A Big Day

To most people this would seem like an ordinary piece of construction equipment digging a hole. But to us.. IT'S THE START OF OUR BRAND NEW HOUSE!!! They broke ground on the house today and we are SOOOO excited!!! Yes, I realize I'm a nerd for taking pictures, but this is a once in a lifetime experience for us and I'm going to enjoy it! For those that don't already know, we've been looking at buying a new house for a couple of months and lucked into an awesome opportunity to custom build our very own home.

We met with the contractor yesterday and Chris got to tell him exactly how he wanted it positioned on the lot.

Today, we're supposed to meet with them to start finalizing all the little details of the plans. I have no problem letting Chris decide stuff like this because I get to decide most of the other stuff (carpet, paint,etc.) I gave up on having any input on the exterior a couple of weeks ago. The contractor told us that we could drive around town and look at stucco colors and rock patterns that we might like. Chris found one that he just fell in love with and every time I show him something else he gives me a "You've got to be kidding" look and says, "But don't you like the other one better?" It's hilarious!!! I think I almost have him talked into a rock pattern that I really like, but he still keeps saying, "It's not tooooo bad!"

I thought that the interior would be my department because Chris could not possibly care less about decorating the house. WRONG!! I was showing him some granite that I liked and I got the "But don't you like this better?" line again. haha All of this and we haven't even gotten into the nitty gritty of picking things out.

Our New Address

In other news today, I went to see the "Independent Physician" today. He agreed with what the Dr. here has already said. I need ACL surgery. He said that he could see where the insurance company was saying that it looked old. Apparently, a "new" tear generally has jagged edges, but mine have started to smooth over a little bit. This indicates that it's done SOME healing. However, he says that this is very possible and very likely to have taken place in the 5 1/2 weeks that it took for them to finally authorize the stupid MRI! So, now he has to send his report back to the insurance company and then we'll have to wait for them to review it again and make a decision. RIDICULOUS!!!

Today, the kids had the big ribbon cutting ceremony for the new wind turbine that the school just got. It's the first in Southern Utah and it will help generate some of the schools electricity. Pretty Cool!! Shelby has been so excited for this. It's all she's talked about non-stop for weeks!

Also, Morgan's teacher had her baby today. We are so excited for her. Congratulations Tara. He's so cute! He almost made me baby hungry. ALMOST!!!!

She's Lucky She's Cute!

Apparently, Morgan didn’t learn her lesson the last 2 times that she cut her hair, because she did it again today! She says that she was tired of having a “lump” in her hair when she woke up. (Her cowlick) So she decided to cut it out. You can’t see it in the picture really well, but she cut a piece a little bigger than a 50 cent piece out of her head. All the way to the scalp! She’s lucky I didn’t shave her bald to teach her a lesson. Instead I took the other 2 to get ice cream at Maggie Moo’s (YUMMY!) I made her stay with Chris and watch him fix a car. When Chris saw what she had done, he said, “Morgan, I’m really disappointed in you right now.” This DEVASTATED her!! Oh well, she’s still one of the cutest things around!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!

Today was Chris’ 31st birthday. He didn’t freak out about it like he did last year. Last night the girls were teasing him about being old and he said, “When I was your age I couldn’t even imagine being 31.“ I said, “Let’s be real, when you were MY age you couldn’t imagine being 31”. His reply: “Shut Up!.... You just wait”. I’m in SOOOOOO much trouble when I turn 30.
He went shooting at the trap club today. He said he was the youngest one there. (At least he’s the youngest one somewhere.... so much trouble) After I woke up this afternoon, we drove to Beaver to the gun store. He walked around there for about 45 minutes and then we went over to the cheese factory. See, this is why I love my husband…. He was perfectly content with LOOKING at new guns and getting a couple bags of squeaky cheese for his birthday. How easy is that????
He actually got a HUGE present for his birthday, but it won’t be ready until closer to my birthday…hehe
All in all, it’s been a crazy week at our house. Shelby, Morgan and I have had strep throat. We had picture day on Wednesday. Chris and I have both worked extra hours. On the bright side, we still have 4 boxes of girl scout cookies left and my house is clean!! Hopefully this upcoming week will be a little calmer…. DOUBT IT!!

P.S. I got a sign for my kitchen at the cheese factory. It said, "This kitchen was perfectly clean yesterday... Sorry you missed it." Ha!!

Yes, I know I'm Mean!

Chris called him "Ricky Martin". I called him "Angry Eyes". No matter what you call him, he's gone. WooHoo!

PURE EVIL!!

That's right folks, it's that time of year again. You know...It's been just long enough for everyone to give up on their New Years resolution to lose weight, What does that mean? Oh yeah baby- it's Girl Scout cookie time! (You will never convince me that they don't do that on purpose.)
I will openly admit that I have ZERO willpower to resist a Thin Mint. My only hope is to simply NOT buy them. No problem, right? Wrong! Why? Because I'm a sucker for other peoples kids begging for money. That look when you tell them "No thanks" gets me EVERY time!! It's the same look that cashiers give you when you don't want to buy a $1 Children's Miracle Network balloon at Wal-Mart...The "What if it were your child, you selfish woman" look.
Last year we ate so many girl scout cookies that I couldn't eat anything with mint in it for about 6 months. This year, I swore that I was just going to take a hard line and not buy any!! No such luck. Chris came home for lunch today with 6 freaking boxes!!! I told him that he was going to have to take them back to work and ration them out to me. He said, "Hey! I almost ordered a whole case for you. Consider yourself lucky."

WooHoo!

We got new couches today!!! WOOHOO!! Neither one of us have EVER had brand new couches. EVER! So, needless to say we're kind of excited. (Yes I admit, it doesn't take much to excite me)

(By the way Chris said I'm a smartass for my "Ya Think" comment! hehe)

Well Duh!

Chris (calling me at about 11am this morning) : "Hey I think I need to go to the Dr."
Jana: OK why what's wrong?
Chris: I have a killer headache and I have blood leaking out of my ear. And I looked it up on the internet and it says that I should see a Dr."

UH.... YA THINK?????

Turns out he has a severe sinus and ear infecion. They gave him antibiotics and cleaned his ear out and now he's fine. What's crazy is that his ear started trickling blood at about 7am this morning and he didn't decide that he might need to see a Dr. until 11am. Crazy Man!!!

Chris called the owner of MoonRidge on Wednesday and got him involved with my workers comp. When he called them, they told him that my claim was not denied and that it was standard protocol to make all surgical cases see an independant physician. I told him that they were lying and that they only decided to send me to the other Dr. when I mentioned calling an attorney. When I called Dr. Nakken's office to tell him that I would be seeing this other Dr. she laughed and said, "Ah, you must have threatened them with a lawsuit."

The kids are doing great! Preston is over his infections! Preston is really starting to pick up on things in pre-school. Morgan and Shelby had their SEP conferences (parent teacher conferences)this week. They are both doing really well. Morgan has mastered everything she needs to know up to this point in Kindergarten and Shelby is past where she needs to be in 1st grade. (Not that this should surprise anyone since they are, in fact, the: cutest, smartest, funnest, and most loved kids on the planet)

Who's in the Doghouse Now?

This weekend, Chris and the kids made a doghouse for Tucker. The kids had so much fun "helping" Daddy. He let them paint the doghouse and also nail the shingles on. They were all so proud of it. Tucker on the other hand wasn't to thrilled. The kids and Chris have tried everything to get him to use it, but he absolutely refuses. The girls even threw hot dogs in there, but he wasn't having it. Oh well...it was a fun Daddy/Kids activity anyway!!

Rise and Shine Sunshine!!

Isn't it amazing that even when kids are really sick, they never slow down?

Exhibit A

Even with a 102 fever, double ear infection, sinus infection and having not eaten since Monday night He STILL manages to find the energy to get into trouble. (Please ignore the orphan clothes. He's sick and dressed himself... pick your battles ya know!)

He's feeling slightly better this afternoon. This morning was really rough. He went to sleep in my bed last night. When I woke up this morning, he had gotten a bloody nose during the night and my bed looked like someone had been murdered in it. Then, of course, in the process of getting him cleaned up - he puked all over the bathroom. Nothing gets your day started quite like blood AND puke first thing in the morning.

Hopefully his antibiotics will start to kick in REALLY soon. I bought him a toy at the store which made him feel a lot better. lol He said, "I just feel a little bit better now, but I'll feel all the way better when Dad brings me something from Salt Lake". I think Mom will feel better when Dad gets home too!

It's Been A Pretty Good Day at Our House

Today, Morgan's class had a wedding! Mr. Q has decided that he simply can't live without Miss U, so they got married. Morgan has been SOOOOO excited for this. They went all out! All the kids were supposed to wear nice clothes, they had dancing, cupcakes, decorations... the whole nine yards. Morgan was really excited to get to wear her "fancy" dress to school. She looked so cute.
The elementary school is getting a huge wind turbine next month, and they are having a big ribbon cutting ceremony. The 1st graders sent invitations to President Obama today. Shelby was really excited that she got to write a letter to the President. She said, "Don't worry mom, I didn't tell him that you and dad don't like him cause that would be rude." Hahahahaha
I went on a "Girls Night Out" tonight with some ladies from the PTA. It was actually a lot of fun. Tomorrow, Chris is going to organize HIS garage while I sleep. Then, we have a babysitter coming and we're going to go back to St. George for the Parade of Homes (our tickets are still good, so...why not?). I just don't know what to do with myself having all of these breaks from the kids.

The most amazing weekend.

Our weekend was awesome! Friday, Chris' mom came and got the kids, so I went up to Parkway and hung out with Chris while he finished some side work. Then, we went to dinner.

Saturday, we went to St. George to look at furniture and ended up going to the Washington County Parade of Homes. It was a lot of fun. I have to admit, it felt a little bit voyeuristic walking through people's homes. I was looking for decorating ideas, but there wasn't really anything that jumped out at me. There were a few things structurally that I loved though. One was a faucet behind the stove for filling big pots. The other: a washer/dryer in the master closet. The coolest thing I saw though, was a ground level trampoline. Next to it was a big rock. My first thought, as a mom, was "Who the hell puts a giant decorative rock next to a trampoline. That's a head injury waiting to happen." As you looked closer you saw that it was a faux rock with a tunnel inside that led down to a sandbox that was under the trampoline. I still would have put the rock further back, but it was pretty cool. When we got home, Chris grilled some steaks and we vegged!

Sunday, we cleaned house!! We completely de-mucked the basement. We even shampooed carpets. Now, my house looks halfway presentable.

Today, I did a little bit of window shopping without the kids. This afternoon, I picked my babies up. I reached my limit of time without them last night and was pretty excited to go get them.

We didn't do anything spectacular, but it was SOOOOOO nice to just have the house all to ourselves!!

You Know You're a Mom When...

You know you're a mom when the greatest thing anyone could ever do for you is take your kids far,far away for the weekend!! Chris' mom is taking our kids for the entire weekend. WOOOOHOOOOO! (Sorry Auggie lol) I know I'll miss them by Saturday night and we'll talk about them non-stop from the time I drop them off until they get home BUT I'm really going to enjoy the fact that I don't have to hear them, see them or smell them for 3 whole days!!!
Actually, it's our 9 year anniversary on Saturday. Last year, we went to Las Vegas for the weekend. Chris did some side work for a guy that is a pit boss down there. As payment, he comped us a room. We had so much fun!! We had an INSANELY expensive dinner. Then, we went to see one of the Cirque De Sole shows. It was awesome!!!Chris even liked it-double bonus!
This year we're not doing anything spectacular.We're both taking the entire weekend off. We're just going to hang out (we haven't done this in a really long time) and work on little projects around the house together. I'm SO excited!

Misc. Pictures

Here are some misc. pics. of the kids. I did it mainly to see if I could get the slide show to work!

The Super Bowl

The game was great! Half Time show sucked! Here's our favorite commercial of the night!




Side Note: I forgot to explain about Shelby's meds. After the Dr. looked at her test results from 2 weeks ago, he said that her baseline for the test was even in the asthmatic range. He put her on Albuteral maintenance program. She has to take it about 20 minutes before PE, then as needed for shortness of breath and/or coughing.We're hoping that she'll outgrow it, but with the family history it's unlikely. We'll try this for a month and then we have to take her in for a follow up. If this is working we'll keep doing what we're doing, if not we'll try new meds. So far it's working great!

Chris' Rebutle

Chris says he was not laughing at me! He also says, it actally takes 84 stairs to do one load of laundry!

Our Week

Monday: Preston and I spent half the morning trying to get Shelby's medicine straightened out. I thought it was going to take an act of congress to get them to administer it at school!

Tuesday: Preston went to school without screaming. Since Christmas, he's had a really hard time with separation anxiety when I drop him off. Tuesday, he didn't even want me to get out of the car. He walked himself in with no problems whatsoever. WOOHOO!!!
As I was leaving the school to go get Preston, I slipped on ice and jacked up my other knee (the one I hurt in my accident)! Now I have 2 hurt knees! I can't straighten one and can't bend the other. Walking has become quite interesting and extremely comical. By "extremely comical" I mean: I don't think it's funny, but Christopher's children think it's a riot. Chris just says,"I'm sorry your knees hurt, baby" as he tries desperately/unsuccessfully not to laugh as I hobble by. I never realized how many stairs our house has until I hurt both knees. I can't even get inside without tackling stairs. We have 4 entrances and every single one involves stairs. BOOOOOOO stairs!
Chris and I spent half the afternoon talking to people about our house. We just keep telling ourselves that one way or another, everything is going to work out!

Wednesday: Preston, Morgan and I helped with the "Snake Bait" shop. It's a little PTA sponsored candy store that the school does on Wednesdays after lunch. Preston loves "Snake Bake" (as he calls it) He's learned that the day after he goes to preschool is "Snake Bake" day and he gets/steals money out of our change cup so that Shelby can bring home candy for him. He and Morgan got to eat lunch in the cafeteria with Shelby. They both thought it was pretty cool. Shelby is such a good big sister. Every week, I give her enough to get all 3 of them something. Most of the kids at school eat their candy at recess, but she waits until she gets home so that she can eat it with her brother and sister.
Anyway... Preston got a little plastic frog at snake bait. When we got home, he decided (for no reason other than the fact that he's a heathen) to stick it in the pilot light of the fireplace. It, of course, caught on fire, which then burned his finger, which then made him drop it onto the floor where it caught a piece of paper on fire. Thankfully, I was able to stomp it out before it caused any damage!! His finger was ok too. It scared the crap out of all of us though.

Thursday: Chris had a migraine that was bad enough that he came home from work. For those of you that don't know him... this does not happen!!! We've been married almost 9 years and he's called in sick to work 1 time (he'd had pins put in his finger the afternoon before) and come home early 1 other time (he had food poisoning). We all spent the entire day laying around the house doing nothing.

Friday and Saturday: Chris worked and the kids and I hung around the house.

Today we'll start getting geared up for next week. The girls start Spanish class, bright and early Monday morning. I work all week so that I can have our anniversary weekend off. I have my MRI on Monday morning (I'm never going to make it through that without falling asleep) Chris has a (hopefully) busy week ahead of him. Hopefully, we'll hear something on the house and then we'll have some big decisions to make. No matter what happens, we have to clean, clean, clean!(And fix, fix, fix everything that that Preston has broken!) Lastly, Chris has a ton of laundry to do. It takes 28 stairs (roundtrip) to do a load of laundry at our house, and that's just not going to happen! No worries, I'm sure he'll "maximize" each and every load!!

Now That's Tired!

Morgan fell asleep mid-bite during her bedtime snack!

Who says slavery is dead?

I was reminded of the commercial where the Dad is standing at the window with a cup of coffee watching his son shovel snow. The Mom walks up and says "It looks cold out there." The Dad says, 'It's freezing. I'm not going out there!"
Chris and I laughed ourselves silly when we saw that commercial. Not only did I stand inside and watch them, I got the camera and took pictures of my little slaves.
In all fairness, Chris shoveled this morning before he left and then I shoveled again at noon. They were making the 3rd sweep.

This week:
We took the kids bowling this weekend. They had a lot of fun. Morgan kicked all of our butts. Preston kept yelling. "I won" every time he knocked a pin down.
We went shopping in St. George. I think Shelby is more dangerous in the bookstore than Chris is. Well maybe not.... she doesn't have her own debit card like he does.

Funny things that have been said this past week:
Chris: "Shelby hand me that bottle of pills." (It was Tylenol)
Shelby: (We were watching Top Chef and the guy got emotional when he got kicked off. )She said, "Oh quit being a punk and get off my tv. It's not my fault you can't cook."
Shelby: (Watching American Idol) "Mom, look at her outfit. It is hideous."
Shelby: "Dang it. I can't fit a carrot in my teeth anymore."
Preston: "I want to watch something scary. I want to freak my sisters out."
Preston: "I has big muscles" "oh yeah let me see your big muscles"

Ariane, I feel your pain!

A few weeks ago, my old roommate Ariane, did a post on her blog about her little boys curly hair and how hard it was to manage. Let me describe to you Morgan's hair. Half of it is curly, the other half is straight. But the straight and curly pieces are all mixed together. She has 2 cowlicks on the crown of her head and a natural side part on her right side. To top it all off, about a year ago, she cut a comb out of her hair and gave herself ½ of a mullet (we’ve been trying to grow this out) It doesn’t matter what I do to her hair, within an hour, she looks like she’s been thrown away. You can't straighten it because of the curly parts, but you can't curl it because of the board straight parts. You can't put it up because of the 1/2 mullet part and you cant just leave it down because of all of the above. I try to style it every morning ( I swear I really do Tara) By the time I get to the school to do whatever task I have there that day, she looks like she’s just barely rolled out of bed. It’s embarrassing!!! SOOOOO… yesterday, we cut it off. I think she looks adorable. We cut it to the level of the ½ grown out mullet. It looks so much healthier and she loves it. This picture was after an entire day!!Onto more hair woes… Preston hates having his hair washed!!! I finally told him that if he didn’t start washing his hair better, I’d shave it all off and he’d be bald! His response: “NOOOOOO! Human beings is supposed to has hair!”

In other news: Shelby’s been complaining that she couldn’t breathe off and on for the past couple of months. She hyperventilates at the drop of hat when she gets emotional, but we have just chocked that up to age/gender manipulation. At Christmas time, Chris asked me if I thought she might have asthma and I told him no because she doesn’t cough of wheeze or anything. Well, when school started after Christmas, she started complaining of shortness of breath after PE. Given a family history of lung problems, we got her in to see the doctor. He ordered a test where they give her medication that will induce an asthma attack if she has it. We had the test this morning and she definitely had a problem. She only made it 2 doses out of 8 before she started showing signs of distress, so they stopped. Her face turned bright red, she started coughing, she was complaining that it was hard to breathe, and her air output dropped by about 25%. We had to sit there for over an hour and a half and have a breathing treatment before she was stable enough for us to leave. Now, we have to wait for an official diagnosis from Dr. Dowse and then decide how to treat it from here. The RT said that he thought they would just start her on a maintenance program for now. At one point while we were waiting, Shelby was looking at a book and there was a diagram. She asked the RT what the yellow stuff was and he told her it was "mucus". She said, "Oh yeah, that's the stuff my dad spits out the car window." He just busted up laughing!

She’s totally milking it though! I told her to go put some clothes away tonight. She said (with her most fake pitiful look) “I don’t think I can cause when I put clothes away it makes me feel like I can’t breathe.” I said, “Well, if you start feeling like that, then stop until you feel better then get back up and finish putting them away. When you get done there’s more up here for you!” I’m such a loving mom!! As she walked away I heard her whisper, "Dang it!" Gotta give her props for trying!

Still no word on the MRI! The physical therapy seems to be helping a lot!

Holy Cow!!

For the first time in over 6 years, I actually had a gallon of milk expire before it was used. Guess I'm gonna have to start checking expiration dates from now on!!

Update on my knee. I went to the ortho on Monday. He ordered an MRI, physical therapy and a brace. He says he thinks it's either an ACL sprain, slight ACL tear, or torn cartilage. Who knows!! We're still waiting for workers comp. to authorize the MRI.

I think Preston is hitting a growth spurt. On Tuesday, he cried hysterically when I tried to drop him off at preschool. After I picked him up that afternoon he fell asleep before I could get to my house. (about 3 miles) Today, he did the same thing when I dropped him off. His teacher said that after about 10 minutes he stopped crying. She looked over and he had gotten a bean bag, curled up in it and fallen sleep. He slept over half the morning. When he woke up he was perfectly fine. This was after 11 hours of sleep last night.

The girls are doing great. Morgan's pretty stoked because I found a lady that does private riding lessons. I work with her, and she doesn't require you to have your own horse. She lets you use hers. I asked Morgan, "So would you rather do gymnastics or take horseback riding lessons?" She looked at me like I was nuts and said, "Seriously mom, which do you think?" This is certainly not something that we'll be doing right away, but hopefully in the spring or summer we'll be in a position to swing it.