Never A Dull Moment

 Since I just posted about Josh's birthday, no better time like the present to blog about his birthday party.  As I mentioned he loves Star Wars, hence a Star Wars themed party.  While we were waiting for everyone to get here, they played on the trampoline.  The light sabers were a hit.
 I couldn't find a Star Wars pinata so, I took a star shaped one and spray painted it black and stuck a picture of Darth Maul on one side and Darth Vader on the other.
 Once everyone had arrived we had an obstacle course in our back yard.  Under the trampoline, around the cones, climb up the stairs and run down them, then "cross the tight rope", grab a light saber and hit Darth Maul 3 times.  (some of the kids hit a few more than 3 times).
 Such concentration!

 A friend of ours came and (this was her idea mind you) dressed up as Darth Vader.  She did not know what she was in for...The kids all had light sabers in their hands.
 They chased her under the trampoline, she was such a good sport!

 Next we played pin the light saber on the Jedi.  I think a couple of them could see cuz they were right on.  A couple of the kids went multiple times, it was a hit!

 After some lunch, we did the pinata, Darth Vader made another apperance. ..I love that you can see the orange from the bandana under the mask.  It makes me smile.

 Noone actually broke the silly thing open.  I wish they still made pinatas like they used to out of paper mache. 

 My favorite food is blueberries. (It's true, he can eat a whole container by himself for a snack).
My favorite sports are tennis and soccer. 
The best show on television is Ninjago.
The coolest person on earth is Dad.


My current favorite song is the Star Wars theme song.
The book I am loving right now is Fly Guy.
Three words that describe me are: awesome, cool, and fun.
When I was little, I used to play with Pooh Bear.

 Abby usually just plays soccer in the fall.  She says it's "her sport".  This year her friends wanted to do synchronized swimming so she was more than excited to do it too.  She is a fish in the water, so I figured it was right up her alley.  As it turns out she's really quite good at it.  She got a first place ribbon in her first meet for figures.  She and her friends are really getting a kick out of it.


The spring season is a little shorter and has a lot less people than the summer season.  All the same they made it to the City Finals, they were so excited.  Abby was in a trio with her two friends Sophia (lft) and Eleni (rt), and a part of the group routine. The trio did well, they were really synchronized for alot of it.
 

The group routine.  They did their routine to Sunshine Day.  They had flowers on their wrists and ankles and in their hair.  They had the cutest routine by far.
And it paid off, they got  a First Place medal in their group routine, and a Second Place medal for their trio.  They were so excited to say the least!  It was a great end to the first season, I think we will definately be doing synchro over the summer.

Ok, so a couple of weeks ago at church our bishop challenged us to have a "no media week".  The way we interperted this challenge was: no tv, internet (other than work purposes), video games, radio, long or too many texts.  As I type it, it doesn't sound so bad....  On the way home from church the we told the kids, to say they were excited would be to lie.  They were bummed, but ready for the challenge.  We had a great Sunday, then the kids went to bed.  And James and I looked at each other like, "what do we do now?"...We folded clothes, and made granola for breakfast.  Monday rolled around and with homework and playing outside the kids were fine.  Then they went to bed and James was working late...So I read a book.  Tuesday and Wednesday were similar days.  Thursday I let the boys stay home while I took Abby to synchronized swimming practice.  When I came home I knew that they had blown it.  Josh had his homework laid out on the floor in front of the tv, so I asked and Josh just melted, he felt so bad about breaking his promise to be a part of no media week.  Toby and Tyler on the other hand couldn't decide who had turned on the tv (never mind neither one of them turned it off!) First they told me they hadn't watched tv, when I told them I knew that they had, they said they were in the other room, you get the idea.  I was more mad that they were lying to me than that they had actually watched tv so no media week started over!

If I'm being honest, I really didn't want to do it! I was craving tv and playing with my pictures on the computer.  James was happy to add the additional time.  So I put a password on both tv's so noone could watch them and we did it! We made it 11 days with no tv, no internet, no video games! The kids didn't kill each other, it was great.  I thought that my house would be cleaner, but it wasn't.  I thought that my laundry would be caught up, but it never was.  But we had fun playing, Candyland, Winnie the Pooh Uno, Dominion, Power Grid, Ticket to Ride, and more.  The kids read more, they practiced the piano more, it was good.

I noticed that I don't really need to watch some shows, so I just deleted them and I'm moving on.  We got closer as a family and maybe next year, we'll try another no media week.

A little while ago I was reading someone's blog where they interviewed their kids and blogged about it. I haven't ever done that so, I thought I might. I hope you don't get tired of hearing about each one, I know I have a lot of kids.

Toby is my oldest. He was my birthday present 13 years ago. He loves to read, and is such a wonderful helper. He can babysit, and is very good with all little kids. He is in 8th grade, he hates to do homework. Toby has played the alto saxaphone in band for the past 3 years, he loves it. On the flip side he does not like to play the piano even though when he practices he's quite good. He is a basically good kid, goofy at times, crabby at others, but underneath all that he's great. He has a testimony of the gospel and lives his life as such. He is a great example to his brothers and sisters. We went to the park over spring break to fly kites and John really wanted to fly the kite, so Toby just bent down and helped him fly it, it was very sweet, as we didn't even have to ask him to do it.
So Here's what he says about himself:

My favorite food is steak.
My favorite sport to play is tennis.
The best show on television is Star Wars the Clone Wars
The coolest person on earth is Victor Vallin.
My favorite thing to learn in school is reading.
If I could go anywhere in the world I would go to South Jordan, UT. (his friend Victor moved there a year ago).
My favorite color is blue.
My current favorite song in Get Crazy.
The book I am loving right now is the Inheritance Series.

Three words that describe me are: very awesome reader.
The best season of the year is summer.
The thing I do most awesomely is read.
The snack I like best is rock candy.
One food I really dislike is fish.
My best friend is Victor.
If I had one wish it would be to go to South Jordan, UT (can you tell he was missing Victor when I interviewed him)?


My best memory is putting water baloons (with Victor) under Amy's (Victor's sister) boyfriends car and watching their expressions as they ran over them.

Jamie is a funny girl! She is 4 and has her own little qwerks about her. She won't wear a coat if she's wearing long sleeves. She wears her church shoes everywhere, without socks, they smell. :( I'll blog more about her later. I noticed her underwear was getting a little tight. So the other day we were shopping I saw underwear and had her pick some new ones out. When we got home she wanted to put on the new ones. I told her they needed to be washed first, and put them in the washing machine with the other whites. The thing you have to understand is that we have two washing machines and 1 dryer. That's a different story though. So I put jeans in the other washer at the same time. I went about my errands for the day. that night I made a judgement call, and put the jeans in the dryer and left the whites in the washer. As it turns out that was NOT a good call.

Jamie woke up the next morning, and I told her to get dressed, so she did what any 4 year old with new underwear would do. She stripped down, and grabbed all the old underwear, and walked into my room. Naked. Holding the now ill fitting underwear. It was then that I realized I should have put the whites in the dryer. I had totally forgotten then I bought the underwear (thank goodness I have her to remind me).

When I informed her that she needed to wear her old underwear one more day she completely lost it. She threw them on the floor in the hall (see picture) and declared them ALL unwearable. None of them were acceptable. Mind you she never said anything to me about them not fitting before I bought them. I caught her trying to put on pants with no underwear on. Which was a great moment. Finally, I picked up "the biggest pair I could find" and stretched it so the stitches ripped a little. Which is when she informed me that I was not to rip them because she was planning on giving them away!! This girl is so used to hand me downs, she thought we would be handing down the underwear too!! Funny girl. I finally got her dressed in the old underwear, but don't worry she had the new ones on the next day!

I don't really know where to start this story, the begining is much too long, so I guess I'll start in January.

In January I had a bit of an intervention with myself, I need to get serious about losing weight. One of my goals was to start running, so that I could run atleast on leg of Ragnar this year. I needed to start soon so I would be ready by the end of April, so I started a couch to 5K program, 8 weeks of running 3 times a week so at the end you are able to run 3.2 miles without stopping. I started going to the gym, running outside, lifting, etc. I struggle with eating right, but I didn't want to cancel out any progress I had made by running. And in 2 months I lost 15 pounds. But, I can also run 5 miles without stopping. The other day I did 6 miles, but I kinda walked a mile of it, so I'm only counting it as 5 miles running (one walking). Anyway, the lady that works in the kid care at the gym didn't show up one day and they couldn't find anyone to cover so, I thought I'll just put John in the backpack (frame backpack for hiking) since that was what I had in the car. I parked at the top of the hill, hiked down, then hiked back up. On the way up I felt a little pang in my left heel, ignoring it I continued on....for 2 weeks. Finally (5 weeks away from the race) I decided to see the podiatrist regarding it...Plantar Facitis (sp?)! I had it in the right foot so it wasn't really a surprise that that's what it was. With the other foot they were able to give me a cortizone shot and I was healed (enter heavenly choirs singing). However, on this foot the placement of the pain makes it hard for the medicine to stay localized, and it usually doesn't work. So he gave me some other steroid that I take a bunch of the first day then taper off for like 5 days. I need to stay off of it for 2 weeks! ugh! Only light impact exercise. So of course not wanting to get rid of any momentum that I have I go to the gym to do the cross trainer.

They have 2 cross trainer type things there, the cross trainer which moves your arms and legs and the precore which just moves your legs. So I poke my head into the personal trainer office to ask about the machines and which one would be better to help me with my training. It all went down hill from there.

He told me about the two, their pros and cons etc. We decided that the precore would probably be better suited for my needs, he showed me how to use it, I was feeling kinda good. He asked me if I had had my free personal training yet, to which I replied no. So we decided I would come back on Friday. Ok, then he asked me if I was just starting my workout and if I would just like to do the workout now. Ok I thought. So Malcom (beware of Malcom) talked to me for a bit then we worked out for 30 minutes. It was tough, at times definately harder than I would actually push myself. At the end of the session he put me together for some training sessions, but since I hadn't discussed any of this James I said I would get back to him. I was totally ready to sign up for a year of workouts with him. I felt great, I didn't think it was so bad till I walked out of the gym...My legs felt like jelly! I had to walk up the hill to Bogdonovich to pick up Jamie and on the way down I had to hold onto the rail my legs were so weak. If I thought that was bad wait until today. You know you're sore when you gauge how badly you have to go pee, based on the fact how much it hurts to sit down! (TMI I know!) The whole day I have been walking (hobbling) about. I think I should've signed up for the workouts before I was so sore! He got me all motivated to lose weight, but now I'm so sore, I don't think I could be this sore for the next year! What to do?!?! It's been a weird day.

I cracked the screen on my ipod.
I folded 5 baskets of laundry
I did one load of laundry (still not folded)
I did yoga
I took Abby to synchronized swimming practice
I helped with a mural
I did my visiting teaching
I watched Josh get an award at school.
I gave the kids kisses before bed.

Just a day in the life.

I snapped these pictures of Jamie and John last week. The hill at Bogdonovich is so beautiful right now, full of yellow flowers, I couldn't resist taking a little walk up the hill to snap a few pictures.
Just Jamie, you can almost see the flowers. Trust me it's spectacular.