IN YOUR SENIOR YEAR DID YOU...
1. Did you date someone from your school? Yes

2. Did you marry someone from your high school? No

3. Did you car pool to school? Sometimes

4. What kind of car did you have? Chrysler lebaron

5. What kind of car do you have now? Dodge Durango

6. It is a Saturday night...where are you now? Home with the kids sleeping!

7. It is Saturday night...where were you then? Out hanging with friends

8. What kind of job did you have in high school? Waitress at Golden Corral or Old Country Buffet

9. What kind of job do you do now? FT Mommy

10. Were you a part of a clique? No way!

11. Were you considered a flirt? Umm.. yeah

12. Were you in band, orchestra, or choir? Choir all the way!

13. Were you a nerd? No

14. Did you get suspended or expelled? No

15. Can you sing the fight song? Not then ..not now!

16. Who was/were your favorite teacher(s)? All! They let me graduate!

17. Where did you sit during lunch? Sometimes in the Cafeteria at a table sometimes standing in the commons area.

18. What was your school's full name? Northrop High School

19. When did you graduate? 2001

20. What was your school mascot? Bruins

21. If you could go back and do it again, would you? HECK NO!!

22. Did you have fun at Prom? Not really.

23. Are you still in touch with a HS boyfriend/girlfriend? No.

24. Are you planning on going to your next reunion? I only went there one year and everyone thought I was a Freshman soooo.... No.

25. Do you still talk to people from school? Honestly I can't think of anyone off hand so I don't think so, but maybe??

26. School Colors? Orange and Brown, EWE!!

27. Did you do Senior Skip Day? I don't think I did.

28. Were you in any high school sports? No

29. What was your favorite high school memory? GRADUATION!!

Video Blog

Ready for Halloween!




Look at the tong action!!




This is his favorite thing to do!




Leo being Leo!

Labor Day Weekend Re-cap

So not much was going to happen here for us. It was just going to be a long weekend at home. We were not even going to church because Leo got a snotty nose... again. I was just about to make bread Sunday morning, but then around 9am I got a phone call from my Dad. Oh yeah he was going to VA this weekend to check on my grandparents land that they still have. I decided I would meet him half way or something. I looked up how long the drive was going to be... only 4 hours!! Heck yeah I will go see him. I decided I would drive all the way instead of meeting half way. So about an hour later the kids and I were on our way to go see my Dad. The trip consisted of many cute phrases that all sounded like this :

Leo-"when we get to Grandmas house can we play with her toys?"
Me-"We aren't going to Grandmas house."
Leo-"when we get to Grandpas can we play?"
Me-"We aren't going to Grandpas we are just going to go see Grandpa."

And so on and so forth. It was really cute. I finally explained that we were going to go meet at a hotel. It was really a quick drive and the kids did a great job. So we got to visit, stayed the night, had breakfast, got to visit a little more and then came home. But not without pictures.

I know you can't see them very well but there are 3 baby birds in there. It was a nest built between the window and screen of my Grandparents back door. There were 4 but Dad scared one away when he stuck his had down there before we knew the nest was there. It just looked like a pile of pine needles had collected there. The window was broken. The other 3 birds were gone before we left that day.

This is a tree that was planted back when Steven was a baby. So roughly 30 or so years ago. My siblings had a picture taken standing in front of it. At the time that tree was probably about 2 feet taller than Katie, I think. And now here are my kids in front of it. I don't think my other siblings will ever see that tree again, so I wanted to get one last picture of it.
Mom says "The tree was nothing special, just a background."

I do not know if this was taken by Katie or Leo. This was at the hotel waiting to leave to get dinner.

Another taken while we waited. Photographer is Katie this time. I also found pictures of the microwaves and another that I could not make out because of the finger in the way.

Here is Me and Dad. Look at his nice straight teeth!! I took a lot of pictures of us but I didn' t think he wanted the world to see him trying to pick my nose. Plus I kept chopping off his head.

So after I returned home from VA I decided to make that bread I was about to start the day before. So I prepared the dough and got it rising. I then had time to throw dinner together to get it ready for the oven. After that I divided the dough into the pans and let them return to rising again. It was then that I realized the bread and dinner were both going to need to be in the oven at 4. WHAT WAS I GOING OT DO? After 3 phone calls (one to each of my sisters and one to my Mom(not in that order)) I decided to cook them together. I was a little worried about the chicken flavor being cooked into the bread. Thankfully that did not happen. Before I go on about the bread let me tell you about dinner! It was the FIRST meal I made up myself!! No recipe or ideas from someone else! And it was delicious! Everyone ate it and liked it and there were no leftovers. Ok on to the bread. So my bread turned out beautiful looking and I decided to capture it on camera and blog about it. Took a picture and brought it up on the computer and this is what it looked like.


Whats wrong with this you ask? Well nothing except for it being purple and horizontal lines going across it!! (Enlarge it and you will see). Man!! That will be the 3rd camera I have broken in the last 18 months!!! UGH!! How frustrating. So I thought maybe it was just the lighting. Nope, took a picture of myself and the same thing. So I banged the side of the camera with my hand a little and thought "yeah, let's hit the camera. That's really going to fix it..." (Very un-hopeful, if that is even a word) Took another picture of myself and vwala! It worked!! Holy cow! Hitting my camera out of frustration and disappointment actually fixed my camera. So hear is the lovely bread I made. And it tastes SOOO GOOD!!

Problem Solved

Yup, that was a really short break. As a matter of fact the break was over about 5 min. after my last post. I searched around the settings and decided to take off the "leave comments" setting. It makes me feel better this way. Aside from that...

Pictures!!!!

Sage is HUGE!!!!

She really is a good dog... just hyper. I am still learning things in how to train her. Although she does not run away from me. I have her off the leash and out of the gate all the time to play ball. It is only for a few min. at a time. She really does enjoy playing ball.

Next up....

Simon and Leo hit puberty!!

They are both way to cute in their stages of life right now. Simon rolls and rolls and rolls and rolls. He is really good at giggling too. At the last Dr.s appointment we went to he weighed in at a WHOPPING 18 pounds!! He is gaining weight like crazy!! I figure he is just playing catch up from his delay with his heart. But he is doing great now.
And Leo is such a charmer! And somehow at the same time is is such a trouble maker. I do hope that it is true about boys being difficult as youngsters and easier as teens. He really does find some enjoyment out of pushing my buttons. However, it is so easy to change his mood. He could be crying one min. and you just mention Ice Cream and let me tell you he has a smile on so fast, you would have never known he was crying in the first place. He really can be easy going if you know just what to say.

Katie's FIRST day of school!!!

It was so exciting!!

After school she was waiting like a good little Kindergartner!!

The children play while Katie is away!

Wait! What!?! What is THAT!?! Oh right, it's Katie's new pet. It is a cut gerbil (I know only I could think a rodent is cute). I think the name is Max but that could always change, it used to be Mickey. but then it got changed. We will see what it is in a week. But it really is cute. We did have one for Leo but it had a sick eye and one of the pet store people put medicine on it an pushed on the eye a bit and irritated it so i took it back. I would rather return a pet than have to explain why it died after a few days.

I suppose that's all for us right now. I will try hard to not make such long posts. Ta ta for now.

Blogging break

Maybe everyone thought I was already taking a break. I just wanted to give a heads up that I will not be tending to my blog for a little while. To those of you that are waiting for something to arrive in the mail from me, never fear it will come. It has been slow to finish the projects but they are almost done. I plan to have them in the mail by Sat. Sept. 5.
I just find it a little disappointing putting effort into my blog and the people who I thought might comment.... well, never do. Now I don't want anyone going and feeling bad. I know everyone has lives. And I suppose if I want comments then I should go give comments myself. But as I see it I was giving comments and getting no feed back, so I stopped commenting. But again. Don't go feeling bad or feeling sorry. I just need to get over a few struggles and figure out what my blog is here for. May take a few days, a week or a few weeks. Who knows. But for now, "God be with you till we meet again."

SLEEP!!! I NEED SLEEP!!

Well Simon has been so lousy at sleeping at night that I have had enough. Here is a rundown of a typical night with Simon. At around 6:30 or 7pm I nurse him one last time before bed. This is with being wrapped up in his blanket really tight so his arms can't get free. If his arms are free they fly around all over and he cries. So I nurse him all the way to sleep because heaven forbid if I put him in his crib awake! When he is good and out as gently as I can I roll him out of my arms into his crib onto his side. He likes sleeping on his side for some reason. Slowly walk away and close his door. Now if I am luck that is all I have to do to get him to sleep. But a lot of the time I am going back upstairs 5 min. later to sooth him to sleep again. Then that is all. Oh wait, there's more. On a good night He will sleep till about 12 or 1 for a feeding. On a bad night I have had him wake up anywhere from 9:30-11:30. That does not start off the night well. I nurse him, rock him, gently put him back in his crib just as before and if I am lucky that is all I have to do. Then at about 3 he is again calling for me for another feeding... not so bad thus far ight. It this was it I would have no problems. But this is the problem feeding. Let me go on and you will understand what I am talking about. I feed him at 3 but he does not really want to eat. He just needed a little comfort. So I put him back as usual. But this time he does not sleep for another 3 hours. Somehow he knows that I did not feed him on both sides. Even though he was in a deep sleep he still wakes up 3 min. later to eat on the other side. Back to bed he goes. Well for another 5-10 min anyway. After about 30 min. or so of this he is finally in bed for good. Now it is about 3:30or so. He will then wake up every hour for the rest of whats left of night time sleeping. I then give in around 6-6:30am (by this time Hugh is gone to PT) and I bring Simon into my bed which is a king size and one side is against the wall and I lay him on that side and give him some toys. He plays there while I sleep until the other 2 kids get up around 6:30 or 7. I then turn on the TV in my room for them to watch while I get as many min. of shut eye as I can. Lately I have been so tired that Katie will get her and Leo breakfast in the morning. Its fun having a child old enough to pour cereal.
So on to the good news. Since Hugh is gone for a little while I decided to take this opportunity to let Simon learn how to sooth himself to sleep. I do not have to worry about his heart anymore or a Daddy that feels bad letting his little boy cry or worrying about Daddy waking up in the middle of the night with Simon crying and he has to ge to work in the morning. So last night I got the kids into bed fairly easy by 6:50. That included feeding Simon without being wrapped up or nursing him to sleep. Everything was good for about 5 min. Then Simon did not like this idea and started crying. I was so exhausted from the night before that I was determined this was the night he would go to sleep by himself even if it took 3 hours. Well it didn't take that long. He cried for 1 hour. That was it just 1 hour. Now you may think "WOW that's a long time to let him cry." Well it really isn't I thought he was going to cry for at least 2. Then all was quiet. After about 5 min. of quiet I decided I wanted to check to make sure he was still breathing. Yup he was. He was no longer wrapped up tho and had pushed his head up into a corner. But there was no way I was going to move him. I did not want to take the chance of him waking up. I was paranoid however of when he would wake up. This was the first time he was sleeping unwrapped and i knew it would not last very long. So I skipped my shower. I finally decided it was going to be a long night so I should get as much shut eye as I could and went to sleep at about 9:30. At about 1am Leo called me to his room because he could not find his blanket. Since I knew the time then I knew Simon would be waking up any min. to eat like normal and I was going to have to listen to him cry. I was determined not to feed him before 3am. So I waited. And waited. It was not until about 5am that I was finally going to sleep and he finally woke up. I fed him right away... I was so ready if you know what I mean. Put him back in bed unwrapped after feeding him and he slept for another hour. It was amazing. I did not think he would sleep so long the first night. I do hope tonight goes just as smooth if not smoother.
So for today's first nap I put him in bed gave him his pacifier, started his mobile and said good night. He cried for about 40 min. and is asleep like a good little boy. I do hope this will help him sleep better.
Oh yeah and Katie starts full day kindergarten on Tuesday!! We have a meeting with her teacher on Monday. I am so excited for her. I know she has been ready for this for a long time. I will be taking lots of pictures since Hugh will not be here for it.
Sorry about the long post. But there really is no appreciation for good sleep until you know what someone has been through. And I think I have been through a lot. I am sure a lot of his sleep problems came because of his heart and I did not want him to cry a lot. But now he is better and the Dr.s gave the ok about 2 months ago. So I have finally done it and I now know Simon can do it too.

Beware... Long post but lots of pictures

So one day I thought Simon just looked really yummy and I thought I might cook him. It was really cute. He just fit so well.


When my Mom came for when Simon was born, Hugh got a bright idea to build bunk beds so she could have a place to sleep and everyone was still in a bed. He started it and got really far but got burnt out from always working on it. he didn't finish them before my Mom got here. And it even took about another month after my Mom left that he finally did finish them. It was when I went to Iowa for a week that I said they had better be done by the time I got back. He assembled them the day we were to arrive home. They are GREAT. Very sturdy.

This is a great picture. I am so glad he is the father of my children . He is so good with them. I know they love him.


This is just one of the parks here on post. Its not even the cool one. But I liked it. I haven't seen the cool one yet.


Katie is so good with Simon. Sometimes she does a better job watching Simon than Hugh. Simon just loves to watch her and is always smiling when she talks to him.


I made a rainbow Jello. It was so good too. There are 5 colors. It takes all day to make. The kids got to help me with this. They really had fun.


Simon s now on solids. This was just the plain rice cereal. He likes it better when I mix in banana or apple sauce with it. He didn't even spit out the first bite. Hugh is the one who got to feed him first.




Sage is getting so big. Katie has a hard time holding on to her. She was in a very playful mood in this shot. It isn't even a recent shot.

She looks so cute with a bandanna around her neck. But she is not allowed in the house at the moment. I couldn't take the whining at night she was doing while I fed Simon and Hugh would not hear here (so he says). So she got sent outside one night and hasn't really been back in since then. Now we are having a problem with ticks and we are trying to fix that problem. There is another current reason for Sage not coming in the house but that will come later in the post.


For mothers day I asked for a Wii and I got it. Leo had been boxing and took a break and fell asleep. He had spent most of that day outside playing with a neighbor and ridding his bike and such. I had just mentioned bedtime and then I saw him asleep about 2 min. later. Good times. Now my Wii is fried from lightning striking between my neighbors house and the next house over (I am attached to one neighbor). Our router and cable modem box, DVD player and a lamp were all fried along with it. Who knows what else. On one of the outlets you can see burn marks on it. We are going to see if our insurance will cover the cost of replacement.


Sister Jones came down for a few days. Katie has already said she wants Sister Jones to come down when I have another baby. Hugh asked if she wanted Grandma or Sister Jones and she very excitedly said Sister Jones. I know Katie and Leo had so much fun with her. I hope she didn't get to worn out with them. Katie has told me Sister Jones taught her how to play 2 songs on the piano and how to make a soup. This is when she first got here and Katie wanted to play littlest pet shop with her. The neighbor girl was over too (she broke her arm from jumping on the bed at 1:30am.) She is a week younger than Leo.

(Viewer discretion is advised: graphic picture, scroll slowly)
Simon had surgery on the 9th of June. We did not inform the public of this by Hugh's request. He was born with a hole in his heart also known as a VSD (look it up if you want). We found this out the day after he was born. It was considered a large hole and was not expected to close by its self. I as the nursing mother was to watch for signs of congestive heart failure. That included fast breathing, turning blue when crying, heavy sweating while nursing, weight loss from having a hard time nursing (becoming worn out)... and such. We were very blessed for him to have none of the problems associated with a VSD. Power of the Priesthood. So while I went 4 months with the stresses of keeping a careful eye on him, he finally got to have the surgery and is now recovering. All the Doctors and Nurses at Duke were great. I am so grateful for the care they put into my son and his comfort. We were sent home on Friday and Simon is doing so well. That is why Sister Jones came to visit. She is a blessing to us for caring for our other children while this was going on. It is while she was here that the lightning struck. That is also the reason why Sage will not be coming into the house for a few weeks. But I can't wait to have her back in. So the following picture is of Simon and his new battle wound. Look if you would like or cover it with your hand as you scroll to the last picture under it.




These are my wonderful kids a few days after Simon's surgery. He is all smiles again as long as he has had his pain medication. I hope when we run out of that med he is no longer in pain. Well that is all for now. Have a good rest of the day.

Leo 3, Simon 4 months, Katie 5