Evil, Like The Fruits Of The Devil

That is a quote from one of my favorite movies. Anybody know what it's from? I am talking about Thin Mints. Evil! I told myself last year I was not going to make the same mistake and buy a ton of Girl Scout cookies this year. But then I thought, Thin Mints are my most very favorite ever and I will put them in the freezer in my garage and they can last me a long time. Yeah right. They are so yummy. And the best way to eat them is frozen so keeping them in my freezer is no deterrent. And the biggest problem with them is their size. They are just the right size to pop the whole thing right in your mouth. Thankfully Aubrey and I just opened the last box after lunch today. I won't tell you how many boxes I bought...

Undone

I have a question for all of you stay at home mom's. All three of you who are the only one's who will be reading this anyway. Do you ever get tired of feeling like you never accomplish anything? Now don't get all,"you're doing the most important job", or "your raising the next generation", 'cause that's not what I mean. Let me start off by first saying that I LOVE being a stay at home mom. I would NOT trade it for anything. I would HATE to have to leave my kids and go to a job somewhere. And I am EXTREMELY grateful for my DEAR (and ever so loving) husband who works so very hard so that I can be a stay at home mom. It's just that I feel like everything I spend all day doing just gets undone constantly. There isn't anything that I do that just stays done. I bathe the kids. That is just going to have to be done again tomorrow. I clean the kitchen, that lasts about 5 minutes. I do the laundry. There are 6 of us wearing clothes so even if I get everything washed there are still six complete outfits that are just waiting to hit the bottom of my empty laundry hamper. I clean the bathrooms, doesn't last. Sweep, mop, dust, vacuum. You name it, I do it and then I turn around after doing all day and guess what??? It is all undone. I feel like I am constantly fighting a losing battle. If there was just one thing in my life that I could do that would just stay done and I never had to go back and do it again, that would just be really nice. I know I shouldn't complain. I have a good life. Ok, I have a near perfect life. I should be grateful that I have a kitchen to clean and a working toilet to clean and clothes to wash and kids that are healthy enough to make a mess. Now I feel really bad for complaining. Anyway, I was just wondering if I am the only one who feels this way.

People Please

I am begging you. Please stop voting for Sanjaya! Honestly. I am an American Idol junkie and I can usually guess correctly who is going home. I knew Chris would go home tonight but I thought that Sanjaya would at least be in the bottom 3. I couldn't believe it when they said he wasn't. My kids really like the Kid Bop CD's, which drive me crazy, but I think Sanjaya would be perfect for something like that. But not the American Idol. Come on! Enough is enough. There it is, I have said my peace. My personal favorite: BeatBoxin' Blake.

Lunch Time Dilemma

Don't tell anyone, but it is 12:45 in the afternoon here and Aubrey and Addison and I are still in our PJ's. I really am not a lazy person, just read 3 posts down and you will see. I am just lazy today. Because I choose to be. But anyway. We are hungry, Aubrey and I, and we don't know what we want for lunch. I hate having to decide what to eat 3 times a day, day in and day out. It seriously get on my nerves sometimes. Like now. Nothing that we have sounds good. And everything that sounds good, we don't have. And we obviously can go to the store because we are in our pajamas. One of my favorite things to eat for lunch is a spinach egg white omelet. But I don't have any spinach. So I spot some bacon in the fridge and think a BLT would be really good right now. But I don't have lettuce or tomatoes. We will probably end up eating soup because that is almost always what we end up eating but I am bored with soup. So I just stand at my kitchen counter eating chex mix left over from our weekend trip. Frosted Mini Wheats sounds good but I had that for breakfast. Not like that has ever stopped me before. I ate it constantly when I was pregnant will all my kids. They are practically made up of frosted mini wheats. Well, this isn't helping. I better go figure something out.

Weekend Getaway In...Ogden???

The kids got out of school early on Thursday and did not have school Friday. I thought it would be fun to take them on a little trip somewhere. I didn't want to go to far from home because I didn't want to drive forever and I wanted to do something we have never done. Now if it were up to my dear husband we would have gone to Moab or St. George. However, we have done that a million times. Plus it is more driving than I wanted to do. So I came up with the idea to go to Ogden for the weekend. Woo hoo! Not the most exciting place in the world. It is about 40 minutes away from where we live so it met my driving distance requirements. It also had some fun places we have always wanted to visit but never have. So we got a hotel room for 2 nights. Made sure the hotel had an indoor pool so we could swim and made our way to Ogden. We had so much fun. We stayed up late, slept in, took the kids swimming every day. The first day we spent at the dinosaur park. Then that night we went to see "The Last Mimzy". Which was actually entertaining for adults and kids alike. Then the next day we went to the Tree House Museum and the Air Force Museum. Then since we were up by my parents house we met them for dinner that night before we made the journey home. Click here for pictures of our trip.

Emily's 7th Birthday

We celebrated Emily's 7th Birthday at the Mayan Restaurant. She invited some of her friends to come along. She had a very fun party. She was able to get her picture taken with the cliff divers and from then on out whenever they would dive Emily and her friends would scream, "We love you!" Click here for more pictures of the party.

Cookie Dough, Claustrophobia and the Saga of the Breast Fed Baby

I have threatened "nervous breakdown" many times in my life. I never fully understood what a nervous breakdown meant until last week. Because I came really close to it. Dangerously close. The week before last we had our PTA fundraiser where we sold cookie dough. I was at the school everyday that week and that nearly made me crazy. Then I was there all day on Friday because I not only had to open all the envelopes and count all the money but I also had a PTA board meeting that day. Then the following Monday I went to school when I dropped the kids off to count the rest of the orders that trickled in that morning from the kids who forgot to turn them in on Friday. I spent all morning at the school doing that then I had to leave to get an MRI done. I have had all these on going problems which separately and by themselves are all symptoms of different things, but together they are all symptoms of a brain tumor. And since my body is so good a growing benign tumors (I have about 12 of them on my arms alone) my doctor thought it would be a good idea to start by ruling out brain tumor. Which we did. Thankfully. But that's not the point of my story. The point of my story is that I had to undergo an MRI. It freaks me out now just to think about it. I am the most claustrophobic person you will ever meet. It's not even funny. And it is getting worse with age. I panic at the thought of taking an elevator. I am sure that one day soon I will not even be able to take one anymore. I think about taking my kids to Disneyland and I seriously don't know if I can ride the rides anymore. The thought of being strapped in makes me crazy. So when we arrived at the place to get my MRI I was pretty freaked. When I got into the room I told the girl that I needed to have a look at the MRI thing before I got in it. It was a long skinny tube that my whole body had to go in. It didn't look pleasant but it was open on both ends and I thought, "if I had to shimmy my way out of this I could". So I told her I thought I could do it. She explained everything to me, said I would have a panic button to hold and if need be they could have me out of there really fast. I would be in the room by myself but they had cameras on me and would be talking to me and they could hear me too. So I'm like ok, deep breath, I can do it! I lie down on the table and she is getting stuff ready and then she says "OK, now I just need to put this CAGE over your face", like it is no big deal. I am sitting there going WHAT THE CRAP! You didn't say anything about that! So I close my eyes and think, if I don't see her put it on I won't know it is there. It won't be touching my face, I will be ok. Kind of. So she locks that into place. Then she sticks some kind of something on either side of my face and says this is to keep my head from moving because the machine vibrates. So much for not feeling anything touching my face. So much for my shimmy idea. I was stuck. And I was trying not to go crazy. I kept saying to myself that I have to get this done because I have 4 kids and I need to know if there is a problem so I can get it taken care of. I thought about each one of my kids and thought about when they were born and about how much I love them. And the whole time I would not open my eyes because I knew if I did that that would be the end of all sanity. Then I knew I had to think of something else because my mind was starting to wander and I was starting to think about my head and whole body being stuck in that tiny thing. So out of nowhere I started singing at the top of my head (I wasn't doing it out loud) songs from musicals. And that got a little psycho. They were going through my head so loud and so fast and I was going from song to song it was like this, "go grease lightnin' your burnin' up the quarter mile..grease lightnin'..go grease lightnin'..If I were a rich man yiddle deedle deedle diddle diddle dittle dittle dum..all day long I'd bitta bitta bum..if I were a wealthy man..five hundred twenty five thousand six hundred minutes..five hundred twenty five thousand moments of love...hi Nancy, hi Ursula, what's the story, morning glory, what's the word humming bird..did you hear about Hugo and Kim...we're gonna score-or-or tonight, we're gonna score-or-or tonight...come on babe, why don't we paint the town, and all that jazz. It got a little crazy in my head but I made it through the whole 40 minute ordeal. By the time I got done I was so physically and mentally exhausted I could hardly function. Then I had to go straight to my doctors office so he could read the results. Then I had to go straight to the school because I had to enter each individual cookie dough order for each kid into the computer. I figured I would be there all night. I was only there for a minute because the cookie dough guy didn't give us the right program to use so I had to come back the next day and take care of it. But the next day was Emily's birthday and I hadn't bought her present yet because I had been so busy with everything else so my plan was on Tuesday while Aubrey was at pre-school I was going to go shopping for her present. I decided I would go Monday night and buy it so I didn't have to worry about it the next day. We had dinner, took Zac to Tae Kwon Do, gave the girls a bath, picked up Zac, had Family Home Evening, and then I went shopping. I was so exhausted it was not the most fun shopping trip. But I did get Emily's shoes and I also had to get cream cheese for a PTA activity we were having the next morning. Oh, and I left out the best part of the story. As they were taking me back for my MRI they said, "and by the way, you can't feed your baby for the next 48 hours." Like it was no big deal. Ok, well my baby has never had a bottle! Kind of a big deal. So on top of everything I had a screaming baby who would not eat. Steve tried to get her to take a bottle. The screaming broke my heart so I took her and tried to give her a bottle. It took more than an hour of her screaming before she finally started to fall asleep and as she would fall asleep she would start to suck a little on the bottle. Then she would realize what she was doing and would wake up and start to scream again. It was lovely. Really it broke my heart. It did make me appreciate breast feeding though. None of my kids have ever had a bottle. The first bottle I made for Addison was the first bottle I had ever made, ever. I had always taken breast feeding for granted. But I grew to appreciate it really fast. I also learned that formula stinks. It stinks in the canister, it stinks in the bottle, it stinks when it comes out as spit up and it especially stinks when it come out in the diaper! I was so sad because I thought Addison would hate me for not feeding her and for torturing her so, but after every episode of trying to get her to take a bottle, she would look up at me and smile and that made me feel better. To know that she didn't hate me. So I go to bed completely exhausted and stressed on Monday night. Then I woke up 4 hours later to get ready for the PTA "Book & Bagels" activity we were having at the school that morning before school started. I tried for another hour to feed Addison while she screamed, and this time she didn't eat anything and I had to get to the school. Thank goodness for the great people on my board who were there to help because I was a basket case. They took care of Addison for me. When the activity was over and cleaned up I took Addison home and this time she did take the bottle. In the mean time the principal at the school worked out the problem with the cookie dough program so we could enter the order that had to be turned in that day. After feeding Addison I went back up to the school and my friend that was going to help me enter the orders found 2 other people to help us so it went much faster than I thought it would. We got the orders entered and then I called the orders in. Then went home to get ready for Emily's party that was after school. We had her birthday party at the Mayan restaurant, got home late, put kids in bed. At some point I woke Steve up in the middle of the night screaming in my sleep, then Aubrey woke me up crying that her ear hurt. The next morning I took the kids to school. Then took Aubrey to the doctor. She has an ear infection. They called me from the school to say that they found out that we were missing orders from 2 classes for the cookie dough. I went back up to the school to try and figure that out. Changed the figures and called in the new order. Figured out who the top sellers were so they could get their prizes. Got to finally feed Addison again. Picked the kids up from school, took Emily to dance, Zac to Tae Kwon Do, ate dinner, made 4 dozen cookies and took them around to all the people I visit teach, took Zac to scouts, went to book club, came home and fell into bed exhausted. Seriously the phrase "I am going to have a nervous breakdown" has taken on a completely new meaning to me.

Pictures

When Farrah and Kristy were here we all went and had pictures taken by a lady named Tara. She did a wonderful job. Here are the pictures. Now we just need to figure out where to hang them.

Turn Around And Let Me See If That Makes Your Butt Look Big

After I took Emily to get her ears pierced yesterday, I stopped to try on some clothes. I am sure all the women in the dressing room were cracking up. These are some of the things Emily was saying:
"Turn around and let me see if those make your butt look big."
"No, It doesn't look TOO big in those."
"Mommy, your stomach looks like you are going to have another baby."

I must say I was so excited because I bought a size 8 shorts yesterday. And they fit! Granted they are a size 8 STRETCH. But they are a size 8. And they fit. Ok, so the sizing must be way off on them because I also bought a size 10 capris and I had to majorly suck in to get them done up. Still. Size 8 is what I wore in High School.

The Ears Have It

Emily turns 7 on Tuesday. I told her for her 7th b-day she could get her ears pierced. She insisted that it be done prior to her 7th b-day so that on her b-day all her friends could see her pierced ears. I took her to the mall after school yesterday and let her get them pierced. Naturally she picked out the biggest diamond earrings they had.

My Baby

This is the one where she is trying to talk.

Addison is growing so fast. She is getting to the fun stage where she likes to laugh and play. It is cute except at times like yesterday when I was in a hurry to get to the school and I was trying to feed her and she would eat, eat, eat-then she would look up at me and smile and laugh and then she would get serious and eat,eat, eat...look up and smile...eat,eat,eat....smile. She wants to talk so bad. You can see her look at you and ooh and goo and try to form words and you can see in her eyes she wants to be able to say something. Here are some pictures of her I took yesterday. In one of them she is trying to talk to me. She laughs right out loud now when ever I tickle her feet. She is so cute I just want to pick her up and eat her!

The Park

We have been having such nice weather here. We have been spending everyday of it outside and loving it. We went to the park on Monday for Family Home Evening. Here are some of our pictures.

Allyson & AddisonEmily

Aubrey

Steve & Aubrey
Zac
Zac just chillin' on top of the swings

Didn't Smell A Thing

So I am the PTA President at the kids school this year. We just finished our week long fundraiser of selling cookie dough yesterday. I was at the school all day opening envelopes, checking orders and counting $$$. My friend who was there helping me reminded me of what happened last year when we were doing the same thing. I kept opening envelopes that the kids turned in with their orders and $ in them and I kept asking her "do you smell that?" I kept saying I could tell what peoples houses smelled like because I could smell it when I opened their envelopes and I was amazed she couldn't smell it too. I kept saying, "this one smells like maple syrup, SMELL IT!" And she kept looking at me like I was crazy. At one point last year I said to her, "I better not be pregnant". Totally kidding. Then I found out a couple weeks later that I was pregnant! Well thankfully yesterday when I was opening the envelopes, I didn't smell a darn thing!

So Long, Farewell

So my one and only son is 9 1/2 years old. I have been saving all his clothes since he was born so that when we had another boy, he'd have something to wear. And Zac had the cutest clothes when he was a baby! Well, 9 1/2 years, 8 big boxes of clothes, and 3 girls later I decided enough was enough. I am tired of saving clothes that will never be used again. When and if we ever have another boy the clothes will be more than 10 years old. I figured someone should get some use out of them so I invited 2 of my friends over who have boys at different ages and one on the way. They went through the clothes and HOORAY!!! We got rid of them all. Seeing some of those clothes brought back some memories. The only time I got really sentimental was when they pulled out his Dallas Cowboys jersey he had when he was 1. He used to wear that all the time and he was so little tiny and cute! The other thing that made me sentimental is an old navy shirt with a dog on it that he and Sam had matching shirts. I have a video of them together wearing those shirts. When I started to get sentimental my friends asked if I wanted to keep those things. I came to my senses and said, NO TAKE IT ALL! We have also decided that as Addison outgrows things we are giving them away too. We aren't making any announcements, so don't get all excited. If we ever have another baby we will just have to go shopping.

Idiot

So the other day, I am making dinner and trying to get 2 kids to do their homework and Aubrey is crying because she is sick and Addison is crying because she is hungry. And the phone rings. Now I grew up in a house where the phone rang off the wall nonstop. It isn't that way at our house. And most people that call us call our cell phones. So when I say hello and this man on the other end says "HELLO! Is the the Schimd's?" I am thinking SALES CALL! Get him off the line quick. Because sales people have a knack for calling at the most inconvenient times. So I very abruptly said "yes it is". And he said "is this Allyson?". "Yes". "This is Ray Bateman". Now at this point if I had actually been paying attention to what he was saying I would have known exactly who it was. However I was not paying attention. So I just said "yes". "I used to live in St. Charles with Steve and I have met you before but you obviously don't remember me." So at this point I realized it isn't a sales call and I am really quick trying to remember who he said he was. And so again I said "yes". Now you have to remember what my environment is like at the time: dinner cooking, 2 kids crying, 2 kids NOT doing their homework. I am all flustered and he goes on to ask if Steve still does concrete work. I say "yes, let me let you talk to him." So I hand Steve the phone. Then I realize who he said it was and I totally FREAKED OUT! Yeah, Ray Bateman. Steve's bishop when he was growing up. The man responsible for getting him to go on his mission. Now known as E. Ray Bateman, General Authority of The Church Of Jesus Christ Of Latter Day Saints. I was just incredibly rude to a General Authority who called my house. IDIOT!

New Fandangled Sink

This new sink of ours sure comes in handy at times. Like when I am giving Aubrey and Emily a bath and need a place to set Addison. It also comes in handy during other times too!

Taken By Force

Tonight is the opening night for the Utah Blaze arena football. It is Steve's second year to have season tickets. He and his friend Scott were leaving and I said "wait, I want to take a picture of you leaving for the game." Steve looked at me for about 2 seconds like I was crazy and turned around and walked out of the front door. I followed them out demanding a picture. I said "hold up your tickets". Then Steve said "oh yeah, tickets!" and ran back into the house to get the tickets. You would think he would be grateful that I reminded him of something so important, but NOOOOOO. I had to snap this picture as they were getting in the truck to go.

She's Got The Skitters

Aubrey got a skitter from papa and grandma for her birthday.

The following picture is Aubrey kicking her brother saying "No boys allowed!"

Aubrey Turns Four!

Aubrey turned 4 today! We had a princess party at our house. It was pretty calm as far as the 4 year olds were concerned. It was her 9 year old brother and almost 7 year old sister who were on the wild side.

Google Earth

OK, so maybe we are really slow around here. And maybe we are the last people in the world to google earth. Hello!!! How cool is that. We are all addicted in our house now. Seriously. Steve and I spent about an hour yesterday on it while the kids were at school. Then Steve and I and Zac and Emily stayed up till 11pm last night googleing earth. We went everywhere. France, NY, Grand Canyon, Germany, Temple Square, Hawaii, statue of Liberty, our honeymoon hotel in Cancun, Egypt, we saw where Sam is on his mission, South Africa, Disney World, Disneyland, my old high school...you name it, we were there. Then we got out our address book and went to everyone's house that we know. Yes, if we know you, we looked at your house last night. We had so much fun! Then this morning Steve found Zac and Em on the computer, flying over Iraq looking at stuff. Pretty funny. For real. If you have never googled earth, you have to do it NOW! You can see real satellite pictures of anywhere in the world. You just type in an address or name of a place and it takes you there. You can Zoom in and everything. I'm tellin' you, it is so much fun.