Ruby loves Jesus

While walking to swimming lessons Ruby said something interesting about the dead worm carcasses all over our sidewalk. She said, "Oh how sad... the worms died. They are going to be with Jesus Christ now." I never thought about worms going to heaven and so asked her who told her that and she said that dad did. Ben says he never said this or anything close to it. A couple days later she brought up Jesus Christ while saying her prayers, she blessed him and the Holy Ghost. My thoughts on this are that Primary is doing a good job and I will have to be careful about my worm dealings... just in case they do make it to heaven.

Hubby hidden Talent #1

Cake decorating

He did not do this one

He did this one for Ruby"s 3rd Birthday

And this one for Lulu's 1st

Ballet Lessons

Ruby is in Ballet/Tap class. She has been going for about 9 weeks (nine classes). They are every Wednesday at 3:15 and I love it. I get to mix and mingle with all the moms and dads and Lulu just gets to roam around. Ruby likes to get dressed up and wear her special shoes. It is a win win win for me, Ruby and Lulu. This has also been a learning experience for Miss Ruby who has never been in a class with so much structure. The teacher is Miss Candi and she runs a very tight ship. I love her balance of fun and structure. Ruby tends to want to leave class early by having to go PeePee whenever any of the other girls leave the class to go PeePee. This was very frustrating for me, but now I am over it. If she wants to leave class whatever. The first couple of weeks it would really ruin my day when she would be silly or need to leave the class several times. But ever since I have lightened up about it, Ruby has done much better. We are both learning valuable lessons.

Ben and I were prepared with camcorder and camera.

While Ben is Away

Ben is in Utah for a couple of days on Business/Pleasure. When he told me his plans I felt scared, nervous, excited, and resentful all at once.

Scared- that something might happen to him while he is gone.
Nervous- to hold down the fort all alone, when my energy level is low I am the only one to care for the kids
Excited- have the bed all to myself, and have a friend come sleep over or go sleep over at a friends if I want
Resentful- I want to go to Utah with him

Here is the reality. Life is exactly the same. He is as worried about us as I am for him, especially when I told him we were in the Disneyland parking structure elevator when there was an aftershock from an earthquake in San Diego. I still get up with the kids the same and put them down the same, I just have to ration my energy to get to the end of the day instead of till the end of "my shift" when Ben gets home. I still slept on my side of the bed. I never had anyone sleep over or slept over at someone house... too much work and preparation. I still wish I was in Utah however, hanging out with Cody and Berkeley and Sam.

Disneyland Story- A heads up to anyone making the trip to see the color of the World water show they have going on at California Adventure- go in the morning and get a viewing pass by the grizzly rapids area, then come back an hour before the showing. Do not do what we did, which was show up and find a good spot to see the show and deal with all the madness of getting out of the place. They only have one exit and it is like a funnel, Trying to get all the crowd out of the area over a little bridge.

While in the elevator a voice came on over the speaker system asking if we were stuck in the elevator.... We were like huh? What is she talking about? Then when we got out and started walking to our cars, a lady said she was on the phone and San Diego just had a 5.3 earthquake. Happy Disneyland has good craftsmanship in their elevators

When I told Ben about this the next morning, we discussed our emergency plan for where he might find us after we evacuate the house... which was, I will leave a note near our 72 hours kids and most likely head to the church building.

Good to think about these situations before they actually occur.

Journal Flashback 6/12/1994

I am having so much fun, going through all my old journals.  i will post this one, but after this I am going to create a new blog that is only dedicated to old journal posts.  See here for yesterday's post 6/11/1994.

Today I woke up to buttons pushing (of course it was my brother playing his game boy.)  WE went to church and I herd this grate talk.  He was a Gymnist.  he won a lout of medles from the Olympics.  His name was Peter.

He talked about how they wer passing the wine by and each person took a sip and he had it and the gye next to him new he was mormon and new what he believed and said go ahead take a sipe it won't matter.  But he took it and hold it up and passed it on.  I thought that was cool.  We came home and Garet played pogs with Cody and Garet got all of Cody's pogs.  We went to see the house and our schools that we would go to (Jessica is being mean to me latly.  It's because the gameboy)  We came home me and Jessica exacted.

Journal Flashback 6/10/1994

I love reading old Journals and remembering those things that were so important to me back then.  I found an entry that was exactly 16 years ago when I was 10 years old. I am retyping it exactly as it is:

Today has been a great day.  It was kind of weird.  Because all week we have been practicing a Germain dance. Well today we did it (all the school was doing other country dances).  I had to be with a boy named Robert that is the worst in the class.  it turned out all right.  Our student teacher (Mrs Thetfart) gave us a Girmain Chocholate cake peices.  Well Shelly and I walked home.  We were planning that I could spend the night at her house.  I went to my party.  Our party went home and I called Shelly to see if I could and she said that she said that she was spending the night at Jodies.  I felt bad.  Then we went to see this house. My mom says we are going to move into it at the end of July.  The house is cool it has a 9 foot pool.  and a big hill!  We drove home.  Jessica is being mean to me and nice to Cody because Cody has a game boy.  I came home and babysat Cody until mom and dad got home  I started to cross stitch.  Mom is constantly helpping me.  (I am afraid she will do everything).  I babysat Cody because Jessica is at a friends)  P.S. I want to save up to get a game boy too.

summer goals 2010

I always find myself making lofty summer goals, just to end up not doing them.  This year is different I am putting them on my blog so when I do not do them it is not only for me to know but all the world, because everyone is reading this blog (think I have been around the youth to long).  These are some that popped into my head.

1. Craft time, time lulu is napping will no longer be quiet tv time, but craft time.

2. Go on camp-outs, spontaneous inexpensive camp-outs once a month.

3. Beach days, can be every week or every other week, but try to hit up the beach.

4. Lake Powell, this one will happen because it is planned, scheduled and I wouldn't miss it.

5. Swim Lessons, this one I will not miss because I just camped out for 3 hours to sign the girls up and dished out the dough for it.

6. Volleyball/BBQ Parties often

My mom used to plan educational/life lesson experiences over the summer.  Some involved road trips to places and some were right  in our own backyard with a telescope.  One in particular I remember, we first raised money by having a garage sale we sold our toys and big ticket items of our parents and even our dumb birds we didn't want any more.  We did a transportation experience with the money.  We took the train to Olivera Street and then another day we rode on the bus.  I felt very grown up and a little nervous.  

It is time to build some good memories for my own kids.

Youth these days

You know you are getting older and a little more out of touch when you start to analyze the actions and motives of the youth of these days.  Ben and I were asked to be Youth Conference parents over the weekend.  It was a crazy weekend and we could only do it half of the time, Friday night for the kick off and Saturday night for the dinner and dance chaperoning and Sunday testimony meeting.  I LOVED and still do LOVE Youth Conference.  I felt the same type of nervous excitement I felt as a youth about the unknowns of the weekend.  These were my observations:


1.  Kids are very unpredictable and irrational.
2.  Kids are very impressionable
3. Kids need approval from their peers as much as they need air.
4.  Confident Kids are hard to come by, but when you meet one they are a breath of fresh air.


I love working with the youth... i do not love enforcing rules/church standards.  I just like being the fun leader, but felt the need to step in a couple times aka, kids giving each other massages cause we all know what that can lead to (back massages in the front room lead to front massages in the back room).  Ben too had to step in when a boy was dancing super raunchy on a pole... pole dancing.  


For the most part the LDS kids of these days, kick serious butt.  The stories I hear about the crazy/inappropriate/despicable things they face on a daily basis is enough for me to throw in the towel on humanity.   But then I hear their testimonies and I am blown away by their strength and courage to stand alone at times and be persecuted for not following the worldly curve.  They are an example to me and I give them props!


President George Q. Cannon:“God has reserved spirits for this dispensation who have the courage and determination to face the world, and all the powers of the evil one, visible and invisible, to proclaim the Gospel, and maintain the truth, and establish and build up the Zion of our God, fearless of all consequences. He has sent these spirits in this generation to lay the foundation of Zion never more to be overthrown, and to raise up a seed that will be righteous, and that will honor God, and honor him supremely, and be obedient to him under all circumstances.”⁷

Lulu age 16 months

Lulu is a funny kid.  She makes the funniest faces with her gapped front teeth and her big eyes.  I love how she toddles around falling.  I love her baby sign language that is constantly telling me "please" and "more" by patting her chest and bumping her hands together.  And I love how tough she is to older children, she seems to be a kid magnet and they all want to lead her by the hand around and jump in her face.


The down side to that baby is how she howlers when she needs help, which is constantly.  She holds to the swing we wants to be pushed on

scream/cry/yelling.  I know... stages... she will grow out of it.  But for now it really bugs.  She also takes standing baths.  She is the only person I know that stands the whole time they take a bath.  She doesn't like being IN water.  She is fine playing with it and splashing.  Ben believes this fear stems from when she was a baby and we gave her a bubble bath, she was scared of the bubbles.

This baby loves to be held.  She is very strong willed and determined.  When she looks at you... she really LOOKS at you, making eye contact for some times an uncomfortable amount of time.


She is really good at holding on to a big kid swing without falling down.  She is fearless around Gus and she has an infectious laugh that is usually a result of tickling or Ruby getting in her face, for some reason she thinks that is really funny.

Caught Lulu playing in Gus' water bowl, Don"t worry I washed it out just before this picture

Recent Online Purchases... on Amazon

Growing up I always had a small complex that I was not girly enough.  I had to observe and mimic the actions and movement and speech of my fellow girlfriends.  I liked competition and sports and not clothes and shopping.  Guess what??? Not much has changed.  I still like sports and competition and still do not like to shop, at least at malls and large department type stores.  I have embraced this and moved forward with life... Until I discovered the wonders and ease of online shopping probably six christmases ago.  I did my main shopping on ebay and amazon.  To this day I prefer this method over the  gamble of retail shopping.  If I know exactly what I want why waste a day driving and search for it when I can cruise the World Wide Web in five minutes and usually find a better deal.  My most recent online purchases that I would recommend to anyone:

1. Baby Wise- a present to Cody and Berkeley to bring glorious sleep to their lives, which it successfully did.

2. Love and Logic- a present to Cody and Berkeley  for a later time in life, the second parenting book I swear by.

3. Pandemic the game- to my uncle Mike, the game we (me, Ben, Gail, and Jimbo) are obsessed with... love this game and would recommend it if you need a good game to bring everyone together but may involve modest arguing amongst each other.

4. School Books- Because I am taking a continuing education class for bookkeeping.  The class was good and the books were very necessary and half the price on amazon than in the school bookstore.

I just love the ease of click, click, click and done.  I also love to receive gifts that were purchased online, such as flowers from flowers.com.  That is always a nice treat dad.  

So if you plan to purchase an item online, just click on my little widget and we all win.  You get an enjoyable shopping experience and I am promised money for having their advertisement on my blog.  It is a win win in my book, which was purchased on amazon.com.

Worth mentioning-D-land trip

So many times I go to Disneyland and it is not worth mentioning or blogging about, because we show up and leave in three hours and in that time have done the monorail, Small World, Tea Cups, and if I get my way Pirates of the Caribbean and the Jungle Cruise and usually some other kiddie ride.

But today was such a fun day at Disneyland. Friend Sarah and I got a sitter for the little tykes (Lulu and Franco) and booked it over to Disneyland with the older and TALLER kids. Life changes when you are equal to or greater than 40 inches tall. As of today Ruby has been on The Matterhorn, Star Tours, and Thunder Mountain. The best part is - I think she likes it and will go on said rides again! Thank you Disneyland for letting tall three year olds ride on fast and somewhat scary rides.