Chad and Barbi's Family

Update

2011-04-06T09:59:00.004-05:00

Well, the countdown is on! My mom gets to come and stay with me in 5 weeks! She will be here for 6 weeks! Some of my siblings don't think that she will stay that long, but that is what her plane ticket says. I don't get to see her very often, so I think that is all evens out. Our little girl should arrive in 6 weeks. I have never made it to 37 weeks gestation and I really hope I don't with this one. My dear friends are also throwing me a baby shower that my mom will get to come to as well.

We got the news last week that Chad's company that he works for changed health insurances! We were not happy about this. All of us had to change Drs. except for me. The only reason why I didn't was because I am so far along. If I were two weeks behind from what I am, I would have too. I also would have had to change hospitals that I am going to deliver at. The hospital they wanted me to deliver at, none of my Drs. have privileges at. We absolutely loved our kids' pediatrician, but had to change him as well. The worst part of it is that we had already reached our out-of-pocket maximum with the old health insurance and now we will have to meet another one for the new one. I hate all the politics!

Brahnson is now over 6 feet tall and pretty proud of that. He is 14 and loves basketball. He has found quite an interest in cooking. He likes to help me in the kitchen and create his own dishes that are usually desserts. He continues to stay close to his sister Sydnee. She has him wrapped around her little finger! He has to be careful, because she can grow impatient with him. He is going to be going to high school next year and is really looking forward to that.

Camren is 13 and just earned his rank as a star scout! He loves the outdoors and has learned to carve bows and arrows with his knife. He is very kind to his younger brother Jorden, who likes to shoot his bows and arrows, sometimes without asking. He is looking forward to us going to Utah and being able to go to Scout Camp.

Tori is little Miss Popular. She has friends call her almost everyday to play with her. She has a great ability to include everyone. Her teacher says that everyone wants to work in her group. Within the last few months, she and Sydnee have really formed a tight bond.That is a good and bad thing, because Sydnee wants to hang out with Tori when she is with her friends. Tori loves having girls' movie night with her mom. Our favorite is Pride and Prejudice, the six hour version.

Jorden is a happy kid! He is loving 1st grade and is preparing to be baptized later this year. He is doing really well in reading and math. His teacher says that he has a wonderful scientific mind. His older siblings are astonished at the things that he can read and the math that he is doing. His favorite video game is Zelda.

Sydnee has a unique relationship with everyone of her siblings. She loves them all. She is going to a preschool that has 7 autistic kids in it and she and another little girl are the peers. Her teachers tell me that she is a great friend and comforts those that are having a hard time. Next year she gets to go to a 4K kindergarten and gets to get bussed both ways. It will be everyday for about 3 hours. She is excited to get to ride the bus!

Chad is still working at what used to be Percipenz Technology. They changed their name to Forte Research. It is right down the street from us and he doesn't have any kind of commute. He is serving on the scout committee in our ward and is also Camren's Sunday School Teacher.

I am staying busy at home. Waiting for our next one to arrive. These last few weeks have gone really slow for me. I fell in Costco a few weeks ago and did something to my left side. It is hard for me to walk at night if I have been up a lot during the day. My Dr. says that my joints are softening in my pelvic area anyway to get ready for delivering and my fall probably just aggravated it. There is really nothing to do, but wait until the baby comes. I see other babies and wonder if I am ready to start all over again. I am currently serving in the Relief Society presidency as the activities councilor.

Our whole family is excited for this next little one to come. She is already so loved. We feel so blessed to be able to have her in our family. Her arrival will probably be my next blog post. Here is the latest picture. I think she is going to have a look of her own. She definitely has the "Sampson" nose. Other than that, I can't tell who she will look like. We will just have to wait and see. :)

Getting Closer!

2011-02-24T09:51:00.010-06:00

We are getting so excited for this little girl to come to our family! We had some really cool pictures at the the last ultra sound. Brahnson, 14, looked at them and immediately exclaimed, "She looks like me! Those are my lips!" That is true, but dad is the one that gave them to her, because he has Chad's lips. It was funny. She also looks like she is going to follow in her sisters' footsteps by being a thumb sucker.

Both my girls loved their thumb. Sydnee who is almost 4 is currently trying to break the habit right now. She went to her first dentist appointment and had no cavities! She loved it and when the hygienist asked her if she had any questions, she looked up at her and said, "I love you." It was very cute! The dentist did explain to her that she needed to do her best to stop sucking her thumb so that her teeth will be straight. She is trying and does better on most days than not.

Our little girl is already 1 pound and 7 ounces. She is very wiggly and I can already tell that she is going to be a night owl and not a morning person. Jorden keeps asking how many months left. He doesn't care about the weeks because it would be a bigger number. He just wants to know in months. I told him three and he was excited.

We have been discussing names and some of them have been, Michaela, Katrina, Jocelyn, Alyssa, and some others. With our track record, the only name that we have kept that we thought of before the baby was born was Victoria (Tori). All the others, we thought of at the hospital, so we will see what happens!

Getting Even

2010-12-31T08:47:00.002-06:00

It has been a long while since I last blogged. I need to update this quite a bit. I really don't have time now and I don't have all the pictures that I need. However, I did want to share this. We are going to be welcoming a new little girl to our family in May. Everything looks good and I am feeling good. We had an ultra sound and they said that the placenta looks healthy and it is on the back of the uterus, so I am able to feel the movements earlier and more often. All of us, except for Chad, were expecting a boy. We were pleasantly surprised with finding out that we have another girl. My daughters were especially pleased. We are so grateful to be able to have her in our family and look forward to the day we can hold and snuggle her. Here is a picture of the latest ultra sound.

Our Vacation

2010-08-25T10:59:00.002-05:00

We have had such a fun summer. My mom came at the beginning of July and then drove back to Utah with me and my three youngest kids. It was 20 hours altogether. We stopped at the halfway point in North Platte, NE. We went to this place called Fort Cody. It was pretty cool with all the little figurines that we saw and it had a lot of stuff from Buffalo Bill Cody. It was a nice place to get out and stretch our legs. The place we stayed didn't have a pool, so I went to Walmart and got something for everyone to keep themselves entertained. We had a good breakfast and then continued on our way. We got to my mom's house at around 5. The kids were really good on the way there.
Sydnee has a cousin that is a few months younger than she is and they got along really well, once they got to know each other. My older kids came during the next week with my brother-in-law on his semi. They were able to make a lot of reconnection's with friends from when we lived there.
One of the highlights of our trips was that Tori and I got to go to Cedar City to the Shakespearean Festival. This is a tradition with my family. It was Tori's first year and she had a blast. We saw "The Merchant of Venice", "Macbeth", "Much Ado About Nothing", and "Pride and Prejudice". We usually only go to the three main Shakespeare plays, but my mom really wanted to see Pride and Prejudice that we went a day early. It was so great to have that extra day. I wish we could do that every year and not necessarily go to a play on the extra day. One of the funny things that happened, Tori brought all her shoes that she has been wearing that are a size 4-5 and her feet wouldn't fit into any of them. We went to the shoe store and had her foot measured and she is a size 8! I couldn't believe it! We had to go and get her all new shoes.
It was so much fun spending time at my mom's house and my sister Kim's house. I loved spending time with all of my family. I really felt that I bonded with my family in ways that I haven't before. It actually made leaving all that harder. All of our kids got a long, we played games, watched shows, and hung out. It doesn't sound all that exciting, but it was one of the best times I have ever had with my family. It was nice to be around my in-laws too. It was fun to be there when my sister-in-law had her baby. I was able to hold him and realized that I had forgotten how tiny newborns are.
As a last minute decision, I was able to attend Education Week with my mom and two of my sisters. I truly believe that Heavenly Father wanted me to go to that to hear certain messages that I heard. I went to one class that talked about Zion vs. Babylon. Do we have more Zion homes or Babylon homes? Are we living a life that puts us in Zion or Babylon? It was really good. Another one talked about how we need to teach our kids to be achievers and leaders among their peers. My favorite one was the one that Sheri Dew presented. She talked about the importance of being a righteous influence in our lives. That is so perfect to teach my kids about while they are around their friends that aren't LDS , but also in our own home. I absolutely loved it. I hope Brahnson can go to education week next year when he will be 14. I wish that he could have gone this year, but he missed the cut off by a week and a half. I really hope that my husband can be with me next year.
I then had to drive home with all five kids by myself. We stopped in NE. again. It was a little more contentious then on the drive up, but we made it. We continued home the next day and it was so good to see my husband. I was gone for 5 weeks and we really missed each other.
I am so grateful that I was able to go. I am very grateful to my sister-in-law Jen for being willing to have my kids at their house for two weeks while I was elsewhere.
This vacation came right at the right time for me. I had just the right experiences and now I am ready to move forward with everything. The only bad thing about this vacation, apart from not having my husband with me, is that I forgot my camera! Hopefully, I'll be able to get some pictures from people that were there with me.
I am looking forward to the kids going back to school and resuming my life here. I don't know why I need to live away from my family in Utah, but I trust Heavenly Father and His plan for me. I am already looking forward to going back next year. My kids are too!

#6 will still come, just a little bit later.

2010-07-10T10:10:00.003-05:00

I am so grateful for the tender mercies that Heavenly Father gives me. Last April, I found a really good deal on a flight for my mom to come and visit me. I had a very strong prompting from the spirit that I needed to get that flight for her on July 7th. I thought it was because she could use a change of scenery while my dad is out of the country. I never thought that she needed to be here for me to give me the extra help and support that I needed.

July 8th, the day after she got here, she came with me to my regular OB appointment. I was 17 1/2 weeks along. I was really hoping to be able to talk my Dr. into giving me an ultrasound to see if the baby was a boy or a girl. I was going to be going out of town and my normal 20 week ultra sound was going to have to be 23 week ultra sound. I really wanted one before I went out of town. The nurse came into the room and did all my vitals and then tried to see if we could hear the baby's heartbeat. She couldn't find it. She had another nurse come in and she couldn't find it either. They were going to have to give me an ultra sound to see if they could see a heartbeat. The Dr. came in and asked all her questions and then afterward had me go in to the ultrasound room. It was then that she saw that there was no heartbeat or movement of any kind. I was shocked! I have had a miscarriage before, but had had cramping and bleeding to go with it. I have had none of that.

I was so glad that my mom was there with me. Otherwise, I would have had one of my older kids with me or I would have been alone. Chad was working. The nurses, residents, and Dr.s were so good to me and took great care of me. I was a weeping wreck along with my mom, but I felt the spirit close to me. The hospital staff said that they were going to do thier best to be able to take care of everything that same day. I stayed in the back office while they scheduled the procedure for later that afternoon. It just so happened that the OB that was on call at the hospital was an expert in the kind of procedure that I needed. If I had been two weeks farther along, I would have had to go into labor and given birth to the fetus. As it was, I was able to be put out the whole time and didn't feel a thing. The Dr. said that when she examined the placenta that it didn't look healthy.

I was considering getting my tubes tied, and Chad supported me in whatever I wanted to do with that. A little later, before the procedure, he came to me and told me that we were not supposed to get my tubes tied and that this little spirit still needed to come to our family. Something had gone wrong with the body. This information also helped the kids cope with this loss. They took it pretty hard too. I am so grateful for Chad and for him sharing his answers to prayers with me. He has been a great comfort to me through all of this.

I am so grateful of my knowledge of this gospel and knowing that Heavenly Father wants us to be happy and that He is in charge, is keeping my spirits up. He has really been holding my hand through all of this and has blessed me with several "tender mercies" through this time. He has blessed me with a wonderful family and friends that have all been there. I have been truly humbled by all the love and prayers that I have felt during this time of trial. My dad always taught me to pray for trials to become a stronger person. I didn't pray for this, but my testimony has been boosted through this process. I have become a stronger person. Thanks to everyone that has supported me and prayed for me and my family. I love you all!

# SIX!!

2010-05-09T14:35:00.002-05:00

We just wanted to let people know that we are expecting our 6th and final child. I am due Dec. 12. I have my babies 31/2 weeks early, so we are planning for him to arrive around Nov.17. Yes, Chad and I both feel that we will be having a little boy join our family. Time will tell, but I bet that we are right! The kids are so excited. Brahnson actually took the time to hold and play with a baby today during church. I am happy that this baby is already loved and wanted. Jorden keeps asking if he can feel the baby. I told him it's a little early to be doing that. Camren keeps coming up with all sorts of names. Tori is just plain excited. Sydnee, when we told her that mommy had a baby in her tummy, she said "NO!" She'll come around and I am sure she will be my best helper. Usually, we tell people as soon as we get the positive pregnancy test. This time it has been fun for Chad and I to share a secret for a little while. I am currently 9 weeks along. The Dr. did an ultra sound and said that baby looked great! More updates to come..... Love you all!

Nauvoo

2010-04-12T09:30:00.003-05:00

I keep thinking that I will be better at this blogging thing, and I am not! We just continue with our life from day to day. We still really love it here in Wisconsin.
We recently took our first trip to Nauvoo. My mom and my sister's family were going to be there and so we decided to go down there for one night and spend time with them. I forgot my camera, but my sister said she would send some pictures that she took. I'll post those later. It was so fun to see some of my family.
It should only take about 4 hours to drive to Nauvoo. Well, it took us nine. We left at 6:30 in the morning so that we could get another full day in Nauvoo. We were only staying one night and thought that we would make the most of our time. We were about an hour and a half away from Nauvoo when we thought that we would go straight to Carthage and do that first before we went to Nauvoo. We didn't have the exact address and so we just put "Carthage, IL" in our GPS. We didn't know this but, THERE ARE TWO CARTHAGE, IL!! The time of arrival was really close and we knew that the Carthage we wanted to go to was close to Nauvoo, so we thought nothing of it. The GPS took us back an hour and half the opposite way we wanted to go! When we got to the place that the GPS said was Carthage, we were in the middle of nowhere! It was a cross roads with farm land on each of the four corners. We knew that it wasn't a big community, but we thought we should see some sort of sign of a city. We continued driving for about 15 minutes and came to a town called Dixon. We went to the local Library and looked up the actual address of the Carthage Jail and then put it in our GPS, IT WAS THREE HOURS AWAY in the opposite direction that we were going!!! This was around lunch time and so we went to a park and made our lunch and let the kids play a little bit. We continued on our way and got to Nauvoo at 3:30 in the afternoon.We had to get to Nauvoo to pick up tickets for the show that was later that night. We were supposed to pick up our 16 tickets by 2:00p.m. and there was no way that we were going to be able to do that. We don't have a cell phone and so all I could do was say a prayer that they wouldn't give our tickets away. I got to the Visitor's Center and they said that they had just left a message on our home phone and were wondering if we were going to pick them up. Luckily, I got there just in time, before they would have given them to somebody else. We never found time to make it to Carthage. But, we had a good time while we were there and my kids got a new perspective for the trials that the early saints had to endure and how they lived day to day. When we were headed back home the next night, we were in a torrential thunder and lightning storm that had tornado warnings everywhere. It was the scariest drive home that I ever have experienced!
I am grateful that we were able to go and enjoy most of the parts of Nauvoo. I was getting homesick for my mom and it was fun to see her along with my sister's family. All of the kids got a long really well. Living so close to Nauvoo, I am sure we will make it back again and see the other stuff that we didn't get time to do.

Big Update!

2010-02-21T15:43:00.014-06:00

I have a lot of updating to do with this blog! I haven't had the time to update this. So, here is the scoop. We were able to go to Utah for Christmas this year. Camren was able to go earlier with his grandpa in his big truck. It helped us out because it was one less child in the car for when we drove there. We made it in 20 hours driving. We were able to be there two weeks! We spent Camren's birthday, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, My birthday, New Year's Eve, and some of New Year's Day. We left on New Year's day and drove back without stopping anywhere to spend the night. We left at 10 a.m. Utah time and got home at 7 a.m Wisconsin time the next morning. It was a hard drive, but everyone was glad to get it over with.

Camren turned 12 while we were there. We were able to celebrate it at Chad's mom's house. We were also able to ordain him a deacon while we were there. The picture below is Camren with both his grandpas, his great-grandpa, and his dad. I love generational pictures!

I thought this picture of my dad and Sydnee was too cute not to share! Every time I look at a picture of my dad, I miss him! I haven't been able to see him a whole lot lately because he has been out of town with his business. We are so grateful that we were able to catch him home for some of our time while we were there.

The ordination took place at Chad's parents' ward house. There were several of his uncles and grandpas there. We have lived out-of -town a lot and with that, we don't get to have a lot of our family share in these kinds of events. It was so nice to have so much support by both our families on Camren's special day!

After the ordination, we enjoyed soup and rolls for dinner and then we just had to have my mom's pies for dessert. There is nothing that Camren likes better than my mom's pies!

It was also fun for everyone to see Sydnee. She wasn't even walking when we left for Wisconsin. We haven't been back in a year and a half with all of our family since. She loved all the attention she got when she sang all of her songs. She particularly liked singing "We Wish You A Merry Christmas" and "Jingle Bells".

A few weeks after we got home, Sydnee and I went to tour the Fire Station here. It was very nice. We learned that there is only three people in Middleton that are considered payed fireman. The rest of them are volunteer firefighters.

Sydnee liked seeing all the big trucks and was happy to be able to go inside one to explore!

They also had a lot of fire trucks and such from the past. On the walls they wrote minutes from meetings that were from the early 1900's.

I am so grateful for my family. Heavenly Father has blessed us so much. We have such a wonderful family and we live in such a great place.

Last week, I had an experience that shows me just how much Heavenly Father is aware of us and that if we ask Him for things, He answers! I was finishing reading my book last Saturday. I was reading the "Undaunted" by Gerald Lund. It is a really good book. Anyway, I finished reading it about 1 in the morning. I was so tired! I needed to be up early because we had people coming to dinner after church and I needed to do some dinner preparations. I was saying my prayers and told Heavenly Father that I needed to get up by 6 a.m. I was too tired to set the alarm. I went to sleep, not really thinking about what I had asked. The next thing I knew, our light in our bedroom turned on and Sydnee came in and said "Mommy, it's time to wake up!" I looked over at the clock and it read 6 a.m. straight up! It wasn't a minute before or after! I then remembered what I had asked in my prayer before falling asleep and was amazed how Heavenly Father answers even the littlest of requests! I was also thinking that I should have asked for 6:30 a.m. instead! :)

Odds & Ends

2009-12-14T08:08:00.006-06:00

So, I thought I needed to update our blog with a few of our comings and goings. This blog is a little backwards, because I forgot that you need to do your last pictures first and your first pictures last. Oh well! I can't believe that we are already into the middle of December! Time has gone by so fast. We are going to Utah for two weeks for Christmas and New Years. Camren's birthday and my birthday are also going to be squeezed into those two weeks as well. I am not looking forward to the 23 hour drive. I have been praying for dry roads and good weather while we are travelling. Any of you that wish to join in that prayer, our family would appreciate it! :)
There was a little girl that asked Tori to race down the hill at recess with her. Before she asked Tori, she had covered up a hole in the hill with snow. Tori didn't know this and ran right over the ditch and fell and sprained her ankle! We took her to the Dr. and she ended up having an air cast and crutches for the week. I cannot believe how mean some little girls can be. Tori has taken it all in stride though. She is a tough little girl, and a very nice one, I might add. :)

This is Brahnson. Why does he have bows in his hair? He lost a competition with Tori of who could get their area of the kitchen done the fastest!

Thanksgiving was very fun and stress free this year! The pictures are a little smudgy, but you get the idea! My really good friend and I decided that we didn't want to make the whole Thanksgiving meal for just our families and then have to clean up everything. We decided to do it at the church and invite any other families that didn't have families around to join us. We each had our assignment and dinner was done and cleaned up by 4:30 that afternoon and we could go home to clean houses. We decorated so it was a little more "homely". One family brought gingerbread cookies for the kids to decorate as one of that family's traditions. We had an art and crafts table, a game table, and the other half of the gym to play basketball. We had about 30 people there. It was great. We will totally do it for next year.

I want to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. I can guarantee I won't be having a new post before 2010! I hope you all have a very safe and fun holiday! We are so grateful for all of our wonderful friends and family! We love you!

Tori and Jorden's birthday and Halloween

2009-11-01T20:46:00.012-06:00

Well, we had a busy October! On October 14 our #4 turned 6! Our #3 turned 9 on Oct. 16. We combined the birthdays on Jorden's birthday and did pie and presents. We had our dear friends the Flentjes over for that part. Tori and Jorden also had their next door neighbor friends here as well. We are not big cake eaters in this house, so I asked them what they wanted me to make for their birthdays and they both wanted pie. We had butterscotch, pumpkin, and banana cream. On Tori's birthday, Chad and I took both of them out to dinner to their favorite place, Hu Hot. That is a local Mongolian Grill. We had a good time.

We had a good time at at Halloween! We had a ward Trunk-or treat the night before Halloween and it was absolutely chaotic! I don't really like having to get kids ready twice in one month! The kids had fun and that is what really matters! Right?

Sydnee was a lady bug! The hat part was a little big. Maybe she'll be able to be a ladybug next year too! Sydnee could not get enough of trick-or-treating! She was on her feet practically the whole time and kept saying "More Candy! More Candy!" She would go up to the door and say "Trick-or-treat!" and then would say "Thank You!" when they gave her some. Some of the people would ask "What are you this year?" and she would say "TWO!!" It was very cute! Maybe, you just had to be there!

Jorden and Tori both wanted to be vampires!

They were both very patient while mom was trying to figure out the make-up!

They both got a lot of comments when they were trick-or-treating!

Camren wanted to be a Ninja! He likes anything that has to do with swords! Go figure! The mask was a little tricky. Brahnson wanted to be a 70's Disco Dude! He had a youth Halloween party and the mom didn't know who he was when he came in. He wanted to stay home for part of the time and hand out candy. Nobody came! Chad said he only handed out to two trick-or-treaters! Oh well! More candy for us! We may just save it for Christmas. The kids go sooo much candy! It is absolutely sickening! We had a good time. The place where we live has an 8:00p.m. curfew for trick-or-treating . We live across from a retirement home so we went there last. We went in and they had a carmel apple dipping station and the dipped whole apples in carmel and then the kids could roll it in toffee, pecans, or rainbow sprinkles. They also had hot cider and a Halloween scene and took pictures. The kids then went a round a little circle and the residents handed out candy while they told all the kids how cute they were.

We hope that all of you had a very Happy Halloween! We are looking forward to the holidays! I wish that we were going to be around more of our family, but that is what you get when you live so far away. We have been so blessed here with a wonderful ward and lots of great friends. It makes it a little easier not being around family as much as we would like to. We love it here during this time of year. It is so beautiful! We haven't seen the snow yet! But, I know it's coming and I have a feeling we are going to see a lot this year! Meanwhile, we will just enjoy the 50's weather and the gorgeous colors all around us! We hope all is well with all of you! We love you all!

*FYI*I don't know how this is going to look on the blog once I hit "publish post", but at least you can see the pictures and read what we have been doing. I am not very good at this blogging thing yet!

Happy Birthday Brahnson and the First Day of School

2009-09-11T16:34:00.013-05:00

I can't believe that I am a mother of a teenager!! Brahnson turned 13 on September 1. We had one of our favorite families from the ward over for dinner. Brahnson chose to have breakfast casserole, scones w/ honey butter, and orange julius for his birthday dinner. Instead of cake he wanted banana splits. We had a good time.

Despite his mother's protest, he got an air soft gun with a protective mask and bullets. Our friends got him various gifts including 9 of his favorite kind huge candy bars, Hersheys Cookies and Cream bars.

The day after Brahnson's birthday was the first day of school. We had a lot of "firsts" this year! This was Camren's first time in Middle School, it was Jorden's first day at Kidnergartin, and it was my first time having only one child at home since only having one child. That is why Sydnee gets to have her picture on here too. I get so much more done, but the day seems so much shorter to me. I am really glad that Jorden has all day kidnergartin. It has been fun to have just "mommy and Sydnee time". I have to think of enough things to keep her entertained though. I don't want her watching a bunch of T.V. We have made treats, colored, drew on the sidewalk with chalk, read stories, had extra long tubby time, and of course go on walks to the parks that are around us. It has been very fun! All of the kids are getting on very well in their schools. Jorden loves Kidnergartin, Camren loves middleschool, Brahnson is loving middleschool a lot more as a 7th grader than he did as a 6th grader, and Tori got secret admirer gifts the first week of school. She found out who it was and told him she just wants to be friends, but thanks for the flowers and cards. We have had a great beginning to this school year! I pray that it lasts all year!

A New Blankie!!!

2009-08-03T08:57:00.008-05:00

So, all of my kids get very attached to their blankies. It starts from almost day 1 and continues. Jorden seemed to have gotten the most use out of his blankie, as you can see from the picture. We have been trying this last year to see if we could talk him into giving it up and we have not been too successful! He loves this blankie and whenever we would talk to him about giving it up he would start to cry and be so sad! He used to take it in the car with us, but we had to put a stop to that about two years ago, but it was just plain embarrassing to have it with us. If he ever lost it for a day or two he couldn't sleep. He was very attached. Chad had a few days off this week and decided that it was high time to retire his blankie!

So, we took Jorden to the fabric store and let him choose out his own material and loved that! He first chose dinosaurs, then sharks, but then he saw a pirate one and loved that one. His favorite color is green and so the back of it had to be green. We brought the material home and started on the blankie!

I should say that Chad started on the blankie, because I don't sew! Jorden helped a little bit too. Chad even quadrupled the batting in it to make it really soft. I helped tie it and then we showed it to Jorden. Chad told Jorden that if he wanted the new blankie he had to trade him his old blankie for it!Jorden wasn't sure if he wanted to do that! He said with big puppy dog eyes, "But, I love my old blankie." I told him that now that he was going to kindergarten he needed to get rid of his baby blankie and have a big boy blankie! The deal was the deal. Jorden had to trade it in to get his new one. After alot of discussion, he finally did it! The old blankie went into the garbage! I asked him how his first night was with it and if he liked his new blankie better than his old one. He said no, his old blankie was better, but he still liked his new blankie. I think he likes the idea that he is becoming a big boy now!

A Little Sad, But Very Glad!!!

2009-07-20T08:10:00.002-05:00

Well, first for the sad news... We have decided that we will not be able to make it back to Utah as a family this year. We have had some unexpected medical bills, pay cut, and just the whole economy thing hit us more than we have liked. I am grateful that we can pay our bills, but we don't have as much wiggle room as we once did. My kids were really sad when we told them, but they understood. This was going to be Tori's first year going to Cedar City, that made it a little harder for her, but she said that she can wait until next year. Hopefully, we can get family to come to us. I keep telling people that we are only an hour away from the Water park capitol of the world! :) Anyway, I have been so homesick! I tried not to get to sad about not being able to go, but I wasn't doing a very good job. If the subject came up, I would totally break into tears! I am typically not like that!
Now, for glad news... My husband saw how sad I was and really felt that I needed to go and see my family, even if we can't all go. He asked me if there was a time in August that I would like to go. I couldn't go during Cedar City, because I wasn't going to go without my daughter. Then I realized that I could go for BYU Education week! I told Chad about that time and he thought that was a great idea! He got online and found an unheard of good deal to fly out of Madison to SLC. Usually you have to go to Chicago or Milwaukee to get good deals on flights. He purchased it and even made it so that I can be in Utah for 12 days! He is going to take the week of education week off (using his vacation) to stay home with the kids! I am so excited!!! I feel bad that not everyone can go, but we will try to go back some other time as a family another time. I AM SO GRATEFUL FOR MY HUSBAND AND LOVE HIM SOOO MUCH!!!! THANK YOU HONEY!!!!!

Happy Birthday Chad!!

2009-07-07T20:58:00.003-05:00

Happy Birthday to my best friend for the past 14 years! Today is Chad's birthday! I am so grateful for everything that he has done for me and our children. He is the best husband and father that anyone could ever ask for. I asked him what he wanted for his birthday and he said a chess set. Well, I am not a good chess set picker outer so, I told him that he could go and find one that he wanted and get it for his birthday present. I then asked him what he wanted for his birthday dinner. He said he wanted omlettes. I don't make omlettes, but he makes awesome ones! So, he made everyone omlettes for his birthday dinner. I then asked him what kind of dessert or cake he wanted. He didn't want anything! Well, I had to make him something! We are not big cake eaters here, so I made him homemade doughnuts and he seemed to like those. We sang him our family birthday song and we also had our adopted "family" here for dinner as well. It was a great evening. I am the luckiest woman alive to be married to Chad. Happy Birthday Honey! I love you with all my heart!! :)

Answers To Prayers

2009-06-25T21:53:00.003-05:00

Tori came to me, a few months ago after a hard emotional day at school, and said that she didn't feel like she had any really good friends her age at school. She explained to me that she played more with the boys because the girls acted dumb. They weren't very nice a lot of the time either and only wanted to play what they wanted to play and wouldn't play what she wanted to play. She asked me what she could do about it. Taking the opportunity to teach, I told her to start praying for friends. I told her that Heavenly Father wanted her to be happy and have good friends. I also told her that she should pray for good friends that were nice and she would get along with. Tori started praying for friends that very night and has kept it up. Lo and behold, she has two new friends that are her age and will be in her grade living on both sides of her! They moved in within a couple of weeks of each other. She has gotten to know one of them and she is very nice. Her name is Courtney. They can play for hours on end and not have one problem. The other friend, Anna, on the other side she hasn't met yet. She will be here this week! I have talked to Tori and made sure that she realizes that Heavenly Father has answered her prayer and that she should make sure that she says thank you to Him. I love it when you have those opportunities to teach your children that prayers really are answered and how much Heavenly Father loves and knows each one of his children. I am also so glad that I have Tori for a daughter and that she does her best to choose the right and to be kind to everyone. I love her dearly!

No More Pain!!!

2009-06-23T17:05:00.002-05:00

We just got back from the doctor, he concurred that Brahnson had Bursitis. We don't know why he has it or what caused it, but at this point, I don't care. Brahnson is not in anymore pain and he can sit down! The doctor gave him a cortisone shot and it had almost an immediate affect! We were so excited that he could actually sit down in the car, we had to make a stop at Culver's to get a shake to celebrate. I am glad that the doctors could rule out all of the major stuff, I just wished they would have tried the simpler stuff first. Thanks again for all of your concern and prayers! Love you all!

We Know the WHAT, Just Not the WHY!!!

2009-06-19T14:27:00.003-05:00

So, the doctors and the physical therapist think that Brahnson has Bursitis. They don't know why, because bursitis is not usually seen in 12 year old boys. They are either seen in pregnant women, athletes, or geriatric patients. Brahnson doesn't fit into any of these categories. Anyway, they are treating the symptoms that they can locate. He has pain in his trochataric (SP?) part of his hip. We have to go twice a week and they put this medicine on an electrode and place it on his skin and the electric current pushes it through his skin to the place that it hurts. He still can't sit down after two treatments, but the therapist said it may take a few more to notice any difference. So, as his mother, I am glad that they are doing something for his pain, but I still would like to know why he has this. We will continue our escapades to other doctors next week and hopefully find some more answers! Thanks for all your concern and prayers for his behalf! I'll keep you posted!

Brahnson's Pain

2009-06-04T19:19:00.002-05:00

Brahnson has had a pain in his hips for about the last three weeks. At first, Chad and I chalked it up to growing pains and told him it would go away in a few days. Well, it didn't go away. A week ago Sunday, he could sit through church and was okay. His pain was a little annoying, but no big deal. By Wednesday, he couldn't sit down without having extreme pain. We decided to take him to his pediatrician, who then referred us to an Orthopedic Surgeon, who then ordered an MRI, put Brahnson on anti-inflammatory medicine with heat and cold packs, after that the doctor had him go to Physical Therapy, and is now back to doing another MRI on Monday. Brahnson is still in pain and cannot sit down. The Physical Therapist thought that he was in too much pain to have him move him around. So now, they are going to do another MRI to look at his whole spine. The pain still might be from growing really fast that parts of his body can't keep up. They don't know right now and neither do we. Brahnson can stand for a period of time or he can be flat on his tummy. Either position, he has not been able to attend school. He has been doing his work at home by standing next to the counter in the kitchen. He has also been allowed to play way too much Wii. He doesn't have a problem standing for that! It is sad that he has to be in pain and nobody can explain why. He is a tough kid though. I have to admit that he and I butt heads quite a bit, but having him home with me hasn't been as bad as I thought it would be. He is actually a lot nicer to be around, than he was when he would go to school. We love him dearly and hope that we can figure out what is going on so he won't have to be in anymore pain.

End Of The Year Concert

2009-06-01T20:24:00.004-05:00

Ever since Camren was little, he has always had a little song going on in his head. He would even dance a little when he walked. As he has gotten older, nothing has changed. Camren loves music. Camren has taken up the violin. His school that he goes to has a great Orchestra program. He has had orchestra twice a week with one of those times we have to take him to the Middle School at 7:25 in the morning and then they bus him to his school. He has enjoyed it and practices on his own. Chad and I were really surprised at how much he practiced and kept up on it. We really thought that he would have gotten tired of it and not practiced. He proved us wrong. He loves playing the violin. Hopefully, this summer, I will have more time and I can help him improve to get ready for next year at Glacier Creek Middle School.

This is Camren's friend Jordan Futch. He goes to a different elementary school, but in our ward. He is also in scouts and Sunday classes. We see him every time Camren has a concert.

Camren's teacher Mrs. Corry. She was so good with him. He was the only 5th grade orchestra student and so he got one-on-one lessons with her once a week. She said she was amazed with how quickly that he took to the violin. We are very proud of what he has accomplished in such a little amount of time.

Sydnee's Birthday #2 and 2 New Callings

2009-05-27T21:35:00.006-05:00

Sydnee turned two on May 24, 2009. We have really enjoyed having Sydnee in our family! She has certainly kept us on our toes! She has us all wrapped around her little finger. She has been a very bright and loud spot in our family. We love her dearly.
We went to our friend's house and had her birthday party. Their kids were so cute! They wanted to give something to Sydnee and so the looked around their house and wrapped up toys that they thought that she would like. She has been playing with everything that she has gotten non-stop!
Along with Sydnee's birthday, Chad and I got new callings. Chad is serving as the Secretary in the Young Men's and I am serving as the Enrichment Councilor in the Relief Society Presidency. I have never served in the Relief Society Presidency, but I have been the Enrichment leader. I am excited to try some fun things and stir things up a bit in this new calling. I was sad to say good bye to the Cub Scouting program. I will miss seeing all those cute cub scouts every week. Chad and I are both grateful to be able to serve our Heavenly Father in anyway we can, even if it means that our lives are going to get more than little bit busier.

"MY PRESENTS!!!"

"Barbie Diamond Castle! My favorite!!"

1, 2, 3, BLOW!!!

She was happy to get her own piece of pie!!

Sydnee loved her birthday pie!!

Choosing the Right

2009-05-12T10:01:00.003-05:00

We are so very proud of Camren. Last Friday, a student brought in a movie that the teacher thought was rated PG for the class to watch. When Camren asked what the movie was rated, it was discovered that the movie was actually PG-13. Camren told his teacher that he was not allowed to watch PG-13 movies. The teacher and Camren tried to get a hold of us to see if it was okay, but was unable to. Even if they would have been able to get a hold of us, the answer would have still been no. The teacher asked the principal and he thought because there was no nudity that it would be alright. The entire class had their hearts set on being able to watch a movie in class as a reward for some class accomplishment. The teacher told Camren that they were going to watch the movie in class and if Camren didn't want to he could go into the library and do his homework or read. He chose to go to the library. He sat there for 21/2 hours by himself busying himself with different things. He told me later, tearing up, that it was hard to be in there, but that he just kept telling himself, " I know, I am doing the right thing. I know, I am doing the right thing." A couple of his classmates came up to him and told him that they couldn't believe that he couldn't watch PG-13 movies and that they could watch rated R movies. Camren also over heard a few of his classmates say that it was a funny movie, but that there was a lot of swearing. The movie was called "Get Smart". Chad and I have never seen or heard of this movie. Camren was glad that he didn't participate in that movie after he had heard about how much profanity there was in it. I felt bad for him that he had to go through that, especially at school.
Chad was really upset! He was ready to go down to that school and give the teacher a piece of his mind. I told him that I would handle it, because I would be more tactful and wouldn't say things that I would regret later. I wrote her an email expressing our disappointment that this movie was shown to a bunch of 11year olds and made her aware of Camren's feelings about it. She called me that day and profusely apologized. She said it was the wrong choice to make and that it would never happen again. She told me that she just loved Camren and admired that he would always do what was right. I accepted the apology and assured her that we didn't bear any hard feelings towards her. She later spoke to Camren and apologized to him as well. She really is a great teacher and I hope that Tori gets her when she gets into 5th grade.
Chad and I took Camren to Chilies for dessert and let him have his own white chocolate molten lava cake for a reward. We told him that we were proud of him for standing up for what is right even when you are the only one. We teach and talk to our children a lot about this concept and emphasize how important choosing the right is. We also point out that sometimes making the bad choice will make us happy for that very moment, but will feel us with regret and bad consequences later. It would have been fun for Camren to watch that movie with his class, but when hearing all the profanity, it would have hurt his spirit. Camren was very glad that he was able to be strong and make the right choice. Love You Camren!

A Whole Lot Of Just About Everything!!!

2009-05-07T17:30:00.026-05:00

So, I haven't blogged for a long time, and I thought I would do just one big blog to catch up! First of all, I can't believe that it has been almost a year since we moved to Wisconsin! We really have adapted well. The most important thing to me is that my kids are totally happy here. They wish that we could see more family or that more family would come and see us, but they really do love it here.

I kinda just uploaded pictures and then I was just going to write about the pictures, so I don't know what this is going to look like when I am done.

I am so shocked when I look at my kids and see how big and old they are getting! Brahnson is going to be a teenager in September! That is totally unreal to me!

Jorden's favorite thing to do is smile at the camera!

Sydnee has been learning how to do her "happy face" and her "sad face"!

Easter was fun this year!

We told the Easter Bunny to not go overboard with our kids Easter. We loved the idea that he chose to do buckets and shovels instead of baskets.

Sydnee really got into it! I think her candy was gone the first day!

Brahnson was happy to get his marshmellow Peeps! He traded a lot of his candy to get more. Mom likes them too, but dad can't understand why we do.

All in all, the Easter bunny did very well. We also invited a family from our ward that has two kids. We thought that we would ask the Easter Bunny to remember our friend Margaret too. That is why there are so many Easter buckets!
General Conference is always another holiday that we look forward to. General Conference has always been a fun thing in my family growing up and because I can't be there with my extended family we do everything they do plus some! One of the extra things we do is that we do a chocolate fountain. It has become a favorite with all members of my family. We also do our traditional "General Conference Breakfast" which includes; breakfast casserole, homemade scones with honey butter, and orange julius. We also do "General Conference Bingo" with candy for the markers and candy bars for the prizes. The minimum you have to have to get a candy bar is three bingos! One bingo is just too easy! It is an exhausting day, as you can see from Jorden's picture, but very fun. Sydnee totally loved it! I think she got more on her than in her

Everybody got into it! Having traditions like this make memories. My kids, with everything that we do for General Conference, actually sit through all four sessions quietly! Even Jorden! Chad and I think it is so important for them to hear the prophet's voice and then have them feel the Holy Ghost testify to their hearts that what they are hearing is true. We have a DVR now and we put General Conference on our DVR. For Family Home Evening each Monday we play one of the talks and discuss it. It has worked really well for our family. I am so happy that we have the gospel in our lives to help us teach our children the way that Heavenly Father wants them to live. We have also started to get up at 5:30 in the morning to read family scriptures together. We are doing it a different way this time. We have gone through the Book of Mormon cover to cover several times as a family. This year we are taking it verse by verse and pondering why Heavenly Father wanted that particular verse in the Book of Mormon. Sometimes we read three verses sometimes we read more or less. We started this I think in December and we are almost finished with first Nephi chapter 15. We have found a lot of things that we have never thought about before in our scripture study. Our family has really benefited from this.

We went to the Madison Children's Museum. It wasn't the best Children's Museum that I have been to, but my kids were glad to get out of the house.

Jorden liked the Dinosaurs!

The older kids liked the crane!

Sydnee liked it all and if you asked her to show you her teeth this is what you got!

Brahnson just liked being silly! Sydnee would not get into that fish's mouth!

Anyway, this was the biggest blog that I think I have done yet! We are so grateful for all our friends and family that comment and do blogs too. We are looking forward to a busy summer. I am so glad that the kids are back on the tradition school schedule instead of year round school. We are going to be spending about 5 weeks in Utah this summer and staying at different family's' homes. It will be over a year since our family has seen most of our family. We will be there from July 1-Aug. 10th. Chad will be there off and on during that time. Hopefully we will see you soon and hopefully I'll be better at blogging! Love you all!

Experiencing all the seasons

2009-04-14T13:09:00.003-05:00

So, I have been here for about 10 months now. I have absolutely loved experiencing all of the different seasons. Las Vegas the seasons that you experience are extreme hot, hot, and mild. You also don't see a lot of variance in the color scheme either. I am so glad that I get to experience the changing seasons and the variety in colors!

I came here in June. The summer was incredible! I love it! My favorite part was the fireflies that came out at dusk. We have a field in our backyard and those little lighted bugs covered it! It was so cool! The worse thing was the mosquitoes. I didn't even mind the humidity all that much. We also have a pond in our backyard and the mosquitoes were unbelievable! I have never spent so much money on mosquito repellent as I have here. The temperatures were wonderful here. Being in Las Vegas for three years and three summers, was really taking a toll on me. I do have to say for Vegas, it is nice to be able to go to the park in February and only have to wear jackets.

The Fall here was incredible! The colors were so vibrant! There are farms all around and so you always could find fresh produce! There is a Farmer's Market right down the street from me and they have the most amazing produce. I don't think that I have ever tasted such good produce as I have here. There is a store here called Brennan's and they have these peaches that are so good. They call them "Chin Drippin' Peaches". They have all sorts of other peaches and produce there as well. They have these apples that are called "Honey Crisp" apples. They are not too sweet and not too tart. They have just enough crisp to them when you bite them.

The winter before I got here, Madison had over 100 inches of snow. Everybody told me that when I got here that the farmer's almanac was predicting an even worse winter. We didn't have near the amount of snow that was predicted. I was very grateful for that. We did have cold. I have never experienced cold like they have here. Snow pants are a requirement at school. We even got down to a windchill that was -35- -40 degrees! They also have freezing rain. It makes the roads so slick, it makes everything very slick! I kept telling my friends that it was so cold here and they would just smile and say "Not yet". That was in December. January was when we got very cold.

Well, now it is April. I really love Spring. Mother Nature plays tricks on you here though. It will warm up and just when you think that you are finally experiencing Spring, it snows! It looks very Springlike when you look out your window. Then, you go outside and it would be okay, but the wind makes it really cold still. They have a lot of fun outdoor free activities here and I am anxious to be able to do them again. I just want it to stop snowing and warm up! I looked at the weather for the week and we are supposed to hit mid sixties this week and then it drops again into the 40s by the weekend. Why can't it just warm up and stay that way? The winter was cold enough to last us another year! My friends here tell me that Spring really doesn't start until the middle of May! Spring is almost over by that time! My Las Vegas friends that are reading this are enjoying 80 degree weather right now at night! But, when they have 115 degree summer, I will be enjoying weather in the 80s. Oh well, there are pros and cons to everything!

Recipes for April 3-9

2009-04-03T14:18:00.003-05:00

I decided to post more recipes. I didn't do it last week because I was too busy dealing with Spring Break for my kids and I think I am only going to do this every once in a while and not every week. Anyway, this weekend is conference weekend and I like to make extra easy and good food for that so that my kids look forward to this weekend. My kids for the last 5 years or so have actually watched all of the conference sessions and stayed quiet so that Chad and I can watch them. Conference Bingo helps too, but having yummy food and snacks is the best. My kids look forward to it the same as they would a holiday. My family does the same thing in Utah and so I have to do it too, so I don't get too homesick.

Friday- Grilled Ham and Cheese Sandwiches

Saturday-
Breakfast
Bagels and cream cheese and cereal
Lunch
Croissant sandwiches and Queso dip with chips, fruit
Dinner
Pizza night

Sunday-
Breakfast- Breakfast Casserole, Scones, Honey Butter, Orange Julius
Orange Julies:
2 cups milk
1/3c. sugar
1tsp. vanilla
6oz. orange juice concentrate
Ice
Instructions:
Blend all ingredients in blender until well incorporated and you have no ice chunks.
Breakfast Casserole:
6 slices of bread
1# ground sausage (if you want it more meaty, do 2#s)
6 eggs
1tsp. dry mustard (I have used prepared mustard and that works fine)
dash of pepper
2cups of milk
1tsp. salt
Shredded cheddar cheese
Instructions:
Place bread in the bottom of a greased 9X13 pan.
Brown Sausage and put on top of bread, sprinkle cheese on top of sausage.
Mix everything else and pour mixture on top of cheese. Bake at 350 degrees for 40 minutes.
Lunch/Dinner-Yummy Chicken salad
4cups cooked chicken breast cubed
1cup celery chopped
1/2c slivered almonds
1(16oz) can pineapple tidbits
2 c. red grapes
1 bunch green onions
1 can sliced water chestnuts
1 large can mandarin oranges
Chinese chow mien noodles
Dressing
2c. mayo
1/2tsp. garlic powder
1Tbs. lemon juice
1Tbs soy sauce
1tsp. curry powder
1/2 tsp. lemon pepper
1/2tsp. pepper
Instructions
Mix dressing ahead and chill
Mix everything else together except the noodles and oranges.
Garnish with the noodles and oranges just before serving.

Monday- Steak Fajitas
This is my husband's recipe. He won't let me in on how he makes them so good!

Wednesday- Strawberry Waffles
Use your favorite waffle recipe and serve with strawberries, whipped cream, and butter syrup.

Thursday- Zesty Chicken
3 chicken breast (can be frozen)
1 dry zesty Italian mix
1 cube butter
1 (8oz) pkg cream cheese
1 can of cream of mushroom soup
1/2 c. Parmesan cheese
cooked noodles (any kind)
Instructions
Put chicken, zesty Italian mix, and butter in a crock pot cook for 3-4 hours on high. The last hour add everything else except noodles. Mix well until cream cheese is melted. Heat through and add noodles.

Dessert: Munchie Stuff
2 boxes of chex corn or rice cereal or one of each
1c. brown sugar
3/4c corn syrup
2 cups butter
1tsp. vanilla
1tsp. baking soda
Instructions
Empty cereal into a large roasting pan. Mix everything in a sauce pan except for vanilla and baking soda. When the butter is melted and the sugar is dissolved remove from heat and add vanilla and baking soda. Stir until foamy and pour over cereal. Bale @ 250 degrees for 45-60 minutes. stirring every 15 minutes. Remove from oven and put in a large bowl to cool. Stirring every once in a while as it cools. If you don't do this you will end up with a hard brick of cereal. My kids and my husband like this as regular cereal too.

Glad my kids are happy!

2009-03-23T14:50:00.005-05:00

I am just so glad that I have the kids that I have and they are happy. They make me and my husband happy. Each one of them has had a reason to be happy recently. Tori was so happy on her baptism day and she has been very careful that she keeps the covenants that she made with her Heavenly Father. She always helps me without complaint and loves doing "girl movie night with me." Camren is happy that he has a teacher that is so nice and treats him with kindness. She does so many good thing in that class and is preparing him for Middle school. He was very behind when he came and she just took him under her wing and has helped him with anything that he has needed. They have the most fun activities in their class and also rewards. I couldn't be more pleased with Camren's teacher and his class.

Brahnson is happy about being able to have so much fun in middle school. He has had a lot of new and interesting classes that have given him so much exposure to different things. The blue clip board that you see in the picture is a project that he did in his tech ed class. He totally made that all by himself. He has also had opportunities to learn a little Spanish, French, and German. He has decided that he wants to take French for his Foreign Language requirement for next year. He is also a big help with Sydnee. He will always take her whenever I need him to and she loves it too!

Jorden is happy about all the "girl friends" that he has here. He only has one little boy here that is his age that he has played with and gets along with. The other friends that he has are all girls and they will be going to kindergarten with him next year. He also gets to go to a speech preschool and ride a bus to get there. Very Exciting!

Sydnee is happy to be able to talk and use her words now in order to communicate. We went through a very frustrating time because she knew what she wanted, but couldn't tell us what she wanted. She is getting better and even saying three word sentences now. She knows how to get her way when she wants to with those bright baby blues and her bright smile. She is also happy because she is in Nursery. She absolutely loves it!

Wisconsin has been such a perfect place for our family! Chad told me that he thought that we would still be on the west side of the Mississippi when we were thinking about moving here. He was wrong and I didn't know that until we passed it when we drove over the bridge to it. I wasn't so happy about that, but now that I am here, I can't imagine a better place for our family. Life here is lived in a lot slower pace than we have been used to. We love our ward, our neighborhood, and the schools that our kids go to. The only thing that would make it absolutely perfect is, to have all of our family move here too. I just know that they would love it too if they came here. Don't ya think? :) :)

This week's recipes March 20-26

2009-03-20T12:59:00.007-05:00

So, I have had an overwhelming number of requests to start putting my recipes online. This blog is my family blog, but I thought that I could do this once a week. I can't guarantee that I will do it every week though. It depends on how busy my week is. I can put my recipes here, but if my husband is cooking, he is not as willing to share his recipes. Keep in mind that the recipes are not all "my " recipes. I get them from different sources and I will note the source. I figure out my menu either Thursday or Friday and go shopping every Friday, that way I don't have to go back to the store the rest of the week. It works well for me. I also usually do left overs on Thursday or Friday. I am only going to put the main dishes here. I almost always serve a fruit and vegetable with every meal and sometimes bread. FYI. Never substitute margarine for butter! Always cook with butter! So, we'll see how it goes to see if I continue next week....

Friday-Left overs

Saturday- Ham and Turkey Sandwiches

Sunday-Lasagna
Sauce:
Dry Spaghetti Mix
1# hamburger
2(6oz) tomato paste
2(60z) cans of water
onion, mushrooms, green pepper (chopped)
Cook hamburger and add veggies then everything else. Simmer for 20 minutes.

8oz. package of noodles Cooked according to package directions

1lb of shredded cheddar jack cheese (if you like it really cheesy add more)

Next Combine...
3cups cottage cheese
1/2 cup parm. cheese
2 Tbls. Parsley flakes
2 beaten eggs
2 tsp. salt
1/2tsp. pepper

Instructions:
Pre-heat oven to 375 degrees.
Put a little sauce on the bottom of 9X13 pan. Put half noodles then half of the cottage cheese mixture then have of the meat mixture, then half of the cheese. Repeat. Cover with foil. It helps to spray the inside of your foil so that the cheese doesn't stick to it when it is done. Bake for 30 minutes and then let sit for 10 minutes before serving.

Monday- Cheese Enchilada Chowder
1small can green chillies
1(15oz) can black beans
1(14oz) can Italian seasoned diced tomatoes
1(10oz) pkg. frozen corn
small onion chopped
green pepper chopped
Sauce:
1(190z.) can of enchilada sauce (Roserita is my favorite, El Paso works well too)
1 can cream of chicken soup
2 c. milk
2c. shredded cheddar cheese
Toppings:
sour cream
guacamole or fresh avocados
more cheese
tortilla corn chips
Instructions:
In a 3-5 quart crock pot add all ingredients except for the sauce and toppings. In a large mixing bowl whisk together enchilada sauce and soup. Gradually add milk. Pour over ingredients in the crock pot. Stir and cover. Cook on low 6-8 hours or high 3-4 hours. Stir in cheese just before serving until cheese is melted. Ladle into bowls and top with desired toppings. We don't use spoons with this soup. We just use the Tortilla chips.

Tuesday- Beef Stroganoff (Rachel Ray)
1# beef cut in thin strips
salt and pepper
3Tbls. Butter divided
2Tbls. flour
2cups beef consomme'
2tsp. Dijon mustard
1/4c sour cream
1Tbls. olive oil
onion (Chopped)
Mushroom (Chopped)
parsley leaves
Egg noodles (cooked to pkg. directions)

Instructions:
Heat skillet and add 1Tbls. olive oil and 1 Tbls. Butter once melted add flour and whisk in consomme and thicken 1min. Stir in mustard and sour cream and thicken 2-3 min. Remove from heat and season with salt and pepper. Brown meat in 1Tbls. olive oil and 1T butter and onion and mushrooms. Cook through and add sauce. Serve over noodles. My kids like me to shake a little of Parmesan cheese on top too.

Wednesday- French Toast
6 eggs
11/2c. milk
1/4c sugar
2 Tbls. Orange juice
1tsp. vanilla
1/2 tsp. salt
2 dashes of cinnamon
Instructions:
Mix all together and dip the bread. Cook on heated griddle and serve w/ syrup and Strawberries.
Butter syrup
1cube butter
3/4c. sugar
1/2 buttermilk or sour milk
1tsp. baking soda
Melt butter and sugar and add buttermilk or sour milk stir until sugar is dissolved. Remove from heat and add the baking soda. Stir until foamy and serve.

Thursday- Sweet and Sour Pork (Lion House Recipe)
1# lean pork cut in 1/2 inch chunks
2Tbls. Cornstarch
1/4c. Soy Sauce
2Tbls. oil
1c. carrots cut in chunks
2 small onions cut in chunks
1green pepper cut in strips
1 can (20oz.) chunk pineapple drained, reserve the juice
3Tbls. cornstarch
3tbls. Brown sugar
2cups pineapple juice
1/4 c vinegar
1/3 c soy sauce
Instructions:
Mix 2 Tbls. cornstarch and 1/4 cup soy sauce and marinate for one to two hours or over night in refrigerator. Drain, reserving marinade. Stir fry meat in hot oil until evenly browned and tender, about ten minutes. Remove meat from pan. Stir fry carrots and onions in same pan using more oil if needed. Cover and cook on low heat until tender about 10 minutes. Add green pepper and pineapple. Return meat to pan, then stir in marinade.
Make the sweet and sour sauce by mixing cornstarch and sugar in small saucepan. Add pineapple juice, vinegar, and soy sauce. Cook and stir until thickened and clear. Pour over meat and vegetables; heat until flavors are blended. Serve with steamed rice, ham fried rice, or noodles.

Dessert of the Week:
Raspberry Peach Dessert
1 Large can of sliced peaches
1 (12oz) pkg. frozen raspberries
1 (3oz.) pkg raspberry jello (dry)
1 vanilla cake mix (dry)
1 cube melted butter
1-11/2c. water

Instructions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees
Drain the peaches and put them in the bottom of a 9X13 pan. Put the frozen raspberries on top of that. Sprinkle the dry jello mix on top of that. Put the dry cake mix on top of that. Drizzle the melted butter on top of that followed by the water. Take a fork and try to get what you can moist on top. You will not be able to get it all moist. That is okay. Bake in oven for 1 hour or until the top is golden brown . Serve with vanilla ice cream.

My poor little Leopard baby!

2009-03-09T15:37:00.005-05:00

So, my Sydnee decided that she need to try about 5 cashews and this is what happened! It happened about a month a go. I was browsing my pictures and thought that this would make a good post. It took us a week straight on benedryl to get all the hives to clear up. Isn't this just soo sad? She kept pointing to herself and saying "Owie owie." So, she is the third one of my children that is allergic to nuts. She, by far, has had the worst reaction. Nuts aren't too bad to stay away from. We really don't have them around. Except during Christmas when I do my chocolates.That is how we found out that Jorden was allergic to nuts too. He had a small bit of a pecan and broke out into hives as well. So far, Brahnson and Tori are okay with them. The rest of them are okay if they don't eat the actual nut. If the label says that it was manufactured on a plant that uses nuts then they are okay. If they do slip up and have a reaction, Benedryl has taken care of them so far.

Update on Kids Part 1 Photos

2009-02-25T13:27:00.001-06:00

Update On Kids Part 2 The Story

2009-02-25T11:35:00.004-06:00

I thought this would be good time to write a short post on my kids! We just got done with having Grammy here for three weeks and had a great time with her! Brahnson is 12. He is in middle school and letting us experience all the ups and downs that has to go with the preteen age. He loves Sydnee and gives her all the attention that she could possibly need! Brahnson loves attending Young Men's and interacting with the youth. We have got really good youth in our ward that have taken him under their wings. Camren age 11, got new glasses and loves them. He has lost 4 pairs now and I am certainly grateful to my friend Joy who introduced me to zennioptical.com so that we haven't had to pay an arm and a leg to replace them. We actually got two pairs one for home and one for school. Hopefully, that will solve the losing the glasses thing. His fifth grade class did a colonial day and had all the kids dress up, the best they could, as if they were living during that time period. He is kind, considerate and a friend to all. Tori age 8, is mom's helper. She will help me with whatever that needs to get done and not complain. She likes school and activity days. She is also my movie partner. Some of her favorite movies are Jane Eyre, Pride and Prejudice, and anything with Dorris Day, just like her mom. Jorden age 5, is our know it all. He told Grammy that Monk Sharks eat monkeys. He got on the phone with Grammy after she was back home and told her that she needed to go to the airport so that we could pick her up again and come back. Jorden and I go to the library once a week and he always needs to get a dinosaur book, a snake book, a shark book, a big truck book, and a whale book. He doesn't spend time in the story book section, just the non fiction section. Sydnee,11/2, is a little firecracker. She is by far our most vocal child at this age. She will come up to you after you have been gone and yell HI!! She is also getting to know all the animal sounds and starting to communicate quite well for her age. The two things she needs to be happy is sleep and food. If she is hungry or has not had enough sleep you know it and if you don't, she will let you know. I love my kids! I am so lucky to have such great kids! I am even luckier to have an even greater husband that is so supportive. Family is so importantand I am so grateful for mine. I came from a wonderful family and my husband and I are raising a wonderful family. It doesn't get better than this. Some people think that I am crazy because I have five kids, but I wouldn't trade any of them for anything in the world, at least I can say that today at this moment, three of them are still at school! LOL :) :)

Totally Having Mom Withdrawals

2009-02-23T14:54:00.004-06:00

So, my mom came to stay with us in Wisconsin. Little did she know that it was going to be for three weeks! We had such a great time. We went out to eat and other places. We forgot our camera every where we went so this isn't going to be a great post that has a lot of pictures of where we went. Sorry Steph! This is the picture she took of our family when we were at church, so she could put it into her family album at home. My mom was able to just sit and relax. Some days, she didn't even get dressed! It was great! I didn't get dressed either if we were just hanging out at home. We played tons of games together. We totally got into "Pride and Prejudice". We watched the whole 6 hour version of it. We researched and found some very enlightening books called "The Pemberly Chronicles." Those books start after the weddings are over and tell about what happens to Mr Darcy and his wife Elizabeth Bennett. We also watched "Jane Eyre" three times and that is a 4-5 hour movie and "Sense and Sensibility". My husband caught up on his sleep on the weekends. Instead of me nagging him to get things done, I was so busy playing games with my mom and watching movies, he took the opportunity to take naps. She went out on our date nights also. We went to Chili's, Olive Garden, Texas Roadhouse, and Bellini's. Bellini's is the best Italian restaurant that I have ever been to! Their Chicken Marsala was to die for. Thanks Honey for finding that one, we will be returning soon! I can't wait until she comes again! I am totally missing her already.
We had great weather while she was here. It even almost got to the 60 degree mark! Then, the day that she was going to go which was Saturday, got dumped on with 6+ inches! We had to have her stay one more day and bump her to the next day! I wasn't sad at all about that one! We go to the airport on Sunday and we are hugging goodbye and I still am not crying! I then look at her and she is crying! That was it for me. I started the tears then and there and continued them off and on the rest of the night. I am still getting a little choked up about it.
It was so great to watch my mom interact with my kids one-on-one! We have lived away from Utah for a number of years now and my kids don't get that too much. They loved spending time with her. She read to them, helped them with their homework, did their dishes, and played games with them. Jorden asked as we were walking out the door to take her to the airport, with a worried look on his face, "How long do we have to give her back?" Mom, you are always welcome at my house. It is a little slower paced than what you are used to and that is a good thing! I don't think she has ever stayed at one of my siblings houses for that long of a time. HMMM...I GUESS THAT MEANS THAT I AM HER FAVORITE!!! :) :) :)

I Love My Mom!!

2009-02-07T23:35:00.002-06:00

Last Saturday, my sweet husband asked me if I would like my mom to come out here to Wisconsin to visit. He was going to be out of town and knows how I hate being alone when he is not here. I totally got all excited and said YES!! We got online and found a really good one way airfare. I called my mom up and got my sister Jessica. She said mom was busy and asked if I could call back later. She then, continued to ask how I was and started chit chatting with me. There was no way that I was going to tell her what I was going to ask mom before I asked her. My other sister had just taken her away a week or so before this and I am sure my sister Jessica wouldn't want my mom to leave home again. After chit chatting, I hung up and told Chad that I didn't think that my mom would go for it. About twenty minutes later, I called back and my mom answered. I told her that we found an awesome airfare and wanted to know if she would come out for a visit. I explained that I was going to be all alone and it would be really fun for her to come out to see where I lived. She mentioned that she had some prior commitments and she didn't know. Then, Jessica said that she should go , so my mom said yes! I honestly thought that I would have to have done some serious convincing on my part, but I was wrong.
It has been so fun having her here. I haven't let her do a thing. She has been totally relaxing this whole time. She will sometimes sneak and help her grand kids do their dishes. But, other than that, I am letting her relax as much as she wants. We are playing games. We actually watched the entire six hour movie of "Pride and Prejudice". Chad and I go on a date once a week and because he wasn't here I took her out on a mother-daughter date to HU HOT. It is a really yummy Mongolian BBQ place and she tried crab ragoons for the first time. I am so excited for her to go to church with me tomorrow and meet the wonderful people that are my friends here. My kids totally love having her here too. I am not sure that I want to get her that one way ticket back to Utah. I wish she and my dad could come and stay with me! I am well aware that is not reality though. I am just enjoying every minute that she is here. I love my mom and dad so much and I don't realize how much I miss having them around until they are here with me. I am not looking forward to her going home, but that won't be for at least another week or so. :) Pictures will follow in my next blog when my husband comes home to show me how to get them off the camera!

Is it just me?

2009-01-17T12:17:00.005-06:00

I am not understanding why every member of my family can fall asleep at any given moment when their body says it is time for sleep. My body constantly tells me it is time for sleep and yet, sleep for me is hard to find. I have to at least have three things happening for me to even have a prayer of sleep finding me. 1. It has to be dark. 2. It has to be quiet. 3. Nobody can be touching me. I have never had the problem with letting my children sleep in my bed, because if they do, I will definitely not get any sleep. Tori likes to come in and she knows that she cannot come on my side of the bed. She has to go to her dad's side. The problem with that is then my husband sleeps too close to me so, I can't sleep anyway. My children have inherited the ability to fall asleep at will. Within minutes of them going up to bed, they are asleep. I can be talking to Chad right after we put the lights out and, literally, within 10 seconds he can be snoring. It takes me a good 30 minutes to an hour to fall asleep and even then I don't stay asleep all night usually. I have even tried sleeping pills. If there is some sort of secret, I would like to know. Maybe, it's genetics. If that is the case, things are not looking well for me. I know my dad has a hard time sleeping as well.

All of our kids have been born sleepers. Our kids sleep 18-22 hours for the first few weeks of life. They then have three naps during the day until they are about 9 months and then go down to 2 until they are 18 months. I am just now starting to let Sydnee have only one nap during the day. By 7:00 at night, she is so ready for bed. Even Brahnson, who is twelve, likes to go to bed at 8:00. We have even given him the option to stay up until 9:00 p.m. I usually will be in bed by 10:00, but I can't fall asleep until around midnight. We then get up at 5:30 a.m. to do scriptures. I can't nap during the day because that decreases my chances of being able to get to sleep during my normal time. I am grateful that I have children that sleep. I just wish I knew how they do it.

This was nice.

2009-01-09T21:25:00.003-06:00

Today, I had the opportunity to meet some moms of students in Camren's class. One of the moms, Zoey, called me and asked if we could get our boys together. I said sure. We had a meeting at the school to plan for the 5th grade Colonial days that is coming up and Zoey was wondering if afterwards we could go sledding behind the fire station. One of the kids that we were going to be with has a dad that is a volunteer firefighter and he invited us to also have hot chocolate inside the firestation after we were through. I thought that sounded very fun. I went to the meeting and all the moms knew who Camren was. (I had never met any of these moms at this point) I was told some wonderful things about Camren that they had heard from their kids. I was told that Camren always shared his treats, that he sat by their kids at lunch, that they thought that he was such a sweet and nice kid. I have to say that as the mother of Camren, I wasn't surprised. That truly is the way Camren is. It is his nature. It is nice to get confirmation from people outside of your home that your children are living the way that you have tried to teach them. Anyway, sledding was fun, but very cold! I spent my time in my friend's van with Sydnee. It would not have been all that bad if the wind would have not blown so cold. I did have a nice time getting to know Zoey and her family. Unfortunately, the firemen got called away to put out a fire, so we were not able to do the hot chocolate thing. Jorden was disappointed. Maybe another time. I'm sure we will be seeing a lot more of our new friends.

Sledding in the cold, cold, cold!!

2009-01-09T21:23:00.001-06:00

Happy Birthday to me!

2008-12-31T15:12:00.003-06:00

December 30, I turned 32 years old! We just got back from Great Wolf. We made Raspberry peach dessert and opened presents. I really don't feel any older, I may look it though!

Trip to Great Wolf

2008-12-31T15:00:00.003-06:00

We were able to return to Great Wolf Lodge on Dec.29-30. We had a blast! Chad's sister's family came with us. A really good thing about this resort is that it is not open to the general public. They only open it to those that are staying at the resort. It was sold out on the days that we were there and it didn't seem crowded. Tori and Camren were able to go on the Tornado. The Tornado is a huge slide that you ride on a four person tube. You start on the slide and then you drop straight down and go into this big tube that is kinda like a toilet bowl. You slide up and down the sides of it and drop again into the bottom of it. I hate it, but the rest of the family seemed to like it. Great Wolf is a great vacation because you are either in your swimsuit or your PJs. They have a story time by the clock tower in the lobby at 8:00. This time of the year they even make it snow in the lobby. It was really fun. You don't see Sydnee in any of the pictures because my friend offered to take her so Chad and I could play with our older kids. It was so great not having to hold her all day. Another fun thing there is the Treehouse. It has a huge 1000 gallon bucket that dumps every 5 minutes. It can really sweep you off your feet! The tube slides, mat slides, lazy river, kiddie slides, hot tub and more that they have there was so much fun. So, if anyone wants to come and visit us in Wisconsin, let us know and we will make reservations to go there again!

Great Wolf Lobby

2008-12-31T14:58:00.001-06:00

Great Wolf Lodge

2008-12-31T14:50:00.001-06:00

Christmas

2008-12-26T21:57:00.002-06:00

We had a very nice Christmas! Christmas Eve, Chad and I needed to go and pick up some "special packages" at our friends' house in Cross Plains. We were going down this winding road and hit some black ice. We swerved to not hit a plow truck and hit a snow bank instead facing the other direction we were going. The van was stuck! Luckily, the guy in the plow truck was nice enough to give Chad a ride home to get his tow ropes. While he was gone, two different trucks stopped to see if I needed help. I thought that it was weird that both men that got out of their trucks had shovels automatically with them in their trucks. They started shoveling me out, but it was no use. The snow was too deep and I was too stuck. I told them that my husband would be back soon and that he could get me out. By the way, I wasn't driving when we hit the black ice. Chad was, I just wanted to make that clear. Anyway, one of the men asked if I needed water or crackers and I said no and thanked them, then they left. I was grateful to know that their were good Samaritans in Wisconsin. Chad arrived shortly afterwards with two other vehicles that could pull the van out of the snow bank. We were able to get out, and continued on our way. Needless to say, I will not ever go down that hill again during the winter.
Anyway, Chad's sister and her family came to Wisconsin to share Christmas with us. They arrived on Christmas Eve. We had a big turkey dinner and then decorated Santa's cookies. We stayed up until 1 in the morning. Christmas morning, nobody came to wake us up early and so I went downstairs, hoping to start on breakfast, and found Camren in the living room just waiting for people to wake up! Soon after that all the kids came trickling down and the parents soon followed. We had the kids look in their stockings first and then they took turns opening presents! We had a huge mess at the end of it, but had a lot of fun! All Christmas day, we played and ate! It was great. We really enjoyed having the Curtis' here. It was really nice to spend Christmas with some of our family, instead of being by ourselves. I hope all of you reading this had a very Merry Christmas!

Christmas eve and Christmas

2008-12-26T21:55:00.001-06:00

Chistmas 2008

2008-12-26T21:44:00.001-06:00

Happy Birthday Camren!

2008-12-21T22:10:00.005-06:00

December 20th was Camren's 11th birthday! He wanted Stawberry Cream Cheese Pie!

The boy by Camren is Jules. When we found out that we were going to be moving to Las Vegas, all Camren wanted was to find a really good friend. Chad and I told Camren that he should pray for that and that Heavenly Father could bless him with that. Jules' family moved in about a month or so after us. He lives about three houses down, he is in Camren's grade, and he is also in Camren's school class. He is such a good kid just like Camren. He truly had his prayers answered.

Camren told us that all he wanted for his birthday was Zelda Twilight Princess Wii game and Star Wars; Force Unleashed. We decided to get him one of them and thanks to Grandma Adams he got the other one as well. Camren was very excited!

These are our dear friends Bishop Walker Carolyn Walker and their daughter Kristina. You can't really see Kristina, but Sydnee is sitting on her lap. Sydnee has taken quite a liking to this family. Carolyn has really been like a mother to me here. She has been there always whenever I am in need of something. She can never leave you without her giving you a hug. Her birthday is on Christmas day and I thought it would be fun to surprise her on Camren's birthday. With Camren's permission, we decided to surprise her with a blueberry cream cheese pie for her to blow out candles on and a present from our family. With her birthday on Christmas, she doesn't get to open any other presents on any other day. She told me that this was her first time that she was able to open a birthday present that wasn't on Christmas. It was really fun to do that for her. She has done so much for me and my family while we have been here. We love their whole family!

Colder than Ever!!

2008-12-21T21:59:00.002-06:00

I just have to say that it is absolutely freezing here. I know that I have said that on previous blogs, but this time I know what I am saying because I have experienced it. The past few days have had unbelievable temperatures and wind chill factors and snow accumulation! We had our second snow day on Friday. The kids got an extra day of Christmas vacation and Chad's work closed at noon because of so much snow. There are 30 people that work for his company and 4 showed up. When I woke up today the normal temperature was -10. We had a windchill advisory that got to -30. I have never experienced cold like this! Church was cancelled for the other ward that shares our building because of how cold it was. Our bishop considered cancelling church today or just having sacrament meeting today because of the cold. He didn't, but I was glad that we only lived across the street for our building. The wind has caused a lot of drifting snow all over the roads. The fields all over our area look like frozen waves on an ocean. My friends say that this is cold, but it gets colder come January!

More Christmas Spirit

2008-12-21T21:48:00.003-06:00

We got our Christmas Tree up and decorated. I have to say that our decorations keep getting higher and higher. Sydnee thinks they are "pitty" and has to touch them and as a result has broken a lot of them! Our small entryway Christmas tree was something that we go when we were in Las Vegas and too lazy to put up the big one. I am glad that we made the effort to put up the big one.

I love this part of Christmas when you can say that all your neighbor treats and gifts are out and you are done with Christmas shopping. We are going to have Chad's sister Jen and her family come and stay with us for Christmas. We are so excited to be able to share this holiday with "real" extended family. Chad and I have been away for a lot of Christmas' and have tried to form and continue on with the Christmas traditions that are a good fit for our family. It still is not easy to have to go through so many holidays without our extended family around, so it is fun when they come to us, instead of us going to them. My kids are counting down the days until the Curtis family gets here.

Tag 3 Christmas Wishes

2008-12-15T16:56:00.002-06:00

I would have several Christmas wishes. The three that come to mind are:
1. Plane tickets for my whole family to go and visit family in Utah.
2.My children's happy faces on Christmas morning
3.Getting all debt paid off!

Those are in no special order, but now that you have read them, you now have to go to your blog and do your 3 Christmas wishes because you are now.......TAGGED!!! HA! HA! HA!

Our First "Snow Day"

2008-12-10T10:01:00.002-06:00

I didn't take any pictures for this post. We had our first "snow day" yesterday. The night before we had freezing rain and then about 5-7 inches of snow. I have never seen freezing rain. It falls very lightly, but it freezes on anything it touches. We had ice droplets all over our windows. It is a really bad thing for the roads. It makes the roads really slick. They cancelled school for the day because of it. I didn't think it looked all that bad, but if you went outside you slipped if you were not careful.
I have heard that we are in for a long winter. Last year there was over 100 inches of snow! The Farmer's Almanac is predicting even more for this year. I don't mind the snow as much as I thought I would. I just don't like the cold with the wind chill factor. The other morning it was 7 degrees, but the wind chill made it feel like -2. I dread having to go out anywhere. My kids love playing in it, but lately they haven't been staying out too long. I just try not to go out at all!

'Tis the Season for Chocolate!

2008-12-03T23:47:00.000-06:00

I haven't been blogging much lately, because my life has totally stopped as it does every year around this time since I learned to make chocolates! This is my tenth year doing it. I learned when I lived in Washington. Glenna Dean taught me. I had to do it with her for three years before I dared to venture out on my own. Thanks Glenna!
I started my chocolates early this year! I started the Sunday before Thanksgiving and got done with them today! I usually start the week after Thanksgiving. I made more chocolates this year than I ever have before. Wisconsin is a great place to make them! I closed off my kitchen and made it very cold! It was not a hard thing to do here. In Las Vegas, I had to do them in the wee hours of the morning to even get it close to the freezing temperature that it has to be at when I make chocolate. They didn't turn out near as well as they should have. Here, I could do it in the middle of the day! No problems! They turned out wonderful. I didn't have many people come and talk to me while I was doing them unless they were bundled up, even then they didn't stay long. Tori helped a lot by putting the centers in the chocolate for me. You wouldn't think that it would save me much time, but it saved me tons!

I made two of everything that I make. I made 8 batches all together of the fondant. (That's the white stuff I am working on my marble slab.) It takes anywhere between 35 minutes to an 11/2 hours to work it. It starts out as a syrup and gets really thick and glossy. It then will lose it's shine and go really creamy. I then will add whatever flavor that I am doing. I think this was a mint batch. I did cherries (my mom's favorite), cherry-nuts, pina coladas (my dad's favorite), and mints. The non-fondant chocolates were caramels, turtles, and peanut butters (Chad's favorite). I can't decide which one I like best. It is a toss up between the cherries, the cherry-nuts, and the turtles. I also made 5 batches of Walnut Rocha. I was going to do six, but I don't think that I will need to. Here is a picture of the finished products. I will only do this once a year. My family is glad to get the kitchen warm again. Making these chocolates, totally gets me into the Christmas Spirit! MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!! (I am yelling this from Wisconsin. Can you hear me?) :)

Camren Orchestra

2008-12-03T23:43:00.000-06:00

Camren decided that he wanted to learn the violin. He has done a lot better than I thought he would. He is learning quickly and it is something that he loves to do. I like it that I can help him when he needs it.

COLD!! COLD!! COLD!!

2008-12-03T23:34:00.000-06:00

This picture of Jorden was taken in November. We had our first official snow ans Jorden was able to make his first snowball. Then, a few weeks later we got a big winter storm. We still have that snow! It is so cold here and my friends just laugh and say that it is cold, but it is not yet freezing! What am I going to do? My friends in Las Vegas tell me that it is still in the 70s. Our high tomorrow is going to be 22 degrees, our low is going to be 8 degrees! My kids are liking the snow for going sledding. They come in the house and want hot cocoa to warm up. I have not been able to find certain name brands of foods that I like here and one of those is Stephen's Hot Chocolate. I did find one called Polar Express and it is pretty good. I just don't know if I can handle all these adjustments! :]

Sydnee

2008-12-03T23:25:00.000-06:00

This is our Sydnee. This picture with her mouth open reflects a lot of her personality. She has her mouth open a lot because she is very vocal. She also will come over to you when you are eating and stand there with her mouth open until you give her a bite of whatever you are eating. She loves egg nog and her blankie. She will suck her thumb and hold on to one of the strings on her blanket and put it up to her nose. The most excited thing about Sydnee right now is that she is finally in Nursery! YEAH!

Pinewood Derby

2008-11-24T13:33:00.001-06:00

This is Camren with his last Pinewood Derby car. He and Chad had a good time working on it together. It didn't go very fast, but it looked really cool! He did a really good job on it. He had a lot of positive comments on it. He will be out of Cub Scouts in December and we won't have to do this again for three years! Yeah!

Brahnson and Sydnee

2008-11-17T20:24:00.000-06:00

I have to say, at times, Brahnson can be very hard. I truly believe that Sydnee was sent to us to soften him. It doesn't matter how bad of a mood he is in, if Sydnee is around he is instantly happier. Sydnee is the same way. Brahnson can always make her day brighter. She prefers him over her mom sometimes. The first thing that he asks when he gets home from anywhere is "Is Sydnee awake?" If she is, he goes and finds her and if she isn't, he wakes her up and plays with her. She is always happy to see him. She stops whatever she is doing, stands by his feet, puts her arms up towards him, and says "Up!". He picks her up and she gives him big hugs that she rarely gives anyone else. They have a very sweet relationship. We love them both dearly!

Tino

2008-11-16T22:34:00.000-06:00

This is our dog Tino. We have had him for a little over a year now. He is a pretty good dog, if you have to have a dog. He comes when he is told and does tricks. He is really good with Sydnee. She will pull on his ears and and grab at his skin and hair and he will just sit there. He hardly ever barks. He hates the cold though! We will take him out right now and he does his business in a matter of seconds and comes right back in. It is in the thirties now for the highs!

Nobody wants to really take him out and take care of him except for Camren. So, we told Camren that Tino is his dog and he is responsible for him. He has done a pretty good job in taking care of him. I think Tino understands that he is Camren's because he never leves Camren's side when Camren is home. I tolerate him when Camren is gone. If we have to have a dog I can't complain about this one.

Christmas Decorating Early

2008-11-16T22:19:00.001-06:00

Chad wants to take away my "traditional" Thanksgiving. He wants to go to a restaurant for Thanksgiving. He even got the kids on his side too. So, I couldn't wait to get on to the next holiday and start putting up Christmas decorations. Tori and I wen to a super Saturday for Relief Society and made these Christmas ball ornaments to put on our tree. It was way fun to spend time with her that way! Jorden just wanted his picture taken.

We can't really put nails into our fireplace mantel, so I found these cute things at Menards!(that's like a Home Depot) I was so excited that I had to put them up! Don't they just make you feel happy? I love them. And yes, you can count eight stockings up, even though we only have seven people in our family. We thought we should buy an extra just in case we add another person to our family in the future. There are no announcements that are being made by that statement. (:

Sydnee loves to see all the decorations. I'm only doing a little at a time. I also got my chocolate and that made me a little excited for Christmas too. Chad found a food distributor that is only an hour away. Instead of getting my usual 10lbs. He got me 50lbs. I will be dipping a lot of chocolate this year and the next!

Purple Velvet Girls

2008-11-16T22:02:00.001-06:00

Tori is turning into such a beautiful girl. She is just as beautiful inside as she on the outside. Her teacher tells me that she is nice to everyone and makes sure that everyone is being included in whatever game she is playing.

Sydnee keeps us on our toes. She did her first trial run of nursery today. I had to stay with her, but she did great! She will be 18 months next week. I am so excited to be able to go to both Sunday school and Relief Society by myself and not be distracted or be the distraction when I have Sydnee in their with me.

I found Sydnee's purple velvet dress at Saver's and knew that Tori had a purple velvet dress as well and had to get it. People at church said she looked like a little "snow princess". This is them together in their purple velvet! It was very fun to dress them similar for church.

Our Handsome Boys

2008-11-16T21:44:00.001-06:00

These are our handsome boys after a very much needed haircut. I was too embarrassed to take before pictures. I can't believe how much older they look when they get a clean cut haircut. Brahnson is almost as tall as I am. Camren and Tori are pretty much about the same height now. Jorden loves getting his picture taken!

Our Backyard

2008-11-16T21:13:00.000-06:00

This is what we see when we look out our back yard. In the distance, you can see a pole sticking out. That is a tornado siren. Every Wednesday around noon it goes off as a test. I have never heard one before I moved here. We see a lot of birds here. We get a lot of them in our backyard. I have seen a few wild turkeys, but not in our backyard yet.

This is the pond that we have in our backyard. My neighbor's daughter said that it froze completely solid last winter and she liked to ice skate on it. The other picture has all the ducks and Canada geese we get on the pond. They are pretty wild. I gave my kids some bread to go feed the ducks and they swam away from them and hid in the bushes. The ducks that I grew up with always would come near you when you had bread.

I'm glad we have some small sledding hills in the back. Jorden is just waiting for it to snow so he can go sledding. We have had snow, but nothing that has stuck around. My friend told me that last year it really started snowing around the first part of December and didn't stop until mid April! They had over 100 inches of snow. The farmer's almanac, that is pretty accurate, is predicting even more snow this winter!

2008-11-10T08:24:00.001-06:00

This is Tori going to her second official Activity days! They did a way cute thing that I thought was great. They went to Old Navy and had a modesty fashion show. They brought out an immodest outfit and talked about why it was immodest. The girls were then able to choose a modest outfit and model it for their "fashion show". This is Tori's outfit. The other picture is all of the girls that went! They are a great bunch of girls!

The Best French Toast

2008-11-06T19:31:00.001-06:00

I really like cooking. When I come across a really good and easy recipe, I like to share it. So here is a recipe that you can have for breakfast or dinner.
The Best French Toast
6 eggs
1 1/2c. milk
1/4c. sugar
3T Prepared Orange Juice
1 t. vanilla
1/2 t. salt
2-3 dashes of cinnamon
sliced bread
Beat all ingredients together except for the bread. Dip bread on both sides and place on greased skillet. Cook on both sides.
I like to put strawberries, sweetened whipped cream (the real stuff not cool whip) , butter syrup, and a sprinkle of powdered sugar on top. I also serve it with sausage or bacon.
Butter Syrup
1 stick of butter (no substitutes!)
3/4c. sugar
1/2 c. buttermilk or sour milk
1 t. vanilla
1 t. baking soda
Melt butter and sugar together. Add buttermilk or sour milk. Cook until sugar is dissolved. Remove from heat and add vanilla and baking soda. Stir until foamy. Serve immediately. YUMMY!!!!
I hope you enjoy this. It is a quick, easy, and yummy dinner or breakfast. Look for other recipes on future blogs.

2008-11-05T09:55:00.000-06:00

This is in response to my sister Stephanie's TAG!
She tagged everyone that read her blog and now that you are reading my blog, you are tagged also! TAG!!! YOU ARE IT!! (for those who don't know about tags if you are reading this you HAVE to do this same tag on your blog.)
Five favorite family memories.
Here are five of my many favorite memories.
1.Thanksgiving and Christmas at Aunt Margaret's house with her yummy punch and raspberry candies
2. Grandpa always giving a kiss on each cheek anytime I saw him. The kisses were always wet!
3. Going to Richfield and the Ideal Dairy's punch bags! I think they still have them!
4. Clothes shopping with mom. She always made it very fun and always took me out to lunch! If you went shopping with dad, he would get you the same thing just in different colors. Then, you would have to clean out his shoe closet.
5. Going to Cedar City with my mom and sisters. I always had to visit the Indian store to buy bottles of painted sand and polished rocks. Looking back, it was a waste of money. At the time, I thought I had the best treasures! It will be even more fun this next year when Tori goes with me!

Henry Villas Zoo

2008-11-05T08:29:00.000-06:00

The first picture you see of Sydnee was taken before we went to the zoo. I had gotten her all ready to go and then she got into Jorden's candy and she thought it was pretty funny. When I was ready this is what I found when I came downstairs.

This zoo is totally free. It has all the animals you could want, except elephants. It is not as big as Hogle, but they spread their animals out so you can see more of them when you go. It was such a wonderful day we thought we would take advantage of the opportunity and go to the zoo. It is supposed to snow majorly on Friday and Saturday! I don't think that I am ready for that yet.

This zoo has a wonderful play area! Sydnee loved it. For most of the pictures that you see of her, we had to take two or three. She would look at the person that was taking them, and then they would say "1, 2, 3!" Sydnee would turn her head as soon as they said "3!" every time!

Even though this zoo is free, you would think that it didn't have a lot of animals or good animals. Wrong! They have 2 huge polar bears and I think 3 or 4 other kinds of bears. I was shocked the first time I went.

They have cute photo opportunities too!

Jorden at the play ground! We went with our friends Karin Johnson and her little boy, Walker. Jorden and Walker get along very well!

Behind me is all the flamingos that they have and you can see the big playground area a little bit better.

They have three giraffes. A daddy, mommy and a baby. You can see the baby behind the boys. This is a very likely place that we will go if we have any visitors in the Spring, Summer, or Fall. I can't guarantee that in the Winter.

Tori's Baptism

2008-11-04T07:55:00.000-06:00

At Tori's Baptism, Camren gave the opening prayer. Brahnson gave a talk on baptism. Our friend, Kristina Walker gave the talk on the Holy Ghost. We have a girl in our ward that plays the viola and she and I played "I Know My Redeemer Lives". We had testimonies and Chad performed the ordinances.

Chad's dad, Dennis, was the only outside family that was able to attend her baptism. We were grateful that he was there. Her uncle Cole tried, but had to take a load to California.

This is Tori after she was baptized. We are so proud of Tori for making the choice to be baptized. I have to remember in the future to go from last to first when blogging! Sorry if this is a little confusing!

Tori was baptized on October 26, 2008. They do baptisms here more on Sundays. We had over 50 people attend. I was amazed! The ward here really supports the baptisms. We had homemade brownie sundaes afterward. A member of our bishopric works at the University Dairy and gave us a three gallon tub of vanilla ice cream. We literally went to the last scoop of that. I made my homemade hot fudge and people volunteered to bring Brownies. It was a nice time.

Halloween costumes

2008-11-04T07:37:00.001-06:00

On Halloween, I forgot to take pictures of my kids in their costumes. I had them get all dressed up again as part of our FHE.

It was very nice during trick-or treating. It wasn't cold at all. Sydnee loved it! I tried to carry her basket for her and every time I did she screamed. She was very protective with her candy. She is the first one to blame if we someone has their candy stolen. There is usually a bunch of half eaten candy with their wrappers still on them at the crime scene.

Jorden and Tori went hunting into my friend, Tanya's Halloween costume stash. Jorden loved the idea of being able to be a GREEN dinosaur. Jorden likes everything green. Tori found a very cool wizard costume.

Camren loved the idea of being an "undead warrior", what ever that means. I think it has something to do with Lord of the Rings.

This was the third year that Brahnson wanted to be the Sumo wrestler. They were out of school for Halloween. They had a wacky dress day at his school and he wore this. I don't think he lasted all day though.

They have certain hours that kids can trick-or-treat here. In Middleton, it was from 6-8 p.m. After 8 p.m., nobody had their lights on. In another town by us, the hours were 5-7 p.m. Apparently, they past a law or some kind of ordinance about the whole thing. My kids weren't able to get as much candy as they hoped to get. I didn't think that was a bad thing.

Jorden's Halloween Cookie

2008-11-04T07:32:00.000-06:00

Our kids love decorating the Halloween cookies. It's great! We start an assembly line and each one gets to add to the face of the cookie. When we are done they get to decorate one cookie any way they want. The rest have to be decorated the way mom wants them done.

These are our girls!

2008-11-04T07:28:00.001-06:00

Tori loves having a sister.

She is a great help when I need to get something done. Sydnee loves to held all the time!

2008-11-03T14:20:00.000-06:00

This is Camren in the wave pool. Every five minutes an Alarm would sound and the waves would go for the next five minutes. There were also 16 different slides plus a big tree house with a 1000 gallon bucket that would dump every fiv minutes. If you were under it, you got swept off your feet! Brahnson liked the Tornado the best. Camren and Tori needed some convincing to go on some of the slides. In the end, they went on all the slides except for the Tornado and had a fun time. I don't blame them for not going on the Tornado. Brahnson convinced me that I just HAD to go and I hated every minute of it. Thankfully, I won't ever have to do that again! Even though we are going again during the Christmas Break!

2008-11-03T14:12:00.000-06:00

We went to a very fun place. It's called Great Wolf Lodge in Wisconsin Dells. Wisconsin Dells has a bunch of resorts that have huge indoor water parks. We all had a great time. Chad and I forgot our camera, so these are pictures that our friends took and sent to us. This is Brahnson underwater.

My first post

2008-11-03T11:58:00.001-06:00

This is my first post. I am hopefully going to get the hang of this. Here are some pictures from the kids first day of school and also from Brahnson's 12 year old birthday party.