True Companions

My baby is 10 today! I can't believe it!! It is crazy to me to think that just 10 years ago I was laying in the hospital gazing at my newborn baby thinking "I could stare at you all day" and "where in the heck were you inside my body??" (he was laying with his head on my chest and his feet were on the bed). It has been an amazing ten years! He is the sweetest, most amazing kid - with a crazy attitude streak every now and again. I guess that makes him a normal preteen. UUGGHHH Preteen??!!?!!?? Hunter decided that for his birthday dinner we would go to Red Lobster - this is not a surprise as we go here for each of his birthday dinners. He loves Crab Legs!! He ate an entire pound of them. Mom and Allen came with us. I know the pictures are dark - I forgot my camera and only had my phone.

I had my first Dr. appointment yesterday - it was a little last minute - so thanks Cecily for watching Jilly. I appreciate it!! He did an ultrasound and it turns out that I am a week behind what we thought. I am only about 5 weeks because I ovulate so late so he wasn't able to see the heartbeat. That makes me a little nervous. The doc seemed fine with it. He said he could see everything developing as it should at 5 weeks and that normally you can't detect a heartbeat until about 6 weeks. So I have another appointment in a week and a half. That one Greg can come with and see everything too. Other than that everything else is very normal. I love normal!!!! (I don't get that a lot in my world) :-)

I am so excited!!! We got a new Tahoe!! Since the baby is coming we were going to need a car that seated 9. I have wanted a Tahoe since I was pregnant with Jilly. That was my plan then ..... but the van fell in our laps and it was too good of a deal to pass up. So, my dreams of a Tahoe went on hold. Now that I have another "reason" to need a new car I get serious. After a couple of weeks of looking for a few vehicles that met our criteria and a very long day of being on the phone and negotiating with numerous car dealerships, we finally came to terms that everyone could agree on with this beautiful vehicle. YEAH!!! I am soo excited. It will be squishy with all the kids - but we all love each other. :-)

I received this email from a friend of mine. I laugh sooo hard everytime I look at it! I thought I would share it with you. She is from Minnesota, of course........ Summer is almost here.....we can now see the deer moving around. Yep, won't be long . . .

So I think I finally have this blog thing figured out. I went online and figured out how to change the background of our blog. I was ready for something different. Like it? I also added pictures of the kids along the side. Apparently I am in the mood for redecorating.

So first off......this is me :-) I am not quite 6 weeks along (I will be on Tuesday) and I am larger than some people that are six months.........hmmm.....reasons this is a good thing: 1) I don't have to feel bad about spending money on maternity clothes, because I will wear them out 2) No one has to wonder if I am pregnant or if I am just chubby 3) You can never get tired of hearing 'are you sure you aren't having twins or triplets?' and 4) (my personal favorite) I like to give my babies the best - they live in a mansion while others keep their babies in an apartment. So, I had a return this morning at Ross. Because Greg was with me when we bought the items I was returning, he had used his card. Since I didn't have his card with me, they would only give me store credit. This, my friends, is a VERY dangerous situation. I had a gift card with $32.00 on it. You don't really expect me to walk out of the store with it do you???? Well, I didn't.....and I sp...

It has been raining NON-STOP for the last couple of weeks. It is crazy the amount of water. Who knew we had lake front property!! So I took a picture of the soccer field. If it wasn't so cold, I would have let the kids go swimming!

YEAH!!! I'm pregnant!! We just found out. An online pregnancy calendar says that I am due on September 27th. I am soo excited!!!

Here I am for post #2 and it is still January....can you believe it????? Well we have had a VERY busy couple of weeks. Greg and I have new stake callings. Yes, stake callings. That is never good. It is never good to get on the stake radar!! But we have been called as Assistant Coordinators for the Trek in December. It should be a ton of fun....interesting to see what happens when the two oldest girls hear they will be attending this fun filled event!!!! ;-) Also, and probably the most life changing information is that we found out Greg is allergic to....everything!! Well, specifically WHEAT, OATS, SHRIMP, CHICKEN, TURKEY, CORN, RICE, and ORANGES. It is crazy!! These allergies are sooo encompassing. Things that you would never even think about. Such as - his medication has cornstarch in them; candy bars are molded by using a wheat by product; just about anything sweet had corn syrup in it; all gluten (wheat) free products are made with corn or rice. We have had a tough time figuring out...

So it is January 2010. I know that I post a new post at the beginning of every year indicating that I am going to post more this year than last.....well, since I only posted 5 times last year that goal should not be too hard to obtain. I love looking at every one's "blog books" and want to make some of my own. I realize that in order to accomplish this I actually have to blog. Maybe I will actually do it this year. That is certainly my hope. After reading everyone's blogs, you all made me think about what has happened in the last decade. As 2010 begins, I look back at the last 10 years and am amazed at the time that has come and gone. The big moments of the last 10 years of my life are..... 2000 Gave birth to Hunter James 2001 Moved to Ramsey Started going back to church in the Anoka Ward 2002 Gave birth to Daniel Bradley 2003 Quit Kenwood Chiropractic Arts to move on to bigger and better things 2004 Got Divorced Buried my step mom Started working at Hopkins Health ...

.: (You really should read this first!) :. I think they need to create a child recall program. They could easily set the qualifications for children between the ages of 12-17. There needs to be some incentive for children to behave in order to continue into adulthood. It would definately be a program for OTHER people's children, because MY children are little angels who take responsibility for their own lives and love to provide solutions to the trouble the create in their lives. So a program for other people's children would be good. ('cause I am totally fine with counting down the days 'til they move to independence and freedom). Teenage children have many wonderful talents. Like the ability to spend 4 hours complaining about doing a task that takes 30mins to do. Don't get me wrong, younger children are capable of prolonging the timeframe of task completion, but teens have mastered the ability to add 'pizazz' to the misery of complaint. Pizazz - now ...

.: (You really should read this first!) :. OK - so I know I haven't blogged in FOREVER!! But I wanted to blog this to make sure that no one got caught as I almost did. So I was home today - Jilly was sleeping so it was nice and quiet at my house. I sat on the couch and was flipping through the channels. I watched a commercial for US Fidelis (one we have all seen many, many times). It is a company that claims they give you insurance coverage for your car so you never have to pay for any repairs again - even over 100,000 miles. With the fact that we have 2 vehicles that fall under that description I thought I would call and get a quote for coverage. So I call and talk to the guy. After a lengthy discussion, it sounded like a pretty good deal. I got Greg on the phone to discuss whether or not we should invest in this coverage. He was much more skeptical than I was. He asked a few questions and then my cell phone coverage disappeared (divine cell phone intervention????). In t...

.: (You really should read this first!) :. Well we are all back from our vacation to MN. (Pictures to come). We came back to 115 degree heat and a freezer full of rotten meat. We are making all kinds of improvements to the house (i.e. painting, hanging more stuff on the walls, rearranging the furniture, etc.) Jen is quite the busybody. The girls went to UT and even TX and NV as well. The boys will be back from MN soon and we can rearrange our schedules once again. Life is certainly interesting! Jileighan is a ball of energy and as smiley and loving as she has always been. Thanks to Auntie Kathy she now has a new little playhouse to practice being MOM. We are doing well and hope it cools off SOON!!!

I love my Father! He is my Hero, my Example, my Mentor, my Friend. I hope he knows how much I love and appreciate him. Thanks for being a wonderful Father! I love you DAD!

This is what happens when your well intentioned children take their little sister so mom can sleep in on Mother's day morning: ....... She eats pictures and gets the ink all over herself, of course! Just a quick note to tell all the mom's in my life that I love you all! I am so thankful for all of the advice (good and bad) that I get. I am a better mom for having you all in my life!!

Hrmm.. I hope the above photo doesn't qualify as Awkward . LOL

You'll have to ask Jen to tell you the story on this one... but I found a T-shirt that is almost perfect for the occasion. JEN'S NOTE: The cat threw up on Kendall's bed and Jilly happened to find it before I did. My sister's favorite text message: Jilly ate cat vomit for breakfast. Should I be worried??

After much debate, I have convinced Greg that he really could be a "two dog man". A free cocker spaniel fell into our possession. My mother (who is currently addicted to the humane society - and is bringing home her fourth dog tomorrow [crazy woman!!]) came across a woman who was needing a new home for her one year old cocker. After much negotiation (and the promise of a new super computer) Callie came to live with us. So far, she has been a great dog!!

I'm sure you could take this idea and run with it.. but take a look at this: http://www.boingboing.net/2009/04/21/freaky-food-fun-inse.html What do you think? Do you think the kids would like this?

Finally...after a short sabbatical....here I am (mighty mouse would finish it with.... to save the day!!) Well... I blew off hours of laundry (sorry, honey) and spent that last couple of hours online reading everyone else's blogs. I left a lot of comments and realized that I haven't actually blogged forever (OK since Christmas). But I felt a little bit better knowing that Dani and Amber are further behind than I am. (ha ha ha! sorry....schadenfreude) But anyway, I will try to blog and do laundry and workout and everything else I am supposed to do. Nothing like a challenge to keep life interesting. After all raising hooligans (see previous post) is hard work!! I have to blog steal this from Sarah and Twylla because it is hilarious. And you all know how real this really is, right? Again, just to quote my shirt...Just because I am a Woolf....Doesn't mean I can't love a vampire.