Beat the Heat!

This summer has been awfully hot. Most of you know that bit of info, but thought I should let

those of you who are out of town know that small factoid.

Anyway, to make matters worse as far as we were concerned this summer, a pipe to one of the water wells in our city broke.The first day it broke we were told that they would be shutting off our water at some point in the night. We hurried and did whatever we to do...When we went to bed at 11 pm, they still hadn't turned it off. When we woke up around 7 the water was back on...So they either never turned it off, or they did it while everyone was sleeping.

For the next month or so they told us to conserve water and even limited watering...For the first little while there was to be no outdoor watering at all. This kinda sucked as its been such a hot summer and our lawn is still new. Needless to say, some of the lawn turned brown.

Within a couple of weeks they had repaired the pipe so that people could water 2 days a week but only during certain time periods. There was still no other use for outdoor water "permitted." They were good to say that people with very new sod could water as they needed to.

Anyway, so we've been dealing with this situation for awhile and it's been difficult all around. I finally heard that they had repaired the well and everything was fine, which also meant that we can water outdoors again and I even took the opportunity to let the kids play in the water.

My brother gave Lex a little water t-ball thing for his birthday that we had only been able to use one time...So yesterday as I was bored and needed to get outdoors, I decided to let the kids play in that again. Tanis & Shaylyn had a great time...Lex, however, wasn't too fond of all the water . Maybe in time...

What Happens Next...

Happy Tuesday

This past Tuesday, August 7, we had quite a busy day.

My older sister was trying to get a video slideshow done from Girls Camp done...She was having difficulties making a disc that would play in a regular DVD player and sadly, I wasn't much help explaining it to her over the phone.

So, I took my actual computer over to her house with a program I use to make the videos I've done. For some reason, however, when I imported the saved Windows Video that she had saved, it wasn't showing the pictures...

I made plans with my younger sister to take the kids swimming and time was running out, so I explained to my sister how to remake the video and how to capture it on disc and went to get my little sister and head to the pool.

We got to the pool and the kids had loads of fun. The place we went actually has a little place where the water isn't deep at all (as you can tell from the picture). My kids had fun jumping into the water - I wasn't worried about drowning as much as I was about broken legs since the drop was nothing...However, no one got injured. Even my little nephew who will be 1 in a couple of weeks had lots of fun splashing in the water - he is one kid who is not afraid of water AT ALL! The pool closed for open plunge at 4, which was good as we had yet more plans...

I dropped my little sister and nephew off and headed over to Eric's parents home. We were all headed to the zoo for a members night. The birthday gifts for all the kids this year was a year membership to the zoo. It was a perfect time of day to go to the zoo. It had cooled off enough that it was nice and there really wasn't that many people at all! I didn't really take any pictures at the zoo because Eric's mom was taking lots and she gives them to me...I just don't have them yet.

We enjoyed the Birds of Flight show which was really cool. There were many birds that flew right over your heads. The kids enjoyed it lots and it was neat to see all the different kind of birds and what they can be trained to do. We also spent some time seeing how the trainers take care of the Elephants. They have trained the Elephants to stick out their feet and ears to get checked for things. They've also trained these elephants to pick up things that may get thrown into their exhibit that don't belong there. One of the elephants could even kick a ball that the trainer would throw in. I think it is interesting how and what you can teach animals with a certain amount of care and patience.

We also saw turtles mating...(Picture is below) This was hilarious to us. The female acted like she didn't even care what was going on as she just kept eating and walking around. This did not deter the male however...He just kept at it no matter how much the female kept walking around. Luckily the turtles were across from the playground and so the kids didn't see the turtles and just wanted to play.

As for what else has been going on - not much!

The IDOLS concert last week was awesome! There is a guy from Seattle, Washington who beatboxes as well. He is such an entertainer and one of my favorites. The show was fun and so enjoyable. I was just mad that I didn't take my camera. I wasn't sure if they would allow it in, but there were lots of people that took theirs...So that upset me. Maybe next year if we have lots of favorites like we did this year we will go to the concert again and I will take my camera.

Monday at work there was an interesting thing that happened. It was about 9:30 and we hear screaming coming from the USCAN area...Monday night was really busy, but everyone in the store turned to hear what was going on. We see two guys yelling at each other and ALMOST getting into a fist fight in the store. One guy and lady had a little baby in their arms as well. It was so scary that my heart was beating fast. They got them out of the store and I guess after they were out of the store they went at it...Someone called the cops though and it was taken care of. My manager came back into the store in the middle of it and didn't know what to do. When I left work that night I asked the manager what had happened and she related the story.

Apparently guy #1 and guy #2 bumped into each other, when guy #2 turned around guy #1 didn't like the way guy #2 looked at guy #1's wife...Is that a crazy thing to get into a fist fight over or what? I guess guy #1 is a little possesive of his wifey? Oh well.

Hope all is well with you all!

What Happens Next...

Another Update

That's me - Simpsonized...Couldn't resist.

Anyhow, just another update about last week.

Sunday, July 22: Tanis' 7th Birthday. Before church at one, we let him open all of his gifts that Eric and I got for him. He was extremely happy and and maybe a wee bit spoiled. We go to church and after church come home and get ready for his party with family. I made the party start at 5 as an open house, so we didn't have time for a major dinner or anything. I just did Lloyd's BBQ chicken and called it good. We all enjoyed his party and had lots of fun. And our family members spoiled Tanis as well. Tanis even got to sleep over at my mom's that night, while my older sister took Shaylyn and Lex. Monday night they were going to swap kids...My mom would take Shaylyn and Lex and my sister would take Tanis.

Monday, July 23: Took the time that the kids were with family to relax. Straightened the house and did all the things I normally do, but then I had lots of time to get pages ready to scrapbook. I had to work at 5 that night, so I didn't get anything scrapbooked, but figured I had the next day to do so. About halfway through my shift I get the feeling that I am getting a sore throat. I wasn't happy...But I figured as long as it's just a sore throat I'll be fine. However, as soon as I got home from work, I knew that I was going to be sick - I was thinking flu with the symptoms I was having. Luckily because the kids were with family I was able to go straight to bed.

Tuesday, July 24: Happy Pioneer Day! Didn't even realize it was a holiday...Spent the morning in bed trying to recover and be well enough to go to work that night. Got out of bed only to take medicine. Around 3:30 I took a nice bath to get ready for work. Worked from 5-10 and was miserable the whole time...It was one of those situations where your head is so dizzy and light you don't really feel like you are where you are...Came home from work and just lied in bed waiting for Eric and the kids to come home. They had gone to Eric's parents to celebrate and watch fireworks. They came home around 11, and after getting the kids settled in bed, I went to bed as well.

Wednesday, July 25: Still don't feel well in the morning. Eric decides he better work from home so that I can get more rest. I rest on and off and around 11 or so I get up to get some medicine. I take my medicine and a drink to wash down the nasty taste of medicine and the next thing I know I am on the kitchen floor with Eric asking if I can breathe...Apparently, I passed out...I was so glad Eric was home. I was supposed to work that night but because I had passed out, and I still wasn't feeling good - I called in.

Thursday, July 26: I still don't feel good in the morning...Feel better, but not like I would if I had just had the flu or a cold...Still spend the day in bed and around 4 we decided to head to Instacare...We see the nurse in Instacare tell her what has been going on - Difficulty swallowing, Lightheaded, Dizzy - and she does a quick strep test. The dr. then comes in does the usual look in the ears and mouth. He looks in my mouth real quick and says it looks nasty in there. And I reply it feels nasty. He tells me that I have STREP! I have NO IDEA where I got it from. No one I have been around has been sick. Oh well. He tells me I have 2 options. He can give me a prescription that would be 2 pills a day for 10 days and I would feel better in 2-3 days, or I can get a shot in the butt and most people say they feel better within 24 hours. Reluctantly I went for the shot in the butt.

Friday, July 27: Still not feeling great, but feel like I can somewhat function. Straighten the house as best I can feel up to doing. Still get tired easily however, so I do take it easy. We spend the night at home just watching a movie.

Saturday, July 28: Still not 100% but feeling better. I head to work to pick up my check and check on my schedule for the next week. Then I head to the Wal-Mart by us, because our bank has a branch there. I pick up a few things and start feeling really worn out again, so I head back home. I take the rest of the night easy reading Harry Potter! Not quite halfway through, but I am still reading. Go to bed kind of early because I needed to rest up for Sunday.

Sunday, July 29: Not happy because I get scheduled to work from 12-8:30. I miss church AND its an 8 hour shift. I DON'T work 8 hour shifts. I think someone different did the schedule. Anyway, I work my shift and feel mostly okay, but totally drained again by the time I get home. We then play DVD Scene It with the kids before bed, then head to bed around 10.

Today, July 30: Still feel mostly okay, but not totally. Luckily only have to work a 5 hour shift like I am used to. I also have a job interview with the city at 1:00 that I hope results in good news...I am so ready to be done with Smith's... Anyway, guess I better get the house straightened and get some things done. Tomorrow is IDOL'S LIVE! Yeah!

What Happens Next...

Ho Hum

Not a whole lot has been going on in our lives lately...

It's all been pretty much the same thing day to day. The kids having fun and enjoying the summer. And of course, the "occassional" fighting which is driving me insane. I can think of one little person who really needs to go back to school.

We took a nice trip to the zoo last Saturday with friends of ours and my little sisters small family. We had lots of fun, though we didn't have a lot of time. We arrived at the zoo around 4 and they close at 6:30. We figured we should have plenty of time to see what was there. However, Saturday was still plenty dang hot at that time. They had a sno cone special for $0.75 so we all had to have one. Though we didn't have a whole lot of time we all enjoyed the time we got to spend together and the kids had lots of fun. Eric's parents gift to all the kids this year for their birthdays was a membership to the zoo. So, it wasn't a big lose not seeing everything. We can go back whenever we want to. I had to post the picture of Eric because it is RARE that he will actually let someone take a picture of him without him making a funny face or turning his head. I was very glad he cooperated. Nice to have a picture of his face and not his profile.

After the zoo our friends had another appointment they had to go to, so the rest of us figured out what we wanted to do. My little sisters husband really wanted to go see "Transformers" and Eric didn't mind that at all. (He'd already seen it twice) My sister and I weren't really in the mood to go see a movie, so we decided the guys could go to the movie and we would go shopping.

It turned out to be a good night, but we were all exhausted by the time we got home. It's been nice to take this week slow. My little brother is staying with us this week and I hope he's had fun. My parents went away to Girl's Camp, so it was nice for him to have somewhere to go.

Sunday is Tanis' 7th birthday. We are getting geared up for that. He is excited. I was frustrated with when I got the invitations...The package with all the bday decorations and invites didn't come as soon as I had hoped, so his invites just barely went out yesterday. I hope everyone receives them in time.

As for the job, I've decided I need to find something new. I am too stressed out... Smith's wants so much "perfection" that it is just driving me crazy. We have produce tests every so often, have to be scanning 28 items or something per minute, and do a bunch of other things. I don't know, for the most part it wouldn't be so bad. But I just don't have enough coordination to go super fast when scanning things, and I don't know enough about produce to be too effective. I applied for a job with the city that would be part time doing things I did when Eric and I first got married. I am so hoping it will work out. I am so much more comfortable in an office setting. If anyone else hears of other job opportunities that will allow me to kind of work around a Kindergarten schedule please let me know...

Still need to get back to the gym...Don't know what is holding me back. This week would've been a perfect week to go, but I've just been too lazy.

Hope everyone is doing well.

What Happens Next...

Just To Keep You Up To Date

I hope the summer has been good to all of you.

We have been kinda busy all things considering.

I got a job at the Smith's out here and a couple weeks ago I had 3 days full of training. It was exhausting to say the least. Now that I am actually working it isn't quite so bad. There is a lot to learn and I learn something new everyday. It is a fast paced job, which I like because the time flies by.

The kids are enjoying the summer and playing outside with their friends. They have all gotten sun tans from the length of time they are outside. We've also had the ouchies that come with the summer.

The past few days have been busy, and fun. On the 3rd of July I was able to get together with my best friend from High School. We each have 3 kids, although only Shaylyn and Lex have a kid their age. But even though that is the case, they all had fun playing while my friend and I visited.

After the visit, we headed to my little sisters place to wait for Eric. When Eric got there we all headed to dinner at Godfather's Pizza. The kids enjoyed their food and it was fun to be with my little sister and her husband. We then went back to their place to watch a movie.

The kids were going to sleep over at my parents house that night, but my mom wouldn't get home from work until 9:30. After the movie ended, it was about 10, so we decided to take the kids to my parents. When we got there, my mom still wasn't home - she decided to run to the store to pick up things for the 4th. Luckily, we only had to wait about 10 minutes before she got back home. We got the kids all settled and said our goodbyes and headed home.

The next morning, July 4th, we headed back out to the valley. My family all decided we would do mini golf before they headed where they needed to go. We all met up at the outdoor mini golf place and we all had fun. The kids enjoyed their time and so did the "big kids." After mini golf we went to get ice cream. It was yummy. When we all finished our ice cream we said our goodbyes. My family was headed to my uncles house for a party (we couldn't go as I had to work), so we headed home. We stopped to check out the new IKEA store, but that was a bad idea. It was crazy full of people and we were all too tired to really enjoy looking at anything. Before heading home we stopped and bought some fireworks to do when I got home from work. (My shift was from 5-8:45)

After a crazy day at work, I headed home and it was time for fireworks! Sadly, Lex was asleep and I was unable to rouse him, so we did them without him. :(

Shaylyn had had a fever for the better part of the day and fell asleep halfway through. Eric, Tanis and I all enjoyed the fireworks, however. We even had other people on the street doing their fireworks, so it was fun to see it all. I was sad that I missed out on the party at my uncles, because I haven't seen that side of the family for awhile and my cousin who joined the Coast Guard was on leave. It would've been nice to talk with him.

Anyway, I think I rambled on a bit...Hope everyone else had a nice 4th of July.

As for the gym and losing weight thing - I kind of got out of the habit with the training I had to do. I am hoping to get back into the swing of things this week. Help keep me motivated!!!!

What Happens Next...

Does It Ever End?

Once again, Shaylyn gave us another exciting couple of weeks.

On Friday, June 15th, I was doing my major housecleaning. I do this every week on Friday because we are usually busy on Saturdays. I was trying to clean it extra nice as we were having Lex's birthday party the next day. I had just finished and it was 4:00 in the afternoon. I was just sitting down to have some lunch when Tanis comes running in the house telling me that Shaylyn fell in the window well.

I knew this couldn't be good because our window wells are fairly deep. I ran outside and as I went around the corner, she was climbing out of the neighbors window well. (I am still surprised she was able to do this on her own.) My first thought when I heard that she fell down the window well was that she broke a bone. Luckily this wasn't the case. However, she was bleeding from her head.

I know that head wounds bleed quite a lot even if it isn't bad. I got her in the tub so I could clean her off and clean off the blood to see just how bad she had gotten hurt. Shaylyn was screaming, Lex and Tanis were wondering what was going on and I am trying to talk to Eric on the phone...Such chaos. Then in the midst of her screaming (understandable, by the way) she threw up. I knew this probably wasn't such a good thing. Eric thought it was probably just because she was so worked up. Possible, I guess. So I tell Eric that it looks like the wound has stopped bleeding and he says he is getting ready to leave.

I get Shaylyn out of the tub and into some pajamas so that she would be comfortable. I hold her in my lap with a washcloth pressed to her head to clean off the wound a little more. She keeps asking for her daddy and I tell her he should be home soon. After about a half hour, she dozes off to sleep. Eric then calls and tells me he is just leaving his uncles house. I was a little upset as I misunderstood what he meant by getting ready to leave and he misunderstood how bad Shaylyn was hurt. Then while I was talking to Eric, Shaylyn woke up needing to go to the bathroom. She did that and as she was heading back to the couch, I noticed her wound was bleeding again. I told Eric this and he says, yeah she probably will need stitches then.

Eric gets home, takes one look at her head and decides that she will need stitches. We figure we don't want to go to the hospital (Also, don't know where the closest one is to us, yet) because we will be there all night. So we take our chances at Instacare.

Luckily, Instacare was able to take care of it and stitch her all up. We were in and out of there in an hour. Picture of her stitches is posted below.





As if Shaylyn cutting her head wasn't enough - Lex threw up in the car on the way to Instacare and on the way home...Then about an hour later Lex and Shaylyn both threw up within seconds of each other. I was worried that Lex was sick and that we would have to cancel his party. Shaylyn I figured was just so worked up and stuff that her stomach was still a little uneasy.

Luckily, Lex and Shaylyn were both back to normal in the morning. So we enjoyed Lex's birthday party and the rest of that day.

This past Friday we went and got Shaylyn's stitches out - all in a matter of 5 minutes. Picture without the stitches is posted below.

Some other good news - the tree that the boys killed next door? It started growing branches back! But then, the home builders or the company who is selling the house just replaced the tree. So now I am feeling relieved, yet guilty at the same time...Oh well, what do you do?

What Happens Next...

An "Exciting" Couple of Weeks

The last few weeks have been fairly eventful...

We'll start in the life of Shaylyn.

Sunday, May 20: We arrive at Eric's parents house for our weekly Sunday dinner and Shaylyn complains that her ear is bleeding. Eric looks in her ear quickly and decides she just scratched her ear and it wasn't bleeding that bad.

Monday, May 21: Shaylyn wakes up and there is dried blood in her ear and on her pillow are 3 small spots of dried blood. I start to get a little worried. I clean out the ear as best I can, cause she says it still hurts, then I tell Eric what happened and he says if she had scratched the ear and opened up the scab during the night that would've happened. The rest of that day goes by without too much incident.

Tuesday, May 22: Shaylyn is a little bit whiny today. Complaining that her ear hurts. Don't really know what to think as she is a bit of a "drama queen" at times, so it is hard to distinguish when she really is hurt and when she isn't.

Wednesday, May 23: Shaylyn is whiny all day and just isn't acting like herself. She is tired and moody. Doesn't want to do a whole lot at all. She goes to bed that night, but a few hours later she is up crying and complaining that her ear really hurts and she can't sleep. So she comes and sleeps with us...Yeah...She doesn't sleep all night, and neither do we. By this time we have decided that in the morning we need to take her to Instacare.

Thursday, May 24: We take her to Instacare. Luckily we went fairly early in the morning, so we didn't have to wait long at all. Shaylyn is acting more like herself with the prospect of her ear feeling better. The dr. comes in and checks the ear out. He actually says to us, "There is so much dried blood in here that I can't really tell what's going on." He says what probably happened was that her ear drum ruptured and then she had an infection on top of that. He gives us prescriptions - ear drop type stuff to clear out the dried blood and amoxicillan. I was a little bit nervous about the amoxicillan because the first time Tanis had the stuff he broke out in a rash. Luckily, Shaylyn didn't have any reactions. Thankfully as well, she will take medicine for us without any fight. We give her some medicine and she goes to sleep really quick. Not a big suprise as she didn't sleep all night.

That night Eric has his game night and as the guys are talking one of his friends said that this Instacare dr. isn't a very good dr. Apparently he had torn some ligaments or something and went to the Instacare and this dr. just told him that he pulled some muscles.

Friday, May 25: Shaylyn is back to normal, but her ear looks really disgusting as the medicine had pulled that dried blood out. (Picture below) She feels good enough that she even goes to the Bees game with us. Thursday night she was insistant that she didn't want to go.

So after all the hassle we had with her that week, the next week was just crazy with things that needed to be done.

Tuesday, May 29: Shaylyn has dance pictures. Luckily the studio her dance teacher decided to use was located real close to us. A 5 minute drive if that! We made it in time for her pictures but as everyone was crowded in the studio, Shaylyn got into the studio and had her individual picture taken before I got to even see how she looked. Then for her class picture she wanted to look at me instead of the photographer. Oh well. (Dance pic is posted below)

Thursday, May 31: Shaylyn has her last dance class of the season. For once we are actually one time because Tanis got out of school way early.

Friday, June 1: Shaylyn has her dress rehearsal. Her dance teacher is smart and separates each group into 15 minute segments instead of having everyone there for the whole amount of time. Shaylyn has her session at 5:45 P.M. We know we are going to be cutting it close as we were trying to get to my brother in laws graduation at the E Center by 7:00. Eric was taking the kids to a movie at the mall that started at 7:00 as well. We walk into the school for Shaylyn's dress rehearsal and NO ONE is in this same costume. Someone made a mistake - ME! I wasn't sure what time she was really supposed to be there, just knew that I read the paper wrong. Good news is we all made it where we were supposed to be on time because she didn't have to stay and practice.

Saturday, June 2: Shaylyn's dance concert. I am stressed hoping my family will get there in time to see her perform. She was #7. Luckily my parents only missed a slideshow presentation and my sister and brother only missed the first number. Shaylyn did great and looked like she was having a great time. Then when she was supposed to leave the stage, because they couldn't quite find the opening in the curtain, her and 2 other little girls decided to just crawl under the curtain. It was funny to see.

Tanis finished school on Thursday the 31st. He only had to go to school for an hour and a half that day. I don't know what in the heck the point was for that. Oh well. I am glad that he is out of school, although this morning has already been a morning of fighting over nothing.

On Memorial Day, I went to the gym with my mom and sisters. It was supposed to be a $10 one time thing, but then the guy sold me into a membership. I was a little leary at first because I wasn't sure where there was a gym close to me and about the kids. But my $40 a month membership included unlimited daycare, so I couldn't really pass it up. He also explained to me where the nearest gym to me is. It is like a half hour away, but that's better than driving to the valley. It was something I've wanted to do for awhile, but just kept putting off. My 10 year High School reunion is next year and I want to lose like 20 - 25 pounds before then.

So wish me luck and I'll keep you posted. :D

What Happens Next...