6 quirky things about me...

I am finally getting around to answering these things...I had to think long and hard to decide what I would write but here it goes....

1. My feet get irritated really easy, hence why I wear sandals whenever I can or better yet, no shoes at all! Unless my feet are freezing at home I am always barefoot! If I put shoes on my girls instantly think we must be going somewhere. I think this problem first emerged on my mission, my feet would sweat so bad and they would ache. After the first two months on my mission I had a transfer and after being with my new companion who was an American, the first was from Uraguay, only a few days and my feet were in constant pain she looked at me and said, "see that phone go to it right now, call your mom and tell her to send you Doc Martens"...so that's what I did, my mom set two packages one with each shoe in them and they saved me! But my feet have never been the same since!

2. I really really dislike when cupboard doors get left open, it drives me crazy! Especially since we have self closing doors, well at least they are suppose to be, and they work great as long as you give them that intial push!

3. My sisters use to call me "Bossy Bessy Cow" since I apparently always bossed them around, but isn't that the normal thing for the oldest of 5 girls to do? When my oldest starts in on bossing, my family now calls her "bossy bessy".

4. There are very few foods that I will not eat...I love food....hence why even though I go to the gym several times a week I am not quite seeing the results I would like...I guess I need to stop eating. There are two things though that I can't not stand at all....cottage cheese and shrimp! It's all about the texture and I just can't do those two!

5. I would much rather read a good book than watch tv or a movie. There is just something magical about a book for me....my husband doesn't always understand my obbession for reading, but I have loved a good book ever since I was very little. I use to save my money when I was little and ride my bike to this awesome children's bookstore that was in our neighborhood so that I could buy myself a new book.

6. I use to dream of being a star ballerina...I loved to dance when I was younger and dreamed of bring a professional ballerina or at least a ballet teacher, but I wasn't given a ballerina's body and like I said earlier I love to eat too much!

I would love to hear what my sister's think there quirks are as well as any of my sister-in-laws so let's hear it girls! CHRISTAL, KEELY, CHELSEA, ASHLYN, CELESTE, MELISSA, DIANA, and SHELLEY

Chinese New Year

It's not too late to still celebrate the Chinese New Year since is does last for 2 weeks! We began a fun little family tradition of celebrating last year...if anyone wants a FHE lesson on Chinese New Year let me know and I will email it to you and this year we even attended a local celebration with dancers.

I was first introduced to this wonderful 2 week vacation, when I went to teach in Taiwan. It was great, we had just gotten to the country, we taught for a few weeks and then got a two week paid vacation...which meant time for an adventure! And oh what an adventure it was...first off was Justin's surprise visit which turned into a bit of a nightmare, well at least the getting him to Taiwan without a passport, acquiring one in two days and then having it lost in San Francisco, the many train rides, hostels, hot springs...with naked Taiwanese people in them, hitchhiking out of a national park, having a "family picture" with the family who gave me a ride, my dear friend Rachel jumping off a train in the dead of the night, a rocky boat, spiders the size of your hands, riding three to a moped in the rain, without headlights that stayed on by themself, sitting in 1 of only 2 in the world's salt water hot springs, getting lost from our friends, swimming in the ocean, missing the "famed sunrise" over the mountains because there were too many clouds, trying to decide if Justin liked me or not?....oh the list could go on...and all of this happened in the space of a week! I am so grateful for Jean's minute to minute travel log that she kept, reading through it replays the whole thing over and over again!

Fun time Friday...take 2

So I really good intentions when I started this last week, but like a lot of things in my life sometimes I just don't get to the things that I want to do.
But here it is only 2 days late...we love to play with shaving cream, I first read about this is some "mormon fiction novel" that I read years ago before i had kids about how the mom put shaving cream on the bathtub wall and the kids practiced writing their letters in the shaving cream, and I stored it somewhere in the back of my brain as one of those good ideas! We don't get much letter writing done in the shaving cream but we do have fun rubbing it all over the place, especially on our siblings! I love this one because it keeps my kids entertained and is so easy to clean up....the only drawback, we sometimes use all of Dad's shaving cream!

FUN TIME FRIDAY

I love reading blogs, it's quick, easy, and often way too time consuming, but I still love it. One of the things that I most enjoy that I have come across are things such as works for me wednesday where people post things that work for them, the same author also hosts different giveaways, where I actually even won! Another favorite is talk to me tuesday at meckmom, who has all sorts of organizing ideas for making life easier. I also love the lazy organizer her blog is just good old fun reading material that is sure to make you laugh, and she hosts talk about tuesday and smart habit saturday.

After reading a friend's blog about being a fun mom I thought, well we could all use some ideas of how to be a "fun mom" so here are the rules: simply post an idea of something fun to do with your kids. It doesn't have to be elaborate, expensive or time consuming in fact, the cheaper, the easier, the less planning involved, and less messy is what we all need! So post away, my plan is to share something each week and I would love if you joined in as well. I am excited to see what you have to share and try it out with my kiddos!

So here is my first "FUN TIME FRIDAY" post, go paper skating. This is something that my daughter Lainey invented at our house. Wrap some paper around your feet, cover them in tape, and you've got skates. The girls had so much fun skating in the kitchen and even more fun trying to get the paper off their feet! We haven't done it in months and I think it is definitely time to try again and I think this time I will even put paper on my feet!

January came and went...

I still can't believe that we are already in the month of February here is a picture summary of what we have been up to the last few weeks...I apologize for being such a poor blogger, especially since I always love reading everyone else's posts.

1. I went away for a week to a scrapbooking retreat, I wish! Really I just pushed myself really hard at home, ignored my family and put together my 2007 family scrapbook so that I could save a few bucks on a promotional that winkflash was having. I had a few pages done already but ended up having to reformat them to fit the book and then completed another 80+ pages so that I could get the book done...my goal for this year, do each month at the end of the month so I don't have to pull late nights. I am still waiting for it to come but here's sample of one of the pages, this is from last year at the beginning of February...notice the baby still in the belly.

2. Justin finally got all the cabinet doors back from the painter and I now have doors to close in my kitchen. Doesn't it look beautiful? If only I could keep the counters that clean all the time! Justin did such an amazing job designing our kitchen. He also recently ran another water line to the refrigerator, installed a water filter, and touched up paint throughout the whole house!

3. Had a bout with the stomach flu! Hopefully it doesn't make it's way back again. My poor baby was so exhuasted that when I set her on the floor while I changed her sheets and she just fell over and went right back to sleep!

4. Had a very fun week with a visit from Grandma Aleen. The girls had so much fun playing with her, I am not sure who enjoyed the trampoline more, Grandma or the girls ? I think they went out on it everyday she was here. One of the best part of her visit for me, was that Justin surprised me with a night away. We had already made plans to go see Wicked for my birthday and he decided that since his mom was here we might as well make a "whole" night of it. I must admit I was a bit nervous but the girls had so much fun and were very well taken care of, my mom came and got the 2 big girls the next day to give Grandma Aleen a break for a few hours. The girls were just telling me this morning about how the got to have a sleepover with the sleeping bags in the living room while we were gone. Wicked was AMAZING and even Justin liked it! I can't remember the last time I got to sleep all the way through the night without being awoken! We even got to sneak in a trip to the temple, neither of us had Sunday clothes, so we got to go on a shopping spree before our spontaneous temple trip!

This is at a museum that Grandma always likes to visit when she comes to see us.

5. The girls have become very good at learning to play with one another. I love to watch them play together. Malia loves to come up with names for people, the other day she was calling Lainey, "Laineyca". Playing usually involves dragging dolls, clothes, backpacks, and blankets all over the house.

6. We have had the craziest weather this past month. When Justin's mom was here it was beautiful, sunny and even on the hot side, and the very next week is rained and poured and the Brown river in front of our front door came back. We're back to sun for the moment, but it is cool and had been a bit windy. The mountains have snow on them and I love seeing it, in our old house it was harder to see them and I have enjoyed the change of scenery this winter

7. Lainey started ballet, and couldn't be more excited! She is taking her class at the YMCA or YMCE as she calls it. The first day we went to class she had the best look on her face, it just glowed all day long! We got a membership at the Y and I have loved getting an hour or so to myself each day and I feel great!

8. Last but not least Lyndie is now an official CRUISER! She no longer crawls at all, and goes from morning to night on her two little feet. She is not that big and it is so funny to see such a little person walking around. She loves to play with her sisters and will get right in there and climb right on top of them.

I think that does it...hope you are all well!

A few pictures...

Mom's birthday party

Don't you wish you had one of these at your house?

I love the close up photo of her, she has this look of,

"I know I shouldn't be up here!"

Malia riding her new "old" Radio Flyer tricycle

Lainey exploring a career in African Drumming and Dancing

Christmas, New Years, Birthdays and all that stuff...

So I feel like I have posted in ages and it has been ages, and I am too tired tonight to go into great detail but we had a wonderful Christmas, New Years, I am now the mother of a primary age child and I'm another year older! I don't feel a bit older which I guess is good. We had all of my family and two of our friends over for dessert tonight for my birthday, awhile later I was talking to my sister and she said, "Yeah, my husband said that was one crazy party." But what do you expect when you have 13 kids under the age of 6 inside a tiny California house. Lainey directed them in a rendition of the nutcracker ballet for me, she could only convince one of the boys to be in it and then the other boys did a cowboy and indian show while riding around on their broom horses!

We have taken lots of fun photos over the last few weeks but they will have to be posted at a later date but I have to post this one that was taken on the Sunday before Christmas. We decided to take advantage of the low tide and nice weather we were having one Sunday afternoon and headed for the beach for a little walk and exploring...Justin was taking a picture of us when this lady walked by and asked if we wanted her to take a picture of all us, we of course said yes and this was the first shot...can you believe it? Everyone is looking and smiling! I think that must be the key, have a total strange take an unplanned picture and you are sure to get a good one on the first try! I love this photo of my very favorite people in one of my favorite spots. I am so grateful to have Justin and the girls in my life! I couldn't imagine life without them!