Kradyville

Turning Bar Soap Into Liquid Hand Soap

2012-01-31T15:37:00.003-05:00

I saw a tutorial on Pinterest showing how to take your favorite bar soap and turn it into a gallon of liquid hand soap. The point is to use a kind of soap that you love but that is expesive to buy the liquid refills, I don't know if it's worth it for cheap soap.
I had to try it. The store I went to didn't have Mrs. Meyers bar soap in the scent I wanted so I got this instead:

I have used the Goat's Milk Lotion before and liked it.

Then I got a grater from the dollar store and grated the whole bar of soap into a stock pot. I added 1 gallon of water.

Next, add 2 Tablespoons of Pure Glycerin. I found this bottle at CVS in the hand lotion section.

Heat the mixture over Medium-High heat until all the soap is melted. It looked foamy.

Then let it cool completely. It will need to be mixed up afterwards, if you have a hand-held mixer that would work well. My batch seemed a little thick so I added a little more water. Then, using a funnel I refilled a soap container I had just used up and another container from the dollar store.

I can't imagine how much this much of the liquid Goat's milk hand soap would cost but I know it's more than I would've paid!

Fried Rice with no Rice, and Jello legs

2012-01-30T20:48:00.001-05:00

My family would survive on all carbohydrates if I didn't intervene, thus, I'm always looking for ways to limit them. So when I came across a recipe for "Asian Cauliflower Fried "Rice" I had to try it. I tried South Beach Cauliflower "mashed potatoes" once and they were horrible! Horrible! But this recipe turned out great! (I didn't use all the herbs it called for.)

You put the Cauliflower in your food processor and since it's very small it does look like rice. Faked out my whole family!

Mine: Eggs, chicken, carrots, onion, scallion, soy sauce, mushrooms, and of course Cauliflower.

After supper I headed to the gym to do a "Reggae-tone" class with my friend, it combines weight lifting and lunges and other awful things all set to reggae music. All I know is that I almost blacked out and my legs barely carried me to my car afterwards. I see sore muscles in my future.

I guess it's time to shake up my treadmill and swimming routine with something more challenging. The problem is that I like to go to the gym in the morning and get it over with but the classes I want to do are in the evening. We'll see..

If I Had Skills

2012-01-29T15:56:00.000-05:00

Driving in the car the other day I randomly asked Jason if he could have any talent he does not already posess, what would that talent or skill be? He said he thought maybe playing the guitar. This was surprising to me because it was such an attainable answer.

He asked me what my talent would be and I answered: "Well, I guess I'd be a ninja." We both laughed because really I have no ninja skills and also because our answers were so different. Who wouldn't want to be able to flip off of buildings, take down bad guys, and sneak around? I know I would. Think of all the calories you'd burn!

I've already told you about our different gut reactions and about how we think differently about money , I guess this is just another example about how our brains work differently most of the time. Maybe on our upcoming road trip I'll give him a second chance to give me a more lofty answer.

Saturday Night Camera

2012-01-28T20:04:00.001-05:00

Jason decided to sort of surprise me and buy me a camera I had on my Amazon wish list. Well actually he picked one model newer than I wanted because, well, "it exists so it has to be at least a little better" I guess would be his reasoning. I'm so excited to take it on our road trip to Savannah soon. He decided to buy the camera at Sears because it was on sale. So we headed to the mall and picked the sucker up. Tonight I will sit and read the manual because I'm a geek like that :) Here are the first shots.

See that plate? All three of us girls split it for supper. We are a cheap date. Oh, and Jason just reminded me that we didn't even finish it.

Now, hopefully all of the random stuff we listed on Ebay sells to offset the price of our new camera, that's always fun.

Lunch With Dad

2012-01-28T13:37:00.000-05:00

Jason was working on a Saturday because he is taking a couple days off next week (no paid vacation in this company folks) so he asked if we would want to bring some lunch and check out their latest house. The girls and I picked up Subway and headed over. They sat at their "chairs" and "table" and enjoyed a quick lunch. Ahh the 5 gallon bucket, the common-place chair of the construction site; perfect size for kids though.

Homemade Soft Pretzels

2012-01-26T19:51:00.002-05:00

Every other week I get together with three other ladies from my church, it's nice to have this time to reconnect and talk. This week we made soft pretzels that were really good. The second batch we filled with cheese and dipped in sauce. Yum!

Here is the recipe:
1 1/4 cups warm water
1 T yeast
1/4 cup brown sugar
2 cups flour
2 cups occident flour
Dissolve the yeast in the water, add the sugar then flour, mix well, cover and let rise for 20 minutes.
Cut into pieces and form into pretzel shapes.
Dip in solution made of:
4 T Baking soda
1/2 cup cold water
Place on well greased parchment paper and bake at 390 for 5-7 minutes.
Cover with melted butter and coarse salt. You can also use cinnamon and sugar to coat them.

TOMS shoes

2012-01-24T17:09:00.000-05:00

I ordered a pair of TOMS shoes that were on sale the other day and today they came in the mail! I wasn't sure if they'd be comfy and read lots of reviews, it seemed most people thought they were. I was worried they wouldn't have arch support but they do have a little; flat shoes kill my feet. I was looking for gray slip on shoes and I like that for every purchase TOMS gives a pair of shoes to a child in the world who needs them. I'm not crazy about the square toe but I think I'm going to keep them.

Oreo Cookie Cheesecake

2012-01-23T19:59:00.000-05:00

My parents came over tonight to celebrate their birthdays' and Leilani's birthday. One of their favorite desserts is cheesecake so that's what I made. But I'm always a little let down after cheesecake so I looked up a recipe for one with Oreo's and this is what I found. It turned out really well, we all thought it was delicious.

The crust:

1 Cup crushed Oreo cookies (about 12)

1 Tbsp. melted butter

Mix and press into a 9inch spring form pan. Bake for 10 minutes at 325.

Then mix:

4 pkg. (8oz each) Philadelphia Cream Cheese, softened

1 Cup Sugar

1 tsp. Vanilla

4 eggs (mix in one at a time)

20 Oreo cookies, quartered

Bake for 1 hour at 325. Let cool and refrigerate overnight.

* A couple of notes*

DON'T substitute generic Oreo cookies or generic cream cheese, go for the name brands, I find they have more flavor. I also like to add a tiny bit of lemon juice but didn't have any so I used 2t. of Key Lime Yogurt, that worked well.

ENJOY!

Sunday Lunch

2012-01-22T13:30:00.002-05:00

It's the same every Sunday. The whole family loves it except me. Lucky for them I love them so much I just go along with it.

9th Birthday Party

2012-01-21T17:49:00.000-05:00

Leilani celebrated her 9th birthday today with a party. She chose to invite all 4 girls in her class and two of them brought their little sisters for Samiya to play with. She was so excited for her party and the fact that it was snowing out, she woke up at 4 AM :( I didn't know she was awake but I do know she was tired and crabby by the time her party was over at 4 pm.

She made a schedule for her party and made her friends sign in:

It says:

1. Play until every body gets here

2. If you want take a a tour of my house

3. Do cool craft (we bought keychains that you draw on)

4. Eat cake and ice cream

5. Open presents (and read cards)

6. Fun surprise (we did a treasure hunt)

7. Play Wii

We made a treasure hunt with clues to follow to the goody bags.

The little sisters play Hungry Hungry Hippos

Birthday Queen.

She had a fun party and I was proud of how graciously she opened all her presents and read all of her cards. She is a great kid and we feel lucky to have her! Happy Birthday love bug!

My Morning

2012-01-20T12:32:00.000-05:00

If you've been to our house you know about our hatred of our stupid brown chair and a half. In fact, if you've sat on it you probably hate it too. That was the last time we buy furniture online without sitting on it first. It was just so uncomfortable. I made the kids jump on it lots and lots but it never softened up.

Well, you'll be happy to know that we have finally ~~found a sucker~~ sold it to a nice guy who saw it on Craigslist. I was nervous before he showed up, I don't like to meet people at my house when Jason isn't home; I assume I'll be robbed or worse, but this guy was very nice. He LOVED the chair and was so excited to buy it and cram it in his Escape. He didn't sit on it but loved that it was made of plywood and very light. Mmmk. Glad he's happy.

Then Samiya and I headed out to Starbucks for a celebratory Latte (me) and coffee cake (her). We love that place. She asked why if it's called Star-bucks then why don't they hand us bucks? I explained that we hand them bucks and they give us coffee. She didn't think that was so great.
Next, we went to the grocery store to pick up birthday party supplies for Leilani's party tomorrow. I figured since they were calling for snow then the store would be packed. You know how people love to panic and buy bread anytime it flurries. But it wasn't too bad and I had my assistant with me, she always makes it fun.

She's a maniac driver but I do love her enthusiasm. We also picked up one of our favorite lunches to split. Salad bar with spinach, chick peas, tomatoes, broccoli, feta, Thousand Island dressing, and cooked chicken. Yum!

And then headed home to wrap Leilani's presents. I just got new Kitchen Aid scissors from Target. Every time I get new scissors I realized how much we were suffering through our old ones.

While I was wrapping, my city-slicker daughter informed me she knew how to milk a cow! She said she wants to milk one so badly and all you need is: good shoes, gloves, a bucket, and a stool. You just go out to the barn and do this:

I guess milking that fake cow at Oregon Dairy Farm Days just wasn't good enough.

Wooden Kids Blocks

2012-01-18T07:06:00.000-05:00

I got the girls a neat set of wooden blocks at Bed Bath & Beyond today. It was Christmas clearance and it's a castle set. They were pretty excited to build with them at home. I love wooden blocks and these mix in nicely with the set we already have.

While I was there I went next door to Christmas Tree Shoppes; I was buying stuff for birthday party goody bags and found some great items on clearance. Some of them were only 25 cents; the only problem was that it took two cashiers and 15 minutes to figure out how to ring them up! Still worth it in the end.

Things On My Mind...

2012-01-17T17:23:00.000-05:00

We have a lot on our minds' here lately. Jason and I are making some decisions. They feel like dominoes, one affects the other. If we choose option A then we should also do B. If we don't do plan C then we shouldn't do plan D; like that.

1. We are thinking of going away for a long weekend, somewhere slightly warmer but Jason doesn't want to lay on a beach this time. We are thinking possibly here. Husband wants to drive though and I hate driving. The kids want to stay at their grandparents house so they don't care either way.

Courtesy Aol travel

If we do go I think I'll need a cute pair of walking shoes. Maybe these or these or possibly these.

2. We are thinking of switching our kids' school so that our youngest can enroll in a Spanish Immersion program, we think it's a fabulous opportunity that we can't pass up. We just hate to leave our lovely little school for a bigger one.

3. If we switch schools we will be a little farther away then I like to commute, which would mean moving back to our old house. We like our old house and the neighborhood has improved since we've been away. But it will need some work and we will be giving up our large yard and super quiet neighbors. It does have high ceilings and large bedrooms though...

4. We want a dog. Sort of. We want a well trained dogs like a few of our friends have (Danae! Anna!) But there's also the issue of dog hair, having to let it out, cleaning up after it, vet bills, etc. That being said I loved having a black lab growing up. But..

Courtesy of AKC

5. I want a job. I don't want to stay home 5 days a week when our youngest starts full time school in the fall so I want to work. It would have to be a job flexible with the school year. But then it feels dumb to get a dog if we aren't going to be home much.

There are a few other things that I don't feel like mentioning here. Hopefully we'll decide some stuff soon. In the meantime we're going to go out for supper.

After the long weekend

2012-01-17T07:49:00.001-05:00

It's Always hard to wake up early after a four day weekend. Back to school today so it's hot chocolate for the girls and coffee for me, and I barely like plain coffee. Starbucks Mocha Latte my Keurig is not.

Corporate Retreat

2012-01-16T12:28:00.001-05:00

We had a fun time in the mountains this weekend with our company. This year we took all of our kids which was fine but we later decided it would have been better if it had been warm and they could play outside too. I was surprised to see snow when we got there, it's good most of our vehicles had 4 wheel drive or we wouldn't have made it up the driveway. It was also great not to have cell phone reception for a few days. Today the girls have off of school so we slept in and went grocery shopping.

We brought a Wii for the kids to play.

They love their PJ's.

I didn't take many pictures of the adults, kids are much more willing subjects. But I know when we look back in 20 years we would probably like to see what we were all doing too. Zach got a piece of metal in his eye at work on Friday so Jason and Josh ended up taking him to an Urgent Care on Saturday. We felt bad for him it looked so painful, luckily they had an eye doctor nearby who got the piece out.

Twister pile up with lots of giggling.

Jason carries supplies: Coke Zero, Honey Whiskey, and a helicopter :)

Today my kids again told me that we tell them "I love you" too much, and that they "already know." I ask them if we should stop saying it and they suggest we cut back to once a week :) Impossible I tell them. They are just going to have to suffer through our proclamations. It's a rough life, I know.

We still have to get the car washed since it's super salty and dirty. We also need to get stuff ready for Leilani's 9th birthday party this weekend. We are having a hard time believing this is her last year of single digit age. She asked for Angry Bird stuffed animals for her birthday and a party with her school friends. She also gets to be the special person for the week at school which thrills her.

Dreadmill Mini-Panic

2012-01-09T14:59:00.000-05:00

I have to admit I think I actually missed working out when I was sick. It's hard to believe since I hate exercise, but it's true. It's part of my routine and I know it's good for me. When I finally got back to the gym an odd thing occurred to me. As I looked around the normally semi-crowded gym there was NOT one person on the treadmills. Just me. Now, I go at the same time on the same days every week and the fifteen-ish treadmills are never totally empty. But on this day all the treadmills were empty and all of the bikes were full!

It was very strange, it was like everyone was boycotting the treadmills. Five minutes into my session I started to get nervous. Had I missed a sign posted somewhere "Please! Do not use treadmills for your own safety! They are all malfunctioning!" Dag, that would be embarrassing. I'm a stickler for reading all pertinent signage in my surroundings and I'd hate to end up in the hospital due to an avoidable incident. I looked around and didn't see any signs or caution tape. Mine seemed to be working fine, except for the sketchy closed captioning that gets stuck on a few words, but that happens on almost all the machines there.

My next thought was: Had there been some sort of contamination? Had someone with Mono or Ebola virus sneezed on all the treadmills and they were highly contagious until cleaned?! But there would've been a sign for that and I didn't think the bikes were far enough away that people would've been cool sitting that close if Ebola were in the room.

These thoughts really only passed lightning quick through my semi-awake brain, I didn't give them any serious consideration. But I did think it was super weird. Ten minutes later two other ladies hopped on the treadmills and all my fears were relieved. I was going to take a picture of all the empty machines but I waited too long. So now you'll just have to take my word for it I guess.

Two ladies on treadmills. All bikes full. The ones on the other side of me were empty too.

The Book On My Shelf

2012-01-08T07:07:00.000-05:00

I love that every time I bring this up, my friend Kelly giggles. It shows me that (once again) I was over-worried. You know how we as moms have this great intuition; being able to sense when something with our child is off? Knowing from their voice that they are thirsty, or knowing from the shape of their eyes that they are getting sick? This is not one of those stories.

On my bookshelf, in the parenting section, is a book called "The Explosive Child." This book explains how to deal with children who are so explosive they can't function in society; it talks about how if the explosion that day is just too bad, it's ok to keep them home from school. (If your child has this actual problem and I know some kids do, I am NOT making light of it, this is just a story of my parenting struggle.) I bought this book and the "Supernanny" book when Leilani was around 2.

Yes, of course I'd heard of the terrible twos, who hasn't?! I had lots of experience with young children from babysitting, teaching pre-school, even house-parenting; but she was something else. In my previous post I talked about her outbursts over my ponytail but that was just the tip of the iceberg. She was so stubborn I thought something must be wrong with her.

Looking at Leilani now you'd tell me she doesn't fit that bill (thus Kelly's giggles); and you'd be right. But she was my first, and most stubborn, and I'm ~~paranoid~~ pro-active like that.

2 days old, yeah I can probably hold my head up!

This girl, this sweet daughter of mine, was born stubborn and determined. She tried to hold her head up from the day she was born; she would waggle it around unsuccessfully, smacking us in the face until she developed the neck muscles to control it. She was determined to walk and she did by the time she was 9 months; the doctor made me prove it to him.

All PJ's, all the time.

I learned the meaning of the phrase "choose your battles wisely." I knew anything I asked her to do was going to be a battle. I always stand my ground with the important stuff but luckily, Jason convinced me to give in to the clothes battle. Because as much as it bothers me, it. does. not. matter. (as I had to repeat to myself though clenched teeth) if my two year old wore footie pajamas and rain boots for an entire spring. Yes, she was sweaty and gross. Yes, I was embarrassed and felt like a bad mother walking around town with her like that. But guess what? We all survived, and she doesn't insist on wearing them anymore. (That being said, she did just wear her new footie pj's the last three days of Christmas vacation, but she doesn't fight me about not wearing them to school!)

Riding like a champion.

Lots of things are still a battle with her; she doesn't like change so switching plans at the last minute will still make her cry, so does homework, and showers, and errands, and chores! But she can function in life; she excels at school and her teachers all rave at her pleasantness. I keep that crazy book on my shelf to remind me that much of what I worry about doesn't happen. I was also positive that she would never give up her blankies (done, all by herself, age 3), that she would never learn to share (also done), and that she'd never try to ride a bike again (after she gave up at age 8 declaring bikes "not as fun as scooters" :) but she did, a month later.

Motherhood is full of challenges, it's exhausting sometimes, trying to raise decent human beings. There are plenty of things that can, and sometimes do, go horribly wrong; but so far nothing has been insurmountable, and for that I am exceedingly thankful. The second kid around it's been much easier to use the phrase "she's little, she'll grow out of it!"

Am I $100 sick?

2012-01-06T08:55:00.000-05:00

Wednesday evening a week ago we were driving in the car, an hour and a half, to my in-laws when I felt something starting. That achy, heavy headed feeling that just screams: "Hello! You're getting sick! You can look forward to feeling like garbage tomorrow!" We were dropping the kids off for a sleepover (perfect timing!) so I knew I'd be able to sleep in the next day.

I took Emergen-C as soon as we got home but that only helps sometimes. I think I got whatever virus my kids had each previously hosted. Fever, achy, coughing, coughing, and oh did I mention the coughing? Flu, I guessed, although I'm still fighting the coughing a week later so maybe Bronchitis? I can feel stuff rattling around in my lung/chest area.

I didn't go to the Doctor so who knows what it really was. This is the life of the high-deductible health insurance person. My parents live the same exciting life. See every time we get sick, the game is called "Am I $80-$100 sick?" Because that's how much I'm going to pay out of pocket to see said Dr. whether I have a virus which they can do nothing about, OR something bacterial in which case they can give me (more money out of my pocket) anti-biotics.

Now, either way I get to pay the Doctor bill because they did spend a whole 10 minutes with me; but I do feel like the winner if indeed it's not just a cold. I then feel justified when the bill comes in the mail and Jason makes his inevitable "stupid doctor bill!" comment and groans. Sure, we have the money to pay it, and he'll let it go after an hour or two since it's inevitable; but I feel better when I can say: "Oh, but I had Strep throat so it's good that I went and got medicine too or it could have turned into Scarlett Fever and I may have died." See how that works there? I was $100 sick, so I won.

This is why I usually wait at least a week to see how we are feeling. I figure if you haven't gotten any better by then, well there's probably something really wrong with you. So far this plan has worked ok, with the exception of Strep which we do call sooner because that's no joke. I hate that "rocks-in-your-throat" feeling. Luckily we've finally got the kids on great health insurance, but the same instinct to wait it out still took me over. We never did go.

I can't wait until technology has progressed to us just licking a tester at home and a display reading out "cold", or "flu", or "strep". That will save me lots of time. For now I'm just excited to almost be done hacking up my lungs; I hate sleeping propped up and the noise is driving us crazy.

Lunch Packing Fail

2012-01-05T17:06:00.001-05:00

Today when I opened Leilani's lunch box after school I found her peaches with granola package unopened and with a note on the top:

The notes says "I don't want to eat thees" That was good for a laugh.

Trite Sayings Bother Me

2012-01-05T07:28:00.000-05:00

I dislike those bumper-sticker-esque sayings that seem to add insult to injury. I think the "advice" we sometimes give to hurting people doesn't help or it makes them feel worse when the situation doesn't get better. One such saying I keep seeing on Pinterest that's been annoying me is: "If God brings you to it, He will bring you through it."

I can't imagine saying this to someone who is struggling; if you said it to me when I was feeling hopeless I would roll my eyes and and say "whatever" in a sulky teenage tone. Alright, I might not but I'd probably think that way in my head. I know things like this are meant to be helpful and I bet sometimes they are but...

Aw, sorry sweetie but "If God brings you to it..."

Here is why crap like this bothers me.
1. I think it trivializes pain. When someone is really hurting or struggling they don't want to hear your assumptions of the sun-coming-out-tomorrow. It doesn't help. Say "I'm here for you." or "How can I pray for you?" or if you can't think of anything then just say "Here are some brownies I baked for you." (or maybe that's specific to me :) Don't promise people things are going to get better if you don't know they are! Sure, we want to encourage each other in our faith, but there is a fine line, sister, between spurring someone on and turning them off completely.

2. Does the above saying mean that if God didn't bring me to it then He's abandoning me? We all make poor choices, some worse than others, if you are a believer then He is with you irregardless of those choices. Whether He brought us to it or we made a bad decision, He'll still be there and He is still our comforter. I'm sure He intervenes in non-believers' situations as well.

3. God bringing us through something may not feel like a happy ending. It may still end in a loved one dying, someone losing a job, or living with the consequences of our bad choices. I think as Americans we almost have the mentality that God "bringing us through" something means no suffering and/or a happy ending. That is just not reality. (Ok, our ultimate heavenly-ending is happy, but I'm talking earthly since I doubt people in heaven are wasting time reading my blog.)

I guess we don't actually want to say the truth: "Aw, I'm sorry you are going through this awful situation, it might suck for a really, really long time; heck it may never get better! But hopefully you can find joy through it all by putting your trust and hope in God. And remember we get to go to heaven eventually!" That would be totally insensitive; and yet, to me, that's almost as bad as trying to smooth things over with a trite saying.

But hey, if the sappy saying ministers to you, that's great! Next time you're suffering I'll be happy to send you an e-card with the words blinking at you in front of some pastel flowers in the background. :)

My kids hate my ponytail

2012-01-04T13:13:00.001-05:00

My kids have a strong aversion to me wearing my hair in a ponytail.
I remember Leilani being barely two years old and screaming and crying about my ponytail. If I came downstairs with my hair pulled back she would just start crying and crying that she didn't like my hair. It wasn't like she was shocked at how different I looked and didn't recognize me; I wore it like that several times a week. She just didn't like it.

**Have I mentioned she was a stubborn toddler?! That will be the next blog post I guess.**

Ponytail does not equal end of world.

Some days I would have the energy to stand strong and leave the ponytail in, telling her she wasn't the boss of me :) (Classic line at our house said only half jokingly to children, because really they shouldn't be the boss.) Some days I didn't have the strength to stand it and gave in because who enjoys an hour of a two year old screaming? She grew out of it but still to this day she will comment that she prefers my hair down.

Now the odd part, to me is this: Samiya, WHO IS NOT BIOLOGICALLY RELATED to Leilani, and wasn't even around during aforementioned episodes, started with the same attitude about a year ago! Do I really look so atrocious in a ponytail?! Her personality is more easy going so there isn't an hour long scream fest, but she will whine a little and insist it would look better down.

I just think the whole thing is really odd because there is no way I look that bad with my hair up. Although come to think of it, Jason prefers it down too. Sure, if I ask him how my hair looks on a ponytail day he'll just shrug his shoulders and look confused, but I don't think he hates it like the girls do. So far he hasn't thrown himself on the floor and cried about it; although I'd kind of like to see that, wouldn't you? ;)

Weekend in NYC

2011-12-05T19:08:00.001-05:00

We had a great weekend away in NYC. We were missing one member of our group which was sad, but we had fun and will do it again soonish. We took the subway from Brooklyn and ended up in Times Square. We waited in line at TKTS for an hour to get half price Phantom of the Opera tickets. I was excited to see my first Broadway show.
After purchasing our tickets we had supper at Chevy's Mexican restaurant which was delicious. It took us two hours to finish our meal and the waitress was really slow. It was delicious though and we were reading to start walking again afterwards. We walked around and saw Christmas lights but the sidewalks were crowded we decided to walk to the Majestic theater early. I am not a fan of crowds and I would hate to live where so many tourists clog the sidewalks.
The show was amazing, great effects, costumes, and sets. The singing was great and I always love hearing a live orchestra. We got back to where we were staying really late and fell asleep quickly. Sunday we headed to Chinatown which was also crowded. We went to a bakery that was so similar to the ones we used to visit in Macau. Same baked goods, same set up. But I forgot how so many Chinese stores don't take credit card and I was out of cash. Luckily my friend scraped together a few dollars and I was able to buy Jason his favorite pork bbq bun, he was very happy.
All in all it was a great getaway. We hope to bring the husbands next time and see a play instead of a musical.

Gingerbread houses

2011-11-28T17:48:00.001-05:00

Today we assembled one of our two gingerbread villages. I bought the kits at Target awhile ago because I always forget until its top late and then end up having to pay too much for one at CVS.
Hopefully I can keep the kids from eating the candy off of them until Christmas.

Holiday season begins

2011-11-26T16:27:00.000-05:00

We went to a tree farm to cut our own tree down this year. It was almost 60 degrees which was un-holiday feeling ish, but at least we weren't freezing out butts off walking around the fields. Now our house is smelling great with evergreen and we all had a great time decorating.

6th birthday

2011-11-26T16:17:00.000-05:00

Yep, she turned 6. It's hard to believe. We celebrated by going bowling with two of her friends from church and then having cake and ice cream. She picked a princess ballerina cake, it was delicious. The best part was that I didn't have to make it!

August already

2011-08-02T12:17:00.000-04:00

It's August already. Three weeks from today we will be back to school! Back to waking up at 7 am, packing lunches, getting the girls dressed, and hopefully getting them to brush their teeth before heading out the door to school. Soon the summer fun will be finished...

Climbing on the counter, getting PB

Loafing around, playing with boxes

My plants are dying

Buying school supplies.

We'll be busy these next three weeks, the girls are going camping, trying to pack in a few more play dates, cook outs with our friends, softball playoffs for Jason, both of our birthdays, and getting stuff ready at church for the upcoming year.

Yep, summer is winding down for us. I'm not gonna lie, I do miss wearing jeans. So easy and they match everything. But I will savor wearing sandals, not having to find coats or gloves, and the fresh air blowing in our windows in the evening.

I am still having a hard time believing that I have a 3rd grader and a Kindergartner...
I feel so blessed to be able to send them back to the same school this year. I wasn't sure if things were going to work out financially but they totally did. Although the frugality inside of Jason and I hates the fact that we already pay school taxes and then pay for private school on top of that, it's worth it. I feel totally at peace every day when I drop them off; knowing that their teachers care for them, pray for them, and are concerned with more that just their education but also with their character. Their teachers care about their relationships in the class and their relationship with God. I also like being able to volunteer there and getting to know the other students and parents.

I am a winner!

2011-08-02T09:17:00.000-04:00

I was so excited to start my day with an email from Darlene at Fieldstone Hill saying that I had won her giveaway for Stella and Dot earrings! Take a look, aren't they fabulous?!

I can't wait to receive these earrings. Check out Darlene's blog for beautiful home inspiration.

Mountains and flowers

2011-07-31T15:38:00.001-04:00

We headed up to the mountains for a few days this week with Jason's family. The girls were so excited to go fishing for the first time and ride on 4 wheeler's with uncle Josh and future-aunt Sarah. We had S'mores, did a few puzzles, and saw some deer, you know, mountain-y stuff. Samiya had a bad cold so her stuffy nose and sneezing kept her (and me) awake a lot at night.

I don't really enjoy the mountains or camping or anything too far from civilization. My parents have long since given up on trying to get me to go camping, even though now their camper is quite the step up from the leaky tents we slept in as kids. Maybe if we'd had heat, air conditioning, shower, and a toilet in a camper as a kid I would have become a camping lover, like my kids. But we didn't, and I'm not, it's just too late :)

Anywho...This weekend was a relaxing time to read and watch the kids have fun. The highlight for me was when Samiya had to whisper something in my ear. Usually her secrets are pretty ridiculous or don't make sense at all. But this was a great one. She whispered "Sarah asked me to be in her wedding!!!!" She was soooo excited. She loves Sarah, we all do, so it's extra special that she gets to be in the wedding. She'll have to wait over a year to be the flower girl but I know her excitement won't fade. Leilani will be in it also but this will be her third time as a flower girl so it wasn't such a big deal for her.

Jason said: "Why don't people with cabins just paint everything inside white?" Great question. Why do so many cabins have dark paneling? A coat of white Kilz over everything and the houses would turn into a cheerful place to be. He wants to buy a cabin (and when we say "cabin" we mean "fully equipped house that happens to be in the mountains.") I do not. I want a beach house. But of course beach houses are not as cheap as cabins so he will get his dream first. He says I only have to go once a year and I can decorate it however I want. :) He also promises we will buy a beach house, eventually...

My brilliant hour

2011-07-25T08:25:00.001-04:00

It happened again last night. I was awoken at 3:45 AM to my sweet girl who'd had a bad dream. I tried a new approach where I had her explain it to me and we re-told it in a happy light. In this case she said two lions had been chasing her. I gave her some ideas of how it could go better and she came up with two lions taking her do Dunkin' Donuts.
It worked. She didn't come back into my room.

But I was wide awake. I'm not sure when I finally fell back asleep but it was at least two hours. And here's what I figured out; I am brilliant at 4 AM. I realized that every time I'm stuck awake in the wee hours of the morning, I come up with all sorts of brilliant ideas. Sometimes I'll pray and God will give me some good ideas or insights; but usually my brain races like it did last night.

I think: well I'm wide awake now, I guess I'll just get up at 6:30 and go for a jog. Yeah, that's it! And I'll probably start doing that every day! I think I should just buy a lotto ticket and then I can start the orphan foundation I thought up and travel the world with my kids. I think of the perfect schedule for the next day, in which I will accomplish everything and everyone will be happy. I think of the perfect meal plan for the next week.

But then 8 AM rolls around and I'm still sleeping (hey, it's summer and my kids are school age!) I realize that I didn't get up at 6:30, it's really hard to win the lotto, I have other things planned for today, and my meal plan will be super expensive.

But it all seemed so brilliant when I was tossing and turning at 4:07 AM! Ah well, the best laid plans...

By the way, there is a weird phenomenon that happens to me if I get up too early. "Too early" depends on how much sleep I've gotten but it generally means anytime before 7:00AM. Several bad things happen every time and all day.
1. I am starving all day. Doesn't matter if I eat right away or wait awhile. Super hungry. All day.
2. My mouth feels like I didn't brush my teeth even after I have.
3. My skin produces excess oil. Yeah, I'm gross like that. Still have teenage skin apparently.
4. My eyes are extremely dry. Even if I put in eye drops.

Weird, no? It's like my body is revolting. Surely it means I was not designed to wake up before 7:00, and thankfully I rarely have to. Does anyone else have this freakish nature?

Summer baseball

2011-07-25T07:52:00.007-04:00

Our kids love to play baseball in the yard. Last time my parents came over my dad brought little bases he'd made for them. He also brought spray paint to draw the baseball diamond in the grass. Much fun ensued.

We found out that Samiya runs the bases no matter what. Foul ball; she runs. Caught out; she runs. She's in the outfield and someone else hits it; she runs. She also giggles the whole time :0)

Setting up the bases

Papa spray paints the lines

Samiya has to try

Leilani tries too

Papa pitches to Samiya, she gets frustrated.

I pitch to Samiya

Gets frustrated and throws the bat.

Doesn't stay mad long

Ahhh, the simple joys of summer. Now if only it would be below 90 degrees soon so we could enjoy playing outside again.

Brownies of which you can only handle a few bites

2011-07-24T07:15:00.002-04:00

Brownies are my favorite food group. Don't get me wrong, I love all veggies; even brussel sprouts and bok choy can be made in a way in which I will devour.

But brownies...they are my favorite. Although I love to bake, I don't do it often because we can't keep junk food in the house. I have no restraint. I also have really high cholesterol. Sigh.

But when I saw a recipe on Pioneer Woman for "knock you naked brownies," I had to try them. They sounded so good. I mean how can you go wrong with German Chocolate cake mix, melted caramels, chocolate chips, and butter? You can't.

They are a-maz-ing. Soooo not helping with trying to slim us down. If you are also trying to slim down, avoid sugar, or be healthy...for crying out loud stop reading now! I mean it.

Have the kids unwrap the caramels, pay them in chocolate chips.

Melt them with some evaporated milk.

Sandwhich with choco chips between two layers of brownie.

Enjoy in small quantities or you will have a stomach ache.

Brownies with a gooey caramel center. Her recipe calls for nuts which I don't appreciate in my junk food so I just skipped them. You can go to the PW website and ~~see all the gory details~~ see the step by step and get the recipe.
***After having these in the house for two days I feel I need to throw the rest away; these things are like crack. I've never partaken of said crack but I have this compulsion to eat these brownies. All the time. Even though they are not good for me and I keep getting a stomach ache from them. Maybe I could sell them on my corner... ***

What have i been doing all this time?

2011-07-23T15:54:00.001-04:00

I just realized Blogger had an app for my phone. I had previously been using the email option to post on the road. So this here is my first post via the Blogger app. I will also try to include some pics from my new phone's camera. (It also records video in HD which is pretty amazing.)

Shirts they can't buy & serious business

2011-07-23T07:04:00.002-04:00

The girls found a shirt at Kohl's this week that said "My dad rocks!" they loved it, thought it was so amazingly convenient that a shirt would just-so-happen to say their exact feelings about their dad! They wanted to buy it (actually they wanted one for each of them) until Leilani pointed out that they couldn't buy it because it had a skull and crossbones on it.

We have a strict "no skulls and crossbones on clothing" policy around here. Why that particular graphic is on so many little girls clothing is beyond me. Boys clothing I get it, they think it's cool. But girls? That's weird. Anyway, they were bummed but they let it go without complaint. More about the shirt in a minute but first you need to know this:

Today Leilani opened a "pin shop" in her room. She had previously been running a mildly successful tattoo / nail salon in her room but decided she wanted to switch to pin making. She had even made $1.25 in tips from her shop; all from poor Samiya who has no concept of money. When Jason got his tattoo's he didn't even tip her real money, but Samiya happily shelled out her largest denominations for her sisters services.

Leilani is serious about her business. (As was I too, about my "art store" in my room around the same age. I think my specialty was fashion plates.) She is so serious that the other day I let Samiya draw a flower on my leg; Leilani looked over and started crying, hard. She started yelling "Samiya stole my job! She stole my business! I'm the tattoo shop and she stole my job!" Over and over she cried. She couldn't believe I had let this happen.

I had to try hard not to laugh because I couldn't believe she was serious. I promised from then on to schedule all my tattoos with her. That was not good enough. She badgered Samiya into confessing that yes, indeed she had stolen her job. Leilani demanded Samiya pick something new and different IMMEDIATELY! Leilani suggested stylist, hair salon, and finally they agreed on "Flag shop." So Samiya started making flags for people. Even our dinner guests last night went home with two custom flags.

Ok, so back to the pin shop. Since they couldn't buy the "My dad rocks!" T-shirt, Leilani decided to honor her dad with a pin. She worked on it in her shop for awhile and when she came out they explained to Jason about the-shirt-they-could-not-buy and presented him with his very own pin.

It read:

"This is a very grate dad"

He was pleased. In case you were wondering mine says "Worlds BEST Mom."

So stop on by Kradyville, your one stop shop for Tattoos, Nails, Flags, and of course Pins.

Fun at the museum

2011-07-22T13:10:00.000-04:00

It. is. too. hot. I like warm weather but this is ridiculous. Since it was going to be 100 degrees and humid today we tried to think of something to do (outside of our house) that was in air conditioning. We already played at the mall playground the other day when it was only 95 degrees. We also went swimming twice this week. The cheap movie theater didn't have a movie we wanted to see.

So we decided on the Science Factory. We hadn't been there in a few years and the girls are probably a better age for it now. They've also added some neat things. Please pardon the fuzzy pictures as I only had my phone. We went right when it opened which was good because by the time we were hungry and ready to leave there were two bus loads of YMCA camp kids coming in.

Kalidescope

Bubble shapes

Building a dam

Sand pendulum drawing

Building a track for the ball to roll on

We also enjoyed building K'Nex race cars, shooting parachute jumpers up in the air, shape puzzles, magnetic shape building, and the two satellite shaped dishes that you whisper in one and hear it in the other across the room.

Jason has a softball tournament starting tonight and lasting through Sunday evening, I hardly want to go watch him play now that I know how hot it's going to be. But we will anyway. I should go buy 20 bottles of Gatorade so he can stay hydrated. He went through 4 large bottles yesterday at work so if you add in long baseball pants and 98 degree heat I think 20 should last him.

The glass is half...

2011-07-21T14:57:00.003-04:00

If you know us at all you know that Jason would say the glass is half full and I would say the glass is half empty.

Although, to be more precise, Jason would probably say: "Wow, great, my glass is half full! I'm sure there is more in the fridge too in case I run out. If there isn't, I'm sure we have loads of money to buy some at Turkey Hill. I'm so glad we have this delicious drink because it just makes my day!"

Whereas I would probably say: "Oh crap, my glass is almost empty! There probably isn't any more in the fridge so I'd better go to the store and get more. But which store should I go to so I can get the cheapest drink? Oh man, all I wanted to do was sit down and rest and now I have to go to the store. Is this drink even healthy for us? Ugh, I can't believe how this drink is ruining my day!"

Jason enjoying his drink.

There, my friends, is the difference between us. So my goal for this month is to focus on something positive in every situation I don't like, event I don't want to attend, person who drives me nuts, or situation I can't change.
This is not my natural bend, it will be mind training for me. I'm not looking to be as optimistic as Jason, I think God made me to be thoughtful and detail oriented and that leads to more of a realist mindset. I just want to be able to overlook a few negative aspects in every situation and enjoy my half full drink.

From the "on space line" and my secret life

2011-07-18T15:23:00.003-04:00

I don't remember why Jason started calling the internet "on space line" but he does, and it's funny.
As in "...I don't know, let's look it up on the on space line."
Sometimes I find things that make me laugh or feel shocked or happy so today I'm going to post some here.
Because I can.

Here is what I liked today:

Laundry instructions. Haha.

Marshmallow catapult found on google somewhere

No solicitors. found on etsy

So helpful for a road trip

And finally I know you always wondered how you could find out your ninja name. Well I am at your service and have found the definitive chart so you can figure out yours.

Apparently my ninja name would be Takadoshikuto. I've told Jason that really, on the inside, I'm this girl:

Click this link to see the video!

That's right I'm a hoodie ninja. I am a spunky, building hopping, fast car driving, candy eating, jumping the bridge, ninja girl. At least that's how I picture myself... :)

So next time you are driving down the highway at 2 a.m and are passed by a speeding Honda Civic with a girl eating Twizzlers and laughing hysterically, that's me. Just wave as a I speed past because I'm in a hurry. Although I probably haven't just blown up a building...

In the middle of the night

2011-07-17T14:58:00.000-04:00

Leilani has never once in her 8.5 years woken up because she has had a bad dream. She sleeps comatose just like her father. She has fallen out of bed and not waken up, slept through fire works and thunderstorms, and sleeps fine when she is sick.

I am not so lucky. I am a light sleeper. I wake up to every noise, wind, or drop of rain.

But when Samiya comes in our room in the middle of the night I am always startled. Our hallway is carpeted and I usually don't hear her coming. Once, when I awoke to her saying my name at 2 a.m. I woke up swinging and hit her in the head :( I felt sooooo awful. She cried, I cried, I apologized, she accepted. I told her she should probably stand at the doorway and call my name from then on and she always has. Poor kid.

Samiya wakes up in the middle of the night fairly often. I have figured out it is one of three reasons:
1. She had a bad dream.

I'm pretty picky about what they watch but if she watches something even remotely intense before bed she may have a bad dream. (intense is very mild for the rest of us but she's very sensitive.)

2. She didn't have a bad dream but says she did because:
a. she loves sleeping on our floor which I sometimes let her do if I'm too exhausted to walk her back to her room over and over
b. she doesn't know why she woke up
c. she had a bad dream the night before and got to sleep on the floor and wants to do it again.

3. She didn't have a nap
It's not always a problem for her to skip her nap, she'll often sleep fine that night. But probably 85% of the times she has bad dreams I realize she didn't take a nap that day. She already gets 11 hours a sleep at night so she should outgrow the need for a nap soon!

When she wakes up at night I usually nudge Jason. This nudge is more of a formality at this point because I know he won't really wake up from his coma-like state and help. But I do like him to know that other people are awake and he is welcome to join in if he'd like :) Even if he does wake up and walk her back to her room she usually comes back up for me.

I pray with her, turn on her music, pat her a minute, and go back up to bed. Sometimes she goes back to sleep for the night; other times I may have to do this 3 more times. Thus the sometimes-I'm-too-exhausted-to-walk-her-back-again-so-I-just-let-her-sleep-on-my-floor scenario.

The thing I can't stand about these middle of the night excursions is that usually once I'm awake I have a hard time falling back asleep. So if she doesn't stay in her bed that first time then I'll probably be awake for a few hours. I don't get up and read or get a drink or anything. I just lay there and fight the sleeplessness, it's like I feel that if I would get up then I'm losing the battle.

I don't mind it too much, I'm glad she doesn't sleep walk or have night terrors, I just wish sometimes she would wake up Jason and I could sleep through it all.

A Perfect summer day

2011-07-16T20:39:00.001-04:00

I love summer, that's no secret. I love not having to wake up at a certain time and not having to rush around and be places. I do miss having a schedule but it's a fair trade for lots of family time and relaxing. Today started out great with sunshine in my kitchen, making pancakes while listening to music, and Jason finishing the plumbing and electric for my laundry room.

I already liked doing wash. Something about the instant gratification of smelly dirty clothes turning into fresh clean smelling clothes. But now that my laundry is on my first floor and not in a dark, yucky basement, it is just fabulous! The laundry / mudroom is really bright and sunny. There is still a bunch of work to be done in there like painting and building closets, but just getting to do wash without stooping over is great!

Jason came home from Home Depot with a cabinet for above the washer and dryer and a surprise chest freezer! I have been wanting one for awhile but our house is small and we never had the room. Now that we moved the laundry out of the basement we have room for one. Too bad my Costco membership ran out...

We also headed to one of our favorite parks (Greider) and watched the kids bike and scooter. Samiya had one bad wipeout after scootering down a hill to fast, other than that is was great. That park is really shady in the afternoon.

We also got some family pictures printed (finally) so I am putting them in frames and trying to figure out where to hang them. Jason fixed our ice maker in a 10 minute period, after we let it sit broken for over a year. Sigh.

Ha, sorry the captions are small, I've been trying a new program.

See Leilani's toolbox in the picture above? She is so creative, she wanted to help her dad fix stuff so she made her own toolbox out of popsicle sticks and tape. She filled it with the tools that came with the trampoline and was practicing using a screw driver :)

Trampoline

2011-07-16T08:06:00.000-04:00

I've been looking on Craigslist for over a year hoping to find a good deal on a trampoline. We almost got one a few weeks ago but the people backed out at the last minute. Well, the kids just keep getting older and still not having the fun of a trampoline. So we finally decided to just buy a new one as soon as it came on sale. Sears had them over $100 off so we snagged one.

We had some friends come over to help with the assembly. The directions said it would require "2-3 physically fit adults." Jason said him and Jay combined were like 3-4 physically fit men :) I fed them dinner and off they went. Jason tried to get out of assembling the net but I really wanted one.

Enjoying the view!

Steals this week

2011-07-15T08:20:00.000-04:00

The kids were at ~~summer camp~~ their grandparents house for a few days this week so I had some time to shop. I found some great deals! It technically started Saturday when they were home. I had been praying for a cheap bike for our newly-two-wheel-riding-Leilani and felt like I should go down the road where I knew there was a multi-family yard sale. Lo and behold right out front is a 20" Schwinn pink girly bike. I thought I would pay up to $15 for it. I asked the lady how much she wanted and she said "Ummm....how about $2." To which I of course replied: "Oh, ok SOLD." I realized it needed a new brake and tires pumped or fixed, so we took it to the bike shop in town. It was $13 to fix it up and now she has a great bike :)

please pardon the phone pictures, it's just easy because its always with me

The next deal was at Kirkland's outlet. My girls love forts and tents. We've been through several of those little IKEA tents, one blew away after we left it outside in a storm, one we broke the poles, and I can't remember what happened to the third one. Leilani has asked me before to help her make a teepee, I never know how to make it stand up. Turns out, Kirkland's had kids teepee tents on clearance for $7! The girls were super excited and promptly set out on a camping expedition (in the living room, Krady-style; we don't like to rough it too much :)

The other good deal was at the Goodwill. Everything is already cheap there, but yesterday I got a cute dress from GAP, a new-with-tags-still-on Tommy Hilfiger tank top, and a cute GAP jacket. On Wednesdays it's "pick your discount" day if you are a discount card holder, which I am. I reached in the bucket and picked out a chip: 20% off! Great deal!

Church day in the park

2011-07-14T12:28:00.001-04:00

Once a year our church goes to a campground and has an outdoor service. We all bring chairs and sit in the woods outside a pavilion and worship our creator among His creation. Afterwards we all eat lunch in the pavillion.

After lunch the kids play on the playground and after that is the long awaited water slide!

The water slide is really long and the kids LOVE it. We spent hours watching them go doooowwwwn and then climb the hill and wait in line to take another turn. It was tons of fun. It was nice to meet some new people as well.

I'm no woodworker

2011-07-13T16:25:00.001-04:00

We are in the process of converting an extra room on our first floor into a mudroom / laundry. I'm so excited not to have to go in the basement to do laundry anymore. I'm also psyched to have somewhere for all our shoes and coats other than in our dining room.

I stumbled across a website by a woman in Alaska who makes all of her own furniture. She gives simple plans on how you can do the same. Since Jason's to do list is 2 miles long I thought I would try a project of my own. I wanted those pedestals for front load washers or dryers but they are such a rip off! So I followed her plans and made my own.

I started by having a guy at home depot cut the large pieces of plywood down to the size I needed. (Jason was very against this and insisted we cut them at home, but I thought it would be nice if he didn't have to do this for me.) They will give you two free cuts and then additional cuts are 25 cents each. He even waved my 50 cent bill for two extra cuts.

Hates loud noises!

I was nervous to use Jason's large saw and I hate loud noises just like Leilani, but after I had him show me one time it was fine. The instructions come with a cut list that tell you how many pieces of each size board you need, so I cut all of that.

Jason helped me hold things while I screwed the pieces together. (See dad I can drive a screw through a 2x4! He totally didn't think I could, I have a reputation for being a wimp.) Jason also insisted we use his framing nailer in some places. I tried it, but it's too much like a gun and I don't like it; also, I couldn't get it to work...

Then I painted it two coats of white and the two of us carried it into the laundry room. That thing is heavy! Now I will have much higher washer and dryer openings and a place to store laundry baskets.

There are so many other projects on her website that I would like to make but we'll see what I actually attempt. We do need a larger table for our deck and her plan seems easy...

This Week

2011-07-08T09:49:00.000-04:00

We had a nice long weekend over Independence day. We went to the movies to see Mr. Popper Penguins.

It wasn't much like the book but we all really liked it. It was clean, funny, and very entertaining. It had a fairy tale ending as well which is always nice. I highly recommend it.

We had a cook out with friends. We were excited to try an idea we'd seen online for our drinks.

Step 1: scoop out a watermelon.

Step 2: Drill a hole in the side near the bottom.

Step 3: Put in spigot that you have assembled from random plumbing parts, one of which you found on the floor of Home Depot without a price tag so you get it for free.

Step 5: Fill with pink lemonade and enjoy!

Leilani and Asher help stick the top back on with toothpicks.

It was pretty cool but we need to make the spigot tighter next time. It was a fun night and the kids enjoyed playing together while we talked and enjoyed some nice weather and good food.

We've also been enjoying some down time with school being out. We don't like our schedule to be packed full and Jason really appreciates just relaxing with his girls.

We also had a cook out with my extended family. It was nice to see everyone and hear about my aunt and uncles recent trip to Sweden. I forgot to take pictures of that day!

Samiya lost her first tooth:

And then yesterday we went with some friends from school to the Crayola Factory.

View from the parking garage roof.

There is only one small part (showed above) which is like a factory, they do a demonstration every hour about how crayons and markers are made. I liked it but Samiya didn't pay attention at all. The rest of the place was crafts you could make with different Crayola products.

Model magic clay.

Sand art is an extra $4.00 per kid.

Afterwards we headed next door to a super cute ice cream parlor named The Purple Cow Creamery. I ate the best soft serve ice cream that I've had in a long time. In a waffle cone of course, yum. It was decorated really cute inside and the girls enjoyed some freshly made ice cream.

I haven't been getting to the gym much with the girls out of school. They don't like to go in the play area with a ton of kids. They prefer when we go to the local school track and they can ride scooter and bike while I run. I hate it because it's been so humid and sunny, I prefer exercising in climate controlled areas :) Hopefully I will get to go and swim after Jason gets home today. Apparently he is going to start coming home earlier on Fridays, we'll see if that lasts...

I think today I'm going to take the girls to the cheap movie theater since it's only $6 for us all to go see a movie. I also want to go to the produce stand down that way, we haven't had any great sweet corn yet this summer. I'm glad it's the weekend again already, love those 4 day work weeks! We have some fun things planned for this weekend as well.

This Age

2011-07-02T10:10:00.001-04:00

Can I just say how much we love the ages our girls are at right now? We do. We love that they are out of the baby and toddler stages, those are cute but just not our favs. I'm honestly not a person who ever craves holding or having another baby. And Jason has only liked two babies ever and they were of course ours. I've only seen him/ hold like two other babies in our lives and he didn't enjoy it :)
Age 3 and up is so much fun. We love the interaction, seeing what kind of personality they have, how they act with other people. Now that our kids are school age it is so much fun. We slept until 930 today and came downstairs to the scene in the picture above. They made animal habitats and were being a bear (complete with a bowl of "honey" which was peach gatorade, and an alligator.)
We love all the places we get to enjoy with them, today we are going to the movies and riding bikes at the park. These days go so fast, I already can't believe how old my kids are, I'm trying to savor them as much as possible.

Craftapalooza

2011-06-30T10:58:00.000-04:00

We've been crafting up a storm around here. And by "we" I obviously don't mean Jason. I've been inspired by some blogs and have too much free time now that the girls are on summer break. Here are a few of the crafts we've made. Some are not quite finished. These aren't even all of the ones we've done over the last few weeks!

Can add a light insert to turn into lantern.

Dry erase for fridge, I used too dark of fabric, guess I'll have to look for something lighter.

Bulletin board from Goodwill covered with a fabric remnant. Jason still needs to build a white frame around it.

Goodwill chalkboard and dollar wooden "K" painted to match my kitchen.

Wreath made from old sheet music.

Old picture frame with old map background, dollar letter "K" from craft store.

Super cheap hot pink base found at Goodwill, spray painted bronze and added bowl.

So that's a few things that we've been up to lately. Leilani has been enjoying using the low temp hot glue gun. I have some other things I found that I am in the process of painting, like a huge mirror and a recipe box. Some things turn out, some things don't but it's been pretty fun so far!

Lucky Number 13: Anniversary thoughts

2011-06-27T13:47:00.001-04:00

"To get the full value of joy you must have someone to divide it with." Mark Twain

"What counts in making a happy marriage is not so much how compatible you are, but how you deal with incompatibility." Leo Tolstoy

"I think a man and a woman should choose each other for life, for the simple reason that a long life with all its accidents is barely enough time for a man and a woman to understand each other and. . . to understand - is to love." William Butler Yeats

"A good marriage is the union of two good forgivers." Ruth Bell Graham

I love all of those quotes. Today Jason and I celebrate 13 years of marriage. Jason has been my best friend for 15 years, which happens to be half of my life. Wow. There is no luckier feeling than having found someone who loves you "as is" and continues to do so after seeing you at your worst, many times over.

We had a weekend alone this past weekend, we had good conversations about our marriage, marriage in general, and how lucky we are to have our two daughters. Jason claims the girls and I have made him what he is today and that we are the driving force behind him wanting to have a business and win at life :) (This is his response many times when I text or ask him what he's doing..."winning.")

I take no credit for still being married. Jason is the rock in this relationship. I am the wavering one, I tend to quit when things get hard. I'm not proud of this, it's just how I've always been and am trying really hard not to be. Our marriage is not perfect, we are very opposite in so many areas. Sometimes during a disagreement I look at him and wonder HOW he can possibly believe the exact opposite thing that I do?!

Before you get married you know there is a learning curve, you know you're a little selfish, you think marriage will make you happy. Then you get married and realize you know almost nothing, you're both really selfish, and marriage is one of God's ways of molding us into who he wants us to be. Sometimes it's painful, sometimes it feels hopeless, sometimes you wonder how you'd live without the other person, sometimes you enjoy the comfortableness of living with someone who knows everything about you. It's such a complex relationship.

We were really rolling the dice when we got married at ages 17 and 19. The odds were against us. Although Jason would surely say statistics shmatistics! I know moving to the other side of the earth was pivotal for us at that age, it's been me and him taking on the world ever since :)

As I look back I see ways that we've grown, but in other areas it seems like we have miles to go. I guess that's how it is in any lifelong relationship (family too), it takes time to work things out, to find the right groove, and just when you figure it out; life changes, you change. But finding someone who is committed to working on it forever? That's pretty amazing.

Jason, you're one I call when I have something interesting / exciting / sad / funny / unbelievable to say, who makes me laugh the hardest, who drives me nuts, who drags me kicking and screaming out of my pessimism and into your eternal optimism, who makes our children's eyes light up just by pulling in the driveway, who hates the things I hate (BOA, boooooo! :) You're the one who shares my life and I know I'm lucky to have you. I love you. Happy Anniversary!

No school = comfy clothes

2011-06-14T11:35:00.002-04:00

This is the first week the kids are home for school break (last week hardly counts since we were away.) I give the kids lots of freedom in the summer because the school year is so busy even after they get home for the day. I pretty much let them wear what they want when we are at home.
Today Leilani has chosen pajammas and Samiya is sporting a gymnastics leotard. When we were outside Leilani added a winter sweater jacket and Samiya wore her dads work sweatshirt.
Ahh the freedom of summer vacation. What are they currently doing with their free time you ask? Oh, they are playing school :)

Successful Vacation Components

2011-06-10T19:34:00.000-04:00

I have a few requirements for an enjoyable vacation:

1. The place we stay should be as nice or nicer than my own home. This is why I don't like camping, it's never as comfy as my own bed and doesn't have a nice bathroom.
2. Water. We all love to swim so preferably a beach or a pool should be present.
3. Good company. People that make me laugh and like my kids.
5. Lots of reading time. I love to read.
4. Lack of a sinus infection.

This vacation had 4 out of the 5 requirements. I did, however, have bad sinus congestion and pain the entire week. I was taking several Ibuprofen cold and sinus pills a day :( Besides that we had a fabulous time with our friends. I didn't do my hair or makeup once which means I was really relaxing. Our kids got along smashingly, much better than I had anticipated. Leilani took on the role of big sister and really bonded with 4 year old Asher. Much cuteness was seen by all.

The weather was great, high 80s and low humidity all week, we sat outside a few nights and enjoyed the breeze and crickets. The water temperature at the beach was a perfect 86 degrees. And we were all happy to miss out on a heat wave back home.

Our kids played Wii, pretended to be puppies, and swam so much they all fell asleep quickly at night.

Although I'm not looking forward to the long drive home, I couldn't have asked for a better vacation. Thanks friends, great memories :)

Vacay

2011-06-05T18:05:00.001-04:00

The first full day of vacation had us going to two different beautiful beaches. Our kids have been swimming half the day and I know they are all going to be exhausted tonight.

Hotel bed jumping

Very pleased with the free breakfast!

Chilling by the pool, gorgeous weather!

Siesta Key

Splash contest

The guys monkey around in the pool.

Forgot the pics

2011-06-03T11:35:00.001-04:00

Here are the road trip phone shots I forgot to attach to the last post.

Road Trip

2011-06-03T11:31:00.001-04:00

Our bags are packed, electronics gathered, workbooks and crayons assebled; the road trip has begun. I must say I would've loved long drives much more as a kid if we'd had a tv in the car. The girls and I watched "Ramona and Beezus" which I wanted to see a while ago. Now we are playing an alphabet game. So far its going well.

Last game

2011-05-21T10:44:00.001-04:00

Its the last soccer game of the season and we had to bribe Leilani to play. A little donut goes a long way in our family. We finally have nice weather after seemingly weeks of rain so it's the perfect end to the season. Leilani claims to never want to play again but we made her finish out the season.
Samiya likes playing a little more but she claims to not want to play next year either. I'm always amazed at the parents who continue to yell "be more aggressive" at their 7 year old. Can't they just play for fun at this age?

Busy living

2011-05-18T19:35:00.000-04:00

It's the end of the school year, I've been busy. Field trips, soccer games, going to the park, spring programs, etc. When it's warm out I tend to spend less time blogging. Here's what we've been up to.

Playing Wii

Field Trip

Field trip

The kids only have another two weeks of school. We have more programs, school day at the park, the last soccer game, and a trip to the zoo. Then we are off to vacation with a bunch of friends, we're super excited for that. Now if only it would stop raining for a few days so we could finish mowing the lawn.

Sunblock

2011-05-10T07:49:00.000-04:00

I am slightly sunblock crazy. When I was a kid we never, ever wore sunblock, I'd never heard of it. I would turn brown every summer.

Put your sunblock on!

When I turned about 14 I started hearing about skin cancer, sun damage, and I got my first sunburn. I also realized that every summer I ended up getting a few more moles on my skin. That is when I started wearing sunblock.

Over the years I've gotten more and more careful about taking care of my skin and now when we go to the beach I am a sunblock nut. It helps that I've married a man who burns just by thinking about sun. Last year by the end of our 2 week trip to Florida I realized I'd barely even gotten tan! Jason, however, is afraid to come out of the ocean when we go to the beach because he burns every time.

I've heard that anything over SPF 20 doesn't really make a difference but this year I saw SPF 110 and grabbed it, we'll see if it helps him. We go through a can about every day or other day (depending on how much we swim) when we are at the beach. This is what I'm bringing for our one week trip. I assume we'll have some left over that we will use up this summer.

I also break out very easily so I have my own oil-free spray and one for our faces. I love to look really tan but I know it ages skin so quickly and I don't need any more moles. So if you see that crazy person applying yet another layer to her husbands pale/burned shoulders on the beach, yeah, that's us.

Tale of our rings

2011-05-09T07:02:00.001-04:00

I've been through a few wedding rings.

I started with a gold engagement ring and plain gold wedding band. That seemed too thin to me so I also wore a gold heart ring that Jason had bought me while we were dating.
I still wear this set sometimes when I wear gold jewelry but it is a little bit tight.

Then on our 1 year anniversary Jason bought what he thought was an "anniversary band." He was really sad when I told him it wasn't an anniversary band and that I would want a silver wedding band to match it.

I temporarily wore my gold band with it, but 11 years later I got tired of waiting and bought my own silver band to go with it. That band however turned out not to be great and is getting very tarnished. Cleaning does not remove the black spots so maybe the word is oxidized, I don't know.

One day we were at the mall and ended up getting this one. I like this one and have been wearing it for about a year, but since I've recently started swimming twice a week I've wrecked it. I was not aware that you are not supposed to wear jewelry in the pool, apparently chlorine will oxidize sterling silver and damage it. Grrreat.

So now I'm back to the "anniversary band" and the slightly tarnished (oxidized?) band I bought myself. We tried other bands with it but I couldn't find one I liked. I'm not really sentimental about jewelry, but I want to wear something I like, also we are cheap. When we were shopping for a band all I really wanted was a spiral-twisted all the way around ring. We couldn't find one like that, maybe we'll have to have one custom made.

Jewelry is something neither of us care to splurge on. I'd much rather have a fancy fridge than a bigger diamond. So if you wonder why I wear different rings sometimes, that's why. This June is our 13th wedding anniversary, maybe we'll get it solved by then.

Now is probably a good time to mention that Jason is on his 5th wedding band! He was allergic to the original gold one (it was my dads), so he started wearing one I had given him while we were dating but it got tight. Then I bought him a cheapo one at PacSun that he wore for like 10 years. We can't remember what happened to that one but while we were on our 10th anniversary cruise we got him a new one in Mexico. He lost that one flipping it up in the air in the yard, or technically Samiya may have. Then he bought himself a $4 ring off of ebay from Israel. We'll see how long that one lasts.

Ok, I'm willing to admit that there may be something wrong with us.

My mothers day

2011-05-08T20:25:00.000-04:00

I awoke this mothers day to the sound of the kids banging around in the kitchen. I elbowed Jason and told him he'd better go downstairs to supervise. A minute later we heard the girls running upstairs and then tip-toeing into our room asking Jason to come help them. Turns out the girls had found their kids cookbook and laid out all the ingredients they could find. Jason ended up doing all of the cooking but they added a cookie and brought it up to me.

I enjoyed my breakfast of pancakes, pineapples, and orange juice.

I'm already sad for the Mothers day when my kids grow up and move away and I don't get to wake up to these smiles.

Both of the girls made me cards which were very sweet. I'm so blessed to have them as my daughters and pray they feel as blessed to have me as their mom.

At church we had fun talking about mothers in Sunday school. I asked them all to raise their hands if they had a "mother" and only two raised their hands! Then I re-phrased and asked who had a "mommy" and they all raised their hands. Awww.

After lunch on our deck, people stopped by to buy our pellet stove that Jason had listed on Craigslist. I was sad because that sucker keeps me warm all winter. I think Jason may have gone a little crazy. Now our house smells like woodstove. On the bright side we have our vacation funded!

Next we took a family trip to a school track where the girls assured me they wanted to run with me. We brought their bikes too. Samiya fell asleep on the way there but Leilani did well running and walking with me.

We finished the day by having my family over for a cook out. It was a beautiful day. I'm so thankful for my mom; from caring for me as a colicky baby who cried for months, to helping me take care of my newborn who wouldn't stop crying. She is a loving grandmother to my daughters and I am blessed to have her in my life.

Vignette App

2011-05-06T18:04:00.001-04:00

I love the Vignette camera app for Android phones, I highly recommend it if you have one. You can edit photos in a variety of ways. Here are a few from supper.

May

2011-05-05T19:21:00.001-04:00

I think May is my favorite month. It's the beginning of warm weather, the end of school, and the start of having friends over for cookouts. The girls are playing soccer every Saturday in May which is great because it gets them outside and exercising.

Its been raining so much that our yard needs to be mowed every other day. I love waking up and seeing all the leaves and green grass outside. The drive to school along the river is beautiful too.

Spring is just wonderful.

Surprise!

2011-05-03T07:38:00.000-04:00

Last week our friends said they might have extra tickets to the Phillies baseball game for Sunday night. Jason said he would love to go. It was an 8:05 game so I asked my mom if she would be willing to keep the kids overnight, she was. I told Kelly if they did have extra tickets to text me and not tell Jason so that I could surprise him.

I thought he would let it go if he didn't hear from Duane, but he didn't. So we had to lead him to believe that it wouldn't work out this time. He was sooo dissappointed. My parents picked up the kids on Sunday but he didn't think that too odd since the kids love to sleepover there. I was even coming up with ideas of what we could do with our fake free night.

When Kelly and Duane showed up at our door and I told him we were going to the game he looked like this:

We stopped for supper on the way to the game. "Don's" was the hoagie place of choice. When Jason asked what the difference was between the "regular" Italian hoagie and the "special," they explained that it had more meat and it included Capicola. Those were the magic words, so he ordered the special. He was shocked, however, when the hoagie had so much meat he couldn't fit it in his mouth. He had to take some ham off, I've never seen him do that before! He saved half of it for the 7th inning stretch. Although he ended up eating it in the 12th inning.

Nothing like a hoagie at midnight :)

ESPN was out front, I even recognized one of the guys, John Kruk!

Citizens Bank ball park has the largest jumbo tron on the East coast. It is pretty cool. During the game news started spreading that Osama Bin Laden had been killed. You could see tons of people checking the news on their phones and then chants started of U-S-A, U-S-A! All around the park of 47,000 people, it was loud. It was even on Comcast news.

We stayed until the 14th inning but it was late and still tied at 1-1. As we were driving out of the parking lot the Mets scored and Phillies lost. It was a fun night anyway. Although we did get pulled over twice on the way home. It was after 1 am but the state troopers thought we needed to know that a headlight was out.

Music to swim to

2011-05-02T08:47:00.007-04:00

I was telling Jason that I've really been enjoying my swimming sessions at the Y but I love working out to music and miss that. He whips out his phone and immediately finds and orders me a waterproof, meant for swimming mp3 player. It straps to the back of my goggle strap and it recharges by plugging into my laptop. Best of all, it was only $20.

I couldn't wait to try it.

The results?

It. was. fabulous. I swam for 40 minutes instead of my usual 30 and didn't even feel tired at the end. The music kept me going and kept me distracted, sometimes swimming laps gets boring and this totally fixed that.

It's the little things

2011-05-01T07:50:00.002-04:00

You know how you see your kids sleeping and it just melts your heart? I also feel that way when I look in my car side mirror and see Samiya's hand sticking out.

She has such a small hand. She just loves to stick it out the window and feel the air rushing by. Reminds me of a song I love: "Hands out the window, floating on air...."

I love running my day to day errands with her, looking back at her just enjoying life. Plus every time I turn around and look at her she smiles at me. It melts my heart.

Family Pictures - almost

2011-04-29T07:13:00.001-04:00

We were supposed to have our family photo taken Wednesday. I got everyone showered, dressed in their pictures-only clothing, did all of our hair, and then our photographer texts that she can't make it. Major sigh. She had a really good excuse, what with getting blood taken, or more accurately going to get her blood taken but the lady just kept jabbing her in the arm and never actually got any blood and then the patient almost passed out. Ew.

What to do? We were already all dressed, so we used the self timer on our camera and got some totally mediocre pictures (compared to what the photographer will take next week!)

We re-scheduled for next Wednesday. Which will probably end up being better anyway since this Wednesday was actually very windy and humid.

We had promised the girls ice cream if they cooperated with all picture requests so we hit up Dairy Queen and took some to our very pale and weak photographer and her husband. Because that's what friends do, they bring you a Blizzard when you are weak. We had a short, nice visit and after she told me her story all my disappointment left. Hopefully next week will go smoothly and we will have our first ever professional family photo to show you soon.

And you thought your guest list was complicated

2011-04-28T10:26:00.001-04:00

Tomorrow Prince William and Catherine Middleton get married. No, I am not waking up at 4 am to see the wedding live, I don't care that much. I will look online later to check out her dress though. Jason says he couldn't imagine caring less about something than he does the royal wedding.

It's like the mom said on an episode of "The Middle" last week: there's just something about her walking in as a commoner and walking out as royalty.

So yes, I did click on their official wedding website. I did click on the guest list. I heard there were like 1,900 people attending. The prince's family has all kinds of great titles that I have no clue what they mean like Earl, Countess, Lord, Lady, Duke, Viscount. It's all very formal and fancy.

There are royalty from all over the world attending. Is there some sort of royalty clique I wasn't aware of? Are they all hanging out on their private jets and having poker night in their castles?

Next are celebrities; I noticed Mr. Bean (ok, he's listed as Rowan Atkinson), The Beckhams, and swimmer Ian Thorpe are all attending.

Princess Diana's and Prince Charles cake. Credit: Getty images

Many heads of the charities that William is involved with are attending, they have descriptions after their names.

There is so much diplomacy and etiquette involved, I wouldn't want the job of planning that guest list.

How much will this wedding cost taxpayers? Well don't worry, they Queen, Prince Charles, and Catherine's family are forking over their own personal $70 million for most of the details. (Sorry I just fell off of my chair typing that, I love all the pomp and circumstance but do you know how many people that could feed!???)

The taxpayers will only have to pay for the "security and transport." Oh wait, that bill is now estimated to be $32 million. Partly because the Prime minister declared it to be bank holiday so all the police have to be paid double.

I was going to say that I'm glad we don't have to fund our President's kids weddings like that, but I guess we do pay secret service to guard them and their families, not that they don't deserve it, they probably do. I'm just frugal and tend to think ~~parties~~ weddings are a huge waste of money. They certainly don't determine whether the marriage will be a success. You aren't more married if you spend more or less married if you elope. Nope it's all the same result.

Sorry, I warned you I'm not that sentimental.

Sometimes you accidentally invite the whole company

2011-04-27T13:23:00.001-04:00

Saturday night as we were driving home from an Easter get-together, Jason and I decided that we would go on vacation to Florida in June. Yes, I know, it's hot then. But I like hot and I just love to sit on those powder white beaches once a year and that's when it works for us.

So Jason emailed his vacation to the company shared Google calender so the other partners would know when he would not be working. Or so he thought.

A few hours later, around 10pm, as we were lounging on the sofa I got a text from Megan, his partners wife, asking some detailed questions about the vacation. Jason said "Huh, do you think she thinks we invited them?" "Nah," I said, "she's just asking about our trip."

Turns out what Jason actually sent out was an invitation that had yes, no, and maybe responses to click.

What a great idea! I told her they were more than welcome to join us. So now the Kennels and their two sons, the Lapps, and Jeryl will all be joining us in some beach fun. The Gibbels couldn't make it this year since they have a newborn but hopefully next year.

So in just over a month you will be seeing pictures of us all sitting around here:

Or looking for shells and lounging here:

My daughters are excited to have other kids to play and swim with this year. And all four of them love the water so it should be a great time. Jason says him and Zach have already started giving each other random "vacation high fives" at work :)

I'm so excited I starting buying fun beach things at Target today. Tiny squirt guns, coloring posters, and sunblock. We've also decided to drive this year, we'll see how that goes. We will save a couple hundred on airfare, parking, and car rental. I calculated how much we would spend in gas here, it's a pretty cool thing that takes in account your car make and model and average gas price by region.

Jason did figure out how to hook up our Wii to our car entertainment system. Plus we'll get a bunch of new movies.

We'll see if the stress of driving vs. flying is worth the money savings....

Warm

2011-04-25T18:11:00.001-04:00

It was so warm today that we wore T-shirts and shorts. My Lilacs are blooming. Its the first real softball game of the season. My yard was finally mowed. What a great day.

Celebrating with Family

2011-04-25T07:06:00.000-04:00

We had a lovely time celebrating Easter with our families. The kids had several egg hunts and a great time over the weekend. They had a sleepover at each of their grandparents houses which is one of their favorite things to do. It was also so great to celebrate at church this morning, what a privilege.

My cousin Lizy is turning 14 which I can't believe; I remember when she was born and now she has grown into a lovely teenager. Happy Birthday Lizy!

At my parents new house my dad had some leftover panels from doing trade shows. Since he is no longer doing that business he thought they would make a great backdrop for a stage. In the second floor of their barn they set it up with lights and a rug. The kids were super excited. They made up a "play," and I use that term loosely because half of the play was running in circles around the backdrop. They told us it was a "western" although I'm not sure we figured out how.

The family gathered for the show

It's so beautiful to drive through Lancaster right now with all of the flowering trees, they are all over the city and make my day so pleasant!

Sweetness

2011-04-23T10:39:00.000-04:00

We had fun the other night in the 'burg with our friends the Glicks. We don't get to see them very often but it's really fun when we do. We met at Chili's and ate supper. Jason became a runner over the last few months and has lost a ton of weight. Krystal starting running too and gave up sugar around New Years which is extremely impressive to a sugar addict like me. She lost a bunch of weight too. I don't think I've ever gone a day without a sweet treat.

We did indulge in this molten lava peanut butter chocolate ice cream dessert.

The next day I saw this in the store and almost bought it to hang on our kitchen wall. Maybe some day I'll be awesome enough to give up sugar, but I'm not there yet.

We also watched "The King's Speech" with them that night. In case you live under a rock and didn't know, it won lots of awards. I didn't want to see it when it came out because it looked boring and was rated R. But I felt like watching it that night and let me tell you, we all really liked it. It's based on the true story of a King with a stammer. The cursing is all bunched into a few scenes and it didn't offend us, you'll see why if you watch it.

We also laughed a lot which we didn't expect, and it was a heartwarming ending which we loved.

I hope you all have a great weekend celebrating Jesus' victory and new life in Him. We are off to our first of two family meals.

Good Friday

2011-04-22T10:36:00.000-04:00

Remembering Christ's death on this day reminds us that it was our sin that caused that death. Christianity Today says this:

Contrary to rumor, the church's observance of Good Friday, which is often accompanied by a decrescendo of light, is not primarily designed to induce a crescendo of guilt. You and I may have a lot of that to deal with—and dealing with it may be a very redemptive thing. But make no mistake: We gather on Good Friday not to wallow in guilt, but to announce that sin and guilt have been atoned for, conquered, healed, addressed, dealt with once and for all, in heaven and on earth through the blood of the cross.

source

What a miraculous sacrifice Jesus is! Today we as Christians are thankful beyond words for the atonement of our sins.

It's a day of looking back at what we've been set free from, looking forward to the marvelous hope we have in Him, and enjoying that we can walk with Him now, never alone, never forsaken.

A greater love story has never been told.

Cook out and summer plans

2011-04-19T11:07:00.000-04:00

You know how sometimes midway through the day you invite your co-workers/friends over for a cook out, but then you eat an hour late because you had just bought a grill the day before and hadn't assembled it yet, so your guests had to help you assemble it when they arrived?!

Yeah, that was our cook out last night :)

We finally got a gas grill, no more charcoal for us. It was a nice evening to sit outside and relax with friends. The kids had fun playing in the yard, one of them was dressed like Batman, which was super cute.

Lately it's been raining every other day so we take advantage of the days without rain.

Hope you all got your taxes in by yesterday, no one in the pictures above did. We all had to file extensions even though we gave our tax stuff to the accountant in January. We will not be using the same guy next year.

Because of that our summer plans are little messed up, we aren't sure if we will be able to go to China or not. We were going to use our tax refund to go on our mission trip, but now we might need to use it to help pay for school. Since we didn't have our taxes we missed the financial aide deadline for the kids school, they sent a letter saying they will be making aide decisions by April 29; we won't even have our taxes finished by then. So lots of financial stuff up in the air right now. I'm fighting the urge to be worried about it.

They just keep sucking me in

2011-04-18T07:24:00.000-04:00

Foolish me is on several travel company newsletter email lists. They send me emails once a week with all kinds of travel deals and specials. I don't have the heart to cancel because what if I miss the best deal ever!!?? I casually glance at the email and then see something like this:

And then I think to myself: "That's not bad! Jason and I could just go by ourselves, the kids would love to stay at grammy's anyway!" I click on it, figure out which dates would work. Then by the time I choose a local airport and add in all the taxes and fees, it's not looking so good.

Then Jason comes home and my excitement just doesn't catch on. He looks at me with his I-just-got-home-from-work-and-I'm-tired-and-hungry-because-we-eat-lunch-at-9:30-look. He asks me if I'm serious to which I reply "Of course!" Then I quote the line he sometimes sarcastically says "What good is money just sitting in the bank?" Then we both laugh and that's the end of that.

But look at the picture! There's nothing I love more than white sand and crystal clear water. Going to Siesta Key in Florida has officially ruined me from liking beaches anywhere close to home. I'll still go if invited, but I won't go in the water. And I've turned into a sand snob too. I don't know how my friend Coleen, who grew up in Sarasota, can possibly enjoy the yellow, crusty, beaches around here! I think it's even nicer than some Caribbean beaches I've been to.

Anyway, I also peruse the international deals, the flights to Hong Kong for our (hopefully upcoming) trip this summer, and before I know it I've wasted 20 minutes on vacations that aren't actually happening.

Don't worry internet, I still love you. It's not your fault I don't have the heart to click "unsubscribe."

That's a true quote, except when it comes to liking other places better than your own.

Making Amends

2011-04-17T06:50:00.001-04:00

Every Tuesday Leilani's class has a meeting to discuss issues that may have come up. They are allowed to share ideas or suggestions. Leilani, being a typical firstborn, always seems to have an idea to share at home so I wasn't surprised to hear that she often has ideas to share at group time.

Previously she shared that she thought her classmates always sat with the same people and that maybe all the girls didn't have to sit together but they could try to mix it up a little bit. I thought that was mature for an 8 year old.

But she blew my socks off yesterday when she told me her latest idea. She said she told them that when they were lying in bed at night trying to fall asleep, they should think back over their day and see if there was anything they needed to make up for the next day. She told me about how she had done this twice this week.

Once, she was kidding around with a girl and she was concerned maybe she had been a little mean, so the next day she apologized and the girl said it was fine, I'm sure a hug was involved as it so often is in 2nd grade.

The previous time she was upset with how a boy had been treating her. She felt like he was being mean to her lately. She told him how she felt and said she was sorry for thinking he was mean. He said it was ok and he did still like her.

Whoa. I would never have done that on my own as an 8 year old. Do I even do that enough now as a grown up? Maybe I need to take more time in the 5 minutes it takes me to fall asleep to think over my day or week and see if there is anywhere I need to make amends.

Another life lesson from my child. It's amazing how many I've learned along the way from them. I'm always amazed at what they learn by just watching us as well.

I knew I wasn't alone

2011-04-16T07:45:00.001-04:00

Remember this post when I talked about nudity at the gym? I mentioned that it seemed to be excessive at one of the local YMCA's and not the other, (it could also depend on class times but I digress.)

Then Friday when I took the girls swimming at the gym-with-less-prolonged-nudity I laughed when I saw this on the locker room wall:

Number 5 made me laugh out loud. I couldn't imagine the meeting where people came up with these and typed them up. But hey, maybe the sign works! Maybe the other YMCA needs a copy to hang on their wall. Also, I thought it odd that they numbered them and called them "Step"s instead of just numbering them like rules...

I knew I wasn't alone in my concern for locker room etiquette, although I hadn't thought it out as well as that memo.

Do men have instructions like these on their locker room walls? I guess I kind of doubt it but please let me know men if you've seen nudity etiquette instructions at the Y.

About being liked

2011-04-15T12:09:00.001-04:00

I have some potentially bad news for you, some of you are already aware, some of you may not be...here is is: not everyone likes you (or me.)
It's true, I checked.
No matter how nice you are I can guarantee that there will be people who don't like you or me.

It took me a long time to be OK with this. I used to think that if someone didn't like me then there must be something wrong with me. Until 2 things sunk in, deep.

1. People not only didn't like, but they hated Jesus. Him, perfect and willing to die for everyone, they hated Him. He didn't turn into a people pleaser, he didn't pretend to be someone he wasn't, he expected it. He didn't try to be overly nice and sugar coat His message. He threw over their tables at the temple.

2. Jason expects that people will like him, when they don't he assumes something is wrong with them. That is the opposite of how I thought. I'm not saying there is something wrong with them, but it lead me to my conclusion...

We weren't meant to be friends with everyone. Everyone has different personalities, sense of humors, interests; we gravitate towards those who laugh at the same things and have common interests.

I'm not saying go out and be as mean and rude as you want, no, we already have plenty of that in this world. I'm saying that when we aren't authentically ourselves we might miss out on attracting the people we need in our lives. Not only will we miss out on them, but they miss out on us. That's part of living as the body of Christ. We have to be who God created us to be, not try to be a hand or foot in the body when we were really made to be an elbow.

I wish I could sing, I mean really sing, but I can't. My friend Kelly can really sing. In the metaphorical body of Christ maybe she is the mouth. I can't belt it out like she can; but let's say I'm an "encourager". What if one day she needs encouragement and I don't do my function as the elbow and encourage her because I think it's silly. Then she stops singing, people miss out on that thing she was going to bring to the worship. See that domino effect? (hypothetical example)

Fear of man / people pleasing- it's a slippery slope. Don't get on that slope. I'm trying to avoid it like the plague. God knit you together in your mothers womb, he wanted you to be special and not like anyone else on this earth, I think that's amazing. If people can't see the amazing in you, well move on sister, find someone who can.

Cold day, warm day

2011-04-14T19:06:00.000-04:00

It was cold and rainy yesterday and the day before, so we headed out to Isaac's to warm up with some tasty soup.

Jason just loves their Pepperjack Tomato soup. I tried one of their flat bread pizzas, it wasn't actually very good.

I saw they have their outdoor seating waiting outside, I can't wait for warm weather and dining al fresco.

Then inside I took some pictures with my phone and they look crappy:

Then today it was 65 and sunny. I love waking up to sunshine! I swam laps in the sunshine filled pool, met some friends at the park, went to the library book sale where everything was half price, got some Vietnamese food for lunch, stopped at a Goodwill my friend told me about, and took the kids to the park.

I got a stack of books to take on our travels this summer. I don't like taking library books for fear that I will lose one. I also got some neat older edition kids books. They were only 50 cents so I was thinking of taking out a few pages and framing them to hang in Samiya's room.

All-in-all a great day.

Get a real job

2011-04-13T16:19:00.000-04:00

This is how happy he looks at work.

I'll never forget that rainy evening about 7 years ago that Jason told me he thought he should probably quit his job and be self-employed. I had to fight the urge to sock him. Quit your job?! Are you nuts? We have a kid! We're starting an adoption! We have a mortgage to pay!

I grew up with a self-employed dad. He always provided for us and I know he loves being his own boss; but I always felt it added so much stress to his life. I'd see him work all day and then come home to do the books at night.

At the time Jason announced this to me we were both working for my dad, who was a great boss. We had steady paychecks and health insurance. Jason enjoyed his co-workers and even the work he was doing; so I didn't see it coming. He said he wanted to buy houses, fix them up, be his own boss. I wanted to know we were going to have money for groceries every week.

There was no changing his mind; being stubborn might be a 3rd quality useful to the self-employed. We bought some run down properties, fixed them up, rented them out. It was a steep and expensive learning curve in the beginning, before we learned ~~that tenants lie and you can't be a nice guy~~ about being landlords. We made money and lost money; he liked it and I hated it. We've since learned the value of a good property management company.

The one thing I really miss is health insurance. Jason didn't actually want to pay for insurance so we compromised and bought a really high deductible policy. We never meet our deductible so all of our medical bills are paid out of pocket. Now it always takes some consideration when the kids are sick: Hmmm, how sick are they? Do they need to go to the doctor for $120? Or should we wait another day and see? Just this year we found out our kids could get immunizations for free from PA Dept. of Health. We had previously been told that was only for uninsured people, but now they say that if our insurance didn't cover it then we qualify. Geez, that could have saved us thousands of dollars over the years!

Jason still loves being self employed. There have been stressful times; times where I've said please, please, just get a real job! But he loves the flexibility, his business partners (I don't think I've ever seen anyone have as much fun at work as they do), and the work he does. I think having a husband who actually looks forward to going to work every day is priceless. It's worked out financially as well, although our taxes are complicated and it's weird not knowing how much money you'll make from one month to another.

Last fall on the way home from a long weekend away he said: "I can't wait to go to work tomorrow." I asked him if he knew how blessed he was to be able to say that, he said yes, he fully realized he was living the dream - providing well for his family, building a future, and having a blast doing it.

Flower beds and Softball games

2011-04-12T10:41:00.000-04:00

Yesterday was a gorgeous 83 degrees! It made my heart smile to open all the windows in the house that morning and let the fresh air inside. My mom came over to help me with my flower beds. I am a gardening disaster so this was really great. We raked tons of leaves out of all the beds and planted a few hostas and one flat of flowers. I still need to get some weed killer before I can plant in one of the beds.

It was so nice out that Samiya put on her swimsuit and played with a bucket of water. She asked if we could set up our pool and go swimming. I had to inform her that it would be chilly the rest of the week.

It was so much work to get all of the beds cleaned out, I was exhausted by the time we were done. I still want to plant more stuff in a few weeks.

Lowes was packed with people all chomping at the bit to get outside and beautify their yards.

In the evening we packed a picnic supper and went to Jason's softball game. It was such a nice evening to be outside and let the kids run around with their friends. My girls were excited to see dad score 2 runs, it's amazing they were actually watching at those times.

Softball games are great play dates without any planning on my part :)

4 ingredient Blondies

2011-04-10T07:35:00.001-04:00

Here is a super easy, super delicious dessert.

It only has 4 ingredients.

I found it on food.com

We ate the whole pan of them within 24 hours.

That's why I try not to bake, or if I do I give some away. I did give a few pieces to friends.

Too many high fives

2011-04-09T06:58:00.003-04:00

There was a point in time where I had to put a stop to Jason's overabundant request for high fives and fist bumps. It was just getting to be too much. Any little thing that went right or that made him happy, he was right there in your face waiting for a five.

Jeryl (his only co-worker at the time) and I had had enough. It was getting to be exhausting. We had to give him a cap; my limit was 1 a day. Jason thought this was too extreme. He couldn't believe I would only give up one celebratory arm gesture per day!

I'm just not as easily thrilled as he is. I'm all for enjoying every day and celebrating the small things. He's won me over to getting excited about many things that wouldn't have excited me before. The car odometer turning to 100,000 miles was a big one, I even got a picture for him because he wasn't with me.

Great deals on houses, yes. Winning his softball game, yes. Vacation coming up, yes.

But I can no longer dole out fives for any of the following:

The fact that it is Thursday
HTC putting out a new phone
Finding a bag of chips above the fridge
The Celtics Ray Allen hitting a series of 3's. (He's awesome, I agree, but I just can't watch any more YouTube of him being great.)
Successfully "rooting" a phone. I still can't remember what that means.
That it's almost time for lunch

Luckily he now works with Josh and Zack, who seem to share his love of celebratory arm gestures. I tell him to get his fill while he's at work. It's a win - win situation.

All kidding aside (not that all of the above isn't true; it is, I just write it tongue in cheek), I love his exuberance for the small things. I love that if he's in a bad mood I can just get him some food and he's instantly better. While his high fives may be draining to my melancholy personality, I'm sure they bring me a bit of much needed optimism.

Christian chain mail?

2011-04-08T07:32:00.003-04:00

I got this in the mail yesterday:

click for a larger view

"prayer mat"

They said I should pray with the "prayer mat" and then return it to them with my prayer request so they can send the mat to another house quickly! Time is of the essence! Really? Do they think I believe they are going to send that piece of paper to tons of houses?

They don't ask for money, but there is a spot where you can write in an amount of "seed money" you're sending in so you can get your blessing.

I can't stand people trying to make a profit off of things like holy water, blessed scraps of fabric, even teaching CD's when they are marketing to hurting people. If you are really trying to help people and think God has either anointed you, your fabric, or your teaching, shouldn't you be trying to give that to as many people as possible? That's just my personal opinion.

This mailing felt like total chain mail. The paper "prayer mat" made me sad. I threw it away, sorry if you don't get it mailed to your house because I chucked it. I guess if you wanted one you can enlarge my photo and print your own on your color printer...

Samiya's first hair cut

2011-04-07T05:42:00.003-04:00

I've trimmed Samiya's hair if there was a knot that I couldn't get out or if one piece was really long, but I've never taken her to a professional to get her hair cut. Yesterday was the first time.

A couple of people recommended Jas It Up Hair Salon, here in the city so I thought we'd give it a try. Jasmine, the owner, did Samiya's hair. She combed it out dry which I have NEVER done and it hurt Samiya, so there was lots of crying (by Samiya, but I felt like crying too.) I felt like leaving. I asked if they could put a kids show on the TV which helped a little.

She had to blow dry the hair so it was straight enough to cut. It was so weird seeing Samiya with long straight-ish hair. It looked like she had a wig on. She asked if I wanted her to flat iron it when she was finished cutting but I thought Samiya had been through enough for one day.

She ended up cutting about an inch and a half off, which is pretty much what I thought it needed.

If ever there was a girl whose hair suited her personality it's Samiya's! Springy, bouncy, curly, beautiful hair, it just suits her :)

After her hair cut I let her choose where we would eat lunch, she chose Subway at the mall. We painted her nails and then after school she played salon with Leilani.

Old Navy Twins

2011-04-06T07:03:00.000-04:00

The kids say everyone has a mannequin twin at Old Navy.

They love to point them out and say who looks like who. When we were there the other night they insisted I take their pictures with their Old Navy mannequin twins.

Notice that Leilani was holding her twins hand. :) And doesn't it look like the boy mannequin behind her is smiling just for her picture!?

They really wanted me to pose with my "twin" who happened to be on the top row, up there in the back. By now there were two sales ladies smiling and giggling at how cute the girls were. I was pretty sure I would have knocked over a mannequin or two trying to pose with my twin. So I declined. There was a collective "Awww, come on mom!" But I didn't do it. I could just foresee the domino effect and broken mannequin limbs knocked here and there.

Maybe next time kids. Maybe next time.

Bike goal

2011-04-05T10:38:00.000-04:00

My goal this summer is to teach both girls how to ride their bikes without training wheels. Although I think that was also my goal last year too...
Part of the problem is that we have a small driveway and its hard to practice there. We often load up the bikes and find a nice flat parking lot for them to ride in.

The other problem is that they haven't show much interest. They seem to like it a little more this year so hopefully we will get off of those trainers soon!

Also, the 5 year old can't go up any hills. Her legs are really tiny, maybe she doesn't have enough muscle in there.

And yes, they usually wear helmets. Although guess which parent thinks its ridiculous to make them wear helmets because we never did as kids? :)

File under random

2011-04-04T13:33:00.003-04:00

1. I like to read, a lot. (My high school English teacher never let us use the phrase "a lot" because it's not a real or correct phrase, so I try not to write it but I just can't help it sometimes.)

Sometimes besides my Bible and the numerous books I read to the kids, I will read 3 books in a week. This week I read one about The Russian Tea Room in NYC. It was written by the wife of Sidney Kaye who owned it for a long time. She also ran it after his death.

I read one by the author who wrote The Ladies No. 1 Detective Agency. It was a little boring and I ended up skipping parts of it.
I'm also reading one about Jackie O. in the years after JFK's assassination. Fairly interesting so far, she was different than I pictured her. Apparently she was shy but pushy. Hmmm. And oooh boy the real estate of those people!

2. The new Red Robin on route 30 seems to be opening today. There was a radio station and balloons out front. I'm not a fan of Red Robin seeing as how I think you can get a good burger at like 10 different places around here and I don't want or need unlimited fries. But Jason is pretty excited about this, seeing as how he is 95% carnivore. He wants to go tonight; I'm not willing to wait an hour+ for any food.

3. Church Softball season has begun. The guys have two scrimmages this week and next week. Now, I'm all in favor of male bonding time and exercise, but sometimes it's just too much. Two times a week would be fine with me. It is fun to go to their games and chat with the other wives while the kids play together and enjoy the fresh air. Oh yeah, and watch the game too :)

4. We are getting out first ever professional family photo taken. At the end of April. Did I mention 3 out of 4 of us hate having our picture taken? The other one is extremely photogenic and will always try to be in any photo within a 10 foot radius.

Seriously, who comes up for air looking this good? She even has cheeto mouth.

I want one good photo of us. And the photographer who will be doing our pictures is really talented and sweet so it should be fine...if I can find us clothes that go well together.

I was in Target today trying to pick out clothes for Jason. I think that ship has sailed. It was overwhelming to try to remember what he likes or doesn't. He also has certain side-pocket requirements for his cell phone...

So next week my goal is to get us (or find in our closets) all nice spring outfits that coordinate (Not match. We will not be rocking the white shirt/khaki pants matching look!) Wish me luck!

Older ladies at the gym

2011-04-03T18:22:00.000-04:00

There are not pictures in this post, you'll thank me later.

The YMCA I belong to has two facilities, both very new and nice. I like to swim at the one more than the other because there is a hot tub to soak in after I've finished my laps.

The downfall to this gym however, if that there always seems to be about 5 older ladies (like age 70+) who are sitting around naked and talking. I guess they are getting dressed, but too slowly for my comfort level.

I've discussed with my girl friends if there is an age where we will be chatting and naked in front of each other, we all agree that there will not be. But is it our generation? Are these older ladies all ex-hippies? Or is there an age where a switch flips in your brain and you just really don't care anymore?

I do like listening to their conversations however (preferable from the visual safety of the other side of the lockers) The interesting one this week was about their weekly household chore schedules, back when they had kids living at home. They talked about which days they mopped or dusted or did laundry.

They finished the conversation with "but it doesn't matter now, does it?" Now that most of them are on their own they looked back with fond memories, but also seemed to wish they hadn't placed as much importance on the cleanliness of their house.

I'm pretty good at doing what I can when the kids are otherwise pre-occupied and then concentrating on them for a good amount of time too. I have no problem leaving things undone if I don't have time. I also like to make time to unwind in the evening, I think Americans are way too stressed and it's very unhealthy.

I don't want to look back one day and wish I'd spent more time reading, chatting with a friend, or being with the kids.

I mean the house is going to get dirty again no matter how well I clean it, so there is a little bit of futility there. But the kids will remember me spending time with them, making memories, teaching them about life; there is no futility there whatsoever.

So thanks older ladies at the gym, for reminding me of what is important in life, even though I wish you would do that while being fully clothed.

April Fools Day

2011-04-01T14:37:00.000-04:00

I woke up to this:

But I want to wear is this:

It's been cold and dreary this week. I even had Jason light the pellet stove last night because had felt chilled all day. I'm ready for warm weather and sunshine.

I'm really ready to stop explaining to Samiya (literally every single day for the past 3 weeks) that, no, she cannot wear just that sun dress because it's cold out and yes, she must put long sleeves and pants on underneath of it.

Soda Jerk

2011-03-31T12:24:00.002-04:00

We here at Kradyville are firm believers that fountain Coke is one of the greatest inventions ever. It is delicious, the end.

We've become soda snobs over the years. We'd gotten to the point a few years ago that we were too good to buy soda in big bottles. It goes flat in a day or two. We started buying cans of soda by the box. We sometimes chuckle remembering the first time Josh Gibbel came over and looked in our fridge. His eyes got wide as he pulled out a can and asked "Can I have one?" We said that of course he could, that's what it was there for. He said they only had cans on special occasions, or something like that.

You can't argue with Jason about how unhealthy soda is. Don't even bother. He shuns science when it doesn't fit his taste buds.

Two weeks ago I made a bold move. I stopped buying soda. The fridge looked so empty. Jason kept opening it saying "There's nothing to drink." After a few days I informed him that I would no longer be purchasing soda. That went over like a lead balloon.

Jason claims drinking water is:

-gross

-awful

-un-refreshing

-unnecessary, since soda is mostly water

-and my personal favorite:-makes him thirstier (oh come on, that is just ridiculous!)

I've been keeping a pitcher of water in the fridge which he will drink out of desperation. He will often stop at Turkey Hill on the way home to get a soda (and I'm sure on the way to work too, but he doesn't tell me that.) But I'm convinced he is drinking less and I know I am. I'm hoping we both lose some weight.

If you know us at all, you know we like to eat out. Jason would often get a huge glass of soda and have it refilled 2-4 times!! So many empty calories. Now we pretty much always get water and often he doesn't even finish one glass.

Except Sunday. Every Sunday we eat at McDonalds after church, it's the one time a week we have fast food and we do get a large, delicious Coke for Jason and I to share. There is no denying I love soda too, but it's just so much sugar, it's got to be an occasional treat rather than a staple of our diets.

We'll see how long this fun experiment lasts. Will Jason resort to going to the store and buying boxes of soda himself?! Only time will tell.

Freezing last weekend at the kids soccer game.

To spite your face

2011-03-30T14:02:00.001-04:00

"Cutting off the nose to spite the face" is an expression used to describe a needlessly self-destructive over-reaction to a problem: "Don't cut off your nose to spite your face" is a warning against acting out of pique, or against pursuing revenge in a way that would damage oneself more than the source of one's anger.

I'm thinking we may have done just that. But it was worth it.

We downgraded our Comcast cable just to show them who was boss. We were tired of them upping our rate every month (or so it seemed.) We couldn't decide what package to get so we really stuck it to them by switching to basic; now we get like 5 channels. I think they're really hurting now, what with the loss of our $60 a month and all....right?

The truth is I miss the travel channel, amongst other things. How will I live vicariously through the travel channel hosts now? I'll have to travel for real, and that is way more expensive than paying for cable.

And I know Jason is really going to miss ESPN once football season rolls around, I'm sure we'll sign up again eventually, but for now...

We got Netflix for our tv. It has plenty of kids shows and documentaries to entertain us. Three of us love documentaries. For $7 a month it's a great deal.

We loved:
-Fathead
-September Issue (ok that was all me, Jason is not interested in how Vogue puts together their magazine, I found it fascinating)
-Beavers - The best dam movie ever (that's what it's called! Me and the kids loved this, we all learned so much)
- Freakonomics
-Exit through the gift shop

We did not love:
-Grey Gardens - It was from 1975 about Jackie O.'s crazy aunt and cousin living in a mansion in the Hamptons. I didn't even finish this one.
- The art of the steal - Very interesting about the Barnes art collection in Merion, PA but way, way, too long.
- Kings of Pastry
-The last train home - about the greatest human migration; when millions of Chinese workers go home for the new year holiday. Very sad story. It was interesting, but left us both so sad.

So for now we are happily saving $60 a month and learning tons of random stuff from documentaries. Ask the girls if they know what noise a beaver makes, before Netflix we didn't even know they made noises!

Whisper down the lane

2011-03-29T10:18:00.001-04:00

Last night I was laying on the floor at the top of our stairs talking to Jason as he was on the computer. We have very comfy carpet up there so I do that sometimes.

Leilani was in the dining room working on her homework. Samiya was in the middle drawing in the living room.

Leilani yells at the top of her lungs: "MOM! How do you spell water?!"

To which I yell back: "W-A-T-E-R!"

Samiya tries to be helpful, thinking she can't hear my response and calls to Leilaini "W-play-E-E-R!"

Now "play" isn't even a letter and I don't know what Leilani wrote down but then Leilani yells: "How do you spell bottle?!"

To which I respond "B-O-T-T-L-E."

But Samiya yells: "P-O-P-T-E"

At which point I start laughing hysterically. She was so cute, trying in earnest to help, but so totally wrong.
Leilani was not laughing, she came over and demanded the correct spelling and for her little sister to be quiet.

In other news, Samiya has been practicing for her upcoming ballet recital. It's a pretty cute dance but she is always looking to see what the other girls are doing and half of them don't know it.

Rice Dreams

2011-03-28T13:32:00.000-04:00

Every time we're served plain rice at a restaurant it smells like home to us.

In case you don't know, we were missionaries in Macau, China from 1999-2001. We worked in and lived at an orphanage. Although really I've come to realize its more of a foster care home since almost all of the same kids are still there, the parents seem to still have their rights.

Dried fish stand

It was a life changing experience for us. It was hard, amazing, fun, and bonded Jason and I together in a way that not much else could have. It was Jason's favorite thing he ever did, although right now he's loving his business so it might be a tie. We loved those kids and still think about them all the time. The kids there are in wonderful hands, the facility is run by Christians and extremely well cared for.

McDonalds. We didn't have a digital camera back then :)

Last visit, I was pregnant. Jason's brother came too.

We've been invited to go back this summer and help out while the kids are on school vacation. We haven't been back since I was pregnant with Leilani. We would LOVE to go with our daughters and show them this significant part of our lives.

Dance class

They offered us free room and board so we just need to pay for the airfare. The problem is that airfare over the summer is running around $1400-$1600 per person. With four of us travelling it will be around $6,000. This is a huge amount of money to us and especially for a two week trip!

The kids want to go, but if we do then we won't be able to go to Florida, this is a bummer for all of us. They do want to experience Macau and meet the kids we cared for all those years ago. We want to see those kids as teenagers!

Jason giving a hair cut.

So here's the dilemma. What if we do a fundraiser and we still have to shell out $5,000 ? We're already committed to sending our kids to Christian school, so we have bills to pay... Would Dave Ramsey approve of us using our emergency fund for a mission trip?!

Would you pray with us about this? We're praying that if God wants us to go, then we'll find plane tickets for $1,000 or less. The only other idea would be to go at the end of August when it's cheaper, but our kids start on the 23rd so they would miss the first two weeks of school. I kind of hate that idea.

So that's what we've been pondering. Anyone want to just donate $7,000 and that will be that?!

Over the border in mainland China.

Sunday

2011-03-27T18:51:00.000-04:00

After church Jason had an open house for his latest project, no buyers yet but it's spring and should sell soon. We also had a fundraiser at church for his softball team, it was a silent auction, I left before finding out if I won either the landscaping or the Hershey park tickets I bid on.

I'm amazed that Samiya still really needs a nap, when she doesn't have one she gets all mad and mean.

When she woke up from her nap today we went to Long's park. It was nice and sunny albeit chilly; they shed their coats quickly though. The ice cream truck was there but it was close to supper so we didn't get any. After dinner we did hit up Dairy Queen for the first time this season, I still say they give you about half of the candy that they used to in Blizzards.

Freezing Soccer

2011-03-26T11:34:00.002-04:00

Today was Leilani's first soccer game. Her team won by four goals so she had a great time. She didn't score any goals but did have two assists, although when we tried to explain that to her she didn't get it. She was just excited when her team scored.

It.was.freezing. 31 degrees. I had them wear stockings under their pants and they wore gloves too, but Samiya started crying and wanted to sit in the car. Luckily, the car was close by so we took turns watching from there.

I'm hoping Samiya will stay for her practice/scrimmage and not end up in tears. We are currently waiting in the car since they have an hour before its her teams turn.

The ones you can't get rid of

2011-03-24T10:19:00.001-04:00

We all have them, those items of clothing that lurk in our closet. Some we think we'll fit into again, some are sentimental items, some are just too comfy to part with. I have all of the above.

I have a few pair of pants that I love so much and I'm praying I'll fit into again soon. My weight has been the same for years but I guess I've gotten, um, curvier.

I have a shirt from China and a sweatshirt my sister bought me in Ocean City that I am sentimental about. Notice how my wedding dress is not on that list? Yeah, that is actually in a bag and thrown over our oil tank in the basement. I just laughed out loud writing that, it's awful I know. I mean, it's in a plastic garment bag so it's probably fine right?

Now my favorite: the comfy items. What items do you wear that you know are ugly but you just can't part with them because you love how they feel? I have a pair of lined wind pants, a pair of lined army-ish Old Navy pants, and a pair of way-too-long jeans that are all too comfy to give away. I don't even like how my Uggs look, but they are foot heaven.

Luckily, Jason doesn't abhor any of them, but that reminds me....

Once, when we were first married, Jason had this horrible grey/blue t-shirt. It was too wide, the neck was super stretched out, and the color actually made him look sickly. I hated that shirt.

I decided to do something about it.

He wouldn't part with it. He thought it was fine. So while we were doing our wash at my sister's house I just "tossed" it behind a chest freezer that was next to the washer.

Jason didn't even ask about it for months! I felt fine about it since technically I hadn't gotten rid of it, I could get to it if needed. Finally one day he asked where that shirt was, I laughed during my confession. He look shocked, I'm sure he was wondering what kind of maniac he had married.

I gave it back to him and begged him not to wear it. I can't even remember if he did. He has never felt that strongly about any of my clothing so he couldn't understand my issue.

Marriage is about give and take right? I "give" him clean clothes so I should be able to "take" out the ones I hate....I think that's what that phrase means anyway.