"I gave the old man some candy"

Last night while Audie was in scouts, I made a last minute decision to join a Relief Society service project. We even talked a non-member scout parent into joining us. Our project was to visit the residents of Care Haven in Martinsburg and give them valentines hearts and candy. Our little kiddos even went with us and helped us pass them out. The residents were grateful, the nurses were happy to see us, and I'm so impressed with the kiddos' behavior and willingness to serve.

On our way out, Dallas (my friend's youngest son) had two pieces of candy left, and he gave them to the elderly gentleman sitting in his wheelchair by the door. He proudly exclaimed, "I gave the old man some candy!" Good job sharing, kiddo!

A Hair-Raising Valentines day

Friday afternoon, I retrieved my kiddos from the bus and took them home. Audie successfully completed his first week in the new disciplinary program we co-designed, so he got to play on the Wii for 30 minutes all by himself. Chloie then joined him. While they were otherwise entertained, I took my shower and started the 1.5 hour process of putting my hair up for the Sweetheart Dance at the church. This was the final result... I had to take a picture for a friend at work whose advice I received while trying to figure out what to do with it all. She liked it, so I'm happy.

The dance itself was a lot of fun. There were a lot of songs that I didn't recognize, but Tim and I got to dance to our song. I think we were one of 3 couples out there during that particular diddy (compared to a packed floor for others), and I'm sure we got some weird looks as we sang to each other. They did have a couple fun songs like the Electric Slide and the Twist. Oh, and the lasagna and cake were awesome, too. I didn't do the cake this time, but it was nice to just attend and enjoy myself.

Saturday morning we had pink heart-shaped pancakes for breakfast.Tim and Audie changed the oil in the Trailblazer, and then we worked on cleaning house. Sunday we made valentines during singing time as we talked about Heavenly Father's love for us. Our valentines said, "I love you like He loves me. In my heart you'll always be." The kiddos and I visited Sister Fanning in Martinsburg to give her valentines we'd made for her and to say hello. When we got home, Audie and I put the wheels on his pinewood derby car (pics on that later), and I helped Tim put some cables on his motorcycle. We were having trouble putting the seat back on, but then we realized that the front bracket was on upside-down. :)

Have Blood (and cupcakes) Will Donate

It's that time again. Time for me to eat a good breakfast. Time for me to actually eat a breakfast. Time to lounge around and feel drained. Time to try not to get light headed.

Time to donate blood.

Yep, it's time for me (the scaredy cat about needles) to let them poke my arm and take a pint. I saw the roster this morning. I'm not sure if people didn't sign up because they weren't here for the holidays, but our numbers are looking pretty thin. I'm hoping that the cupcakes I bring in each blood drive will help encourage others to donate. This morning when I clocked in on the factory floor, one guy looked at the tray of cupcakes and said he was going to follow me wherever I was going. I told him to donate today. I'll walk down the hallway enticing people if I have to. Can you see me? "Come here! Wanna cupcake? Wanna donate? Donate with me!"

In the mean time, this will bring my lifetime units to 6 pints donated. At 4 times a year for another 50+ years, that could be more than 200 pints or over 25 GALLONS of blood over a lifetime. Just wow. O.o

Mommy Milk! Mommy Milk!

And now for a moment of hilarity and embarrassment...

Sunday was a pretty busy day (more on that in a minute), but as we were heading home for some lasagna-making and a nap while it baked, we saw some cows. Cows feeding calves. Cows with udders feeding calves. So the conversation goes something like this...

"Mommy, I know what those are called... they're called udders!"

"Do you know what udders do?"

"Yes, they make milk. Mommy, do mommies make milk?"

"Yes, we do after we have wee-bitty babies. We feed them with milk our bodies make like cows do."

"Did you feed us milk when we were little babies?"

"Yes, I did."

"So we had mommy milk?"

"Yes."

"Can we have more mommy milk?"

(all three) "Mommy milk! Mommy milk! We want mommy milk!"

"Oh, dear."

Serves me right answering questions about mommies and babies when they're this age. Luckily they quickly forgot about "mommy milk" soon after we starting talking about making lasagna when we got home.

Saturday was a fun-filled day of wood-working. We coated the small drawers with polyurethane and put together 2 more of the big drawers. When we tried to do the last two big drawers, we only had 2 long pieces and 1 short piece (enough to do 3/4 of a drawer). Where did the rest of the pieces go? Are you sure we bought the wood? Yes, we checked the planks off as we got them. Are you sure we cut the pieces? Yes, because we marked off the pieces as we finished cutting them to size. So where are they? We can't find them!

Calling my organizational skills into jeopardy, we're still missing 5 pieces of wood, and I don't know where they are. So I finished carving the mortise and tenon joints for the back frame and moved the big drawers we had already completed so that I could use the counter space... and found our missing pieces under them. Haha. Funny, Tim. So we took a nap and had lunch, then we worked some more on the dressers. We put the last 2 drawers together, routed out the recess for the panel in the back frames and completed the back frame assembly, and found out that we had cut the front drawer covers too short. Yes, we did. Tim's response was that we're still learning. Sure, let's go with that. I'll have pictures to post soon of our progress.

I stopped by Lowe's and got some 1x8x6 white pine so that we could re-do the pieces we cut too short, and headed to the church for Women's Conference. I got to eat dessert with some wonderful sisters in Relief Society and talk knitting with Bette Carpenter. I just love the scarf she was knitting out of grayish eyelash yarn! We sat in the back of the chapel knitting together while we listened to the speakers of the evening. During the third talk, JaNae and I received confirmation of our theme for the Visiting Teaching Conference next year. I can't wait to do it, and I can't wait for you to see what we have planned! :)

I loved hearing President Monson speak to us. Not only is he funny, but you can tell from the way he talks to us that he has a genuine love for the sisters of the Church. He exudes warmth and compassion. Overall an awesome conference. I can't wait to see what we hear this Sunday at General Conference!

Sunday was full of service, and I'm honestly surprised at how satisfying it was. We presented the crochet-along in RS, and had a lot of interest (more than I was expecting). I'm teaching my BFF how to crochet Tuesday night so that she can participate. I'm doing the crochet-along in two yarns and bringing in the squares each week with the associated clues for the sisters to see. We spent time with my parents and had Mom's new enchilada recipe for lunch. It was very tasty! Then the kiddos and I got to visit some sisters on our way home. We saw Sister Fanning at her new apartment and gave her some canned peaches and flowers. It was nice to sit and talk to her for a little bit. Then we stopped by Jayne and Joe's house so that I could visit with her. All three of the kiddos at some point during our time at church came up to her individually to tell her that we were coming over to deliver cookies. They got to feed the chickens and play with their children while Jayne and I talked. I learned that they like crabs. Me too!!! We've decided that if they get the crabs, I'll make dessert. :)

More fun than I can imagine.

I've noticed that weekends tend to be very busy around here. You know, I spend all week looking forward to a nice relaxing day, and end up with an activity explosion!

We invited Peyton over to play with Chloie Friday night. We painted nails, made necklaces, and had ziti while we watched Planet 51. Both of them had been bouncing off the walls with excitement all week waiting for Friday, and I'm glad they had a good time.

Saturday started simply enough, slept in an extra hour or so, kids up for breakfast (Tim made eggs... yummy!). Then the kiddos and I left for my parents' house and Tim went to Virginia to visit friends. My mother had hatched a plan... no, this is serious business. While Dad and I went to the AT&T store to get new phones, Mom would take the kids to Chuck E. Cheese's for lunch and games. I'd finally settled on a Samsung Solstice. It's a neat little messaging phone with a touch screen and more buttons on the sides than I know what to do with. Funny thing is, I remember when you got a user manual in the box. Now you get a quick start up guide and a CD for the computer with the tutorial on it. Who has time to watch the tutorial to figure out how their phone works??? I just want to know how to set up my contacts! Dad settled on a slider like my sister. It took a little longer picking out and setting up phones than expected, but we finally made it back to Cheese's after 1.5 hours. Poor Mom. Somehow she talked me into playing a few of the games, and among the 5 of us we managed to get 433 tickets. We picked out glow-in-the-dark bracelets and were on our way. I'm told that Mom and Dad stopped by Rita's for some well-deserved tastiness.

By the time we got home, Tim still hadn't made it back, so we ate a quick dinner of sandwiches and finished the Avatar: the Last Airbender series while we baked chocolate chip cookies and I tried a Scottish Shortbread recipe. Tim finally got home late after the kiddos fell asleep. He said he had a good time visiting.

We were almost late for church on Sunday. Tim was released as a ward missionary and the Gospel Essentials teacher. Then he was called to be the Bear leader for our Boy Scouts program. They called Tom Hall to be his assistant. It was an inspiring fast and testimony meeting. I particularly enjoyed listening to Bishop Vincent. Tim taught his last class in Essentials about sacrifice, and our Relief Society lesson was on Service. I remembered that talk from General Conference a couple years ago. It's nice to hear references to talks I've heard; it makes me feel more "into it" than when they reference something from before my time in the church.

Tim didn't have to work Sunday night so we watched a few episodes of Star Trek: Deep Space 9. If you can't tell, I'm a big Star Trek fan... and a geek, but please don't hold it against me.

Monday, oh Monday, a holiday! Labor Day! No school! No work! I weighed myself and discovered that I'd gained 2 pounds back of the 3 that I'd lost. Grrr! I hopped onto the treadmill for double the time, determined to get rid of it. 30 minutes, 1.25 miles, and 145 calories later, it wasn't much better. Tim and Audie helped Steve work on his yard for a few hours. Chloie, Dougie, and I followed them down to visit for a minute before the 3 of us went grocery shopping at the Winchester Martin's. Hannah was taking a bath so we just left the cookies on the counter for her, Abbey, and Steve.

Would you believe that I didn't get lost on my way to Martin's? I was so happy! Even better, we're trying to cut back on the amount of money we spend so that we can pay off our bills and save for a house, so my goal for our 2-week menu was to spend less than $100. Our bill came to $99.45. The kiddos helped me unload everything when we got home, and we had lunch ready when Tim and Audie got back. They got clean (wow, they were dusty), and everyone took a short nap before we went to the Galbraith's house for a Labor Day BBQ. It was good to see them, friends we knew, and to meet new people.

And then I realize how long this post has gotten...

I was on the treadmill again this morning for 30 minutes hoping to work off the good food I ate yesterday. Honestly, I was such a pig! I can't tell if it's working, but I hope that it does some thing soon!

A fish by any other name would be... Fish

Poor Fish, poor Audie.

Fish has been sick. I cleaned Fish's tank Monday evening in the hopes that the little guy would perk up. He seemed to just breathe at the bottom of his tank. Eventually we couldn't even get him to go up and eat. Audie's had him almost a year, and Betas usually only live to be 2 or so. Tuesday morning I awoke to find him lifeless on the bottom of his tank. No moving gills, no moving fins. I was heartbroken that Audie should lose his pet. I quickly sent Fish to his watery grave and cleaned the tank to put away before Audie woke up. Our discussion was brief... he is Jesus' fish until he gets there to get him back. I promised we'd get a new fish this weekend, and maybe we can get a different fish so that his brother and sister can have a fish as well. For now, Fish, you will be missed.
Something else happened Monday night; the house 2 doors down from us caught fire. The fire trucks were there all night, and there is not much left of the house or their trailblazer (sitting in close proximity), but as far as we know, no one was hurt. We're still not entirely sure what happened. The firemen were very appreciative of the hot chocolate and warm bagels we took over the next morning on our way to school and work. Our prayers are with the family as they recover.

Another busy weekend...

It seems like we never have enough time in the day to get everything done! We stopped by my parent's house on Saturday to pick up some things that we left behind... there's still stuff there in the garage, but that can wait until our next visit. Then we got to go to the emergency room only this time it was a quick trip to triage to get Dougie's staple removed. I was picturing something resembling the little handheld fanged contraption I use at work to remove staples from paper. I tell you, I was relieved to see it was a little thing that crimped the center and in doing so, allowed the nurse to just lift the staple... no blood or screaming. It was actually kind of neat. We had lunch at Pizza Hut and afterwards stopped by Wal-mart. We got lucky with front row parking and decided to take the whole family in for the trip instead of just me running in for the two or three things we needed there. I did get the #10 yarn for the leprosy bandages we're doing in Relief Society as one of our service projects. I've been working on my first one for two days and so far it's almost 3 feet long. I understand why they're so hard to keep doing... it started out 2" wide, but it seems to have shrunk to 1 1/2". It's getting there. We also went to Martin's to get groceries. I spent a little more than I really wanted to, but at least we're stocked up for a little bit. I even got my veggie seeds for the garden. I can't wait to start planting!

Sunday was a little more tame (I think). We woke up to almost an inch of snow (that I didn't know was coming). The kids seemed pretty excited about it. I promised them we could play in it when we got home, but it had almost completely melted by the time we got home. Church today was the first of two(!) fast Sundays this month, and it was a wonderful meeting. Brother Taylor did very well his first time conducting Sacrament. President Fugate got up to talk about how we need adversity. I hate to admit it, but I agree with him. The missionaries and our returned missionaries all got up to speak as well. That reminds me, we need to start saving for missions later, too. Relief Society was about Joy and Happiness and the things we could do in our lives to cultivate both. I really like it when Sister Meehan teaches us. She as a sense of humor about everything that make the lesson interesting and tangible. When we did finally get home and while the kids were taking their nap, Tim and I had a long conversation about the temple, going there, what we had to do, why we wanted to go. It seems like it will take forever for us to get there, and I worry that something will happen between now and then. He seems confident that it will all be OK, but I'm not. I wish he could pass some of that over to me. For now his reassurances will be enough.

I did start on the figures for the skate boarder cake that I'm making for next weekend. I also have to start finding ideas for the Relief Society Birthday cake coming up at the end of the month. Purses. Lots and lots of purses. Should be fun!

This morning (Monday) on my way to work, the Trailblazer and I had a run in with a patch of black ice near Sulphur Springs Stables... as a garbage truck was coming the other way. I was really scared, especially after the talk I had with Tim yesterday, but luckily the Lord was watching over me and we made it our unscathed. When I say "we" I mean the Trailblazer, too. Not a scratch! I put it in 4-wheel drive for the rest of the trip into work.

Tim and I plan to unpack throughout the week as much as possible, and hopefully most of it will be done before Saturday so we can relax a little bit. I say hopefully because they are starting a rotating schedule at Tim's work so he might not be home for some Saturdays or Sundays. I strongly dislike it when they do this. I honestly think it's a waste of time, not to mention making him work on Sundays. Grrr!