WHAT CHILDHOOD IS ALL ABOUT

When you are the mother of 4 busy, industrious, adventurous and fun loving boys the days are full of fun. You never know what is going to happen. This morning started out as a normal Sunday and the day pretty well ended that way too come to think of it. Anyhow, I guess that this didn't really surprise me but I got out of the shower to hear laughing and yelling and lots of thuds. Of course I go investigate and this is what I saw. To be honest this is much better than when they were pushing each other down the stairs in the laundry basket so I told them to keep it down since Ryan was sleeping and went to finish getting dressed. Then I decided to video it. I told Ryan about it this afternoon and he said he did the same thing when he was their age but he didn't tell them about it and said they all figure it out eventually. It was great to see them having fun together and laughing so hard. I love to watch them play and laugh.

OH SO TALENTED!

Today was the primary talent show. At the last minute AJ decided to dance in the talent show and since Levi wanted to go on the stage the whole time he went up with AJ to dance. The highlight was when AJ picked up Levi, that got so many laughs that he thought kicking Levi would be good and that got so many laughs that next he started to choke Levi who at that point wasn't having fun anymore. Then the dance ended.

Caleb played an arrangement of the Star Wars theme song courtesy of Sister Emmett. She gave it to him yesterday and he practiced it since then and did pretty well for only one day of practice.

Jake also played the piano and got a song from the Biermans yesterday. He played "Love One Another". He also did a great job. All in all the talent show lasted about 90 minutes including cookies afterward. We have a very talented bunch of kiddos and we enjoyed them sharing their talents with us.

SO REDNECK

Yesterday was my errand day. We went to 5 different places, not really a super big deal, just another day in the life of a mom right? Well Levi is potty training and doing pretty well, he HATES diapers and always wants to wear underwear (we had a huge toodoo about him wearing a diaper to my friends house on Monday while I went to my test) anyway, I forgot to have him pee before we ate lunch and of course... out to the car we go to clean him off and put on some dry pants EXCEPT the pants and unders I had gotten out for his backup before we left were still sitting on the back of the couch at home. Luckily I had a diaper and of course wipes in the car so he had to go back into Sam's Club in a diaper, polo shirt and his faithful cowboy boots. Soooo... Ryan just laughed at my embarrassing escapade but no way was I going all the way home and back into town to get pants for him. This is him lounging in his new to him booster seat Mr. I'm too cool for this chair. He of course fell asleep shortly after this was taken. Sorry for the lopsided pic but I was driving and thought it better to look where I was going instead of turning around to look at the camera.

ALL BOY

When Ryan and I were first married one of the things I loved about him was that at every family function he was always playing with the kids. He was always on the bottom of the pile of A giggling wrestling mass. After our kids were born and life got harder and more stressful it didn't happen so much anymore which was kind of sad in a way for me because some of my best and favorite memories growing up were wrestling on the floor with my brother and mom. The last 6 months, maybe more, I've started seeing the old Ryan I fell in love with. I still love him. AJ today reminded me how much they love him too and love wrestling with him when he came up to me tonight before dinner and asked if dad would wrestle with him ( he couldn't since he was in the shower) and since Ryan couldn't asked if I would wrestle with him. I guess boys really do need that rough play... Anyway then tonight Ryan went into work late so that Jake could go to football practice since we are down to one vehicle right now. Practice was cancelled, after we got there, because coach hurt his back but he handed out some plays to work on at home. My superstar hubby stayed at the park and ran through plays with Jake and Caleb. Within minutes he was surrounded by other kids asking to play too, and of course he included them and AJ. He ran around with them and threw to them and just had a great time. I'm not sure who had more fun, him or the kids, but I'm so grateful for him and the great man/father he is.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO RYAN AKA STUDMUFFIN

My awesome hubby's birthday was yesterday and I meant to post about it yesterday but we were busy celebrating family style. We had a great day together despite having awakened to water dripping from the ceiling fixture in our dining room first thing in the morning. Our on the ball landlord got the plumber out right away and even though I spent pretty much the whole morning cleaning up, we had a great afternoon. Ryan is a champ and was content to hang at home and enjoy a steak dinner and his fave... yellow cake with chocolate frosting! It was a great time at home with the boys enjoying his special day as much as he did. He is of course old at a ripe old age of 35 with many more to come I hope!

GRATITUDE

Thank you to my great friend Kelli for watching my little ones today for my stress test. I am so grateful for you! So, in keeping with my committment to be an accurate journaler ( is that even a word? you know what I mean anyhow)... All of my life, at least what I can remember, I have had heart palpitations, sometimes it feels like my heart is doing a somersault in my chest but it always goes away and I've always ignored it. Until about a month ago anyway. I started having chest pain and it started to get old. When Ryan was with me and it happened again, he insisted I see the Dr. So skip to today, I've had an echo, event monitor and EKG's. Today they wanted me to have a stress test since I've been having PVC's (premature ventricular contractions) and I don't want to take meds, I'm not big on meds if I don't absolutely need to take them, so they sent me for a stress test to make sure I don't absolutely need them. The good news is my heart is great. The bad news is I have biatrial enlargement which indicates lung disease. I was told today that I need lung tests to see how bad it is and that I will most likely need to take a steroid daily for the rest of my life to attempt to manage it. I can't tell you how many patients I've taken care of whose bodies are torn up from long term steroid use, the alternative is of course worse, but I was pretty upset. A month ago I was healthy and active, today I have PVC's and fairly advanced lung disease. In the grand scheme of things it's not really so bad. I'm not dying, I don't have cancer and cardiovascularly, I'm in pretty good shape. Thankfully, while I was sitting there waiting for 90 minutes for the test I was reading the Ensign. Seriously like 5 talks on trials, I was starting to worry that the Lord was telling me I was about to have a doozy of a trial and I was starting to panic about maybe losing my husband or kids or something devastating. Then one on Gratitude. So on the way home I realized this isn't the end of the world. I need to back up and remember to be grateful. We found out before I collapsed and died too young. It's not cancer. It's not my heart. There are meds to take care of it. I'm not dying. All of my kids and my husband are healthy and countless other blessings. Maybe this is my trial and I can handle this. I am so thankful for the Ensign, it always seems to have exactly what I need when I need it. The Lord is incredible!!!!!!

JOURNALING

If you were in our ward's Sacrament Meeting yesterday you heard Sister Lewis speak on the importance of journaling not just for our own benefit but also the benefit of our posterity and others. She also mentioned that we will be held accountable for the record we keep and the lessons we could have taught/learned with that record. That is pretty heavy and of course I got to thinking that I obviously haven't been keeping a very good record so I'm recommitting to do better. She also reminded us to represent ourselves truthfully and not try to "whitewash" ourselves. I'd like to think I'm pretty good about that since I frequently share my most embarrassing and unflattering moments, never the less, I can do and will try to do better. I also got to thinking that I should document our Saturday night.
I am so thankful for good friends, of which I am blessed with many. Four of which I was blessed to spend Saturday evening with in the temple and afterwards, dinner. Tisha, thanks for thinking of going and getting the ASL screen for the session, I felt the spirit so much stronger than I can ever remember, I think because I was focusing so hard on the sign language and what was being said. Joyce and Andy, thanks for driving all of us and especially Andy, thanks for saving us from that accident on the way there, that would have ruined the evening. During that session I felt the most love for my incredible husband that I have ever felt. I love him so much and that feeling and the feeling of the spirit testified to me how great our marriage is and how blessed I am to be married to him. I have to admit though that looking at some of the younger men in there made me jealous. I was jealous that I didn't know Ryan when we were 19 or 20 and I wish I had, I'm certain I would have seen then how truly wonderful he is, I could have enjoyed him that much longer. I'm just grateful to have him now and for the last 10 years.