Super heroes and a Jedi

The infamous reversible capes.

Literally the only picure I could get with both of their backs facing me. 

And here is the Jedi Master homself.

This one makes me laugh because technically he is batman and yet he's still trying to fly. 

Nothing says Merry Christmas better than a tetanus shot

I am an idiot.
No, really. I. am. a. big. idiot.
 In fact I would even say I am a moron. If you don't like stories about someone (me) injuring themselves, then I suggest you stop reading now. This post it full of self injuring.  Lots of moronic self infliction of wounds. No, really.

For part of the boys' Christmas I'm sewing them some reversable capes with Batman and Superman. Last night at about 9:30, I was apparently tired and should have stopped sewing.

I'm cruising along when there was a string in the way. Most normal people would take their foot of the sewing pedal. Since I am in fact a moron, I didn't. Suddenly the needle broke and I thought, "huh that sucks." Then I couldn't see the needle anywhere. That's when I realized  that it's sticking out of my left pointer finger. It wasn't just stuck it was bent like a fish hook through my finger.

Chad doesn't do well with blood, at all! He didn't want to take it out because it was going to hurt like a banshee. So I manned up and grabbed the tweezers from him. That is when I discovered it was already broken. So it came out easily enough. Thats when we realized there was a little chip still in there. So upon Dr. Dad's suggestion I get to leave it in there like a war veteran with shrapnel. I also had to sleep with my finger elevated. On top of that, I don't remember the last time I got a tetanus shot. Yeah that stunk. My arm is so stinking sore.
So I am an idiot. Somehow I managed to sew right over my finger.

A flood of biblical proportions

Well at least it was a flood of washing machine proportions.

Grandpa and Grandma M installed a washer and dryer in the bedroom above the boys room about 10 years ago making it easier for them to do laundry. The plumber had been here the last week fixing a leak in the drain of the tub. But he had to disconnect Grandpa's washer and dryer to reach the pipes. Despite telling Grandpa and I that we'd have to do the laundry downstairs. The plumber still hooked up the water and power to the washer.

My aunt Janalee comes up every Thursday to help Grandpa clean and to help him do laundry. (I do the outside chores she does the inside which is a right dandy deal) While I was driving to Hill she called me to make sure I didn't have any laundry downstairs. She did 3 large loads there. Needless to say there was a minor miscommunication and she thought it was only the dryer that wasn't hooked up. Luckily, she only did one small load in the washer upstairs. Unfortunately, that load of wash drained directly down the wall between the boys room and the bathroom.


For the past 3 days we've been cleaning and drying. I have a carpet cleaner that I managed to suck up 3-4 gallons with and my parents still had a fan from when their carpets were cleaned. So that helped move things along. But Chad had to peel back the carpet and the pad to make sure its' all dry. The boys' room is finally put back together. Let me tell you it's been fun!

Flying by the seat of my pants

So I technically graduated from good ol' BYU-Idaho in April of 2007 despite the fact that I walked in my little cap and gown in April of 2006. I had to finish one online literature class from BYU to graduate and I took my sweet time doing it.

I graduated in History Education with a minor in English Education. When you graduate you are supposed to apply for your Idaho teaching certificate so that you can get a job or so that you can keep your certificate up to date until you want to teach.

Well, you have 3 years to apply. Since my 3 years was almost up, I finally got my fingerprinting done. It was literally the only thing I had left to do. Are you starting to see a pattern of procrastination? My mom calls it "Flying by the seat of my pants" and after 26 1/2 years of doing it I'm getting pretty awesome!

I got my little certificate in the mail and guess what? Procrastination has paid off! I have until 2014 to do my 6 credits of continuing education to renew my license! Mwah ha ha. Will I procrastinate that too? Yeah probably! I'm going to try really hard not to though!

The real question is, Do I honestly feel qualified to teach? Those silly people gave me a certificate to teach things that I've totally forgotten. Honestly I'm reading a book about grammar for Pete's sake! Oh well its taken care of...for now.

More Misadventures of Mooch

I'm so sad I didn't get a picture of this one.
When Mooch climbs up somewhere and gets stuck there is a certain sense of panic in his voice when he cries. Usually he is stuck on top of the table or another piece of furniture.

Sometime last week he was in my room using the panicky cry. I sort of ignored him because there isn't anything he could get stuck on, or so I thought.

As all of you know we've been battling Hobo spiders for the past 4 months. And for the last 4 months Mooch hasn't touched a single sticky trap.

After a couple more yelps of panic I came in to investigate. Somehow he had gotten a sticky trap stuck to the bottom of his footie pajamas and then managed to get the trap stuck to the carpet too. He was literally Stuck in the middle of the floor.

I don't know how the kid does it.

Feeling somewhat nostalgic

As fall has hit, the valley here has just gotten even more pretty. Looking at some of our pictures I couldn't just help but think about growing up here.

While growing up here, I totally hated living in a small town. I hated that the closest movie theater was 20 minutes away. I hated that I was related to almost everyone. I do in fact know who my 8th cousins are in some cases. I didn't really like that I went to high school with not 1, but 8 of my cousins- 6 on my Dad’s side and 2 on my Mom’s and lets be honest I’m probably forgetting someone. I hated that all we had to do was go bowling or light toilet paper on fire and kick it around (Seriously that really happened). I had a professor at BYU-I tell me he wanted to live here someday and I thought he was crazy!

It took me living outside the Mormon bubble that runs from lets say St. George to oh maybe somewhere in Southeast Idaho, to really appreciate where I grew up. Although everything in Reno seemed a lot closer it still took 20 minutes to get there.

But I love it now, well at least some things.

I love that we can go see my parents on a whim- I don’t know if they love that though. I love that I get to live in this gorgeous valley again. I even sometimes love running into old friends at the grocery store, sometimes. I love that I get to see some of my oldest and dearest friends if we can ever coordinate schedules right.

I love living here with Grandpa and that my kids love him and want to play with him. Seriously, Mooch was trying to wrestle him the other day and it made me think of all the times Grandpa did that with all of us grandkids when we were little. I love that Chad gets to see where I grew up for an extended period of time, yet again not sure if he loves it. This place made me who I am. The people here made me who I am. I’m grateful for it. I just thought I’d tell all of you that because, well I can.

Loving Fall

Oh how I love fall. It’s definitely at the top of my favorite four seasons of the year list.
Just looking at these pictures makes me love living here all the more. I wish I would have gotten more with the mountains in them. Oh well.

Anyways…

Grandpa has some excellent farming connections. Since we waited until the last weekend before Halloween we got our pumpkins for free. We were able to go out to one of Grandpa’s friend’s pumpkin patch and choose our pumpkins. Chad was like a little boy. Apparently he has never been able to pick a pumpkin out of a field for himself. So it was fun to take all my boys to pick their pumpkins. So here are they are out on the hunt.

Big Helpings

There are a number of reasons you shouldn't leave your child alone at the dinner table.

Here is one of them...

And another...

He decided he needed just a bit more spaghetti for dinner.

Apple Core...Baltimore

I feel like all I've blogged about is canning. Oh wait, that IS all I've blogged about! I promise this is the last one, I think. Yep we canned apples. We did some pie filling and just plain apples.

The whole summer Cowboy has wanted to help while we've canned everything. It wasn't until the apples that he actually got to help. He ran the apple core/peeler/slicer thingy for at least 3 hours on Tuesday. When he first started he needed help getting the apples on and off. An hour or so later he was doing it all by himself.

I just love it when he does stuff for himself. If only he wouldn't pour/spill himself juice....

My mom started at 10 AM with Andrea and me. She then proceeded to do all this...

Apparently when my Dad got home from work they started doing the applesauce. So basically she was canning for over 12 hours. Isn't she just Superwoman?

Mooch vs. the #10 can

Last week I was talking to my lovely sister Chelsie on the phone. Despite being in the same room as my children, I’m pretty much ignoring them. Usually they play pretty well together until Cowboy does something to tease or annoy Mooch. This time he chose for his weapon of annoyance, #10 can. For those of you who don't know what that is, its about the size a can of crisco only made entirely of metal.

Despite both of them banging on it like a drum I’m still choosing to ignore them. Suddenly Mooch starts crying and I’m thinking, “Come on Cowboy, and share the stinking toy. So I turn around at look at them and that when I see what’s really happened with the can. It’s hard to ignore your 19 month old when he’s crying and has a #10 can stuck on his head.

My aunt Janalee was up for the day visiting Grandpa. Since she is a RN I figured she’d be helpful. Both of us were trying unsuccessfully not to laugh at the kid. While I held him on my lap she proceeded to rub shampoo all over his little cranium. We finally got it to pop off. It was just a cheese stick, blanket, and a binkie later and he was smiling again.

I’m not sure if the can pinched him or scratched him but he’s had a red line across his forehead for the last week. In the heat of the moment I didn’t get a picture with it stuck on his head but I got a picture of the afterwards. Ahh poor Mooch!

Food Storage

So in an effort to reduce the mouse population in the basement, my mother and I have been cleaning out Grandpa's pantry which is a veritable buffet for mice. There were only a few things that they were actually eating in there. I've pretty much thrown away anything that wasn't mouse proof including a five gallon bucket of sugar that had collapsed. We rotated some food and water storage and voila! So why am I telling you about this?

We found some neat stuff (Yeah, I just said neat). Apparently back in the day you could buy gelatin in a 1 pound can. The directions to use the whole can are to mix it with a half a gallon of boiling water. Then add half a gallon of cool water. Yep we're talking about a gallon of jell-o. Who knows what one would do with a gallon of jell-o? But the cans are pretty sweet looking eh?

There was also a box of powdered starch. Yep the original starch! As in starch your husbands collar starch.

My favorite though is that apparently shortening lasts forever. No really it does. There were a few cans from the 70's that I was fully prepared to chuck. Mom told me to open it up and see if it had gone rancid. Oh it hadn't! Though, I'm not really excited for anyone to use it. Yeah if you can't read the lid is labeled 9/77 as in September 1977. I love it!

Mom, Ma-Mom, and Mike

So we've been busy canning more. I swear I'm incapable of doing anything else when we spend a couple of days canning. So instead of blogging I've been catching up on house work and all those other menial tasks.

Cowboy is in our own little version of Joyschool. There are 7 other moms in the group and we all take turns having school at our house on Tuesday and Thursdays. Its great and its fun getting to know some of the kids in the ward. Heis loving it and asks daily when we're going to school.

Mooch is gradually starting to talk. He's trying to say more words but they all sound the same. Like More, milk, and moo all sound like Moo.

Mom and Grandma and Mike all sound the same. seriosuly its "Ma, Ma-Ma, and Ma. Of all the aunt and uncle names he chooses, Mike, the most recent uncle addition to try and say. Yeah I don't get it either.

He's on the "no" kick. As of right now most of the "no" yelling is directed at Cowboy because he's being a mean brother. He yells "no" and rapidly ascends in both volume and tone. Its kind of cute, kind of. Even though the talking is a slow work in progress he's becoming more and more active. He's figured out how to jump and sort of shuffle skip. His favorite move is jumping in his crib while holding on the side rails.

Chad's work is going sweet. He's doing some engineering and some project mangagement. A part of his job is similar to what he was doing at his previous job. Chad's super tough and gets up at 4 AM every day to ride in the van pool. Which is awesome because its saved us over $200 a month in gas alone. Needless to say we try to go to bed before 9 at our house. Sad huh? But he has every other Friday off which is so nice to have an extra day to get things done. Then we can usually play or just relax on Saturday.

Little ummm... friends?

So Monday I had my mom watch the boys so I could go and finally register the van and get my Utah Drivers license. So I get in the van and think to myself "I better check and make sure the insurance card and registration are in the glove box." So then I opened the glove box and I see a small pile of shredded paper and what was formerly a maxi-pad. I thought to myself "huh that's weird. That almost looks like a nest." Thats when the mouse climbed out of the nest and on to the hand that I was holding the glove box with!!!!!!!!

Obviously I started screaming and had to get out of the van and dance around hysterically. No really I was hysterical. I was half laughing, half crying, half screaming, half gagging, and half cringing. Okay so really that would make me a fifth crying a fifth laughing and so on but you get the idea.

Just ask my sister I called her because Chad wouldn't pick up his phone. I'm driving down the road on my way to the DMV when my sister points out the fact that I have to open the glove box again and get the registration out. That's when I drove back to my parent's. So after a beating to the glove box to make sure the mouse crawled back into the engine compartment and numerous freak outs later I got it all out. As of right now there is a sticky trap in the glove box, but I'm not sure how effective that's going to be. At least I know it can't actually get into the car, just the glove box. ICK ICK ICK

P.S. It's dead! It got caught on the sticky trap. Chad, being the manly man that he is, got rid of it for me.

The post you've all been waiting for. . .

No, I'm not pregnant-I would probably cry if I was.

After 6 months of unemployment, Chad officially starts work on Monday.  We've known about it for a couple of months but have been waiting on paperwork, security crap, and general bureaucracy to get an official start date.

He'll be working in the Palace Aquire program which is a three year program. The first year, he'll be working as a Mechanical Engineer around base. The Second year, they will be paying for him to get his Masters. The third year he'll be working full time again.

So we'll be in Northern, UT for the next few years. We'll stay with Grandpa M for a bit saving us money and helping him out in the process. That is as long as he doesn't totally get sick of having us around.

Spiderman

Just so you know if you don't like pictures of slightly oozing wounds or spiders don't look at the pictures, really.

Chad had the lovely experience of being bitten by what we're pretty sure was a Hobo Spider. I say this because the day after he was bitten his arm became infected. The first prescription of antibiotics didn't work and by day 4 he had to have it drained and get a super antibiotic. The next step would have been IV treatments luckily we didn't have to do that. He's all better now but we've now gone on a rampage against the dozens of hobo spiders in the basment. Bless whoever invented the sticky trap.

Right now the score is Spiders:1 Humans: 14

The misadventures of Mooch

Jack has this amazing gift, he can get into trouble quicker than you can say, “Mooch, stop!” It’s true, I’ve tried it. For the record I found him with the bowl on his head.

Last Saturday our little fiend decided that it would be a fun thing to pull on the iron cord after it had recently been on. We thought he was safely in the other room when he managed to sneak in and unfortunately pull the iron down right on top of his own hand. So if you’re not into seeing 2nd degree burns don’t look at the next picture.

We’ve had him wrapped up like a little mummy this last week. Anytime we go outside or feed him, I’ve had to wrap a plastic baggy around it so we don’t get dirt or food in the wounds. He's healing up well and finally acting like himself again.

This lovely morning, while Chad and I were pretending the kids weren’t awake, Mooch managed to pull the box of chocolate milk mix off the table. He then proceeded to dump it out in piles across the carpet. It wasn’t until he left a lovely chocolate handprint on the side of the bed that we noticed his face and hands were covered.

Also Mooch has started to sort of say “cheese” and smiles for the camera instead of trying to grab it all the time! OH yeah Mooch sort of speaks. He’s got “more” down and can say “Momma” and “Daddy” but never to the right parent. We’ll get it eventually.

Oh how I love boys!

sticky and muddy

Here are a few pictures from doing yard work and eating ice cream/dirt.

Trey is obviously happy with having just eaten a chocolate ice cream cone.

I've decided that Jack will not be wearing a lot of clothes this summer. I'm pretty sure the summer uniform will be a diaper and a pair of sandals. Every time he goes outside is ridiculous and he usually ends up like the picture below.

My Boys

My boys are crazy! They are totally loving having a yard to play in and I'm totally loving a yard to play with. Grandpa is amazing with the things he knows about gardening be it flowers, veggies, or weeds. It has been fun to be outside digging holes, planting plants, trimming roses, and weeding with him.

Here are a few pictures of our boys' adventures. I just want to say that in most of these pictures it was only about 60 degrees outside, if that. Mooch is in fact wearing a sweatshirt in one of them because it was a bit chilly and yet I just can't keep him away from the hose. So like I said, my boys are crazy.

If you can't tell Mooch has "planted" his foot in one of the holes we dug to plant lilies.

Mooch now thinks it's cool to have mud for shoes.

It's like boot camp at our house all the time. We even make the boys do push ups in the mud.

How can you not love this kid?


I'm sure I'll have plenty of pictures similar to this throughout the summer. Lets just hope its warm enough to put swimsuits on for some of them.

Oh the joys of SPAM

So this was an actual SPAM e-mail that I got today.
I love it!

Dear,
I come through the internet (very accessible for Communication) seek assistance from you.Miss Corine, a young heir to my late father who was a personality known for his dedication to his youth. I want to recieve what I had when I asking you to help me recieve this amount from his bank.I have all the documents that I entrusted to my pastor.Incidentally, I inform you that that sum is $ 6.5 million dollars.Thanks and God Bless.
Best regards
Cher,

First of all I love that it is addressed to just "dear". No "Dear Friend," no "Dear Sucker who may possibly send me money," just "Dear". My next favorite part is that she has to explain what the internet is. Because anyone reading e-mails really wouldn't know that its "very accessible for Communication". I also love that at no point in time do they actually ask me for anything. I'm pretty sure the gyst of the scam is that they've been cut out of good old Dad's will and need money in order to get the "Incindental" 6.5 Million. And will then share some of it with "dear" me. Frankly, I'm half tempted to send "Dear" some money so she can invest in English lessons or even pay for a decent translator.

Starving Students

Guess what!?! Chad's in Reno again for the week. He's there to get some tools and possibly a truck from PacWest. But I’m going to cross my fingers on that one until it’s actually in the driveway. We finally got on unemployment so here in a week we'll have a nice little debit card from the state of NV.

Now we just need to sell the Forester get on food stamps and possibly Medicaid and we may just make it. If we can get on glorious welfare for a bit, then the world will be slightly less stressful. Let us be honest, it’s not like I’m not going to pay it all back in taxes once we’re gainfully employed again.

Now I just have to get over the feeling that we’ve taken 2 GIANT steps backwards. Financially we’re a little better off than when we were in college because we actually have some savings. But I can’t help but feel like a starving college student again, except now I have 2 children instead of just one! Chad’s even thinking about taking the GMAT and trying to get into Grad school for his MBA. So maybe we really will be starving college students again!

But we're settling in a bit. Its still sort of weird living in Grandpa M's basement. Because it's Grandpa's basement. But I'm so grateful that we don't have to worry about rent right now. Its a huge blessing to us and I know we're helping him out as well. Its been nice to be able to just walk upstairs and talk with him. Hearing Grandpa's stories has always been one of my favorite things and now I get to do it often. But after being away for so long it nice to be close to my family again. We even got to go just hang out at my parents house for a few hours and then come home.

So we're trying to make the best of everything. Because yet again the only thing I really have control over is my attitude. But we're doing fine and both Chad and I know that everything is going to work out for the best. Thank goodness for knowing that Heavenly Father has a plan for us!

Game Over

Well we've been informed that the company Chad's working for is calling it quits. So now we've been blessed with the opportunity to move on. Chad will be working until Friday and then after that will be home a lot more. After a whole year of praying that Chad would be home more, my prayers have finally been answered!

Seriously though. . . If anyone knows of any jobs in construction managment or Mechanical Engineering please feel free to let me know. I'm willing to move just about anywhere. Good thing we kept all those boxes from moving to California 2 months ago since we're renting from Chad's boss! Wahoo!

Ignorance is not bliss, it's annoying!

OK so I'm going to vent. I'm all for forwarding funny e-mails and the occasional inspirational e-mail. But there is a particular e-mail thats just starting to bug me because I've gotten it so much lately. It goes a little something like this. . .

"Please read this important message! RE: Removal of Joel Osteen, Joyce Meyer, Charles Stanley, David Jeremiah and other pastors from the air waves. This includes "The Spoken Word" with the Tabernacle Choir. An organization has been granted a Federal Hearing on the same subject by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in Washington , D.C. Their petition, Number 2493, would ultimately pave the way to stop the reading of the gospel of our Lord and Savior, on the airwaves of America."

Blah blah blah sign our petition on the internet and we can put a stop to this. Blah Blah Blah. If you're a good Christian you'll forward this to everyone you know. Blah BLah Blah.

I'm sure this started with good intentions. But this whole e-mail is a hoax.
here's the link that explains the origins of this hoax: http://www.snopes.com/politics/religion/fcc.asp

And even if it were true would signing a petition ON THE INTERNET really be a valid and effective way to stop something that big? YES and Bill Gates is really going to send me money.

People all you have to do is take 10 seconds and google something like this and you too will know that its UTTER CRAP! If you've sent me something like this, know that I do love you, a lot. But please, oh please, I urge you to at least research something before you forward to everyone in your contact list.

There I've vented! I feel better now.

I like to move it?

So.....we moved. Yes after months of planning on moving and slowly packing we moved to Sacramento. We got back from Utah last Saturday night, went to church Sunday, and then Monday morning Chad decided we should move on Tuesday. I thought he was kidding until he called and arranged for some of the laborers at Pacific West to show up at 7 AM with two trucks and two trailers. Needless to say we stayed up late and woke up early to finish all the last minute junk packing. But we're here and all I have left to unpack are a couple of suitcases with my clothes. It was like ripping a band-aid off. Quick and painful. But its over. . . for now. We're still in touch with one company with a job in Denver. Ahh the joys of being nomadic! Hope you all have a Happy New Year! I know ours definitely brought some changes already!