Wednesday, July 28, 2010

A Fun Little Color Test

I found this color/personality test this morning on How About Orange.  You choose your favorite and least favorite colors and it gives you some insight to your personality.  Takes less than 5 minutes.  (Great little time waster without wasting too much time.)  I liked in the results that it made mention this is your personality today (because you know we could very well choose different colors tomorrow depending on mood, weather, etc).  So, here's the 411 on what I'm like today.

You are 47 % extrovert and 53 % introvert.


You are a manager and a structured person, you know how to take into account the needs of each person while leading them towards the set goals.

You are also creative, you always have new ideas, and your inspiration comes from the inside.

Finally you are able to listen to others, you show a good emotional intelligence, you know how to bring your support to others.
 
I really liked this last statement:
 
You are a creative person, with always new ideas, and you know how to apply them, You are intellectual and intelligent, you wonder and you inquire before taking any action and setting your values.
 
Not sure how accurate it all is, but it made me feel good.  Sometimes, that's enough.

Friday, July 23, 2010

Tools

Sometimes there are tools that you cannot live without.  They make a daunting task easy.  They make it fun.  They make you do it.  :)  Here are a few of my favorite "tools" that get me going. (I should mention none of these are my personal photos.  All were searched out by using google images)

My vacuum.

This baby may not be the best in the market, but it is heads above my last one.  (But not quite as good as my 1st Bissell, may it rest in peace.)  Vacuuming was always a favorite, preferred chore of mine until I had this yellow beastly vacuum that refused to work.  Since replacing it with this beauty, vacuuming is back in "preferred chore" status.

My Bosch.

I loved baking before this guy came a long, but I was content to use my hand mixer or a wooden spoon.  Now, it is my sole baking mixer.  It mixes, it kneads, it blends, shreds and it's easy to clean! I love you Bosch!!

My gardening gloves.

I don't mind getting out and pulling some weeds or digging in the dirt or planting or other types of yard work, but until recently you would find me doing all these chores bare handed.  I hate the bulkiness of gardening gloves. It felt awkward to garden in them.  So I went bare-handed. I mean, you can only get so much dirt under your nails, right? After awhile there's no more room for it.  ;)  This summer I had it though. I found some fitted gardening gloves at Lowe's and forked over the big $$ for these.  I love them.  (The brand is Ethel if you are wondering.) Not only are my nails clean after gardening, but my hands are too!  And, bonus- yard work is now getting done.  (I'm going to have a party to celebrate my good-looking yard. Seriously.)

Lastly (for now anyway)-my camera.

Once again, not top of the line, but it's great for my every day use.  As I've been sorting through the last 2 years worth of pictures trying to get a big order ready to print, it's hit me just how blessed I am.  How this tiny little machine can catch the depth of my baby's super deep dimple.  How it makes my oldest look even more like a super model than she already does. How it is the only thing that catch my son's thoughtful smile.  I could cry for all the happy memories that we have as a family that will be remembered in crystal clear detail because of this little thing. 

Do you have a favorite "tool" that makes your life easier?

Thursday, July 22, 2010

Sometimes it pays to not do yard work

At the beginning of spring, we found out we were expecting baby #4.  All my plans (not that they were grand) of gardening were thrown out the window.  I didn't even have enough time to get to my winter clean-up stage before sickness set in.  So, I decided, we'll just do what we need to to keep up the bare minimum, i.e. Jeff will mow the lawn.  :)

Let me tell you, for once, ignoring the yard has paid off!  Off my patio I have these 3 giant planters that I like to put the wave petunias in. They fill out nicely.  The only problem with petunias is they are annuals, causing me to shell out money each spring (wave petunias are a little more pricey than your regular variety).  Well, well, well.  2 out of the 3 containers are now blossoming with wave petunias that we neither bought nor planted this year!  That's right.  Due to my lack of diligent care for my flowers, they went to seed and I now have two containers full of beautiful, sweet smelling petunias.  For free. Ha!

One other gardening tip-wait til July to purchase your flowers.  What once was $6 or more per pot, you can now by for $2/pot.  Thus filling the 3rd pot.  :)

Friday, July 16, 2010

With Service Comes Trials

Jeff's parents are serving in the Denver South mission. I believe their official start date was July1.  It didn't take long for the faith-testing trials to come in.  Just after they were officially in the mission and working, 2 of my adorable little nieces both landed in the hospital.  It's been a rough week or so.  One niece has been at the Seattle Children's hospital.  She's home for now and things are looking good, but it will be a long road for her and her family.  It makes me sad that I can't visit her. 

So when my other niece Gabby landed in the hospital (Primary Children's) Sunday night, we made sure to go visit a couple of times.  Gabby was pretty sedated the first time, but McKay managed to make her smile.  We didn't stay too long, but promised to come back later in the week.  Yesterday was our 2nd visit.  Gabby seemed to be doing much better.

(From this picture, you'd think I was the paparazzi!)

We got to go to the playroom with her for a little while.  It was so fun!  I loved watching the volunteers and staff get really involved with all the patients-playing games, with toys, making crafts, etc.  But then, I noticed they started inviting my kids to participate too.  It was just a little above and beyond what they needed to do.  And I really appreciated it.  One staff member got McKay and Lyndsi involved in making their own little Hospital Buddies.

Sophie had no interest in that and headed for the little dollhouse.  She's very content to play on her own, and I didn't think about it.  Soon I looked over and saw this.  It melted my heart. 

While they were busy, I was busy with this

my newest niece, Afton.  And visiting with her mom and dad.

For all the heaviness that's been hanging around our hearts lately, this was a fun and uplifting experience. 

I've joked a little with Jeff that if these are the kinds of things that happen when his parents leave on a mission, they are not allowed to go again. :)  But, then I thought to myself, what if these things were to happen anyway?  I'm so glad that they are where they are, serving faithfully.  Elder Hales promised our families tremendous blessings for Alan and Laurie's service. Despite the awful trials happening, blessings are already being manifested.  And life is good.

Wednesday, July 14, 2010

Awesome Giveaway!

Have you seen the super cool Silhouette machine?  Little Birdie Secrets is giving away one here!  The contest ends tonight, so sorry about the short notice.  :)

Thursday, July 8, 2010

Ultrasound

The final vote stands at Boy: 5 Girl: 2.  In this instance, the underdog wins.


IT'S A GIRL!!!

Tuesday, July 6, 2010

4th of July Weekend

I love long weekends, especially ones where we get to play all weekend.  Which is exactly what we did.

Saturday we headed out to Copperton for their Town Days breakfast and races.  We met up with some friends there and enjoyed a yummy hot breakfast of eggs, hash browns, ham, sausage, french toast sticks, fruit and drinks.  The kids opted for the playground most of the morning, but there were also lots of fun races for all age groups.  We did convince Lyndsi to do the Father/Daughter 3-legged race.  The morning was comfortably cool so after the park we decided to head to the zoo. (Sorry-no pictures.) It was the perfect day for walking around the zoo.  It was surprisingly uncrowded and not hot at all.  Jeff sprung for all the kids to ride the carousel which made the afternoon complete in their little eyes.  Later that night we had our friends back over for fireworks and ice cream.  It wasn't your city-sponsored display, but we had lots of fun and found it just right for all the little ones that were there.

Sunday we rested.  Saturday was busy and Monday morning was coming quick.

Our other friends invited us to attend Provo's Freedom Fest with them. The Stringham's have been going every year and always start off with the hot air balloon fest in the morning.  So, 5 a.m. found us on the road to Provo so we could get the perfect spot to watch the balloons.  Which we got.  Except it turned out to be not so perfect.  We had to keep moving for the balloonists.  It's all good.  We had fun watching the balloons and enjoying a picnic sunrise breakfast with great friends. 

The parade was next on our agenda.  Despite not camping out the night before we still got a good spot.  Some parade favorites were the highway patrolman on their motorcycles, the scouts carrying tons of American flags, the military tributes, firetrucks (always a crowd pleaser), the missionaries from the Provo mission and the big Macy's Parade-style balloons, especially the Curious George one.

For lunch we headed to the park and partook of fair food.  The kids also got to do lots of free crafts.  Cami and I also got to sneak off without the kids to enjoy a little window shopping and cotton candy (yum!). 

Apparently, none of us had our fill of fun yet and went to SubZero for some ice cream.  I got Lime with sour patch kids.  You can blame that one on the pregnancy, but it was very refreshing and light tasting.  Not too sour, but just enough.  Next time though, I think I'll take my sour patch kids on the side.  I forget what ice cream does to gummy candies. 

A busy weekend, but lots of fun.  My kids are finally out for a 3 week summer break.  Time to party!

Thursday, July 1, 2010

generic update

Just a couple of days after McKay lost his first tooth, he popped out his 2nd on his own.  Hopefully there are no more loose teeth.  Not sure if the tooth fairy has enough cash to cover that cute little mouth. 

The kids are both finishing school this week. McKay's last day was today and Lyndsi's is tomorrow.  This school year has seemed long.  I'm looking forward to a few weeks of summer with my 3 kiddos before we jump into a new scool year.  I feel like I've hardly had any time with them this last month.

Jeff's parents got off to the mission home fine and are getting settled in.  He was able to talk to both of his parents the other day.  He said they sounded a little flustered, but who isn't moving to a new place?  If you know anyone heading to the Denver South mission, just let them know they will have the best mission president they could ever hope for. :)

One more week and we'll be in for our ultrasound.  I've always looked forward to my ultrasounds, but I'm down right excited about this one.  The general concensus is a boy.  I have no personal feeling either way and am determined we are getting puppies.  ;)  Whatever the outcome is, I'm excited to start working on some baby projects for this kid.