Random Thoughts of the Day

Here are some things that went through my mind today:

1. Josh's picture from the previous DWTS post was used when we made this picture for Homecoming. We lived on campus last year and our apartment complex had a competition to see who could decorate their front window for the Superhero Homecoming theme. We won. Of course, only one other window (out of about 40 apartments) competed. But it was still fun. Josh drew this, by the way.

2. Yesterday our neighbor approached Josh and asked him if we got rid of our dogs. The sad truth is that, yes, we had to find them more suitable homes. This was a very hard decision to make and it took us a few months to decide to do it. When we got our dogs we expected to buy a few acres further out in the country and they would have plenty of room to run and work. They're border collie/Aussie shepherd mixes. Anyway, keeping them cooped up in our backyard with Josh working so much, the kids so young, and me high-risk pregnant, we couldn't give them the attention and work they needed, so Bear went to a family in a nearby small town with a few acres and Jessie went to a Heuterite colony (for simplicity's sake think "Amish") to be a cattle/sheep dog. They'll be much happier and in a few years we'll do more research on the breed of dog that fits our family's lifestyle better. Anyway, this neighbor went off on Josh about how "when you get a pet, you should be committed." I really don't need or want his judgement. MYOB, dude.

3. There seems to be a hypocrisy when it comes to teaching children how to handle other people. We always tell our children to be nice and kind, but it's come to my attention that we also have to teach them to stand up for themselves. Where exactly is the line between nicely telling someone to leave you alone and firmly making them leave you alone? I feel like a hypocrite telling my children to be aggressive when I'm always telling them to be nice.

4. Black Friday is a stupid idea.

5. My biggest fear right now is that my water is going to break. I've never had an early delivery, except for Matt, but he was induced a week early. I have no reason to believe that Millie will come any earlier than we've already planned, but in my mind I've formulated an emergency plan of what to do with my children if I suddenly go into irreversible labor. Plus, I know the ER phone number by heart so I can warn Josh that I'd be coming in. Overreacting? Probably. I'm so paranoid of my water breaking that I'm nervous sitting on our nice couch.

So, how was your day?

Care For a Smoke?

This morning at about 4am I woke up choking on smoke. I knew one of two things had happened...either our house was on fire, or Josh got off work and started a smoky fire in the fireplace. Luckily, it was the latter. Unluckily, our whole house was filled with smoke. It still smells like a hickory BBQ in here, but we all made it through. The girls never woke up (I don't know if that's good or not) but Matt did. He snuck into my bed after I went to investigate the smoke source. He said he couldn't sleep in his bed because it smelled like smoke and fire and he didn't want to die because "I love my mom, and I love my dad, and I love my sisters, and I love my room, and I love ours house, and I love my toys." Poor Josh felt so bad. We think that the heaviness of the cold air in the flue pressed the smoke into the room. To avoid this again, I've already started a fire before it gets too cold outside. Josh tried to be a good dad and husband and warm us up on a cold morning. He's a good man.

Happy Thanksgiving 2008

Being with family is always fun, especially during the holidays. The only problem was that we didn't have everyone with us. We needed some more of our aunts, uncles, cousins, and grandparents. But, we had a nice dinner anyway.

Gramma Courtney (Dad's mom), Genica (Peter's wife), Teagan (Lori's youngest), and Peter

Dad and Grampa Bill (Dad's dad)

Emma had to get in the shot, of course!

Abby and Pete needed their own pictures

What would Thanksgiving be without a superhero? Trenton (Lori's second son) and Emma

Mom cheesed it up for the camera, with Trenton

Lori and Aunt Jo (Dad's sister)

I almost missed getting a picture of Josh, but I found him!

I almost didn't put this one in, I look like a beached whale. Just realize I'm wearing Josh's shirt.

Emma and Mommy

Somehow I missed pictures of Tyler (Lori's oldest) and Matt.

I think they were engrossed in Inspector Gadget.

I hope you all had an enjoyable Thanksgiving too. The food was good, the company was great, and the realization that Millie is coming in 25 days was freaky. Overall, a pretty good day.

DWTS--Spoiler Alert

Josh and I don't get a whole lot of nights together, but with our handy-dandy DVR we still get to enjoy our favorite shows together. The one we never miss is Dancing With the Stars. We love that show, and as much as I'm glad to know the winner, I'm also sad that it's over for the season.

We both believed that Brooke would win because she truly should have. She was consistant in her technique and had amazing hyper-extended legs. If I can look half as good as she does by the time Millie is two I'll be happy. I loved watching the backstage footage of her taking her children with her and it made me think of all the times my kids followed me to the theatre. I think Emma was one of the few two-year-olds in the world that knew what a Green Room was.

My favorite person to watch, however, was Warren Sapp. I love Warren. He makes me think of Josh. Here's why:


WARREN SAPP

Height: 6'2"
Weight: 300 lbs
Football position: Defense
Nickname: Twinkle Toes Teddy Bear
Very charismatic on the dance floor








JOSHUA JOHNSON

Height: 6'4"
Weight: 320 lbs
Football Position: Defense/Offense
Nickname: Love, Baby, Sweatheat, Handsome Man
Very charismatic with his wife


I think if Josh and I ever take the dancing lessons we've always wanted to, he'd discover that he is very light on his feet for a big guy. He can already sweep me off mine!

Tag! I'm "It"

So, my friend Jeri Dawn (http://lingeringqueen.blogspot.com/ I don't know how to do the nice looking link stuff. If you want to tell me I'd be happy to learn.) tagged me with a theme of six. So, yeah, you guessed it...if you're reading this, you're probably going to be tagged. That's just the way it is!

Here are the rules:

1. link to the person who tagged you.
2. post the rules on your blog.
3. write six random things about yourself.
4. tag six people at the end of your post and link to them.
5. let each person know they’ve been tagged and leave a comment on their blog.
6. let the tagger know when your entry is up.

So for some reason Jeri Dawn thought I'd have some random things to say. I'll try not to disappoint...

1. I remembered Friday night as I joined some friends for the opening night of Twilight that I am very uncomfortable in a room full of estrogen. Holy crap! As I was listening to these women and girls scream, clap, and holler at a decent looking guy, I slid down further and further into my chair and the sarcasm welled nearly beyond control. I just wanted to yell at them all that if they flung their panties at the screen and hit me, I'd kill them all. This may have also been due in part to my hormones raging out of control lately.

2. I love soft Red Vines. Not the black ones, they're gross. And not Twizlers. Just soft Red Vines. Ooohh, if it weren't Sunday I'd send Josh to the store right this second.

3. I hate it when people touch my head. I don't know if it's because of something that happened in my early childhood that I don't remember or one of the things I do remember: a boy in fourth grade punched me in the head when I got a better grade than he did. I didn't like him. Or maybe it was from eighth grade when Wade Schofield threw a blue racquetball across the choir room and it hit me in the head. I just can't remember.

4. When I eat an apple I have to twist the stem off. But that's not all. I also have to sing the ABC song, out of habit, until the stem pops off. It used to be to find out the first letter of the first name of the boy I'd marry, but now it's just because I can't NOT do it.

5. There are two movies I can't watch anymore since I've had kids. I used to love to watch these movies whenever I could. The day after Abby was born I couldn't watch The Green Mile because of the scene with my favorite character, John Coffey, and the two beautiful blond girls he pitifully held while he was crying because he couldn't save them. Oh man, it still gets to me. The other is John Q. I love Denzel Washington and I even got one of my professors to show the movie when we were discussing ethical decisions. But, it's about a father who holds an ER hostage until the hospital agrees to put his son on the heart transplant list. I made the stupid mistake to watch it while Matt was in the hospital during his last heart surgery. Call me a masochist.

6. I love to collect Precious Moments collectibles. I haven't been able to get a new one for a very long time, a few years at least. The other day Josh came home and presented me with a gift. It's a Precious Moments with a mommy holding her new blanket-enfolded baby up and they're looking at each other. It's so cute. I love it. It made me cry. What a good husband I have!

Okay, so the people to tag...you know I only know six people, and one of them was the person who tagged me, so I'm going to cheat and only tag the five of you that I usually tag. Sorry! I hope you have some fun with this, though.

Tara http://obyandtarabennett.blogspot.com/

Tara and Jabon (if you each do this, it'll be my six people...) http://jabon.hintegration.com/blogger/bolgger.html

Mindy http://cmreederfamily.blogspot.com/

Cindy http://family.utahsysadmin.com/

Michelle http://missusbennett.blogspot.com/

Kidz Blog

My dear friend Tara Bennett has begun a blog created specifically for parents with children who have endured several different health difficulties. I had asked Tara quite a while ago if I could tell a little about Matt and his heart issues, since I noticed she had no "Heart" labels for previous posts. She readily agreed and I was determined to finally sit and write out a bit of Matt's story.

I ended up sitting on this idea for a long time. It's tough to experience the catharsis of what we went through, so I kept thinking I needed to be in the right mood. Last night Tara encouraged readers of the blog to share their stories to add to the Kidz Blog, anything that is inspiring. I was encouraged to begin my delve into the world that I needed to explore, but was scared of. I knew doing so would envelop my entire soul for the duration of the writing time I needed. Luckily, I could hammer it out in one sitting.

I encourage everyone to check out Tara's Kidz Blog. There really are some inspiring stories there and if you have any to add, I know Tara would love to hear from you. I think you should check it out anyway because Tara is pretty inspirational herself. She explains her mission as such:

Hi! My name is Tara. I am the wife of one amazing guy and the mother to one beautiful girl who has special needs. I realized when going through my unexpected journey that most on-line resources for children with special needs or health concerns are cold and factual, and quite often discouraging. I hope KIDZ can be a place where everyone can be inspired, and a resource for Parentz to connect, share the lessons they learn from their special Kidz, a place to give and share encouragement.

Her blog is undergoing a face lift, so check back often to see the transformation and be sure to add whatever inspirational stories you have.

http://kidzorg.blogspot.com/

Another Abby Moment

Do you remember in "Goldmember" when Austin Powers pokes the Mole (Fred Savage) in the mole with this random stick that just sort of appears out of nowhere? I think it's the greatest Austin Powers moment out of all three movies, even though I won't always admit that I've seen all three movies.

Anyway, when I went to pick the girls up from school today, Abby had a stick and nearly poked my face with it about 20 times. It just totally made me think of that movie moment.

I was reminded today about another Abby moment. A few weeks ago I received a call from the secretary at the elementary school. She said that Abby came to the office during recess time to give her a note from me. The note read, "My mom said to call her if I'm sick." Did you catch that the note was supposed to be from me? At the time I laughed at first and then we had to address some of the mistakes Abby made in trying to come home from school. Now that we've overcome most of the mistakes, we can laugh about it again. "My mom said to call her if I'm sick." Where the heck does she get that from? She's a bit devious, isn't she?

Sweet Dreams are Made of These...

...Who am I to disagree?

So, I had this dream that Millie was born. I've deleted the details of the dream twice now in trying to explain it because it was just weird. Why is it that pregnant women have to have such weird dreams? When I was prego with Emma I kept dreaming that I forgot her whenever I went anywhere. It's bad enough that I can't easily toss and turn in my bed and that I must get up at least twice a night. I also have to be haunted by these psychotic dreams. If I knew how to interpret them I may be scared. And to add insult to injury, I wake up from these dreams feeling overwhelmed by them and then I have to roll back and forth like a turtle that's been flipped on its shell just to try to get out of bed. Just thinking about it stresses me out. Anyone have chocolate?

I don't get it

I don't really understand something, big surprise. At Halloween, no one at the girls' school dressed up except the second-graders who had a round-up and dressed up like cowgirls/boys. I think Abby was the only kid in her class that dressed up. But, for no known reason, today was "Crazy Hair" day. There was just a note that said the Leadership Committee wanted everyone to have crazy hair today. Whatever. We happily joined in the fun regardless of my confusion over when it's appropriate to dress funny and when it's not.

I french braided the girls hair last night after their showers so they had nice and fluffy hair. We also stopped at Walmart for clearance hair color ($.16).
It's hard to see, but we signed "A.J." on Abby's hair back here.

Ain't she purty?

Emma got to have black/purple streaks. She thought it was so cool. I normally wouldn't encourage this sort of behavior, but I feel rebellious, so I let the girls be rebellious too.

Emma loves her hair.

Matt had to have his picture taken too. I think he's showing off his muscles.

I know he's showing his muscles in this one, despite the fact that it looks like he has to pee.

One other note for the moment. I went to Walmart this morning to do our grocery shopping for the week--in and out in under an hour and under $100, thank you very much. Anyway, I'm determined to work off of the idea of the "Bro," the bra for men that Kramer developed on Seinfeld. There should be some sort of belly bra for big-bellied pregnant women. I guess beer belly dudes could use it too. I just don't know what we'd call it. Any ideas?

Testing 1, 2, 3...

This is what quality of pictures my camera takes when the lens is clean. Special thanks to both Josh and Jabon for that one. Josh mentioned that he thought the haze on our pictures was a dirty lens two seconds before I read an email from Jabon suggesting I clean it also. (Thanks, Jabon, for being considerate enough to send me an email rather than posting that I'm a bit ignorant in the ways of cameras. That was nice of you!) I'd feel kind of dumb about not realizing my lens was dirty if I didn't do an even dumber thing in cleaning it. I took this picture of Abby as a test and Josh asked how I cleaned the lens. I told him I used my finger, the hem of my shirt, and spit. He about had an embolism. Sometimes IQ and GPA have nothing to do with common sense.

What an honor!

Holy cow! I was nominated for a Blog Award!! Thank you so much, Tara, for thinking of me as one of your favorite blogs! I'd say it's an honor just to be nominated, but let's face it, I love the attention!

Tara Bennett, my award-er, was my college roomie at USU, and we even survived some of high school together. Tara, I love your blog. I've often read your posts and realized how incredible it was of Chloe to choose you as her mom. Those anally-retentive things I teased you about when we lived together (don't get Tara started on the alarm clocks not being synchronized) are exactly the need for details that Chloe benefits from. You're amazing, and I'm in awe of the love you obviously have for your precious little girl. She couldn't have been sent to a better mom! If you haven't seen Tara's blog, check it out. http://obyandtarabennett.blogspot.com/

So, as a recipient of this award I get to do a few things:

1. Name 5 things you love,

2. Pass the award on to 5 blogs you love, and

3. Link back to the giver's blog and tell how fabulous they are.

5 Things I love:

1. I love my family. I'm going to lump everyone in this one category, but it's a lot of people that I love. First, my sweatheat, Josh. I always hoped I'd have a big, strong man to love, but I never understood how incredible that man would be. Josh works so hard for us and wants so many good things for us, me in particular. I'm so glad he took me to the temple, now he can never get rid of me! I also love our children. I love that Emma wants to learn and be a writer. I love that Abby wants to emulate me so much that she even wants to use Breathe-Right strips at night (those things are miracles, I swear). I love that Matt wants to be my little boy forever. I love that Millie will be coming very, very soon. I love our parents, our siblings, their families, our grandparents. I just love everyone. I just do.

2. I love movies. Okay, this one we already knew. I really don't think I go a single day without referring to a movie in one way or another: either quoting it or comparing it to my life. Here's an example: last night I was exhausted. I'm 33 weeks pregnant (I think) so I'm always tired, but we spent most of the weekend car shopping and ALL day Monday. It was a bust, we didn't find what we wanted, but not for the lack of trying. I spent Tuesday trying to get things caught up at home and by the time I finished washing, drying, folding, and putting away 8 loads of laundry, I was done. I just wanted to sit in our lazy chair, put up the footrest and eat cookies until I was so big and rested that Josh would have to use a crane to get me out of the house to have the baby. My imagination went directly to two different movies: What's Eating Gilbert Grape and I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry. Okay, that's pretty morbid now that I think about it, but it did sound like a desirable thing at that particular moment.

3. I love shocking people. Whether it's to get a laugh or just get a rise out of someone. I showed my brother Pete my belly button the other day. I thought it might gross him out since it's now inside out, and I was totally right. Some things you just never grow out of.

4. I love the stage. If I could continue one thing I did in school, it would be acting--minus the many nights I missed tucking my children in bed. I love getting the opening night butterflies and trying to overcome the second night blues. I love the audience's applause. I love having fans. I love having people come up to me after a show has closed and tell me that they quote my lines from a play. I love working with so many people to make a show successful and I loved when I directed my own plays. I really miss the theatre sometimes.

5. I love food. My OB will testify that this is the case. I think his exact words were, "Eat for one."

5 Blogs I Love

I only know five other people's blogs besides Tara's, so that makes this easy. That doesn't mean I'm nominating you for an award because of default. I check up on you all very regularly and this blog-thing has become an incredible way to keep tabs on all of you! Everyone else: If you've got a blog and it's not listed to the side, tell me about it and I'll happily add it.

1. Tara and Jabon Eagar: http://jabon.hintegration.com/blogger/bolgger.html. This is my dear sister's blog. It's got some great pictures of my nephews and Jabon has some incredible posts on there. It makes me miss them that much more, though.

2. Cindy Pendleton: http://www.roundsphere.com/family/. I love to read about Cindy's boys and their escapades. Cindy's oldest son is the same age as my son. They're only a few weeks apart. And our next children will be about six weeks apart. We've lived away from each other for over ten years now, but there are still so many things that we have in common, not even counting our kids.

3. Mindy Reeder: http://cmreederfamily.blogspot.com/. The thing I love most about blogs are keeping in contact with friends that live so far away. Min and Clinton are on the east coast, living a very different life than the one we lead in rural Montana. It's so cool to see the pics of different places I've never been and Lizzie is the cutest thing ever.

4. Michelle Bennett: http://missusbennett.blogspot.com/. I love reading about Michelle, whom I just found a few weeks ago. Michelle and her husband look so happy, especially with the new arrival of their son. He's so cute, you've got to check him out.

5. Jeri Dawn McKellar: http://lingeringqueen.blogspot.com/. I wouldn't have expected to ever find Jeri Dawn again, but it's been really fun to see her beautiful girls and read the stories that I can so easily relate to. It's so nice to know that I'm not the only one going through some of the tough things and joys of motherhood.

Now, all of you bloggers that I mentioned, it's your turn! Enjoy your award, I know I have! Thanks again, Tara, you made my day!

Save the Drama for Yo' Mama!

Today Emma lost her top front teeth. Both of them. They weren't loose enough to just fall out, but they needed to come out since her big teeth are coming in. Emma freaked!

Here she sees what she looks like with one of the teeth gone.

She's supposed to be showing me what she looks like with the first tooth out, but you can see that the trauma of the moment was overwhelming.

Here she's finally calm enough to show me her tooth.

She's loving on Daddy for helping her.

Finally, the ordeal is over...

She survived. I even made sure she told Daddy thank you.

Abby, however, is still undaunted and wishes she were 7 so she could lose her teeth also.

Pulling at my Heart Strings

Just when I thought I knew just about everything about my children and being a mom, I was taught something new. Abby is such a beautiful girl. She's generally happy, she has a wicked sense of humor, she's active and loves to play, she's loving and nurturing, and I never really saw a lot of myself in her. I've always compared Abby to Tara in that their temperaments are similar--they both have so much emotion that it's sometimes hard to control it. Abby's also a lot like her daddy--things need to be a certain way or they're wrong.

I never thought anything negative about her being like other people but not like me. I already have one child that is almost an exact replica of me as a kid. And since Emma and Abby are so different, I always saw my relationship with Abby kind of like my relationship with my sister. Emma and Abby are almost copies of Tara and me. But, I've realized that there are similarities between Ab and me.

Abby has been complaining that she doesn't like school. She says it's boring and that she has no friends. I haven't known how serious to take the friend issue. But it keeps coming up more and more. I checked with her teacher and she reports that Abby has a friend, but my heart has begun to break for Abby. Maybe she's not really exaggerating. It brings me to memories of second grade, probably the most difficult year of my life. I felt exactly the way Abby says she feels.

I try to joke about the fact that in second grade I went to three schools. I wasn't expelled, we just moved a lot. We moved the summer before second grade, so I began the year at a new school. I knew two sisters that attended that school, but neither were in my grade, so I didn't have anyone to play with at recess. My teacher seemed very uncaring, and once I heard her tell another teacher that she thought my dad was cute. I didn't like her. We were there during my birthday in September, but we moved before Halloween. At the second school I did have one friend named Kindsey. We played together and walked home together, but there were two girls that were older than us that picked on us on our way home everyday. One day, one of the girls (the ringleader) asked what our names were. I told her mine and she bit my head off that she wasn't talking to me. When Kindsey told the girl her name, the girl said her name was Lindsay. Then Lindsay asked Kindsey if she wanted to play with them. That was the last day I had a friend at that school. I tried to make other friends, but when you're eight years old, it's hard to balance old and new friends and old friends always won. I played at recess alone, I walked home alone, I was really pretty miserable. Finally, in May, we moved again. This time we moved to New Orleans. I made one friend, a boy. We got teased all the time. Not because we were different races, but because we were different genders. We mutually stopped being friends since we couldn't take the teasing anymore. We moved again during the summer and I made a much better friend, several actually, and never really had the problem again.

But now, listening to Abby talk about not having friends and knowing that we've transplanted her twice in the last year, I can't help but completely empathize with her. I just want to hold her and make her feel safe and loved. She's such a great person and I love her beyond anything. I wish she understood how wonderful she really is. My tears have been plentiful over this issue. I wish I could make her feel loved and accepted when I'm not around and I wish I could shake sense in the kids around her until they too know how incredible she is. My sweet Ab.

Ode to November

Some things I'm happy about November for (Is that an awkward statement? I'm not in the mood to care.):

1. It was one year ago that we decided to move to Montana. I can't believe it's already been a year. Josh took a chance and applied for a job that he really wanted. Oh, he got it, by the way. (It's the one he has now.)

2. This month I get to say, "My baby is due next month." That's always a happy thing.

3. We get to vote and utilize the freedoms so many of our ancestors fought for. Don't call me corny. It's truly a big deal.

4. It's all our daddies' birthdays this month.

5. It's almost Christmastime. I love Christmas. It's so great. Truly.

Say "Cheeeeeese"!

Here are our babies on Halloween about to head out to WalMart for some fun.

Matt was a spider. I don't know why my camera insists on making the haze. I think it wants me to buy a new one.

Emma was the Elf Princess. I forgot to get close ups of their makeup. I had to do it since Josh was working. It didn't turn out half bad.

Look at my cute Ninja Geisha. Abby said she was actually Mulan. We've never seen that movie, shocker, I know.

This was Emma's class party. I took a picture of her teacher and then my camera died. Like I said, I think my camera wants me to buy a new one.




In this picture, Abby is reading to Matt. It was so sweet!

For some reason Matt thought he needed to dodge this picture. Silly boy.

This is Emma washing her first dish. I look forward to many more days like this.

For some reason she wouldn't do the rest of the dishes. Darn it.

Did anybody else have a rough day at church today? The kids would not sit quietly during Sacrament Meeting. Then, the kids in my Primary class were SOOOO rowdy. It took more time to quiet them throughout the lesson than anything else, including teaching. Plus I'm having a bad hair/clothes day. I need a haircut. And the new clothes I got have already become too small. Seven weeks left. How am I supposed to make it? We had to wait in the ER waiting room last night to give Josh some stuff, but he was too busy to come out right away. Anyway, a family was out there waiting to find out about a loved one and one of the ladies asked when I was due. I said I have seven weeks left and she looked at me in disbelief, "Are you serious?" Yeah, I was serious. Even Josh has made the comment that maybe we're having twins. I only feel one baby moving, but I've wondered that myself. All prayers are greatly appreciated! I've got to make it through these next seven weeks!!!