Sami's World

Once again I’ve waited too long to give an update so this may take a while, sit back and enjoy.

Friday, October 21 was an at home day. In the morning one of my friends called me and asked me if I was doing park day. I told her I was carless. She said her boys really wanted to get together with Milo and Niah so I told her to bring them over here. They could entertain my little ones while I did school with Jaime and Alix. It worked like a charm. They got picked up about 3:30 and we started our normal chores and dinner fixing routine. Scott got home early and we had an early family dinner. I dressed and left for the cannery. I picked up a sister who needed a ride (her name is Sister Thompson) and then dropped Jaime off for her first offical Activities Day activity since she turned 8. The cannery went well. Usually I sort out the cannery items at the cannery according to who ordered so if I come up short I know why. But we had three no shows so I had to help can. I didn’t mind though. It’s fun to can. After we loaded the 50 boxes into my van Sister Thompson invited me out to dinner, her treat. Can’t pass up that kind of offer. We enjoyed a very nice, very quiet dinner. I got to know her much better and am even more amazed at her abilities after that. I got home about 10pm.

Saturday was a “lazy” day. Well, sort of. We decided to do a major clean. Good thing too, because it rained. After cleaning in the house for a few hours, we emptied the food storage from the back of the van, sorted out the orders and emailed every to let them know that they could come pick it up anytime. Because it was a rainy day we promised the kids a movie and popcorn night. Also, we had commited to babysitting three kids for a couple in the ward so they could go to a wedding. We had a delightful time with the three little ones and enjoyed having them at our “popcorn and movie” party. Our kids were in bed asleep by 8:30 and the parents came about 10 to get their kids.

Sunday was “normal”. Chruch, family time, dinner and then bed time.

Monday morning was the start of my week with the daycare kids. It was also my car care day. Our car put on so many miles this summer it was already ready for it’s “check up”. That took two hours, but there was a park close, so we walked to the park, played and then came back. Since we sold the red car we decided to use the money to put new tires on our van. So then I took the van to the tire place and had them put on a new set of tires. Again we went for a walk but this time to McDonalds. The kids were very excited. They were so well behaved we got 3 compliments while we were eating. We walked back to the car and drove home for about 10 minutes while I checked messages and returned phone calls. Then we went to P.E. We left a little early so I could pick up the kiddo’s from school. We got home to a mess of more messages, chores needing to be done and hungry kids. We somehow managed to relieve all those stresses and do family home evening before putting all the kids to bed.

Tuesday started out “fun”. Scott had an early morning appointment and had to take the car, so the children and I walked a mile to school and then home again. We got home in enough time to take daddy to the late shuttle and then have a normal rest of the day.

Wednesday September 26 was a busy day. All the kids were dressed and ready to go by 7:45. We all left the house, I dropped off Scott, dropped off the Millick kids at school and then headed to Afton’s doctor’s appointment. It was her one year check up. She did great. She weighs 18 lbs 14 oz and is 30 1/2 inches long. This puts her in the 10% for weight and 80% for height. Wouldn’t we all love stats like that? Anyway, we got done with that and headed over to a friends house to pick up her son. We all do P.E. together and her other son had surgery on Tuesday. We got to P.E. in just enough time and enjoyed watching the kids play some soccer. After that we all loaded in the car and I did three errands that were on the way home to the little boy’s house. I made two other stops before going home to our house. As soon as we got home I realized it was time to pick up the other kids from school. By the time we did a little bit of school work, chores and dinner I picked up Scott and then left. There was a wedding shower I was scheduled to attend. It was very fun and I enjoyed the company of the sisters I was with.

Thursday was piano. Then we came home and knuckled down on school and got a ton done. After the Millick kids were picked up we rushed to dance class. Right after dance we rushed to pick up Scott. After a quick dinner, Jaime got picked up and taken to roadshow practice. Alix had fallen asleep during the day and slept for 3 hours. She was not ready for sleep. Instead we did her school work that she missed while sleeping and cut her hair. Ever since she saw my hair cut she has wanted hers cut too. So we did it, took some “glamour” shots and sent her to bed. Jaime got home pretty late, went to bed and so did we.

Friday was temple day. Scott took the day off and got a ride to the temple. He spent about 5 hours doing temple work and then came home in the early afternoon. We spent some time enjoying eachothers company and doing chores so that we could do some other planned things on Saturday. Then I ran out to do some errands. It was suppose to be a quick trip to the bank and Wal Mart but I made quite a few stops in between and didn’t manage to get home till 9. I had a great time though. We tried watching a movie but ended up just falling asleep.

Saturday September 29 started out early. I got up early and did some computer work. Then I went to a friends garage sale. I had a ton of stuff I was going to give away but she said she was having a sale and so I told her she could have my stuff to sell. So I went over early and helped her set up and get things going. I then ran to Wal Mart (I never did make it the night before) got a few things and was home making breakfast by 7:45 am. After a yummy breakfast we finished the few chores that we had left and then showered everyone and left by 11am. It was Gayle’s birthday and Joey had invited a few guests to a resturant to help her celebrate. It was a surprise and we volunteered to go early and decorate. It was fun. The kids enjoyed decorating, the resturant was very accomodating and we had fun. We got home about 3. I vegged for a minute and then got dressed and went to a friends house. We rode together to the R.S. broadcast. It was an amazing, uplifting meeting and I was very glad I could attend. We had a dinner afterwards and just enjoyed the company of so many wonderful sisters from the stake. I got home about 8.

Sunday was a normal day. Jaime had her debue in Sacrament meeting singing “Reverently, Quietly”. She did a beautiful job and we were all very proud of her. After church we rested, had home teachers come and then rested some more. Too much resting I think. We served the kids cookies and squash for dinner. Now I can justify the cookies because they were home made, 100% whole wheat, oats and raisins. And who doesn’t love a fresh butternut squash from someone else’s garden? Oh ya, did I mention we served milk too? It was fun and I think the kids enjoyed the “unnormal” dinner.

Today, Monday October 1, has been routine. It is the first day of October which means it is the first day of three months of non stop partying for one reason or another! Today was also the day I put the order in for 55 gallon water barrels. In an attempt to help ward members store water, I volunteered to do an order. I put the word out to the stake. I was able to place an order for 37 barrels. It will be quite the order to pick up when the time comes. Other than that we did our school work, chores, P.E., dinner and FHE. It was a fun day.

I feel great. I was talking with another mom who has a child slightly older than Afton and we were talking about how we are just barely feeling like we have our bodies back! It feels great to have lots of energy. To want to play on the floor with my kids. To want to cook and clean and have enthusiasm for life. It’s amazing what a hit your body takes for children, and yet it is all worth it. To see my five children smiling at me, laughing and enjoying life is amazing. To get hugs and kisses and am told how much they love me and are glad that I am thier mommy. What a joy parenthood is and I wouldn’t change it for a thing. Not one thing!!

I continue to heal, and get better day after day. My right arm is getting stronger, and I’m happy about that. I’m also still making very small gains in movement and dexterity, though they are hard to notice on a day-by-day basis, but it’s the aggregate that matters.

My right side still hurts a TON as does my lower back. With those areas it’s just a waiting game. I can pretty much manage my pain with Motrin or Tylenol, so that’s good. I have been going to physical therapy for my back. I haven’t really noticed very many gains since starting physical therapy, but that’s mostly because I haven’t been diligent in my home exercises. I have finally disciplined myself to do my exercises everyday this week, and we’ll see what the therapist has to say Tomorrow (9/25) when I go in for what may be my last PT appointment.

I also visited with my Doctor of Occupational Medicine this last week. He was very encourage by my progress and suggests that now might be a good time to begin a regular exercise routine. Those who know me, know how much I love to hate exercise, so we’ll see if I can actually discipline myself in that regard. I did go out for a 5 minute bike ride on Saturday. What can I say, each little step is a victory.

I have been teaching the Gospel Doctrine class now for about 6 weeks. I’m starting to finally get a feel for the calling. It’s amazing how you can spend all week preparing for a lesson, make a nice outline and everything, and then, when you get up to teach, it goes in a completely different direction from what was planned. I’m confident that the Spirit of the Lord leads our discussions. I’m not sure about the class attendees, but I feel enlightened when I leave.

Things at work are going well. I am on a team that is developing a product in house to help with acquisitions as well as provide remote access to some of Google’s services. That products launched last Friday, and pretty much went off as expected. We even had the bugs in the system that we expected. Over all though, it was a success and should be a nice feather in my cap during my tenure at Google.

I don’t drive to work. Google has a shuttle that makes regular pick-ups around the bay, and I take that to work. Recently, a homeless person has started using the shuttle stop as her bedroom. I suppose because it has benches and a canopy. When I get there in the mornings she is usually still asleep. It’s a scene that breaks my heart really. I finally left her a note with instructions on how to get to the nearest homeless shelter, but she still sleeps at the shuttle stop. One of the things I realized while waiting for the shuttle one morning, is that really, there isn’t much difference between me and her. We are all beggars before God, and in a very real sense, the line between affluence and poverty is very thin. I think sometimes we forget that.

A couple of weeks ago Jaime and I went on a Daddy-daughter date. Jaime is eight and now attends Achievement Days. For the non-LDS readers, it’s kinda’ like cub scouts, but for girls, but it’s not girl scouts. Anyway, they had a western themed dance for the Dad’s and Daughters to go to. It was fun. They had a potato bar and nachos for dinner and they taught us how to country line dance. Jaime, of course, was born to dance and she picked up on it immediately. Her poor old dad was more like an embarrassment, but we persisted and had lots of fun. On the way there and back, I let her control the radio in the car. Jaime is a better channel surfer than me! She finally found the song she was looking for and sang along at the top of her lungs all the way home from the dance. It was great!

October 5th and 6th should be fun. Joey and I are arranging an all night fishing trip for those two days. We’re going to the San Luis reservoir, which isn’t too far from here and is supposed to be famous for bass, cat and sturgeon fishing. We have several other men from our ward signed up and it promises to be a good time. It’s close enough that we can fish all night, leave by 7:00am and still make the first session of general conference. I’ll let you all know how that goes.

You all have seen pictures of Sami’s new do. I have to say, I like it. I wasn’t so sure because I like long hair, but I have to admit, it is very cute. Of course, I’m married to the best looking woman around, so I shouldn’t have been too surprised that she looks so cute with shorter hair.

We sold our red car. (Pause for a moment of silence…) We loved that car. We had it for most of our marriage. But it finally broke down and I didn’t have the umph to fix it. It was (I assumed) an electrical problem because I couldn’t get spark on any of the plugs. I swapped out the distributor and still couldn’t get it to work. We finally put it up on craigslist. A couple of guys came and looked at the car, paid us and drove away. They came back in a couple of hours with a new timing belt. They swapped it out, and the car started right up. We’re sad to see the red car go, but we are genuinely glad it went to people who obviously know how to take care of it, and we hope they get as much joy and enjoyment from the car as we did.

OK. That’s it. I promise no more. For now… If you’ve read this far you deserve a cookie. Go ahead. Go get one.

~Scott

It’s been such a great week that I must report on the happenings now.

Monday is usually my stay at home day and do as much school as I can. Then we do our chores and anticiapte dad coming home. But I decided to go check out another home schooling P.E. group that meets on Monday’s at 1:30. We had such a good time. The kids are older and there are more of them. Probably the most amazing part of this group, is the size of the families. My family almost looked small compared to these families. There were four, count them four, full size extended vans in the parking lot! Over half of the families there had 6+ kids. It was very fun. Jaime found a new friend already and some of the older boys migrated to Milo right away and were pitching balls to him so he could hit them. It was a lot of fun and we will be going every Monday now. We got home in enough time to finish our chores, make dinner and go get Scott.

Tuesday was slightly busier. Scott had an appointment in the morning so he took the late shuttle. After we got home from doing that we cleaned our chores as fast as we could, got everyone dressed and were gone by 11. We had a park day with Jaime and Alix’s virtual school. We had tons of fun meeting new people again. We left there about 1 and I took Afton and Alix to Laura’s house because Milo had a doctor’s appointment in Oakland at 2:20. We got there right on time and the doctor was running on time. This appointment was with Dr. Toth the plastic surgeon that was in on Milo’s original surgery. He said it was time to do the face surgery and he wants to do it March/April 2008. He said we would get the ball rolling now so we will be ready then. That just means LOTS of doctor appointments. He wants us to come to his San Fransisco office and meet with him and the oral surgeon on the same day (the other doctor involved in this surgery). *This is for Steve’s benefit* Dr. Toth said that when they do the surgery they will cut along the same incision line they made before, peal back the skin from the face, remove the bones, arrange them how they want and then put the bones back where they belong. They said Milo will for sure get a blood transfusion and be in the hospital about 6 days. They will have to stitch his eyes closed again because of all the swelling that will occur. Anyway, no nuerosurgeon will be involved this time because they don’t go anywhere near the brain and his eyes should be more protected and not look so “buggie”. After all that information we said our goodbyes. I went and picked up the kids from Laura’s house, dashed home and did an hour of school with the kids. By then it was time to cook dinner and get Alix ready. She was invited to her very first birthday party. She’s gone to birthday parties before with Jaime, but this was her very first one with a friend that was not a friend of Jaime. She was very excited. I had one of my friends come over and watch the other kids and Scott arranged to get a ride home from the shuttle from someone else. The party was at Pump It Up and the kids all seemed to have a great time. I got to talk with a new mom that I had seen at other activities but never actually had a chance to get to know. It was fun getting to know her better. We made it home by 8 pm and Alix was in bed by 8:30. Jaime however was still gone. They asked Jaime to participate in the Roadshow this year. She was very excited and it was their first practice. She got home a little after nine and was so excited it took us a half hour to calm her down enough to get her to bed! Scott and I were finally able to retire as well.

Wednesday was kinda full too. We spent the morning doing chores and getting ready to leave. We left about 10:15 to get to the girls’ P.E. group. We got home from there about 1:30. Did school for a couple of hours then started the “night” routine. I had Enrichment to go to and I was doing a provident living presentation. After Scott got home I left. I went and picked up another lady from church and we carpooled. It was a very fun evening full of much laughter and friendship building. I got home by 9 and went straight to bed!

Thursday Scott had another doctor appointment and I had agreed to watch a little boy all day. So Scott left and Dalyn showed up about the same time. He is 18 months and about the sweetest little boy. He has tons of personality but is mostly quiet and very well behaved. Most of the time I forgot he was even here. After taking Scott to the shuttle I took Jaime and Alix to piano and the four little ones and I walked to the park to play. That was super fun. After piano, we came home and had lunch. I put the three little kids down for a nap (Niah actually slept) and Jaime, Alix and I got so much school done it was awesome!! Then we did chores and at 4 we got everyone ready and headed to Jaime’s dance class. It was her first one this dance year and there were only 5 girls in the class. There were two absent but that’s it, only 7 girls signed up. The last three years there have been about 14. We aren’t quite sure what happened to the othe girls but the 5 girls that were there got a lot of one on one attention and were able to do more since there were less kids. Jaime seemed to enjoy it. We rushed home and I started cooking dinner while the other kids finished up their chores. Scott got home and so did Dayln’s mom. We said goodbye, had dinner and then started putting kids down one by one. I went to bed pretty early, Scott stayed up till 11 reading. He loves to read.

So here we are, Friday morning. I have cannery tonight and so Scott took the van so he could get home early so I could go. Today will be an at home day. It’s nice to have those every once in a while.

Afton is growing up so fast. She tries to mimic everything we do. Niah was pretending to be a dog the other day and Afton started crawling right behind her with her tounge sticking out and “panting”. It was super cute. She is also really good at independent standing and the other morning, Monday I believe, she walked three steps to Jaime. She hasn’t taken another step since but she did a good job with those first three. The older kids love to run and jump on the big bean bag we have. So last night Afton would stand up and then fall forward into the bean bag and just laugh and laugh. Then stand up and do it again. It was too funny. She “talks” constantly. She’s pretty sure she is communicating with us, but we have not idea what she is saying! Milo and Niah are letting her join thier group sometimes and it’s cute to watch the three of them play. Jaime and Alix still just pretend they are Afton’s moms!

Alix was telling me that she LOVED horses. She said that horses were her favorite animal. Milo piped in and said he loved cows, and that cows were his favorite animal. Alix said she loved horses so much she wanted to marry one. Milo was right behind ‘I’m going to marry a cow’!!

I love kids, I love being a mom and, even though it can be frustrating sometimes, I hope my kids remember and relish all the good times and not remember or dwell on the hard times. Much love to all.

I had an unusually slow week, that somehow seemed very busy and fast paced.

Sunday, September 9 was pretty low key. We got home from church and put the little ones down for naps. Did some very minimal cleaning (since it was the sabbath) and rested oursleves. It was a VERY nice sabbath afternoon. One of the best in a long time. That evening around 5 a family from church, The Toh’s, came over. They brought all the food. They wanted to invite a few families over to celebrate their son’s birthday but they have a very small 1 bedroom apartment so they asked if they could use our house. So, including our family, we had 4 families here. That made 7 adults and 12 children. It was very fun and very easy. Li-Li did all the cooking and clean up afterward. I just got to enjoy some good food and good company. It was very fun.

Monday and Tuesday consisted of school, chores and going to bed. We did not leave the house all day except to drop off and pick up daddy and drop off and pick up my daycare kids.

Wednesday was my errand day. We left about 9 did 4 errands and got to P.E. at 10:35. The kids played while I chatted with some moms. We left and got home by 1. We had lunch, put the little ones down for naps and then did school. Then Scott came home, dinner, baths and bed.

Thursday Scott had a P.T. appointment and so I had to walk my daycare kids to school. We didn’t realize the conflict until late the night before. It is about a mile walk one way and so Alix and Milo rode bikes and Niah and Afton sat in the stroller. The other three kids just walked. It actually turned out to be quite nice and the kids asked if we could do it again. We got home just as Scott did. We piled in the car. I dropped off Scott then took Jaime and Alix to piano. Milo, Niah, Afton and I went for a walk, played at the park and met some really nice neighbors. We got back just in time to get Jaime and Alix. The rest of the day was school and chores. Li-Li came over for a couple of hours in the afternoon to help me bake Amish Friendship bread. A friend of mine gave me a starter and so I had to bake that day. It was fun and it was good. Now I have two starters. I’m suppose to give one away, but I haven’t yet. We’ll have lots of bread next week. The rest of the night went as usual.

Friday was park day. I had every intention of going but had to get some things done first. The kids worked a little slower than I had expected and so we were an hour late to park day. I felt bad. Those ladies really rely on me to be there. We still had a good time and ended up staying a little late. We got home about 1. Jaime and Alix had been invited to a birthday party. So the mom came and picked them up at 2. It was a nice afternoon with just Milo and Niah (Afton was sleeping). Things got a little noisier once my daycare kids came but they are pretty quiet. As it got closer to the time that Jaime and Alix were going to come home I realized that I needed to get Scott. So I called Camille (the mom who had my children) and asked her if I should go pick up Scott or wait till she got there. She was in the area where Scott needed to be picked up so she just picked him up, perfect!! As soon as they got home Scott and Jaime jumped in the car and attended a Stake daddy/daughter night. The four children home with me all were VERY tired and so all the kids here were asleep by 7:30 pm. That was great for me. I had almost 2 hours of “free” time. It sure did go by fast! Jaime and Scott had a great time and we all got to bed.

Saturday was a good day too. I got up and out of the house by 6 am. I did grocery shopping and was home by 7. After the groceries were brought in and put away I left for my 7:30 am appointment at the blood bank. I was home by 9. We had originally planned a different morning but we realized that our house needed some serious cleaning, so we all went into deep cleaning mode! *tangent* Since we have moved in our room has been the place we put everything that doesn’t have a place. It was just piling and piling till it was seriously out of control. On Monday I had decided I’d work for an hour everyday in my room. I did that and so by Saturday we just had about another hour worth of work. So we finished our room including dusting, vaccuming and hanging pictures. We scrubbed, cleaned, dusted….. till 3 pm. We stopped then. Got dressed and went on errands. We got home by 6, ate dinner, did baths and put kids to bed. Then I left. I had an appointment with my friend Laura. She cut my hair. Not a little trim, but a full on cut. I have 12 inches to donate and another inch was cut off to even things out. My hair brushes the top of my shoulders now. I’d love to post a picture but Scott hasn’t taken one yet. I’ll try to have one by the end of today. It was easier to do this time than it was last time. I cried for days after the last hair cut. Not this time, I LOVE it.

Sunday was easy for me! It took about 3 minutes to wash my hair and maybe 1 minute to brush it! Church went really well and the after church routine was nice too. I had a meeting at 2 and took Milo with me. He had a great time playing with another little boy. The rest of the day was low key and relaxing, it was nice. We got all the kids to bed and I spent a couple of hours updating the kids’ baby books and Scott enjoyed reading quiet a few pages from his grandfathers journal.

It was a nice week overall. This week is a bit more scheduled but that’s ok. As long as we get school done that is what is important. With all the stuff earlier in the year we are right on schedule so any missed days are lost time. Too bad for us, I really liked being ahead so we could miss a day or two and it wouldn’t matter. That’s ok, life goes on right?

We love you all. We miss you too.

A Daddy’s bedtime version of Pachelbel’s Canon in D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uISuvTiTYJA

This was too clever not to send along. Enjoy!

Well here I am again with an update of our happenings. Enjoy.

Tuesday I had a 9 am appointment in Pleasanton for Afton and Milo. So we got everyone up, dressed and ready to go by 7:45. We took Scott to the shuttle stop and then I hopped on the freeway and got to the appointment 10 minutes early. They actually took me early and I was done by 9:30. I had another appointment that morning at 11 am with Jaime and Alix’s teacher. I made it to that appointment by 10am. She was able to take us early too. So we got home by 11. It was nice! We ate lunch, I put the little kids down for naps and Jaime, Alix and I did school. It was a very nice, very productive day. We did our chores, picked up dad, had dinner and went to bed.

Wednesday was the first day of P.E. for the girls. We got up, got dressed and out of the house by 10:30. We made it to P.E. slightly late, but that was fine. P.E. got over by 11:45. Niah and Alix went home with my friend Laura and I took the other three and headed to Oakland. Milo had a doctors appointment with his ENT. He checked out fine. Both tubes have fallen out. There was quite a bit of wax build up in both ears so the dr. removed that. He did say that there is fluid forming behind the ear drum and if Milo starts getting ear infections or having a hard time hearing that they will want to put tubes back in. We shall see what the winter season brings. We got done and back to Laura’s by 3. I grabbed the kids and headed home. I got home by 3:30. We got to work right away on our chores and cooking dinner. The sister missionaries were due at 5 pm. We had everything done by the time they showed up and had a nice dinner and short gospel game. After they left we went and picked up Scott. He ate a quick dinner, then we did our normal bed time routines and put the kiddos to bed.

Thursday was the first day of piano lessons for the Jaime and Alix. Since the girls can go anytime, we chose 10 am on Thursdays. I dropped the girls off and Milo, Niah, Afton and I went for a walk. I wasn’t too familiar with the area and so we ended up getting slightly lost. But we had a good time. Milo road his bike and I think he really enjoyed the time we spent together, I know I did. We did find a park on our little excursion and played there for a few minutes. That was fun. I was slightly late picking up the girls but the piano teacher said she didn’t mind. She could have kept them for 2 hours she had so much fun. The girls said they had fun too and couldn’t wait to come home and practice. They have done a really good job about practicing and they love it. We spent the rest of the rest of the early afternoon doing school. My friend Li-Li came by about 3 and the kids played and we talked. She left about 5. The kids did chores and I cooked dinner. We got Scott, ate dinner and then went to bed, we were all pretty tired out by now.

Friday was suppose to be a little less crazy. We did some morning school and chores. We then went and met our group at the park. Alix had an appointment at noon. None of my friends were ready to leave the park and asked if my kids could stay to play with their kids. I agreed and Afton and Alix and I went to the appointment. After waiting 20 minutes I went up to the receptionist and asked how much longer, she said about 30-40 minutes. No thank you! I asked for my co-pay back and left. But, I did get a chance to talk to some really nice old people. One couple had been married for 56 years. The other old man was there with his daughter. He had been married for 64 years before his wife passed on and he was now a great-great grandfather. Amazing! He seemed very alert and healthy for the age he must have been. He even sang Happy Birthday to Afton! Oh ya, it was Afton’s birthday on Friday. We didn’t do too much celebrating since Scott was at work and she usually goes to bed very soon after he gets home. We had decided to save the festivities for Saturday. So we got back to the park. By then the original set of friends were ready to go home, but a couple of other people I know and don’t get to see too often came to the park so we stayed and talked and played. We didn’t get home till 3:30. By then we were all pretty tired out so we just lounged till it was time to make dinner and do chores. After picking up Scott and having dinner, Scott went to run errands and I put the kiddo’s to bed. I fell asleep before Scott even got home.

Saturday morning started early for me. Niah woke me up at 6 am to go potty. That was fine since I needed to grab a few things from the store for Afton’s party. Niah went with me since she was awake. We pulled into the Wal Mart parking lot and I was just sitting there enjoying the quiet of the morning. All of a sudden Niah laughs and says ‘I tooted. That means it’s time to get out of the car. My toot was telling me it’s time to get out.’ It was so funny I couldn’t help laughing. She has such a wonderfully happy personality. After picking up a few things at Wal Mart I stopped by Safeway and got donuts and ice cream. Scott said Afton would want donuts for her birthday breakfast. After eating a donut as big as her, Afton was still hungry so she ate some pancakes too. We had a few Saturday morning chores to do and so we went right to work. We were having the Elders for lunch and had decided to bbq. We did some ribs, hamburgers and hot dogs. We had potato salad and watermellon. Then we had smores. Afton had fallen asleep, otherwise we were going to share her birthday cake with the Elders. We had a nice visit and they left us with a wonderful spiritual thought. After they left we tried to lay Milo and Niah down for naps but that did not work. Instead, Afton woke up and we had her party. She enjoyed opening her gifts. Her radio from Grandma A was a big hit. She didn’t want to give that up. We brought in the cake and she looked at us as if we were crazy. She had help blowing out her candle and then we gave her her piece. We fully expected her to go at it. We were hopeful when she right away put her hand in it. But she wouldn’t take a bite, she just kept smooshing it. Scott put a little piece in her mouth. She gave a look of confusion/disgust and picked up the whole piece and threw it!! It was so funny we picked it up and gave it back to her. She looked at us like we were idiots or something and threw it again. At this point it was getting pretty messy on the floor and so we cleaned up. It was funny though. She would have nothing to do with that cake. We washed her up and relaxed for about an hour. Then we put Afton down for a nap and played a few games with the other kids. That was super fun. Then we had dinner, baths and bed. Jaime and Alix stayed up a little later than usual cause we were looking at some old pictures. I had forgotten how fat/chubby Niah was as a baby. She had rolls! Not Afton, no way! Anyway, it was fun to remember some fun times in the past. The girls really enjoyed it. It made me realize how very important pictures and journals are. Posterity really enjoys them.

Scott is putting the finishing touches on his lesson. I finished mine. They called me on Wednesday night and asked if I would teach the lesson in R.S. I said sure. The lesson is on keeping the sabbath day holy. It’s been interesting the information I’ve found on that. One quote in particular really hit me. Anyway, fun times. I’ll let you know how things go. We have some families over for dinner tomorrow night and then nothing, not one thing scheduled till next Saturday. Not sure how I will handle that, but we shall see. I haven’t had a blank week in….I don’t know how long.

Much love to all.

Well, I guess today marks the offical first day of school for most here in Fremont and therefore yesterday was the last day of summer. We went out with a bang, yes we did!

Sunday we had a dinner invite. Three families got together and ate some really good food cooked by Joey and Gayle. Then we played a fun card game late into the night that Dave and Camille brought. The kiddos played with each other and, when it got really late, relaxed in front of a movie. It was very fun.

Monday monring we woke up to the warmth of the sun. Good thing too, we had planned a beach trip. Four families met up at the beach. The Bennett Sr, the Bennett Jr, the Toh’s and us. We left Fremont at 10 am and arrived about 11. We had claimed our spot and were all set up by 11:30. It was a bit overcast but by 12:30 it had blown off and was a beautiful day. The kids had so much fun in the water, and digging holes and enjoying one another’s company. I couldn’t get Scott out of the waves he was having so much fun. Alix was swimming in the sand. Niah and Logan were up to no good the whole time, but having fun doing it and Milo and Toby were unseperable, until Toby met a girl and ditched Milo for a while. Milo didn’t seem to mind too much and they were good buddies again by the end!! :0)

Once it was declared leaving time we still had a good 40 minutes worth of work ahead of us. We had to get all the stuff back to the car and all the kids “showered” enough to put back in the car. It’s fun to go to the beach, but getting sand off of little bums itsn’t easy!! We managed though and did it with a smile. We got loaded and in the car and home by 4:45. Then we really showered all the kiddos and adults. We also got the car cleaned out, everything hosed down and by today it should all be dry and put away. That is good though. I liked having our camping stuff put away so fast. It’s a nice feeling to be done with a trip, cleaning and all.

Since our anniversary is today and finding a babysitter to watch five kids is near impossible around here, we took the whole family out for dinner. It was nice. The kids seemed to have a good time and the food was awesome. We enjoyed spending time with the kids. It helped to remind us that getting married ment having a family and what better way to celebrate marriage than with the family.

We came home and did the normal family bed time routine. Scott did take some extra time to give Jaime and Alix a father’s blessing for the start of a new school year. I think they enjoyed that time and felt better about life. It’s great to have the preisthood in the home.

Today starts a week FULL of appointments. If I make it through this week with my sanity, it will be amazing. Enjoy your week.

Saturday August 25 found us waking up early. We were leaving camp this day and figured there was no reason to dilly dally about it. We got up, dressed and had cereal. We packed and cleaned and organized and managed to leave the camp site by 9 am. I hadn’t had the opprotunity to look at a couple of places at the camp ground so we drove around for a few minutes. This gave the kids’ cereal time to settle and they had to go potty. So we made one last stop before getting on the road. We offically got on the road at 9:30. We were home by 12:30. Since we had a busy weekend we wasted no time getting ourselves unpacked and cleaned up. We had an Elder’s quorum party to attend at 5pm. So we had about 4 hours of solid work ahead of us. First we completely emptied the car. Then Scott took it down for a detailing (we normally do it ourselves, but after three weeks on the road and then a camping trip, we decided to let the “proffesionals” do it). Scott was gone about an hour and in the mean time I had the kids go in the backyard with soap and washcloths and wash down all the camping gear. They thought that was amazingly fun. I had started laundry. We had a good 8 loads to do. So I hung out half of them and dried half of them, just so I could keep the rotation going. As soon as Scott got back we realized they had done an awful job on the van and so I took it back. They gladly redid it for free, but still missed everything I had mentioned to them. So I took a rag and some cleaning spray and worked on the car for almost 10 minutes while they all stood around and watched me. I was pretty ticked! Anyway, I got home and we continued our cleaning. We left the house about 5 pm. By the time we left, it didn’t even look like we had been on a camping trip. It was awesome. I’ve never cleaned up that fast from a trip in my life. It was refreshing to know I was done. We had the Elder’s party at the Hansen’s house. They have an amazing backyard and a pool. It was fun to talk with everyone and catch up after not seeing them for most of the summer. We got home late and put the kids down.

Sunday morning was hard. We had all gone to bed late and we got up late. We rushed around and Sacrament meeting was “one of those”. It’s our own fault really. After church we had a few more things to finish (like folding all eight loads of laundry and putting them away). After naps and the few chores I made some dinner and we prepared for our guests. We had the Hansen family over for dinner. It was fun to socialize with them on a more personal basis in our own home. The kids all enjoyed it too and enjoyed playing.

Monday and Tuesday were “lazy” days. I felt kinda bad for the kids I babysit. I just planned on staying home, doing chores and teaching school. We offically started school on Monday and so I didn’t plan anything. Tuesday Scott was home but he had doctor appointments. So he had the car most of the day. He did try again to find the problem to his car, but it still doesn’t work. We shall see how much longer we hold onto that poor beat up old car.

Wednesday was swim day. It was the last swim day of the season. There were tons of people there. We were the first ones there and almost the last to leave. Our friend Laura has been awesome to open up her pool to everyone. It’s been fun. The number of people at the pool averaged about 30 but people came and went in shifts so it was fun for the kids to keep having new people to play with and fun for us adults to keep having more people to talk with. When we got home it was still pretty hot so all the kids had otter pops and played in the hose outside. I had decided to try this new reciepe I got from Denita while I was in Colorado. It took me forever to cut up all the vegetables that were required in the meal, but it was worth it, it was yummy. Of course I chose to cook it on the hottest day of the week, lucky me! At 5 pm there was suppose to be a meeting at my house. It was a meeting to discuss upcoming Enrichment meetings. Since I am the provident living leader I’m considered ‘on the committee’. So they wanted my input. They may have regretted that in the end….. I was a little late picking up Scott from the shuttle but he didn’t seem to mind. He’s been trying to finish a book and that gave him some uniterupted time to read. We had a late dinner but that was fine, it was too hot to put kids to bed anyway.

Thursday we again arranged with Laura to go swimming. This time it was to be a ‘private’ swim time!! It was fun. She did have one other friend show up who has twins that are a year old. It was fun to get to know her and ask her how she does it. How fun to have twins!! Right after swimming I had to take Afton in for a blood test. At a year they want to make sure her iron levels are good. But they don’t just prick the finger, they find the vein and take a vial. So we went to see the nurse to weigh and messure our lightweight. She weighed in at a whopping 18 pounds (it was actually slightly less but it was easier to just put 18). Her height was 29 1/2 inches. I bet Noah has her beat hands down…. We had to go to the lab to get her blood drawn. Since Afton has never been poked by a needle I wasn’t sure how she was going to react. I just hopped that the blood draw lady was good. She wasn’t. She was awful at drawing blood, at least in little children. She put the needle in about 3 times and had to dig around each time. It was awful. However, Afton didn’t make a sound. She didn’t even move. She just sat there patiently looking from the needle to the lady and around the room. We had quite the crowd of techs gathered around watching this baby in wonder. Especially since a slightly older girl came in to have blood drawn and was wailing. Anyway, I was tempted to crack some jokes like ‘oh she used to pain’ or ‘she gets poked with sharp objects all the time’ but thought better of it in case they did not find it funny or took me seriously. Another thing to point out. Since I had the two extra kids with me I was at the doctors office with 7 children. I thought I got looks with 5, people wouldn’t even talk to me with 7. You could just see them mentally counting how many kids were there. Then they would look at me, I would smile and they would turn away. It was pretty funny!! We got home in enough time to have some really late lunch (I left the lunch I had for the kids on the counter when we left for swimming, they were all STARVING). The kids I babysit got picked up and I went to get Scott a little later.

Fiday was “normal”. We had park day in the morning. One of the little boys at park day set up a lemonade stand. So we all brought our dimes and enjoyed lemonade and cookies. Alix was not able to enjoy. I had asked the kids to do their chores in the morning before park. That way we could be free in the evening. If they were able to finish I would provide the funds to pay for the goodies. Alix decided she’d rather play, that is until we actually got to the park. She was pretty sad, but I think she learned her lesson. After park day we had lunch, finished chores and then rested. I was pretty tired. It has been really hot the last few days and I haven’t been getting to bed very early because I use the cool of the night to get things done. So the kids watched a video while I had a little nap. We also had been talking with Stan and Angela and trying to arrange a meeting with them. They were visiting Jody’s mission and wanted to take some time to see us. I’m so glad they did. We met up with them about 6 at Google. They got the Google tour and even some fun food and snacks. I think Stan enjoyed the massage chair, and Ann really enjoyed the bathrooms!! :0) Anyway, after a fun tour we headed down a street to find something to eat. It took a few minutes to really decide where to stop but once we did we took over the place. Try showing up anywhere with 4 adults and 11 kids (although three of those ‘kids’ were actually adults). We didn’t get done eating and socializing till almost 10 pm. I know the Hurst clan was running on empty but we really appreciated them taking the time to meet up with us. We really enjoyed it a lot.

Saturday September 1 was our “lazy” day. It was the first Saturday since May that we had NOTHING planned. Just chores of course. I rolled out of bed with the kids around 7. We had an easy breakfast and then just lazed around. Scott got me hooked on the book he was reading so I picked that up while the kids played. Scott got up a little after 8. He ate some breakfast then played with the kids while I read. It pretty much went like that till 11. Then we had lunch, put little ones to nap and then we did chores. We finished about 3. We lazed a little more and then did a bbq for dinner. That was pretty good. We finished up, did baths for the littlest ones and got them ready for bed. I grabbed Jaime and Alix. Jaime was invited to Katies house for an improptu playdate and Alix wanted to spend her $3 gift card at Toys R Us. The only thing at Toys R Us for three bucks is candy. So we looked around the store for a while and then she choose some candy that replicated make up and she was happy. Then we went to Wal Mart to pick up some diapers and food storage items I needed. We picked up Jaime from her friend and the girls got to bed by 9. Scott and I stayed up another hour finishing up some cleaning and then we were asleep by 10. Well, Scott was. I had to read just a couple more pages of the book. At midnight I thought I better put it away and get some sleep!!

Well, that brings us to today. I finally caught up! We had a great service today. I really felt like I had a great spiritually uplifting Sabbath day. Even the kids seemed really quiet and reverent today. It was nice. I finished my bullinten board. As the provident living leader I have a bulliten board. I have been working on it since April. I finally put some of my ideas up in the begining of June, but since I had never done a bulliten board before, it looked pretty awful. So I got more ideas and finally finished it today. Well, almost finished it. A very sweet sister in the ward suggested that I add some cannery order forms so ward memebers can take one anytime. She was right. It will be easy to add, I was just hoping I could be ‘done’! Although I guess I’ll have to change it up sometime. It’s always nice to see different things once in a while, not just the same stuff all the time. I think the board finally came out looking very nice and I hope it helps the ward members get excited about food storage and financial security so that we can all be better prepared.

Guess that is the news. I did forget to report that Afton got her two bottom molars August 11 and her two top molars on August 24. She is the munching machine now!! She stood up independently (meaning she was sitting in the middle of the room and just stood up without help from anyone or anything) on August 17, she thought she was pretty cool. She’s gotten better and better, but no real walking yet! If we ask her to say a prayer she’ll fold her arms and start babbling really low and serious, it’s pretty cute. She waves hi and bye. She laughs and snorts constantly. She is still sleeping really well but I think she is about ready to give up her first nap. I think she is ready for one long afternoon nap. Afton is really growing up. Her first birthday is just 5 days away and it seems almost impossible that a whole year has gone by already. What a good baby she has been and I anticipate she will be just as good a toddler. What a great blessing it is to be a parent. To watch your children learn and grow and become better people physically and spiritually. I am grateful to God for trusting me with his spirit children. Much love to all.