Dad of the Year

At the mall today the kids got ice cream. Jared was sitting next to Corbin and smelled poo. He turned to Corb and said,
"Did you toot?"
Corbin said,
"No, I pooped my pants."
Jared said,
"What?!"
So he took Corbin into the bathroom and cleaned him up. While we did our other shopping he had a pair of dirty underwear in his jeans' pocket.

Then tonight the toilet overflowed which he cleaned up. He came upstairs and said,
"I HATE toilets." The kids are always flushing something down or using too much toilet paper.
I said,
"Honey...."
Jared cut me off with,
"Don't even go into how wonderful I am."
I said,
"You are so wonderful."

Family Home Evening at the Laudromat

Corbin peed on my down comforter last week. I had lofty goals to go to the laundromat to wash it the next day. A week passes....but see I still had my normal king-size comforter to keep me warm. Well, two nights ago Corbin peed on that one too. So it became mandatory to wash my only blankets which means we ended up having Family Home Evening at the laundromat. It was actually kind of fun. We did the story of the birth of Jesus with little figures on popsickle sticks and played a Christmas matching game. I'll always remember our Family Home Evening at the laudromat.

Singing in Sacrament Meeting

In the van driving to church.

Mom "Sing good and loud today in Sacrament Meeting."

Corbin "I just like to hum because opening my mouth makes me tired."

Jared "But don't yell when you sing. Just sing nice."

Asher "Sometimes I just have a little bit of yell in my singing Dad."

Triple Muchacho Kiss

This is what we call the triple muchacho kiss when all the boys give Jared a good night kiss at the same time.

Jared eating salad!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Newsflash, just in. During a card game last night Jared Guy Speaks chose salad for a snack instead of junk food. He just might live until he's 35. Stay tuned for more healthy eating choices.

Haircuts

Gavin tried a Mohawk.

But in the end everyone decided to go with Daddy's army doo.

I am still growing my hair out. See how long it is? I am so proud because this is the longest I've ever gotten it. Yeah me.

Fun Breakfast

3-D Movie

We rented Journey to the Center of the Earth to watch in 3-D. It wasn't that great on our small screen but we had fun just being together.

Getting the Christmas Tree

Here is the Alaska terrain. Evergreens everywhere dusted with snow. Isn't it beautiful? Do you think this means it's east to get a live Christmas tree here? Why no it's not. You know how you can get a Christmas tree at your local Wal-Mart or grocery store? Not here. They IMPORT all of their Christmas trees from Oregan. The first place we went was a greenhouse in Eagle River. $100. Enough said. We spent the whole day trying to find a decent priced tree. We finally had to suck it up and spend $60 at Lowes in Anchorage. It's a beautiful tree though. It smells like heaven...well...at least like Pinesol.

Corbin being silly on our long search for a Christmas tree.


Here's the tree before the decorations.




And after! Good job guys!

Mom and Dad still love each other after all of the drama!

Toothfairy Dilemmas

When we lived in Missouri the Toothfairy brought a dollar. Our children would then go to Dollar General and get a sword or something and they thought they had just won the lottery. Then we moved to Alaska. The toothfairy left a dollar. You can't buy a pack of gum for a dollar in Alaska. So then the Toothfairy brought five dollars. There were 2 items at 4 stores you could get for five dollars. So we bought one and it broke as soon as we got in the car.

So the Toothfairy decided that just while we are in Alaska she would bring ten dollars. Oh no. There's nothing you can get for ten dollars that doesn't break the minute you open the package!

The Toothfairy is very resourceful and doesn't easily get discouraged. She is now bringing $5 gift certificates for McDonalds which is great. At least the children get a meal with their junk toy that breaks in a day.

Here's Gavin who just lost another one.

10 Degrees

It's 10 degees in Alaska so what do Karen Melander and I decide to do? Take the kids out for ice cream! Yes!
Carter and Corbin.


Jake in his coat walking outside with his ice cream cone. Doesn't this picture just make you want one too?

Quilting

My first finished quilting project. I am only a little proud. :o)

Remembering Corbin's picture taking

So we're at the vet and they FORGOT about us! We waited 45 minutes in the little room and I didn't bring anything for Corbin to do. I have to say he did an exceptional job. I let him take pictures to pass the time. Here they are for him to remember when he's 25.
The door stop. Always a classic.

My feet.

Our cat in his box. Can you tell?

So close to a full shot.

Here we go! A full shot of me!

Never Before!

So a lady in our ward challenged us to find something we are grateful for that we've NEVER BEFORE expressed thanks for. This was a challenge. I feel I've expressed gratitude for most things except....

HOT DOGS! I love the cheap 50 cent pack of eight with chicken, pork, beef, moose, quail, rabbit......They're the best. And on one of those cheap white flour buns with absolutely no nutritional value.

The double dvd system in our van. Enough said.

Homemade bread.

Star Wars

We just got done watching Star Wars IV. Immediately after watching Star Wars we play Star Wars. Notice R2D2 in the middle. I love that guy.

I'm doomed

Asher: Mom can we go see a movie with Kevin?
Mom: Sure, as long as it's clean and doesn't have things in it that would chase the spirit away.
Asher: You mean like immodesty?
Mom: Yes.
Asher: Even if they're cute?
Mom: Yes.
Asher: I can live with that.

I am so doomed!

Gratitude

Cereal: Simply the best and fastest food ever. Love it for breakfast, lunch, dinner, or snack.

Tide: Didn't believe the commercials until a very frugal mom in my last ward said that's all that she would buy because it gets out all stains without any other stain remover and keeps cloths bright and sturdy. It's true! Now that's all that I will buy. Worth every penny.

Charmin Toiletpaper: I don't have to buy Kleenex because Charmin does it all. Booties and noeses.

Lost tooth

WARNING: Jessica Loff should NOT read this blog. Might induce vomiting.

So Asher lost his sixth tooth the other night.



Boy! It was quite the endeavor to get it out.

We tried to tie one end of a string around the tooth and the other end around the doorknob. You slam the door and your tooth is supposed to come out. We tried this endlessly when we were kids. Didn't work then, doesn't work now. The string kept popping off of the tooth.


Then Asher decided he wanted to sneeze it out. (We read about a girl who did that in a book) I had him sniff pepper and flour. No luck.

Then we remembered how Asher got out his fourth tooth. He got so mad about something and ran to his room, grabbed his pillow and bit it. Our popped the tooth and Asher's anger went away.


So I got out a little hand towel and he kept biting it until his tooth popped out.

My little man

Asher got undressed to take a bath the other day and "Mom" was etched across his belly! It was like a little tatoo dedicated to me. It made my heart melt.

Gratitude

Okay let's just get one thing staight. Of course I drew the pictures on the blog two down and not the twins! I am taking a picture of our whole wall on Thanksgiving.

Three Things today that I am grateful for

1. Cetaphil is the best lotion EVER! It is the only thing that can remotely keep my eczema in check. Cannot live without it. I have a year supply of tampons and cetaphil. That just shows you that I could not live without it.

2. Quilt group. We have quilt group here in Alaska. At first I was like whatever. Now, I LOVE it! I love the people, the creativity, and the chance to get out of the house.

3. And my favorite food group, ice cream. Especially custard.

My Three Grateful Things

Okay, today I am grateful for a really good snow shovel. Tools are SOOOO handy in the right situation. Have you ever had a tool of some sort that you didn't know what on earth it was for and come to find out it's perfect for such and such. When you don't know what it's for you almost want to throw it out like it's worthless. Then just a little knowledge then makes that object necessary for your life.

Older children. I can't believe how much easier life as a single parent is with older children! The first time Jared was gone in the Army for 9 months I had the twins who had just turned five and weren't in school yet and Corbin who was three. I just about died. Now life is so much easier. Everyone can use the bathroom on their own and take their own bath. Wow! Live is so much easier.

Planet Earth. That's the coolest show about earth. Period.

7 Weird Things About Me

So Laurel and I had one weird thing in common.
1. I love smells too! Especially books. I can tell you about the age of a book by it's smell. I can smell the iron in blood, it smells like metal. Jared calls me a blood hound.

2. I rub fabric in between my fingers to comfort myself. I love the feel of different fabrics between my fingers. I run my bedsheet between my toes to help me fall asleep.

3. I live foods with mushy soft or creamy consistencies. Like pudding, rice, refried beans, mashed potatoes, noodles, bread, half baked whatever...

4. I love my toes. They are short and fat but I just love them!

5. When no one is home I dance around my house. I would never dance with someone (anyone!) present but by myself I feel free!

6. I don't like the feel of grass on my skin. I despise it! I don't like leaves touching me or any plantlife. It's probably because of my eczema and anything that touches me makes me itch.

7. I am a pretty organized person except when I grocery shopping. There is no order to how it goes in the cart, I am backtracking like crazy, I just throw it up on the conveyer belt and hope they put the bread on top. It drives Jared and Alanna crazy.

Gratitude

So you probably thought I forgot to do my grateful list yesterday. Well you were wrong. See, I've got my kids in on it now. They are drawing a picture of something they are grateful for everyday and we're making a grateful wall. By Thanksgiving our wall should be filled with gratitude pictures.

So today I am grateful for frinds. Four frinds in particular for getting me through this the 7th day of November 2008. For Steph Bacon for letting me just come over unplanned at 12:30 today and talk her ear off for three hours. Julie Holt for having me over for dinner tonight because my husband is gone. Shannon Coop for setting up a playdate tomorrow afternoon for us because her husband is gone as well. For Jessi Larsen who checks up on me and makes sure I'm okay frequently and who gave me the phone number for a service on base that will watch your kids when your husband is gone. YES! Friends. What would life be without them.

Okay, these were for yesterday. I am grateful for Fall. Life would be truly bleak without Fall. And I mean that, bleak. I LOVE fall. It's worth living a whole year for.

For rain. Sometimes when I get up and see the sun shining I'm sad because I wish it were a rainy day. Seriously. I know I probably need therapy but I love rain.

For books and the public library. I get all excited inside EVERY time I get to go to the library. I don't know what it is but I love the library and I love reading.

Gratitude

Okay, on one of my friend's blogs she's writing three things she's grateful for everyday in the month of November. I know I'm a little behind but better late than never.

1.Crayola products
My kids come home from school and color for two hours everyday. It's such a blessing because it's cold here and they can't go outside and play. Those of you who have kids know how crazy you can go with kids cooped up in the house. The great thing about crayola is it washes off the table, clothes, and bodies easily.

2. Studded tires
I am terrible at driving in the snow. I can get stuck on a flat surface with just snow dust on it. Studded tires are my lifesaver. I can go anywhere and I feel so powerfull and in control. Steep driveway? No problem! My little studs dig in and get me up it everyday.

3. Conference Ensign
It came today! I don't know why but I get so excited when it comes. I check the mail every day and am dissapointed when it's not there. I opened it up tonight and just read two articles and the spirit was so strong. I am just giddy with excitment about the Conference Ensign.

Fort Irwin NTC

Dad is leaving

So last week we had the Family Home Evening on deployment and we watched Elmo on Sesame Street deal with his dad going away. It's a DVD the army puts out for children.

Jared left today for just a short deployment. He'll be at the National Training Center in California preparing for the culture in Afghanistan.

Watch this the two minute clip in the above blog to get good idea of what he will be doing. I can't for the life of me figure out how to get that video clip into THIS blog. See what happens when Jared is gone!

It affects Asher the most. Every prayer today (morining, food, Family Home Evening) he's been begging his Father in heaven to help him while his dad is gone. He told me he cried at school today.

We went to McDonalds for our last family outing. Here's all my men.

Here's the boys trying to carry dad's packed bags.

And here's the man himself doing it all on his own.


Can't wait for Jared to get home!

Pin the Scooby Snack

Jared and I went to a Halloween party and played pin the wart on the witch using chewed up gum.

The kids kept begging and begging us to play it too. So Jared came up with pin the Scooby snack on Scooby. Here he is trying to get closest to Scooby's tongue. The kids wanted to play over and over again. Jared and I thought once was sufficient.

Halloween

So Gavin was a firefighter at his school party.

And Asher was a football player.

Then on Halloween night they switched and Gavin was the football player.


And Asher was the firefighter.


Corbin was a super hero.

I was a turkey huntress.

And Jared was sick. He had gotten a small pox shot (the one with fifteen needles), a flut shot and an anthrax shot that day. His poor body was not doing well. So here we are right before loading up and heading to the church for the annual Halloween party.


The first event of the night was cracking me up. Wack-a-scout, where the kids took an empty two liter bottle of soda and wacked scouts with motorcycle helmets on as they popped up in different places. Hilarious.


Next up was donut eating. For some reason Corbin didn't want to play very many of the games so there aren't as many pictures of him in case anyone was wondering why he isn't present in these pictures.


Here's our little Corbster! Doing the cake walk. He didn't even eat the cupcake he'd won. I had to do it. Well, I just ate the frosting part.

Asher actually ate his prize.

Shoot the ping pong ball off the bottle with a water gun anyone?

Gavin got his fortune told. I asked him afterwards what she said and his reply was "I don't want to talk about it." Okaaaay....

Asher looks all embarassed.

Corbin getting his hair sprayed with sparkles and he got a face painting.



So it's November 3rd today and our candy is officially gone. It's so cold in Alaska that they only trick or treated for about 30 minutes. Corbin was in tears he was so cold. It didn't help that I had forgotten everybody's coats. I know, I know, I get the Mom of the Year award. Today I completely forgot to pack Gavin and Asher's lunches for school. Completely FORGOT! Mom of the Year again. Luckily they were able to charge a school lunch at three bucks a pop. Stay tuned for more Mom of the Year moments.