Green Lights and Red Lights

I seem to be in my car a good portion of the day it seems like, and I have realized that there is something fishy going on. Every single time I am running late, I have to stop at each red light. And I just get later and later. But the times when I have extra time, and I want to stop at the lights to eat something, like cereal or a salad, I never have to stop or the light turns green right away. Why is that?

On a different topic, I saw Dylan's teacher at Costco tonight, and she commented on how well he has been doing in school. With a week like last week, it was nice to hear something nice about one of my kids. (and then tonight, he actually spent a good deal of time memorizing his poem for tomorrow...is there hope that he might actually be responsible?)

Finally, there is this girl in Spencer's class that he really likes. Well, today after school another girl came up to him and said that the other girl just likes him as a friend. I know he was trying to act like it didn't matter, but he talks about her all the time, and I could just feel his heart breaking. Not that I am encouraging any kind of romance for 8 year olds by any means, but...I felt sad for him. I am sure only the beginning of heart aches to come. I am totally not ready for these kind of things.

Life...

October, that is the last time I have blogged. I just don't think I am cut out for this blogging stuff. It seems like every other time I blog, I say how it has been so long since I have blogged. Well, I got tired of seeing the same post every time that I went to look at my blog list of other bloggers, so I figured that I should write something. I can't put pictures on, because they are on my phone, and our computer has major problems so I pulled out our old old laptop that is missing half the keys and only has like 4 gig left of space. Which used to be a lot, but now you download two programs and there goes any empty space. So needless to say I can get online, but I can't do anything too fancy.

For those that I don't regularly talk to, here are some highlights of the last few months.

-All 3 boys just ended Basketball. I love this sport because there is one practice, (which they all happened to be on Friday Afternoons) and one 1 hour game. Lovely.

-Brooke took a tap class and had a little performance in December.

-The Holidays were great, and we got a visit from Grammy

-Spencer just started Baseball, and is loving it.

-Brooke just started gymnastics and loves it!

-I am still loving being the Primary President. It brings joy and goodness into my life.

-I have two official boy scouts, one cub scout, and one daisy scout. And Chad is the Boy Scout Commitee Chair (I think that is the title). Anyway, we definitely have a lot of scouting going on over here.

-I am still teaching preschool to the sweetest little group of kids I have ever had. They really are the best behaved kids. And they are adorable.

-Chad is still working out of town every week at Chevron. He loves this job! We miss seeing him every night, but he usually doesn't work on Fridays so it is good to have him around an extra day each week.

-I have fallen in love with Pinterest. What a wonderful place to get the best ideas!

-My brother Dan and his wife just had their third baby!

-My sister Ariel is due in a little over a month with a little boy!

-My sister in law Britty is expecting pretty soon also!

(wow, all this talk of babies is making me jealous)

So there are some updates. Life is busy but really good. I have had my share of challenges lately, but with good friends and the gospel in my life, I feel like I have been able to keep things in perspective and keep on going. I know that things happen for a reason, even if it is to just teach us to have empathy when others are going through the same thing, but sometimes we learn the most by going through challenges.

p.s. The picture above is where I wish I was right now...just for a couple of days. On second thought maybe more like a month.

Good, Better, Best

I have always loved the talk by President Dallin H. Oaks about good, better, best. But didn't until today realize how I could apply it to myself. For the past several years, I think that I have been in survival mode. Running a day care was a lot of fun, but it took all of my time. I started at 6:30 am and didn't finish until 5 or 5:30 every day. When I had kids here that I was watching, I had to completely focus on them. My kids were here too, so it was great that I was always with them. But I rarely if ever got a free moment. Ok once or twice a day I was alone in the bathroom. =) Even when all my kids were little it wasn't as time consuming, because I could put them down for a nap, or turn on a movie, and take a break here and there. It was a full-time job that was done at home. Not to mention my own kids. Now luckily I had Chad here to help, and then I even had my sister helping, which was great. But even with both of them, I was almost always "on"

Then last year after my sister got married and Chad started working up in Los Angeles I was really flying solo. Which is why I decided to stop doing full time daycare and just do three days of 3 hour preschool. I abosuletely love it. The kids are awesome and I can't imagine doing anything else. Mondays and Fridays I don't have any set commitments except that I volunteer at the school on Fridays, but Mondays are almost completely free.

And thus we get to the point of my post. Today after the kids left preschool I had 2 hours until my kids came home from school. Because Mondays are mostly free, I get pretty much caught up with cleaning and laundry, with not too much left during the week. So as I sat here I almost couldn't decide what to do. The thought process was this, "well, I could wash the few dishes in the sink, or fold the two loads of laundry that's left, or I could just play the piano, or maybe I should take a nap." (playing the piano won). And thus the thought of the talk came into mind. "so this is what he meant about how we spend our time doing the best things, even if the other things are good. Because for the first time in a while I felt like I didn't absolutely have to do anything. When things are mostly caught up there isn't the same pressure to just keep plugging away at everything that "needs" to get done. Now don't get me wrong, the dishes piled up after the kids came home, and the family room is a mess again, and darn it if those kids didn't wear enough clothes today to make up 2 more loads of laundry. But the point is, I now feel like I can spend my time doing the best things. Like just holding Brooke tonight as she fell asleep watching Monster's Inc. Or talking to Dylan about things that happened at school. Or reading out loud to Spencer last week when he stayed home from school.

But most of all I feel like I can enjoy the most important thing in life...my family.

p.s. I should have figured this out and enjoyed the best things even when life was hectic, but as usual it took going through it and looking back to see how I could have done things differently.

8 months and 2 weeks

Brooke at the Temple

Brooke's Halloween Costume

Chase on his field trip to the Renaisance Fair. Standing next to a Knight.

Dylan at his field trip to Biz Town as the UPS Sales Manager.

That's how long it has been since I have posted on my blog. And I have finally found some time to write again. As most of you know, life has been a little crazy for the last, well, probably year or so. What with unemployment, full-time day care, sister getting married, sister moving away =( ,new job, a move down the street, the stress that comes with moving, and getting settled, especially with less space, (good excuse to get rid of stuff). So yes, with all of that going on, I just couldn't find a spare moment to write about it. But I am back, and hopefully for good. I have realized that although most of my friends here know what's going on in our lives , my family and friends that live far away do not, so I want to try to put pictures and videos on here more often so they can also see what we are up to. Also, as I was looking at pictures from just one year ago, I realize how much my kids have changed in that year. I feel sad that our families are missing it, so I want to do my part to help them see it. So here goes...Hopefully this will be the start of a new thing. =)

ok, so I can't move the text to the top, every time I highlight the words to move them the computer freezes for like 2 minutes. So this is what you get. It isn't pretty but it's here. =)

A good day!

Today was a good day. Even though there are only 12 or less minutes in this day, I wanted to blog about it before it was over. It started off like any other day. Early, with very little sleep for me. But it seemed like it was a good day. The kids and I played Wii, the little kids almost never get to touch the wii, so they were super excited they actuallly got a turn. Then we played in the playroom, then we played outside. As we had just sat down to eat lunch, Chad called. We hadn't talked all morning which is pretty unusual. We usually at least text something to each other. He asked if I had seen his text which I had not, when I went over to see the phone, I saw the text. He told me they offered him the job. I was so excited, I could hardly stand it. Although this job is in Los Angeles, and we probably won't see him except for the weekends, it is a really good thing. So after 2 years of underemployment, I mean let's not forget he was the culinary supervisor, schedular, and billing specialist for the day-care, he finally has a full-time, good paying job. I can't even begin to tell you how grateful I am that the Lord has blessed us with this right now. The timing is impeccable, (but that is usually how He works). We just last night met with a couple that are buying a house in our neighborhood that want to rent it out as an investment property, they want to rent it to us and we want to rent it, so I think that we will pretty much be able to get it (Thank you Brad!) The house is more rent than what we are paying for right now, so I was really nervous about doing it just based on what I make with the day-care, but now with a Chad's job, that isn't nearly as big of a worry. I am so happy and grateful that things seem to be working out. I know that things could change, but if everything keeps going like it is, then we should have a house to live in and a job to pay for it. I will write about more details soon, but it is now midnight, and I have to get up in 5.45 hours.

Friends...

What would life be like without friends? I am so grateful for the friends that I have. Between my last post and the post I put on facebook, I can't believe the amazing feeling of love that I have felt from friends and family. To all of you who have said such nice things, or offered words of support, or just ask how things are going. Thank you so much! I am so lucky to have such great friends and family. I saw this quote today and really liked it. "Friends are like walls, sometimes you lean on them, and sometimes it's just enough to know they're there." I am so glad to know that I have friends that I can lean on, but just to know they are there is comforting too. Thank you!!!!

Life...

I am so infrequent with blogging that it is a little sad. But alas it is always good to start afresh.

For anyone that is reading this, they probably already know the drama going on with our life right now. Out of the blue in the beginning of January, our Landlords let us know that they would not be renewing our lease at the end of March. They had decided to sell the house they live in and move back into this one. Leaving us hanging just a little. Needless to say I was in panic mode for a couple of days, then slowly things started to return to normal. Well, I say normal, but what is normal really? But at least I stopped crying at night after I put the kids to bed. I don't remember the last time I cried so much in a three day period. Our house has been perfect for us, our neighborhood is great, the ward is wonderful, the elementary school is good, Chase can walk to middle school, and our next door neighbors the Dunns, are the best neighbors one could ever dream of having. Just thinking about them right now makes me sad that we won't be living next to them. Brooke can't just walk over there at the slightest whim, just to see them. Our families have become very close these last almost 4 years. If any member of our family can't be found, the first place everyone knows to check is next door. And Grandpa (well really he is their grandpa, but we claim him too) who lives their 6 months out of the year at least, comes over to see Chad at least once a day. And he always rings the doorbell twice, so all of the kids, even the day care kids hear it and yell out, "Grandpas here". So that is probably the part of this all that makes me the saddest.

But I have learned and grown already from this experience and it isn't even over yet. We will be sad to leave, but I think that is part of life, to have sorrow and sadness, but to find joy and gladness in every situation. I think of all of the pioneers and what they had to leave when they left their homes, and they didn't even have a "stay with parents till we figure it out" back up plan. They just left everything and walked for months to get to someplace they hadn't even checked out on google maps. I can't imagine the faith that that must have taken. I take for granted so much of what I have, and I am so blessed.

I have realized with this though that everyone is going through some kind of trial right now, and we all need to help each other, and keep our faith strong to make it through whatever we are going through. I hope we find a place to live soon, but I truly feel that the Lord knows what he is doing, and in the end everything will work out.