. Most don't look very pretty, but they do actually taste good and are leaps and bound better than the 1st 2 attempts!

So, not bad for my first try!:)

Brielle's "Thankful" list!

After explaining to Brielle that the things we are happy to have are the things we are thankful for she told me a list of things she was thankful for. Remember this is her words!

1. I so happy that daddy loves me so much, that he leaves all day for me!
*** side note: I have explained to her that the reason Josh is gone so much is because he loves
us so much and is working hard for us!

2. My crayons and markers

3. Hopey

4. All da people

5. All da dogs

6. The beach

7. The Grandmas- since their visit we have started referring to them as 'The Grandmas'

8. My pretty hair- I take this as she is grateful that I do her hair. Probably NOT what she meant, but I like to think that it is!

It did hurt my feelings a tiny bit that I didn't make the cut! Maybe that is why I have to tell lie to myself about the whole getting her hair done thing. I did think this was SO sweet though, because she didn't know what she was expected to be thankful for!(ie food, clothes, family, house, all the great things that we are all so thankful for!) I just loved it because she gave totally random answers!

Random little story......

So, this is the night light that is NORMALLY in Brielle and Hope's room. The past few nights when I have gone to switch it on it hasn't been there. I always end up finding it in the bathroom. I figured Josh put it in there so if Brie had to go potty she would have a light. It just didn't make sense, because why now all of the sudden. I just kept moving it back into there room and didn't say anything.

Well tonight we went to get in the bath tub and the bathroom door was locked. I said "Brielle did you lock the door?"

"yeah mom, shhhhh be quiet my rocks are sleeping!"

WHAT??!!??!?

I open the door and low and behold this is what I see. The vase has little pebbles in it and usually flowers. She has taken out the flowers, covered the rocks up with a wash cloth, and plugged in the night light "so they wouldn't get scared"

Silly girl!

What's in your baskets?

My cousin Krista did her version of the saying "What's in your wallet" making it "What's in your baskets!" I thought it was so cute because my baskets are VERY different from hers! but just the same as her.....we are always emptying our wallets it fill up the baskets!

Here's "What's in my baskets Krista".......

Wooden paper dolls and accessories!
Polly pockets, My little ponies!

Fluffy little dress ups!

and wouldn't you know we did have at least one basket in common.....balls (which filled up all 3 of her baskets)! This must be the UNIVERSAL toy! Notice ours are mostly PINK!


Now I'm curious "What's in your baskets?"

so SWEET!

We have had a hard time keeping Hope out of Brie's bed. Usually Brie comes to complain. Tonight it must not have been a problem. So Sweet! I LOVE my girls so much, and love the relationship they are building. It is so interesting seeing them together. They are so intertwined, and connected. The other day Brie was frustrated and said "Mommy I not like Hopey" I just told her she was her sister and she needed to learn to love her. We went through half the day having this conversation. Finally by the evening she came in and said "Mommy I really love her, I not hate her." It was so cute how she worked it through in her little mind. They, for the most part get along so great! And they will always have each others back!

Sunday afternoon entertainment!

Brielle came into my room with a dime and said "Look at my penny mommy"
I thought it was time she learned the difference in all the money so we went and got the change jar and had a little money lesson.

Then the game of putting all the coins back into the jar came about! I cannot believe how long they did this! Hope especially loved it and thought it was the best game in the world. I eventually had to pull it away because Brie started pretending to be "Clifford" and doing it with her mouth.......Hope followed suit as usual! Money in mouth grosses me out!

The chefs

I was finishing up dinner and Josh was fixing some eggs. We were both right there in the kitchen with our children right in front of us. I have NO CLUE how this happened but when I looked up this is what I found!


Somehow without Josh or I noticing, Brie and Hope got a bowl, a spoon and wire whisk, and 3 eggs! Brie had TOTALLY cracked an egg in the bowl and was stirring it and Hope was banging 2 eggs together! NICE! How did they sneak all that past us when we were in the kitchen?
Too Funny! Brielle felt so big that she made her own eggs. Of course she didn't eat them but she did make them. Don't feel so bad about the lipstick Barbs! This time both of us were RIGHT THERE! Sneaky little girls!

***sidenote for the mommies! I know all you can think about is the clean couch! Don't worry I scrubbed it right up and there is not even a mark!

Disclaimer.....

I just want EVERYBODY to know....

I AM NOT IN LOVE WITH EDWARD CULLEN, OR JACOB BLACK!

They are completely fictional characters, therefore figments of Stephanie Meyers imagination! I just didn't want any confusion with the shirt and all.....it was all about getting into the TWILIGHT spirit and having a little fun with it!

Josh totally made fun of me and told me I was like a star wars junkie........yikes!

Mommies night out!!!!!

Tonight I started out my night with the "LAW WIVES" progressive dinner! It was a lot of fun, and I got to eat a lot of yummy food and meet a lot of great, nice people who will be here with me for the next 3 years.....which is comforting! It is so great to be surrounded by friends! Don't get me wrong I LOVED every second of this...but I couldn't keep my mind off of the next event of the evening........

Twilight Movie
The midnight showing!

YES, I know I am a complete and total nerd! I found out that I bought a special edition book, and it came with t-shirt rub ons! Yeah, you were kind of supposed to pick a team..."TEAM EDWARD" or "TEAM JACOB" but I couldn't! I LOVE them both too much so this is what the front of my shirt said........And this is what the back said! Yeah, like I said...........NERD! You can make fun of me for it, it is OK! I was only wishing I was in UTAH, because I KNOW there would be a lot of nerds with me there!This is my friend Katrina and this is what happens when you put us in front of a camera set to take like 10 pictures! Pretty hilarious.....at least to us!

Yeah a little spastic and sleep deprived......it is 2:30 AM

Don't worry! We can be normal!

We went to the movie with my adopted family out here, the Burtons! It was FANTASTIC! I was bummed I forgot my camera at the theatre! I know, so not like me! I was pleasantly surprised with the movie, and liked it a lot more than I thought I would! I set myself up for the worst, and despite the fact that Bella wouldn't stop shaking her head funny it was GREAT! Seriously though, her head thing was driving me insane....anybody else notice it?

Big THANKS to the Greatest, most WONDERFUL husband ever, who took the kids all night and happily let me go! I LOVE you so much baby!

I'm sure as Brielle is bouncing on me at 8:00 in the morning I will regret my late night rendezvous, but is was a lot of fun!