Danielle's Blog

First Half of March 2011

2011-03-21T11:53:00.000-07:00

I do not know why but March is always a super packed month for us. Everything seems to happen in March. Maybe people think the weather will start to be nice in March? I have no idea what it is but mans alive my schedule is packed this month. Here are some highlights of the first 2 or so weeks.

Dallen and I painted one of the walls in Claira's room for her birthday. She is not into pink anymore and wants to paint her whole room green but I do not want to do all that work, for a color she is not going to be in love with in 2 more years. So we painted just one wall. It went pretty quick but we ran out of paint half way through. Luckily Sandy was in town and picked me up another can. The paint can said that it was a paint and primer in one and would cover 380 square feet. We were only painting one wall so I figured it would cover. But the paint was really thin. I guess that is what I get for not going to Home Depot or Lowes to get the paint. Now Dallen wants his room painted. I told him maybe this summer......maybe.

Claira going into her room after school that day. It took her a while to even notice the wall. All she noticed was that I cleaned her room and made her bed.

Later that evening we opened presents. There was not much to open but she got everything she wanted except some church dresses. We looked and looked online for a week before her birthday but we found nothing that was both modest and that she liked. So when we go to Reno next we will get a couple church dresses and maybe some shorts for the summer.

Then we had cake for dessert. The weekend before Claira had a sleep over with a couple of friends. We watched Napoleon Dynamite, ate tons of Pizza, had banana splits for dessert (well I had bananas), and the girls played xbox and wii. It was a night of lots of high pitched girly shrills.

The rest of our afternoons have been filled with lots and lots of Volleyball....

We also had New Beginings at church. The girls were in charge which was nice for us leaders. It was nice and small and quick. Quick is always a plus on a Sunday evening. They made a Value Fruit Salad.

February 2011

2011-03-13T21:44:00.000-07:00

February, well my household calendar is super full so we must have done a lot. Even with all the activities with the kids I did manage to find time to do something for myself.

I made this bag. I love it it holds so much. I am hoping to make another one soon.

We had wonderful spring like weather the first part of February. Then it hit. We got hammered with snow. Claira had the 14th off and also the 21st (for Valentines Day and President's Day). On the 15th it was so windy that they called a late start and then the power went out so they ended up calling for no school that day. The 16th the power was still out so no school again and it started to snow. Luckily we had power the whole time, we are on a different power company than the school. On Thursday the snow had let up a bit and so they had school. Thursday night another storm rolled in and they should have called a no school day because weather wise it was the worst day of the week but they did not. An hour later the power went out again and so they called a minimum day. The picture above is the snow that we got on Thursday, it just kept coming and coming.

Dallen did not have too much going on in Feb. just keeping up with his school work and scouts. He finished up all the requirements for his bear. So he is now a weblows.

Claira continued with Club Volleyball every Tuesday and Thursday. At the end of the month open gym for school volleyball began. In 4-H we worked on our quilt tops for fair. In photography for 4-H we did a fun little photo booth for the Milford Fire Department's Annual Fundraiser Dinner. That was a lot of fun the kids learned so much from it.

Every year the 6th grade kids are allowed to attend one dance a year. Traditionally it is the Valentine's Day Dance. At this dance they announce the King and Queen (8th grade) and Prince and Princess (7th Grade). Claira found out on Thursday that Claira was one of the two nominations for Princess. I thought this was pretty exciting but Claira was not that excited. She could have cared less either way. Claira did not win but she was totally fine with it.

These are the pre-Dance pictures. A whole bunch of girls got ready together at the Fortin's house. Claira is not really a fancy dancy kind of girl she rather just put her hair in a pony or a bun and call it good. For this dance we told her she had to get her hair done because she was going to be in front of everyone for the whole Princess thing. So she agreed to let Hannah do her hair.

January 2011

2011-03-13T17:41:00.000-07:00

Hmmm What did January hold for us? Claira started Club Volleyball. I figured if she wanted to try out for school volleyball team she needed to see if she really liked volleyball first. After the first practice she loved it and decided that she was going to try out for the school team. So every Tuesday and Wednesday night I drove Claira to town for Club Volleyball.

We made a yummy looking turkey....

it tasted good too.

Dallen learned how to ride his new (to him) motorcycle. The neighbors were nice enough to come over and give him some tips. They even gave us their old riding gear. He loves riding but can only ride once all his school work and chores are done for the day.

Claira had a school dance towards the end of the month. Here are some of the highlights....

Savanah, Claira, Erika, Deanna and Julie before the dance.

Logan and Claira dancing.

Deanna, Heather, Julie, Callie, Erika, Savanah and Claira.

December 2010

2011-03-12T23:33:00.000-08:00

     I have been wanting to update my blog for weeks. There is just never any time for me to get "my" things accomplished. So tonight I could not sleep, after laying there for an hour trying to fall asleep I decided that I might as well get up and accomplish something.
      My last post was the middle of December. Really it was not a post at all, just a note saying to check out a contest. Many contests have you post on your blog or on Facebook as to spread the word about the contests. If you post on your blog about a contest you will often get an extra entry, so hey what can it hurt.

     I find it so much easier to read blogs that have pictures. It just keeps my attention so much better :) So lets see what pictures I have from December....

Well first pics I come across was the Janesville Wrestling Tournament. Since there are no wrestling pictures of my own kid I will not share, but I did get some good shots. Dallen had so much fun being back on the mat cheering on his old teammates as they wrestled. Of course he was yelling at them telling them to sprawl and such just as always.

   The next set of pictures is the Janesville Christmas Program. The Jr High kids always do some type of dance at the performance rather than sing a song. Thankfully my kid is short and was once again in one of the front rows. As soon as the program was over I took Claira out of school for the day, all they were going to do was goof around and eat junk food. So Claira and Jessica came home with me and had a party of their own.

Deanna Julie and Claira


Dancing Queen

Then we have the pictures from the Soccer Team Christmas Party. Of course it was inside in the evening (never makes for good pictures), and the girls were always moving (also another picture nightmare). There are a few that turned out OK.

Claira and Jessica

It was actually Holly's 12th birthday that day too.

They had an ornament exchange and Sally and Jessica saw this ornament and knew it was a perfect one for Claira. So they worked it so that Claira was able to win the ornament.

At the end of the night we let the girls let off sparklers....

Jessica

Then came Christmas but I do not have any of those pictures edited yet. For some reason Christmas pictures are always hard for me. I feel like it is pictures of the same things over and over again....this gift and that gift. Plus I think it bothers me to have pictures of the Christmas mess. Kinda an OCD thing.

After Christmas we went to Granny's to see my boys. I had never actually celebrated KK's birthday with him ever. The end of December is just a hard time to come down the mountain. You never know when there is going to be snow until a day or so before hand and then you have to worry about if you can get back up the mountain when you need to get back home. I was a nervous wreck this time coming home because I knew that it was supposed to snow. And it did. Snow does not bother me here but in the mountains where you have no cell service and cliffs to drive off of and trees to hit. It has begun to freak me out ever since we spun off the road on our way home from Redding on May 22nd. It just took me looking down for one second and BAM I must have hit the slick road just right and we were spinning off the road..... anyways here are some of my favorite pics from KK's 5th birthday.

Dallen Granny and KK

Birthday Boy

Grampy building legos with Dallen and TJ

Claira and TJ

Can you roll your eyes as good as this kid?

Giveaway

2010-12-18T10:06:00.000-08:00

Honeyville farms is doing a giveaway check them out

Week 49- Opps

2010-12-13T12:20:00.000-08:00

Wow week 49 last post was week 33 and I did not even post that full week until today. I figured now that I am home most days again that I will start blogging again. I changed my blogger template I was tired of the plain boring template. But when I did that many of my pictures did not fully show up so I went back through my old posts and fixed all the pictures. So I have gotten NOTHING done today. That seems to be the way my days are going lately.   I also set up a new blog just for pictures so that when I enter contests and need to do blog post about photography things I can just post on that blog rather than linking my "family" blog up for all the world to access ( well easier access I guess).

So what happened in the last 16 weeks?   I was overly busy that is what!
     Claira played competitive soccer and so we were gone every weekend from September to mid November. We are currently on a "Holiday Break" from soccer and practice will begin again after the Holidays. It was a lot of fun doing the whole soccer thing but I am so glad to be taking a little break. Claira is also doing 4-H again. I am still the sewing leader but we are calling it Quilting rather than sewing just because we are making quilts for fair. Claira really likes making the stuff this year and wants to do so many projects on her own but there is just not enough time.

     I was released from YW and put back in 2 minutes later. I am now working with Amy Lott she is new in our ward and it seems to be going well so far. I am taking a break from the PO for a bit well OK I guess break is not the right word but I have had to cut my hours back dramatically last week I only worked 2 hours the week before 3. Yeah, big change from the 20 I was working. Since I am not working so much I am trying to catch up on all the projects I have waiting to be finished. I am not really making much progress on that though.

     Dallen is now doing Charter School. I could no longer handle the stuff going on there so we pulled him out. So far it is working out great we were very lucky in that the teacher we were placed with is a special Education teacher and is helping him learn to "deal " with his crazy learning style, she also happens to be a member of the church just in a ward in town. She is giving him a lot of writing assignments to challenge him and get him to start learning how to get things that he knows down on paper. If you are to ask him about a book that he just read, verbally he can tell you all about it but he can not seem to get it out on paper. We picked up our assignments for the next 4 weeks ( but 2 of those weeks are Christmas Vacation so we do not have to do school work),   and in the assignment he has to write a fiction story. The story has to have 9 paragraphs in it. I am positive that this will be a big challenge for him but with a whole month to complete the task it should be doable. Since he is not enrolled in Janesville school he is not allowed to wrestle with the team. This was the hardest part about withdrawing him from school cause he loves to wrestle and is so good at it. I did not want to take away the thing that he excels at the most but school will just become harder each year if he does not get the help he needs now.

So that is what has been going on here. Let's see if I can keep up with my little blog at least for the rest of the year.

Week 33 August 8th thru August 14th

2010-12-13T11:32:00.000-08:00

Sunday- We are back home and totally exhausted. Getting up in time for church was really hard. But Dallen was the one who was up and ready to go this week. After church we swung by Carol's house to pick up our peaches. They were nice and yummy! Eddie came home from work and made us some yummy venison stroganof for dinner.

Monday- I went to work in the morning.... no real new developments as to how much money the job is being offered for. So until I even know how much per hour there is no way I am going to say either ya or nay about accepting the job. Claira and Dallen both had soccer practice. It is the perfect time for me to walk on the track for a half hour while both of them are still practicing in the same location. Today though, I forgot my darn tennis shoes. So, I ended up walking in my flip flops for a total of one mile. After one mile I knew I was going to end up with blisters in-between my toes. So that is as far as I went. Hopefully this can be a routine for me.

Tuesday- The peaches were getting nice and soft, actually too soft. So soft that actually canning them was not going to work out. Claira and I pealed them and cut them into quarters and then froze about 10 pounds worth. Then I started to make jam out of the other 10 pounds. I did not have enough pectin though, so we froze a bit more and will have to pick up some more pectin soon. Standing on my feet all day cooking is not for me!! It stresses me out big time. I did get quite a bit of peach jam made up. I am thinking I will us the peach jam instead of pineapple apricot for Russian Chicken, cause I really do not think we will go through that much peach jam in a years time. In the evening we had a sewing meeting at the house. Sandy was nice enough to spring for some Papa Murphy's Pizza. It was a nice and easy dinner and a good easy meeting to get the girls APRs updated and done. Dallen and Eddie left today to go camping for a couple days up at Antelope Lake. It is nice to have a little piece and quiet around here.

Week 29- July 11th thru July 17th

2010-08-10T20:57:00.003-07:00

Sunday-Today I drove down to Sac to drop Claira off for soccer camp. Adrienne met me at Grandma's and she took Claira down to Turlock for a week of soccer. After the left Torrie and David came over with brand new baby Lucas and Miss Abby. Lucas looks just like Dallen did when he was a baby. And Dallen looked just like Lance when he was a baby. It is kinda funny and scary how dominate the Sorenson genes are. Later that evening my boy Kayden came over to visit. He was so excited that I was there, he wanted me to spend the night at his house. I told him I could spend the night one night at his house the next time I came to town.

Monday- Today I went shopping for a bit with Mom and then to lunch. Then it was back on the road to Janesville. Dallen and Eddie went to Reno with Shawn, Marybeth, Trevor, Sarah and Paige. They had fun living it up at Scheels and eating sushi.

Week 28- July 4th thru July 10th

2010-08-10T20:57:00.001-07:00

Sunday- Today was the 4th of July. It is everyone's favorite holiday in this house but mine. I just feel like I am lighting my money on fire and just watching it go up in smoke. But every year I get voted out, and we go spend big money on fireworks. At least it is only once a year. This year we headed over to the Aston's house for dinner. Then headed to town to watch the fireworks from the fair grounds. From there we all went over to the Satndback's to light off our personal fireworks. It was a lot of fun and the kids all had a blast.

Monday-It is so nice when holidays are on a Sunday. At least from a postal standpoint. Today was a postal holiday! It was nice to be able to stay home and not have to go into work. Not much got done today but it was nice to just sit around and relax.

Tuesday- All good things must come to an end. It was back to work today. Work days after a holiday are HORRIBLE at the Post Office. The mail was off the hook.

Week 27 - June 27th thru July 3rd

2010-08-10T20:56:00.000-07:00

Man I have done it again, I am 6 weeks behind on blogging again. It is going to take me awhile to remember what all went on. The summer seems busier than during the school season.

Week 26 - June 20th thru 26th

2010-07-17T09:13:00.000-07:00

Here it is another almost month since I updated my blog..... looks like I did not learn my lesson from last time.

Sunday was Fathers Day. Thursday of last week we learned that the YW were in charge of the Fathers Day gifts in church. If we had more time the possibilities would be endless. Since that is not the case here, Annette came up with a great idea. Thank heavens I have a great president, without her this job would not be so much fun, and would be quite a bit of stress. Annette purchased some cute little boxes and decided to make some little banana bread loafs to put inside them. She baked everything and wrapped them up all by herself. All I had to do was print up some Happy Fathers Day tags. Here is what they turned out like....

     After church we came home and got started on making Eddie his Fathers Day dinner. ( Potato Salad, Rib-Eye, garlic bread and banana cream pie for dessert) Eddie came home and we opened presents. He got his blanket, and a new cordless drill set and some chaps. Shortly after, Elder Fetner and his splits companion arrived. Our house was a total disaster with wrapping paper and presents all over the living room. The companion asked if it was someone's birthday.... I said no, what is today???..... Fathers Day?!?.... Yeah..... You guys give present?......UMMM yeah........oh we just walk by and say Happy Fathers Day.   He was surprised that we did so much for Fathers Day.

     After dinner Eddie went out to look at his truck. On his way home he was hearing some noises that he wanted to check out. He took it for a test drive and almost did not make it back. He got back and figured out that he had some big issues. The Hub was bad the axle, barrings, etc. So it was a bad end to a good day.

Monday-Eddie came home from workk and of course the only thing on his mind was looking at the truck and trying to fix it. With not having the right tools, an organized garage and no cement pad to lay down and work on the truck at, he decided to just take it into Les Schwab to have it fixed. It was not an easy decision but he was already stressed out about cutting firewood before the woods are closed. He needs the truck fixed as fast as possible.

Tuesday- This morning I called good old Susanville Towing and had them come out and tow the truck into town. Les Schwab said they would be able to fix the truck with in about a week. Hopefully this way Eddie can not stress so much about getting it fixed.   For YW tonight we did a "Chopped" type cook off with 1st and 2nd wards. The girls had so much fun. We gave them a few key ingredients and they had to make a dessert out of them. Our girls were the ones who ended up winning! We hope that this will become a little tradition with in the 3 wards to kinda keep us connected a little.

Wednesday-Today we just hung out waiting for the paycheck to arrive but it never came. Claira had soccer practice and that was about it.

Thursday- Woo Hoo the paycheck has arrived! So we decided to head to Reno and do a real food shopping trip. We had not gone real shopping in over a month and things were getting a little low. We took the entire day and shopped and shopped. We tried out a new sushi restaurant, Sushi 7. We really liked it it was nice and bright, the owners were very friendly and they have kids too so they were very understanding with the kids. The food was good too. We even tried a roll that had banana on top of it. It was ok I thought, Eddie and Dallen did not like it though.

Saturday- Today Eddie had a holiday from work.

Week 25- June 13th thru 19th

2010-06-19T21:41:00.000-07:00

     Our week was super busy as always.... I thought summer would be a little less running around but I guess not. In fact I got my oil changed when I was in Sacramento the 2nd week of May, and I am already due for another oil change. It has only been 6 WEEKS!

     Sunday our lesson in YW was on keeping a journal. Not one of the girls actually writes in a journal. I totally did at their age.   I do not keep a personal journal anymore I just use my blog as a journal.... one with things that you do not mind the rest of the world reading. But I do have it printed out so that it is actually on paper not just in cyber-land.

     Monday was soccer. Thank heavens we carpool with the Fortin family otherwise soccer would absolutely drain me mentally, physically, and financially. 3 hour practices are too long to just sit there and wait, and just short enough that once I did drive back home I would not be home for long before running back to town. Thankfully I only have to drive one way and Sandy drives the other way.

     Tuesday the YW met here and we learned how to use Royal Icing. It was really fun decorating the cookies. I think these lessons on cake decorating have been so much fun for the girls. Some of them have really learned a lot.

    Wednesday we drove to Reno and picked up Eddie's "New to Him Truck". It was a rather exhausting afternoon. We could not meet the guy until 4 as he had to be at work. So there was no point in leaving first thing in the morning. Claira had soccer so we left her with Sandy around 1. Then we headed to the bank in Reno. We arrived at the bank to see a note on the door. "This Branch is Closed"   What the heck we were just here 3 weeks before making sure that this bank was a "sister-bank" to our bank in Sacramento, and that we would be able to pull out enough money at one time to purchase the truck. So that added a bunch of anxiety.   So I called a bank on the list of "close branches" to see where in the world they were located. Of course they had to be in the most awkward location. Down town Reno where there is no parking and streets are screwy, and it was on the 3rd floor of a medical office. Who would have thought to look for a bank there???? So I went in to get a check printed for the sellers and plain forgot there last name.   So down I had to go to find the boys in the car to get the paper that had the last name - cause Eddie did not bring his cell with him.   Then back up and got the paper work.   After all was said and done it was an hour later than planned and it was now time to get back on the road to meet the guy. They happen to live in Red Rock, which is a very cute little valley but of course it is about 40 min from Reno towards home.   So we get there and they are very nice people. We stayed and chatted for a while, the wife was feeling a little guilty because her husband was getting rid of his baby because of her. She was just getting to "old" to ride in the truck anymore. Once that was done I headed home and Eddie headed to Reno to go to Home Depot so he could get some supplies to build a wood rack.

(I will upload a pic of the new truck tomorrow)

     Thursday was another oh so fun day. Registering the truck! It took Eddie all morning. The rest of our money was turned over to the Great State of California, and we were given a sticker to place on the truck in return.   Dallen and Eddie built the racks that afternoon, while I had a presidency meeting in the house. It was a very productive meeting. We planned some fun things for the girls. That evening Claira and I got the joy of attending a 4-H counsel meeting. It was not that bad but it just ment another trip into town.

    Friday we slept in - that is one nice thing about summer I HATE getting up in the mornings no matter if it is 4 or 9, though it is a little easier at 9.   Then we watched Alice in Wonderland while I worked on Eddie's Fathers Day blanket. It is a rag quilt and dang my fingers hurt by the time I was done snipping the edges. 2 of my fingers still hurt and are a little tingly.   He better like it Dang it!   I know he will. he had been asking for one for a while now.

( I will post a picture of the blanket tomorrow it is currently wrapped up in a box)

     Saturday (today- man I am on top of blogging this week hehehe), I took the truck out for the first time. It is alot higher than I am used to driving and a lot wider and it is a deisel so there are a few things I am not used to. So I did not drive as my peppy self. Our first adventure was to the DUMP!!!   I was so excited to have a truck again so that we could make a run to the dump. Sick I know, but that is what I was most excited about. We filled up the truck, honestly could have gotten a little more in it but I was not in the mood to stuff it as full as I could. And off we went. Of course I am so short that I had to scoot the seat up nice and close, which ment I could not even use my side mirrors. Eddie is going to have to purchase different mirrors for me. (These ones are not adjustable.) The guy at the dump, the worker, just sat there and gave me dirty looks while I slowly tried to back up. I think honestly he was hoping that I would hit his truck and boof it. We got the yucky garbage unloaded and were out of there. Man that is a stinky place.

      Now we are just hanging out waiting for Eddie to come home from work. The kids are playing the Wii and Xbox ( yeah not at the same time - just back and forth between games) and here I sit on the puter trying to stay on top of things.

Week 24- June 6th thru June 12th

2010-06-19T20:57:00.000-07:00

     It took me forever but I got caught up on the blog. It is way easier just to do it week by week but sometimes there are just not enough hours in the day.

   This was our first full week of summer. Monday, Dallen went swimming all day up at the Carters. He always has fun running around on their ranch up there. Claira and I went to town and ran some errons. I decided that at least during the summer I was just going to work 3 days a week max. I just want to be able to have fun and actually go places with the kids while school is out. So day one of no work turned out to be perfect that I was not there.

Monday also happened to be our anniversary. 14 Years. We decided to go out to dinner. We ended up heading into town for Chinese at our regular Chinese spot. Claira and Dallen stayed home and ate our leftovers when we got back.

    Tuesday, we had another cake decorating class here. This time the girls were to come with a cake that was fully frosted and they would do the fun decorating part here. It was lots of fun they all have improved a lot. Here are a few pics from that night.

Claira decorating her cake

Her final product

Sam and her cupcake

Miss Paige

Kambry's finished product

     Wednesday, Claira ended up having soccer and Sandy was nice enough to take Claira both ways for me. Dallen was up camping at the lake with Darrell. He left for Darrell's house Monday night and was not going to be back until Thursday afternoon.

     Thursday, Dallen came back home. Claira was so excited about that as you can imagine.

     Friday was the ward pot luck dinner and baseball game at Janesville Park. So we headed over, Eddie even came with. He actually ended up playing baseball too. I did not! It was a fun time. We played beach blanket volley ball. Eddie was himself and grabbed a hold of the water balloons and tagged Tara with them, she was a good sport though and grabbed some herself and tried to get him back. It was quite funny. Then we played a pioneer game of tag. Basically everyone has 3 clothes pics on the back of your shirt and you run around and try to steal them off the other people. Last one in wins. The YW ended up getting me to play that it was fun but man it is hard going against fast little kids. Here are some pics from the evening.

     Saturday, Claira had soccer all day. It was good though cause it left me and Dallen home alone to get some things done. She is going to have soccer every other sat all summer. It shall be interesting.

I Heart Faces Photo Walk - Sacramento

2010-06-08T09:44:00.000-07:00

I attended the I Heart Faces Photo Walk in Sacramento this past weekend. April Williams and I drove down together. It was our first Photo Walk so we really did not know what to expect. It turned out to be a lot of fun and we plan to attend some more soon. I am not a professional photographer by any means but I love taking pictures for fun. Here are a FEW of my pictures from our walk. (The girl in most of the pictures in Marina, she was our model.)

Week 23 - May 30th thru June 5th

2010-06-06T16:50:00.000-07:00

      It has been weeks since I updated my blog so in order to keep my weekly posts in order I have created a "post" for each week I missed. Hopefully before I totally forget what happened in those weeks I can edit the posts and update them with pictures from those weeks and list the events of the weeks. We will see how good I actually do. ( LOL )

     On the 30th Dallen was finally baptized. He had been waiting to be baptized for a long long time. We kept putting it off for one reason or another and then all of a sudden he was already 9 years old. Once you are officially 9 then you have to take the discussions from the Missionaries.   So we then kept putting git off because when in the world were we going to have the time to talk the discussions.   But we finally said "OK, IT HAS TO BE DONE NOW!"    Why now you ask????   Well, Dallen was very addiment that he was not going to let Callie Marie ( Auntie Michelle's daughter) get baptized before he did. He kept asking if he was going to be able to be baptized before Callie.   Callie's 8th birthday is this 4th of July, so he just barely made it.

     It was decided that Elder Davis, was going to be the one who would actually baptize Dallen. (After all the long hours the Missionaries spent with Dallen teaching him - they needed to get something for all the hard work.) Grandpa would be the one to confirm Dallen. Grandma would give the talk on baptism ( as she did at Claira's baptism, cause Dallen wanted to have his own Baptism Box). Cindy Gamrath ( Dallen's previous primary teacher and Mom's visiting teacher), would give the talk on the Holy Ghost. Tavin Carter, would say the opening prayer, and Dominic Bias would say the closing. Dallen chose to sing his 2 favorite songs ( well 2 of his favorites) Baptism and I am trying to be like Jesus.   There is just something about primary songs that brings in the Spirit. The kids can just belt them out to their little hearts content. (Dallen is especially good at this, as many of my ward members know.) Sometimes I think we should sing them in Sacrament Meeting it just brings everyone together more.

     After the Baptism we had Carrot Cake and Ice Cream for everyone. It was a nice treat after a long day at church. It was also the perfect time to visit with all the different families who were able to stay after church and watch Dallen.

    Following the Baptism however we had to say Good Bye to Elder Davis. He had to report the following morning to the Mission Home, were he would then be transferred to Las Vegas for the last bit of his mission. We were thankful that he was at least able to stay in Susanville to finish out Dallen's discussions and baptism.

Week 22 - May 23rd thru May 29th

2010-06-06T16:26:00.002-07:00

This is a chart that I made for the YW to track their Personal Progress. I did not come up with the idea on my own I took it from a blog I saw. I thought it was totally cute to have jewels on it just to give it a girly feel. I even added a coat of clear glitter paint on top of the title. As you can see from the picture we have some girls that are doing an awesome job on getting things done, and others well, not so hot. I hope this will inspire the girls to get moving on their Personal Progress.

This week was super busy with trying to get things ready for Dallen's baptism. We took a trip over to the church book store and purchased Dallen his own set of scriptures, that is the tradition in this family when you get baptized to get your own set with your name engraved on it. Then it was over to Costco to pick up a cake for afterwords. Since we had no kids with us Eddie and I decided to go to Sushi Pier for lunch. Our whole family LOVES sushi!

We did have a little time to go and look at a truck. It had a lot of the aspects Eddie was looking for and the guy had all the paperwork on all the things he had done to the truck. So we ended up putting a down payment on it and signing a contract that we would be purchasing it from him come pay day! That is one HUGE stresser off my mind. Now maybe Eddie can focus on something other than finding a truck.

Week 21 - May 16th thru May 22nd

2010-06-06T16:26:00.000-07:00

This week for YW's we helped Monty Bates work in his garden. Monty is one of my favorite people in the "Elderly Club" in our ward. He is always so warm and welcoming, he is the total loving Grandpa type.

                                            Grace is in front, Lindsey, Claira, Annette, Me and Monty

     Friday this week Dallen's class had another feild trip. This time it was to Shasta Caverns in Redding.   Claira did not get to go when she was in 4th grade so I took her out of school early so that she could go with us. I drove my own car so that I would not have to be stuck on the bus with a whole bunch of kids.   Since I drive a lot faster than the bus, (suprise suprise) we made a couple pit stops in Redding. We hit up Target first, but that was a bust they had nothing we needed. Then we went to In and Out for lunch. I figured if we had to drive right past there then why bother packing a sack lunch we could just eat there.    We still got to the caverns before the bus.

      The caverns themselves were actually cool. You have to travel across Shasta Lake in a boat to get to them. Once there you have to take a tour bus up a windy little road to get to the interance point. The caves were a bit humid but it was not too bad.   The stairs though..... at times those were killer!   We made it through with Zero kids lost or hurt!   It is an experiance you should have at least once.

Dallen, Cody and Tyler being goofballs in the back of the bus

Dallen in all his gear in the Caves

Jodi, DD, Morgan and Claira inside the caves

Week 20 - May 9th thru May 15th

2010-06-06T16:25:00.001-07:00

Sunday happened to be Mothers Day and also Gran's 50th Birthday. Sat we went out for Gran's Birthday to her favorite restaurant BJ'S. Of course for dessert we had a Pizzokie Trio. Sunday we went to church and got some nummy truffles as our Mothers Day Gift. After church we made dinner at Mom's and tried a chocolate cake recipe from Lisa Busath. It did not turn out as good as Lisa's though.

Week 19- May 2nd thru May 8th

2010-06-06T16:24:00.003-07:00

This week was just another normal week at the Schwab's. Friday however we went down to Coloma for a field trip with Dallen's class. We planned just to head to Grandma's house afterwords since we were already half way down the hill.

Week 18- April 25th thru May 1st

2010-06-06T16:24:00.001-07:00

This weekend we went up to the Bennett's cabin in Tahoe. It was a bit of work to get there with me being dizzy but it was good for the kids to hang out with their cousins, aunts, and Grandma. We got to meet Emmalyn for the first time. It had been a long time since we had seen everyone (Grandma Schwab, Aunt Brit, Ellaree, Emmalynn, Aunt Tricia and Orissa) else too.

We arrived on Friday afternoon. That evening we just hung out and relaxed. We set up the X-Box and played a little Lips. Lips with Schwabs is always an interesting event. Some of us are very competitive! Saturday we went into Tahoe and did a little shopping and played mini golf. We came home and made some of our yummy Homemade Oreo Cakesters for everyone. Sunday morning we ate breakfast and then headed over to the Lake. We hung out there for a little bit but it was rather chilly still.

Week 17 - April 18th thru April 23rd

2010-06-06T16:23:00.001-07:00

Dallen celebrated his 10th Birthday on the 17th but, his actual birthday was the 18th. He got all the new gear needed for becoming a Bear in scouts, an MP3 player, CD of Josh Turner ( Dallen loves his new song Rain is a Good Thing) and lots of other things.

This ended up being a busy busy week - especially since I was dizzy all week. Which meant I got nothing accomplished! I ended up going to the doctors but they really did not know why I was dizzy. I was given some pills but they made me super sleepy. Not something that was actually going to be of any help. Other than that I can not remember what we did this week. That would be why you need to blog week by week LOL!

Week 16- April 11th thru April 17th

2010-06-06T16:22:00.002-07:00

      On Sunday I gave a talk in Sacrament. I HATE talking in front of people it is not something I am good at. But I gave my talk and lived to tell about it so everything is good. I was asked to speak on Charity and the Love of Christ.   They thought that it could be tied into my calling of Ward Activity Leader. I do not know if I actually tied it in they way they were looking for, but at least it is done.

     That afternoon our home teacher came over. While he was here he said, "Your going to be called to YWs"   I told him not to jinks me and that I was only put into my current calling a few months ago so I am pretty sure if I do get called it would not be for a while at least.

     A few hours later there was a knock at the door. It was Larry Memmott - a councilor in our Bishopric.   He asked me to be YW 2nd councilor.   Nice Brother Petersen jinked me!   So now I was going to be put in YW and they will release me once they find a person to take over the Activities calling. I told him I had to talk to Eddie but I was sure it would be fine.

     A few hours later the phone rings, it is Eddie, he had been working a double. "Hey I hit a cow, do I call Triple A for towing?"    I told him who to call and told him I would be there in a minute to pick him up.   When I got to the scene, I stepped out of the car to find a HUGE cow on the side of the road.   I was shocked at how big it was. So I looked at the front of the truck..... yeah it was totaled for sure. It was a dang good thing he had driven the truck that day cause otherwise he would have been hurt really bad if not killed. The cow turned out to be pregnant...... yeah NOT GOOD.   So the insurance will end up paying for 2 cows. Thank heavens we have insurance. Lassen County is open range...... which seems very ridicules because of how much traffic we have on the roads and how many people are NOT farmers here. But I do not make the rules. So it of course becomes our fault for hitting a black cow on a pitch black highway in the middle of the night.

     Of course there has to be drama with the truck it can not go super smooth. Much to our dislike we ended up having the truck towed to a tow yard and parked it there. We had new tires on the car that we wanted to get off and overload springs and a wood rack. Eventually we were able to get them off but trying to be able to do that was drama too.

Now for the next task.....Finding a New Truck

Claira attended Lit Jam on Thursday. She entered a story and ended up taking 2nd place in her grade. Funny thing is she did that story super quick and did not put much thought into it.

Friday, Gran and KK came up to spend the weekend with Dallen for his birthday. We took the kids for a walk Saturday after I got home from work. I of course took my camera....

Week 15- April 4th thru April 10th

2010-06-06T16:22:00.000-07:00

Claira is very into baking and decorating lately. Not so good for the waist sizes around here though. The cookies above are ones that she had seen Sandra Lee make on the Food Network. They are Lemon Cookies with a colored sugar sprinkled on top. They were tasty but we could not get them to raise up at all.

She made them for am Easter treat. This year Easter happened to fall on the same Sunday as General Conference, which made it kinda nice to stay home for the week. The kids had the week off of school so we kinda just hung around the house and were lazy all week. I of course worked everyday, it was no fun getting up while they got to sleep in.

Week 14- March 28th thru April 3rd

2010-06-06T16:20:00.000-07:00

Our Eggs for Easter....

Dallen of course made his traditional "gun" egg... Claira did a funny one with piggy tales.

Week 13- March 21st thru March 27th

2010-04-07T19:07:00.000-07:00

     I was sick as a dog Sunday. I HATE throwing up! I will do anything not to throw up, but I had no choice, I was sick. I stayed in bed to try and not get anyone else sick. It was a No Good Very Horrible Day!

     Monday I decided to stay home and rest. Well, and scrub my entire house.   When anyone is sick they are quarantined and the entire house is scrubbed. I just have this thing with stomach flu germs. They scare me.

     Tuesday I was all better. That evening was YW and Scouts. Dallen was giving me attitude with his homework, so I took away Scouts for the night. You would have thought I had just beat the kid with a whip. He was so upset but I am tired of his attitude when it comes to homework. Maybe now he will not give me so much guff, well at least for a few weeks.

     Wednesday we were able to stay home and get homework done. nothing exciting but then that is the way I like it.

     Thursday, Dallen had wrestling practice. Claira had a Foods meeting for 4-H. They planned what they were going to do for a fund raiser at the Cattle Day. Of course it is on a Sunday, so we think we are going to skip this one. Claira also had her first soccer "practice" for the fall season.   We found out that one of the soccer coaches was going to try and put together a team to play in the Reno League. Coach Heather is going to practice with the girls now through summer. These are called "practices" but they are not mandatory. Once we get to July Heather will have "Tryouts" for the actual team. She will not just be taking the kids with the best skills, she will be taking kids that are polite and good listeners, actually try to do what she teaches, those who come to as many practices as possible and/ or call and let her know they will not be there, and how they actually do on the "tryout" day with the drills she is going to test them on. Claira may or may not make the team but either way she will be able to learn a lot from this coach and will be in shape for what ever team she does play on in the fall. Either way she will have to travel for all her soccer games. For me it will be easier to travel to Reno every weekend than to travel to Redding, Chico, Anderson etc each weekend.

     Friday Dallen had wrestling practice, the last one of the season that he would be going to.

     Saturday we went to a wrestling tournament in Chester. The Chester ones are kinda fun because they are usually a bit smaller in attendance and it is a new area to travel to. Chester is about as far away as Reno is but just feels a bit different since it is the opposite direction. We always weigh in and then head to the Wagon Wheel for breakfast. It is a good little restaurant and they make pretty good breakfast food.   This time there was a huge turnout at the tournament.   Dallen ended up having to wrestle a kid that he has wrestled in the past. This kid is good and Dallen knew that. So he lost all his focus, he was beat before he even got out on the mat. It did not make for a very good day. The second kid he wrestled he has wrestled before and won but he lost focus again and gave up. The last match was against Cody. Cody is our neighbor and Dallen is friends with him. Cody has quite a bit of height on Dallen so doing things like a cradle on Cody are not really a smart idea. Both boys did everything they were taught to do and did it well but in the end Cody got a few more points than Dallen and won the match. At least in this one he did not give up. It was not the best way to end the wrestling season.

Our New Favorite Treat!

2010-03-31T16:33:00.000-07:00

Laurrissa Memmott gave me this recipe on Sunday and said to me, "be careful, these are like crack". Anything sweet is like crack to me..... but these are like crack to everyone in my family including Eddie. Try them out but be warned they are like crack.

Homemade Oreo Cookies - (We call them Homemade Oreo Cakesters)

2 pkg Devils food cake mixes ( you can use regular chocolate if that is all you have)
4 eggs
2/3 Cup Oil
Mix above ingredients to make cookie dough. Heat oven to 350. Make 1 inch balls (I use my pampered chef cookie scoop so they are all the same.) Place on parchment paper or slightly greased cookie sheet. Slightly flatten. Bake for 10 minutes.

Middle

4 oz Cream Cheese
1 Cube butter
1/2 teaspoon Vanilla
2 Cup Powdered Sugar

Mix together until smooth and creamy. Frost 1/2 of the cookies. Place the 2nd cookie on top of the frosting like a sandwich. Then Eat! Tomorrow watch your bathroom scale go up!

Root Beer Frosting for Auntie

2010-03-23T13:28:00.001-07:00

ROOT BEER FROSTING

Ingredients

½ cup of butter, softened

½ teaspoon of root beer concentrate

16 ounces of powdered sugar sifted

¼ cup of milk

DIRETCTIONS

1. Beat butter in large bowl with electric mixer on medium speed until light and fluffy. Add root beer concentrate mix well.

2. Gradually add powdered sugar beating until well blended after each addition and frequently scraping the sides and bottom of the bowl.

3. Add milk, beat until light and fluffy. If frosting is too thick to spread, gradually beat in additional milk. Store in refrigerator up to 2 weeks. Rewhip before using.

Week 12- March 14th thru March 20th

2010-03-22T22:42:00.000-07:00

This was a super busy week.

Sunday, we were late to church AGAIN. It was day light savings day so getting up on time was a little hard. My visting teacher Cindy came over after church. We just kinda hung out all day and got ready for the week ahead. Oh and we found out that the Pinewood Derby was Thursday evening.....

Monday, was nothing to spectacular just the regular work and school. Dallen cut out his Pinewood Derby car and sanded it.

Tuesday was YW YM combined activity. The kids were to be dropped of at the Subway inside of Walmart. Some of the parents and other people in the ward were asked to dress up so that the kids would not recognize them. Then the kids were split up into groups and har a sheet they had to get signed off. For each adult the kids had to perform a task. Mine was to name the rules of dating. Another one was to sing Popcorn on the Apricot Tree, this one I could actually hear the kids signing from a few sections over. It was really fun. One of the boys looked right at me in the eyes and paused for a second and then kept walking. I laughed when they came back to me later. Claira had lots of fun she talked about it the whole way home.

Wednesday, it was another wrestling night. Fun Fun Fun. Dallen also worked a little on his Derby car.

Thursday was the Pinewood Derby. Dallen had a lot of fun. He was able to make his car 90% by himself. He designed it and chose what to put on it. His car was called "The Hunter". It was not the fastest but I think he had fun making it and learned himself what made the car slow down.

Dallen with his ribbon and his car "The Hunter"

The fur on the car is from his coyote he shot a few weeks ago.

Friday, Eddie went to Shawn's house to build a chicken coop. I went to the Relief Society Birthday Dinner. That was very nice, they did a great job.

Saturday was Presentation Day (for 4-H). I had to work at Litchfield so I had Sandy take Claira to Presentation Day and met them there when I finished. Sandy tried to have them have Claira go last but it did not work so I missed her giving her presentation. It was " How to Make a Tie Blanket." I have seen it many times before but oh well. She did not place but that is fine, our purpose was to have her do the presentation if she placed well that would just be icing on the cake. Afterwords we went with Sandy and Dena to Subway and ate lunch.

All the kids who attended Presentation Day from Richmond Club

Week 11 March 7th thru March 13th

2010-03-22T19:49:00.000-07:00

     Sunday was Claira's first time in Young Womens and of course it fell on Fast Sunday. In our ward the YW come into Relief on Fast Sunday. So I warned her that she was going in with the "Old Ladies" today and that it was just what they do one the First Sunday of each month.   The lesson was really good Rachel Whitting taught it and she tells things like they are. She is not a "Molly Mormon" that makes everything look as though her life is so easy and that she is so good at everything she does. She is honest and real and that is what I really like about her. Rachel starts talking about her youngest son "Lane Dallen". So the water works start coming on. All of us "Old Ladies" are crying and Claira is like "OK This is weird".
     After church we stayed for a baptism for "Lane Bias". It was really cute. Many of his family members are   not members and those that are were just recently baptized with in the last few years. He had his Step-Grandpa talk on Baptism (he was baptized a year ago) and his Grandma talk about Lane and who he is (she is not a member). It was really cute.   Then after he was baptized his Mom talked on the Holy Ghost.
     After the baptism we came home to a sleeping Dad. He asked what in the world took us so long to get home? He had been home for over an hour.... He did not know we were staying and since he likes to jam out of church and not do the half hour of chit chat afterwords, he was gone before I could tell him.
    Later we made root beer cupcakes for Claira's class.

     Monday I worked and Tabrina was sick again so I stayed as long as I could and finally I had to tell Teresa I had to go home. I had to bring cupcakes to the school. The mail was still not done but what could I do?!?   So I took the cupcakes to Claira's class. They sang Happy Birthday and many kids loved that the cupcakes tasted like root beer.

     Tuesday was YW. It was just a Personal Progress week. Nothing too exciting. But I have a feeling it is not going to take Claira all 6 years to get hers done.

     Wednesday was wrestling, Oh so fun! it is almost over!

   Thursday was wrestling again LOL.....

     Friday, I worked at Janesville in the morning and we celebrated Carol's 51st Birthday. Kim made a chocolate cake that was really yummy. That night we celebrated again at Pizza Factory. Carol's granddaughter threw her the party. We headed home a little early so we could get ready for an early morning wrestling gig.

     Saturday we headed to Alturas. The roads were a sheet of ice the entire way. It took a little longer than normal to get there but it was fine. My car kicks but on the snow and ice I get great traction and handling. We weighed in and then went to breakfast at our usual Alturas spot.... The Wagon Wheel. It is a cute little mom and pop restaurant with good food and great prices.   The tournament was LONG they ran it kinda funky and so it took ALL DAY. Many of the kids there did not have wrestling shoes or head gear. Some of our boys got a little cocky looking at these kids but dang they had muscles. Eddie told the kids.... " These kids hae some muscles. They are farm raised boys that are out bucking hay everyday. But you guys know way more moves. So you just have to be smart and think when your on the mat. Don't try and out muscle them. Be smart!   Dallen ended up taking first in his weight bracket.

OK check this kid out - he is like a full foot taller it makes my kid look a little chunky - and see what I mean about the no shoes and head gear - kinda misleading with this kid he was a challenge

Dallen getting the pin

Kid #2 They look a little more even body wise

Getting the pin on kid #2

Week 10 - March 1st thru March 6th

2010-03-11T13:08:00.000-08:00

Wow our lives are so uneventful! I guess that can be a good thing though. This week we continued with the same theme. Mom worked every morning, kids went to school, and Dad went to work. This was Eddie's first week at his new job. He had training all week, so he did not really get to experience what it is going to be like. But he did say the new place looks like a park it is very well cared for.

Tuesday was New Beginnings. It was lots of fun! our Young Women's leaders did a lot of work putting together a little program and making treats, putting together decorations and even sewing a apron for each girl. This was a perfect time to have New Beginnings because it got Claira very excited to go into YW. She has worn her necklace everyday.

Friday Grandma and Grandpa dove up. They took FOREVER to get here. I ended up laying down and trying to go to sleep but the kids were too excited. They finally arrived sometime after 11 PM. We stayed up for a while and then I had to go to bed cause I had to work the next morning.

Saturday we played lots of Wii and apples to apples and ate lots and lots of food. We made Claira's Birthday cake, Peanut Butter Fudge. We had Holly come over to help celebrate Claira's birthday. Holly always makes things interesting in our house. She is a wonderful friend for Claira. We of course opened presents.

Claira and Holly

Week 9 - Feb 21st thru 27th

2010-03-05T12:58:00.000-08:00

I am still trying to catch up, but i do not remember what happened and it was only last week.   I think it was pretty boring.   Eddie had his last week of work and the old joint. ( He is at the other one this week.) I worked, oh and I was given my own set of keys to the building. The kids went to school.   SO fun huh.

     The only thing we did different last week that I can think of was that Claira had her country report due. Eddie and I made trifle for her to share with the class. It turned out pretty good. The kids liked it.

     Saturday I took the kids to Reno to do some shopping. We did not go over at all in Feb so we sure needed food.   We did not buy anything exciting just food and household supplies. I did get a book though.

Digital Photography - Volume 2 by Scott Kelby

I already have volume 3, so now I just need volume 1

It is all starting to come back to me now. I got a new phone last week too. Eddie broke his phone and after a week of not being able to get a hold of him, I went in to get him a new one. Of course his phone was not eligible for a free upgrade. Mine was though! ( Which is weird cause we bought the phones on the same day and started our contracts on the same day.) So I gave him my phoen and got a new one. I learned that if you have a "smart phone" you have to have the 30 dollar a month media plan with it. That is 30 per hone on top of what we already pay for phone service. So I made sure I did not get a "smartphone" so no iphone and no more blackberry for me. I got a phone that has a touch screen. Man it drove me crazy the first couple of days. It still does a little but I am liking it a little more now. It did freeze up on me Friday night. So I took it back this week. I tried to see if I could switch it for another phone but that would cost me 35 bucks - NO THANKS I stuck with it and just got a new phone of the same type. I am not going to have a phone that freezes up. They say that is the first time they heard of that happening with that particular phone. So we will see. This is the one I got - samsung flight

Week 8 - February 14th thru 20th

2010-03-02T17:24:00.000-08:00

I am way bad at this blogging once a week thing. At first I thought it was because we had a wrestling tournament every Sunday but now that they are on Saturdays, I know that is not the reason.

I do not remember much about this week. Eddie was off. It was nice outside so he was able to clean up the backyard, we no longer look like total white trash. I worked a lot. I put together a couple photo albums, through artscow. They have specials all the time and if I ordered by the 16th I could get up to 10 free 20 page 8x8 albums. So I did as many as I could. Of course most of them were larger than 20 pages so I had to pay for the extra pages , and shipping ( their shipping is kinda high). I did 5 albums for 63 bucks when all was said and done.   Which even with the high shipping was a really good deal.   They are shipped from Hong Kong so it takes a while to get them. When they get here I will post about the quality of the albums.

     Dallen of course had wrestling practice. He had a tournament he could have gone to but we decided not to go because it was Freestyle and we normally just wrestle Folk style. The two styles are very similar but, there are a few things you can do in Freestyle that you can not in Folk. Like locking hands and throwing. We do not really want him learning that because it can create bad habits for when you wrestle Folk.

     Claira had her first cooking meeting this week. They made dump cake and pizza bread sticks. The food was pretty good and the kids had a lot of fun.

Week7 - Sunday Febuary 7th thru Saturday the 13th

2010-02-14T10:29:00.000-08:00

This week we were all finally better, so it was back to the same old routine, well kind of.
Eddie had this week off. He did some stuff out in his shop, cleaned up the yard a bit ( but then the winds came up and blew everything all over again), tried to hook the spa up again ( looks like it needs a new heating element), and watched cowboy movies. Exciting, I know!
Dallen of course had wrestling practice. That was exciting! We took a team picture for the year book. Hopefully it turns out cute, they love seeing themselves in the yearbook. Thursday, we had a Valentine's Party in Dallen's class. I of course ( because it says sucker across my forehead) am the room Mom in his class. So I needed to be there and help set up and put the party together. He made each kid in his class a Hershey's Kiss Rose. For Erika though he made her a bouquet. He also spent his own money and bought Erika a candy gram and a Teddy Bear from the 8th grade fund raiser. Erika also bought Dallen a bear. He definitely has his Dad's giving genes. Friday, Dallen spent the day helping Dad clean the yard while Mom cleaned his room. I did not actually clean it, I just took in garbage bags and threw half of it out. That is what happens when Mom has to clean your room. Saturday Dallen got to go on his first official (legal) hunt. Eddie Dallen and Shawn went up to the Carter's property and went coyote hunting. Dallen came home with his first coyote. (They are nasty creatures YUCK)

Dallen and his coyote

Dallen made this cake. He says "Mom aren't you going to take a picture?" - Oh yeah sure buddy

Claira had a busy week too. Tuesday was Achievement Day Girls. She only has one more meeting in Achievement Days, then she will be in Young Womens. Wednesday she had 4-H. We came away from the meeting doing very well and did not volunteer for any new assignments. I think Home Arts just about killed me. Thursday Claira had a Valentines Party in her class too. I am not the room mom in that class though, Mr B. did not ask for one LOL. Thursday night was the Valentines Dance. It was her first dance. I was not too excited about her going to the dance. At first she did not even want to go, I told her it was her choice she could go if she wanted to, but I was not going to make her. Eddie however told her she should go. Although he did not think she actually would. The night of the dance we put her hair in curlers, and then Eddie asked about her makeup. He asked why she did not have makeup on? WHAT HELLO Where is my husband? So I used some of her "play" makeup and put it on her. Nothing that she had on hand was really colors that work well with her skin and I definitely did not have anything. She has a much more olive color than I do. We made due though.

New site I found

2010-02-13T21:32:00.000-08:00

I found this new site and I really like it. It has tons of tips for photography and for editing. If you are into that kind of stuff, check it out iheartfaces

Week 6 - Sunday the 31st thru Sat the 6th

2010-02-13T21:21:00.000-08:00

As soon as Home Arts Extravaganza was over I did NOTHING. Part of the reason was Claira got pink eye on Sunday. So Monday we had to go to the doctors and get her some meds. She was home from school until Wednesday, when Dallen decided to get sick. He had a fever for 2 1/2 days. So he stayed home the rest of the week. Since Dallen had a fever we decided to stay home and not go to the wrestling tournament in Oroville. He was pretty bummed but I just did not want him to get sick again. I wish I could say that because I got to stay home from work on Wednesday to take care of Dallen I got things done, but nope, NOTHING.

May did not want to leave Dallen's side -

Dallen was trying to sleep by the fire

Week 5 Sunday 24th to Saturday the 30th

2010-01-31T10:44:00.000-08:00

Sunday, we had a wrestling tournament in Fernley Nevada. Claira was lucky and had a friend ask if she could stay the whole day with them so she did not have to go with. Dallen took first place. It was another long long day. We even had a little brother of one of our team members get sick in the stands. Oh that was a memory I will never forget. I do not deal well with that kind of thing. It started snowing about 2 but we still had another match and then you have to wait for them to announce the winners in your bracket so we did not get out of there until almost 4. So we headed home pretty quickly.

Monday, I worked it was a long day, with lots of mail. I came home that afternoon and started to work on cutting out letters for some posters. I knew I had a lot to do during the week and of course Dallen had his homework packet to do still ( which is due on Tuesday) so I got a little stressed.   We got the packet done and I think 2 posters, before the night was through.

Tuesday, I woke up sick as could be. Thankfully it was a short day, very light mail. So I was able to come home at a decent time. I came home and slept and slept. The kids had achievement days and cub scouts that night. I sat in the car and talked to Mindy while I waited for them.

Wednesday, I sooo wanted to call in sick but I knew that Teresa was relying on me to be there and there was no way Tabrina could come in so I went in. I came home and made all my posters. That was a job, but then I am a little anal and can not have my name on stuff that has only been done half way decent.

Thursday, I wanted to stay in bed but I knew that Tabrina was not coming in again so off I went. Teresa knew I felt horrible so she tried to help me and get me out of there as fast as she could.   I came home and started cutting out fleece tie blankets. I needed to cut out 10 blankets by Sat morning. I cut out as many as I could because I still did not have all the fleece I needed in my possession.   We had wrestling that night so I headed out to wrestling.

Friday, Tabrina was finally able to come back to work but I figured it would be a really fast day since all 3 of us would be working. Good thing I did because Tabrina was still not feeling well and called the doctor and they told her to go into the emergency room. So I stayed and helped Teresa get the mail done. I came home and cut as much fabric as I could before it was time to get the kids. ( I picked up the other fabric I needed that morning at the bus stop, from the husband of the lady who had purchased it for me.)   We then headed over to set up for the Home Arts Extravaganza. It did not take too long but of course we thought of a ton of new stuff that we needed for the following morning so I headed off to Wally World. Once I got home I ate and then took some Nyquil. It was almost gone so I just took as much as was left in the bottle.... not even enough for a full dose. I sat on the couch with Dallen for a little bit and all the sudden I felt a little loopy. Eddie laughed at me and told me I better go to bed cause I was going to fall out in a few minutes. It was only 7 45 So I went to bed and was out in a few minutes.

Saturday, Dallen had a wrestling tournament in Carson City. I was in charge of a county wide 4-H project so there was no way I could take him. So I sent him with Clay and Kristen Montgomery. I hate having to do that but I can not be in both places at once. I also know that he is in good hand with Clay and Kristen. Kristen watched her kids like a hawk so I know that she will watch him too.   Dallen did not do too hot at the tournament. He took 4th out of 5 but Clay was on the mat with him and he said he tried hard and almost had one of the matches but lost in the last couple of seconds by 2 points.

Claira and I went to the Home Arts Extravaganza. I had never been to one before so I really did not know what it was supposed to be. I think it turned out good though. We had 40 kids attend, our club had 17 of those 40 kids. We had centers and the kids were supposed to rotate. It started out great but then kids came in during the rotations and messed the whole system up. They were done about an hour before we planned for them to be done but it worked out good still. We did hand molds, ice candles, hershey kisses rosebuds, cupcake decorating, valentine foam art, sand art, worm valentine cards, and Table setting. Then we did tie blankets for community service and had a judging contest. It was a ton of work and over in 3 hours. Kinda like Christmas but without getting something fun for yourself. I am so glad it is over.

Week 4

2010-01-31T09:21:00.000-08:00

Hmmm week 4 has come and gone. What did we do that week? It feels like forever ago. I am sure we had wrestling and I am sure I worked like everyday but other than that I can not remember what in the world went on. I guess it was nothing exciting like ponies in the post office. Oh well I have another F for week 4

Blog Book ....

2010-01-20T13:30:00.000-08:00

I got my blog book and it is so cool. At this point the only thing I would change would be that my blog title be in a bigger font on the cover. I think that is because on my actual blog it is not very big either. it is nice and think 139 pages long. The cover is nice and thick. Good quality pages on the inside.

week #3 - and on time too

2010-01-17T14:24:00.000-08:00

We are now home from church and have an hour before our home teacher gets here ( my visiting teacher just left) so I figure I will do an entry for this week. That way I am not a week late again. LOL.

     Monday was a super long day. My boss was sick and so it was just my co worker (Tabrina) and I. We got all the mail done and then I covered her at the window so she could take a lunch. So by the time I was done with work it was already 1. Which in my world means my day is over, and the afternoon of doing things for the kids is just beginning. I did however get to watch my soap before I had to pick up the kids. Gotta get my "Days of Our Lives" fix in.

     Tuesday was another long day at work. My boss was still sick so I covered for Tabrina so she could go to lunch again. At least the mail on Tuesdays is super light.   That night the kids had Boy Scouts and Achievement Girls. i just stayed at the church and cleaned out the "Activity" cupboard. Wow that was exciting. LOL. There were a lot of things in there that I personally would have just tossed but since it is not my belongings I just placed them nicely in the cupboard. I can tell one thing for sure....I do not have to purchase anything for the Halloween party this year we have a ton of decorations.   I was under the impression that I was not the only one who was in charge of supplying all the paper goods for the ward and honestly that was the last thing on my mind so I was not checking the cupboard every week. I looked in the cupboard and it is almost empty.   NICE. Oh well I can either get the paper goods in town and pay double the price or they are going to have to wait until I have time to get to Reno and shop. ( Such a brat I am.)

     Wednesday Teresa was still not better. I had to meet the Dish network guy at the house at 10 so I took off at 10 and waited for him to come fix the TV. ( The wind blows it out of wack every time it is windy) He came and fixed it and back to work I went to cover Tabrina for her lunch break. Then I hurried over to the school as soon as she got back to watch the Wrestling Pep Rally. It turned out really cute. That night was our monthly 4-H meeting. That is always exciting.

     Thursday, Teresa was finally back to work. Just in time too. I worked at Janesville for 2 hours then drove over to Litchfield to work there for the rest of the day. Oh that was SOOO boring!   My head was literally bobbing while I sat there and tried not to fall asleep. I had 2 customers in the whole 6 hours I was there. I could not do that job everyday.   Then it was another night of wrestling practice. Eddie went and helped out that night so I came home and cleaned house.The coaches have started a new program this year. The boys have to take a test on wrestling moves, show that they know the correct way to do them and a verbal test too. It was the first possible night you could take the test so Dallen stayed after and took the test. He was tested by the coach that is hardest to pass on. He did fine though, he passed it all on his first try. So he now has his blue tag and is excited to work on the next level.

     Friday, I worked again. Wow what a surprise. I was off by 10:30 so it was not too bad. I came home and cleaned another wow.   I met with the Special Education teacher at the school. We are going to have Dallen tested to see if he is Dyslexic which we know he is, he has all the signs. Then we had wrestling practice again.

     Saturday, I worked again. WHEN DOES IT END????    The craziest thing happened at work. A lady came in with her husband and 2 ponies. Hello you do not bring ponies into a Post Office!!!   Teresa told them they could not bring them in and they responded with " well it does not say ponies on the sign , just dogs" - Who in the world thinks it is ok to bring a pony into a post office ???   of course they pooped in the Post Office.   I came home at 11 and Eddie was already home. He took a half day (ITO) He soon went to bed cause he is getting a head cold. You know how boys are when they get sick. So we just stayed home and cleaned a bit and watched tv nothing too exciting.

Today, we went to church. That is always entertaining. Then my visiting teacher came over. She is always good to come visit every month.    I am sure the rest of the day will be spend watching tv and getting homework done... Oh how interesting.

Sorry I took ZERO pictures this week. I was way too busy to even think about pictures.   I know where the people with the ponies live maybe I can go take a picture of the ponies.

week #2 .... a week late

2010-01-17T10:04:00.000-08:00

For week 2 I definably get an F.   Sunday's are not the best day for me to post during wrestling season. Only 2 and a half more months of wrestling. since this post is to be about the week of the 4th thru the 10th, let me see if I can remember what happened that week.

    The kids started back to school on the 4th. I was happy about that now maybe I could have some free time. But no, no free time for me as Eddie took the week off. It was planned to be my week to get into a new routine with work and cleaning house and making healthy meals and trying to exercise. Well that was a bust! I will not exercise when Eddie is home. I just will not do it. So I at least tried to eat healthy. Which I think i did pretty good ( at least the scale agreed with me) . I bought whole wheat bread and pasta. I am the only one in the house that will eat it but I think that will eventually change.

    Of course this week we had wrestling practice in the evenings. It takes up a good 2 1/2 hours a night for 3 nights a week. It makes it a little hard to get homework and dinner done at a decent hour. I have given up on the 8 o'clock bed time. we are lucky if we make it by 9. 2 of the wrestling coaches came by and delivered some wood to us ( we won the wood raffle- some people did not like that we won cause we cut most of it. but hey we bought tickets and Mrs. Amrein was the one who drew the winning ticket so you know it was not rigged.) So when they dropped the rest of the wood off, they told Eddie he had to start coming to wrestling practice. They need him to help.

     On Friday night we had a 4-h activity, "Girls Night Out". It was a lot of fun. It is a great way for all the girls to get to know each other. We played spoons, had a potluck dinner, made some cards, did some scrapbooking pages for the historian album and ate ice cream sundaes. I would not recommend having them do the scrapbooking pages again. Some girls just did not get the concept that we need to leave space on the pages for writing and some of the pages I just wanted them to do the titles since we did not have pictures to go along with them yet. It turned out to be pretty much a disaster. So the historians ( Claira and Allie) will be redoing the pages.

Sunday was a wrestling tournament in Reno at Damonte Ranch High School. Dallen took 2nd this week too. He did really well. He lost his 4th match of the day it was a tough match but he got punched in the nose on accident when the kid tried to cross-face him. So he had a bloody nose, but he did not give up! And he did not get pinned! We thought maybe he would have a black eye or nose after that but it did not even bruise. So nothing cool to show the girls at school the next day.

1st of 52 weeks

2010-01-06T14:17:00.000-08:00

When thinking about what picture to upload for my first post, I realized I did not take pictures of my own kid at this weeks tournament. All of my pictures are of other peoples kids and their matches. Eddie had to work this week so he could not come to the tournament. So I video'd every match for him. Leaving me with no photo's to post. I did take one with my cell phone.... It is of Dallen's knees. After his last match his knee was bothering him. So I checked it out and there was a big ol not on one knee. So I sent the pic to Eddie. So that is all the pics I have that I can legally share with the world. Next week I will have to think a little more about what I take pictures of.

as for wrestling tournament results, Dallen finished 2nd in his bracket and 3rd over all in his weight. We could have tried for 2nd and challenged that kid since we had not wrestled him but after 4 matches Dallen was really tired and we were so done. We had been up since 4:45 and were ready to get out of the loud and crowded gym.

Blog Book

2010-01-02T09:41:00.000-08:00

OK so I am getting my blog printed from the cutest blog on the block. com here is the link. I usually do not spell check my blog entries so I quickly ( well OK it took a while ) went through and did spell check on all my entries. Today I am going to set it up to have it printed. I will share my thoughts on the print quality once I get the book.

oh yeah make sure you spell check before you upload your book to the site ... it will make it easier if you do it before

Project 52

2010-01-01T21:14:00.000-08:00

In the scrap booking world every year people participate in a thing called Project 365. Project 365 is where you take a picture of your life every day and scrap them. I tried doing this last year and it lasted oh 3 weeks. So this year I am going to attempt to do another version of Project 365 called Project 52. The thought behind 52 is that, it is much easier to take a picture of the week rather than one each day. I do not have time to scrap them all so what I plan to do is to Blog my pictures. Hopefully I can do it every Sunday afternoon, and hopefully it will include a picture every week. Since it is only Friday today LOL and since I have yet to take any pictures this week.... my first post will be in 2 days LOL

2009 goals, how did I do.....

2010-01-01T20:44:00.001-08:00

In January 2009, I made some scrap booking goals. All the sudden it is already 2010. So how did I do on my goals???

Scrapping Goals for 2009

1- Create a wrestling group and upload all pics to wrestling group ~ CREATED ~ Entire Season Uploaded
2- Create a Schwab group and upload all pics to Schwab group ~CREATED~ UPLOADED THRU 6-09
3- Continue to upload all pics to the Sorenson group ~UPLOADED THRU 6-09
4-Get all 2006 and 2007 pictures scrapped and into a book ~Dallen's book I only have to do a 2 page layout of Easter day 2007- Claira's book I need to do the same Easter Day Layout, a 2 page layout of Soccer and a single page from summer ( kinda a filler page so everything flows correctly)
5-Create a year in review album for MIL for Christmas 2009 DONE!!!!!
6- Set up to have my blog printed out- found a site that can do this but they are not yet open for printing... ( finally found a different place today and it is easy to upload to and reasonably priced)
7- Do a wrestling album for Dallen (OH WHOOPS- DID NOT WORK ON THIS ONE)
8- Do a soccer album for each kid - made one for cClaira's first soccer season already had her 2nd season done - just need to do her 3rd season Dallen well not even started on any season yet
9- Project 365 (8x8) - OK YEA THIS ONE FIZZLED OUT AFTER 3 WEEKS
10- Make a Sorenson album ( UMMM..... WELL)

Yea well, does not look like I did too good. Many of them are easy enough to finish up like #s 2, 3, 4 and 6. Dallen's wrestling album is going to be a challenge there is not very much digital wrestling stuff out there. I was able to find one kit and bought that but we are currently in our 3rd season so that is too many seasons to do with one digi kit. Soccer albums should not be too hard to catch up on I bought a kit to do Claira's 3rd season with. For Dallen's I will just put both of his seasons into one book.

So.....

Scrapping Goals for 2010

1-Get all 2006 and 2007 pictures scrapped and into a book
2-Have my blog printed out
3- Get 2008 into an album for both kids
4- Do Soccer albums for each kid
5- Start a wrestling album for Dallen
6- Keep all my photo "groups" up to date ( ie sorenson, schwab, wrestling, 4-h)

soccer

2009-09-30T19:42:00.000-07:00

Claira and Dallen are both playing soccer this year again. So we travel into town at the very least 3 nights a week some weeks it is every night. Which leaves very little time for homework. They both play at the same time on the same days. That can be good and it can be bad. I try to watch the first half of Dallen's game and then watch the second half of Claira's game. So far it has been nice weather at soccer but I have a feeling that is all about to change.

Claira's coach has never coached soccer before. He is more of a football guy. He is not too bad though, he is learning. Luckily they have an assistant coach that has played in high school so that has helped. Her team is pretty split with girls that have played soccer for a while and brand spanking new girls. They did not do too well at the jamboree. It was hot and I think the girls got tired but man it felt like they had just given up. Well at least it felt like half of them had given up. I became that sideline Mom, out there yelling at the girls. At one point it became ridiculous and only 2 girls were up defending the goal and the other girls were all just standing around. It was bad.

Dallen of course is not afraid to go up against the bigger kids for the ball. Why does that not surprise me??? His coach is pretty good with the kids he has coached a couple times before so he knows what he is doing. They are not doing too bad as a team. They did great at their jamboree. They won all games until the last one. Just like Claira's team they were hot and tired and they just were not on top of their game. They played all bunched up together. This time I was not a crazy sideline Mom. Just a regular one.

So only one more month to go. Games every Tuesday and Thursday through the 27th of October. Fun times.... I turned into a soccer mom .... thank heavens I am not a mini van driving soccer mom though

goings on

2009-09-30T19:06:00.000-07:00

Dallen and I are sitting in my scrap room right now Rocking Out.... while doing homework. What ever it takes to get him to actually work on it!

I have been taking tons and tons of pics between soccer fires and photo class.... just when I get them uploaded and edited is another story. If blogger will cooperate with me I will upload a few I took on of claira that I really like.

looks better in real life I think .... it is not looking as cute here

oh man business time cracks me up the kids just ask why I am laughing ..... not going down that road today sorry kids

music

2009-08-14T21:28:00.000-07:00

A while back Mom asked me to change my music cause she was tired of listening to business time. I said NO cause it reminds me of Michelle.... well I got a little bit of a Michelle fix so now i can add a little more music. I have songs in there as a tribute to multiple people and some old school songs ( well not that old ) Hope you like it Mom

playing with some photos

2009-07-28T20:15:00.001-07:00

I need to get working on some Christmas presents for this year and at the same time I also need to get scrapping some of 2009. So why not kill two birds with one stone and work on pictures that can easily be used for both. Well I was looking back at pictures from new years day and playing around with them and I totally love this one of Dallen and Ella...

Now this was not a posed shot he was just holding her right there in the walkway and I think it turned out so dang cute. There are a couple more that I like from the day and I played around with them a little too. I did them all in a faded look. Now I just need to create a page with them.

Merrill Beach, Eagle Lake

2009-07-28T17:23:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday we decided to head up to Eagle Lake to visit Sean and Sarah. They were camping up at Merrill Beach with both Sean's family and Sarah's family. So we went for the day. The kids loved it. Sean took them both for a ride on the jet ski. Dallen of course wanted to go again and again, and Claira of course had to be talked into riding with him. We only stayed for a couple of hours but it was a lot of fun.

Claira's friend Holly came with us.

Love and Hate

2009-07-14T18:28:00.000-07:00

Katie Bigs ( That is what we call the Bigney family in this house) tagged me today for Love Hate
so here are the things I love and hate about today.

Love:
1- Love that I was able to pick up another shift at Janesville after the people at Susanville filed a grievance on me for working there cause I am taking away hours from them and apparently that is not legal since I am not a PTF (part time flex able employee). Yeah talk about drama and the girl who filed is out for the next 6 weeks having surgery. Not like she was going to be working. So now others will have to miss out on taking their vacations like planned.
2- Love that Claira and I made Upside Down German Chocolate Cake. YUMMY
3- Love that I took a 2 hour nap. After all the doctor told me if I am tired I need to take a nap or it will just make my symptoms worse - who would have thought Ebstienbar was a life long issue
4- Love that the Trani is in the Honda
5- Love that the kids are being nice to each other

Hate:
1- I hate that it is HOT in my "scraproom/ office" who wants to hang out on the puter in a hot room
2- I hate that even though the Trani is in the Honda it is still not perfect - it sounds like a stinking rice rocket and it does not go over 65 ( which is fine for grandpa driver Eddie but if you need to drive a little faster to get out of a emergency type situation this does not work) - will be calling my mechanic - who is by the way not the person who "fixed"my trani lets hope it is not an issue with the Trani cause we can not go through that saga again!!!!
3- I hate that I have no idea what type of pay check we will be getting next month - or any other month after that. I can not plan. Like should I buy those peaches that are a really good price or do I need to save my money so that I can pay the bills next month....
4- I hate that no one cleans around here but me. Eddie will clean once in a while but I am anal and want everyone to do there chores everyday with out me having to gripe about them not being done.
5- I hate.....????? I don't know..... well my mom can fill this one in for me ....

Reply to Comments on Cinnamon Rolls

2009-06-22T15:12:00.000-07:00

Mindy- here is a picture of the rolls - well one of them 2 days later - it was the one I ate today for lunch..... ( ok well it will be up once my puter stops freaking out)

Michelle - nope I told her " shut up stop laughing at me. I can make them how I want"

Katie - here is the recipe:

Berry Cinnamon Rolls with Lemon Cream Cheese Icing

INGREDIENTS:

For berry cinnamon rolls:
1/2 c warm water
2 rounded tsp of yeast
1/2 c butter
2 c THRIVE Powdered Milk - ( I just used regular milk)
3/4 c THRIVE White Sugar (with just a dash extra)
2 THRIVE Whole Eggs, reconstituted
1 tsp THRIVE Iodized Salt
6 1/2 c THRIVE Flour (White Flour, Whole Wheat Flour, or half of each)
2-3 c THRIVE Freeze Dried berries - any combination of blueberries, blackberries, strawberries, and raspberries
1/2 c THRIVE Brown Sugar
1-2 tsp cinnamon

For lemon cream cheese icing:
1/4 c softened butter
1/4 c softened cream cheese
2-3 tsp THRIVE Powdered Milk, reconstituted
1 tsp vanilla
zest of one lemon
2-4 cups powdered sugar

PREPARATION:

*Combine water, yeast, and a dash of sugar in a small bowl.
*In a small saucepan, melt butter. Add milk and heat through.
*In a large bowl, mix sugar, eggs, and salt. Add milk mixture to sugar mixture. Mix together with a large spoon. Make sure this mixture is not too hot so it won't kill the yeast, then add in the risen yeast mixture.
*Add 4 c flour to this mixture and gently stir. Beat with a hand mixer for one minute. Add remaining 2 1/2 c flour and stir until remaining flour is just moistened; do not over mix.
*Let rise once and gently pull away from the sides. Don't punch the dough down. Let rise again until doubled in size. At this point, punch the dough down.
*Roll dough out to 24" x 10-12". Spread with melted butter and sprinkle with sugar and cinnamon. Top with dried berries.
*Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Roll dough up as with jellyrolls and cut into 24 1" discs, placing each on a large cookie sheet that has been greased.
*Let rise again, then bake at 350 degrees for 17-20 minutes or until just starting to turn golden brown.
Top with any desired icing, or use with the following instructions for Lemon Cream Cheese Icing:
*Blend butter and cream cheese together, then add milk, vanilla, and lemon zest.
*Whip in the powdered sugar, adding more for thicker icing and less for a drizzly consistency. More milk may be added if icing becomes too thick.

I got it from the shelf reliance website - they have a whole bunch of good Betty homemaker recipes here

And nope there were none left over for another round on Monday morning.

Cinnamon Rolls

2009-06-20T21:09:00.000-07:00

Today we made Cinnamon Rolls from scratch - yes you read that right - scratch I was thinking if we made the rolls tonight then the kids could warm them just a little and frost them in the morning for Eddie for fathers day. ( That is nice of me to think of him huh)

So I made one batch of half white -half wheat cinnamon rolls. I had quite a bit of dough left over so I figured I would just make rolls with them rather than have sugar treats sitting around for all of us to eat. So I am shaping the rolls into balls and Claira comes in the kitchen and starts laughing at me, cause I was not doing it like her dad. Yes Eddie makes good rolls and they actually look good too. Mine are very good and they look OK but who cares they taste good and they are not going to be shared with anyone but us. She just kept laughing and laughing cause I was not shaping them right. WHATEVER

Once the cinnamon rolls came out of the oven we let them cool just a bit and then I let the kids have the end pieces - we had to taste them before we give them to Eddie in the morning what if they are gross? Dallen said they were D-lish and Claira said they were pretty good. I liked them. Now tomorrow will be the test. The rolls are now out of the oven too I had one and I think they are dang good you can not even tell they are half wheat!

My Very First Cinnamon Rolls

Dallen

Claira- not wanting to look at the camera playing like she has no idea what I want from her.

Contest!!!!

2009-06-19T16:17:00.000-07:00

One of my favorite stores is having a contest. Well many contests, one every other friday. This time the are giving away one of those food storage rotation systems that I want.

Check out the blog post about it here Now go check it out and sign up!

What have we done with our summer?

2009-06-18T15:20:00.000-07:00

Since school has been out What have we done with our summer? Nothing exciting really...

We went to wrestling camp for a week in Alturas. Alturas is 1 1/2 hours away but not like towards a big city it is another town in the middle of nowhere just like us. A cute little town though. So we drove there M W T and the Prayter family drove on T and F. So at least I did not have to go everyday. It was good Dallen liked it and he learned a little there. It kinda refocuses him into wrestling again since we are not doing any sports right now and he is just sitting around the house eating... his little face is filling out LOL

Dallen and Eddie got the swine flu. Well not really the swine flu but it was not pretty. Dallen just had it for about 24 hours and Eddie was down for 3 days. He slept the entire 3 days. So of course germ-a-phobic- me was washing everything in site. Claira and I stayed outside a lot on Sat so we would not get it.

Mocha had her puppies on Friday. 9 of them. But then tradgady set in. Mocha had the pups and stayed around the house for the first day or 2 and got over giving birth. Then she did a quick trip down to the neighbors and back to say HI and that she was still around ( she likes all the neighbor dogs and sometimes goes and plays with them). Then Tuesday I noticed Mocha was not acting like herself. So I had Eddie look at her. I thought maybe she was depressed maybe had postpartum cause I think she did with her last litter too. She did not want to eat even corned beef (so not normal for her she loved people food). She looked really tired and did not move much. We do not think she was making much milk for the puppies either because 2 of them had already died. It was already 7 and so the option of even calling the vet was out. In this town no vets are around after 5. So we decided to let Mocha be and decide what to do it the morning. Well Eddie got up early to go cut wood and he checked on Mocha and she was dead. He noticed that she had a 22 bullet hole in her butt area. We totally did not see it the night before. So that is why she died, cause someone had shot her. She must have gone to someones house that day that she went to the neighbors for a quick stroll and they did not want her there and so they shot her. Obviously she was running away when she was shot to be shot in the butt. So cowardly of someone to shoot her as she was running away. We knew that she visited all the neighbor dogs but they all come over here too ( every one of them at one point or another). We live in the country in the middle of nowhere so it is a part of life. So Eddie berried Mocha, and then we had to put the puppies down too. There was no way that we could have taken care of 7 puppies that were only 5 days old. We had tried that with the last litter when Mocha did not make enough milk for everyone but it did not end up saving them.

Last night Claira and Eddie went to a Father Daughter dinner at Janesville Park. They had fun playing games and they even got to eat Hot Dogs ( yuck - I hate them - Yuck)

I have worked a little a day here and a day there since summer started just picking up shifts when I can. No work today, so Dallen and I went to town to get a fathers day gift. Claira came down with the swine flu today so it looks like I will be cleaning everything in site once again.

That is all for our summer so far. Who knows what we will do next week. Lets just hope I do not get sick.

Fashion Revue....Cub Scouts.... Sacramento... Mars

2009-06-02T15:16:00.000-07:00

Fashion Revue:
May 9th we had a Fashion Revue here in town for 4-H. It consisted of girls from all over the county who had created something to wear. Some of the outfits were sewn and some of them were "recycled" meaning take something old and make something fresh and new out of it, and then some were "purchased" meaning they had to purchase an outfit and create it into something new. Since I teach sewing for our 4-H group I had all of my girls make an apron to enter into the apron challenge. The apron pattern was the chosen pattern for the fashion revue you could make anything you wanted but the apron is the chosen pattern for this year. Claira ended up winning second place for her apron. The judges were not very nice they were very very picky but it helped me to understand what to teach the girls for next year so that they could score even higher. It was still fun and a great learning experience for Claira.

Cub Scouts:
May 19th was Dallen's first court of Honor for Scouts. He absolutely loves Scouts. He gets so excited to go every other Wednesday night that he can not eat before Scouts. It is quite funny. So tonight he was awarded his Bobcat. He got to pin a pin on me upside down and once he did a good deed for me he could turn it right side up. As soon as we got home he emptied the dishwasher and filled it back up for me so that he could turn it the right way. Here is a pic of Dallen pinning the award on me.

Sacramento Trip:
FRIDAY: We left school early and took off for Sac. We got there around 3 and met Gran at Home Goods. Of course Gran wanted to do some shopping with us. She always wants to shop. So we hit Home Goods, Old Navy, Barns and Nobles, Church Book Store, Beverly's, and Costco. Then went home to unload. Soon after we headed out to Islands to meet D T and Abby for dinner. It was good. Endless fries is nice but we all did pretty good and did not get much extra. Then we went to a park to play. It was late so we could not go in the sprinkler ( they have sprinkler toys on during the daylight hours) and it was getting pretty dark so taking pictures became a challenge. But here are a few good ones.

SAT: Since Claira won 2nd place at Fashion Revue, she was eligible to compete in the state finals. We honestly did not go expecting to win. Especially since this was our first State experience with 4-H. It was fun though. Or at least I thought it was. Claira was not too into it. She took home a Blue Ribbon ( everyone who participates does except the winner). Towards the end we were so excited to get to go home. The afternoon was warm and we were tired. That night we went and did a little shopping - Gran bought Claira a bathing suit cause the one she had on had some funky problem and the front of the bottoms would not stay up ...it was weird. And then we went and visited Grandma Schwab.

SUN: We got up and went to church. AND WHITNEY WARD / MISSION OAK WARD is SO NOT the same. What happened? Some INTERESTING people have moved into that ward. The speakers were good, one of the guys that spoke, I wonder if he has a brother for my sister to date... he seems like a decent guy .... maybe he has a brother.... I got to talk to Marilyn and Kirham. Oh and of course no trip to Whitney Ward/ Mission Oak Ward is complete without seeing Chris Silliman. After church we came home and ate some lunch and showed Gran how to use her new camera. Then back on the road we went. Sorry no pics for Sunday.

Mars:
Today Claira was in a play at school called Mars. Claira was the planet Venus. She actually had to sing all alone for this part. I was really shocked that she even wanted to try out for this part because of the solo. But she even wanted to try out for a larger part in the play and did but did not make the cut. I took pictures through out the play and then while Claira was on stage I took video so no pictures for that part. She did really good. I will try and see if blogger will let me upload the video of her in the play.

food storage mumbo jumbo

2009-05-23T17:37:00.000-07:00

I found this site that had some great tips. It also has some great plans on how to get your basic food storage in a years time which makes it seem a little more do able. By following this monthly calender you could have a lot built up in a years time. Check it out.

I finally got lucky and got a couple 5 gallon buckets while I was at Safeway this week. They had quite a few but one of the ladies complained that I could not have them all. LOL so nice of her. But I did get a few so I plan to use them to store extra flour, sugar and rice that I know I will use up in a years time. I am just going to keep them in my pantry under the shelves and then I will get more but put them in the #10 cans and just store those in the garage. ( for long term storage)

I also found a decent deal on pinto beans this week at grocery outlet. 25lb bag for 15 bucks. I honestly think that will last me a long long time cause I am not a big bean eater. Eddie has been on a kick with beans lately he has made a couple dinners with them but as far as eating them all the time. I do not see that happening. So at least half this bag will be put in the #10 cans for long term storage.

what clean is not......

2009-05-18T15:58:00.000-07:00

Clean is not piles of "junk" pushed behind the bedroom door.....

Clean is not taking all the clothes on your bedroom floor and sticking them in the laundry pile clean or not...

Clean is not shoving things under the bed so that Mom sees only a clean floor...

Clean is not taking the things that belong to Mom out of your room and just putting them on the kitchen counter - put them back where you got them- And why are they in your room anyways???

Clean is not piling everything in the closet and closing the door...

Clean is not taking your hand across the kitchen table and brushing off the crumbs onto the floor...

Last year we had some mice in our house so we did a huge clean up and got rid of all the old toys and clothes that were piled in the back of our closets. Since then I continually check about once a month in my room for any signs of mice in my closet or dresser drawers etc. I checked yesterday and no signs. Then last night as I was standing in the doorway to my room I saw a mouse peak out from behind Claira's and go right back in her room. I told Eddie to get out of bed and get that mouse. So he got the BB gun and was going to shoot it but we could not find it. So we set out traps. And everyone besides me goes back to bed. Apparently I am the only one who does not like mice. So I was the only one who was bothered by it. I was up all night trying to figure out how it got in the house, how long it has been in here and where in the world it is hiding.

So this morning we get up and I just want to have the kids stay home from school and clean their rooms. Claira's is not too bad but Dallen's is atrocious. But they rather go to school. WOW.

We had dentist appointments today anyways so they only went till 10:30. Eddie Claira and Dallen all got their teeth cleaned. Dallen was the only one with a cavity. Not too bad, cause someone always has one. And he is my better brush er and he is always flossing and it is an in between cavity???? go figure

So we came home and they did their regular chores ( yes they have chores cause I am the meanest mom in the world - their words) and I tell them to clean their rooms. I go and do a check so that I can vacuum and figure out they have no idea what clean means.

New Show

2009-05-10T17:03:00.000-07:00

We watch a lot of Food Network shows at this house. We love to try out the recipes from the shows. Eddie often tried ones from Alton Brown, I think we find his show so interesting because he breaks everything down and tells you the science of everything. It is really interesting. My favorite is Semi Homemade with Sandra Lee. Because, I am a total semi homemade cook. You can make so many good desserts by adding things to a box cake mix!

Well today premiered a new show with Sandra Lee, called Sandra's Money Saving Meals. It is really good. She gives you real recipes that you can make with a few ingredients and gives you tips at the same time on how to save money at the grocery store. She also breaks down how much each serving costs. Not something I really pay attention to but can become useful knowledge. With our current pay cut.... recently I am always trying to figure out ways to cut costs. Jana taught me how to do this with coupons and that has helped. I think learning a few from this show will pay off too. I never bought generic food until recently, I am kinda a food snob. But generic is not that bad. Not that I am buying all generic but a some here and there I have been. There are some things though that there is no way I will go generic on - like laundry soap and toilet paper!

So check out Sandra's new show it may be helpful to you to.

My New Song

2009-05-09T17:48:00.000-07:00

While reading Auntie Shells blog today, her music began to play. (Dallen is sitting her with me and he began to sing along!) While they were down for their Easter break Josh introduced the family to a new song. It is quite funny. So I added it to my blog to share with all of you..... if anyone besides my fam actually reads my blog LOL So enjoy the new song !

check out this jewelry

2009-04-13T20:53:00.000-07:00

I am not one to really wear jewelry I am just plain jane - jeans and a t-shirt. But while I was blog surfing for a moment today I say a link to this chicks brothers page.... he makes this jewelry on etsy.... here I think it is kinda cute... and decently priced too

here are the ones I like :

Easter Drama

2009-04-12T14:09:00.000-07:00

So this morning we were sitting there and I was looking at Dallen's hair. It needed to be cut badly so I told him to go get me the clippers and we would go cut it before church. So I cut his hair and it looks all nice and pretty much bald. So I tell Claira to come out back too and I will cut hers to. Her hair is way too long. She can not reach all of it to properly brush it and it is quite scraggly in the back. So I take my first cut and she says "I do not want it that short" - well it is too late now it has already been cut. So I finish up and she looks in the mirror and starts crying. I tell her to get in the shower and wash off and I hear her in there bawling. Like someone had actually killed her dog or something. She comes out of the bathroom still crying her eyes out. She put her hair back in a ponytail and will not take it out. So I said forget it we are not going to church crying like that - so we stayed home.

Hopefully I can get a picture of her hair cut later today. We will see

Dallen's kid birthday party....

2009-04-11T17:54:00.000-07:00

I thought I would be a nice Mom and take Dallen and his friends to the bowling ally for his birthday. The bowling ally just reopened this part month. They changed owner ship ( a couple times since they closed years ago) and redid the entire inside. It is now nice and clean and does not smell like an ash tray - which is VERY NICE.

Dallen had never bowled before but his friends had. They are all (4 of them- Dallen Cody Steven and Darrell) very competitive with each other. In everything they do. So Dallen took his first "roll" and got a gutter. Second "roll" and he got another gutter. So he threw a stinking fit. He did not want to play anymore. Took off his shoes and sat there pouting. I tried to get him to play and I even went out there and bowled for him and made a fool of myself. But he sat there like a 4 year old and would not listen to me. I wanted to beat him.... yes I wrote it ..... I wanted to beat the child.... (I can hear my Mom and Eddie saying Danielle that is not the kind of stuff you should write on your blog... but I am real and not the Molly Mormon Mom LOL ) Probably a good thing for me and Dallen both was that the bowling ally was packed and so there is no way I could have beat the kid. LOL

Eventually that round of bowling was over and Dallen's friends wanted to play another game with the bumpers. So Dallen finally agreed to play. Once he did he loved it and wants to go back there this week. YEAH FAT CHANCE OF THAT HAPPENING.

After bowling we came back to the house and had cake. Vanilla cake with root beer frosting. Then the boys played out back. They are definitely boys climbing on everything running around getting dirty. They had lots of fun, but it was rather exhausting for me. It is things like birthday parties that remind me why I only had 2 kids. I am so not patient, and I am way too controlling and way too much of a neat freak. ( which the neat freak part has been going out the window the last few years with me working part time)

the kids have this week off school - which I am so grateful for. I need a break from homework everynight and making them get up every morning. Too bad I still have to get up and go to work everyday. But maybe I can get caught up on a few things around the house that need to get done.

picks to come one day ....

Root Beer Frosting

2009-03-14T20:25:00.000-07:00

Root Beer Frosting - my kids love this stuff

Ingredients
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened
1/2 teaspoon McCormick® Root Beer Concentrate
1 box (16 ounces) confectioners' sugar, sifted
1/4 cup milk
Directions
1. Beat butter in large bowl with electric mixer on medium speed until light and fluffy. Add Root Beer Concentrate; mix well.

2. Gradually add confectioners' sugar, beating until well blended after each addition and frequently scraping sides and bottom of bowl.

3. Add milk; beat until light and fluffy. If frosting is too thick to spread, gradually beat in additional milk. Store in refrigerator up to 2 weeks. Re whip before using.

I get my flavoring at Winco and I am not sure that I use the name brand or not - it is the cheapest place I have found for it and it lasts a long time too

too much to do no time to post...

2009-03-10T20:40:00.000-07:00

I could post on a billion things but I just never have time to post - Maybe I should get off of facebook for a minute Huh...
I told Katie I would post the root beer frosting recipe - I will - one day LOL
I need to the post on what my kids think about me - one day and I need to do an update on wrestling and birthdays that have just happened.... one day

my newest want

2009-01-26T13:37:00.001-08:00

OK so canning kinda scares me well maybe that is not the right word. But I do not know anything about it but I know I need to get into it, to save some money. I have certain sites I go to all the time about food storage and today i went to one blog and they had these videos posted about dehydrating foods so now i want a dehydrator LOL man i always have wants LOL

here is a link to the videos

check out this food storage set up...

2009-01-22T15:08:00.000-08:00

click on this link to check out their food storage set up I am way jealous!

found this quote that I think is perfect!!!

"Many more people could ride out the storm-tossed waves in their economic lives if they had their year's supply of food . . . and were debt-free. Today we find that many have followed this counsel in reverse: they have at least a year's supply of debt and are food-free"
Pres. Thomas S. Monson

I found this blog
I like that they do it as a RS and all the sisters can look at it. For me that is great cause I have not been to church all month because of wrestling and it would be a great way to stay informed of stuff going on. I think they have a good example of a 72 hour kit too

Katie Tagged Me

2009-01-22T13:17:00.001-08:00

Katie tagged me to write 5 thing I like about today so far.....

1- That it is raining rather than snowing
2- That there is a 25% off coupon to shelfreliance in the food storage newsletter today- maybe I can afford to get a few basics
3- That Eddie is already in the process of making dinner - Pork Roast
4- That we do not have any activities tonight - no wrestling, no scouts, no achievement days, and no 4-H either - just time to study spelling words woo hoo
5-That I already went to town and did a little shopping- I was a dork standing in wally's writing down prices of items i normally buy so that I would know when they come on sale at places that the sale price is a good deal or not LOL

Wrestling

2009-01-20T15:05:00.000-08:00

This time of year wrestling is our life. We eat sleep and breath wrestling. Practice is 3 nights a week and there is a tournament every weekend. On the non wrestling days Dallen runs on the treadmill for 15 min to keep up his cardio. (now if only I would do this too.)

This past Sunday, the tournament was in Fallon Nevada. Fallon is about 2 hours away from us, so we had to leave by 5 am. This was the hardest part of the day. I am soooo not a morning person. Dallen is definitely not a morning person! Eddie is not the greatest either. Claira on the other hand is fine with it, but this weekend she stayed at Julieann's house so she was not there to make the rest of us get up. We did it though. We got in the car and I drove to Fallon. We made it in just over 2 hours too. I passed up a few of our team members on the road. They claim I was driving 85 but I was only going 75 I mean come on the speed limit in Nevada is 70 so you can go 75!!!

Dallen pinned his first kid super fast. I even missed the whole thing it was so fast. I was taking pictures of another kid and was watching for Dallen to come out of staging and did not see him come out. So I thought I was all good. Then Eddie walked by me and said "He just pinned a kid" CRAP I missed it I was so bummed.

His second match was good. The kids were evenly matched. Those are the best ones cause you learn so much from having to struggle. Dallen came out on top tough and won that match too. I got to see that whole match.

His 3rd match we knew that if he was to win he would take first place. We did not want to jink it but Eddie told him anyways. Dallen said to me "Hey Mom the next kid I wrestle I have already beat before. So I am going to win" I told him not to get cocky cause that is when you loose. I told him you have to go out there and fight like you have never wrestled him before cause he could have gotten better since you wrestled him last. So he did. He went out and fought hard. I was able to be right on the edge of the mat for this match. The other kids mom was standing right next to me. She looked like a really nice person. LOL Then there was me LOL Dallen got the kid down right away and almost had him pinned so I started screaming at the top of my lungs to push " Push Push" He heard me and pushed a little harder and the kid got pinned. Once I knew it was a pin I yelled quite loud again because I knew that it ment that Dallen had won first place. The nice mom looked at me and gave me a weird look like I was crazy.

Usually you do not get trophies at the tournaments but they were giving out trophies for 1st place in all weight classes at this tournament. That was a big carrot for us to dangle in front of him so he would fight hard because he had never received a wrestling trophy before. Other wise it would not have been such a big deal I would not have yelled as much. Still a lot but not as much.

Here is a pic with his trophy. It is Cody (Dallen's best friend) 1st place also, Kyle (Cody's brother) 2nd place, Dallen 1st place and Darrell (in the back- one of Dallen's other best friends) 2nd place

After the tournament we stopped in Reno for gas and dinner. It was Dallen's turn to decide where to eat but he did not want to eat. Cody was going to spend the night at our house as soon as we got home so he wanted to hurry up and get home. But Eddie was starving so we had to eat. So that ment I got to choose. I suggested Sushi. Eddie was not too excited about my idea but he said I would try it. So we went to Sushi Pier in Reno. Eddie was very weary. He said well I can always eat at home again. Once we ordered our first thing he loved it. It was sooo stinking good I wasn't to go back today. But going to Sushi is not going to be something we do often. It is kinda expensive. Dallen really liked it too. I have a picture of Eddie at the restaurant on my phone He said "none of my friends are going to believe I ate here" So I took a pic I will try and see if I can upload it later

Sorry

2009-01-14T11:04:00.000-08:00

Sorry but I have to put one of those stupid spam blocker things on my comments. I was hoping to not do it but I have been hacked and it keeps happening. So now you have to do the password thing when you make a comment. It sucks I know, Sorry.

Nothing new since my post last night. Just went to work this morning and am home checking my emails and such. We have sewing class this afternoon, then 4-H meeting, then scouts and achievement girls. So it will be a busy busy afternoon.

Project 365

2009-01-13T19:58:00.000-08:00

I am already falling way behind on project 365 I will go one or 2 days and then forget again. This book is going to be really lame if I keep this up. Keeping up with adding my pics to the photo groups has not been too bad i just have to do it every week since we have a wrestling tournament every week this month. As soon as I finish getting my house organized I hope to start doing some pages for the 2006 and 2007 albums so I can finish that this year.

Dallen took 3rd place at the wrestling tournament this week. He was even wrestling in a weight class above him LOL ( they did not have any kids there his age that were as skinny as him LOL ) We think he could have had 2nd but they were not doing challenges this time. He did not actually have to wrestle the kid that got 2nd place but he has wrestled him before and won, plus the other kid had one less match then Dallen so we think that 2nd really should have gone to Dallen but oh well. It was a lot of fun. We sit as a team in the stands and we cheer for each kid like they are our own. It really helps you to forget that you are sitting smushed in with a million strangers at each tournament. That gets kinda annoying and it is always loud. If I have a good recording of one of his matches I will upload it. I am planning to go through all the pics of this last tournament tonight while I watch BL.

My Newest "Want"

2009-01-10T11:09:00.000-08:00

So I have a list of "wants" it is not too big but big enough that I can not just go out and buy them all. So a little at a time. I was going to focus on getting a laptop, so I could be on it while Eddie is watching TV and at least be able to be in the same room ( let alone in the same building). That was at least until yesterday....

We got the oh so lovely news that Arni is for sure taking away 10% of our paychecks. Now for some people that means that means that they will not be able to work 2 days a month, equaling 10% cut in pay because they are not working it. But for us lovely people in jobs that can not close down for 2 days a month, that means 2 days of working without pay. Yeah nice huh. How they plan to make this "legal" is to then put 2 days of "furlough" on your books each month. What that means is that once this 18month long pay cut is over with, you will be able to take the days off that you have already worked but did not get paid for. These days on the books will not increase in value (smart move on the states part but not good at all for us people who will get pay raises in the mean time.) These days are only valid for 2 years. at the end of the 18 months you will have 36 days of "furlough" on the books to use. In order to use your "furloughs" you have to write a memo asking for the days off. If granted great you can have a day off and not worry cause you will still be making your full paycheck. So it sound fair right? yea sure sounds good, now stop and think about it.... at our location we have 839 guys working there. We have 819 positions to fill each day. That leaves an extra 20 guys to fill in for people who are sick, on comp, or who have taken a hospital. That is not many extras so there is still some OT not much though. ( ok I got off track with that) There are 839 people they will each get 36 "furlough" days. 839*36=30,204 days to be taken off. Now they can not let everyone take off the days at the same time so of course that would be asinine. So say they let 20 people a day take off, because there are 20 "extra" guys to fill in those positions that will not create the OT to replace people for those "furlough" days. so 20*365= 7,300 so 7,300 days will be able to be used in one years time. You only have 2 years to use your days in so 7,300*2= 14,600 only 14,600 days will be able to be used. That is less than half of the 30,204 available to be used so you will loose most likely half of your "furlough" days. So you are working for FREE. Granted during this time variables will change, people will get fired people will die and some will retire all changing variables here and there. Notice I did not say people will be hired... because they are putting hiring freeze on again ( or maybe it is still I can not keep up with it) I agree you should not taken on more mouths if you can not afford to pay them. But by doing all this you are creating more OT and now do we make our money OT. Sure we make a decent wage without OT, you can live but if you want anything extra you work the OT. Put the life of your childrens father or mother at risk everyday and see if you feel we are overpaid. Most people have no clue what goes on behind those walls or out on the streets and until you live it you do not understand it in the least.

Ok, now back to me real post....
I was going to get a laptop but then I decided that maybe I should wait on that I have a puter that works great so why do I need a laptop right now. So here is what I do want though... It is a shelf to put your canned food on for food storage. It is 18 inches wide which is perfect I have a spot in my pantry that this would fit perfect in. I just have to take out 4 little shelfs ( which could then be used in Dallen's room so they would not be wasted) But Costco has a bigger one that is 36 inches wide ( so double wide) it too would fit in my pantry well. The one from Costco is only 65 bucks more too. Now I just have to talk Eddie into it and find the money. Anyone want to pitch in for it?

cool site

2009-01-08T10:02:00.000-08:00

While I am working on my "Goals" for the year, I am going to post my progress and my tips well not my tips but tips I have found or people have shared with me. My go to food storage girl and honorary Mormon, Jana shared a site with me yesterday. I checked it out this morning and I am really liking it. They have lots of tips and they are going to be sending out email reminders every 2 weeks of what you should be buying those weeks to help you get your food storage bought throughout the year. They are also running some contests currently so head over and check them out Fun with Food Storage

That is all for now I have a billion things to do today but who wants to Clean? NOT ME I am thinking I will just work on my scraproom today, since it is suppose to be my room. I think it has turned into an extra family room just without a TV. You know the room with the computer and the treadmill and all the mish mash stuff that you do not know where to put. That is what my room has turned into. I don't deal with mess well! So this room is driving me nuts.

It is windy as all get up over here Looks like a storm is going to roll in- just checked yep it is suppose to rain today. At least it is not snow I do not want more snow yet.

Goals

2009-01-07T15:02:00.000-08:00

So I did not really make any resolutions this year. I do not really think I ever do. But today I have been wasting time on the net ( not like I do not do that everyday) and I am seeing a lot about Project 365 in the scrapping world. I know there are a billion P365 things out there but I was mainly looking at the stuff that pertains to the scrapping world. So it got me thinking maybe I should do this.... but then when do I have time..... but it would be a great way to document our year.... but i will probably only last a week so why bother.... it would help me learn how to use my new camera better and better my skills....but printing all the pages out would cost a fortune..... but then they always have specials randomly in the year and I did already prepay for some albums in shutterfly.... So I am thinking now maybe I should attempt it. Then I start thinking I have a lot of scrapping wants for this year.... maybe I should list them so I can make sure I work on all of them LOL

1- create and upload all wrestling pics to a group for the team parents
2- create a Schwab group and upload all pics that pertain to Schwab family activities
3- continue to upload all pics to the Sorenson group
4-Get all 2006 and 2007 pictures scrapped and into a book ( either bound and printed or printed and slipped into the remaining slots of the paper albums already started)
5-Create a year in review album for MIL for Christmas 2009 with all Schwab families included(I think this is what we are planning to do for my MIL from now on for Christmas presents)
6- Set up to have my blog printed out ( working on this a little at a time and having it ready so that when a good sale price comes along I will be ready)
7- Do a wrestling album for Dallen
8- Do a soccer album for each kid
9- Do project 365 in an 8x8 size
OH HECK WHY NOT MAKE IT AN EVEN 10
10- Make a Sorenson album (this will require the other Sorenson girls help!!!!)

So I guess those are my scrapping goals - Yikes that is a lot I am going to be spending all my time on the puter how am I going to finish all my other goals?

other goals to work on this year-
1-Organize the Pantry- I want to put a big chunk of our food storage in the pantry for easy rotation
2- Work on food storage - right now we have enough to get through one month just fine and we could survive longer but that is with eating some boring meals and who wants to have a boring food storage- what good is it if you do not want to eat it
3- Learn to eat more fresh veggies and fruit and get a little more fiber in the diet- this is not something I am really good at I rather eat sweets than healthy stuff but I do not want to have multiple health problems as the years go on so I need to work on getting more variety
4- To blog more often - after all I am using this as my journal so I need to write in it more often- now if only I could upload pictures I would be happier with this blogger thing

of course there is always the regular pay off debt and loose weight issues which I am constantly working on but those go without saying

lets try uploading the rest of those pics....

2009-01-07T11:45:00.000-08:00

ok Blogger is seriously killing me I am trying to upload these pics and it will not do it URRRGG

Katie- Lips I have is 360 i do not know if they make it for regular Xbox?

Denise- thanks for the compliment - I want to take that class too they are offering it again this semester - Last year they did it in a 6 week class the first weeks of Summer I would love to take it then but then the kids are out of school and what do you do with them? I got a Nikon D90

oh my hell I can not get anything to upload URRR

got a video to upload and then right before I saved it WHAM I lost it ---- now I am trying the jump rope one remember I just got this camera and I did not know that they recorded one direction and I have yet to figure out if I can rotate them after I record them sorry.

ok trying the pics one more time..... nope still nothing urrr

woo hoo it is working now.....

Dallen against Aunt Brit

Claira

I did have another uploaded of Dallen and one of Eddie and then the darn system went down - I guess this is good for now LOL

Pictures

2009-01-03T15:56:00.000-08:00

I am wondering Why? Why do I take so many dang pictures? I have spent 5 hours today on the puter uploading pictures, rotating them ( I switch my camera position often) and weeding out the blurry ones. Now honestly I have not been just sitting here the entire 5 hours, but a good portion I am sure. Because I take so many pictures of things my kids do with other peoples kids,they say "oh well since you are taking pictures I will just put my camera away because you take better pictures." Well yes I do have some good pictures partially because I have a really good camera, and partly cause I take "eleventy billion" and just post the few cute ones. So now I have to upload my pics to snapfish or shutterfly for the other parents so they can see the pics and have a chance to print them out. Either that or burn them a disk of the pictures. Which is fine I do not mind sharing it just takes forever to upload. It is killing me! So today I am creating a Wrestling group page on snapfish and then after that is done I am going to create a Schwab page. (We already have a Sorenson page.)

So I am starting to learn all the new features on my new camera - man there are a million. It also takes video. I am still not good at making that too clear but it has been really nice having that option. I made a video of Dallen singing with aunt Brit. Once I figure out how to, I will upload it here. And one of Dallen trying to jump rope at wrestling practice. He soooo can not jump rope it was too funny.

Last night as I was walking into wrestling practice I went to place my new camera on my shoulder. BAM it dropped straight off the shoulder strap and to the ground. I was not very happy. Luckily it did not break, cause I had my brand new $300 lense on the front. There is no way I could replace that for a while. My lense cover has some big gashes in it and my lense itself has a few but at least not on the actual glass portion so I think it will survive.

Claira got this new Xbox game for Christmas, Lips. It is so much fun if you have an Xbox you have to get it!!! It is like a karaoke game, you can sing by yourself or you can sing against others it is so much fun. We showed it to Brit when she came over on New Years Day. We played that thing for hours and now Brit is thinking she will let Zach get that Xbox that he has been asking for.

One of the best thing about Brit and Zach coming up to visit was miss Ellaree. (Sorry Brit you are second place now LOL) I took elenty billion pictures of Ella. Many of them are really cute. Of course though they are of a baby LOL so here are a few that I love.

ok That is all for now uploading to Blogger is stinking slower than molasses... more next time.

Holly Cow it has been a month...

2008-12-21T18:26:00.000-08:00

Wow I have been slacking! I have been spending a lot of time on Facebook. It is addicting! I like it because it is easy to check on just one click and you can see the latest things that your friends have posted all in one spot. I like that because clicking onto every blog sure takes a lot of time, something that I definitely do not have. I have been working a lot at the post office in the mornings and on my off days I have been working at the school. So no free time for me. But, the girl I was filling in for at the post office has now returned so I will not be working as much now. It is fine, it means that I can get some things done around the house and maybe scrap a page or two. I am sure it will not be long before I will be working more often again.

So here are some old pics from the last few months to share with you....

This is my first Turkey I made Thanksgiving Dinner this year for the first time and it turned out pretty good.

ok blogger is freaking out on me I will post more later

Thank You Jana!

2008-11-27T19:34:00.000-08:00

So my friend Jana read my last post and shared some great sites with me on food storage. So I added many of them to the side of my blog so that I can easily access them and so that I can share them with all of you. Jana is not LDS but she sure knows a lot about food storage, I told her she was turning into a Mormon and she did not even know it. Jana and I talked back and forth for quite a while about food storage and what steps she had done and what she plans to do in the upcoming months. She is a real inspiration as to how hard she works at it and how smart she is about it. She also shared with me some of her Susanville shopping tips. In this small town with not many options you need to be smart and make your money go a little further here because prices are a bit higher here than in the city.

So Thank You Jana for sharing you knowledge with me!

Preparedness tip

2008-11-18T16:03:00.000-08:00

Here is a tip I found while searching on the net. This is what one lady does: while she is doing the regular shopping she will pick up one extra ( lets say spag sauce) so she puts one in the pantry in the house to use and the second one she writes the date on top ( like mom used to do) and then places it in her food storage section (lets say in her garage). Then when she needs spag sauce again she will buy 2 again and they both go in food storage and the one that she previously placed in food storage she bring into the pantry. That way everything is rotated and she now has 2 extra spag sauces in her storage and next time she will do the same and it will add up (being smart though - only buying what they will actually use in a years time) I like this idea cause honestly you can not afford to buy a ton extra every month but at least you can buy 2 of the things that are on sale.

Preparedness thoughts

2008-11-15T16:11:00.001-08:00

So for the past little while we have been feeling like we need to be better prepared. I have actually been thinking about it for a whole year but never truly did anything about it, other than ask for shelves to put food storage on, for Christmas last year. So we talked about it and would figure "oh we do not have extra money with the gas prices." Then a month or so would go by and we would talk about doing it again. So finally we decided to start paying down our debt cause we need to be just as prepared financially and it would benefit us in more than one way. So we did for a few months and made a huge dent. But then we decided to put that on hold for a little bit and work on some other preparedness issues. With all the talk about the economy lately and people defaulting on loans and no one shopping, you kinda start thinking. We personally have not felt the crunch,at least not yet. But you never know when it will happen to you. So anyways the whole reason for this post was to share with you a site that I found in my search for some preparedness tips simplylivingsmart.com check it out it has a lot of good information.

more pages from my class

2008-10-25T14:55:00.001-07:00

So here are a couple more pages I made while taking the class from jessica sprague. I am all done taking her class it was a lot of fun I learned a lot from it.

We are all better here FINALLY well at least from the sickness we had... now claira is onto the next sickness which I am sure the rest of us will get. It is such a JOY having kids go to school and come home with crap like this!

Mindy-I love them all LOL I think my fav is the first one the black with the pink and green flowers with the stripes on the reverse- but I like the paisley one too!

Mom- all you have to do is click the pause button on the music player then it will stop for ya

So anyone want to become an RN and come work at the prison here? I wish I could stomach that kind of stuff - they just got a raise and Dang that would be tempting. Base Salary $10,000.00 a month (Nope that is not a typo) plus a signing bonus every 6 months (meaning you agree to stay at that location for the next 6 months) first bonus is 1500.00 and each time you sign it goes up 500.00 more. Nice huh? Wish I had the stomach for it - Just thought I would share my info with the public

Camera Strap deal----

2008-10-23T17:04:00.001-07:00

I want to get one of these camera straps and I saw that she is having a sell!!! So anyone else want to get one so we can get the discount??

another you tube

2008-10-18T16:12:00.000-07:00

Sorry I know it has been a long time since I updated but we have all been really sick here for about 2 1/2 weeks and it has finally hit me. woo hoo But here is another you tube that I really like - my Aunt Shaila sent it to me so I thought I would share.

Prop 8 You tube video

2008-10-10T12:54:00.000-07:00

A LO from the Jessica Sprague class

2008-10-01T16:08:00.000-07:00

well I was able to get into both classes that I wanted to take. I am learning a ton from both. Now of course i want a new camera and new lenses LOL maybe for Christmas. This week I started the scrapping class and this is the first LO I created

I had so much fun learning how to create this. Jessica is a really good teacher. She has created little videos to watch so you can go at your own pace which is very nice - especially since I have very little time to scrap. I was so excited to learn how to edit photos so that only part of the picture has color showing and it is not that hard either I do have a dot of color missing on one of the sparklers which I did not notice till a few minutes ago but oh well I am happy with it anyways.

oh crud i hear boys screaming in the house - I have little Chance this afternoon - better go see what they are doing... more later ( maybe)

What did I get myself into?

2008-09-20T15:53:00.000-07:00

When you look at me I am sure you can see the word "SUCKER" across my forehead. If you ask me to help with a school project I always say yes if there is anyway possible that I can complete the task. The same goes for church or soccer or now 4H. Don't get me wrong I am not mad that I said I would help with 4H. When you stop and think of all the things you have going on and you stop to think where in the world am I going to fit in another activity it can be a bit overwhelming.

So for 4H I am going to be the sewing Mom. Yes I know how to sew, I am not the best though. But it will be a good opportunity for Claira to learn and spend time with friends at the same time. Maybe it will help me learn the virtue of patients. (honestly I think not) So in searching the web for some easy sewing ideas I came across quite a few cheese things that I know my daughter would not be caught dead in. But then I thought of this cool idea we saw on Martha So while looking for this beach bag made out of a towel idea (which I still have not found) I found tons of cute ideas. So I wonder how much the 4H budget is? Cause with a ton of money we could make some really cute things. So here is a list of ideas I came up with (some will have links others are just ideas I thought of):
Rice Bags- what girl just starting there period doesn't need a rice bag for those cramp days ( oh and if you are one of those girls who never got cramps- well I have a few choice words for you) Here Martha made some using cute material rather than just one with a cover made from a kitchen towel idea.
Pillow Cases- I think these would be a great start nothing too hard about sewing a few straight lines to make a pillow case and they could totally personalize them
Napkin Folded Pillow Cases- these again are from Martha and I think they are very very cute - the girls could make these for their beds it doesn't look too hard
Tie blankets- These are easy enough get 2 different patterns of fleece (ones that go together of course) and cut strips on the edges and tie the strips in knots winter is coming that would be useful
Pajama Pants- What kid (OK adult too) does not like to lounge around in pajama pants on Saturday mornings? the pattern I have used to make these is not too hard
Artist Organizer these are cute and look simple enough
Reversible Purse- I think these are totally cute I want one of these - they would be so much fun with some cute fabric

If you have any ideas on what i could make with these girls (ages 10 to 14 mostly) please share your ideas!

soccer life

2008-09-07T15:11:00.000-07:00

Since I was not able to take the digital photography class offered at the college this semester, I decided that I would sing up for this class instead: Oh Shoot! Beginning Photography . Sign ups are tomorrow and the class starts the following week. Well of course I have to be at soccer when registration begins. Last time this class was offered they sold out in 7 minutes! Nice, what are my chances of getting into it this time? arrg If I get into the class or not I still want to take this class: Now We're Rockin' With Photoshop . Registration for this class is the 22nd. But of course again I have to be somewhere at the time registration opens for that class too. Nice.

time for a couple soccer picture... It is really hard to watch both kids games when they are played at the same time. Claira plays at the top hill and Dallen always at the bottom fields thankfully this week they were the field right next to each other so I could kinda watch both. It is not to great for pictures though cause I am missing out on some really good shots. But here are a couple good ones of my kids:

looks like he is about to head butt it

I like this one cause Dallen is cheering when Landon made a goal

This one looks like she is totally reaching to make that kick

Off to make pineapple upside down cake for Eddie's birthday

Another Find

2008-09-06T08:38:00.000-07:00

I found another thing to spend money on LOL. Kim Wresh has a deal on some vinyl going on on her blog. 3 totally cute holiday cutouts that you can place on boards to display during the holidays. They are to go on a board that is 6 inches tall and 24 inches long. So decent sized not miniature sized like you get from some companies. They are only 18 bucks for the set and that includes the shipping and handling. I just ordered something from her this week and I already have it... and it is very cute once I get it made up I will share it. (They are teacher gifts.) Here is a picture of the sayings:

I would totally make them for my sibling I drew for Christmas this year but I already made her something. I know some other siblings that would love to have these too. Who has who for Christmas? You know I was just thinking they would be cute to display in a classroom to add a little festiveness to the room ( well not for a teacher like Josh that would be a little femmie)

Ok that is all for now - just needed to plug this little find i found this morning. More later...

random this and that

2008-09-01T20:00:00.000-07:00

Katie asked me a while back to take pics of the things i have around my house made with the vinyl cut outs so here are most of them i do not have pics of 2 of them.....

They are all on wood but the next ones I order are going to go right on the wall.

I actually ordered 2 today from Kim Wresh. She has an etsy store that you can see a few examples of what she has there are a few listed on her blog too. I ordered some to make some personalized teacher gifts for Christmas with. She was very reasonably priced.

Speaking of Kim I was going to post my little album a while back and never got around to it. Kim has a badge album template set available so I grabbed it and thought it would make a cute gift for the little kids, something they could take with them to church to look at during sacrament meeting. So I made one for my nieces Abby and Marley. They are both exactly the same. I just did one page of each family member. It was not too hard. Here are 2 pics of it - kinda blurry sorry...

the front.... and claira's page
all the digi papers and embellishments were used from digitreats alpha kit. One day I will make one for the little boys they of course do not want a pink one.

Shellber- The pic will come on a day when I have a good hair day.....

I worked on painting my bathroom cabinets today. That is a chore! I think they are original with the house Yikes I would love to replace them but once you start a project like that it always seems to grow bigger so I will leave them till we have the money to redo the bathroom.
Part of the reason I painted the cabinets was because I want to paint my room ( after all I bought the paint in May thinking I would paint back then) and I did not want to start another job until the bathroom was totally done.
Well it is not totally done I just need to do a few touch up now and then it will be done. So I opened up the "cream" color I bought to paint the bedroom walls with - It looks a little yellowish cream I am not sure I really really like it. The paint chip looked totally different. So i painted one wall and I am going to let it sit for a day and see if it grows on me. I know for sure though that the wall behind my bed is going to be green. And once I find another door like the one I randomly purchased 2 months ago then I am going to pain them black and make a headboard out of them. kind of a cottage feel with a little country and a little modern in it. ( I learned that that is my style from the show "find your style")

Eddie worked another double last night so Dallen and I stayed up late watching TV. We watched dinner impossible and they made chocolate covered bacon. So this morning as soon as he woke up Dallen looked and me and asked if we could make chocolate covered bacon. So we tried it ... Not my favorite but Dallen liked it. We should have taken a picture what kind of scrapper am I?

Soccer starts tomorrow which means lots and lots of time will soon be spent driving to town every week for the next 2 months - Claira does not even have her schedule yet and the season starts tomorrow nice huh. I am sure I will have tons of pics don't worry

I have been on the cupcake lately I have no clue why. We made root beer flavored frosting for a batch that we took to the ward corn feed those were yummy. So last week I made them with root beer flavored cake but it did not turn out as good. Erika has made a couple sets of really good looking cupcakes so I scanned her blog to see if she had any good recipes listed today. I want to try the key lime ones they look really good. But of course I do not have all the ingredients so some other night. I did find a root beer cake recipe that looks good though through her blog and onto another who had a link to the cake. So maybe tomorrow I can try that one out.

ok off to see what is on the boob toob tonight.

new find

2008-08-29T19:39:00.000-07:00

so while i was blog surfing today, I found this site. They cut out all kinds of cute vinyl. I really like vinyl because it is not too expensive and once you put it on the walls you can take it off really easily and it will not ruin the walls. So I see that they are having a contest.
this is what they are giving away.

And you know I am a sucker for contests I will sign up for anything that tickles my fancy. So go check the site out and see what they have to offer. Here are my favorites:

this would look so cute in miss Marley's room
just had to show the fushia
These would be really nice if you have them displayed in the kitchen
I so want this but i do not have anywhere to put it- oh wait by the back door ( that is the door we use most often) - Christmas idea for who ever has me hint hint
this would be a great teachers gift deff considering this for Christmas gift for the kids teachers
I really like how graphic these are very cute

check out what we did today...

2008-08-23T15:33:00.000-07:00

Today was the air show in town. So we met Sarah (Eddie's cousins wife) and went together. Dallen wanted to take a ride in the helicopter so when we got down to that end of the show we decided to check it out. It was not free of course but I figured how often do you have the opportunity to ride in a helicopter, so we took a ride. Dallen was totally excited Claira, not so much. She did not want to go at first but then decided to try it. Dallen decided that he was going to sit up front. Until the last minute then he chickened out. Of course Claira did not want to sit up front so I ended up doing it. We got in and took off, the pilot took us up over by Jim and Bernadette's so I pointed out there house to the kids. So the pilot said "do you want to buzz them and see if we can get them to come and see us?" We then flew down pretty close and circled their house a couple times. That was pretty cool but a little scary too. Then he did some tricks taking us sideways and up and down and backwards it was really cool to see all the things he could do. Then we got to huge the mountains. He took us to the top of the mountain and we followed the contours of the land and then flew off the edge that was pretty cool too. We had a lot of fun. So that was our excitement for the day. Now we are off to meet up with Sarah again and go to the corn feed at our bishops house.

I actually won something....

2008-08-14T09:56:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I got an email saying that I won a free digital scrap booking kit. At first I thought I am not going to open it it is probably just spam. But I eventually did, and it is a good thing I did.

Here is the kit I won from One Memory at a time

I was pretty excited! It will be great for back to school photos this year. Which is less than 2 weeks away!!!!

Yesterday we hit 100 degrees I think it was the first time this summer. It has been hot but not too hot but yesterday was a little too hot to be outside. Since it was so hot we decided to just have fruit for dinner. That was nice and easy and it was gone mega fast. I made some dip to go along, the cream cheese and jet puff marshmallow cream. It is nice and quick but it does not make a ton.

cute little cork boards

2008-08-04T13:46:00.001-07:00

check out these cute little cork boards they

would be so easy to make and you could do them in any decor - they would be cute in Callie and bay's room with matching fabric to their room so they could hang their art work on them or pictures of their family-

new pages

2008-08-03T20:23:00.001-07:00

page 1 is of Callie Marie page two is of Bay, Callie, Dal and Grandpa planting flowers the day before Lance's wedding. And so I am legal to share this here are the credits:pattern paper by tracy ann-promise too, summer days by tracy ann- summer sizzle, flowers by graphic jam designs, template (pg 2) by pink peacock, frame by scrap street-swirl photo frames

Kaci - Yes they are what you call a Digital Layout- it is really quite easy and not too expensive either. There are all kinds of programs out there to use that help you make them more easily. I use Photoshop Elements 5.

Found a cool new site

2008-07-29T10:01:00.000-07:00

I found this cool new site (well new to me) Tracy Joy She has tons of really really cute bags. They are really cute but a little too spendy for me what can I say I am cheap ( I get that trait from my Dad) If I know can make it myself I don't buy it. I am really liking these bags it almost makes me want to take a trip to Honey Run. I did say almost! I have yet to check out the Honey Run but my Mom has been there a few times and they have some really cute fabric. It is owned by my SIL's Mom "Momma Carmen" So if any of you are in Chico you should check it out!

A Dallen Layout

2008-07-20T20:21:00.000-07:00

i made this page of Dallen riding Tally from oh 2 years ago I am a little behind

here are the credits: template-simply yin- title- elegant word art – paper- Leora Sanford

Jessica Spragues - ShaZAM

2008-07-11T13:45:00.000-07:00

Today on Sprague Lab Jessica gives a tutorial on Photo ShaZAM. And if you do a Photo ShaZAM and post the pics you can enter to win this way cute camera strap!

Isn't it too cute!?! Natalie Putman makes these you can check them out in her etsy shop here (Stephanie you deffinatly need to check these out!!)

SO of course I tried Jessica's tutorial! and here is what I got:

first one is the SOC (straight ot of the camera- for those that don't know what it means) and 2nd is with ShaZAM - the ShaZAM is alot more colorful but it also shows her veins in her face more too so then I tried a Skin Softner from Graffi

this girl is so darn cute I miss her sooo much!!

The Post Office finds

2008-07-09T14:45:00.000-07:00

Working at the Post Office does have some good points. Like you know when the postal rates are going up... you know who in town is having problems paying their bills... you get to know where every street in town is and you learn where half the town lives. But my favorite is when we are cleaning out the UBBM (the post office has acronyms for absolutely everything). UBBM is also know as the trash mail, junk mail, recycling etc. When people move and they still receive those catalogs from random places that they once purchased something from, all those catalogs go in the recycling. So when emptying out the recycling bins I get to see a lot of companies that I had no idea even existed. ( We are not supposed to look inside the catalogs but from the covers you can get a feel of what type of catalog it is) My newest find is Grandin Road.com

I found a million things I want there. Everything is a little over my Target budget but it is still fun to look at. Here are some of my finds/wants:

I thought these were cute butterflies and they are solar I LOVE this patio set it is kinda old farmhouse looking to me I thought oh I could at least get 2 chairs - NOPE not at the SALE price of 149 each - I really like the "couch" though it is only 499 LOL

These solar globes would be cute to kinda give some light ( at night it is pitch black here just like you are camping

Did you ever think of putting actual pictures on the walls of the back patio? here are 2 that I saw that would work for Mom's back patio with the whole beachy theme - not that I am encouraging her to buy more stuff!

I need a new door mat for the front door - I like both of these - the pink one comes in "eleventy billion" different colors

So those are my finds it has cute stuff so if you want to fill some time check it out.

guess what my boy just did.....

2008-07-08T19:43:00.000-07:00

No it was not something bad! I was in my scrap room and I came in the house and he was doing the dishes! He loaded the dishwasher and even started it! He was so proud of himself it was cute!

I finally uploaded my pics from our week in Sac to my puter so hopefully today or tomorrow I will have time to post a few - it was a busy 5 days with shopping and Abby's birthday and the 4th.

I got my car registered today - the price was actually not bad way cheaper than what registration would have been on the truck in a few months. California is so dumb sometimes If you buy a car in another state you have to have it smogged here to show that it passed. Like brand new cars are not going to pass! plus they have already done it in another state to California standards it is so dumb - so you are forewarned if you buy a car in Reno if you are not financing the registration you will have to have it smogged in Cali before you can register it.
I got a bag thingy to organize my car at wally's today. It attaches to the back of the front seats and it has little compartments so you can store stuff in it. So I picked up some wipes and some interior wipes for the dusty dash and I put some tissues in there too - I am thinking maybe I better stick some barf bags in there too cause if you are not prepared it will happen LOL hopefully this will keep the car a little more organized

dallen just came in and told me the Sheriff is at the neighbors - i should go peak and see what is going on.... later gators

Cachet July Newsletter

2008-06-29T19:40:00.001-07:00

my anniversary present....

2008-06-27T19:55:00.000-07:00

For our actual anniversary this year we were not even in the same state. So we did not celebrate or exchange presents. But Eddie did tell me that he owed me a present once I got home.

Well once I got home he was really serious about getting rid of the Ford ( it was his ford F150 that he drove). We had been talking about getting rid of it for the past 9 month but I kept saying NO cause it was the nicest car we owned LOL. But he did not want it anymore and it was just sucking up the gas so I finally agreed. So we decided that we should just get a little put put car that he could drive to and from work and in 2 years we would get me a new car. So we looked and looked and had a few choice words with a couple of car dealers in town. ( i swear they think they have gold mines in this town cause competition is not big here but it still does not mean I want to pay an arm and a leg for a piece of CRAP). Anyways, we finally decided to just get a brand new or slightly used Honda - a 2 door civic. We found some in Reno and off he and Chance went to do some wheeling and dealing.

When they came home this is what they drove up with this .....

I was shocked - still am a little. Eddie decided that it was my turn for a new car since I have been driving my accord for 10 years ( yeah it has been 10 years since we bought it) So this little CRV became my anniversary present. Now he is going to drive my old beat up accord. I like it, it drives just like me little car. I had wanted something a littler higher up off the road and something with a little more trunk space so I can pile the groceries up high. The back seats fold down in a couple different configurations so that will be good when I have the kids with me when I shop too. I have already ordered my custom seat covers for the back seats. I HAVE to have them with Dallen he is a messy Marvin!! I was going to order them for the front too but the sales lady at Honda told me that the side curtain airbags have sensors in the front seats so I don't want to block them. So I am going to wait a little bit on those and see if they come out with a seat cover that will work alongside the airbags. Now just need to find a place to get the windows tinted for a good deal and get some all weather floor mats ( at least before the winter hits) and we will be good to go.

Now that we have 4 cats we have seen no mice!! Eddie has actually seen all of them catching a mouse at one time or another - so we know that they are earning their keep around here.

ruffus

shotgun the king of the cats

tiger

maddie