Bad, Bad Blogger!

I know I've been really bad at blogging lately, but I have really good excuses (or at least they sound good to me!). With finishing up my research class, packing and getting ready for the move to Hurricane I've been swamped. Plus, I received the gift of a very nasty cold over the weekend that has brought my life to a screeching halt. I'm glad to be upright! At least I got it now instead of a week from now when we will be doing the big move.

In other news to tide ya'll over until I can get back to more normal blogdom (including unpacking the cord for my camera which I accidentally packed already), the kids are doing great in school. Ashley loves 2nd grade and Gavin and Cierra absolutely love kindergarten. The only thing that we don't like is the bus driver. He is really mean! He yells at the kids constantly and if they get loud he pulls over to yell at them. They were 10 minutes late getting home yesterday from all of the yelling! I'm so glad they won't have him much longer. I think he is in danger of going postal. I'm not kidding.

Anyways, back to packing.....

Bryan's New Job!!

Bryan accepted an offer yesterday from an awesome company. We are so happy and relieved and excited! He starts work today even! The biggest thing about his new job is that we will be moving back to the Hurricane, UT area! Woo Hoo! The kids are so excited. So are we. We will be moving on Saturday, September 26th (loading the truck Friday night/Early Sat. morning). We will miss all of our friends up here, but we are excited for this next phase in our life!

Update on Gavin's Boo Boo

He's doing pretty well. One of the hardest things is to keep him from trying to walk on his bad leg. He is such an active little boy! We can definitely tell when the ibuprofin wears off, but we try to not let that happen. He and Cierra start school tomorrow. Riding the bus will be postponed until Monday after he gets his cast and he can walk again. Until then, I'll be taking them to school and picking them up afterwards. Gavin's teacher said that she will assign him a helper for Thursday and Friday to help him with the things he needs. Poor guy!

When It Rains.....

You know. We seem to be in a downpour!!!!! First, Bryan loses his job, it's taking longer than we thought to find a new one, and now.....wait for it.....Gavin broke his ankle this afternoon. The only thing to do is to laugh maniacally and raid the ice cream!!!!!

Grateful

With everything going on right now, it is really easy to get down in the dumps, so I decided to list all the things I'm grateful for. I started thinking about all the things that Heavenly Father has blessed me with, and I am grateful for so much.

-I'm grateful for a wonderful husband that is a worthy Priesthood holder.

-I'm grateful for three beautiful, smart, healthy children whom I am sealed to forever and ever.

-I'm grateful that my kids are great friends and love to play with each other (most of the time!).

-I'm grateful for the gospel in our lives.

-I'm grateful that I'm able to go back to school (and have something to occupy my mind).

-I'm grateful for my wonderful parents who always support us and give us love.

-Just everything that Heavenly Father has blessed us with. Which is everything!

Did I Mention How Much I Hate Research Papers?

I've been in school for a whole 17 days now, and I'm knee deep in medical journal articles. I'm also preparing to take my first "real" final on Thursday, which is also Ashley's first day of 2nd grade. Busy day! In the meantime, I'm gathering the sources that I need to write a 10-15 page research paper for a different class that I'm taking (LAT1, although I'm sure that doesn't mean anything to any of you!). I haven't had to write a research paper for over 10 years, and I will be so glad when this particular class is over!! My official opinion is: Research Papers Suck! Hey, maybe we could make that into a bumper sticker.

The Time Has Come

The time has come for us to consider moving out of state. He hasn't been offered a job outside of Utah or anything, but we need to open up our options. We really need to find a new job for Bryan in the next 6 weeks - For Real. That is essentially how long we have until we are really in trouble. So, we are now applying for jobs outside of Utah, and hoping that Heavenly Father will lead us wherever we are supposed to be. *As I am trying so hard to give up control (since I have absolutely none) and not freak out*

School Time.....

...for ME! I am officially enrolled in school! I started August 1st (just an orientation class) and I officially enrolled today. I'm so excited!!!

Yet Again....

Well, it has happened again. Just about every 6 months for the past year and a half, Bryan has had to look for a new job. It's just part of the recession. The company wants to keep him, but they just plain run out of work for him to do. So, yet again, he is looking for a new job. If everyone could keep us in their prayers that Bryan can find a GOOD, STABLE job soon, we would really appreciate it. Ugggghhhhh.....

My Genius Little 7 Year Old

I have decided that Ashley is a genius (I'm biased, though!). But listen to this - I was quizzing my kids on rhymes (to combat summer brain atrophy) and was asking Ashley harder ones than the twins, of course. So, to try to trick her I asked her what rhymed with superkalafragalisticexpyaladocious (the Mary Poppins word). About 5 seconds later she said "ferocious"! I couldn't believe it! It really rhymes! Genius I tell you!

Back to School

It's official! I just talked to my entrance councilor with WGU, and she said that financial aid should go through, which means, I'm in!!! I'm going back to school to finally get my degree in Accounting on August 1st. It should take me between 2 and 3 years to finish, depending on how fast I can get through the material. I'm so excited!!

Caught up. Again.

Okay, I'm now pretty much caught up with my posts.  There are quite a few so just keep reading to get them all!  Oh, and they are in chronological order, too.

My Attempt at Gardening

I've never planted a vegetable garden before.  I don't know how successful I will be with vegetables seeing that there are only two house plants that I have managed to not kill since Bryan and I have been married.  Because of this, I didn't want to dig up part of the backyard to try my hand at gardening, so I decided to do it in containers on the deck.  We (the kids helped) planted tomatoes, peppers, carrots, and green beans.  The first three are in the above picture, and the beans are below.   I'm really pleased with how they are doing!  We planted right after Mother's day, and we even did seeds instead of plants!  (Ignore the dead plant towards the middle.  Yet another victim of my house plant murdering spree.  I haven't disposed of the body yet.)

Our New Dining Set

This is our new "dining set".  It's this cute little picnic table that I found at Costco, and it is perfect for the kids!  We keep it out on the deck and they love to eat outside now.  They also paint and play with their play dough on it.  It's great for me because then the mess is outside instead of inside!  Last night they ate watermelon until they exploded.

UP in 3D

I took the kids to see the movie "UP" in 3D after Ashley got out of school for the summer, sort of like a "Congratulations!  You survived first grade!" kind of thing.  They liked the movie.  They liked the glasses even more!

Fathers and Sons 2009

Gavin and Bryan went to the Fathers and Sons campout at the end of May.  They even stayed overnight this year!  This is Gavin all set and ready to leave.  He gave the thumbs-up all by himself.  He was so excited!  Bryan took a bunch of pictures while they were out.  Enjoy!

This is a little boy from our ward that Gavin hung out with that day.

I swear this boy cannot keep his tongue in his mouth!  He always has it sticking out!  But he's a cutie anyways.  I'm so glad we have this little guy in our family.  He may be our only little boy, and he sure is a little guy, but he makes up for it with a HUGE personality!  Love you Buddy!

Turning 5!!

Gavin and Cierra turned 5 years old on May 14th.  We had a small celebration at home on their birthday and then had a little party in Hurricane when we went down there for Memorial Day weekend.  They had so much fun with their cousins and friends in Hurricane!!  Thanks everyone that could come!  It was great to see you.  Hopefully we can see everyone else next time.

Sorry it's sideways.  This is Gavin and Cierra's "5" cake made from cupcakes.

This is when the twins saw their birthday presents as Bryan was bringing their new bikes down the stairs.

Gavin and Cierra on their new bikes.  I told them to smile and this is what they did!  Cute!!

Blowing out their candles.  They each had 5 candles on their half of the cake.

The party in Hurricane.  Everything was soooo great!  Thanks to everyone.  Thanks to Sweetheart for making the cupcakes in the shapes of a "C" and a "G"!  It was great!

Update...

So, I'm doing much better.  My thyroid hormones (which had gotten extremely low) are now "approaching normal" again and I'm off all the meds.  Hopefully my thyroid is healing from the viral attack sooner than they thought and everything is leveling out already.  I go back in for another blood test to check my levels in 4 weeks.  Which, by the way, is very nice because I've been going in every week for the last 3 weeks for blood tests and all of my veins are blown now.  Hopefully they will have time to heal before I go in again in a month.

In other news, I'm also doing better with the whole "we're not adopting anymore" thing.  My kids are awesome and I can be a really good mom to the three of them.  Another thing that is helping is that we're working on something for me to focus my OCD brain on so I'm not obsessing over not having a baby.  I'm going to go back to school to finally get my degree.  I've been accepted to WGU (a really cool, totally accredited online university that Bryan and Matt got their degrees from) and start the first of August.  The last hurdle is financial aid, which I should find out if I'm getting any soon.  But it's looking good and I'm really excited.  I should be able to finish in 2-3 years depending on how much I remember from my previous college classes (that were at least 8 years ago, I feel soooo old).  Wish me luck!

Explination

So a bunch of you probably came to my blog over the last couple of days because that handy dandy little sidebar feed that a lot of you have told you that I had a new post up called "I Wish..." but once you got here there was no such post.  No you are not crazy.  Neither is the handy dandy gadget that told you about the post.  I really did write a post called "I Wish..." and posted it on Saturday night.  It was up for all of about 7 1/2 hours before I took it down.  It was a little poem venting my feelings.  It was kind of sad and depressing.  So I took it down.  No need to depress all you wonderful people with my I'm-in-the-4th-stage-in-the-5-stages-of-grieving-AKA-depression-post.  So, just know that I'm trying to work through it, and the good news is that the 5th stage of grief is acceptance - I'm just one step away!  BTW - the 4th stage isn't fun.  I hope I can work through it quickly.

Ashley's Future "Job"

Ashley just told me that when she grows up she wants to be a "Vegetarian" (she meant to say Veterinarian).  So cute!