So things have been busy around here. Too busy. So busy I sometimes don’t have time to think. Or go to the grocery store. Or whatever. But I do like things being busy. So here’s a (short) list of things we’ve been doing.
Juice: He’s been splitting his time between working full time, picking up the slack when I am off playing working, and furiously looking for a job. Does anyone know of a Mechanical Engineering position near them? We’d love to have it!
Me: I’ve done a lot of working. And riding horses. And playing with the kids and our friends. Not a whole lot of everyday stuff.
Butterfly: Did you know she turned 7? I can’t believe she is so old! Time really does fly. She has less than 20 days left of school and is getting so big. We are having a party for her next week with her friends.
Pirate: How much Indian food can one little boy eat? Because it’s a lot. I mean, A LOT. He out ate all 5 adults at the table. He has been enjoying himself running the fastest he can possibly go. And out running me most days! But he has the sweetest of hearts and loves his mommy.
Professor: This little boy can out eat a few adults with Indian food too. But then he falls asleep at the table. Which is completely adorable. He also says things like “ice cream of the cold place” and “darkness of the forest.” He has the greatest quotes lately. This is my favorite:
We read scriptures together as a family every evening. We all read one verse, and the boys repeat the verse back to us as we read. One night, Professor went off on his own after I said, “And it came to pass…”
And it came to pass, that the Lord said, LOUDLY, “Yea, listen to me! Thus verily, You need to do what I say. Right now. Or you will not go to Heaven.”
I laughed and laughed and laughed. Mostly because he used the proper terminology (yea and thus verily) and that he specified that the Lord spoke loudly.
Soot the dog: She has decided that sleeping on a dog bed is overrated. Especially when our bed is much better. Or right outside our door. Where she digs at odd hours of the night and wakes me up.
So. There’s a short update of things. And I will load some pictures if I can.
Is it bad that I JUST TODAY uploaded my pictures from December from my camera? Please lie and say it’s fine! Happens all the time!
{liar}
So…ahem…here’s what we did in December!
Every year we make a gingerbread house. This year was no exception.
We did add one two things. First was our friend Lavender joined us for the candy placing. And this year we had extra frosting on hand. And we did the best thing we could with it.
Then there was the trip to the Washington DC Temple to see the lights. Twice. Because I forgot my camera the first time.
And the great hunt for the missing glove.
Christmas Eve brought us Chinese food. So naturally, Santa got a fortune cookie for his cookie plate.
(Which said, “You will make many changes before settling satisfactorily.” I thought that was very fitting.)
Christmas was a blast!
And on Sunday! So the kids looked so so cute in the afternoon!
But before that, there were presents to open.
And bikes to ride in the house.
And we always go to Mt. Vernon the week between Christmas and New Year’s. We saw the sights:
The house.
The Gingerbread House.
The River.
The Gardens.
The Pardoned Turkey from Thanksgiving. (Professor just laughed and laughed when the turkey gobbled.)
Aladdin the Camel. (Which Professor kept a HUGE berth around. I guess camels are “scary”.)
A Distant Relative (aka my Great Aunt!).
So in answer to my above question, it IS okay that I just uploaded my pictures. And it IS okay that it took me 2 days to do this post. You enjoyed it right? That makes it okay!
So, yeah, I know…it’s been awhile. I know what has been going on with all of you because I do manage to read blogs a few times a week. But no one really knows what’s going on with me. Well, besides me. And Juice.
Sounds like it’s update time!
December went by fast and furious! Christmas was excellent. Top presents included an American Girl doll for Butterfly (Felicity, because she is a Virginia girl like Butterfly!), 2 wheel push bikes for the boys and a new set of trains, a sword for Juice and a glass table top for me.
Through December, we decided we were NOT going to move. Stupid economy. I’m hopeful we can try again in 2 years or so.
Also in December, after poking around on Craig’s List just for fun, I decided to get a job. Like, a job outside of the house. I am teaching horseback riding lessons about half an hour north of here. I LOVE LOVE LOVE it. Yes, it’s outside. Yes, it’s freezing cold some days. But boy am I having a fun time.
Sadly, with this job, I’m still trying to figure out my days and how to schedule my time. Blogging got pushed way back. I hope that I’ll be able to get back to doing it regularly. But I’m not making any promises.
That’s what’s been going on in a nutshell. Life is full and I’m loving it!
So I failed this month at the whole NaBloPoMo but I have a good excuse. It’s called moving. And gutting my house. It’s really no fun. All my evenings are spent cleaning or organizing or putting things in boxes.
I like the throwing away part. That’s been very happy for some reason.
We’ve spent almost a week on the kitchen alone. Holy cow, was the kitchen dirty. But now my stove looks like it’s brand new (thanks to my awesome Oreck Steam Mop) and the fridge is devoid of magnets.
I also can’t find anything because I rearranged my cupboards.
(I am playing catch up from our trip to Utah this year to see family. I’m picking a few things to focus on and highlight every week until I am done. Enjoy!)
Our annual fishing trip with Grandpa continues to be a huge hit with the kids! We always drive up to Trial Lake and fish on the lake for a bit. On the way back down from the mountains, we stop at a family fishing pond and let the kids actually catch a fish. Butterfly caught her first fish when she was 3 years old. It was the boys turn! Cousin Cappy came along and we had a blast.
The night before, we had gone out to dinner for Cappy’s Mom’s birthday. I took the kids outside of the restaurant while the adults finished up. There was a creek running past and we spent most of our time throwing rocks in the creek. So our car ride up the mountain was peppered with questions from the 3 little boys, “Are we going to throw rocks?”
You can’t throw rocks in the lake because that scares the fish. And that makes the fishermen mad. So we found the little stream that ran out of the lake and threw rocks there.
A three year old boy’s dream, let me tell you!
Once we got the fishing poles set up and ready, we fished! We saw an albino fish hugging the shore and a bunch of little fish in the shallows. We also saw a bald eagle fishing. Amazing!
After a nice picnic lunch, we headed down to the fish farm and let everyone catch a fish to take home. (Well, to take to Grandma and Grandpa. They seem to like them!)
Butterfly was the first to catch one, followed closely by each of the boys.
While we were helping the boys catch their fish, Butterfly was dangling her line in the water and just playing around with it. She caught another one, with no bait! Wow were we all surprised!
Then everyone had to get another fish. Pirate was SO happy to help Grandpa with his tools to take the hooks out of the fish. Cappy wasn’t too sure about the whole thing, and Butterfly really wasn’t inrerested in touching the fish once we had put them in a bucket.
Summer all of a sudden exploded for me. Remember that lovely list of things we wanted to do over the summer? Flower and I were looking over it last week and we realized that we haden’t even done 10 things. Ack! So we’ve been cramming as much as we possibly can into each day.
Which means that by the time we get home, make and eat dinner, put the kids to bed and sit down, I’m too tired to blog.
An example: Juice and I went on a date (one of the few we’ve done this summer…) to see Harry Potter the other night. I FELL ASLEEP during the previews. Juice had to wake me up when the movie started. I had a hard time staying awake through the first little bit of the movie.
I have SO much to talk about on here. If I ever have a free moment (hahahaha!) I will talk about what we’ve done on our list. And Butterfly’s new found addiction to water slides. And the adventure I had with Flower and Lolli. And the amazing thunderstorm we got caught in and the aftermath. Plus I never finished our drive home from New York.
Well, while I’m here, I may as well tell you the news of today. I have spent the morning making lists and getting prepared for our week at the beach. I’m SO excited, but nervous that I will forget something. I’m prepping the house for us to be gone, and clearing the fridge of perishables.
Our little thermometer says it’s 101 degrees outside. DC’s heat at 3pm today was 102, one degree away from the record. But the heat index? 121 DEGREES. OUCH.
Needless to say we have been staying inside today and thanking Heavenly Father for continued power for our air conditioner. I am NOT looking forward to my power bill at the end of the month!
